Marika's friends, Oma and Jim, from the U.S. have lived in Nepal on and off for the last 30+ years and have most recently settled in Bhaktapur, so we went to visit them. Bhaktapur is a UNESCO World Heritage site, and you immediately realize why upon entering the city gates. It's an ancient Newar town (Newar is one of the ethnic groups in Nepal), the 3rd largest city in the country, and one of the previous capitals. They are famous for their wood carvings and royal yogurt, and have an unbelievable New Years festival which we walked right in to! The festival is a 10-day affair, and we were there for the last half of it. A recommendation if anyone happens to ever stay here, is Unique Guest House, right in the center of Dattatraya Square.
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From a Nepali blog about the festival: "The festivities start off with a friendly tug-of-war between the residents of the lower and upper halves of the town of Bhaktapur, during which each group tries to pull an ancient chariot containing an image of Shiva Bhairab to their side of the town. The festival includes parades, a candlelight procession and the display of temple deities throughout the city. On the fourth day of the festival, and the last day of the “old year”, the men of the city work together to raise a 25 meter high ceremonial pole into place. The pole has a crossbeam with two strips of cloth hanging from it as a representation of two slain snakes. This ceremonial pole stays up until the following day when residents of the lower and upper halves of the city once more engage in a tug of war, but this time to pull the pole down to their respective sides. Once the pole crashes to the ground, sometimes resulting in casualties, it is seen as the official beginning of the New Year and the festivities continue for three more days.
The Bisket Festival of Nepal is based on the story of a Bhaktapur King’s quest to find a husband for his daughter. Each time he made a suitable match, the groom would be found dead in the marital bed the following morning. Eventually eligible bachelors became a scarce commodity and the people prayed earnestly for deliverance from this mysterious curse. One day the father of the next prospective groom, on learning of the curse, offered to take his son’s place in the marital bed. Forcing himself to stay awake and alert following the consummation of the marriage, the substitute groom saw two deadly serpents slithering out of the princesses’ nostrils. The hero quickly killed the snakes and broke the spell, thereby earning the undying gratitude of the people and resulting in the celebration of the Bisket Festival."
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The festival culminates in the oversized chariot being at the center of a city-wide tug-of-war, so the chariot could theoretically end up in one of several parts of town. We made our way toward the chariot on the last night and noticed clusters of Nepali Police in full riot gear surveying the crowds, and we asked ourselves what we were walking in to. We found a good spot where we perched above the street and crowds and waited for the tug-of-war to begin. A local guy standing next to us told us that in years past, young testosterone filled men start a brick-throwing fight, but that he thought this year was going to be different. RIGHHHHHHHHT. As the chariot swayed back and forth, each side had their own chants that accompanied their collective tugs. You could feel the energy of the crowd building, fueled by endless imbibing of local rice beer. Suddenly we saw some rocks flying overhead and the sea of people began to flow in our direction, a woman clutching her baby was starting to cry, and the local guy grabbed us and told us to get inside the hotel we were in front of. The hotel had (properly) anticipated the chaos and had barred their doors shut from the inside, so we were all pounding on the door for a couple minutes before they opened up and we could run inside.
We sprinted up to the roof top terrace where there were lots of other tourists watching the scene unfold. It felt like the news reports you see with Palestinian youths, faces covered in bandanas, throwing rocks and bricks at an the other side, but in this case the other side also had bricks and rocks that they launched right back. Meanwhile the backdrop of the city was also transformed by the stunning lightning and thunder storm (minus the rain) that began, as if on cue. We were about 6 stories up, on the highest rooftop in the city (which we became concerned about at one point when we realized we were standing against metal railings, in a puddle of water, in a lightning storm), when a rock hit the wall near us... Needless to say everyone crammed inside at that point, and the hotel manager told us that last year a tourist had been hit in the head by a rock on that same roof. Thanks man.
It was one of the craziest things i've ever seen, people with total disregard for the potential injury they were causing by throwing big bricks in to a group of other people, and having such disregard for their own safety by getting right up to the "front-line" in a show of machismo. BUT... the next day they're all back to being friends, it's just their annual release before they "go back to planting rice" as Oma put it.
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On a lighter note... in the early morning when we went to go watch the pole being brought down, there were 3 little girls sitting around me, all under 12 years old, who spoke English well enough for us to get to know each other. They invited me back to their house for tea and a pastry, and they didn't bat an eye when I asked them if Marika and Josh could also come, one of them grabbed Marika's hand and led the way. Their house was typical Newar style, a steep narrow staircase leading to a small room on each floor. After they made us tea, they put on a Newari movie (not even just a Nepali movie - a Newari movie!) and taught us some Newari dance moves! They also took us to see some sights around Bhaktapur that we hadn't seen yet. Basically they were the best little tour guides you could imagine, something you'd NEVER experience in a western country!
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