A Few Days In Kathmandu
Hi Everyone. I’ve been shooting a bit here. Here are some notes.
Some days I walk to the World Education office and some days I go to a local coffee shop to work on the suitcases. Coffee Escape in Lazimpat has really good wifi and an interesting view of Kathmandu traffic out the front window.
I almost always see these dogs while walking from the hotel to Coffee Escape. They hang together and sleep wherever they want. Today, a security guard at one of the nearby businesses was chasing them away from their usual spot. They were back by the time I returned though.
This is Ramesh Mainali. His business is Shrawan Handicrafts and it is where we go to buy pashmina. He is a great fellow and was introduced to us by his childhood friend Narayan Thapa who works the desk at the Hotel Tibet.
Narayan often stops by for a chat on his way home from work.
I have never been to Nepal during monsoon and it is amazing to see all the flowers, fruits, and vegetables in the shops. It hasn’t rained much at all since we got here, but India is apparently getting hammered. There was some flooding in Kathmandu before we arrived, but it hasn’t even rained every day. When it does, it’s nice as it keeps the dust down.
There are shrines to Hindu gods everywhere. Here is a little shrine to Hanuman. When ever you see him, he is dressed up with clothing.
We are kind of obsessed with dogs here. This guy (and I wrote his name down somewhere; if I can find it I’ll update) was hanging out at the amazing Saturday Farmer’s Market at the LeSherpa restaurant. As I have mentioned before, you can’t really mess around with them, but this fellow had a collar which indicates that he belongs to someone. He was totally trying to cage some cheese from the cheese booth and he sat there like a statue. Everybody seemed to know him and he was super friendly and was open to being pet.
We bought a couple bottles of achar pickle from these folks; lime and radish. Their business is called AMĀKO, and the samples were amazing.
I bought a couple of these cookies and they were amazing.
Amazing breads too.
I am guessing that this is some kind of kohlrabi, but it is hard to know. You can see the corn to the right. Lots of sweet corn here and you can see people roasting it on the streets for sale.
I had read an article about the market in one of the local English language newspapers and they were touting the “Say No To Plastic” campaign. This market was so wonderful and would rival many that I have been to in the US.
My friend Katie Harhen was asking about the 2015 earthquake and how the country is recovering. Here is a (rather disorientating, I am standing on the pavement looking up) shot that shows what one still sees around Kathmandu. There is a building boom here, but most of the new structures are commercial in nature and fairly big. Some of the temples in the city have been rebuilt, but there is still evidence of the quake.
I love walking around the city looking in shop windows. This business was (among other things) a shop that made trophies. Football, dancing, basketball, tennis!
We always go to Bodinath to walk around the stupa. I posted about it last year.
This year was totally different for us. First of all, it was jammed with people. I have mentioned before that the area is an interesting mix of religion and commerce. It is such a peaceful and comfortable place.
This room is up a flight of stairs and has always been closed off to the public on our previous visits. We were invited in this year (not sure why, really) and were encouraged to walk around and check out all the Buddhas. Lastly we were encouraged to sit on the mat in front of the monk on the left, where he chanted and blessed us. It was strangely moving, and felt like something very important had just happened.
On Sunday we had a bit of shopping to do so we went to Thamel. I’m always on the lookout for shrines to Ganesh. Here he is being protected by a couple of Naga.
We had told our friends Ken and Kitty that we would buy a carpet for them, so we went back to our favorite shop to see what we could find. The guys at Carpet House are so nice and helpful. Lovely shop and fair trade too!
We had also promised our friend Suzan that we would get her a lungi (check out this how to video!). The one we bought started out as a single piece of cloth that was not sewn closed. The woman in the orange sold it to us in her shop, but said that she knew a tailor that could sew it up. She escorted us up the street, but couldn’t find him right away. After asking a bunch of different people she led us up a steep flight of stairs and introduced us to this gentleman with his treadle sewing maching. Sorted it out in 5 minutes. His shop had been at street level, but was leveled in the quake, so he moved across the street and upstairs.
Here is a happy Cris outside of his shop.
Thanks for following along. Sometimes I feel a bit like the neighbor back in the 60’s who would travel and then drag you over to his house to show his (always the dad in the family) slides from some “exotic” vacation. Anyway cheers everyone.
Great Dane
I was driving back from a shoot in the Albany area last week and as I was waiting at a light on Route 9 in Hadley I saw this guy. He is a really beautiful dog and I think his name is Felix. His chauffeur rolled her window down and chatted for a minute (it was a long light). Check out the slobber on the B-Pillar.
Dogs / Thanks / Home
I walked Cris to the World Ed office every morning, and back to the hotel at the end of the day. Kathmandu has a lot of street dogs, most of whom don’t seem attached to any particular person, although the ones we regularly saw were in the same areas every day. You would never want to try to pet them, and they mostly ignore you anyway. We got used to seeing this pup twice a day near a shop, and she was one of the few leashed dogs that we encountered. She clearly belonged to someone who cared for her.
Thanks to everyone who passed along good wishes in regards to my eye thing. I really appreciate it. We are home now and I see my retina guy tomorrow morning; I am really eager to see what he has to say. The huge black blob is beginning to resolve a bit, which is encouraging.
More suitcase uploads coming soon. Thanks for following.
New Page
I have just created a direct link to all of the suitcase posts for those of you who have very little interest in my dog, or the other bits of my life that I like to post here. If you look to the column on the right →, under “Pages” you will see a link to “All Willard Suitcase Posts”. I hope that it makes it easier for folks who are looking for all the suitcases in one place. I will still upload all suitcase stuff to this site.
We are in South Carolina for a bit and seeing tons of interesting wildlife. This bobcat was just hanging around on the deck yesterday.
And this little lizard was on one of the dining room chairs.
Olive has been swimming every day, and it doesn’t take much to get her to nap between dips.
Happy New Year’s everyone, thanks for following, and be well. Cheers, Jon
A Lovely Sunday
I thought it might be a nice day today as this happened this morning when I threw a handful of things from my pocket on the bed.
John, Flora, Violet, and I drove to Broadway in the Cotswolds to walk from there to Snowshill and back.
We started on the outskirts of Broadway and we were immediately in fields.
Blackberries were plentiful.
Quite quickly we climbed up to the ridge where the view was spectacular.
As we were walking next to this pasture, we were passed by a horse carrier that contained one of this fellow’s mates. They were both whinnying and it was obvious that they weren’t happy about being split up. Horses are really interesting animals.
The footpath at times was on public roads, and at times just a narrow trail through the woods.
This is the view of Snowshill when we were about 10 minutes walk away.
Here’s another example of when the public footpath shares a country lane.
I have always liked these convex mirrors.
St. Barnabas is directly arcross the road from our halfway stop.
The Snowshill Arms is a great place for a couple of pints and the Sunday Roast. It was excellent.
After lunch, I stuck my head inside the church. It is very simple and not old (in relative terms), and the windows are beautiful.
This sweet little cat followed us for a bit and mewed the whole way.
Once outside the village, we were pretty quickly back into the woods.
It is such a peaceful walk, and we rarely saw others on the path.
Violet gave me this stone with moss growing on it.
This property is called Middle Hill House. It is pretty easy to fantasize about living in a place like this.
This sort of day is so exotic to me; for my friends who live less than an hour away it is a regular trip to make at the weekend.
It is so interesting to me that the public footpath goes right through the middle of farms and fields. We shared our walk with horses, cows, dogs, cats, and of course, lots of sheep.
This particular horse was very friendly though he could be a bit nippy.
A farm just on the outskirts of Broadway breeds dogs for the hunt, and these very friendly pups loved the attention.
A great day. Thanks to John, Flora, and Violet. Wonderful.
Artists (and dogs) at the Exploratorium
I have never given much thought to whether or not I am an artist. And the whole idea of whether or not photography is an art is a whole ball of wax that I try to avoid. So when Pam Winfrey (whose idea it was to have the Exploratorium host the “Normal” exhibit) invited me to be part of an artist’s night, I said yes without giving it much thought. So it was a bit weird for me to be introduced to people as one of the artists whose work was on display. I’ll accept it for the time being but I doubt it will go to my head. The event was pretty cool. Since I was basically alone, I wandered around looking lost for a while before I ran into my refound friend Katie Hahren and her daughter Annie. That loosened things up a bit. Eventually Karen Miller and I ended up signing catalogues and chatting with guests. / One thing about San Francisco that I really like is that dogs seem to be accepted in most public places. When I was at the Exploratorium in February I met a 4 month old black lab who was on his way to work for only the second day. I can not imagine bringing the Pearl to an office job even now when she is 12 and mostly calm.
This is the new Exploratorium on the Embarcadero at Pier 15. It is amazing. Go check it out if you ever get the chance.
Pearl
The Pearl and I went for a walk in the mist this afternoon. She as usual found some water to meander through and we had a nice time looking at ducks on the little pond and all the redwing blackbirds hanging out on the cat-tails. She is 10 now and the gray is starting to show up on her face and under her chin. She’s still the sweetest dog in the world, though.
Dog in window
Whenever I am in Stratford upon Avon I see this dog sitting in the window. Usually he sees me and starts barking and jumping around like crazy. He just sat this time. Maybe he is getting old, or at least somewhat used to me.
Jon Crispin's Notebook 
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