Pray For Nepal

Heard about the Nepal earthquake today and feel sad for the casualties. The quake even affect those in India, Bhutan and Tibet and also coincidentally, these are the few places I had a chance to visit three years back.

When I looked at the photos of the demolished UNESCO heritage in Kathmandu, my heart sank. I quite like Kathmandu honestly and its quirky traits and now most of the buildings were in rubble. My prayer goes to the people of Nepal and not forgetting those who are affected by the earthquake. I will forever treasure the memories and the good times I had when I was in Kathmandu 3 years back.

The Monkey Temple, Kathmandu

The eye

Or otherwise known as Swayambunath.

I only found out the name of the temple when I was busy doing my photobook for my Nepal trip. All I can recalled from the trip was that the temple is on top of a hill and full of monkeys, hence the other name as Monkey Temple. I am not going to dwell much on the history and stuff like that as wikipedia is available.
As we followed a tour, I have no idea how to get there as well, just that it's highly recommended as the scenary up the hill is gorgeous. Practically, you can see the whole of Kathmandu from the top.

And not forgetting the bad monkeys which chase us around and fighting for food. Locals do not need to pay to get in but the tourists are charged a small fee.

I always wanted to try taking this motion type of photo

Check the view from the top

Prayers flag everywhere

Patan, Kathmandu

During the last Nepal, Tibet, Bhutan trip, we spend three days in Kathmandu as we need 3 days to do our visa for the Tibet trip. On the second day we spend in Patan, a town nearby Kathmandu where it has a huge Durbar square and museum for visit. Patan is also one of the UNESCO World Heritage.


I remember we spend quite some time here as the guide probably thought that we were very interested in the history and the carvings. No doubt, it is great and astounding to see such stunning buildings, but try seeing them so much in a day.

Nevertheless, I love the carvings and how the people here chilled out during their free time. People come here for prayers most of the times as there are a few temples surrounding the Durbar Square. In case anyone confuse what Durbar means, it means market. So yeap, technically we were visiting a market and I don't even like going to market in Malaysia, haha.

Durbar square

during our visit, they have another festival going on

People chilling out

The square

Carvings

check out the carvings

People watching

view of Patan Square from across the road

Kumari, the Live Goddess

Kumari house from Durbar square

After losing my blogging mojo for the past few weeks, decided to blog something that I enjoy more; travel.

I know it's been almost a year since I visited Nepal and witnessed this event but it still remained one of the luckiest thing we encountered during the trip. Even the guide told us that it is very rare that we can see Kumari so upclose and she's out from her house at Durbar square. Each day, Kumari will appear at her window for only 1 minute and no photos are allowed. So we are very very lucky that we managed to capture her in photo while she's out from the house. According to the guide, she will only be out 3 times a year.

To those who do not know who is Kumari, basically she's a child worshiped as living goddess in Nepal. It is believed that the goddess Taleju is incarnated into young virgin girls and will leave them once they hit puberty. So there is no permanent Kumari and every time the current Kumari hit puberty, a new Kumari will be selected among young girls. So far, according to the guide, these ex Kumari girls remained unmarried.

Here's some shots I managed to get at the current Kumari.

Kumari will appear from these windows everyday for only a minute

Pashupatinath Temple, Kathmandu

Pashupatinath temple is located at the Bagmati river banks where the dead will be cremated and the ashes will be thrown into the river. Coincidentally, there were a few cremation ceremony going on when we were there in the evening. I didn't take any of the cremation ceremony photos out of the respect for the dead but we walked along the temple river banks for photos from afar.

Pashupatinath temple

People watching the cremation

See the smoke, it's the burning of the corpse

Boudhanath, The Eye of Kathmandu

The amazing Boudhanath

The eyes are located around the four sides

This ancient stupa is considered one of the largest stupa in the world and even make it into the UNESCO World Heritage. This stupa is located at the heart of Kathmandu and surrounded by tourist buildings. According to our guide, this stupa is influenced by the Tibetan culture. Around this area, we can find a lot of Tibetans making Kathmandu as their home with mostly setting up restaurant serving Tibetan and Chinese food. We even had Chinese food in one of the restaurant. Most locals and tourists will usually go around the stupa three times for luck and blessing.

Thamel, Kathmandu

Colourful, vibrant, dusty, chaotic, noisy

These are just a few words to describe Kathmandu. Every minute, we will hear some vehicle honking either behind us or even in front of us. What we learn after a few days in Kathmandu is, you just need to cross the road and the cars will try to avoid you. If you wait for the traffic light to turn to green, you will never cross as there are no traffic lights in the city. There are only polic traffics. In Malaysia, honking is very rare but in Kathmandu, it is a way to tell people that there is a vehicle coming through.

We are lucky to stay in one of the most happening place in Kathmandu, Thamel.

Thamel is very popular tourist spot in Kathmandu whereby there are many shops selling souvenirs, plenty of pretty Arabian pants (which I got myself one), colourful scarfs, many unique trinkets and not forgetting affordable books. Yes, in Kathmandu, there are plenty of book stores selling Everest base camp trekking maps, books about travel, books about Dalai Lama (I bought one since books about Dalai Lama in Tibet are illegal) and not forgetting books about religion.

The colourful signage in Thamel

For information, we booked the tour package which includes Nepal, Tibet and Bhutan from Visit Nepal Tibet. Check out the website for our testimonial and a photo of us. Highly recommended. Special thanks to Birendra for organising such memorable trip for the 3 of us.

Qomolangma

Qomolangma, the left peak

Qomolangma or Sagarmatha or better known as Everest is the tallest mountain in the world standing at more than 8000m above sea level. One of the highlights of our Tibet trip is to see Everest from the base camp but we didnt get to see in the end. Instead, we took the mountain flight from Kathmandu which enable us to see Everest and the Himalayans range from above the clouds. The flight cost us around USD 130 for an hour. Worth every dollar paid!

Some pictures for the feast of your eyes. Enjoy!

More mountain range

Himalayan range

The leng chai pilot on the right

Inside the plane with the mountain map

Gai Jatra (Cow Festival) @ Kathmandu, Nepal

locals enjoying a view of the festival

We were indeed very lucky to be in Kathmandu during one of the important festivals of Nepal.

Gai Jatra or Cow Festival is normally celebrated in Nepal during the month of August or September. The festival itself is full of humor, mockery, satire but not without sadness at the same time. Gai Jatra is a festival whereby the family 'celebrate' the passing of their loved ones during the year. During this day, those who had lost someone close during the year will come out to the streets to take part in a procession which lead by a cow or someone dress like a cow. For Hindus, the cow is a holy animal which they believe will help their loved ones to cross over to heaven. It was said the festival is the idea of the Nepal king, King Pratap after seeing his wife sadden over the death of their son.

Since we were scheduled to go to Bhaktapur on the day of the festival, we decided to leave early to join the crowd. It was a feast of colours and culture during the parade with lots of tourists and locals coming out together to celebrate the day. We saw lots of dance, locals donned in masks and colourful dresses as well as young children participating.

boy and girl goddess dressup

photographers in action

a girl enjoying the sights and sound

the locals enjoying the festival

A woman's prayer

Faces of Kathmandu

The whole month of August had been a really busy month for me as I went for a trip around Nepal, Tibet and Bhutan. Had been planning for the trip for some time since middle of last year and it's like a dream come true especially travelling with two of my besties from high school and university.

We flew in to Kathmandu via Nepal Airlines and spend 3 days before flying to Lhasa and lastly to Bhutan. We actually went in and out of Kathmandu for several times. Visa can be applied on arrival but prepared with 1 passport size photo and the visa fee. For us, we paid USD 40 for a 30 days multiple entry. Since I am still sorting out the photos, just want to share a few of my favourite shots of the people in Kathmandu.

We were lucky to be there during the 'Cow Festival' whereby the Nepalese celebrate the death of their families and relatives for the past one year. Yup, instead of mourning and sad over the passing of their loved ones, they went all out to celebrate as death signifies another beginning of another life. Coincidentally, the festival is the same day as the Hungry Ghost festival celebrated by the Chinese in Malaysia.

little boy praying

little girl praying 

family of five

heavy on her back