Musings: Nepal ko time

It’s not just high-ranking government officials who believe only their time is important.
There is a limit to even Madhav Kumar Nepal’s patience. For the longest time the former prime minister had made it a habit to arrive at scheduled meetings at least 15 minutes ahead of time. Often the reporters who went to cover important inter-party parleys would find Nepal, all by himself, twiddling his thumbs, impatiently waiting for others to arrive. Nepal was among that rare breed of punctual Nepali civil servants, who stuck to his schedule even when he occupied the highest office in the land. But after countless hours (days? months?) wasted sitting on his bum, eyes riveted to the door, Nepal decided that he had had enough. These days he doesn’t mind turning up a few minutes late.

What can the poor fella do when the whole country is conspiring to put back the clocks? The other day I had to attend a public gathering. Since I was running late I hustled and bustled my way to the venue, arriving a full fifteen minutes to the arrears. But when I got there everyone was outside in the sun: happily milling about, sipping tea, slapping backs, talking over their phones. The main hall was nearly empty. The Minister of Tourism, the chief guest, had not arrived. In fact, it would be another 45 minutes before the dusky minister—who, incidentally, also belongs to UML party—in Nepali topi graced the audience with his august presence.

It’s not just high-ranking government officials who believe only their time is important. I was at an embassy the other day. I had been asked to arrive at 10:15 sharp. The actual interview, I was told, would start at 10:30. But when I got there at 10:15, half an hour passed just to get the security clearance. Some people, I am told, feel so harassed by these elaborate security checks they would rather not go anywhere than be molested in their own country. But working in Nepal,where punctuality, as they see, symbolizes inferior social status, the Kuires perhaps want to show the Nepalis their rightful place.

The other breed of people with a tardy streak is, of course, our duty-bound doctors. You would be lucky to meet one after a couple of hour’s wait. Oftentimes, at the appointed hour, the doctors aren’t even in. A week ago, I had to take my mother for an endoscopy, at 7:30 in the morning. On reaching hospital not even the nurses who come first to arrange equipment and logistics for the doctor had arrived. The crowd in the waiting area was steadily building, but 45 minutes after the scheduled time, the doctor was nowhere in sight.

The middle-aged medic got there after another half hour, much to the relief of everyone. Soon ama’s endoscopy was also over. (Surprisingly, it doesn’t take more than a couple of minutes to insert that dastardly pipe into your esophagus, have a dekko at your innards, and yank the pipe out with your guts intact.) We are ready to go when we are informed that we need to wait for the report. What report? The report of the endoscopy, which, we were told, needed to be prepared on computer, then printed, then signed by the doctor. That such an elaborate process was completed in only thirty more minutes was another surprise.

Then, one find day, the health of you and your family assured, you go to the Department of Transport to renew your driving license. You learn there are two ways to go about it: the hard way (do it all yourself) and the easy way (hire one of the dalals, give him a couple of hundred rupees and sit back and relax). God knows why but that cursed day we, for once, decided to make matters into our own blasted hands.

One counter disgorged a longish form after we fed it 10 rupees. Models of patience, we dutifully filled it up. Then it was on to the next counter to get the details checked. Done! Next was typing out the hand-written document, at yet another counter. Easy, too. Next stop: the fifth courter to submit the form.

Hang on, how come my late father all of a sudden has a middle name! We go back to counter five and the lady kindly informs us that it’s all our fault: why-oh-way were we nitpicking, adding to her back-breaking work. Her words of wisdom apart, two more counters and we are done. Now we wait. Wait for my name to be called out—When? ‘Who knows!’—among the melee of license-renewers.

I shudder to think what would happen if our meetings were suddenly held on time, if that embassy dispensed with its VIP security arrangements, if that doctor arrived ahead of time, or if all license services were handled in one counter. We would have so much time on our hands we wouldn’t know what to do with it. Just ask Mr Nepal.

biswas.baral@gmail.com