Most tourists come to Islay either by car or with their bicycles which is not the worst idea as public transportation is rather scarce. I don’t have either and using a bicycle on a windy island for hours wouldn’t be to my taste anyway. For Sunday I planned a visit to the Bowmore distillery which […]
Yoshin Pole
It’s New Year’s eve today (in the local calendar) and as part of the celebrations, a huge pole was erected on Bhaktapur’s pottery square. The small square was jam-packed with locals and a couple of visitors. More than a hundred people were working on erecting the pole with ropes and supporting tree trunk constructions. Even […]
Tangier
The place I’m staying at is an old, rather tiny building with doors a head shorter than me. It’s narrow stairways and colourful interior seem oddly familiar but I can’t quite put my finger on where I’d have seen something similar before. A rooftop terrace is overlooking the neighbourhood maze and on a clear day […]
Beautiful Budapest
This city has some seriously good looking buildings. Seeing the parliament for the first time is a true “Neat!” moment. It should be mentioned though that not every building looks like it’s straight out of a fairy tale. The subway that took me into the city (M3) had a distinct Soviet flair. Of course no […]
Music and Dance
It’s the last day of Bisket Jatra today. Or second to last, I lost track. In comparison to huge chariots, even bigger poles and pools of chicken blood, today was almost mundane. Devotees of the various gods and goddesses walked through the streets, visiting their favourite temples. Many of them were wearing traditional Newari dresses […]
Shivaratri
“Maha Shivaratri is a Hindu festival of Nepal and India celebrated annually in reverence of the God Shiva” (wikipedia). The guys at the house had gotten pretty excited about it, as it’s the one day were one can smoke excessive amounts of weed in the streets without being considered a lowlife. Yesterday it was that […]