Memoir: IN THE STREETS OF PRAGUE (Satis Shroff)
Memoir: IN THE STREETS OF PRAGUE (Satis Shroff) ‘It’s awfully nice to see you in Czech surroundings’ said my long-lost friend Kundan, as he raised his massive and ornate glass of pivo, the famous black Czech beer. That was in 1976 and the Czechs and Slovaks were a single nation. Kunda Dixit was “Our Man Behind the Iron Curtain” and wrote a column in The Rising Nepal named “Prague Prattles.” Kanak might have the gift of the gab, but I’d always enjoyed Kunda’s literary articles during my Katmandu days, when Hippies and Flower Power people were everywhere, mostly to be seen in the high temples and pagodas, stoned with Cannabis sativa, wearing deshi clothes with the word “Ram” printed on them a thousand times. In Katmandu it was a delight to go to the many psychedelic cafes, where you could drink tea and relish Katmandu’s “special” cake baked with hash. After that, and a round of charas smoking, Katmandu looked different. Fantastic, psychedelic Katmandu, made immortal by Cat Steven...