Boodha, Boodha, Boodha

The micro-bus conductors call out the destinations of the buses as the drive by the "bus stops". The call for the bus to Boudhanath always ends with Boodha, Boodha, Boodha. Three times.

Let me introduce you to one of my favorite places. Boudhanath. To me, this place is magical. Not only for the incredibly sacred stupa that dominates the region and many monasteries, but also because of the people.

My days in Boudha began and ended walking around the stupa. I would get up at 5 am every morning to circum-ambulate (always clockwise and always an odd number of times) the great stupa. Sometimes I would go with my friend Pasang who insisted on 15 times around the stupa. This took about an hour. Other times I would go by myself and only do 3 times around the stupa. This took about 15 minutes. If you're paying attention you might have realized that Pasang made me walk rather quickly.

I spent the full moon in Boudha. The full moon is a sacred day and the Tibetans feel that your religious prostrations have extra strength on this day. The day after the full moon was Boudha Jyanti - Buddha's birthday - to the Nepalis. So it was two wild and crazy religious days filled with lots of people lighting butter lamps, circum-ambulating, and prostrasting in the stupa area.

In an aside - I've found 3 different days that are Buddha's birthday. In India it is April 8. For the Nepalis it is May 21. For the Tibetans, it is June 19. Pick your day! Or celebrate them all.

Boudhanath is home to a large Tibetan refugee population. The Tibetans are amazingly welcoming. My friends spent their days off showing me around and introducing me to Tibetan culture ... from anything to making momos to meeting Rinpoches. They invited me into their homes, fed me countless numbers of times, and spent some of the best hours of my trip with me. Thank you so much Nyindha, Pasang, Dolma, and Pasang.

Rooftop Playgrounds

In Kathmandu the roof is the place to be. In the morning women do all their washing on the roofs and when they have the laundry hanging on the clothes lines (also on the roof) the rooftops look covered in clothes-flags for as far as you can see. In the afternoon, after school, the kids play on the rooftops. I've watched boys play soccer and wrestle, girls skip rope and play sort of a red rover game, and watched them both watch each other. Fathers come up to the roof in the evenings to smoke and watch the sunset. It's life played out on the tops of houses.

Kathmandu is a crowded city and the roof is the backyard of these neighborhoods. They are nicely decorated with blooming flowers in pots. The roof where I'm staying has a nice table for eating meals, writing, and watching all the other rooftop activities. I've spent hours on this roof, with new friends like Reshma, and it is definitely the place to be.

Micro-buses

There are several ways to get around Kathmandu - taxi, buses, and ... the best ... micro-buses. Micro-buses are little minivans that have been converted into small buses with 5 benches. They can hold around 20 people including the "conductor". Personal space issues are not acceptible on micro-buses - you might have to sit in someone's lap - and being short is definitely a benefit. Not a lot of leg room on micro-buses.

They are one of the more efficient ways of getting through Kathmandu's traffic. And cheap! You can get from one side of the city to the other for about 20 rupees (that's about 30 cents).

The conductor takes the money and tells the driver when to stop and go. He hangs out of the micro-bus sliding door and looks for people waiting for the bus. Two bangs on the roof means go. One bang on the roof means stop. He also helps navigate the traffic and makes sure the micro-bus isn't going to run into anything (at least on the sliding door side of the bus).

I've been getting adventurous with the micro-buses. I get a lot of interesting looks as it is not often to see a bedishee (foreigner) on a micro-bus. Last week I took a micro-bus from Jawalahkel to Ratna Park, changed to another micro-bus to go to Boddhanath. And made the return trip. I was on the final leg of the return journey, congratulating myself, when the bus turned down a street I didn't know. Hold on. When we got to the last stop I figured out I'd gotten on the micro-bus to Lagankhel instead of Jawalahkel. Oops. Luckily, in addition to sounding a lot alike, they are pretty close together and you can walk (or take another micro-bus) between the two. That's what I get for congratulating myself early.

This is Ratna Park, which is a large park close to the center of Kathmandu, with a bunch of micro-buses and a larger local bus.

Curd

The best curd (aka yogurt) apparently comes from Bhaktapur. It comes in a unglazed clay pot with a film of wax paper on top from a little grocery on the road. The clay pot is considered disposable. When you're done with it, you chuck it and it eventually dissolves back into the mud. Bhaktapur is an artisans town in the Kathmandu Valley where they also make the pots.

Curd is given to people for luck on special occassions - like Hindi weddings. It's is also a good snack and can come as a side to the Nepali national dish dahl baht. It's pretty sweet and tastes really good with ripe mangos. The mangos are Indian mangos and taste a little different from the ones that come from Mexico. But it's still yummy nonetheless!

The 40,000 1/2 ft Bar

Who has read The Ascent of Rum Doodle? Wikipedia has a good summary. It's essential reading for any of you mountaineering types out there and a highly recommended book which has bit of a cult following here in Thamel.

In addition to being able to find the book in every used book store in Thamel, there is also the Rum Doodle Restaurant and Bar which boasts of a 40,000 1/2 ft bar. Not really, but that's part of the point. Read the book - you'll get the reference. This is a pretty famous place, with memorabilia from all the famous climbers I've heard about - like Sir Ed and Rob Hall. But the interesting signatures are from the sherpas who have climbed Everest 12 and 16 times. Wow.

Thanks Don for lending me the book years ago ... so I could be in the in crowd! That's Justin-the-want-to-be-Rum-Doodle-Ascender in the photo outside the restaurant.