September 17, 2010

Patan, Bhaktapur and Dinner. Whiskey has its price.

Lisa is still under the weather, so she opts to sleep in. Ni and I are up and out early. Tsering has arranged a tour with a guide name Shiva.

Shiva turns out to be a charismatic, funny man who tells us to go ahead and ask any question, he’ll answer it. And he does. When asked, he gives us a basic run-down of Nepali history, current politics, religion, marriage, the generation gap, and everything in between.

He takes us first to see one of the old capitals of Nepal, Patan. It’s a huge city square filled with temples and palaces. It’s fairly empty this early and we enjoy the relative silence. We pile back in the car to head to another old capital, Bhaktapur.

Along the way, when asking about the Tibetan refugee situation in Nepal, Shiva changes our plans and takes us to the Tibetan Refugee Camp. It is not at all what I envisioned. It’s a large compound, built in the 60s, dominated by one big building. The building is home to the Tibetan Refugee carpet factory. We get out and go into the ‘factory’. One floor is full of elderly Tibetan women spinning and carding raw wool into yarn. Another room is full of looms of all sizes where Tibetan women sit and weave carpets by hand (God only knows where the Tibetan men are). Then we went to the showroom to see hundreds of beautiful handmade carpets for sale. Truly lovely work.

Shiva explains that the Tibetans that are there have been there for up to 50 years, and the only way to get citizenship and leave the camp is to marry a Nepali. So this is what most of the young Tibetans spend their time trying to do. Marry a Nepali.

Then off to Bhaktapur. Along the way Shiva explains that Nepal too is run by the caste system, like India. Though not quite as intense as in India. He says the younger generation is trying to abolish that. They say there are only two castes you can be born into ‘man’ or ‘woman’. They’re marrying out of caste and marrying for love. Shiva explains his marriage is a love match. We look at Tsering and he says his was arranged.

Bhaktapur. A much smaller city. Quieter, cleaner. The old capital is made of intricate red brick temples and a huge palace—the palace with one window for everyone of the king’s wives. There are a lot of windows. He must have been one busy man. We stop in the art museum and go to the pottery square, where members of the potters’ caste work everyday in clay.

Then we load up to head back to the Yak and Yeti. Along the way Shiva regales us with the tale of current politics. In 2001, as many will remember, a massacre occurred in the palace. The crown prince, then 29, shot and killed his parents, siblings and many aunts, uncles and cousins, before turning the gun on himself. This is widely reported as fact. But Tsering and Shiva are both adamant in the claim that it was a conspiracy put together by the king’s brother, the crown prince’s uncle. And their reasons are sound, after all the uncle and his immediate family are the only ones who survived the shooting and claim that they did so merely by begging to not be shot. And the crown prince died from a bullet to the left temple, even though he’s right handed. The uncle assumed the throne, was unpopular (and many Nepali believe him a murderer), and later rescinded.

The political situation is now a disaster as many parties vie to run the country. And at this point, most Nepalis seem to want the uncle to resume the thrown to provide stability, and because they said life was better under a king.

We thank Shiva and head back to the Yak and Yeti. Tsering says he’ll pick us up for dinner later. So Ni and I are left to loose ends. We decide on a manicure/pedicure and head off to find the spa. Hysterical. We walk in and it’s like the Nepali version of ‘Steel Magnolias’. It feels like a small town salon in the 80s--both in décor and the hair of the women working there. When we ask for a mani/pedi, we’re greeted with confused looks. Then a conference ensues and eventually five women are consulted and recruited before they say yes.

We then are converged on and one of the more entertaining mani/pedi’s ever occurs. Ni and I can do nothing but laugh. At the end of the day, at least we look better than we did on the way in.

That night, Lisa and Ni and I meet Tsering downstairs. He’s said we’re going to dinner at a traditional Nepali place. We’re excited. What ensues is one of the stranger nights out I’ve ever had.

We go to this restaurant, on the top floor of a building. We’re sat cross-legged on the floor in a corner. Then two other men join us. Tsering had worked for years with a touring company out of San Francisco. This year that company folded and he’s started to work with a new local company, and these two men are the owners of that company and they clearly wanted to meet us so we could come back and promote them to our friends in the states.

Wow, were they something. It was such a strange night, like they’d watched Hollywood movies of how you do business and were trying to emulate that. They bought a bottle of whiskey for the table and a bunch of meat dishes. Then started telling loud, inappropriate jokes. And then, a bunch of beautiful women came out and started doing traditional Nepali dances, clothed true, but still. Strange. Needless to say, at the end of the night, we all assured Tsering that we loved him, and if any of our friends wanted to come, we’d be referring them to him directly.

Strange indeed.

Pictures:
Patan
Tibetan Woman making yarn
Tibetan Women Weaving
Bahktapur
Bahktapur
Pottery Square