Bhaktapur
After an early breakfast, we head back to the airport for a mountain flight. This is a short flight toward the Himalayas for those of us who want to see Everest and its cousins without days of trekking. The security system at the domestic terminal operates on the honor system. We segregate by gender, walk through unplugged metal detectors, and individually enter small curtained booths. The men are patted down, but their bags go unchecked. The ladies remain untouched, but are asked to turn in matches, lighters, or knives. Two of us (Lesley and me) have Swiss army knives. We are asked to go back to the ticket counter to turn these in. They are tagged and disappear into an office. Our delay does not go unnoticed -- the rest of the group twits us for our dangerous accessories. "Chicks with knives" we become. Little do they know how grateful they'll be for those knives a bit further on...The plane for the mountain flight is tiny. 16 passengers, eight rows with one seat on either side of the plane. In-flight service consists of hard candy and cotton balls (for earplugs). My confidence is heightened by the name of the airline. As we learned yesterday, Buddha is calm, kind, and clear of mind. Surely the airline named for him cannot help but follow suit. The other domestic airlines have similarly appropriate names -- Cosmos, Mountain, and our favorite, Yeti. All the planes have little upturned fins on the wings, the interior side of which has the airline's logo painted on it. This seemingly odd positioning is made clear during the mountain flight. All photos taken from the plane, unless carefully framed, include this fin. Along with the logo.
The flight is a lot of fun. The air hostess points out peaks, and we are invited up to the cockpit in shifts for a clear view. As I have no camera, I am free to note during my turn the terrain over which we are flying. It seems very...pointy. I consider the aerodynamics of our little Beechcraft and the no doubt tricky winds rising up off the peaks. In a brief commercial interlude as we return, our air hostess turns tout and asks us if we want a commemorative T-shirt or video to accompany our commemorative certificate. (Aside: We saw someone wearing one of these Buddha Air T-shirts in Angkor a week later.) We return to the airport, Lesley and I retrieve our dangerous penknives, and it's off to Bhaktapur.
The Kathmandu valley was home to three distinct cities, each ruled by its own lineage of kings, until the mid-19th century when the valley was consolodated under the Ranas. The Malla kings were fiercely competitive, but fortunately chose to show this through art and civic works rather than war. The three cities, Patan (Lalitpur), Bhaktapur, and Kathmandu, became showplaces of Newar art and architecture. The main squares, called Durbar Margh, of each was populated with temples, palaces, and monuments. In each, a column was raised facing the palace door. On top of the column is a golden statue of the king, facing his palace. The buildings are beautiful, and remarkably well-preserved. It is easy to see why this largely inaccessible valley was the stuff of legends for many hundreds of years. The few accounts of visitors -- a Chinese monk, a British explorer -- tell of even more wonderous sights now lost. Golden doors and statues draped in gems no longer exist, although the frames and pedestals can still be seen.
The Durbar Margh of Bhaktapur and Patan have been declared World Heritage Sites, and are closed to four-wheeled traffic. Actually, many of the sites we have visited in the valley are Heritage Sites, though most are relatively recently raised to that status. The UN and other bodies are only just starting to build the infrastructure necessary to protect and police these sites. Trash piles, missing statues, wandering cows, and constant motorbike traffic highlight the need for further development. One site, Boudhanath, was recently removed from the list of Historical Sites on the request of the population nearby. They wanted to install metal poles to hold prayer flags, replacing the far more maintenance-intensive bamboo currently used. The UN would not allow the change, so the site is now locally administered in a way less restrictive to the ongoing use of the site. Most of the beautiful repousse images at Swayambhunath and Boudhanath are locked behind thick grilles to prevent theft. Worshippers prop incense against the bars. The balance among preservation, tourism, and ongoing daily life is not an easy one to find.
Bhaktapur is probably the most carefully preserved site, and much of the old city is restricted to foot traffic. The buildings throughout are obviously restored, and while the temples are very much in use they are also in better repair than most. As you walk the streets, the feel of the old cities is apparent. The houses are built with each story a bit larger than the one supporting it, creating a slight tunnel effect in the narrow roads. You walk down the darkened streets, then happen upon a lovely square of large public buildings. Along the way, you pass wells and small shrines, all quite old and all showing evidence of current use. Every image seems to be rubbed with red powder from years of puja. Of particular note is the Nyatapola, a huge five-storied pagoda temple. The woodwork is in spectacular shape for a 500-year old structure.
At about 4pm, it is time to leave and return to Kathmandu, a short (20km) drive away. Roughly halfway there, we encounter a large line of cars and trucks stopped in the road due to some sort of demonstration up ahead. After some conversation in Nepali with the other drivers, we head down a side road and try a different route. About 15 minutes along, we notice that the scenery starts to look rather familiar. We turn into the parking lot at Bhaktapur. Huh?
More conversations in Nepali. Our truly wonderful guide, Lee, gives us the news. There are riots in Kathmandu, and demonstrators and/or the police have blocked all the roads entering the city. The motivation is a supposed quote from an interview with a Bollywood movie star, Hrithik Roshan, that Nepalis are stupid. Some small demonstrations had started outside movie theatres yesterday, in fact we had passed by one without knowing it. Today, they grew and turned ugly. This is quite unusual for Nepal, and the locals seem very disturbed. Lee departs to call her office and see if she can find a route home. She heads to the phones, and we sit and wait. She returns with some initial good news. Two people from our group had gone home early by cab. It turns out that they made it back ok, though they had a bit of an adventure. Their cab driver took them as far as he could, but eventually reached a barricade that he couldn't cross. They got out and walked for a while, past burning tires and a large, though calm, group of men. Soon they found another cab and were able to get back to the hotel. Their daughter, Melissa, had stayed with us. At this report, she looked a bit shocked, but relieved to hear they were fine. Well, her mother was fine. Apparently Lee didn't ask specifically about her father, but we assume she would have mentioned leaving her husband behind at some point.
The afternoon wears on, with more conversations and more trips to the phone. No new developments. Eventually, some of our group gives in to the lure of beer and getting off our stuffy bus, and they head for the bar. A couple of others get out just to stretch their legs. All of us wonder what will happen next. Do we stay in Bhaktapur? What about our flight to Pokhara tomorrow morning? Can we do what the other two did -- take the bus as far as we can, walk a bit, then find cabs? One could imagine getting around barricades that way if people aren't too violent. Should we wait until it gets dark and colder and people scatter? Or will the police shut down the roads at dark? Lee returns to find only a few of us on the bus. We're going to give it a go in a few minutes! We convince the guys in the bar to get their beer to go and soon we're all back together. Lee is back on the phone, but soon returns with our plan. The office will send a car toward us, and we'll head toward them. Hopefully we'll find a clear road and meet the car. Once we do, we should be able to follow it all the way to the hotel.
We head out. On our way, obviously using the back roads discussed by the drivers, we pass Indian trucks parked by the side of the road, small groups of people, and see a few distant protests. Smoke plumes rise in the air in the distance. Everything seems pretty calm, though. We drive past several barriers of now mostly burnt-out tires, and over the ashes of previous bonfires. The crowds are quiet, lining the road as the sun sets. Once or twice we pause to confer with policement, or to choose a route at a rotary. Our driver seems very nervous, but he keeps going. Our mood is high. We toast each other with massive beer bottles, and try to catch photos of burning tires as we pass. Melissa, a one-week veteran of the Israeli army, leads the charge from the front seat. We are half a step from singing British drinking songs.
Eventually, we meet the car that was sent for us. It seems that the path back is clear! We cheer again. Then, a setback. We reach a bridge that we cannot cross. Lee confers with the drivers, and we decide to abandon the bus. The office sent a minivan to meet us, and we think we can all squeeze in. The smaller van should be able to manage smaller, unblocked roads. We climb in, sardine-like, but up for anything. The driver seems rather more dubious, but we give him little time to argue. It's fortunate that two people went back early, or we'd look like college students trying to pack a Beetle. We wave farewell to our faithful bus and driver. We made the poor guy drive around fires, we took photos of rioters, we left beer bottles on his bus, we laughed through it all, and now we abandon him at night with nowhere to go. Poor guy. Then again, perhaps he's happy to ditch the insane foreigners. (Note: He made it home just fine, and was willing to put up with us for several days later on.)
We bump down a dirt road, now without beer but still in good spirits. 10 minutes closer to our destination, now in full dark, we are stopped again. A still-burning barricade blocks our way. Lee calls the office, hoping to find a clear road. While she's gone, we tumble out of the van and discuss our options. Lee tells us that it's only about a 45-minute walk, which seems fine. We assess the likelihood of finding a free riskshaw or two along the way. We suit up to walk for it, still far too jolly. Meanwhile, some sharp-eyed soul notices than a van and several motorbikes have attempted to get past the fire and seem to have been successful. They didn't come back, and we didn't hear any yells. We convince Lee to at least try to go around. We pile in again, give a big cheer, and sloooowly skirt the barricade. We're through!
The streets in the city center are quiet. Stores closed, few people, almost no cars. Every block we gain is a trimuph -- less distance to walk! We start to recognize the neighborhood. We pass the royal palace, notably untouched. Finally, we are back. The hotel is gated, but they let us in with some surprise. We pile out of our tiny van, giggling. Definitely nuts. Lee looks a bit shell-shocked, but happy to have gotten all her chicks home safely.
At dinner an hour later, the mood is quiet. We hear the story of the two who came back early first-hand. Lee tells us what she has learned. Her daughter joins us after motorbiking over with her father. She also seems a bit shocked. There haven't been demonstrations like this since the revolution in 1980, a fairly bloodless affair. There is no evidence of the accusations -- the TV and papers can't find any quote from Hrithik. Maoist plots and similarly dark motives from India are tossed around as possible instigations. While tension with India is high, it somehow seems unlikely that an undocumented quote from a Tom Cruise-type could have this kind of impact unassisted. CNN (out of New Delhi) is silent on the local troubles. We pack our bags, being optimists, and wait for the morning to learn more.