89. NEPAL

The country's national flag - shaped like its many mountain peaks...

I'm basically a democracy and right now I need to take a vote - to take in Nepal or not, what with the country's elections round the corner and Maoist Party supporters out in the streets. My vote was to go - so I approached Nepal the way I approach love and cooking - with reckless abandon.

Maoist Party supporters out in the street canvassing for votes. They looked more like thugs. Shops shut to prevent these feral packs from demanding protection money. I'll say they were paid by politicians to create a buzz and fear, at the same time make some extras at the side.

Traffic was disrupted and the police stood around looking on. The more aggressive 'street walkers' were armed with long wooden batons.

Breaking Dawn.........
(with a vampire like Edward Cullen, I'll gladly donate all my blood to him....)

The drive up to Nagarkot was worth it for its spectacular sunrise and sunset Kodak moments.
 I couldn't stop snapping, it was a moving spiritual experience.

Surely I must be on top of the world looking down at the very many peaks as far as the eye can see...

As I imagined it to be - from my many books on the lives of Masters I love - as they describe their abodes tucked away in Shigatze and Lhasa and surrounds. I contemplated them quietly from the verandah of my room. It was dawn but the weather was pleasantly cool

As I come down to Earth, I stopped to look on a cremation ceremony by the ghats of a terribly polluted Bagmati River with very little water, yet the cremated remains are dumped into the river which was barely flowing. I hope this changes during the wetter months. Here the body is undergoing a water ritual before the actual cremation. Nepal suffers from a chronic water shortage and water rationing is part of their people's lives for many years now.....but perhaps only for the ordinary folks.

The country earns millions from tourism but it dosen't look like the wealth is evenly distributed. It's poor are so terribly poor its heart wrenching to watch.


Patan Durbar Square and the Kathmandu Durbar Square...are World Heritage sites and open living museums. 

They comprise large sprawling complexes of Hindu and Buddhist temples, shrines and palaces, used by their kings when this was a Kingdom.

Once again, as I often do, I marvel at how ancient peoples could create such huge monuments using simple tools and human labour. Its buildings and images have form, shape and function and they didn't design all that on a computer.

Nepal's weather is so dry the buildings remain well-preserved - wooden structures are chiefly in their original condition...

 

 

Phewa Lake, Pokhara, is scenic and clean. I can't say the same of other waterways which were terribly polluted. It's a crying shame that so much natural beauty is spoilt by ignorant bad habits and neglect.

We dined in the cool outdoors in Pokhara, a lake in front of us, mountains all around... 

 

We shopped from street vendors and little places selling local products.

Their shopkeepers and street vendors are not pushy. Once again I pushed my luck drinking fruit juices from the roadside stalls but mercifully I survived Nepal.

Their shops carry products from their neighbours. - Tibetan tangkas and jewellery, Kashmiri shawls, wood and stone carvings from India...

Budhanath Stupa undergoing a facelift. It's one of the better known landmarks. Nepal has at least 4 Unesco World Heritage sites...

Surrounded by hills, it is in the center of a natural mandala, a store of sacred energy - making that a meridian point of Mother Earth's body.

The Ancients would have constructed this from Vaastu calculations - Hindu Fengshui. This place has become a Buddhist pilgrimage site and the Buddhism that has evolved is more Tibetan so the site has become a Little Tibet, full of Tibetan businesses and people. The Tibetans have truly become a displaced people with large numbers building new communities in India and Nepal

Like the Indians, the Nepalis are not afraid of colours. Their ethnic wares come in a riot of colours, their houses too...

 

By contrast the smaller homes have zinc roofs held down by rocks as the winds can lift everything away....

 

Their shopkeepers have a sense of humour - I like this about them - not taking life too seriously - what will be will be.....

Their meals-on-wheels carts are kept clean and prettified

The Kathmandu Valley where the population is concentrated and where they are protected from extreme weather conditions by a ring of mountains...

An orphanage and a government school next door with sparse facilities, right in the heart of the city. Teachers with their meagre wages come in and leave as and when they feel like it, don't do their job - sounds a lot like India...

Their women's dress have evolved into a top with a batik sarong that's made in Indonesia. Apparently, the labels are than changed into a Made in Singapore one as that fetches a higher price as its associated with better quality!

 

Water rationing has been part and parcel of Nepali life for a very long time. Womenfolk and children fetch water at a distribution center during certain timings. Electricity is rationed day and night in hotels as well

Villagers come into the city to seek employment. As in Singapore, such workers do jobs the locals don't want to do - as beasts of burden. Their lives would be a hard slog for so little wages...

 

Nepalis like the Indians, think well of Singapore and Singaporeans. This was the impression I took with me after numerous chit-chats with those who came forward to ask many questions about working or studying in Singapore. When they hear we're from Singapore, they, mainly young men, gather round to chat forgetting to sell us their wares. They spoke good English and seem to know quite a bit about what's going on in Singapore. Not once did I feel threatened surrounded by youths.

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Life is a mystery - it can be lived, it can be known by living it. It's not a problem, it's a challenge. It's not a question - it's an adventure - Osho