Rato Machhindranath Jatra in Kathmandu valley

During our last trip to Kathmandu we witnessed a major festival of Nepal called Rato Machhindranath Jatra. It is like the famous Rath Yatra of Puri in the state of Odisha in India though the story is different. Its a 32 hand (old method of measuring distance in terms of length of one's hands) chariot housing the rain god Machhindranath and is built completely of wood. The unique feature of it is that not even a single nail is used to build the chariot fro Lord Machhindranath.

Rato Machhindranath Jatra, rato (red) machhindranath (matsya or fish god) is celebrated in the month of May-June (Baisakh) every year marking the start of Nepali new year (Bikram Samvat). The legends goes like this: Once Guru Gorakhnath came to Patan without showing his true identity, and people of Nepal did not recognise him and hence he was not treated supposedly the way he should have been treated. He got angry due to his ill treatment and he caught all the rain serpents and went for dhyana (meditation). That year it did not rain as all the rain serpents were in the captivity of Guru Gorakhnath.  

 Advisors of the then king Narendra Dev requested the king to bring the guru of Gorakhnath named Machhindranath from Kamrup in Assam (India). When Machhindranath came to Patan and guru Gorakhnath came to know about it, he released all the Nags (or serpents) responsible for rain and wet to meet his guru Machhindranath. It rained heavily in the valley and the valley came out of drought.

 The king and the people of Patan thanked Guru Machhindranath and started worshiping him as a god. The people of Patan converted this event into a festival called Rato Machhindranath and started celebrating it every year since 879 AD. 

Every year the priests decide the auspicious opening day of the festival and the Jatra is officially started. The chariot used symbolically to bring Machhindranath to Patan is build in Pulchowk and when it is fully constructed he is brought to Jawalakhel in Lalitpur district (Patan) district in the Kathmandu valley with all fanfare of Rathyathra.

The chariot is stationed at Jawalakhel people from all over Nepal visit the place to offer their regards and take get the blessings of Lord Machhindranath. There are various stages of the Ratha Jatra where different kinds of rituals take place at different places between Pulchowk and Jawalakhel. The local people, men and women, take part in this Jatra with a lot of fanfare. The Jtra is also broadcasted live on local television channels.

A pujari busy in counting the currency notes offered to him against the tika or tilak offered by him to the devotees (I also got one).   

 Devotees a a custom offer Deepak of Ghee or lamps lit by butter or ghee to Lord Machhindranath. A women selling such lamps is seen in the inset.

 The volunteer groups and devotees offer water to the people visiting Lord Machhindranath at Jawalakhel in traditional style pots.

 I visited the festival on its last day which is called the bhoto Jatra. Bhoto meaning vest is according to legends was a diamond studded vest which was gifted by a Nag called the Karkatoka Nag (serpent) to a farmer who helped treating her queen from an eye ailment. After some time the farmer lost the vest and a man found it and wore it to Machhindranath festival. When the farmer saw it, he wanted the vest to be returned to him. It is also believed that the Karkatoka nag visited the festival in human form and as an arbitrageur gave the vest into the custody of Lord Machhindranath. Every year the vest (symbolically) is shown by the King (now President) to the people of Patan  as a ritual and it is asked whose vest it is? It symbolises the original event between the farmer and the other man and suggests that the vest should go to its rightful owner. The living goddess Kumari of  Nepal is also present during this event. The day of Bhoto Jatra is declared a public holiday in the Kathmandu valley and thousands of people visit Jawalakhel to have a look at the Bhoto or vest which is considered to be auspicious according to the local people. 

A girl is having a tika from a brahmin in a similar fashion like the godess Kumari.    

 The local administration also uses it as an opportunity to have a medical camp at Jawalakhel where the basic parameters like Blood Pressure, Diabetes, Eye testing etc. for the local citizens takes place. 

Talking about modern times, today selfie moments are for everyone and everywhere. A boy and a girl posing for a selfie at Jawalakhel.

Its a wonderful festival where people from all walks of life visit lord Machhindranath and pray for the well-being and a good harvest in the valley.

Mountain Flight to Everest

On 25th May 2017, while on an official tour I alongwith a mate of mine decided to go to the Everest in a mountain flight. It was supposed to be a one hour flight taking us to Mt. Everest and back. Despite been to Kathmandu several times, I never got a chance to take a mountain flight that takes one all the way upto the highest peak in the world, i.e. Mount Everest. I booked the first flight tickets from Yeti Air, a local carrier of Nepal to visit Mt. Everest. We have been listening a lot about the wonderful mountain flight experience that people had, especially by foreigners who came to Nepal. Most locals had no experience of it as it was their 'local' thing and they did not try.

We boarded a taxi from the hotel at 4:30 am in a hurry to reach the Tribhuvan International Airport to be on time only to find that we were too early when we arrived there. Like us there were many people from various nationalities who came early. At around 5:30 am the gates got opened and boarding passes (manual) were issued to us with a seat number allocated to us. We were promised that everybody will be issued a window seat. Our seat numbers were 7A and 7C and we kept wondering how come A and C be window seats, which became clear when we entered the aircraft and found that there were three seats in a row. Being a photographer I did not like the 7 no. seat that was allotted to me which was just behind the wing. The ideal seat would have been 8 or 9 that had the most clear views. However, during the flight it was not an issue as the fellow travelers were cooperative. This is one heck of a flight where one can find that everybody is so enthusiastic about boarding the flight and was enjoying unlike the others.

As soon as we boarded the aircraft within a few minutes we were on top of himalayas. Yeti Airlines gave us a kind of flight plan showing which all peaks we were going to see. The plan was to reach Everest and then take a U-turn to return to Kathmandu. Soon the Langtang range was visible to us followed by various others then we reach Mt. Gauri Shankar. 

Above is the picture of Mt. Gauri-Shankar that is revered by the Nepali people as they worship it. Although we believe that it might be too tough to scale that was why scaling up this mountain was no allowed. Thereafter we reached the ultimate Mount Everest. 

Mount Everest is the highest point on Earth at 8850 feet (as per latest estimate). From the South ridge base camp it is a 20 km uphill climb. Mt. Everest was named by the British after Sir George Everest who was the then Surveyor General of India. First they named it and then they tried to find out whether there is any name of the mountain that pre-existed. They found that the locals call it Chomolungma (in Tibet/China). By that time it was too late and the name Mt. Everest had gained currency throughout the world. The name remained as it is since then. Later on the Nepali people named it as Sagarmatha (or the forehead of the Sky). 

We were served a glass on champagne aboard the mountain flight and the air hostess assisted us in recognising all the peaks that we were able to see. One interesting thing was they allowed each of us to enter into the cockpit of the aircraft to have more clear views of the mountains. I went inside and saw there were two pilots one male and on female. The female was talking to the passengers visiting the cockpit while the male was busy in flying. She showed me the Kanchenjunga range too. 

We came back by 7:35 am to Tribhuvan international airport of Kathmandu. The flight was really mesmerising and I recalled a flight above the Swiss Alps which was a regular one but had wonderful views of the Alps. However, this was a different one as one can see the great Mt. Everest up and close alongwith many other major peaks of the world having an altitude of more than 20,000 ft above sea level.