A Field TRIP!!!

On the 15^th we got to go to Bhaktapur for a field trip.  Bhaktapur is an old royal city just outside of Kathmandu.  After careful consideration I managed to forget my camera, so all the pictures (assuming they load) are from my friend’s camera.  Anyways, we left nice and early on a chartered bus and three hours later we made it to Bhaktapur.  The first thing we did was eat at a pre-arranged nice-ish restaurant.  I had pizza which aside from being tiny was really, really delicious.  It contained real cheese and real tomato sauce.  I ate and paid quickly and then headed out to grab some street food.  I got a samosa, some tea, and a little biscotti type thing.

The streets of Bhaktapur

 Then we all headed into the tourist area. Peace Corps had arranged guides, so we took a nice guided tour of the city, and saw many of the different temples and squares. Most were built between the 14^thand 17^th centuries. One of everybody’s favorites was the one with all the inappropriate and extremely intricate carvings on it. It must have been made before Nepali culture got quite so conservative concerning sex and whatnot; at any rate it produced some good giggles from us.

Sculptures

It's sideways, but you get the idea

Very intricate snake heads.  Forbidden entrance for all non-Hindus

Snake pool, some of the sculptures were damaged in an earthquake in 1934.

Again, sideways and re-uploading would be a hassle, but it's a cool snake sculpture.

 

 Once again I found some pretty good food.  The area is known for its yogurt which I quickly found and sampled.  It was pretty yummy.  I also sampled some street ice cream which was sold by a guy with a wooden “cooler” on the back of his bike which contained some mostly frozen, extremely creamy, and highly delicious ice cream that when paired with a cone was way good.  Ice cream bars were also available in some of the stores for 50 NR (Nepali Rupees), but the street ice cream was only 5 NR.  Later in the day I found a place that sold sausage which was probably my favorite snack of the day because I spent most of the day eating pretty much solely sugar foods and was fairly nauseous at that point.  The water buffalo sausage really hit the spot and settled things down for the long bus ride home.

The area was super touristy.  There were the expected beggars and every other person you saw approached and said they were a tour guide and would give you a good price if you wanted a tour.  Also, there were a lot of artsy things and really pretty pashmina scarves.  Man those are super-duper soft.  One of the squares was the pottery square where you could watch some potters spin these huge pottery wheels and shape various potteries.  It was mesmerizing watching these guys work because you really couldn’t see what they were doing with their hands.  They would just sort of twitch a little and the cup they had on the wheel would magically turn into a vase of sorts.  I’ve always thought pottery was neat, but this was really something else. 

One of the potters, pretty sweet stuff

 

Pottery square with me looking off in the distance...probably at street ice cream

We also stopped into a painting school, and watched some of the students paint.  They had an ample supply of finished paintings for sale of course, but it was crazy to hear how long some people worked on the paintings.  The bigger paintings averaged about 49 months of work.  They usually had some sort of Buddhist or Hindu meaning behind them; I just thought they were really neat.

 A painter

49 months of work

More art

 

It was very nice to get away from our little village and town area for a day and see a bit of the country, try some interesting food, and experience some of the cultural heritage of Nepal.

The tallest temple in the city.

Another square in the city with an old palace thingy in the background.