Sacred rivers confluences: Devghat

Devghat is located about six kilometers away from the hustle and bustle of Narayangadh.  It is marked by the confluence of the rivers Trishuli and Kali Gandaki, two tributaries of the holy river Ganges.  The village is accessible through a suspension footbridge over the Trishuli river.  Once on the other side, you can explore the religious town wandering through the stony lanes through a maze of local shops that sell everything from local groceries to other religious items. Best way to discover Devghat is set aside a day and wander these lanes that take you higher up the hill and to the various ashrams and schools that are found scattered throughout the village. Devghat essentially has three concentric rings of settlements, the inner most is often considered the heart of the religious hub while the outer two slowly disperse in density as you go outside are mostly residential units. There are several places of interests within the core area such as the famous Sita Cave and other local landmarks.

Confluence of Kali Gandaki and Trishuli Rivers

By the banks of the confluence

Suspension Bride to the pilgrimage site

Trishuli River

Stupas of Kathmandu V: Others

Mahabauddha, Kathmandu

To be continued...

Stupas of Patan I: Northern Stupa

Plan showing the location of the four stupas of Patan

North Stupa (Yampithur Stupa or I-Bahi) which stands to the north off Bangalamukhi Temple / Khumbeshwor Temple Complex. One of the four main stupas in Patan, the others are Lagankhel at the southern edge, Imadol at the eastern periphery and Pulchowk at the west. Of the four, only the northern stupa rests on a hard surface. As for this particular stupa, you will find five minor stupas including a Guthi building around this main central stupa. The entrance to this complex is flanked by a Bhajan Mandal and Sattal, both about 8'-0" high.


Location of North Stupa (Courtesy Google Maps)

A trip to Orvieto

We took the regional train at 7.03 am from Termini to get to Orvieto. The three of us left our B&B Angeletti at around 6.30 am to catch the 64 Stazione Termini Bus.When we got there, we took a Funicular to the top of the old town.

A typical medieval street, Orvieto

We started by walking on the Via Corso – which is the main road that basically connects you to the other end of the town. This is a major tourist town with the streets lined with neat shops which are like the united colors of Benetton, Gucci and what not- you get the picture, it’s a small town up on a hill but its by no means a boring place. The cappuccino and especially the Chocolat Cornetto that I had there had to be the best one I had in Italy. It was this big café cum chocolate store with a lot of fancy Orvieto Chocolates- and there was this one in particular, chocolates with erotic poses that everyone was giving a second glance to as well as taking pictures. The town has a lot of the medieval features especially the homes and the towers intact.

Chocolates

Orvieto

The southern edge of town which is the cliff overlooking the valley below and also has the city gate on its side. I would assume that the city was actually accessed from this side. It had a parking at the bottom of this edge and I have to admit there was a really amazing lift that connected the parking lot from below to the top of the cliff. The shaft  must have been carved out by cutting the Tufa rocks- which forms the base of the town.

For the tourist

Orvieto is a city in southwestern Umbria, Italy. situated on the flat summit of a large butte of volcanic tuff. The site of the city is among the most dramatic in Europe, rising above the almost-vertical faces of tuff cliffs that are completed by defensive walls built of the same stone. Orvieto was populated since the Etruscan times. It is thus also home to Etruscan ruins and the remnants of a wall that enclosed the city more than 2000 years ago. The interesting buildings to see here are the Duomo or the Cathedral, the Piazza del Popolo with the primary building being the Palazzo del Capitalino del Popolo. The original Palazzo del Capitano was a single ground floor loggia that was used as a market place or for meetings, from which the magistrate would speak to the citizens. This was where the surrounding lords or representatives of vanquished cities came to pay their allegiance to Orvieto.

Besides these two interesting places that are a must see when you go to Orvieto- you want to see the Museums that houses the Papal residence. It has a lot of interesting sculptures and the smaller one has a lot of  late 20^th century sketches.

One of the sculptures on exhibit at the museum, Orvieto

Duomo, Orvieto

You also do not want to miss the interior of the Duomo and for a price of about six euros you will get into the museums mentioned above as well as the room in the church that houses the famous frescoes by … Rick Steeve says, “Why such an impressive church in a little tufa town? Because of a blood-stained cloth. In the 1260s, a skeptical priest — who doubted that the bread used in communion was really the body of Christ — passed through Bolsena (a few miles from Orvieto) while on a pilgrimage to Rome. During Mass, the bread bled, staining a linen cloth. The cloth was brought to the pope, who was visiting Orvieto at the time. Such a miraculous relic required a magnificent church.To the right of the altar, the Chapel of St. Brizio features Luca Signorelli's brilliantly-lit frescoes of the Apocalypse (1499-1502). Step into the room and you're surrounded by vivid scenes of damnation and salvation — Orvieto's artistic must-see sight. Only 25 people are allowed in the chapel at a time.”

An Orvieto must have - Classico!

And finally no trip to a foreign place is complete without a taste of its food. There is a saying which is famous in Orvieto- when you are there you must experience the three C’s- drinking the Classico Wine served in Ceramic pots and see the Cathedral. We had lunch in a fancy café- and I had Don Marcello basically pasta with tomato sauce and cheese and of course the Classico house wine. It was pretty good actually, so it was worth the price you paid for it. For a price of around 12-15 Euros you can get a very decent lunch.Some more sketching and then it was time to go down the Funicular and head to Orte.

Bell Tower, Orte

We took the train back from Orvieto to Orte which was about an hour away towards Rome from Orvieto. The town of Orte is located a few miles north of the railway junction on an isolated tufa rock overlooking the Tiber, near the point where this river is joined by the River Nera. Water from a large section of the Central Apennines (a mountain range) flows into the Nera. The Romans built a bridge on the Tiber to facilitate trade between Rome and Umbria. While the Danube is blue, the Tiber is blond (il biondo Tevere) as it carries in suspension minute particles of earth: during the Middle Ages, when the drainage systems put in place by the Romans collapsed, the floods deposited these particles on the lowest areas of the city covering wholly or in part houses and temples. The history of Orte starts with the Etruscans who dug the caves one can still see on the sides of the rock and used them as cemeteries.

View of Tiber from Orte

Upon reaching Orte around four in the afternoon, we took a taxi up to the old town from the train station below. We had our evening coffee there and I have to say that it was not so good. Left me with an upset stomach and I almost needed Pepto Bismol. Orte is really a small town and the best thing about the town was the presence of the almost miniature Piazza Colonna, which is cute to say the least with its small pillar reminiscient of the column at the Piazza Colonna in Rome. I believe I've already made a post about this little piazza in this blog earlier, A Case of two Piazza Colonnas We walked around for a while observing the historic town of Orte and then took a local bus back to the train station from where we caught the next train back to Rome.

Connecting the chowks of Kathmandu - I (North Side)

Areas covered in this walk
(View Courtesy: Google Maps)

A walk through the narrow streets that connect these 'Chowks' starting from Indrachowk. All pictures taken in 2013. As you walk through this historic city core, and try and understand the relationship between the private, the public, the sacred; you realize the city planning comes very close to a traditional Islamic City with its clusters of interlinked private courtyards and a common open space usually a market place or a sacred site.

Indrachowk - now a busy often chaotic traffic junction.
Aakash Bhairabh Temple stands in the background of what 
has historically been (and even today) is site of major Jatras and festivals

In between Indra chowk and Ason
You will find remnants of the past scattered in this historic route

A typical narrow lane
where the new and the old co-exist
Semi-Public

One of the oldest Bahals

Chusya Bahal (Sanskrit Name: Gunakara Mahavihara, Chusya Bahal means Monastery of the Sun-dried grain) located north of the Hanuman Dhoka area is one of the best examples of a Buddhist Vihara to have survived in its original form. Completed in 1648 with an image of Harihar Lokeshvar at the shrine, it's courtyard contains seventh century Chaityas. The Torana over the main entrance dates from 1673 while that over the shrine entrance dates from 1676. There is suggestion that they year 1648 may have marked the date of renovation, rather than the founding of the monastery; it is also Supported by the fact that most of the woodwork is older than the building itself (woodwork dating back to the fourteenth century). After a study conducted in 1977, an article suggested that the iconology of Chusya Bahal follows the prescriptions of Sanskrit Buddhist texts.

Thahity
Was there a water spout here at some point? Why the name 'hity'?

Street parallel to Ason-Indra chowk Street

Older buildings lined along the Ason-Indra chowk Street

Ason chowk before the evening vegetable market sets up

Looking towards Ason from Makhan Galli,
Roof of Aakash Bhairav on the left

A typical shop selling household metal goods.
You can find numerous such shops
lined along Ason-Indra chow street

People, places and fried fish

Tourists, locals and some just trying to be a nuisance

A local shop selling varieties of fried fish

A perfect place for some sunshine and a cup of tea on a cold day
(Temple was completely destroyed by the April 2015 earthquake and
as of Nov. 2016 no reconstruction work has commenced)

Varieties of Lentils sold at a shop behind Kasthamandap

Water Spouts at the heart of the Public Realm II

Of ignorance and neglect.

This is part II of my earlier post on Dhungedharas, the ones still running. For more details on that post, refer the link below -

Part I of this Series

Here's looking at the other end of the spectrum, whose fate stands in stark contrast to those mentioned earlier. Most of them are outside the bounds of the historical core areas and increasingly they seem out of place in areas where changes [read mostly new construction] are taking place rapidly. As we have seen historically, some of these changes are detrimental to these ancient structures and their functioning so a few are in urgent need of repair of some sort! That aside, there is still a growing water shortage in the city and a running water supply system meant for a purely public consumption could be in the best interests of society itself. They are therefore relevant and useful not only from a historical point of view since they represent a way of life that gave rise to them but also because they are still useful even today. And because they are an integral element of the public realm, of elements that has shaped and defined traditional public spaces as we have come to know in this part of the country. Thus they are as integral to this city as 'we' the people are.

Dhungedhara at Gairidhara, Kathmandu

This one next is at Bhimsensthan close to the river Bishnumati and although not physically in ruins like the one above, it has got a drainage problem and needs urgent cleaning as we can see from the picture below.

Dhungedhara at Bhimsenthan

This one next is the famous Water Spout opposite the old south gate of the Narayanhiti Royal Palace (now Museum), a place which has a very interesting legend dating back to the Lichhavi period and the Boudhanath Stupa associated with it. The premise is open to the public and is well kept except the obvious drainage issue, one of the three water spout was working when this picture was taken.

Dhungedhara at Narayanhiti

Where water still flows...

The one below is a Dhungedhara at Naxal.

Dhungedhara at Naxal, Nandi Bahal

Fragments of a different time

Updated on Nov. 2016

Dhungedhara next to Bhatbhateni Temple

Bhuvaneshwori Temple, Pashupati Nath

Bhagwan Pau, Swayambhu Nath