Freak Street in Kathmandu is a hell of a place. If you're a hippie, that is. Marijuana is the #1 cash crop here, and the flocks of hippies passing through here on their way to or back from an ashram in India end up smoking most of it. Given its status as a Mecca of the counter-culture, it's not surprising the KGB and CIA sent up offices here. The US has been pouring foreign aid into Nepal, though the people here are more likely to get stoned than have a revolution. The KGB is here for the hippies, the CIA is here for the KGB, and I'm here to make money off both of them. Business is good. The only downside is the scent of incense. You get used to it after a while.
I came here with the Peace Corps a few years ago and fell in love with the place. At first, it was just a scheme to avoid the draft when my college deferment ran out. After returning to the US, it was a struggle to adjust. It's hard to explain, but I just didn't feel like I belonged there any more. So I called up some college friends and we joined a hippie caravan on its way to India. Hard as it might be to believe today, there was a time when young people with little knowledge of the rest of the world could easily travel overland through Turkey, Iran, Afghanistan, and India. So many came that tourism was a big part of the local economies back then.
Since I spoke Nepali and had a smattering of a few other languages, I was the expedition's interpreter, though most of the time, I ended interpreting English being spoken with very heavy accents. Fine by me, it felt good to be an expert of sorts. When we reached Kathmandu, I really hit my stride. I became friends with all the hotel and restaurant owners, the souvenir peddlers, and even the local police. It's no exaggeration to say I had more knowledge of the place than the US ambassador.
Back when I was still with the Peace Corps, we all got invited to the embassy for Thanksgiving. One guy in our bunch really hated LBJ. At the dinner, he got plastered and told the ambassador to go fuck himself. And that is how Peace Corps got banned from the US embassy in Nepal. That guy became a Peace Corps legend though.
When I think of all the pearl-clutching in the US about dope, I wish I could take all those squares to Freak Street. Then they could see for themselves that a country covered in marijuana fields hasn't collapsed into reefer madness. If anything, the Nepalese have succeeded in making weed boring. Take that, J Edgar Hoover. Today's errands would take me to the local jail to bail out some guys who'd gotten to rowdy and were too clueless to pick up on the bribery hints the police dropped. Who says there isn't an upside to corruption? Greased palms get things done. I practically need a diagram to explain how I got the money, but here's my attempt at it.
First, I made some friends with locals working at the embassy. We'd eat and drink together and sometimes I gave them some cash to pay school fees or buy medicine for a sick relative. In our conversations, they'd inadvertently blurt out some interesting embassy gossip. When I had a few tidbits I thought were worth sharing, I'd head over to one of the bars or restaurants the KGB guys frequented. I'd buy them a drink and hand them a note to set up a dead-drop. I liked to use Hindu shrines since they were easy to spot, and people left all sorts of stuff near them. I used a little clay teapot to hold my messages which the KGB would later surreptitiously retrieve. The night after making a drop, I'd go to the shrine, take the teapot lid off, and take out any money the KGB left inside.
The money from that was good, but why not play both sides and make even more? Once I had enough KGB contacts, I learned their addresses and schedules. Most of them lived outside the Soviet embassy compound in a ritzier neighborhood with all the other expats. Once I had enough quality info, I went to the US embassy and gave them a free sample. That led to the CIA station chief calling me in for an interview. It was a lot of work to convince them I was on their side and worth the risk. The station chief was a wiry, intense man. He told me his name was Bob and tried to put me at ease, but I could tell it was all an act. For three hours, I was stuck in a windowless room in the embassy basement while Bob (or whatever his real name was) and his equally mysterious assistant Chuck peppered me with questions. Questions like: Why are you doing this? Are you a communist? How do you feel about the Vietnam War? Do you smoke pot? How did you get this info about the Russians?
It was grueling, but at last, I won them over by saying that with knowledge of the schedules and addresses of the embassy staff, they could send a break-and-entry team to plant microphones and such. They were surprised and impressed that I knew about such things. I explained that I had learned about wire-tapping and surveillance from reading the Anarchist's Cookbook and other such contraband literature. Bob offered to help me a get a job at the agency. He set I had the right personality and skills for it. I was flattered, but explained that since I had been in the Peace Corps, I was ineligible to work for the CIA. Bob and Chuck thanked me nonetheless and said that we'd be in touch and handed me an evelope which I calmly stashed in my pocket. I could tell it was full of money. Bob said that I should come to the embassy the first day of every month and ask the receptionist if there was any mail for me. I rose to leave, shook their hands, and said it was a pleasure doing business with them.
That B and E team must have found something juicy, because when I went to the US embassy to ask for mail, I got an envelope full of cash, a plane ticket to London, and a scrap of paper that said:
***
Good job. Now lie low for a year. We'll be in touch.
When you get to London, go to the US embassy and tell
the front desk clerk Bob and Chuck sent you.
Namaste
-Bob
***
Well, I was officially a spook. I said goodbye to all my local friends and packed my suitcase. 3 years in Kathmandu and I'd made almost enough money to retire. The only question was whether I'd stay in the game or quit while I was ahead. A year in London would give me plenty of time to think it over.
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