Lumbini is the birthplace of Buddha and it is a long drive... About 6 hours drive from Chitwan. There are no super highways here, so it just happens as it happens on the dusty roads. The area is the poorest we have seen yet of Nepal, and it is quite heart breaking. Although there are dozens of brick factories around, the housing is rudimentary at best and appalling in many cases, the sanitation needs boil down to open defecation and well pumps. This is the only area in Nepal where we all got the sense we were being looked at as being maybe a little unwelcome, and I am not sure if it is because it is a border town - and border towns are often rough - or if it was because they live so hard and we waltz in and snap pictures.
Roadside cafe on the way to Lumbini, not what is hanging above the fire...
The hotel outside of Lumbini was a mistake, according to our fearless leader - it was not the usual hotel, it was rough, mold, garbage, pillows from the 1930s - it is like camping. For myself I could get by, with a loo spilling water on the floor and no hot water, cows fighting in the street, a wedding outside until 2am and the power going out. At breakfast in the hotel everyone could compare horrors, but some of the pictures of the outside of the hotel explain it all, mind you nothing compares to waking up in pitch dark, no light outside and have to get yourself ready for an early cross over the border with India, fortunately the iPad came to rescue, use no. 101 - it makes a good enough light to get ready in dark rooms and pack your bags. The small complimentary shampoo bottle in the room was nearly empty. They use it until it is all gone. If you look outside you see why - they have nothing.
The streets could easily be war torn Afghanistan.
Buddha's birthplace was fittingly plain and not exuberant - plenty of Buddhist nations have monasteries here to send their monks for a while. The Bodhi tree here, which I touched, is not the one Buddha sat under for the longest time, but the one his mother held on to a branch of as she gave birth to him while standing in a bathing pond.
The Bodhi tree.
The middle road philosophy of Buddha makes it an easy religion to follow, there is no God as such, but you just have to do good basically, or at least try...
You can smell Jasmine everywhere - until you get out of the Buddha garden at least.
One monk here, who I asked if I could take his picture said yes, but he was more interested in having the Norwegian girls sit next to him. Naughty monk, I had thought he looked like the Dalai Lama, but he wouldn't be after blondes would he?
The drive home, although we could not jump off the minibus, was full of photo opportunity that just went by the window. Women carrying mud in baskets on their head, monks on motorbikes, old people, kids... Life is tough on that road. No sign of the rags to riches stories in Mumbai and Bangalore.
But the sadness turned to giggles as our crazy border crossing became a joke. The immigration piece was fine, but there was so much traffic at the border we could not find our bus. We walked toward the bus, which apparently was further down the road, but to avoid cars, on the road side we had to avoid garbage, rocks and human excrement, some of it very fresh. The trendier contingent had all come out this morning in sandals :)
But not me!
Leaving Nepal and entering India.
Long distance haulage trucks are all decked out in fancy colours.
I had spent my last remaining Nepalese rupees on chips and cookies and promptly gave them to this little girl - I should imagine her life has been very different from ours.
The rest of the 12th was on another very long drive, this time to Varanasi, to view the river of life, the Ganges.
- BlogPressed from my iPad. Click on picture for larger image and gallery.
