One month to go till my scheduled return to Europe. There is a lot to look forward to, as I hope to see my family and a couple of friends again. Also clean air and non-bursting buses are highly tempting… It’s not all roses and butterflies, though. Over the past weeks I had a couple […]
Changu Narayan
Saturday, the Sunday of Nepal. Although most people still work seven days a week, so it’s not a proper Sunday, really. Be that as it may, I took a day off from volunteering and headed northerly out of Bhaktapur. My destination was a temple sitting atop a hill, and my aim was to get a […]
Volunteering in Bhaktapur
These days I’m staying with a Newar family in a local residential neighbourhood. The other volunteer and I are about the only white faces you’ll ever see in the streets here, which is just my cup of tea. On my way to work, I come by a smith, a vegetable merchant, a carpenter, a butcher […]
Bisket Jatra: Best of
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 […]
Return of the Chariot
It doesn’t get boring around here. The chariot had done it’s duty as a mobile temple/altar and was to be moved to its next destination. Before the procession started, everybody wanted to ring the bells that were dangling from the front of the construction. It did show some signs of the earlier blood orgy. As […]