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Kathmandu (Part 2)

From the Thamel area (last post) we walked past the Kathmandu Durbar Square which was heavily damaged in the 2015 earthquake.  We could see that previously it was an impressive area.   (“Durbar” refers to a term used for the place where Indian Kings and other rulers held formal and informal meetings.  There are three main Durbar Squares in the Kathmandu area, all of which are World Heritage sites.  Kathmandu Durbar, Patan Durbar, and Bhaktapur Durbar)

Another day we walked to Patan Durbar Square.  Again fascinating scenes along the way and many religious sites.  Much of the architecture in Patan Square is from the 1600s but historians know that the place was a more ancient crossroad.  The city itself is a center of both Hinduism and Buddhism with 136 religious courtyards and 55 major temples—most within the Square.  Here we saw a lot of reconstruction from the earthquake.

We visited the architectural museum in part of the old palace.

A good museum is located in another part of the old palace and we spent time there also.

We visited the Golden Temple, a Buddhist temple from the 15th century not far from the Patan Square. It is a Newari Buddhist monastery.  (Newari are the original inhabitants of Kathmandu valley.)  The “gold” is mostly polished brass but is beautiful.  Two large lions guard the entrance and two large brass elephants guard the temple area.  There are small brass monkeys holding jackfruit as offerings as well as many other artifacts and the statue of Buddha and other gods.

To be continued!

This entry was posted on Monday, February 20th, 2017 at 5:57 am and is filed under Nepal. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.

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