After I returned from college in the United States, I went
to meet a prominent journalist of Kathmandu who gave me an enthusiastic lecture
about the pros of returning to Nepal. This is about seventeen years ago, folks,
so this may sound a bit clichéd, but one thing I remember from this
inspirational talk was this:
“Imagine!” He said. “We could make Nepal the Switzerland of
the East.”
This line came back to me and made me chuckle a few days
ago. Specifically, it made me chuckle because I read in the paper that the
Nepal police had caught 100 kilogrammes of gold quietly making its way across
the Chinese border into Nepal. The gold is thought to belong to corrupt Chinese
politicians who are panicking from Chinese President Xi Jinping’s
sweep of political corruption, and who are sending their illegally made
wealth across the border. Despite the Nepalese’s best attempts to keep their
economy at a Bronze Age level, the Chinese, it appear, are determined to turn us
into the default and involuntary Switzerland of the East.
If the Nepal police
caught 100 kilogrammes of gold, imagine how much of it must be going undetected
to build ugly buildings in Lazimpat and all across our highways. All those strange concrete buildings with
glass fronts that are popping up at the speed of light, completely destroying
Nepal’s architectural heritage, appear to have the same (or roughly the same)
funders behind it. And of course, there’s no government in Nepal to actually
say: “Hang on, maybe we should stop these overenthusiastic “investors” before
they completely cover all of Nepal’s square kilometers with these giant
concrete boxes with glass fronts that have no use and which are seeing no
interaction from any locals whatsoever.”
It appears this gold was bound for India before it was
intercepted by the stellar Nepali Police. Now that got me scratching my head.
Why, pray, India? Indian capitalists, who no doubt were the intended recipients
of this largesse (in the form of “joint investments”?) are well known for gaudy
weddings and bad taste. Why would you want to waste the Chinese worker’s hard
earned blood and sweat on another bhangra-thumping wedding where everyone is
covered in too much gold? Or waste it on another extravagant sas-bahu sit-com
where women with dreadful kohl-covered eyes terrorize young women into
submissive female roles?
If I were the economic adviser to China, I would be calling
a meeting right around now of all the 1000 richest mandarins of China, and
giving them this pep talk: “Listen up, folks. In the West, people who screw the
workers and get insanely rich are feted, and celebrated, as great
entrepreneurs. We’ve decided to do the same –instead of scaring you into fleeing
with capital flight, we will instead celebrate your great skills in ripping off
workers to accumulate this vast treasure-trove of illegal wealth. Now instead
of wasting all this gold on bad Bollywood sit-coms, why don’t we get together
and create something useful? Like, for instance, the first Federal Reserve of
Asia? We will create a treasury of gold which will act as a buffer against
currency fluctuation, and provide some stability to the Asian region? You get
to forever have your name engraved in stone as the 1000 Mandarins who set up
the first Federal Reserve of Asia, and Asia gets to have its first bank that
provides a currency stability cushion.”
Doesn’t this seem like the most utilitarian use of this
gold, rather than on gold plating Buddhas (where no doubt some or much of it
will make its way, much to the vexation of old Maoists who took pride in the
Cultural Revolution) and on gaudy Bollywood wedding jewelry?
So says the Swiss woman of the
East. But then don’t take this frugal Brahmin advice too seriously—perhaps the
best way to “grow” the economy at great leaps and bounds is to stop being
austere and waste it on…well, gaudy Indian weddings.
Comments