Temples Galore!

Ok, I got such a good deal yesterday, I have to brag. A lady outside the Pashupantinath Temples was trying to sell me some jewelry, and after her hounding me and being firm on my price, we settled on 220 Rupees. She wanted 2500. The normal amount you can usually barter down the price is about 30-60%. I knocked off 91%. I am good.

On to Pashupantinath. This is the temple complex that has mainly to do with the life and death cycle. In word word: Deep. People come here to cremate their family members and deposit their remains in the Bagmati River, Nepal's holy river that flows into the Ganges. This continues the cycle of life to death, death to life. The only people that don't get cremated are the holy men, who are instead buried, stopping the cycle. It was pretty powerful watching the cremations, and a Buddhist family performing a ritual on the one year anniversary of their family members cremation. I finally caved and hired a guide for this one.

Today I made a trip to Patan, to go see the Durbar Square there. To avoid confusion, Durbar Square is a universal term, there are many of them around the Kathmandu Valley. It was a pretty cool, medieval looking place. Lot's of old architecture and an impressive array of temples in the square. I was hoping for a clear day to shoot some good pictures, but no such luck. The sun here is so intense and the clouds are so gray it's difficult to shoot against, and a lot of my pictures don't end up being as nice as they should be.

I'm typing this on a computer at an internet cafe, the internet at my guest house has been down for a day so I am unable to post any pictures, but hopefully soon. Tomorrow I go finalize my Indian Visa and get the last minute things ready for my trek on Saturday.