Tihar

Today is Newari New Year, a part of the Tihar festival. Newaris are the indiginous people of Kathmandu Valley and we are now in the year 1138. Woo!

The Tihar festival is made up of several days honoring different animals and people.

First day, the crows, the messengers of death, they are fed corn and rice.

Second day, the dogs, they are the guides over the river of death and decorated with tika and garlands of flowers.

Third day, festival of light or Deepawali. The Goddess of wealth, Lakshmi, visits all the homes during the night. Everyone wants a visit and so they light their homes with butterlamps to guide her way.

Fourth day, Newari New Year and honouring your self. Mandalas are drawn by individuals (the circles of colourful designs), which are said to represent the God within yourself and your soul. According to this I am a compass and Martyn is chaos! There is then a long ceremony of puja, which we were able to take part in through our wonderful host, consisting of:

Making the mandala

Burning incense

Throwing wheat

Blessing a flower with yoghurt

Burning wicks

A massive tika

Having flowers poured on your head!

Eating an egg and drinking rakshi, local home brew :)

Saying namaste to the new year.

Followed by lots of food and booze!

Fifth day, Bhai Tika, honouring everyone's brothers. Brothers travel all over the valley to visit their family, especially sisters. They are honoured with a "panch tika" or five coloured tika. We can't wait for more colours and fun!

Bhaktapur

We've had a lovely 2 days in Bhaktapur. It feels more like India in as much as there are tourists but they fit round local life rather than the other way round such as in Pokhara or Thamel in Kathmandu.

The town is based around 4 squares that all have a different job, we havent quite got to the bottom of all of them but we can deduce that Potter's Square is mainly for people who make things out of clay.

But once you leave the squares you enter a labyrinth of small streets and alleyways, dotted with shrines and temples. Shops are holes in walls with older ladies selling penny sweets from big plastic tubs, or chewing tobacco (called Pan) in single serving sachets.

Now is also harvest time, all the rice has been harvested and needs to be processed. By hand of course. There are hundreds of women around the town flinging baskets of rice into the air to seperate the light outer casing from the heavier rice grain and then spreading it flat to dry in the sun. Once dried it's swept up, and into tubs or bags or whatever you can find.

Today we've finally found local food. We'd previously been overwhelmed by the number of cafes and restaurants for tourists. We had momos (a delicious steamed parcel usually filled with vegetables, chicken or my favourite, buffalo) followed by chai. With a new pudding for us Juju Dhau (literally King Curd) a set yoghurt that has a crust on top similar to clotted cream. It was creamy and delicious and obviously bad for us!

Finished the day of with a touch of souvenir shopping. Three small masks that symbolise some of the Gods. When full sized these masks are worn by dancers who twirl on raised platforms in the many squares to tell the stories of the Gods and their fury. We chose Shiva (the Destroyer. He's the blue guy, and a favourite here. So much so there's a TV show based on him!), Ganesh (the elephant headed son of Shiva) and Garuda (the vehicle of Vishnu, the Preserver. Garuda is a man-bird and is seen kneeling outside any Vishnu temple waiting to take his Lord wherever he wants to go).

We can't wait to explore further and see what else we find!

I'm uploading on my phone so I can't put the photos in order. Sorry! (also, we're still not entirely sure what all the colours are for. There's only ever red on shrines and foreheads...)