Corruption and Greed in Tribhuvan International Airport

It took me two long months to import two acoustic basses into Kathmandu.  The events that unfolded around these instruments elicited anger, futility and in the end sweet joy.  In retrospect the frustration I experienced during this period proved a unique insight into the cohesive elements behind a city that straddles the line between liaise-faire democracy and anarchy.

My first month in Kathmandu was spent waiting.  In the morning I would wait for the monsoon rains to come and go to avoid getting soaked on my way to the school.  At school I spent my time practicing electric bass, piano and writing syllabi; honing dusty skills in preparation for my upcoming classes.  After practicing and talking to who ever I could I would wait for the bus and go home (an adventure in itself).  At home I would wait for dinner then eat alone because my new family had left for a month long vacation in the states three days after I arrived.  At night I would make phone calls and write emails to the bass making company in California.  The basses where purchased immediately after my arrival to Kathmandu but I still had to wait for their completion.  Even then, I had to wait for the director of the school, Mariano, to return from abroad to figure out how to get them into Nepal.  And, it dawned upon me that to be in a rush to go anywhere or accomplish anything in this country is a mistake.

After a little over a week of this anticlimactic transition I decided it was time to break the sanitary and safety rules ingrained in me by every westerner I'd met... I rode on the back of a motorbike AND ate mo:mo (exposing myself to the possibility of serious head trauma and gastro intestinal complications).  After this simultaneous deflowering Kathmandu became down right exciting.

The arrival of Mariano at the end of August coincided with the completion of the basses.  They were ready to ship and I was ready to make big moves getting them here.  However, my second day with Mariano ended in me triggering from him a cascade of four letter words ending in the phrase "Get Your Balls Out of my ASS!"  I was surprised.  I am aware that I've been well trained in the art of irritating people but I had know idea I was that good.  We were able to work out our disagreement quickly and if nothing else this little tempest set much needed boundaries.

Customs authorities at the Tribhuvan International Airport have set up an intricate tax scheme; if it is big or expensive we have the authority to tax it.  In the words of Mariano "When these basses come in there are going be Donald Duck dollar signs in their eyes."
Ostensibly there is way to avoid the customs taxes.  The US Embassy recommends filing exemption requests with the Ministry of Finance.  They specifically recommend sending these requests "well in advance".  The term well in advance is rather ambiguous and lends itself to empirically based interpretation.  A twenty something ignorant of the slothful pace of corrupt and dysfunctional bureaucracy might be more inclined to think in terms of a job (two weeks notice), a term paper (a couple days) or a sexual relationship (uh oh......).  However, the people I talked to were no fools.  What the Embassy fails to mention is that without connections or palm greasing the exemption request could take 6 - 9 months.  Most westerners would be inclined to take the squeaky wheel gets oil approach and demand their paperwork be completed Or Else!  This approach would only end in failure, the reason for which is best described as viscoelasticity.  Nepali's have a strong dislike for confrontation the impetus for which is dissertation worthy.  Suffice to say the more pressure you apply the less likely they are to do anything for you, better off giving them tea, almonds and  patience.  But I didn't have patience, just a burning desire to get my babies, back to the task at hand.

Plan A:  alter the invoice on the shipment by putting my name on the return address and claiming the value of the instruments as 100 USD.  In this way we hoped to take advantage of a loophole in the tax system in which personal items were not taxed.  And, with the help of a Nepali insider, we would be able to "remind" any TIA employees if they happened to forget this integral statute.  After forging the invoice to my liking I sent it to the bass company, who sent it to the shipping company, who quickly came to the conclusion that this would not go over well with the insurance company.  This process took about two weeks, most of which involved waiting.  Plan A... Fail.

Plan B:  Contact everyone you know in Kathmandu
While the basses were waiting somewhere outside of Los Angeles with that all dressed up with nowhere to go feeling I was attempting to compel every person in an apparent position of power to provide a solution to my conundrum.  I tried to play it cool and not come off as desperate but the prospect of loosing these instruments became a nagging fear.  Mariano contacted friends at the US Embassy but they stayed tight lipped.  At a dinner with the music director of the American School I made my plea but she received a stiff denial from the principle; apparently the customs office was attempting to extort a large fee over a shipment of textbooks.  The writing was on the wall; nobody wanted to intentionally subject themselves to an uphill wade through bureaucratic mire.

Mid-September Mariano left Kathmandu to lead a series of jazz workshops somewhere in the Eastern hemisphere of the globe.  I was left waiting.  I waited until the principle investor of KJC, Nirakar, returned from a tour in Australia with his rock band 1974 AD (only THE most popular band in Nepal.  But in all honesty their music is pretty good and being the first band able to appeal to the plethora of demographics in Nepal you got to give them credit).  I walked into Nirakar's office knowing this was my last foreseeable option.  After explaining the situation he gave a nonchalant reply, "Don't worry man, we'll have a guy go pick them up in the airport and bring them to the school, it will cost around 10,000Rs" (~150 USD).
I was a little dumbfounded at the simplicity of his answer but the relief it gave me buried any misgivings.  So, that I night I contacted the bass company and within the hour the basses were on a truck headed to the airport.

Ten days later...
The invoice had a contact number and I assumed that when the basses arrived that number would be used to contact the school.  This was not the case.  The basses most likely sat in the airport for two days before anyone knew they were there.  It was a Thursday two weeks before Deshain when we sent our inside man to the airport.  That morning I was greeted with the news "we are going to pick up your basses."  I remember having a lesson shortly after this news and was barely able to contain my excitement enough to critique the student's hand position.  I kept on saying "My basses are coming."  During one of these lessons the administrator of the school, Sunita, poked her head  in and told me to please come down to Nirakar's office after I was done.  I did as was requested and what greeted me as I walked in that office where three dour expressions.  I sat down and within seconds the bottom dropped out and I was going for corkscrews.
"So what were you thinking when you shipped these basses here?",  Nirakar asked.  I don't know how I replied but I remember first feeling a sense of injustice at this accusation and then deciding that playing the blame game was a bad idea.  I think I said "What?"
"They want 9 lak to release the basses from the airport, that's about twelve thousand dollars."
"Why?"
"They say we didn't fill out the required paperwork for the import and they are charging a 200% fee on the basses.  The school can't pay that."
"What can we do?"  I looked at the 'inside' man, who sat looking at his hands in his pitted white shirt with frayed cuffs and collars and thought how could such an astute business man like Nirakar get caught in this mess.  Why had he put our trust in a man incapable of swaying the necessary opinions.
"We'll go back to the airport on Sunday and try to deal with them.  This is bad timing with the holiday.  People are greedy and maybe after Dashain they will want less or just get tired of them and say 'man just get these things out of here."  Nirakar laughed a little, I gave a heavy sigh.  We talked for a little while longer, joked about getting the former army general playing saxophone in my big band to march his troupes to the airport and take the instruments by force and other quixotic schemes.  I was powerless to solve this problem.  But, what I had created by bringing these basses to Nepal's doorstep was a sense of urgency and conflict.  A piece of insight given to me by a Nepali business owner gained new relevance: "This country operates by crisis management.  I don't like to run my business this way but I do because I'm forced to.  If I try to solve a problem in advance it will never happen because no one will do it but when the problem finally happens it gets done very quickly.  But when you start doing this, you never can catch back up to solving problems before they happen and then crisis becomes my comfort zone."

I lost my smile for some time after this.  At school every student and teacher expressed genuine concern and asked me on a regular basis if I was okay.  This was in stark juxtaposition to Mariano's response which basically amounted to "told you so."  On Saturday morning after climbing with Robin I was greeted at the school by ecstatic faces.  Sunita called me into her office and said with barely contained excitement, "I think I can get your basses today."
"How?"
"I saw how sad you where yesterday and it kept me up all night thinking.  My husband's friend owns a shipping company and will be able to negotiate."  This plan sounded suspiciously like the one that just failed and I felt guarded against any preemptive celebration.  "It will take a couple hours but let us see, I think it will work."  I carried on with my day and taught my lessons and then around 1pm a big blue truck pulled into the parking lot and Sunita said, "Ian, your basses are here."  I ran down the stairs and ripped opened the coffin shaped boxes like a child at Christmas.  Then I unzipped the big black softcase, rosined up the bow and played.  The strings were horribly out of tune but I didn't care, I felt the sweet joy of stretching my muscle memory.  It felt like reuniting with a lost limb, my fingers tripped and skipped filling my head with a rush of endorphins that sent a shock down my spine and left me with a helpless grin.

The final price tag for getting the basses out of the airport was 30,000Rs, just under 500 USD.  Even though it may seem criminal to have to pay to donate items in a third world country it is just one of those moments where the only option is to say "ke garne (what to do)" or in the words of another friend faced with criticism of a morally questionable action "this is just the way of things."

Thank you to everyone who helped me bring these instruments to KJC,  good things are coming to you.