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Published: December 14th 2009
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Bodhnath
Famous stupa After an uneventful tourist bus ride from Chitwan, we arrived in Kathmandu on Thanksgiving evening. What a change from the lush and peaceful National Park and beautiful Pokhara! We got an overpriced taxi to our chosen guesthouse in Thamel (Souvenir Guest House, a cute place run by a nice family who owned a gorgeous puppy called Michael!) and went for some food in an American bar.
Thamel is the tourist centre and accordingly packed full of gift shops, internet cafes and western restaurants and hotels. The streets are filled with litter, taxis, motor bikes, cycle-rickshaws, petrol fumes, people trying to sell tat and drugs and little street kids sniffing glue from plastic bags. Sounds awful, but it's all kind of happening in a non-threatening way and was nowhere near as bad as Delhi. But we hadn't come to hang out in Thamel, we had come to Kathmandu (KTM) to see the famous ancient Buddhist temples and soak up some culture......
We walked to the Buddhist temple and stupa called Swayambhunath on top of a hill known locally as Monkey Temple. We climbed hundreds of steps to the top and were greeted by loads of wild monkeys (who feed on
Bhaktapur
Durbar Square the rice and offerings people bring to the temple). The top was crowded with monks, worshippers and tourist stalls but we did get great smoggy views over the sprawling city.
We did the LP walking tour through the city to Durbar Square in the heart of the old town to see the amazing buildings and wooden Newari architecture. We were very interested to learn about the unique Buddhist-Nepali custom of having a Living Goddess called the Kumari Devi. A young girl (4 years old) is chosen to live in the Kumari Bahal palace in KTM Durbar Square and be the Living Goddess until puberty. She makes a few public appearances at festivals, she blesses the Nepali president and people come from all over to pray and worship her. The criteria to be the Kumari (amoung many things) is to be Buddhist, from the bloodline of Buddha, be ''perfect'' and blemish free, born on a full moon and pass a couple of harrowing tests including not being scared spending the night alone in a scary dark temple and not flinching when 108 buffalo, 108 goats and 108 chickens are slaughtered in front of her. An amazing little girl I think
Bhaktapur
Temple through a hole in the wall! you must agree. She sometimes makes an appearance at the palace window after 4pm but unfortunately we didn't get to see her.
We spent a day visiting Bodhnath, home to the largest and most important Buddhist stupa in all of Nepal. The white wash dome, gold tower, colourful prayer flags and painted Buddha eyes were magnificent. The place is very atmospheric with monks, pilgrims and devotees coming here to pray, light butter lamps, spin the prayer wheels and circumnavigate the stupa. Then we walked to Pashupathinath, an important Hindu temple on the holy but filthy Bagmathi river. Here, like in Varanasi, are burning ghats where Hindu and Buddhist funerals take place in the open. As a result this is also a very spiritual but sombre place. We had the services of a local guide who told us all about the custom that the eldest son or partner of the deceased must pray in solitary for 13 days after the funeral and then must shave their heads (men only) and wear white for a year afterwards.
We went to Patan, a suburb south of KTM, to visit its Durbar Square and more wonderful palace, Newari architecture and temples. We
Bhaktapur
City Gates spent a couple of days in the ancient city of Bhaktapur (to the east of KTM), again to see the buildings, the cobbled streets and the people, who's way life is still very traditional and basic. The Bhaktapur curd (buffalo yoghurt) is famous here and very good!! We actually got stuck there one day because of the Maoist strikes that block the roads and make petrol in short supply, so we couldn't get back to KTM (what a shame!).
We took a local bus to Nagarkot, a small village high up on a ridge with the best views of the Himalayan mountains (apparently!). Unfortunately, the days we were there the cloud was very low so we didn’t see the mountains or Mt. Everest at all, which was a shame. The bus ride to and from mountainous Nargakot was interesting though. Getting there, the bus was so full, people were clinging onto the roof and sides by their fingernails and the bus was so loaded down the tyres were grinding on the wheel arches (we had seats thank god!). On the way back, the bus was full with people taking their wares and produce to market, including a woman with
a freshly dead goat in a plastic carrier bag that leaked blood all over the bus floor! Nice!
Having spent a blissful month in Nepal it was time to catch our flight to Hong Kong. We were very sad to leave as we loved Nepal and plan to go back one day.......
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