Kathmandu with the holy town still in the gutsWe quickly left Varanasi to allow us to celebrate Ulrike’s birth day in the relaxing Kathmandu. Varanasi was a short experience but full of contrasts:
- undisturbed cows in the traffic jam
- the dirt: as soon as something has been built, even a toilet, street or house, it becomes a little more dirty every day. Water is not meant for cleaning here.
- evening rituals: Hindu monks with sparkling orange dresses bring an ode to the Ganges. Lots of western and Indian tourists watch and clap their hands on the dissimilar rhythm of drums, bells and singing. The atmosphere of a festival in the evening with aromatic incense. (see short film…)
- little boys trying to sell us paint stuff, stones, plastic birds, making jokes and guessing which land we are from
- tourists: we were photographed a few times by Indy’s while being tourist ourselves. So that’s how it feels!
The atmosphere in Varanasi is of an abundant holiness, with streams of people bathing in the Ganges in order to have a good life, of to prepare their death. According to the Hindu religion this is the ideal place to die. Day and night body cremations are taking place. This ritual is as obvious as all other occupations and it doesn’t feel strange at all to see.
We left Varanasi by night train, but we didn’t hear about the incident Andreas reported to us (panic in a station near Varanasi which caused deaths). We can imagine those things happening in that stir and people walking simply over the railway.
It took thirty hours before we arrived in Kathmandu town at night. As our bus was cancelled for unknown reasons at the boarder of Nepal, we rented a mini bus together with two Indy’s and two Nepali. They proved to be very agreeable international company and we learned a lot about life in Nepal, caste system in India, and they learned about our ‘love marriage’, which for them is rather unusual.
It is lovely to be in Kathmandu although Varanasi is still making havoc in our guts. So in stead of a birth day cake for Ulrike, there was a banana with little candles.
We are enjoying the little restaurants, pretty pavements, strolling about, reading booklets, visiting the old town. We are in contact with the orphanage and itching to start ‘working’. We are so anxious to see the kids and what we will be able to do for them.
Here are some more pictures and videos:
Pictures of Kathmandu
Pictures of Varanasi
Video Ganges 2
Ritual bathing in Ganges
Love!
Report from 4/10/2007, translated by Mieke
Steve and Ulrike
10/10/2007 - 7:01
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