{"id":8636,"date":"2014-05-12T07:26:00","date_gmt":"2014-05-11T23:26:00","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.jipp-world.com\/blog\/?p=8636"},"modified":"2015-04-27T23:02:56","modified_gmt":"2015-04-27T15:02:56","slug":"namaste-kathmandu","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.jipp-world.com\/blog\/namaste-kathmandu\/","title":{"rendered":"Namaste Kathmandu !"},"content":{"rendered":"

Of course, as I had mentioned in my previous post<\/a> on my trip to Nepal, it all began when I came up with a plan to climb up to the Everest Base Camp<\/strong> \u2013 only to be forced to change the plan at the eleventh hour due to some stupid presentation that I had to do at the university. Done with my presentation, I quickly returned home to pack up and hastily dashed over to the airport where my travel buddy Frank was already waiting. Flying on an Air Asia Boeng, it had to be Kathmandu-bound and just in case you didn’t know, Kathmandu is the capital city of Nepal (meh).<\/p>\n

Visa<\/span><\/p>\n

One thing you gotta know about traveling to Nepal at least as a Malaysian is the need for a visa. Applying for a visa to Nepal is very easy peasy. You have the choice of doing it here in KL (which I didn\u2019t bother to find out how) or do it once you landed at the Kathmandu Airport. Of course with all the crazy schedule that I had to march through in the past few months or so, I ventured doing the later which turned out to be so hassle-free. Yippies!<\/p>\n

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The City of Dust<\/span><\/p>\n

Kathmandu that I found out is a very bustling city. Just like most other major cities in Asia, the traffic can get quite crazy. Of course the first thing that I noticed when I first arrived there was the dust. Seriously, Kathmandu is so dusty that being there is like breathing through the exhaust pipe of a motorbike or something.<\/p>\n

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It didn\u2019t take me long to find out why. For one most of the roads in Kathmandu are still not asphalted so they\u2019ve become a constant source of dust and dirt. Then there seems to be a construction going on in just about every corner of the city which contributes largely on the terrible air pollution which is also known to kill quite a good number of residents every year. I actually \u00a0caught a sore in my damn throat the very night I arrived there but somehow it didn\u2019t last long. May be it was\u00a0another form of acclimatization – a word that is somehow so synonym to Kathmandu and Nepal as a whole . You’ll get used to it after awhile. LOL<\/p>\n

Accommodation<\/span><\/p>\n

We stayed at an area called Thamel.<\/strong> Being the place with the highest concentration of hotels and hostels in Kathmandu, Thamel is the place (or rather district) where most of the tourists come to stay in. Mind to tell you that it is very bustling with humans and vehicles and all kinds of activities which can pretty much make your head go crazy if you don\u2019t know how to handle them properly. Every now and then I\u2019d hear somebody saying \u201cI hate this place\u201d \u201cI can\u2019t wait to get out of here\u201d \u201cthis place is crazy\u201d etc etc.<\/strong> Being a city boy back in KL (ehem!), I actually enjoyed the vibrancy of Thamel. I mean, I like crowds. They remind me of the fact that I share the world with so many other people on this planet and that thought alone would make me less selfish in whatever I’m doing. LOL.<\/p>\n

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But then again, when it comes to shopping for trekking gear and stuff, the variety that they offer in Thamel is unmatched.\u00a0 I mean, seriously, you can just come to Nepal to trek without bringing any trekking gear at all. Your money will take care of everything once you are there. It\u2019s only about whether you can trust the quality or not. After all, they are mostly imported from \u2013 well, I\u2019ll leave that for you to fill in. But seriously, coming from KL where the likes of North Face<\/strong> is a thing of luxury, I had to stop myself from laughing when I saw so much of the brand all over Thamel.<\/p>\n

Food<\/span><\/p>\n

I would say the availability of food in Kathmandu \u2013 or at least in the Thamel area where we stayed is quite OK. I mean, it\u2019s not really a food haven but you wouldn\u2019t encounter much problem looking for a place to have a meal. Being a tourist area, I would say the food prices are slightly higher than the average of food prices in most other fellow 3rd<\/sup> world countries that I\u2019ve been to. I mean, I\u2019d put it averagely at USD4-5 for a proper (but basic) meal. Mind to tell you too that they can get much pricier when you are near to any of the UNESCO Sites.<\/p>\n

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Of all the restaurants that I went to when we were in Thamel, I\u2019d really want to highlight a restaurant called Gilingche Tibetan Restaurant<\/strong> which is tucked somewhere in the back of a street. Not only it has one of the most reasonable prices of food that you could probably find around, the foods are also so damn good we had to keep coming there almost all throughout our stay in Kathmandu. I’d really want to further highlight the fact that the momos at this very restaurant are just so OMFG!<\/p>\n

The People<\/span><\/p>\n

One thing I immediately realized when I arrived in Kathmandu is the friendliness of the people. I mean, the only thing that keeps us away from them is probably the language barrier but still they are extremely<\/em> friendly.<\/p>\n

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There was one time when I was checking out an array of gem stones that they displayed in a glass casing from outside a shop when the shop keepers came grabbing my hands as if forcing me into their shop and before I knew a few others came lending their hands so I was going against 5-6 people all forcing me into the shop. Of course I played along by dramatically pulling my hands while moaning \u201chelp! Help! Help me!!!\u201d<\/strong> much to the amusement of the passersby. LOL.<\/p>\n

Perhaps the tour guide at Pashupati described it best when he said \u201cWe might be poor, but we are happy people\u201d.<\/strong><\/p>\n

Places of Interest<\/span><\/p>\n

Kathmandu really is an amazing place. It is so rich in culture and its history dates back to colonial time and beyond which is evidenced by the existence of so many ancient buildings including those that accommodated for the needs of the many emperors that ruled Kathmandu.<\/p>\n

Of course, my main priority was to go to the UNESCO World Heritage Sites. Bundled under one name<\/a> in the list, it consists of a few sites which was unfortunately scattered all over the valley hence the difficulty\u00a0to visit all of them in probably one day.<\/p>\n

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We did however manage to go to the Durbar Squares of Hanuman Dhoka<\/strong> which \u2013 upon entering \u2013 brought us back to the beginning of time. I noticed how the temples looked so much like those that they have in Bali, probably because of the strong elements of Hinduism. After all, I first heard about Hanuman<\/strong> \u2013 the monkey devotee of Lord Ram<\/strong> – when I went to Bali a few years ago. I even stayed a street called Hanuman Street while I was there so the similarities were very unmistakable.<\/p>\n

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Then there was the gigantic stupa of Boudhanath.<\/strong> Getting there required a little bit of ride through the busy streets and back alleys of Kathmandu. I wouldn\u2019t say the stupa really wowed me but the significance (and the folk tale!) that it bears for the people of Kathmandu makes it one of the most important landmarks in the city. The eyes \u2013 which are called the eyes of the Buddha \u2013 are really hypnotic I had to look away before I was drawn too much to them.<\/p>\n

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If I had to pick a favorite of all the UNESCO Sites that I went to in Kathmandu, it had to be the Buddhist stupas of Swayambhu<\/strong>. Also known as the Monkey Temple<\/strong> \u2013 apart from their pink asses which was hard not to take notice of, they didn\u2019t really wow me because we\u2019ve got so many monkeys back in my country Malaysia. I don’t know how but some of them even made it up the ladder<\/em> and became political leaders.<\/p>\n

The temple itself was already a wow to me – there is a little bit of colonial look on some of the buildings which is great\u00a0– but it was the sweeping view of Kathmandu Valley that it offers from there that made me think how blessed I was for simply being<\/em> there.<\/p>\n

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We actually wrapped up our one-day Kathmandu tour at Pashupatinath Temple<\/strong>. For such a not-so-cheap entrance fee (NPR1000), it really has nothing much to offer at least architecturally (but some of the buildings did wow me though). The main temple is not even open to non-Hindus like me so I couldn\u2019t see anything beyond than the damn ass of the bronze-plated bull. Boooo!<\/p>\n

But still, you should never allow yourself to leave Kathmandu without taking a peek at Pashupati. Being one of the most sacred places in the world of Hinduism, many Hindu devotees WOULD DIE to DIE here. I had heard a lot about what they do in Varanasi<\/strong> (bucketlisted!) but I didn\u2019t expect I\u2019d get to see human bodies being burned out in the open, not in Kathmandu.<\/p>\n

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It really was an eye-opening experience. The sight of somebody tossing a torch right at the face of the deceased to start fire (its ceremonial thingy to always start the fire at the face), and flames and billowing smokes that rose from the body and the hollering and crying of families and relatives that followed, the eerie\u00a0smell of the burning bodies \u2013 they would all stay in me for a very long time.<\/p>\n

Verdict<\/span><\/p>\n

I didn\u2019t really get to explore Kathmandu, not as much as I wanted to. My travel buddies were not really into anything else than the mountains so their travel moods kinda died down the moment they came out of the trekking \u2013 which I had nothing against because people look at things quite differently. It was one of those times when I wished I was traveling alone \u2013 or at least with somebody who could see the beauty in things that I saw \u2013 but of course there\u2019s always another time for that.<\/p>\n

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Kathmandu for me is one of the most amazing cities that I’ve ever been to and for sure I\u2019ll be back for more – hopefully sooner than later.<\/p>\n

Amen. \ud83d\ude42<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Of course, as I had mentioned in my previous post on my trip to Nepal, it all began when I came up with a plan to climb up to the Everest Base Camp \u2013 only to be forced to change the plan at the eleventh hour due to some stupid presentation that I had to do at the university. Done with my presentation, I quickly returned home to pack up and hastily dashed over to the airport where my travel…<\/p>\n

Read More Read More<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[13],"tags":[132,130,18,33],"class_list":["post-8636","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-traveling","tag-kathmandu","tag-nepal","tag-travel","tag-unesco"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.jipp-world.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/8636","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.jipp-world.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.jipp-world.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.jipp-world.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.jipp-world.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=8636"}],"version-history":[{"count":12,"href":"https:\/\/www.jipp-world.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/8636\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":9560,"href":"https:\/\/www.jipp-world.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/8636\/revisions\/9560"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.jipp-world.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=8636"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.jipp-world.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=8636"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.jipp-world.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=8636"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}