Bodnath Stupa

Above: an elephant in Kathmandu

Thursday 10th November 1983

We were a bit late getting up and consequently got a couple of old wrecks for bicycles. After breakfast in the Ashok I struggled with a stiff pedal which kept unscrewing, instead of turning, and falling off as we headed east out of the city. The sun was blazing as we weaved between huge areas of road covered with drying grain, and occasionally wool. Women and children turned the grain with wooden hoes to ensure uniform desiccation.

We soon reached the Boudhanath Stupa (or Bodnath Stupa) which is the largest stupa in Nepal and the holiest Tibetan Buddhist temple outside Tibet. It is the centre of Tibetan culture in Kathmandu and rich in Buddhist symbolism. The stupa is located in the town of Boudha, on the eastern outskirts of Kathmandu.

It is also supposed to be the haunt of Tibetan refugees. The huge white dome was identical to that of the Monkey Temple with it’s metal tower and the painted eyes. We sat in the sun halfway up the dome for a while before walking around the perimeter.

A young minstrel tagged along behind us, wailing and strumming a single-stringed instrument, in hope of payment from us. It was probably an Ek Tare which is a single-string instrument played by Santas (ascetics) and Yogis. It is a believed to be the early type of the musical instrument Sitar. Eventually he became dissuaded when George countered by singing “My old man’s a dustman” and asking him for baksheesh.

We had a lovely cup of rum tea in the village (Bodh) and then cycled along an unsurfaced road (dirt track) to Gokarna. Rural activity abounded on each side of the track. Straw was harvested and made into stacks, grain was spread all over the place to dry in the sun, women herded goats and cattle, and gangs of men and women hacked and bludgeoned dry fields into furrows.

Old boys squatted chatting, old crones watched naked babies gambolling in the dust and children chased us up the road waving bye-bye. We continued past a disappointing three-storey temple at Gokarna. Allegedly the Gokarna temple complex, although relatively small, is one of the most feature-filled complexes in all Nepal. The main temple takes centre stage but surrounding it there are a collection of statues and sculptures that outnumber many other places in the country. We were underwhelmed!

We headed for the not-to-be-missed waterfalls at Sundarijal but got fed up of the seemingly endless track and returned to Boudhnath where we had a Coke before moving south to “the most famous temple in Nepal”, the Pashupatinath Temple near the airport.

The Pashupatinath Temple (Nepali: पशुपतिनाथ मन्दिर]) is a famous and sacred Hindu temple complex that is located on the banks of the Bagmati River, approximately 5 km north-east of Kathmandu in the eastern part of Kathmandu Valley. The temple serves as the seat of Pashupatinath. This temple complex was inscribed on the UNESCO World Heritage Sites's list in 1979. This "extensive Hindu temple precinct" is a "sprawling collection of temples, ashrams, images and inscriptions raised over the centuries along the banks of the sacred Bagmati river", which we described as a higgledy-piggledy assortment of shrines, images and religious what-nots.

Non-Hindus were not allowed in the temple, so we crossed the river and mounted the hill via stone steps. At the summit we found a pleasant wooded area amongst the deities and idols in which a troop of monkeys lived. We sat amongst them and watched with fascination as they played around.

At one stage they took fright when a wanker with a catapult passed through, but after one desultory shot he was scared off by our presence. We clambered down to a row of park benches overlooking the temple and the steps along the river Bagmati, where Hindus are cremated on the banks of this holy river, and Kirants are buried in the hills by its side.

Here we watched some soapy package tourists handing out money like confetti to posing locals, beggars and rascals with artificially-aged “antique” bargains. Disgusted, we mounted up and rode our bicycles through the sight-seers coach park and back onto the road into Kathmandu central.

Some of the downhill slopes were a bit hair-raising on these old bone-shakers and I lost my battle to keep my right pedal from dropping off on a couple of occasions. We returned the bicycles, George picked up his embroidered shirt and we hit the Ashok Pie Restaurant as usual.

For a welcome change of diet, we had Japanese sukiyaki and egg fried rice. As usual when we passed through Durbar Square we were appalled afresh by posers, hippies and gormless other individuals of other genders who are content to swan about in the grubby inner city and act “the kiddy” (the big I-am).

It was dark when we left the Ashok Pie for a night-time visit to the Swayambhunath “Monkey” Temple. We wove our way along dark, muddy lanes, over the rickety swaying footbridge and up the steep stairs to the temple. Gaily coloured statues of strange beasts kept a lonely vigil on the stairway and monkeys chattered in the trees at our intrusion.

A string of multi-coloured bulbs encircled the main temple and provided the only source of illumination. I was surprised to find that we were the only Europeans at the summit and we stood alone on a platform looking westwards over the lights of the settlement covering the whole of the Kathmandu Valley.

A few kids chased dogs about while priests kept the prayer wheels spinning around the white dome, chanting as they slowly made their circuitous rounds. Statues of Hindu gods were illuminated behind intricate metal barred gates set into the temple wall. An eerie atmosphere made it easy to believe in the existence of mysterious gods and strange presences.

A monkey reared up on the head of a stone lion as we started down the stairs by the large metal lightening bolt/thunderbolt statue. Halfway down I was startled by the sudden casting of a humanoid shadow on the stairs to my right. A monkey had just stood in front of a light bulb on the stair rail!

Further down a troop of monkeys moved across our path showing their unease in chatters and barks, as a dull sonorous bell started chiming from above. We were pleased to gain the relative sanity of ground level and we strolled back along the alleyways talking of horror and ghost films that we had seen.

Tonight had been a real “experience” and one which I would like to share with people back at home. The mystery of the temple combined with a natural fear of the night combine to make the supernatural seem natural or normal. You expect the statues to move and can imagine how easy it was for superstitious yarns and legends to arise over the years.

The monkeys which seemed so amusing in the daytime seem so menacing at night, probably by reflecting one’s own fear of the unknown. Tonight was one of the rewards of travelling. You feel as if you are in a movie because of the unlikeliness of it all. Hounslow boys menaced by monkeys at the Swayambhunath Temple!

We had a couple of hot lemon drinks in a pie shop while David Bowie’s “Aladdin Sane” album was played and retired to bed early.