Circling the stupa and falling for Boudha

I love it here. I love the kora rush hour, the sounds of horns, chanting and drums that ring throughout the streets from the 50 surrounding monasteries, the flowing burgundy and amber of the monks robes intermingling with the designs and colours of kurta and (tibetan clothing),  the glinting of the gold stupa in the afternoon sun, my favourite haunts of good food, good coffee, and beautiful gardens, that the holiness of this place is ingrained in nearly all who are there, the varied group of people that make morning prostrations, the type of travellers and students i've met here and just well being here.

4-6pm rush hour:)

At my hotel/Monastary



View from my room



Riding the rubbish truck!

I had intended to deepen my yoga practice in an ashram, but as it has turned out, staying nearly 2 weeks here has turned out to be a wonderful opportunity to indeed practice yoga, but also attend teachings in tibetan buddhism, visit rinpoches and lamas, be inspired by the students of tibetan language, buddhism, visit monasteries, observe the activities surrounding the most auspicious day on the Buddhist calendar here and generally get a taste of boudhanath.

The teachings and conversations of the buddhist lineages here has been fascinating - i'm not looking to take refuge or find a lama, but i'm curious, feel a resonance with many of the concepts and ideas, and have had some special deep emotional experiences.
The yoga has been a welcome change too - I found a wonderful teacher - Amrita, who teaches in the Sivananda school, and also doing some deeper work with her too. At first I had wanted to find the more active school of yoga, but this more meditative, holistic experience has been right for me now. I do belive that I may have to look closer at proper education... there are some fascinating ties with the Buddhism and many other readings I've been doing over the last year.

So... i'm rushing as I'm leaving for a 10 day Vipassana Retreat this aftenroon - so I've got some pics from my iphone as my other camera trying it's best to get repaird.... and... some SOUNDS!

the monastery sounds are pretty awesome....

528AM prayers on Buddha's most auspiscicous day

Monks chanting at the Gumpa

830am prayers

Kathmandu tranquility and chaos

The small crowded streets of kathmandu have been overwhelming for me; throngs of people with motorbikes and blaring horns weaving through, dogs, cows and people picking through not so neat piles of roadside rubbish, bare tangles of electricity wiring overhead, shops, vendors and tourist touts piled on top of oneanother, and overlaying all this, the heavy smog and fumes infiltrating up your nose and mouth.


But somehow it feels relaxed too; safer on the whole than south america, less calling out by the men, quiet dawntimes with only a cacophony of birds and the occasional barking dog, and with all the hindu shrines and buddhist temples/stupas, i have found many moments of quiet reflection.

Yesterday i visited the Boudha, a huge stupa just outside of Kathmandu that is surrounded by monasteries. Legend is that a woman was granted as much land as she could cover with the skin of a water buffalo, and she cleverly cut it up into thin strips and joined them together to create a massive circumference

You walk around the stupa in a clockwise direction and you can climb up towards the piercing blue eyes of Buddha and 13 gold steps to nirvana. You can join the monks who are dotted around the edge to meditate too, or give offerings for prayers.

I had a nice time walking around the stupa, stopping here and there, walking around the maze of streets to find various monasteries and enjoying some ginger tea.

Boudha Stupa

It's an interesting mix, you have the normal mess of dirty streets around the pristine white and colourful flagged Boudha, but then soaring mansions and immaculate gardens of the monastery compounds complete with barbed wire fencing. Buddhism is big business here - for both locals and the plethora of foreigners who are either living here or visiting for instruction.

I mean i get it, the appeal of both introspective work and doing it in a place like Nepal. You really can feel it am g everything else, and i myself am being drawn to more meditation practice and have more interest to visit religious sites, like the place Buddha was born to meditate there. But i also have a bit of cynicism too...not to the practice, but the way we as westerners seem to flock in droves with our pre-determined ideas. And i've not met many foreigners who speak Nepali.

I'm struggling with that, not being able to easily converse with locals about things, and funnily enough i don't think they are understanding my automatic spanish responses!

One more rant on us visitors, i was reminded disembarking the plane how we swoop in with our gore tex, high tech hiking gear, over prepared and under relaxed for our planned treks. It sort of feels like overkill, or at least we are some sort of dressed up comedy act ready to perform in the mountains.

Back to the monastaries...i can highly recommend staying in one instead of the tourist throng in kathmandu. Cost wise it's the same, and you get to enjoy hilltop serenity under beautiful stupas and dine with the monks and nuns. And of course meditate and receive instruction. When i come back to kathmandu that's where i'm headed. (Kopan Monastery)

Today i'm on the 'tourist' bus (aka sans chickens and rice bags) to Pokhara. I've been feeling a little overwhelmed with everything here, and frankly i'm just over and tired or traveling, so i'm off to find me some Himalayan mountains to wander through.

Oddly the bus trip is pretty similar; narrow mountainside highways (though for the most part paved) with dangerous passing trucks, and even in the hillside theres inca like terraces carved out.

Oh and the other good thing? Tasty food and hot chai/chiya in the morning!

Cows feasting in central Kathmandu

Durbar Square, central Kathmandu

Shrine at intersection near Thamel, central Kathmandu at 5.45am 

ten days of surrender to noble silence

how to start. where can i start? perhaps with right now. a feeling of balance. somehow a strength in my self awareness. a confidence that i can find the handle that opens the gate to observe my mind and being, and find the moment to change.

oh, i can also sit cross legged, in pose, relaxed, without moving for over an hour. for those that have seen me jumping around for the past 30 years, that's a bit of an achievement.

where have i been? what huge big bang has happened? not a big bang, just a journey of struggles quietening down an over active cluttered mind, surrendering to the stillness of meditation, moving on from extreme lows and highs, slowly building my awareness of mind and body, experiencing and understanding some basics truths and rhythms, and unknowingly, realising an experience to live the teachings of the Buddha.

the course was a 10 day vipassana meditation course. vipassana was the technique of meditation used by the Buddha and what he taught in teaching the dhamma (the universal law) and path to enlightenment and liberation. i knew nothing of this before going in. all I knew was that it was 10 days of meditation, it was vegetarian and that i wasn't allowed to speak for 10 days. (surprisingly not so hard)

being overzealous, i had had the intention before the course to write in detail about my day to day experiences, but now, it's meaningless. all that matters is that for each person it is totally different. i make it sound all airy fairy, but it isn't. unfortunately it's my tendency to use too many words.

it's simple. it's about what you experience and how you relate and react to it, right here, right now.

for some, life changing. for me, with practice and time we will see. i have a long long way to go.

i'll stop here. if you're intrigued... there's information about what it is, videos of experiences of other meditators and an introduction from S.N. Goenka (who brought the teaching to the western world) on the Vipassana website.