Nepal

For February break, I headed to Nepal with my good friend Sharon.
Our first stop was Kathmandu where we stayed for three nights.
Here's a typical street in Kathmandu: chaotic but friendly.

Up and out early in the morning. We saw vendors selling all kinds of things.
Nepal is semitropical, so the fruits were delicious.

"Singing bowls" are very popular.
They resonate when you rub the mallet around the edge, 
like rubbing a wet finger around a wine glass.
Laaaaaaaaaa! 

Namaste.
We were blessed and given a red mark on our foreheads by this Hindu gentleman.
He also gave us a special saffron flower, all for a dollar. 

Walking through the crowded Thamel section of Kathmandu, 
we came across this beautiful reflecting pool.

Pedicabs are everywhere, rundown but reliable.

Nepalis seem to carry everything imaginable.  Like these guys carrying beautiful rugs.

After walking awhile we stopped to eat at a restaurant overlooking 
Kathmandu Durbar square, a complex of temples originally built around a royal palace
 in the 1500's. You can see how Kathmandu is in a valley.

One of the more interesting buildings in Durbar square was the home of the Kumari,
a kind of child queen chosen once every few years from the Newari tribe in Nepal.
She is considered the manifestation of divine female energy, 
worshipped by Hindus and Buddhists alike.
She sometimes appears at the window onto this courtyard, but was not out when we were there.

This Durbar square has many temples dating from the 15th century, 
which are for worship as well as gathering places.
Nepal has a 50% unemployment rate, 
so you see lots of folks just hanging around everywhere you go.

The rat is the guardian of the Hindu god Ganesh and is seen outside his temple.
This one is made of brass and has saffron and red offerings on him.

This temple is to the Hindu god Vishnu and is famous because Jimi Hendrix sat on the steps and
played guitar when he visited Katmandu in the 1960's.

This relief sculpture of the god Shiva is quite popular.
He is thought to be especially benevolent towards women so you often see them 
making offerings and praying to him.

The next day, we went on a temple tour around Nepal.
We started with the tiny Golden Temple.

It's called Golden temple because all the statues of gods inside look like they are made of gold. 

My favorites were the statues of Prince Siddhartha (Buddha) riding on an elephant.
Prayer wheels are on the rack on the right- turn them and the Hindu prayers on them are sent for you.

Cool brass lion at Golden Temple

Monkey and prayer wheels.
If you can't walk around the temple the 100 times you are supposed to, to be devout,
turn the prayer wheels so that the prayers written on them will go around for you. 

Next we went to Patan Durbar square, another complex of temples from the 18th century,
built around a "newer" royal palace. 

Animals are often featured in Hindu art and architecture,
like the elephants in the prior photo, and the cobra with the bird on its head on top of the column here.

There are so many beautiful and ornate sculptures and carvings everywhere on the temples.
Here are some many-armed gods, like Shiva, on the beams.

This is the oldest Krishna temple in Nepal.  Krishna was one of the incarnations of the god Vishnu.
Some of the people hanging around are local college students.

The palaces were often built near a water source.  In this case it's one they still use. 

So much artwork with beautiful gods and animals everywhere... 

Kids enjoy playing on the stone elephants (hundreds of years old) in the square.

Strands of saffron flowers and incense are sold as offerings. 

More stone elephants at Patan Durbar square... a procession is coming...

Hundreds of Hindu pilgrims in a procession were walking from Patan Durbar square to the
sacred Pashupati temple (about eight miles away).

All kinds of musical instruments in the procession.
 They were going to celebrate the annual feast of Shiva, a most revered Hindu god. 

A famous holy man was part of the procession and rode in a carriage
The flags say "Om" in Sanskrit, and flowers in pots are offerings to Shiva.

Pashupati temple was our next stop. Sadhus (holy men) sit near the entrance
 and will pose in exchange for a few dollars.
They are some of the few allowed to wear the saffron robes of the most holy,
 and are devout men who have given up all their 
worldly possessions and live on the kindness of strangers.
They are also yogis (yoga masters).  Check out the pose of this guy's leg.

Pashupati is often used for funerals... we saw several funeral pyres across the dry river.
Kind of eerie to see cremations of people out in the open like that. 

Funeral pyres up close.

A body wrapped in orange, at the edge of the bank, with a loved one mourning, 
getting ready to be cremated at Pashupati. Very moving to see.
The temple is on the left and non-Hindus like us are not allowed inside. 

Pashupati is the most sacred Hindu temple complex in Nepal.

At Pashupati, there is a row of shrines to Shiva.
When I was in this area I got an incredible feeling of deja-vu,  I have no idea why. 

Looking inside the Shiva shrines. It's a symbol of life. 

Another Sadhu, wearing the saffron robes of the holy.

Cows are sacred in Nepal and you see them roaming everywhere.

Next stop was Bouda Stupa.  A stupa is a buddhist shrine in the shape of a dome.
You cannot go inside, just walk around the outside.
You are supposed to walk around it 100 times to complete the prayer ritual.
If you turn prayer wheels like those all around the outside of the walls, it adds to your prayers.

The eyes on the stupa are Buddha's eyes: Wisdom and Compassion. 
The flags are prayer flags, each one contains prayers written in Sanskrit.

Feeding the pigeons around Bouda Stupa is considered to be good karma,
so large bowls of feed are sold. 

This is a sand mandala painted by monks in one of the nearby shops.
Each day it is swept away, to remind us of how fleeting life really is. 

Last temple stop was the "Monkey Temple".
Look closely and I think you can see how it got this name...
There are monkeys everywhere around this stupa. 

The monkeys were well-behaved and didn't bother us.

There are many vendors around the monkey temple, selling things like oil paintings... 

This artist loved showing off his favorite work,
 a painting of a place in the Himalayas that's special to him. 

Buddhist monk novices in the monastery at monkey temple.

The senior buddhist monks were chanting in the monastery, really cool to  hear.

We enjoyed all our temple tours and were thoroughly enlightened.

We took a five hour car ride (via a driver) to the village of Bandipur,
in the foothills of the Himalayas.
Here I am relaxing outside our room at the Old Inn.
Bandipur is 4,000 ft. above sea level, same elevation as Kathmandu.
We had no ill effects from this (relatively low) elevation at all. 

Back view of the Old Inn at Bandipur.
Very comfortable and rustic place, with good hearty meals.

View from the back of the Inn. We hiked to the top of the hill on the left, Thani Mai.
There is a small temple to Shiva up there. 

The next day, after the morning rains cleared, we trekked to the village of Ramkot with a guide.
It was a two and a half hour walk there and we passed
many terraced areas for farming rice and other crops... 

Ramkot is a traditional village and has limited electricity and water.
The only way in and out is to walk in as we did. Once children pass the fifth grade,
they have the option to attend school in Bandipur.
Those that do make the same two and a half hour walk
 that we did, each day.  Talk about devotion to your studies! 

Traditional Nepali house in Ramkot., round with a thatched roof.
Cute kids (baby goats) outside.

We saw chickens and goats everywhere in Nepal.
They are both important food sources and can easily live off the land there.

With the mild weather year-round, much of life in Nepal is lived outdoors. 

Goats and their caretakers (often children) are everywhere.
The goats make good milk and cheese. 

Our wonderful trekking guide, Sook.
 He speaks five languages had lots of good information about the area. 

Trekking back to our hotel at Bandipur. 

As we got closer, we were treated to a view of the Annapurna range of the Himalayas, visible above the clouds...

Sharon with a cow friend on the trail, Himalayas in the distance. 

Here's a closeup of the Himalayas from the previous two photos.
My jaw dropped at seeing them. They were about 70 miles from us.
That's Mt. Manaslu on the left, the eighth highest mountain in the world at 26,758 ft.
Sook told us that about 20 people die each year trying to climb it (a little less than Mt. Everest).

Spectacular Manaslu with snow blowing off the peak as the sun was setting.
Nepal was an amazingly spiritual place.
I fell in love with the pristine Himalayas and will go back one day to see them.