Kathmandu: the beautiful and the terrible

After a safe return to Jomson via horse and jostling all-terrain bus, we spent the night and woke to another spectacular view of Nilgiri on Tuesday morning.

We were delighted to see clear skies and boarded an old De Havilland DH-6 to fly back to Kathmandu via Pokhara. The airport seemed to be back to normal, and a hotel driver met us for a ride through the traffic of Kathmandu. After the pristine solitude of Lo Manthang, the big city was a shock to the senses.

Out on foot that afternoon, we visited Durbar Square and the palace of Nepal's last kings, which has become a museum in their honor and, with the surrounding temples, is a World Heritage site. The architectural details were fascinating.

Dodging the endless flow of motorbikes, scooters, and cars reminded us of our death-defying street crossings in Saigon, and we hired a tuk-tuk to our next destination, the Garden of Dreams, which was near our hotel. It's a pleasant retreat from the busyness of the city.

Whoever designed this gate had imagination and a sense of humor. The yellow is from a shop across the alley.

We hired a driver and were off at 9 a.m. the next morning for an all-day tour of more of the city's landmarks. Patan Durbar Square is the old capital, and part of the palace has been converted to a really excellent museum.

The artifacts include these gold figures of the Tibetan saint Milarepa and the Hindu deity Vishnu riding Garuda.

We ventured down the street to the Golden Temple, which dates back to 1409.

Our next stop was Boudanath, one of Buddhism's holiest sites. Though in the middle of the city, it is on the ancient trade route from Tibet, and because of the influx of refugees from Tibet, about 50 Buddhist monasteries have been established around it.

A visit to a school for Thangka artists resulting in taking home a beautiful small painting.

The final stop on Wednesday was Pashupatinath, another World Heritage Site on the banks of the Bagmati River. It's not a spot for the squeamish: this is where the deceased are cremated and the remains swept into the river, which eventually joins the Ganges. It's a real production line--four cremations were in various stages while we were there.

Animal sacrifices are also featured, this a water buffalo.

Holy men, or sadhus, also hang out here. We were told they are happy to just do yoga and smoke ganja, for which they gain the privilege of not having to reincarnate. They apparently don't disavow materialism entirely, because they wanted 1000 rupees ($10) for Judy to have her picture with them (I'll not embarass her by posting it).

Thursday morning we were off to see some of the local Hindu temples. To say the least, the immersion in Hindu ritual was an authentic experience, and we were the only Westerners at most of the sites.

Dashinkali

Pharping

Kokana

Karya Binayak

Karya Binayak

Tomorrow we're up at 5 a.m. to catch a flight to Lukla and go trekking near Everest. I hope to get some more photos of the Himalayas and the great peak itself. It'll be a few days until the next post, but more adventure is coming.

Lo Manthang: a splendid isolation

In Lo Manthang we stayed at the Mona Lisa guest house (how they arrived at the name, I don't know), where a wonderful family took care of our needs. The wife of the family, Karsang, was a smart and strong woman who prepared our meals and cared for her two-year-old, sometimes simultaneously. The husband helped with the meals, looked after the family's livestock, and in the summer was part of a team that is restoring murals in the local monasteries.





Four generations lived together, the husband and wife, the husband's 62-year-old mother, a 92-year-old blind grandmother,

and an incredibly cute and impish 2-year-old, Nawang.










Since we were the only guests, we ate in the warmth of the kitchen, and it felt for the few days we were here like we were part of the family. Cooking is done on a a very efficient dung-fired stove from China and a 2-burner propane stove. Dried horse and cow dung are used; goat droppings burn the hottest. Though there is no shortage outdoors, the family buys bags of the goat dung.

Tibetan tea was our favorite

The staple food was dal bhat, rice with lentil soup and a little vegetable curry. Because the road had been closed for months, vegetables were in short supply, but the potatoes, cabbage, and cauliflower were very tasty. I was surprised that I was able to get by in the cold weather on a vegetarian diet.

In our humble unheated room, I was happy that I'd brought a sleeping bag.

On our first day out on the streets of Lo Manthang,

we visited a temple and two monasteries. A 35-member team of locals trained by an Italian conservator has been restoring ancient Buddhist murals in a monastery and temple. A young monk showed us around. Like many people in Upper Mustang, all but two monks went south for the winter to Pokhara or Kathmandu.

Thubchen monastery contains giant mandalas with pinhead-size detail. This is said to be the finest Buddhist art in the world, and Thubchen is one of only two examples left in the world, the other being in Tibet. Karsang's husband is on the restoration team, and it took him four years to learn the technique.

He also has his own gallery.

Near the big monastery of Chhyode Gompa, what appeared to be just a pile of stones around an old chorten was in fact hundreds of inscribed tablets.

Buildings are constructed from what we call adobe bricks, but with dung instead of straw in the mud. Chhyode Gompa's walls, however, are solid tamped mud. There is little rain in Mustang, just snow, so the walls last a long time.

Upper Mustang had its own king until 2008, when Nepal changed from a monarchy to a republic. The king's main palace is here in Lo Manthang, though he winters in Kathmandu.

The locals made us feel welcome, offering a greeting of "namaste." Life is not easy here, and the culture is changing rapidly due to Chinese and other outsider influence since completion of the road. Lo Manthang is only about 10 miles from the China/Tibet border.

These people are cleaning the animal enclosures that adjoin most houses. When the snow melts, they'll take the manure out to the fields. The late snows have delayed the start of farming.

Carrying hay to feed the livestock

Most of the livestock consists of horses, cows, and the occasional donkey. I expected to see yaks, but these few that had been brought down from the mountains for the winter were the only ones I noticed.

Yard yaks

I don't think anyone has ever said "The horses are ready" to me, yet on the second day after breakfast we saddled up for a two-hour ride to the Jhong caves, a 2500-year-old village cliff residence.

The adjacent contemporary village appears to have been inhabited by the Maoist rebels during Nepal's civil war.

The old monasteries were built on hilltops, and ruins are everywhere.

Our return to the modern world retraced our steps to Jomson, first by horses through 4 inches of new snow. A group of villagers passed us with pack horses to bring goods back from the Tsarang riverbed waystation. I could not help but feel a kinship to those adventurers in the times of Marco Polo who spent months on horseback in these barren mountain expanses.

Looking back at Lo Manthang's farmland under snow, I admired these enduring people and could hardly comprehend the reality of this exceptional experience.

So farewell to the Kingdom of Lo, its stark beauty, ancient traditions, and hardy people.