NEPALI STREET MARKET

I came on vacation here in Nepal, but I really felt at home here. And one of the things that made me feel at home were the street vendors. I am not sure why, but I love them. Maybe because they are not as intimidating as a regular shop. Actualy, for what I have seen, most of the shopping happens in the streets here. There are very few shops with walls and door. Everything is outdoor. So I took also some pictures to give you a feeling of how it is shopping here in Nepal. This is how a Nepali street looks in the morning from the hotel room. They are there with their bicycle baskets full of oranges and lemons and ginger and apples ...And these are the vegetables vendors in the streets ...

And what about an ice cream? No food is pre-packaged here in Nepal. And I think they are right to do so. They are avoiding a lot of plastic trash ...
These are the fish vendors. Fish is not really fresh. It is all fried. And honestrly I didn't dare to buy it. Still trying to be vegetarian.
And these are some other random vendors that I found on my way
And of course if you don't know where to put all your shopping you can buy a purse in the street as well. I didn't check, but I am pretty sure they had also some fake Prada ones ...

A DIFFICULT DINNER

I am still here in Nepal. And here in Nepal it is still Dashain festival time. After the animal sacrifices of the last days now everybody are busy shopping around. Like Xmas for us. I like it. The only thing that I find hard is that all the restaurants are pretty much closed. Lunch is still OK, it is easy to find some food. But dinner is becoming a small drama. Every day is the same. I kind of forget of it until it is too late. And tonight in Patan has probably been the worst. I realized that I was hungry only after sunset, when all the street food vendors were home. This is the only open restaurant ...Of course I decided that it was too much for me. Too much. So I decided to continue my food hunting. Not an easy one. But I finally found a small shop, which was selling yogurt. This is a special yogurt that is prepared for the Dashain festival. They had one pot left, and of course I bought it. So this was my dinner, 1/2 kg of yogurt. At that point happy about my small shopping cart, I decide to head to my hotel. And there an other surprise. The hotel where I ws staying was also a restaurant. And because the restaurant was closed for the Dashain festivity, they decided to close th main door. And I was, of course, on the wrong side of the door. Intercom? Broken! And there I started getting nervous. But I started knocking the door. 10 seconds. Nothing No answer. 30 seconds. Nothing. I started shouting. "Heeeeeeeellooooooo is anybody theeeeeere?". Nothing. I was there with my stupid yogurt outside my lodge, with no chance to b heard. I continued to nervously play with intercom, shout and knock the door. Nothing. After 5 minutes I was really worried. After 10 minutes, I though to go and find an other room to sleep. When suddenly a guy came out from nowhere. He heard my shout. And lucky me, he had a cell phone and he knew the number of the hotel owner. In 30 seconds, that idiot of the hotel owner showed up and he said that "because of the festival they closed the restaurant". I tried to explain something. But I think I was to nervous to make any sense out of my thoughts. Finally I could start my dinner. I seat in an empty table of the empty restaurant of the hotel. Here it is ...The yogurt was really tasty, and I felt really lucky that I managed to find it. I was there seating at a table in the garden. All busy eating my yogurt when suddently a bomb dropped on my table. Just few inches from my dinner. This was the bomb ...... I guess I was lucky that it didn't splash neither on my head nor on my dinner. That would have been a disaster ... :D The morning after it has been even funnier. When I tried to have a shower I realized that there was no running water in the hotel. And of course, no hotel worker was there to help me. So I had to go to the Durbar square to wash my face ...Good thing that I was not alone ... :D

RICE RICE RICE

An other day in the city of Patan, Nepal. Not a big surprise that I missed all the museums and I just wander around this wonderful town. And I couldn't stop to be amazed on how important is rice for the people here. The harvesting season has just started and the dry has to be dried and cleaned. And it is such a wonderful thing to see how life can be simple, sometimes. This is the rice left there during the night, in front of a small temple, covered by carpets ... And this is the same rice spread to dry up. And women working on it. Really beautiful ... And I am thinking to all of us, in the Western world, how far we are from the the simple life of Nepal. And, again, I am not sure who is really missing something here. The Nepali who have never seen an iPod or us, who don't even know where the rice is coming from ...

The PEOPLE of PATAN

The more I am travelling in Nepal and the more I love its people. They are the real jewel of this country. Much more than any Himalaya peak and any monument. They are simple, honest, always helpful and absolutely lovely. Their traditional dresses are the perfect match with the beautiful buildings. So I have decided to dedicated also to the people of Patan a small entry in my blog ...And I really love the way they are relaxing. It is very common to find people taking a nap. I don't think they are homeless. They are just relaxing. Can you imagine a person in one of our cities just taking a nap in the street? It is so rare to see people really enjoying their time in our society. Maybe because we don't have enough time to do it. We need to work and make more money and get a better job, and make more money again. In the meantime we forget that we maybe the scope of our life is as simple as to be happy ...

I think that the pictures are nice, but see this people with your eyes is much nicer. So I hope, you will have the chance to visit Nepal soon.

PATAN DURBAR SQUARE

It has been hard to leave Bhaktapur, but at the end I managed to convince myself that I had to go. So I left. And I decided to go to Patan. Patan is an other jewel of the Kathmandu valley. A small town with a great history and with a wonderful main square. Here in Nepal the main square of the town is called Durban square, which means "the square of the palace". And the one in Patan is so nice to be in the list of the UNESCO heritage sites. Here are some pictures that I took during the two days that I spent here. I hope you will like them ...

And these are butter candles. The first in a Buddhist temple and the second in a Hindu one. Different religions, but the same warm feeling to be in a special place, almost at home ...