This morning I went for an early walk to Swayambhunath Stupa, commonly known as the Monkey Temple. Armed with a hand-drawn map and a sense of adventure, I decided to walk there rather than take a taxi. Kathmandu wakes up late, so at 8am, the streets were calm and pleasant. In the way there, I met a very nice monk that told me about Nepalese politics and how the Maoist grabed power and changed the country from a monarchy to a democracy.
After a 25 minutes walk, I was at the bottom of the steep steps that lead to the temple. The temple is well known by the large troop of monkeys that patrol it. The monkeys are a pleasure to look at, jumping all over, showing their climbing skills by using the praying flags and making use of the many pools in the lower part of the temple. They can be aggressive towards people with food, but as I didn't have any, they just ignored me.
The temple complex is bigger than it looks, with several levels, many shrines, and a monastery. In one of the shrines, a flag seller invited me to enter Shantipur which translate as the House of Peace. The temple is just a locked door surrounded by frescos. The flag seller told me that the door leads to two other locked doors that protect an underground chamber where a Tantric master lives since the 8th century. The Tantric master keeps alive thanks to his meditation techniques. He also has control over the weather, so in times of drought, the king will enter the chamber and ask the master for a mandala (scroll) to command the weather. The moment that the mandala is shown to the sky, clouds will gather and it will start to rain.
After visiting the temple, I came back to the hotel for a bit of a rest. The walk back was very different as it was time for kids to go to school, so they were thousands of children in school uniforms walking the streets.
Next I went for a "random walk" on the medieval streets south of Thamel. It was an amazing experience and a reminder of what makes Kathmandu an interesting city. Just around every corner there is a shrine. Very few are signed, but the ones that I was able to located on my book date from as further back as the 5th century. The sculptures in some of the shrines would be major pieces of art in any western museum.
After finding my way out of the maze of streets, I headed back again to the hotel for my introductory meeting with the Intrepid group with whom I'll be spending the next 2 week... It turned that it will be 4 Australian girls and me.
After the meeting, we headed to KEEP, a NGO that tries to minimize the impact of trekkers on the mountain environment. Most of the presentation was a rehash of Minimum Impact but they were some interesting comments about Sherpa and Nepalese culture (never point with your feet, don't walk on any "clean" surface, receive or hands things using both hands or your right hand).
I then headed to Durbar square. One of the main attractions of Kathmandu. This is an amazing square that reminds me of a square in a medieval European city. From the maze of tiny streets, you suddenly arrive to a large square with multiple temples. If you don't look Nepalese, you will be asked to pay about $4 to tour the square (if you have a passport picture, you can trade the ticket for a visitor pass that is valid for the length of your stay; or without a picture, you can get a 3 day pass for any three consecutive days of your choosing).
I hired a local guide that gave me an excellent description of each of the temples and a rare sighting of the Living Goddess. The current Living Goddess is a little girl just 4 years old. She is believed to be the incarnation of the goddess Taleju and she is selected by testing her under 32 different criteria, including beauty, intelligence, and courage. Her status of Living Goddess ends when she reverts to be just a human by having her first menstruation.
Tomorrow I'm heading to the mountains with a very early flight to Lukla and a 3-hour hike to Phakding. I'm not sure about Internet access during the next two weeks, but I'll update the blog as often as I can.
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