Kathman-dudes!

After the chilled out vibe of Laos, arriving in Kathmandu was pretty full on. First of all, wed travelled 24 hours to get there (apparently the cheap flights aren't always direct), AND, we didn't have quite enough money for our visas (F.Y.I Lonely Planet - visa prices have gone up at least $10 since your time of research). To add to this, we arrived on day 2 of the 15 day Dasain festival (Nepal's biggest national festival) AND a beggar tried to bite us for refusing to give him cookies we didn't even have.. all of this in our first 12 hours!

The contrast compared to S.E Asia was huge, the smells, the sounds, the colours, the scams and the pace of life bore no resemblance to what we'd been used to in the previous months. It was time to wake up and smell the cow shit.

Bodnath stupa, Kathmandu

As you'd expect, we saw all the main sights around Kathmandu and the valley, but the most exciting part about our time in Kathmandu was the Dasain festival. We're still not 100% sure what the festival is all about, but it involved a lot of people shopping and being merry aaannnd... the decapitation of several hundred animals. You probably think we're horrible people, but we were totally excited to see goats and buffaloes being sacrificed to the gods in this way. Watching 30 or so of these scarifies, wasn't nearly as bad as we thought it would be and although they're killing animals, it's done incredibly quickly and none of the animal goes to waste. If this grosses you out, don't look at the next picture and whatever you do, don't ask to see our videos of it!

Heads!

Once killed, the men run the head and body around a circle

Kathmandu has quite the mix of people walking the streets and we thoroughly enjoyed people watching on a very regular basis - here are our favourites;

The Trekkers: We hate the trekkers. We're not talking about people who climb mountains here, these are the people who feel the need to walk the streets of Kathmandu CITY in their trekking gear. Ummm... despite what you may think, wearing Kathmandu clothing in Kathmandu isn't the epitome of coolness, nor is wearing polar fleece on a 30 degree day. It's not just the clothing that offends us either (but if we see one more quick-dry t-shirt or zip off shorts/trousers, we may scream), it's the unnecessary use of trekking equipment in an urban environment that drives us nuts. Hiking poles on flat bitumen roads and head lamps in restaurants simply are not necessary... we get it, you've walked the Annapurna circuit. Good for you.

We hate trekkers

The Hippies: Hippies and Kathmandu have a historical link.. the city actually has a street called 'Freak St' named after it's long-running hippy community. Thanks to this community, Kathmandu's shops are filled with hippie crap and the young babies of hippie parents are answering to names like "Lark" and "Peace"... seriously cruel... but at least they're not trekkers.

Lark and Peace grown up

The Sadhus: These guys are our favourites... or at least they were until they started stealing our water bottles, attacking us with red dots and asking us for money all the time. Still, their long dreads, body paint and weird walking poles make them a cool novelty in our book!

Two Sadhus kindly posing for our photo... for a few dollars of course

We always seem to like the places that other people hate... and Kathmandu was no exception.