Sensory overload

15 August 2014

The city of Kathmandu

First impression of Kathmandu: COLOURFUL with a sensory overdose!

My morning goal destination was Durbar Square. As I left the hostel with a map in hand I was confident to find my way around as I usually do. However I was greatly mistaken and my orientation confidence decreased with every fruit bike I passed. The streets were set up as random as can be and of course there were no visible street names. It also didn't help that there was a layer of mud which made looking at the ground essential to prevent a slippery fall. Eventually I changed plans and hopped onto a rickshaw to visit Swayambhunath, also known as monkey temple, located 2km west of Kathmandu.

The rickshaw driver dropped me below some abandoned looking steps. As I read that there were steps leading to the top I suspected this to be the right place, so up I went. At the top I reached a small temple, however..............as hard as I looked (even sometimes mistakingly seeing a lion statue as a monkey) there were no monkeys to be seen, so this cannot be the monkey temple! 

Following my intuition I continued walking up the muddy path until I eventually saw the stupa upon a hill in the distance. 

The climb up was an exhausting 365 steps whilst trying to avoid getting attacked by the monkeys. Taking into consideration my previous monkey incident in Malaysia, I was quite focused on avoiding them and I kept thinking "don't look into the eyes, don't look into the eyes"! 

The view from the top:

The eyes overlook the whole city and represent wisdom and compassion. The third eye in between sends messages to heavenly beings via cosmic rays, so that those interested can come down to earth to listen to the Buddha. 

Even monkeys need to reflect sometimes.