NO more than 100 metres separate two of Kathmandu's children - but they are as far apart as heaven and hell. Kumari, the Living Goddess, resides in pampered seclusion in a temple off Durbar Square, is fed by hand and carried wherever she goes. Venerated as the living incarnation of Hindu deity Durga, her childhood is an unending indulgence.
Kanchha sleeps in the street outside, feeds himself from garbage bins and his bare feet are mired with the filth of the gutter. He is but one of hundreds of khartay - street children - who roam the Nepalese capital.
Kumari, and the legends which surround her, are the reasons why tourists have traditionally come to Kathmandu. For them, Nepal is Shangri-La, the Himalayan kingdom, where pre-pubescent girls are deified and worshipped.
Selected from among hundreds of applicants when she is as young as three, the Kumari will only go into the outside world at four or five religious festivals every year, until the day she reaches adolescence and is replaced with another young candidate. There have probably been homeless urchins in Kathmandu as long as there have been child goddesses, but now a new breed of tourist is preying on the Nepali capital's naive and impoverished juveniles.
Kathmandu is cheap, relatively AIDS-free and does not bear the sexual stigma of Bangkok or Manila.
The khartay beg for as little as one rupee. So a foreigner offering them food, money and 'care' is by no means an unacceptable alternative.
