Nighttime Kathmandu: Dogs, Monkeys, and People

There are many dogs in Kathmandu, a lot. But they are more peaceful than ones you can meet in the streets in Southeast Asia or Eastern Europe.

In 2014-2016, I also found dogs in India to be well-mannered. Mystery...

My guess is that dogs in South Asia experience regular kindness of strangers, while Euro and Thai/Lao/Khmer dogs are fed and petted only by owners so the dogs don't feel they need strangers in their life.

Or it's also possible Indian and Nepalese mongrels are just genetically well-mannered type of dog - if local dogs relied on the charity of strangers or were sort of collectively owned for centuries, they could become a special breed adapted to living among people.

Another dog, near the Coca-Cola sign, dozing on the doorstep.

Here, a dog with wise eyes, living at the Swayambhunath temple, full of monkeys; looks like she is not far from achieving enlightenment, lol - she is always unnaturally calm as if she were meditating. Probably, she's very old, perhaps, learned from watching monkeys that life is senseless and only getting free from sansara is a way worth walking along.

Buddha at Swayambhunath, going up to the top of the hill:

Walking up the long staircase to watch monkeys in the dark.

You can see some monkeys there but actually the stupa was full of them. Obviously, they sleep in it when the time comes for sleeping. But they didn't at 9 pm.

Unlike regular monkeys, moonkeys are oddly quiet:

During the daytime, these beasts are a synonym of chaos and never-ending scandal. But in the dark, they are silent. Above, a kid is trying to sleep by his mom's feet.

Here is the opposite, mom is trying to sleep but the kid is active.

It's curious the mother chose a strange place for sleeping - as if she wanted to stay away from her child. The pose is amazing: she locked her four paws together.

But - damn, insomnia:

The beast can't sleep because of all the light at the temple. I mean, I just could witness she was trying to sleep but failed.

Almost 9 pm, some monkey kids still playing (but silently):

Someone could ask, "why don't they go to sleep in a tree in the full darkness? Because nature is beautiful, it's a perfect mother, she gives everything her children need..."

Mommy's at home! Leopards live in the forest by the outskirts of Kathmandu

I guess that neither people nor monkeys like being in the full darkness somewhere in the bushes. It might be a common feature for macaques and humans - we all prefer light, and that's why our ancestors started lighting fires - to push away darkness, to feel calmer. Only then, like, 10 million later, they probably accidentally discovered that you can also cook stuff in fire...

So, how do you think, can it be true?..

Now, a couple of words about the humans of Kathmandu.

People in Kathmandu are quite comfortable. I could live here for years without much stress - I can't say that something is awful in the Kathmandu inhabitants, and I can name their merits.

People are friendly here, polite. 2.5 months, I can't remember someone being rude or icy cold to me.

Outside the tourist areas, people can sometimes start talking to you if you are at their shop or cafe, asking "where are you from" stuff. But you never feel they ruin your plans by asking endless dull questions. Just a courteous small talk.

In the tourist areas, a stranger can sometimes start talking to you about abstract things with a secret intention to invite you to a shop afterwards. Annoying! But I can't say this happens often, though.

I didn't spend much time in the tourist areas, but outside them, store owners/employees don't overprice you. At markets, they can ask you slightly higher prices, but that's quite an international phenomenon.

It's quite safe here - I didn't see suspicious idle men or anyone watching me hostilely. I had many night walks here before the protests. Secondly, locals are friends for travelers, you can always rely on their support in an emergency case.

After the protests: only several days have passed since then, and there was the info that goons were released from prisons during the chaos, so I cancelled my night living. Anyway, I’ve had enough of night walks in Kathmandu.

Some more posts about Kathmandu are ahead, but I only have 2 weeks here left. Leaving for India then, on October 2. :)

The photos were taken with a Nikkor 50mm on a full-frame DSLR Nikon D750 in summer 2025, in Kathmandu, Nepal.