THE LIVE GODDESS AND SLEEPING GOD ,MAGIC OF KATHMANDU -OUR NEPAL JOURNEY

After successfully completing our trip to Muktinath Temple, we returned to our room, rested, and set off for Pokhara the next day. Again, suspense awaited us as to whether the tiny flights would fly; luck favored us, and we could get on the flight to Pokhara.

We reluctantly bid goodbye to the mighty Himalayas and in no time reached Pokhara domestic airport. Our larger luggage pieces had to be collected from Fish Tail Lodge, where we had stayed in Pokhara; luckily, our travel agent brought them in the car promptly, and we proceeded to the international airport of Pokhara, from where we would be taking a flight to Kathmandu.

Kathmandu airport, when we alighted, was crazily packed with tourists, and we waited desperately for our travel agent, as our previous experience with them was not very encouraging.

We had waited for a long hour when the agent nonchalantly walked towards us and took us to the travel car. It was astonishing that this time we had a brand-new car in excellent condition with the AC working very well. We breathed a cool sigh of relief and were told that we would be going directly to the Bhudanilakantha temple, and our luggage would be safely in the car till we went back to our hotel that evening.

We walked to the temple; surprisingly, the entrance was unremarkable, with people going about their daily routine, and we saw a courtyard filled with Rudraksh trees and many small temples built in the Nepali style of architecture.

Budhanilkantha Temple is also known as Narayanthan or Jal Narayanan temple; though the temple is so named, it is not a Buddha temple; instead, it has a Sanskrit origin meaning ‘Old Blue Throat,' a title of Lord Shiva given by the gods after he drank Halahal poison to save the world during Sagar Madhanam.

According to the epics, Shiva then flew up to the north of Kathmandu and struck the mountainside there and, with his power, created a lake named Gosaikunda to quench his thirst; the effect of the powerful poison ended but left behind a blue patch on his throat. This lake, Gosaikunda, is believed to be associated with the temple of Budhanilkantha and Lord Vishnu.

On walking further inside, we were surprised to see an open-air temple with the largest stone statue of Lord Vishnu in Nepal.

The statue symbolizes Lord Vishnu, who is regarded as one of the 'Trimurtis,' along with Brahma and Shiva. It is also said that a statue of Lord Shiva lies in the bottom part of the lake, just below Lord Vishnu’s statue.

The statue was cordoned off on all sides by an iron railing. We followed the queue, went through a small gate and found the 16.4-foot-long image floating in the water pond, 43 feet wide and called Cosmic Sea.

Lord Vishnu was reclining on the divine serpent Shesha's coils. He had in his four hands the Sudarshana Chakra, a Conch Shell, a club, and a gem.

I was spellbound by the remarkably intricate artwork that went into sculpting this magnificent 5th-century stone image of the sleeping Vishnu, which is worth seeing. It is supposed to be carved out of a single rock dating back to the Lichhavi period and is a black stone frame built from a single black basalt base; the Lord has a crown decorated with several pictures of Kirtimukha .

Two priests were standing at the foot of the image to receive offerings from devotees. The statue was covered by a large cloth canopy.

The statue is believed to be floating on water, though this has not been proven scientifically, as studies cannot be undertaken due to religious reasons. However, a chip of the statue that had come off was found to be very rich in silica.

The temple was rediscovered later during the early Malla Dynasty period by a farmer and his wife while they were tilling their field.

This temple is equally well venerated by Buddhists who consider the murti to be Buddha himself.

A big fair is also held at the temple area every year on auspicious occasions such as Ekadashis, Harishayani and Haribodhini of the Hindu lunar calendar, which marks the 4-month sleeping period of Lord Vishnu.

Surprisingly, royal family members, including the Nepalese monarchs, have not visited the temple till now, as King Pratap Malla in the 16th century had a prophetic dream that any king visiting the temple was doomed.

We also visited the other temples in the complex. I found myself humming along to a catchy tune, which I thought was a beautiful song on Vishnu; however, I realised to my chagrin that a blood donation camp was being conducted in the temple campus, and the tune was about the nobility of donating blood, L.O.L !

Suddenly, I found my husband missing. I searched hectically and sat under a tree observing the devotees. He came after 15 minutes apparently, our driver was instructed by the travel agency to shift our luggage to another car and leave for AC servicing- the lamest excuse ever, which left us angry and frustrated indeed.

The new driver was pleasant enough and said he practised Buddhism, he guided us to a restaurant where we had lunch and went to Kathmandu Durbar Square. 

Durbar Square (durbar meaning “palace”) is an important site for Buddhist and Hindu rituals, holy ceremonies, and royal events and coronations; it is a UNESCO World Heritage Site and is one of three squares within Kathmandu Valley in Nepal. Very impressive was the pattern of a central golden window frame with two silver ones

Our driver left us at a traffic junction there and said he would be back after an hour to pick us as the square was a no-car-parking zone. We bought an entrance ticket and went to see the square; there were plenty of tourists going around.

Some of the parts of the square were accessible to tourists; there was a whitewashed European colonial-style building known as Gaddi Baihak. It looked very much out of place in design and architecture compared to the surrounding temples and places. Gaddi Baihak was badly damaged during the April 25th earthquake and was restored, and now serves as a museum

Surrounded by fountains, ancient statues, small ponds, and a series of courtyards such as Mohan Chok and Sundari Chok, the Square is a meditative, religious site for spiritual seekers.

When looked at keenly, the architecture of the buildings showed a lot of snake figures.

Within the inner complex of Durbar Square is the site of the Old Royal Palaces, also referred to as the Hanuman Dhoka Palace Complex. 

The Royal Palaces used to house the kings of the Shah and Malla Dynasties, who ruled over the city until the 19th century. The palaces have since been turned into museums. It was indeed sad to see the palaces, partly ruined and shells of their original glory.

The outer complex consists of numerous pagoda-style temples featuring the meticulously carved facades crafted by Newar artists, some of which date back to the 16th century. 

Built in the Newari architectural style, we could see the Jagannath Temple, Kotilingeshwara Mahadev (a stone temple of Lord Shiva), the Mahendreswara Temple, and the magnificent Taleju Temple, which was adopted from Tulja Bhavani of India

Other popular temples in the square include Mahadev Temple, Shiva Parvati Temple, Maru Ganesh, Bhagwati Temple, Saraswati Temple, octagonal Krishna Temple, and Jagannath Temple.

The Kal Bhairav (which represents the destructive form of Lord Shiva) we found most frequented

The square has the credit of carrying out the royal coronations of King Birendra in 1975 and King Gyanendra in 2001.

We found that most of the buildings that have been damaged during the earthquake in 2015 are still being restored.

The whole picture was a desolate one, but our guide, whom we hired for an hour, told us that Durbar Square comes alive during the festivals, especially during Dasara.

We settled down at a place, trying to give some well-deserved rest to our poor feet when I realized to my utter delight, that we happened to be sitting just across the Kumari house and it was nearly time for her to give darshan.

Perhaps the most popular site for both Hindus and Buddhists is the three-storied temple called Kumari Bahal. This Newari temple, built by the last Malla king Jayaprakash Malla, houses the living Goddess Kumari Devi, who is revered and worshipped by the country’s Hindus. While there are several Kumaris throughout Nepal, the best-known is the Royal Kumari of Kathmandu, who lives in the Kumari Ghar in the southern end of Durbar Square.

A girl is selected to become the earthly embodiment of the Hindu goddess Durga by an ancient and magical selection process. A small girl of about three years from the Nepali Newari community is selected as Kumari through a very rigorous process. After 11 or 12 years, a new Kumari is selected, and each gets a lifelong pension from the Nepal government.

There are a lot of criteria to be met by the girl; she should be healthy, there should be no scars or cuts on the body, etc. Once she becomes the Royal Kumari, she leaves her home and parents and must stay in the Kumari Ghar.

Her feet are not allowed to touch the earth. She goes out only for the festival Indra Jatra and a few other important festivals, taken in a gilded chariot on the lap of selected persons. Everyone, including the king, comes for her darshan and takes her blessing; they carefully watch her for specific signs that may allude to their fortune and fate.

Interestingly, even if she becomes ill, has a cut, and sheds even a drop of blood, she ceases to be Royal Kumari, as the Goddess in Kumari is believed to leave her body the moment she sheds even a drop of blood, and she becomes an ordinary girl.

The house she lives in was beautiful, with Nepali craftsmanship, and we could see some people moving around on the upper floors; we were allowed to take photographs of the courtyard of the house where we gathered.

We saw boards with strict instructions not to take snaps of her when she appeared. Finally, at the stroke of 3 pm, there she was at the heavily decorated window on the 2nd floor and looked around at us; we were looking up at her, some literally with their jaws dropping. In a minute she bounced off, and the window was closed.

The crowd dispersed; there was palpable excitement in the air. I personally felt she looked like a parrot in a cage, albeit a holy one, and wondered how she emotionally coped when she was replaced by another Kumari. Apparently, they are educated well and later on in life are happy; one Kumari, Ms Bajracharya, won the title of Miss National in 2022 and is keen to become an air hostess.

We then went to Swayambhu, an ancient religious complex atop a hill in the Kathmandu Valley. The Tibetan name for it means 'Sublime Trees' because of the wide variety of trees found on the hill.

The complex consisted of a stupa; a variety of shrines and temples, some dating back to the Licchavi period; and a Tibetan monastery, museum, and library.

It has two access points: a long staircase leading directly to the main platform of the temple and a car road around the hill from the south leading to the south-west entrance. As the day we went was a public holiday, there were huge crowds.

According to Swayambhu Purana, the entire valley was once filled with an enormous lake, in which grew a lotus. The valley came to be known as Swayambhu, meaning "self-created," and an eternal, self-existent flame existed over which a stupa was later built.

As we climbed the steps, we saw many monkeys in the north-west parts of the temple. They are holy because Manjushri, bodhisattva of wisdom and learning, was residing on the hill which the stupa stands on. He was supposed to leave his hair short, but he grew it long and head lice grew. It is said that head lice transformed into these monkeys. 

Finally tired after trudging the whole long day, we wanted to retire to our beautiful Hyatt’s Regency hotel, where we had stayed on the 1st day in Kathmandu. We were blithely told by our driver that because that hotel was overbooked, we were going to stay in another hotel; by then we were totally battered by the callous attitude of the tour operator and decided to give in without a fight.

We were driven to the new hotel, which was quite ok; anyway, we would be there only for a night as we were flying home the next morning. Finally, the finishing touch to our Nepal journey was the late arrival of our driver the next day, causing us to rush at breakneck speed for Kathmandu airport, and luckily we reached there just before the counter closed.

Our trip to Nepal was a memorable one except for the careless and callous attitude of our local travel agency; we missed seeing many beautiful places due to our short trip. The people of Nepal were very warm and friendly, weather was good, and we could get all varieties of food available, suiting our preference. Indeed, we sometimes even forgot that we were in Nepal and not in India. If there is a chance to come back again, I would love to do so happily  

MUJHE MUKTI DO BHAGWAN ! OUR NEPAL JOURNEY

We had reached Jomsom in Nepal, left our luggage in our room, freshened up, and started for the Muktinath temple by jeep. The road we would be taking would not be suitable to travel in cars.

Muktinath is one of the most sacred and significant pilgrimage tours in the world for Hindus and Buddhists. It is located in the Mustang district at the base of Thorong La mountain pass at an altitude of 12,500 feet, is one of the 108 Divya Desams, is only one located outside India, and is also one of the Char Dham in Nepal .

Considered sacred by the Sri Vaishnava sect, in Sri Vaishnava literature it is named Tiru Shaligramam; Buddhists call it Chumig Gyatsa, a Tibetan meaning "Hundred Waters." For Tibetan Buddhists the holy murthi is a manifestation of Avalokitesvara, who embodies the compassion of all Buddhas.

There is a legend dating back to the 12th century that Guru Rinpoche, also known as Padmasambhava, the founder of Tibetan Buddhism, meditated at Muktinath on his way to Tibet. 

Hindu mythology refers to a battle between Lord Shiva and Jalandhar, a powerful demon king who had a pious wife, Vrinda. During the war between Shiva and Jalandhar, the demon king was killed, and his wife cursed Lord Vishnu, who had helped Shiva in killing the demon, to turn into a Shila and this is how Muktinath originated and Lord Vishnu started getting worshipped there. 

Devotees coming to the Muktinath temple also worship a 400 million-year-old Shaligram originally found in the Krishna-Gandaki river and now placed in the temple; the 96 square miles surrounding Muktinath is referred to as Shaligram Kshetra.

The other famous legend relates to the death of Sati. It is believed that her face (Mukh in Sanskrit) had fallen down here, and so this place is honoured as Muktinath.

Best time to visit this temple, due to the extreme weather conditions prevailing locally, is September, October, and November. During the festivals of Rishi Tarpan, Ram Navami and Vijay Dasami, thousands of pilgrims arrive for the darshan of Lord Vishnu.

As we sped on our way, we saw that the river Gandaki seemed to accompany us. This river has the uniqueness of having in its riverbed and banks a kind of stone called shaligram, fossils of ammonite shells that are associated with Lord Vishnu and resemble Shankha (conch shell), a sacred emblem of Lord Vishnu used by people as a trumpet during Hindu rituals and festivals. Many travelers come to Mustang from different part of the world just to get a Shaligram stone.

The different patterns of the stone are worshipped as different forms of Vishnu; white color is considered Vasudeva, black as Vishnu, green as Narayana, blue as Krishna, and golden yellow & reddish yellow as Narasimha and Vamana in yellow. The stones are found in various shapes with the shapes of the Panchajanya and Sudarshana Chakra, which are attributed to Vishnu. They are freely found along the banks of the River Gandaki and also sold in the shops in Nepal.

As the way was picturesque, though the road was bad, we enjoyed the travel to the village of Ranipauwa. It was only 24 km but took us 1 hour. On the way we met many trekkers, both young and old, patiently walking along the roads. I was sure they were finding the constant stream of vehicles, their horns and dust a big unavoidable nuisance.

We got down at Ranipauwa and looked around us; we saw the mighty mountains Dhaulagiri and Nilgiri towering over us from all sides. The streets were bustling with tourists, and the locals were busy with their  daily routine.

We had inquired and were told that we could take horses till the temple for a sum of 300 rupees, or we could walk for a short distance and climb 250 steps. We discussed and decided to use our feet.

It was very cold and breezy; as we walked up the incline, the cold air and the high altitude made us slow down, as it was difficult to breathe. People are advised to carry camphor or ginger to overcome the low oxygen conditions.

There were small stalls selling beads and shaligram stones, few Nepali women were weaving Nepali shawls on very basic looms; some youngsters zoomed past us in motorcycles, which were allowed till a certain point.

Finally we reached the welcome arch of the Muktinath temple, and the temple regally stood on top of the steps, beckoning us to climb faster. Some tourists passed by us on horses, and for a second I regretted my decision not to take horses but started to ascend the steps, sure of getting a lot of mukthi.

I observed some tourists being carried on doli shaped like stretchers and admired their devotion and also appreciated the hard work of the locals carrying them up the steps.

Now we started our holy trial. Walking up the stairs was really tiring; the high altitude didn’t help us at all, the winds cheekily egged us on and we could see that tourists were going up a few steps and then stopping for a breath.

To one side sat the holy Sadhus, most of whom were from India, and talking in Telugu quite fluently, some of the tourists returning from the temple were taking blessings from them and offering Nepali rupees in return.

As we went up, we could see the helicopter landing area, and the ground was filled with stones placed one upon the other in multiple tiers, probably placed by people with the hope of building houses in future.

 

We almost reached the temple and saw a Gompa and small temples on the way. 

The prakaram (outer courtyard) was huge, and the temple was simple and 3 tiered, behind the temple flowed Muktidhara—the source of the river Gandaki. There were 108 water spouts in the shape of a bull’s head through which the natural spring water poured. The sacred water that flows in these 108 spouts denotes the sacred Pushkarini water from the 108 Sri Vaishnava Divya Desams; we saw the tourists taking baths or collecting water in bottles to pour over their heads. 

Water from these spouts collected in two ponds called Saraswathi and Lakshmi Kund and pap and punya kunds, bathing in this pond is considered very sacred and is believed to hold the power to wash away negative karma and the results of one’s past negative actions.

We placed our bags on a bench and took turns having a bath and dipping into the kundas. 

Once my husband finished his holy dip and changed into his conventional attire, I started my walk under the 108 waterfalls. I braced to put myself under the icy water; I should say only utmost devotion and grit allow us to go through the ice-cold water. I came out and dipped into the 2 kunds; by now I was freezing and my teeth were chattering with the cold , I rushed to the changing room, where I thankfully changed into dry clothes.

We later waited in the queue and entered into the temple. The main deity is Vishnu, made of pancha loha, some say it is gold, is very lifelike and is in a sitting posture with four hands gracing the devotees by its supreme tranquility .

(This picture is courtesy of the internet, as cameras are not allowed inside the temple.)

There are other idols of Lord Shiva and Goddess Parvati, Bhoodevi , Sita, Luv and Kush, Garuda, and Sapt rishis in the temple. It is said that the initiative for the construction of this temple was given by Sabarna Prabha, a Nepali queen.

The temple had an aura beyond words. We could light diyas, were given holy rice grains to take home , we prayed and came out.

There were a lot of Indian tourists, mainly South Indians; we could see many Nepalis and few foreign tourists, probably on their way to and from the Annapurna Circuit trekking.

We then went to see the 35-foot stone Buddha statue, which was nearby and built at a cost of 5 crores; the weight of the idol is about 60,000 kg, and it is the biggest 'Stone Statue of Buddha' in Nepal.

It was enthralling to sit there peacefully and watch the snow-covered Annapurna range to the south and the Tibetan Plateau to the north. Buddha was highlighted against these mountains in the stark background, only harsh disturbance was the video conversations some of the tourists were having with their near and dear back home. I always wonder why we Indians talk so loudly on the phone. 

We then went to the Jwala Mai Temple, the temple of the eternal flame, located inside the Tibetan-style Dhola Mebar Gompa, to the east of the main Muktinath temple. 

It is built above an underground water stream, and small natural gas jets underneath the gompa produce continuously burning flames on top of the water. This supernatural flame is supposed to be a result of a penance performed by Lord Brahma, who invoked fire on water. 

The holy flame alongside a spring, in combination with earth, water, fire, and air, seems to be the origin of the religious significance of Muktinath, because only here are all the elements present in one spot. 

The small burning flames are hidden in the Gompa on the floor, behind a grid. We had to kneel almost to ground level to see the small blue flame (behind a grid) said to be burning here for thousands of years. 

Inside the Dhola Mebar Gompa, huge statues of Manjushri, Avalokiteshvara, and Vajrapani could be seen. But I felt that the atmosphere was more like any Buddhist temple than a Hindu one. To our surprise, not many tourists were aware of this temple, where pooja is conducted by Buddhists.

The spring water from inside the Jwala Mai temple rushed outside through a bull-shaped water spout. 

We came down the steps, which was much easier than going up the steps. It was almost lunchtime and we went into a small café in the village, which had many hotels and restaurants too, and ordered some simple fare. One has to take care about the chilli and spice used here; we ordered medium spice and regretted it as I had tears abundantly running down my cheeks.

Later we tried to shop for Shaligram; we didn’t have any expertise about them and had to trust the local sellers. Shawls were cheap ,I bought one, though I was sure they were not pure Pashmina at that cost. I loved the cheerful girl looking after the shop.

We have gone on a lot of pilgrimages but Muktinath temple trip was entirely a different experience, it was totally humbling and rewarding and left an everlasting impression in our minds.