With half a million people, Kathmandu is Nepal's biggest and most cosmopolitan city, a meeting place of a dozen ethnic groups, and the home town of the Newars. Nepal's master craftsmen and traders extraordinaire. Trade indeed, created Kathmandu for at least a thousand years it controlled the most important caravan route between Tibet and India - and trade has always funded its Newar artisans. Little wonder, perhaps that Kathmandu has so deftly embraced the tourist business.