Last summer I lived in Portland, Oregon. If anyone has seen the show Portlandia, you'll know that the show has this saying that "the dream of the 90's is alive in Portland". After walking through more of Kathmandu today, I'm pretty sure the this is where the dream of the 70's came to live. Granted, I wasn't alive then, but the guidebook I've been stealing from a friend says this is where the hippie expats came in the 70's from the US.
This morning we went to a place called Swayambhu, or the monkey temple, by city bus. This was an experience in itself; it was pretty loud and lots of people stared at us, but there was also a nice breeze and it was only about 25 Nepalese Rupees, or about 30 cents, to go halfway around the city. After being in India, the staring isn't even very noticable or bad here - at least people don't mob us anymore to take pictures with them or try to touch my hair anymore.
The monkey temple was indeed full of monkeys. This time though, there were no close calls with monkey attacks (if you read the SWE blog I posted in my first post, there was a pretty close call when we visited the Elephanta Caves). The monkey temple was beautiful and we finally found a few more foreigners there. Here's a picture from the temple, please note that we all wore matching Michigan shirts today because we are attempted to take a picture we can submit to the annual photo contest of the International Programs in Engineering Office, not because we think matching helps us blend in.
There was also this sassy monkey who insisted on sitting on the large Buddha statue with a sign that specifically said not to sit on it.
After seeing the monkey temple, we took a taxi to the main tourist area, Thamel. It would only have been about a 30 minute walk to get there, but one thing I neglected to mention yesterday was the fact that there aren't really road names or addresses, and none of the roads go straight. In fact, the roads are more like alleys than roads, unless you're on Ring Road, which makes a loop around the city. Long story short, we took a taxi to get there.
This place is where I am pretty sure the dream of the 70's is still alive. After eating lunch, something we were forced into before we were hungry because there was a short downpour and I had decided I didn't need a raincoat, we walked through an area called "Freak Street". This is where the hippies had once been and probably still are. It was much more touristy than Patan had been yesterday, and most of the clothes being sold were items a local would never be caught dead wearing. There were all kinds of crazy colors and patterns that were not very appealing. We did a lot of walking to find some elephant pants - Rachel and I now own some matching pants with elephants on them. We bought them for about 5 dollars for the bus tomorrow, so I now own bus pants a la Sheldon Cooper.
After doing some walking and being confused about the mix of Northface gear, wool mittens, pants and skirts belonging to the 70's, and trinkets in Thamel, we decided to go to the Garden of Dreams. We had to pay 200 Rupees (2 USD) to get into what we found out was basically a place to go on a date. We also got some stares here since we were a group of 4 girls (most of us also being very pale) in a place Nepalese people go on dates. This was fairly awkward, so we decided to lay on the ground and take naps. Here are a pictures of the nice park and the nice mats we took naps on:
After our afternoon naps, we went back to the hostel in another taxi. People here wear masks to protect themselves from the pollution and dust in the city; after that taxi ride I think I might need one, too. Luckily they are quite stylish and I could get a pink leopard print mask if I really wanted to.
One more weird thing about Nepal - the country is in its own time zone and is 9 hours and 45 minutes ahead of EST. I though India was weird for having a time zone on a half hour, but this 45 minute deal really throws off my ability to tell what time it's going to be in Michigan.
Tomorrow we're off to Pokhara to do some adventure sports. Hopefully that means paragliding, but we're not sure that any of the companies stay open in the off season. While looking up paragliding, we also learned that parahawking is a real thing. It's a combination of paragliding and hawking and is kind of ridiculous and insane. Look it up for a laugh.
This morning we went to a place called Swayambhu, or the monkey temple, by city bus. This was an experience in itself; it was pretty loud and lots of people stared at us, but there was also a nice breeze and it was only about 25 Nepalese Rupees, or about 30 cents, to go halfway around the city. After being in India, the staring isn't even very noticable or bad here - at least people don't mob us anymore to take pictures with them or try to touch my hair anymore.
The monkey temple was indeed full of monkeys. This time though, there were no close calls with monkey attacks (if you read the SWE blog I posted in my first post, there was a pretty close call when we visited the Elephanta Caves). The monkey temple was beautiful and we finally found a few more foreigners there. Here's a picture from the temple, please note that we all wore matching Michigan shirts today because we are attempted to take a picture we can submit to the annual photo contest of the International Programs in Engineering Office, not because we think matching helps us blend in.
There was also this sassy monkey who insisted on sitting on the large Buddha statue with a sign that specifically said not to sit on it.
After seeing the monkey temple, we took a taxi to the main tourist area, Thamel. It would only have been about a 30 minute walk to get there, but one thing I neglected to mention yesterday was the fact that there aren't really road names or addresses, and none of the roads go straight. In fact, the roads are more like alleys than roads, unless you're on Ring Road, which makes a loop around the city. Long story short, we took a taxi to get there.
This place is where I am pretty sure the dream of the 70's is still alive. After eating lunch, something we were forced into before we were hungry because there was a short downpour and I had decided I didn't need a raincoat, we walked through an area called "Freak Street". This is where the hippies had once been and probably still are. It was much more touristy than Patan had been yesterday, and most of the clothes being sold were items a local would never be caught dead wearing. There were all kinds of crazy colors and patterns that were not very appealing. We did a lot of walking to find some elephant pants - Rachel and I now own some matching pants with elephants on them. We bought them for about 5 dollars for the bus tomorrow, so I now own bus pants a la Sheldon Cooper.
After doing some walking and being confused about the mix of Northface gear, wool mittens, pants and skirts belonging to the 70's, and trinkets in Thamel, we decided to go to the Garden of Dreams. We had to pay 200 Rupees (2 USD) to get into what we found out was basically a place to go on a date. We also got some stares here since we were a group of 4 girls (most of us also being very pale) in a place Nepalese people go on dates. This was fairly awkward, so we decided to lay on the ground and take naps. Here are a pictures of the nice park and the nice mats we took naps on:
After our afternoon naps, we went back to the hostel in another taxi. People here wear masks to protect themselves from the pollution and dust in the city; after that taxi ride I think I might need one, too. Luckily they are quite stylish and I could get a pink leopard print mask if I really wanted to.
One more weird thing about Nepal - the country is in its own time zone and is 9 hours and 45 minutes ahead of EST. I though India was weird for having a time zone on a half hour, but this 45 minute deal really throws off my ability to tell what time it's going to be in Michigan.
Tomorrow we're off to Pokhara to do some adventure sports. Hopefully that means paragliding, but we're not sure that any of the companies stay open in the off season. While looking up paragliding, we also learned that parahawking is a real thing. It's a combination of paragliding and hawking and is kind of ridiculous and insane. Look it up for a laugh.
So did you go parahawking with Kevin? Or with Bob? :)
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