Day 145 - Hey, Hey We're the Monkees

Actually, Monkeys. Hundreds of Monkeys. After our ritual pot of Little Britain French Press Coffee (There's an international incident in there somewhere), we took the bus out to Swayambuth. The busride itself was typical South-Asian - UW, Cz, and I all crammed on the front passenger seat, dozens of Nepalis equally crammed in the rest of the bus. By the time we arrived at the temple, about a half-hour ride away, my legs were completely dead, having spent the entire ride being squashed by Cz's remarkably bony bum. What my dismount and dead-leg stagger out of the bus bus lacked in grace, it more than made up for in comedy.

Perched atop a hill, the entrance guarded by three giant, elaborately painted Buddhas, Swayambuth's Chorten Dome and surrounding temples, totems, and shops is one of Kathmandu's most recognised landmarks. However, Swayambuth's fame lies not in its long history (some say more than 1200 years), nor its architecture, not even in its religious significance. Swayambuth is famous for its monkeys.

The complex is presided over by a troup of pink-faced monkeys. In India we learned that the black-face monkeys are nice, and that the pink-face monkeys are aggressive, tourist eating beasts. It was on learning that we would be visiting The Monkey Temple (as Swayambuth is affectionately known) that our travel clinic doctor suggested that we get the rabies vaccine. Our friends living in Bouda warned us not to look the monkeys in the eye, as this was likely to provoke an attack. These are not monkeys to be taken lightly.

Feeling somewhat nervous as we approached the temple complex, we all put on dark sunglasses at the first sight of monkeys. We figured that if they couldn't see our eyes, then they would be less likely to take offence at us. It seemed to work and except for a few charges - and really I think we just happened to be in the monkeys' path, not that it was an actual charge - we managed to avoid any direct contact with them or their teeth.

Back to Bouda, where we delighted in UW's favorite Momo hole before going to dinner with Fast Trekker, who was flying back to Munich the next day. He had been feeling a bit under the weather since getting into Kathmandu (90% of trekkers contract some sort of bug on the trail), so it was nice that he was able to enjoy solid foods with us before leaving Nepal.