Name: Becky
Occupation: Student/Occassional Auxiliary Nurse/ABA Therapist/Serial traveller/owner of itchy feet
Home Towm: Bangor, North Wales
Current Location: Bangor
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| Wednesday, September 26, 2007 |
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Festival time and Nepal time!
So my trip to the orphanaged turned out to be organised in Nepal time- was meant to go Monday, then changed to Tuesday, I then asked if it could be later on Tues or today (Wed) so I could see the start of the festival, and 12 today was agreed on. After sitting downstairs with my bag, ready to go, for half and hour tried to Call Bishnu to see if he was delayed- phone was switched off. At 1 called the orphanage- he wasn't there, they weren't sure where he was, when he'd be back or whether he was meant to ba coming to meet me! Spent the rest of the afternoon trying to contact him, apart from an hour when I got fed up and went for a wander. Eventually got through to him at gone 5 to find out he had been at a funeral and so couldn't come, was it ok for him to come tomorrow?! So with any luck I should be picked up at 8 tomorrow morning! The plus side of all of that was that I got to see the start of the Indra Jatra and the parade today! The festival was due to start at about 3, so at 2:30 I decided to be wrekless and got a rickshaw to avoid the very muddy roads. it was easily far worse than the motorbike trip- at least then there were only cars and bies to avoid- here there were cars, bikes, motorbikes, people, tiny muddy children, goats, cows, chickens and other rickshaws, all of whom seemed to be competing to be the fastest, making it even scarier! It had been raining for a good 36 hours so some of the roads were more like rivers- we were going in to puddles with no idea how deep they were! After the eventful journey I was there ready to grab my place on the temple steps out of the crushing crowds, only to find there were none to be had- it was totally packed! (Have got some great photos of pyramidal temples covered in brightly coloured saris clutching umberellas!) After about 3 hours of standing about in the raining, getting moved from one area, to the 'tourist area' which actually turned out to be for journalist, then on to a nice platform with a great view, then getting pushed off there when someone in the crowd behind decided they were going to start a riot so the police dragged them out and just to be safe pushed us in the the space so we were further from the VIPs, then getting back on to there when all had calmed down, stuff started to happen!!! The balcony was filling up with various officials who kept arriving in blacked-out 4x4s, and then a group of dancers and musicians started to parade around the square, twirlling a big stick thing with stuff attached to it (will add photos when I can and this will all seem much better!). Eventully the Kumari came out and was carried to her highly decorated chariot (she's not allowed to touch the ground being a goddess and all), and the other gods (Ganesh and Kumar) were put in their less grand chariots. At this point I decided being a Hindu is a pretty good idea, as within minutes of the Kumari coming out and officially starting the celebrations for the end of the monsoon, the rain stopped! We need to get us a Kumari festival in England! (It did start again later though and has rained all today, so decided perhaps shes not as good as she first seemed!) Then the army band started playing and the Prime Minister came out on to the balcony to worship the gods as they were paraded past him. On one of the temples behind the band some kids wielding bows and swords started dancing behind a stick of fire! There was a problem with the Kumari's chariot so she was delayed in passing him, and due to having really bad back ache and my camera batteries dying decided to go. Today the celebrations continued, there might have been a big slaughtering in th square- everyone is a bit vague on when things happen as there are several different festivals happening at the moment(and because this is Neapl!). I thought that in my waiting I would have missed everything, but decided to wander towards the square to see if there was anything going on. Came across a play in one chowk (square) with masked dancers who I think were meant to be gods. Then had some more masked dancers in the street. There seemed to be alot of people sitting by the side of the road, but no-one seemed to be able to tell me if the chariots had passed yet, so carried on towards the square and shortly met a police van followed by the army band, and lots of people! Went a bit further then found myself a gap in the crowd, just in time to not be run over by shouting people pulling the first chariot! Followed by similar crowed pulling the other two! It was well worth being left in a hotel lobby for 5 hours to see it all! Need to go now before the doors to my guest house are locked!!! 3:56 PM Comment (0) ... PermaLink |