Lumbini

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Lumbini, the birth place of Lord Buddha. The World Heritage sight that is home to thousands of visitors and buddhist pilgrims every year. The place with more temples than taxis (if that's possible?!!) and huge feasting mosquitos. Lumbini, a place of spiritual calm amongst the chaos of hundreds of tourists.

I arrived in Lumbini after a bareable bus trip (anything is bareable after the trip to Bardia!) I was smiled at and welcomed on local buses by cheerful locals, assisted in finding the smaller, impossible to find on your own buses to Lumbini, by a friendly businessman before doing my very best bargaining with a fat bellied taxi man to get me to the Korean monastery. My first observation, it was hot. Very hot and very humid. I was trying to be all modest with my dress and so had my sarong draped around my sweaty shoulders, but it was becoming more of a hindrence than a courtesy to locals, so I striped it off in a hurry. The fat bellied taxi man tried to over charge me, but having looked at a lonely planet (on the shelf in the bookstore in Pokhara) I knew that it shouldn't cost me more than 200Rs. So I get in and instantly feel cool, cool and calm and happy. I'm about to arrive at a monastery in Lumbini, Buddha's birthplace. Life is good. I arrive ten minutes later, after driving quite a ways around the 'compound' or Heritage site, which is fenced off with a huge brick wall fence from the rest of Lumbini. I've made it to my mosquito infested 'home' for the next two days,the beautiful Korean Monastery.

The Monastery is quite a sight, and after seeing about 10 over the next few days, it's up there with one of the nicest. It was huge. Oriental and huge. Just standing there in the middle of no where, all temple like. I checked in to my 4 bed 'dorm' room, although it's more like a shared quarters. A large room with a separate toilet room and laundry room, all concrete, complete with buckets and taps and hanging space for laundry, quite convenient. The 'sleeping' part of the room was huge, and complete with a very thin (surprisingly not all that uncomfortable) sleeping mat and blanket, which I used as extra padding, and of course the more than necessary mosquito net. The room started off with two of us, and ended up with four, nice and cosy! We had fans in the room and enough power outlets for technology which is always handy. Those Koreans sure do know how to cater for the pilgrim!

The monastery has three types of visitors; pilgrims, those that are staying and meditating for more than a week and up to a year (hardcore), people like me, those foreigners just coming for a few days to give the monastery living a bit of a go, and the day tourists, locals and forgeigners there to check out and compare the monastery with the other's they see. BUt can I just add, it was a fabulous and peaceful place to stay. I met some lovely people, tried my hand at meditating, and lived very cheaply and peacefully for few days. The monastery is 300Rs for room and three meals a day!! You get access to the meditation hall, 24hours a day and are welcome to join in with the morning and evening meditation sessions with the monks. This I tried to attend, twice, but was literally being swarmed by about 15 mosquitos and it was just like Liz out of Eat, Pray, Love; impossible to meditate, impossible to concentrate, to think, to think about anything but those nasty buzzing, biting, blood consuming super huge mozzies! So I gave up on that and tried to think peacefully instead.

The food was good,not great but good, and for 300Rs all inclusive I couldn't complain. There was a selection (the same for breakfast, lunch and dinner) of Korean and Nepali foods; rice, spinach, dal, chapati, potato curry, caulifower curry, curd and tea. All nutritious and edible. Yum!

I spent the day wandering around some temples and getting my head around the 'layout' of the sacred parts of the site. I ate dinner, attempted to meditate and went to sleep on my thin mattress, under my mosquito net. I slept surprisngly well that night, I must have been tired, and woke up fresh and ready to go at 6am for meditation (yes I tried again!) Breakfast was consumed before renting a bike and starting my day.

I visited the actual place Buddha was born, as in you line up with hundreds of Indians and Nepali's for half an hour to lean over a barrier and peer into a small stone hole at the stone Buddha was born on, literally (apparently). You give your blessing/donation and pretend to know what you're doing (insert, almost perfect prayer here!) and you move on. I visited the holy pool where the mother of Lord Buddha bathed after giving birth, the sacred tree and grounds blessed by Buddha. I wandered around the gardens, full of old trees and thousands of prayer flags. I sat quietly in a corner under a tree watching the monks dressed in bright orange and yellow praying under the oldest and most sacred tree, truly magical. I watched the junior monks in procession making there way into the white washed building, like a beam of orange light, just beautiful. I wandered past the sacred canal, and peddaled up the the World Peace Pagoda. I sipped a cold sprite under the shade of a small shop, trying not to die of head exhaustion. I paid 50Rs to enter a very dilapidated museum full of mainly photos and replicas of ancient carvings. I visited the temples of Myanmar, Thailand, China, Tibet, Laos and Cambodia (all free to enter and only possible in one day because I had a bike) before indulging in a very quick to melt ice cream, to assist with the cooling down process, before making my way back to the monastery late afternoon for a much needed shower and laundry session.

I attempted to write my first blog, which was actually possible given the peaceful surroundings. I enjoyed dinner, which was again perfectly on time and announced via gong! before getting ready for bed (making sure my mosquito net was completely wrapped underneath my mattress. Note: I must not have done a good job at this because I didn't sleep well that night, and the reason I didn't sleep well was well because of the mosquitoes that made there way into my obviously not fully wrapped mosquito net.

I got off to sleep ok, the power was still on so the fans were going and it was relatively cool inside the room. But I woke up in the middle of the night after a very real, which turned out to be real, dream. Have you ever had one of those dreams, where you either need to go to the toilet, and you actually do, or where you're super itchy and you wake up covered in hives? Well I had one of those dreams. I was dreaming that there were hundreds of mosquitos in my net biting me, and sure enough when I finally woke up (I'd gone to sleep with my headphones on so couldn't hear them, rookie error) I realised there were indeed about 15 mosquitos INSIDE my net that had indeed been having a lovely time feasting on me. At first I attempted to catch them, you see i've always considered myself really good at killing mozzies, so with head torch on I began my quest, but within five minutes I realised there were too many. I was still half asleep, so thought it best to lather on mosquito repellant, lift up the net (it was now useless) put my headphones back on and attempt to sleep. It worked. I woke up covered in bites but I had a relatively good sleep for the remainder of the evening. Win.

I was up for sunrise in the morning, I didn't attend the morning meditation session but instead enjoyed watching the colours of the sky develop over half an hour (fully clothed and lathered in mozzie spray) it was truly beautiful and the perfect end to my short but enjoyable stay in Lumbini.

I enjoyed my final breakfast at the monastery before doing a final pack and making my way to the bus. This time I walked. I walked back past BUddha's birth stone, past the temples and the canal, and through the gates to the chaos of the bus park. Within half an hour I was on my way to Tansen. Only I got to Bharatpur, changed buses, got to Tansen and decided I didn't want to stay in Tansen, so caught a jeep and another bus and finally arrived in Pokhara at about 5pm. What a day. I ended up being stood right next to a spewing family of three, it was almost like dejavu, before being sat next to a very sick girl, a girl who continued to spew out the window for a number of hours, before eating some greasy food and then continuing to vomit into bag after plastic bag until we arrived in POkhara, just my luck, I'm like a spew magnet!

So there I was, back in Pokhara, almost ready for my Annapurna circuit adventure, but not quite!

I arrived back at Pokhara, ready to check back into my little home away from home, Century Guest House, only there weren't any rooms!The only room they had was there 'nice' rooftop room, for 800RS. It was New Years Eve tomorrow night so there were heaps of people in town, great timing, but not such a great idea to not have booked. I left my bags at the guest house and went looking for another place but everything in that street was ten dollars or more, so I went back and asked in a really sweet voice if I could have the room for 600Rs, as there was no where else in that street and it was dark and late and I'd been staying there quite a bit...tomorrow if there were no cheaper rooms available I'd leave. They couldn't say no to this face, I mean who could?! So I got the really nice room on the roof, complete with squeedgy thing in the bathroom to prevent falls (essential!) tv with movie channels, super soft pillows and really nice fluffy bath towel. Perfect and all for a discounted price 😊 I wandered down the street to my local supermarket to collect the essentials and got set for a very peaceful night indeed.

I woke up feeling fresh. Today was going to be a good day, I could just feel it. I went downstairs to hear that they had another cheap room for me to move into, perfect. I enjoyed my typical breakfast at Olive Cafe and was welcomed back with a smile, alawys nice to be known when travelling. I signed up for a fun run for the following day, I mean why not. It was for foriegners, to tie in with the New Year, it was only 2km and it was free! It included a free cocktail at Busy Bees, a free t-shirt and 40% off spa treatments, I mean I couldn't say no to all of that free stuff and a bit of exercise?! It was also a great way to meet some new people.

I woke up feeling fresh and ready to run, ha 2km, it couldn't be too hard could it? I enjoyed a take away breakfast before making my way down to the starting point. I met some nice people straight away, as simple as that, "hey, how are you" instant friends. It was all a bit of a shambles to start with, bloody Westerners, all turning up late, but finally at about 9.10am we got going, some looking more serious than others...I guess there was every reason to be competitive, there was a free flight back to Kathmanduy up for grabs for first placed female and male and some other great prizes for second and third, ha maybe I should have put in some effort!

As I started running I felt pretty good, must be all that hiking up to E.B.C. I started running alongside a lovely girl, Steph from London, who looked just like Megan from Shadow Lake! We got to talking and the run suddenly felt effortless. We were cheered on like super athletes even though I was in my hiking boots and pants and Steph in her tom's. We felt so awesome we decided to sprint over the finish line and then that was it, the race was over, we were presented with certificates and peace scarves and there were presentations and awards and before you knew it I was enjoying a mint lemonade with Steph and her crew and booking a massage at the local spa. Too easy. After one of the nicest home made mint lemonade's of my life I went shopping, again, why not. I'd told myself I was allowed to buy some nice hemp clothes and the quality of the clothes in this particular shop was great. I was also informed by Steph and crew that I wouldn't find as much, if any hemp in India. Ok I'll buy 5 dresses. That's almost how it went, except for the fact that I was in the shop getting advice from the male shop owner about which style suited me most for hmmm the next two hours, trying on dress after dress, style after style and then deliberating over colour and length. It was quite fun actually and he actually gives good advice. It also helped a lot when the lovely Sydney-sider came in to the shop to try some dresses on. She gave me the very much needed advice on the dresses I'd picked out. She helped me narrow down my definite, maybe and no piles and I walked out of there after a solid two hours with four really nice hemp dresses and one on the order sheet, yes I was getting one made, why not!

Said sydney-sider, invited me to join her and some lovely guys for dinner, and so I couldn't say no. I'd planned to meet up with Steph and crew later at Busy Bees for our free cocktail and to bring in the new year, and I was also catching up with Evelyn whom I'd met on 'trekking partners'. So I put on my new dress and even some mascara and headed out for some beer and food and some good company, mmm, beer!

We had a fabulous night, watching the new years celebrations which are surprisingly similar to home. There's a lot of drinking, the typical family style carnival like celebrations complete with fire works at the local park, more drinks and general festivities. We enjoyed the live music and cocktails at busy bees before heading down to the park to check out the fireworks, only they weren't until 2am, a little bit different to home! We decided to return to Busy Bees where we consumed some necessary midnight snacks and spoke to a very intoxicated although extremely interesting local man about paragliding. Did you know you can fly on your own after only a ten day course? hmmm tempting!

A long story short, I had met some really lovely people in the space of two days, all because I'd said yes to something I hadn't planned for. I had been spontaneous and I was rewarded with new friendships. Ah travelling, always full of surprises and even better people. It turned out Evelyn had already completed the circuit and was looking to do the shorter Poon Hill trek, but for those out there travelling alone "trekking partners" is a fabulous place to get to know people, if not to trek with, to simply meet up with a enjoy some good company. I didn't end up finding anyone to trek with one trekking partners, but through meeting Evelyn I was able to make one of the best decisions of my life...the decision to do the circuit and Poon Hill and not just Poon Hill on it's own.

I had one day to get ready, one day to get organised for the best 23 days of my life, only at the time I didn't know that. Annapurna Circuit, I was coming for you 😊

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Photos

lick it and melt in it
I wish I could have. The much needed ice cream