This is the monk I hung out with.
I met him on my second day during breakfast. He was there with another American, Levi from Arizona. Levi, by the way, was the first American I met since the JETs in Japan. Levi went to the restroom and the monk came over to join me at my table, asking me about myself. Levi came back and we all finished breakfast together. After breakfast we parted, Levi was off to Vietnam that afternoon, and I was off to figure out my Australian Visa. The next day we met up after breakfast, and, since I had planned to go to Durbar Square, he came with me and showed me around. The way men interact with each other is very touchy feely, I noticed his interactions with Levi before we even met. On the walk we constantly put his arm around my arm, rubbed a smudge off my neck, or smoothed down a part of my hair that was sticking up. I would have felt weird about it, but looking around, all the Nepali (and it was the same in India) men were doing the same with their friends. Many mens even held hands. With women, they don’t even walk together, at least not the older generation. It is very strange to me, this almost fear of intimacy with women manifesting itself in intimacy with men. I can understand it between two gay men, but with heterosexual men it just feels like a substitute to fill in for the lack of a relationshiphip with their wives. I like the feeling of brotherhood it brings about, but with the lack of a role for women and the special privileges sons get in families, it ultimately saddens me as it seems as if women are invisible to the older generation.
