Kathmandu and Around
A Tribute of Words for Nepal
I visited Nepal this year from February 26th to Mar 1st. This was in the middle of a trip to Bangladesh. I went with an interesting group. My nana, grandfather, was attending a conference on Anesthesiology there. Many of the attendees took taking their family. I asked him if he could manage a ticket for me. I needed to get out of Dhaka badly.
The conference was very different from conferences I had attended in US. Initially I felt a little bad about barging into his professional trip. But at the airport I saw the attendees and all the family members. Almost everybody was taking there spouses and kids. I was even more surprised to see
the conference program. It was planned so that the attendees would be out early in the afternoon everyday and could go sight seeing.
In the morning we would explore the city. We had different goals. Some wanted to buy jewelry — me, me, me. Some wanted to buy scarves and some the incredibly cheap Chinese clothing. I found a piece of worship thing at each intersection and alley in Kathmandu. They were casually there with the people walking to their work, by the vegetable garden, in the hustle and bustle of the city life. This mandir was behind a store we went.
Swayambhunath was on the schedule the first afternoon. It was raining and the himalayas were behind the gloom. But that did not stop me from climbing up those stairs.
I still cannot believe this 1500 year old shrine was damaged by the earthquake. I am in denial. The square behind me is the Swayambhunath stupa. You can see the eyes of Nepal a little bit. This triplet of eyes are everywhere symbolizing the omnipresence of Buddha – inside us and outwards of us.
One of the images are of the statute of Vairochana buddha there. I really loved the co-existence of different religions and their Gods at Nepal.
Swayambhunath from my hotel
The Gala dinner at the conference included the family, too. I got to experience a lovely program by top local dancers and singers. I wish my camera had a better sports mode to capture them.
This is one of the biggest intersections at Kathmandu. One of the days that we were there a big rally was going on. All the twenty something political parties were marching to a big gathering. In Bangladesh it would translate to a huge chaos. But not there.
I loved the small town feel and the slow pace of this city. The buildings were only few stories, many were old. The shops were not shiny. The cars looked almost antique.
Our tour guide, Shobnam, was telling us that the everest can be seen from few places in Nepal, Nagorkot, Dhulekhel and Pokhra. I couldn’t verify this online. But they seem to be the tourist spots. I didn’t get any updates of Shobnom after the earthquackes. Our trip included a day trip to Nagorkot and a night stay at Dhulikhel.
The resort at Dhuikhel was pretty fancy. There were more modern amanities compared to our hotel at Kathmundu. There were more tourists, too. There was a fancy coffee shop, a wood burning fireplace, a curated garden. Our touring company had arranged a fancy party with bonfire, food and dance floor music. This resort was destroyed, too.
By the last day of the tour was I restless. I wouldn’t leave Nepal without a hike. I asked around the Dhulikhel Lodge and the consensus was that the Kali temple was something we could hike up to in the morning. Most said it is a half an hour walk.
Well, they did not quite tell us that the tiny golden Buddha that we could see from our lodge was at the Kali temple.
We had no maps and no compass. We kept asking the locals for directions and time to get there. The estimates were always half an hour. After walking through the town for half an hour it was still fifteen minutes. But finally my broken knowledge of Hindi from watching all those movies over the years were coming handy.
Though at Kathmandu everybody could communicate well in English, at Dhulikhel Hindi was the only common language we could communicate over. I heard its common for residents of a touristy place to be multilingual. But this was my first experience with it.
Another thing I loved about Nepal was how pervasive women were out on the streets. We drove around a lot. Many shops were run by women. I saw women running coffee shops, copy shops and auto-parts shops. I saw women work in the wee hours of night and on shady tour buses. I saw women in ethnic sharis, kurtas, jeans and dresses. I saw women dance to their hearts content.
The walk through the town was nice. We saw the kids walking in their uniforms. Way up there across the hill was a school. We met the gym teacher and he really insisted we go and see it. I wish I had time. It would have been an awesome experience. I wonder how Dhulikhel was effected. How everybody is doing up there. I here the resort is gone and so is the buddha’s head.
After two hours we finally hiked to the top. We stopped at the Shanti Ban Buddha for few minutes. Then we went all the way up on the top for that perfect panaroma. Mehran had to be my model for scale. There was something about the Himalayas. They were so peaceful and so calm. They could make this restless one pause and stare. I was in that perfect meditative state where I could let all the thoughts passing by just pass by. I could let go.
Let’s donate for the rescue efforts and to rebuild. Lets save the people who take care of this piece of heaven on earth.
Agami, a non-profit that I am a executive of, is working with local groups to rebuild few schools. My friends at Spreeha suggested RoomToRead and Splash. GlobalGiving and few other big names were on NYTimes.
