More Rangoli

Here are some pretty examples of rangoli spotted outside shops here in Kathmandu.







Note the trail of toilet paper inside the shop. Much more sensible than getting clay paint all over the carpet.

I would've put up a few more pictures, but I've somehow managed to almost hit my monthly Flickr upload limit in one week.

Rangoli and Lakshmi Puja

So two days ago, right after Kukur Puja (where the dogs were dressed with mallas around their necks and had tika placed on their foreheads), it was Lakshmi Puja, where households welcome the Lakshmi, the goddess of wealth into their homes.

Part of the preparation for this was by painting a rangoli, a kind of floor painting, just outside the threshold to one's house or shop. Using a kind of clay mixed with water, a path was then painted from that first rangoli into the building, usually to the puja room (the room reserved for worship). It just so happened that our friends L. and S. live on the 4th floor of their building, so there were a few more obstacles to overcome, in addition to all the little kids clamouring to see what we foreigners were up to.

Although women are traditionally in charge of rangoli painting, S. allowed me to help out. Lauren, Sara and I then took turns to do the painting.


Sara painting up the stairs - large circles were also painted at certain points along the path, especially when the path turned or when it branched out to another family's apartment.


And as if the path wasn't enough to entice Lakshmi to enter the house, footprints were also painted onto the path - the white prints were made from some mixture of flour and water, while the red 'toe prints' were made by applying red powder using one's five fingers. After taking over from S., Sara had the more difficult task of applying the white flour mixture, while I followed from behind adding the little toe prints.



Once the footprints had been applied, an offering was placed at the entrance to the building.



Going back up to the apartment, Sara had the job of scattering marigold petals on the path, while I followed behind with incense and candles which needed to be lit as offerings at every large circle along the path between the entrance and the puja room.



The whole affair took about 2 hours to complete, after which the clay we used to paint the floor was mixed with the white flour mixture (?) and some grains, and applied to our foreheads as tika.

I am so glad I decided to stay in Nepal for Tihar and not fly out early to India for Diwali (which was one possible option). Not so sure my stomach agrees right now, given the amount of shel roti I've consumed, but that's for another post.

Reserving an Indian Railways Ticket

For the past few days I've been trying to reserve an Indian Railways ticket for my train ride from Guwahati in Assam to Dimapur in Nagaland. I've tried using two credit / debit cards which have both worked when booking flights and buying stuff off the net.

So far, I have received a few copies of the following two error messages:

We deeply regret that this reservation (reference no.XXXXXXXXXX) requested by you did not materialize as the Communication Problem. Kindly retry the booking if you have not been able to complete your booking yet. We apologize for the inconvenience caused to you. If the amount was Debited from your Account,We shall be making the refund back to your account shortly and it will start reflecting in your bank statement in 3 to 4 working days.

Yes, the Communication Problem.

And in typical Indian bureaucratic fashion, the message essentially blames the client for the fault, before suggesting that the transaction might have actually taken place:

We regret that the booking of your ticket could not be processed at this time as the transaction with ref. No. XXXXXXXXXX was not authorised by your bankers. The failure may also be due to some sort of inadequacies in your card / bank account.
You may kindly try using another valid card / account.
However, before proceeding further, we suggest that you kindly check from your 'Booked tickets' history if transaction has already been booked by you.

Sigh.

Mani Rimdu

The festival of Mani Rimdu at Tengboche, sometimes referred to that 'dancing monk' festival, takes place in the 9th Tibetan month, usually sometime in late October. The main festivities last three days - I believe right after the full moon, though preparations start much earlier. The 16th day is the most important day when the monks from the monastery perform a number of masked dances in the courtyard of the monastery.

The name 'Mani Rimbu' comes from the 'Mani', which forms part of the Avalokiteshvara (or Chenrezig in Tibetan) chant 'Om mani padme hum'. 'Rimdu' is from 'rildu', referring to the small red pills that are blessed and distributed at the main empowerment ceremony. (Note: I'm not sure how the alveolar lateral becomes a bilabial nasal here, not an alveolar nasal 'n', but it could just be one more step in the process of sound dissimilation.)

The Tengboche Monastery


It just so happened that the main festival day was taking place right in the middle of my short visit to Khumbu, so I decided to do the three hour hike from Khumjung to Tengboche (and back) to catch a glimpse of some of the festivities. It was a fun day, though I don't know if I would've liked to have spent the whole day and a night at the festival by myself (Sara had gone off trekking to the stunningly gorgeous area around Gokyo). In any case, I took her advice and got the little sheet of paper at the visitor centre which explained each dance.

While I arrived around 9.30am, the first dance I got to see was about an hour later (and after a piece of applie pie and pot of milk tea). The Ging-cham is performed by four dancers - two females with drums and two males with cymbals who act as the heralds of Dorje Trollo, the 'wrathful appearance' of the Rinpoche who established Buddhism in Tibet (I'm not quite sure why he would be wrathful), and a kind of patron of the monastery.

Ging-cham


Dorje Trollo appears


Nga-cham was my favourite dance, featuring a pair of 'skeleton' dancers with rather monkey-like movements.



At one point, the two skeletons take the ends of a rope, in the middle of which is tied a dough figure which represents evil. Two dancers in big black hats destroy this dough figure.





As a comic interlude, a monk appears as an old man, named 'Mi Tsering', who grabs an audience member, usually a poor unsuspecting tourist and drags them around the courtyard making them do silly things from exchanging hats to mixing flour and water throwing the mixture at people in the crowd. I'd heard the girl who got dragged along from the ride say earlier that she had to get to Machhermo - about 5 hours away - by nightfall. The poor thing...



Between dances, monks would come around and offer biscuits and milk tea. I'm not a big fan of hot drinks in small plastic cups, though it stop me from having my 6th cup of the morning.



There were a number of other dances, but I figured I needed to leave by early enough to get back to Khumjung by nightfall. Before I left, I was glad I managed to spot a monk with his digital camera filming some of the dancing - after all, why should the tourists get all the fun?

Wildlife of Khumbu

So while the brochures talk about musk deer, himalayan tahrs, wild yaks and the elusive snow leopard, the reality is that the most wildlife visitors to the Khumbu region are going to see are birds. Not that I'm complaining, since I've loved birdwatching from back when I lived in Singapore and I've trained my eyes to spot small things flitting through trees and bushes.

I only wish I had a book to help identify the birds I did see. A digital SLR with a big-ass lens would've been nice too...

Some small passerines (not terribly exciting for most)




Pheasants (the males are the colourful ones)




And raptors / birds of prey. This falcon was hovering directly over a single spot. Quite impressive given the winds looked pretty strong.


I originally hought this raptor was an eagle, but looking at its head, it could've been a vulture...


My favourite shot of the raptor with Everest, Lhotse and Ama Dablam in the background


Yup, a big-ass lens would've been nice.

Dog's Day

Before I keep posting about my recent trip to Solukhumbu to see Mt Everest, I should say that we're into the 3rd / 4th day of Tihar here in Nepal. I say 3rd / 4th because the days of Tihar don't necessarily equate with solar days - yesterday afternoon it was Lakshmi Puja, which falls on the 3rd day when people pray to Lakshmi the goddess of wealth to come visit their homes and people smash sweet things on pictures of her face and paint their floors (but more on this later).

Yesterday morning however, it was Kukur Puja, the day when dogs are worshipped and given cute little mallas (garlands, usually marigold) to wear around their cute little necks. They also get red tika on their cute little foreheads.



Dogs seem to be worshipped on this day for a number of reasons, mostly related to their role in people's afterlifes. Some say they are messengers of the god of death, some say they guard the entrance to the underworld (think Cerberus), some say they guide the souls of the dead.





Whatever the reason, it's a great day to take photos of the otherwise confused little canines who get treated like dirt the other 364 years of the year!





That's it for now. I'm off to eat more shel roti!

Lukla to Khumjung (II)

From Phakding, my porter Pemba and I climbed up to Namche Bazaar, where I spent the night to recover and acclimatise. I was half expecting to wake up in the middle of the night gasping for air, which some of my friends had warned me about. However, all I remember was waking up throughout the night and feeling really weak in the morning. It felt just like a bad flu, without nose-related symptoms - I did recall waking up in the middle of the night and realising that for the first time in weeks, my nostrils were clear!

Note that many travellers actually spend two nights in Namche, but I was trying to get to Khumjung as quickly as possible to see Sara at her field site before she headed off to Gokyo. At the time however, I really thought it was a flu bug, and the next morning I pushed on up the steep steps towards Khumjung.

Namche Bazaar from above


The terrifying steps leading up (or down) from Namche.


On the way up, I saw a few people skydiving from of a small aircraft. The same aircraft landed soon right above the steps we were climbing.





I was later told that there's only a small window of opportunity to skydive from one of the highest dropzones in the world - the highest is if you jump out of a helicopter at Gorak Shep according to the Everest Skydive website. They only do jumps for a week or two in October and May every year.

We soon reached Syangboche (though I wasn't feeling great and needed to stop every few minutes), where one of the world's highest airstrips -if not the highest- is located. According to the website, guests at the nearby Everest View Hotel can fly directly to Syangboche, so they don't need to make the trek from Lukla. Other websites however suggest that this is no longer the case, as too many people would suffer from altitude sickness and the supplementary oxygen provided in the hotel's rooms didn't help much.







In any case, after leaving the landing strip, we climbed a small ridge, and once over that ridge found ourselves in Khumjung. By this time, I was absolutely exhausted and felt like crap. I don't remember much from then, apart from having a cup of milk tea, taking a photo with Pemba, my porter / guide, and downing a bowl of garlic soup before crashing in bed till dinnertime some six hours later.

Me with Pemba


Next time, I would probably spend an extra night in Namche. But at least I started feeling better my second day in Khumjung.