Stories, Questions, and Mysteries

Stories, Questions, and Mysteries

Friday 24 January 2014

Durbar Square Mk II


In a city build inside a mountain perimeter on what used to be a lake, now unstable and waiting for the big earthquake, where roads and streets struggle to get names is not easy. I have not yet chanced a taxi and have generously been given lifts by my hosts and the neighbours. Crossing roads in the Asian countries I have visited is probably worth a book in in itself. Mercifully I have survived the two wheelers whom a Tibetan neighbour describes as warding off fear of instant death should their feet touch the ground.
And there are the wires. Some of which have caught passing pedestrians and one of which was caught by a motorist and dragged down nearby posts.
My second trip to Durbar Square involved more backstreet interesting routs than the first. The whole Patan area around the Square is notable for artists of all kinds. Little shop after little shop, dark inside with a dirty window on to a laneway is crammed with religious or cultural or just superstitious pieces. Many are of great beauty and most wonderfully crafted. The two below are a couple studying at university and doing process work in their spare time.

The museum is wonderfully laid out and full of good examples and simple explanations of Buddhist and Hindu theognies. 
The wooden structure of older buildings incorporates jutting crossed beams resting on lintels supported by one or more commonly two carved columns. As the people of Delphi learned to build with stone to withstand earthquake so did the Nepali people using wood.

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