"No. Not at all," Kendra replied, and I laughed at her rejection, while we both kept gazing contentedly out into the void despite the raucous monkey fights all around us. We were at Swayambunath, the Monkey Temple, and had been loitering since mid-afternoon to watch the sun set over Kathmandu. We were waiting in anticipation of seeing the city alight for the festival of Diwali.
This shop is ready to get the party started
Diwali is a major Hindu holiday also known as the Festival of Lights. It's celebrated in autumn, and we had the good luck to be here while the celebrations were happening. To quote the ever-eloquent Wikipedia, "The festival spiritually signifies the victory of light over darkness, knowledge over ignorance, good over evil, and hope over despair... On Diwali night, Hindus dress up in new clothes or their best outfit, light up diyas (lamps and candles) inside and outside their home, participate in family puja (prayers) typically to Lakshmi – the goddess of wealth and prosperity" Nepal is the only country to have Hinduism as its official religion (even though I believe India is basically de facto Hindi as well), and Diwali is an official holiday. In the days preceding Diwali night, Crows were first honored as "the messengers of Death" with treats. The next day, Dogs were honored as the guides to the afterlife. All of the stray dogs were dressed in wreaths and even adorned with Hindi red dots on their forehead. The poor condition of the stray dogs had been bothering me unsurprisingly, and seeing the dogs in their at-best lean condition trotting around wearing a wreath was comical if not actually sad. At the very least, they all seemed to be given a biscuit or bowl of rice, so they had a meal for the day. Then the most sacred animal, Cows, were honored, and finally it was time to attract the attention of lakshmi with lights, candles, and decorative sand mandalas.
Diwali is a major Hindu holiday also known as the Festival of Lights. It's celebrated in autumn, and we had the good luck to be here while the celebrations were happening. To quote the ever-eloquent Wikipedia, "The festival spiritually signifies the victory of light over darkness, knowledge over ignorance, good over evil, and hope over despair... On Diwali night, Hindus dress up in new clothes or their best outfit, light up diyas (lamps and candles) inside and outside their home, participate in family puja (prayers) typically to Lakshmi – the goddess of wealth and prosperity" Nepal is the only country to have Hinduism as its official religion (even though I believe India is basically de facto Hindi as well), and Diwali is an official holiday. In the days preceding Diwali night, Crows were first honored as "the messengers of Death" with treats. The next day, Dogs were honored as the guides to the afterlife. All of the stray dogs were dressed in wreaths and even adorned with Hindi red dots on their forehead. The poor condition of the stray dogs had been bothering me unsurprisingly, and seeing the dogs in their at-best lean condition trotting around wearing a wreath was comical if not actually sad. At the very least, they all seemed to be given a biscuit or bowl of rice, so they had a meal for the day. Then the most sacred animal, Cows, were honored, and finally it was time to attract the attention of lakshmi with lights, candles, and decorative sand mandalas.
Seru, our landlord's dog, looking festive
Selling wreaths and decorative chains of flowers
To attract the goddess of wealth to your home, you would light up the house with festive lights, adorn candles, and make a sand mandala at your doorstep with a path leading inside (or, for businesses, a very non-subtle path to your cash register). This made for a really wonderful aesthetic a out the city, as virtually every door had a mandala, candles were lit all about, and lights adorned most buildings. Having Wednesday off, the residents had advised me to head up to Swayambunath, a hilltop temple over-looking Kathmandu, to watch sunset fall over the city. It was an excellent suggestion, particularly since this temple is one of the main culture sights of Kathmandu and we were going to have to see it anyway.
The challenge of getting around Kathmandu is that there was literally no city planning, making for a chaotic maze of streets, and the petrol crisis makes taxis untenable for Kendra and I. Even though the dollar is so strong that a rupees is equivalent to 1 cent, the fuel crisis had taxi prices inflated. Kendra could easily afford this, of course, but she made the unfortunate decision of marrying me and I can essentially afford nothing. In a stroke of luck, however, I was here with Travel Kendra, and Travel Kendra will not be denied a cultural sight. She'd figured out how to take the government bus up north to the commercial district of Thamel (ie the over-touristed 'Chang Mai' of Kathmandu), then we could walk the remainder, about an hour. The green government bus departed just as we arrived at the relatively nondescript bus stop, but another one followed in short order and we had the incredible luck to have tons of space and seats! Unheard of in Nepali public transit. After catching our stop and paying our 15 cent fares, we set about walking west to Swayambunath. Seeing a taxi, though, we asked about the price and learned it was $7. We decided $7 was just about worth it and hopped in, glad to for once be on the giving end of all of the honking that takes place here. The road turned upward and we were glad to have taken the trip.
We reached a bustling market at the base of a long stairway and hopped out of the taxi. True to form, a large band of +20 monkeys, several with baby monkeys, walked across the road ahead and started fishing around for food in a dump. Kendra then became quite the monkey paparazzi as she took photos among the brightly lit garbage. Now, it's to be said that I love all animals. I joke (it's not really a joke) that I became a human doctor rather than a veterinarian because I had too much sympathy for animals. Sympathy, that is, except for monkeys (specifically Macaques), who are furry fanged hellspawn demons that don't even deserve the garbage they were rooting around in.
[Explanation: Kendra and I were on monkey beach in Phi Phi Don, Thailand, and a troop of monkeys took it upon themselves to try to relieve me of my tuna sandwich. The sandwich actually was quite terrible, so the selfish monkeys would've deserved it, but I fought them on principle. The whole affair ended up with me backed up into the surf while several dog-sized macaques bared their 1.5in long fangs at me and made rushes at my feet trying to scare me into giving them my sandwich. Safe in the water from their savage monkey bites, I made them watch me eat my sandwich and took my time slowly chewing big bites. They lost interest when a tourist bus arrived loaded with bread. Meanwhile, in a beautiful demonstration of the different genders' approaches to conflict resolution, Kendra had been sitting peacefully holding her sandwich among monkeys playing at our picnic site and was video taping the whole affair.]
After the monkey dump photo shoot, we turned our attention toward the ~400 stairs leading up to the hilltop monkey temple. Kendra stopped to take a picture of two more picturesquely posed monkeys until I mentioned they were, uh, mating, and laughing in surprise/disgust we kept on walking (if you were traveling with us, you'd frequently observe that I'm quite the buffoon and Kendra is the consummate reserved world traveller, but Kendra's not writing this blog so I can say whatever I want). We had our first experience with someone begging at the base of the stairs, a young woman holding her baby. She was surprisingly persistent, but we've long held to the principle of supporting charities but not giving people money directly (eg in Rochester we give money to the homeless shelter, not the few panhandlers at the roadside, who we've incidentally learned- through Kendra's work at the shelter - make more money per hour than I do).
Climbing up the steps was a fun chore, and they actually became strikingly steep towards the top. We paid our couple dollar entry fee, which the ticket promised was to put toward maintenance of the site, which is hilarious, and crested the steps to the top. On the drive to the stairs, and then during the climb up, we caught glimpses of Kathmandu well below us, and it was beautiful to see the entire city spread out to the horizon, the omnipresent honking of cars and motorbikes intermittently wafting up from below. Monkeys were practically everywhere, and were I not engaged in a one-sided grudge war of resentment, would be entertaining, while the aforementioned hawks floated all around. We walked around the temple, clockwise to be respectful, and Kendra set about photo documenting all the unique sights, vistas, and textures with her camera. The photos can paint the scene much better than I can describe.
We ended up spending several hours at the hilltop as we waited for darkness to descend. Slowly but surely the sun fell behind the mountains that frame Kathmandu Valley, and then darkness quickly descended over Kathmandu. The city delivered and made the impression it had promised, with lights popping up all over the city as the light faded.
Having accomplished our mission, we headed back down the steps. It was fun to hear the monkeys making surprisingly loud and violent calls in the darkness as it gave the staircase a very primitive feel. We caught a taxi at the base (for which Kendra expertly kept the price to $7. "Ten dollars?! No, seven dollars. Yes it is night time but there are many taxis. You don't want $7 price? Fine, we walk to him and offer it" <turns back to walk away> Okay, okay, $7. Thank you very much." So brutal. I love her).
The taxi through the Thamel area was actually one of the coolest parts of the excursion. We looked out from the cramped cabin into narrow streets and alleyways awash with people, motorbikes, colors, candles, lights, and sand mandalas.
Reaching Thamel, we set about finding our bus stop. After a circuitous walk and a half hour or so wait, the government bus arrived and we hopped on. They were a bit over-eager in their departure from the bus stop (in fact, I'm not entirely sure they even stopped the micro-bus completely), and Kendra took a spill on-entry bumping her shin. She was a champion though and brushed it off, and we headed back home.
Or so we thought. This bus turned out to be going in the wrong direction, but a nice man on the bus took it upon himself to be our guide (the Nepali people, basically to a person, are extremely helpful, polite, and self-sacrificing. In fact, Kendra has only once, this entire trip, been "ogled," when someone told her "You are cute." Compared to her experience in India - with throngs of men following her around, many blatantly video taping her with their camera phones - it's quite charming). We hopped off the bus with our new friend and waited at an unmarked bus stop. A micro bus arrived but it was literally overflowing with people and we couldn't make it on. Our Nepali friend was able to ask a taxi for the price, 500 rupees ($5, Kendra had been quoted $20-30 for the same length trip a couple days prior), and I took them up on it ( a bit preemptively, it seems, but it worked out). In exchange for our guides' help, and another guy who I offered a ride to after he confirmed our trip for $5 with the driver, we took off down the road and reached our neighborhood. Then Kendra and I, having not had any water or food for the past 7 hours or so, went to a western style restaurant and had water, banana lassis, a pizza and schwarma in a shameless feast. It was a great day in Kathmandu.
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