Day 135 - Durbar Square in Patan-dhoka

We took a two hour walk south of Kathmandu to another Durbar Square in the Patan dhoka area. It started to rain and flood through the big city halfway through our walk. It was funny to see the traffic jam caused by the flooding, and the pedestrians all trying to find little islands in the puddles to step over to get from one place to another. I wore flip flops so I just walked through the flooded areas without too much trouble.

The Patan dhoka area, another UNESCO site, was nice to explore, with small mazes of alleyways throughout, and old traditional style buildings still intact. The Durbar square was similar to the one in the Kathmandu Valley, but a little bigger and with more appealing temple structures. We walked around for about 30 minutes, but I think Niels and I got a little tired of seeing some of the same sort of things since we've been traveling for so long.

At night, we headed to Thamel and got another steak dinner, meeting up with my CS friend Sylvia from Austria. She was headed to Pokhara the next morning to trek a little and we shared our experiences with her over dinner.

We were going to head to Durbar Square early tomororw morning to see some animal sacrifices during the Dashain Nepalese Festival (it's like Christmas for the Nepalese) but were told that it would occur another day. One of the workers at our hostel already sacrificed 11 goats during the day at his home by beheading them. The festival lasts 15 days, so I'm sure I'll come across some special things while exploring the city this next week.

Golden Temple

Durbar Square

Day 117 - Hanuman-dhoka Durbar Sq and Boudhanath

Sophie has many different Couchsurfers' belongings at her home, and people come and go at random times, usually when they start a trek and also before they leave the country. They leave the things that are unneccessary for a trek with Sophie. I think it's so great how open she is with her home, to be so trusting of everyone. If only the rest of the world was this way.

When I arrived back at her place last night, a German couple, Rachel and Jonas, came back from their 5-day trek in the Annapura trekking area. I ended up tagging along with them today to sightsee in Kathmandu, saving on taxi fare to the different places we visited.

The first place we visited was the Hanuman-dhoka Durbar Square in Bantapur. It is a UNESCO world heritage site and is a concentrated area of both Hindu and Buddhist temples. One of the more interesting structures in the area is the Kumari-ghar, which is the home of the 'kumari' or living goddess who is considered to be the incarnation of the goddess Taleju. The little girl has spent her whole live pretty much imprisoned, only being shown to the public twice a year. We came at a good time because tomorrow is a celebration, and one of the days that the Kumari would be shown. The festival is called Indra Jatra and it marks the end of monsoon season. There are activists that believe it is child abuse, to keep the Kumari locked up and unable to have her own genuine childhood, or even a life of her own because everyone looks to her as a goddess. I think the different lamas in Tibetan culture also end up having their lives chosen for them, but I wonder how much freedom they have in their lives compared to this little girl...

Afterwards, I headed to the Boudhanath, which is a huge stupa in Bouda, an area with many Tibetans. The stupa was in the center of a touristy Tibetan-inspired area, where many people visited, walked around the stupa, and spun prayer wheels. I walked around the stupa three times, and noticed the way the people prayed to the stupa. They had wooden boards on the floor, and when they prostrated, they placed pieces of cloth under their hands to slide forward until they were fully lying down towards the stupa.

At the end of the night, I headed back to Durbar Square to check into a room there, since I would already be there for the festival tomorrow and rooms were so cheap. It would have been cheaper to stay there than to get a taxi from Sophie's place the next day. For dinner, Jonas and Rachel joined me at a local Indian restaurant, where I tried the dal bhat dish, which is very popular in Nepal. It consisted of rice, lentil soup, some curry, and some vegetables. I ate with my hands the way the locals did, and I think it pleased the restaruant workers. Good to know I was doing something right!

Boudhanath

Hanuman-dhoka Durbar Sq

Dal Bhat

Day 100 – Food and Tour of Georgetown, Penang

Knowing that I would only get one day to explore Penang meant that I would have to try as much food here as I could, which was my main objective, with exploration of the city taking a backseat.

I ended up arriving in the city of Georgetown at 6am, way too early to check into the hostel I booked, but I ended up taking a taxi there anyways in hopes of seeing if I could just nap in the lobby. The doors were locked and no one was around, but luckily, after a couple of minutes of waiting outside, one of the staff came by to open the door and let me sleep in the staff room.

There were informative guides on the popular Penang cuisine at the hostel that I used to find some of the local delicacies. Check out the pictures below to see what I ate.

The city of Georgetown, like Malacca, is a UNESCO world heritage site. Malaysia is a fairly new country, so these two UNESCO sites were very different compared to other places I'd visited in South East Asia. The other sites had been thousands of years old, but here, the buildings are relatively newer, maybe only at the most, a couple hundred years old. Again, most of the “old city” was walkable, and I ventured around using a handy tourist map that I saw every other tourist hold as they also walked around the city. Since today was the day before Aidilfitri, many of the sites were closed and we had to resort to walking by, snapping a quick picture, and then heading to the next stop without really knowing what exactly was the significance of each stop.

Fried Oysters

Cendal

Fort Cornwallis

Guan Yin Temple

Day 98 – Food Paradise in Malacca

I took a 2 hour bus ride from KL to Malacca. It wasn't as crowded on
the bus as I would have guessed during the holidays, maybe because
Melacca is a popular place to visit and there are so many departures
to the city on any given day. Or maybe because it seemed like the city
was predominantly visited (and inhabited?) by Chinese Malaysians who
probably don't celebrate Ramadan.

I walked around the city in the afternoon, without really knowing what
to look for except the night street market that everyone suggested I
visit on Jonker Street. I passed by some churches, temples, and other
landmarks. Some of the buildings were influenced by Europe
(specifically the Dutch and Portuguese). The city itself is a UNESCO
Heritage site, something I've been accustomed to seeing all over SE
Asia in some of the most special places.

Then came food paradise for my hungry stomach and eyes once the sun
went down. The entire Jonker Street was filled with food and
merchandise vendors selling lots of various items, many of them
Chinese/Taiwanese, something I was very familiar with, and happy to be
familiar with. Check the pictures out:

Portuguese Egg Tarts

Taiwanese Sausages

Hainanese Chicken and Rice Balls

Dim Sum

Taiwanese Radish Cake

Curry Fish(?) Balls

Street Dancing on Jonker Street

Chinese Calligraphy