Wednesday 8 May 2013
Meetings and funerals
Wednesday 8th May
This morning we went down to the Social Tours office to see Raj who is coordinating our visit with the orphanage. We wanted to discuss with him what we would like to happen to our individual donations to the orphanage, as he sends the money from Saga on to the committee of the orphanage. We told him of the incident with Mrs Gandhi and expressed other concerns like the children's nutrition and healthcare etc. Not surprisingly, the issue of toilet cleanliness is a regular topic raised by volunteers but we also learned something of the workings of the committee. The president is new and not sure of the protocol when dealing with volunteers. Mrs Gandhi is his wife, say no more. However I think there was an acceptance that issues need to be raised with the committee so that volunteers are not seen as just cash cows and of course, as anywhere in the world, change doesn't happen overnight.
No lecci again at the orphanage, so we went shopping and bought some more items for the clinic and some little gifts to give to the children on our last day. Yes, we are thinking about that now and starting to want to come home.
In the afternoon, we went to a funeral. We didn't know the deceased but anyone can go and gawp. Actually, we were going to the Temple of Pashupati, which is a temple to the god of animals who is also the protector of Nepal and is now a World Heritage site. It is the most holy of Hindu temples and a bit like Mecca, most Hindus would want to visit it in their lifetime. It is spectacular with its silver door and gold pinnacles but we could only look at it from across the river as heathens are not allowed inside. The story behind it is as follows. A farmer had 100 cows which all gave milk except one. Puzzled he followed it one day to a spot where he found the cow dripping milk onto the ground. He started digging at that place and found a statue of the god, Shiva in the form of a giant phallus. A great fire shot out of the ground and burned up all the people around except the farmer, who then placed a linga, a fertility symbol on the site and later the first King of Nepal built the temple in the 11th century. Since then it has been sacked by the Muslims from Syria who destroyed the faces on some of the statues and later damaged by an earthquake but it was rebuilt in its current form in 14th century.
Anyway, we proceeded to the rest of the site but were stopped by a guard demanding 1000 n rupees, about £8.50, each which is a lot of money in Nepal. Most sites cost about 150 n rupees. We asked why other people were walking in free and were told they are Nepalis and we were foreigners. Well, as the only white faces, we couldn't deny it. We argued that we were volunteers working in an orphanage but he wasn't impressed and asked to see our stamped photo volunteer cards. Que? A young Nepali man translated for us and the guard said, okay, for you half price and I'm cheating myself at that. The young man then followed us and gave us some fascinating info on the site and then offered to show us the rest of the site for $10. He was very fluent and informative so we agreed. The best $10 I have ever spent. It was absolutely riveting stuff.
We went first to the river bank. This river, the Bagmati, all spellings are approximate, is culverted to make sure that it flows more quickly and eventually flows into the Ganges, the sacred river of India. Bagmati means "mouth of the tiger". On one of its banks are brick built platforms to hold the pyre to cremate the dead. I think I counted 12 all together and are in use 24/7. Two were on one side of the bridge and of these one was only to be used for the royal family in the past but now only for presidents and prime ministers. The other is for the wealthy, armed forces, police, politicians etc. Of the other ten, three or four are under a corrugated tin canopy along which monkeys caper and bang about. There was a cremation in progress when we arrived and another one about to begin. There is no embarrassment about watching and there are benches so that you can do it in comfort and many people were passing a leisurely afternoon doing just that.
Look away now if you don't want to see the details. The body is cremated on the same day as death so that it doesn't stink on the pyre. It is first taken to a holy room, has its clothes removed,is washed, then covered with a white sheet and an orange cloth. White is the sign of purity and orange, a gift from the gods and symbol of sacrifice. The top is scattered with marigolds. If the deceased wished to donate his corneas, a doctor would be advised in advance and would attend in the cornea extraction building. No other body parts may be donated in the Hindu religion. A pyre of 300 to 400 kilos of split logs is built in a Jenga fashion beforehand. A professional burner does this, (not my words, this is the term used). Then the body is carried from the washing house to the pyre by the family who were all men at the funeral we saw. Women can attend but usually don't as any crying or sign of emotion will make the soul sad and it won't be able to leave the body. They carry the body round the pyre three times to honour the three main gods, Brahma, the creator, Vishnu, the preserver, and Shiva, the destroyer. (There are 33 million gods in Nepal and only 28 million people so more than enough to go round)
If a man is cremated the eldest son officiates, if a woman, the youngest son. Daughters are now allowed to do it if there are no sons. The priest, Sadhu, whips off orange covering which is then thrown into the river. The son walks round the pyre three times carrying the fire in a lamp. He then starts the burning of the body in the mouth as it is the holiest part of the body. The professional burner then takes over and lights the wood. Heaps of straw are wetted in the river and placed over the body to make the fire last longer to ensure that the body is completely burned. This takes between 3 to 4 hours and the family stay there till the end. We heard loud popping noises several times coming from the two pyres and the guide said that it was either the head bursting or a piece of bamboo splitting. During the burning, no one cries, it is a sad time but also a happy time as the soul is being released. If you have good karma, i.e. been good in your life, you will be reincarnated as a human being, possibly in a better life. If you have bad karma, you will return as an animal.
After the body is consumed, the ashes are collected and thrown into the river, where the soul will travel down to the Ganges to begin its reincarnation. The son who officiated changes into white clothes and offers food to the gods on the cleaned up pyre before retiring to a building further along the bank. There he stays for 13 days and is not allowed to be touched or spoken to and he must abstain from alcohol, meat, salt and oil. Thereafter, if it was your father who died, you can't consume alcohol for a year, if it was your mother, no milk for a year. If it was your husband, you must wear white for a year and can never wear the colour red again. The practice of suttee where the wife is burned along with the dead husband, was abandoned some time ago.
Now if you are an important person, you get mostly the same the same ritual except that there is a long,flat stone sloping into the river and the body is placed on this first with its feet in the river. The priest washes its feet and face and prays for the deceased. Close by is Nepal's only hospice. It is state run and when a doctor declares that someone is on the point of death, they are carried out and placed on the stone. If they die within 20 minutes, they achieve nirvana immediately. Although this is a Buddhist concept, it has been integrated into Hindu beliefs. In fact there is a small Buddhist temple built into the rock next to the hospice where Buddhist monks and the hash smoking Sadhus live together.
Now the Sadhus are very interesting. We saw one on his way to work and then we saw a few more lounging about waiting to be photographed for a fee. There are four types of Sadhu. The first type are the naked sadhus who dangle heavy stones from cords round their penis, the second type is the hash smoking sadhu, the third type lives only on milk and the fourth type is the monkey sadhu who dresses up in bright orange clothes, wears a monkey mask and entertains his followers. We had our photo taken with the hash smokers. I swear the one on the left of the photo was English. Although he had a big bun of matted, grey hair, painted face, purple blanket over his loin cloth and was covered in grey ash, he said to me in perfect English, " Where are you from? Can you change me a twenty pound note?" When Barbara handed over the 100 rupees, she noticed that the sadhu had a finger missing. We wondered if it was part of a ritual,(more of this later). No, said the guide, more likely to be leprosy. Aargh!
In another part of the site is another temple to Shiva. It was built by a king with 11 wives and consists of 11 little temples which if you stand at the end of the row and look through the entrance, it appears as if you are looking at 11 mirror images. Inside each of these is a fertility image called a jyothirlinga. Finally there is the temple of Parvati, the wife of Shiva. It has erotic and tantric carvings all over to protect it from the virgin goddess of lightening and thunder, as she would be too shocked and afraid to attack it. There is a big carving of the goddess Kali there too. Nowadays, because she is an angry goddess, they sacrifice alcohol to her and once a year they sacrifice 5 animals -a buffalo to symbolise anger, a sheep to symbolise stupidity, a goat to symbolise sex, a chicken to symbolise laziness and a duck to symbolise desire. These are considered to be the 5 worst human habits. However they need to get the animals' permission to sacrifice them. So they ask the animal "Are you ready to be sacrificed?" and they sprinkle water over its head. The animal will waggle its head to shed the water and that is taken as a sign of agreement. In the past they used to do human sacrifice but clearly no one volunteered so they cut off a man's finger and wrapped it up in some food. All the local men were invited to a feast and the one who found the finger in his food, not only got a nasty shock but was also chosen to be the next sacrifice.
And finally, also on the site is Nepal's only state run and completely free old folk's home. They call it the home of the elderly. There are 230 residents living in communal rooms. It was founded by Mother Theresa and it used to be the kitchen of the king's palace. There are 5 lovely white temples in the centre of the quadrangle. You have to be 65 to get a place and if they are full, you have to wait for someone to die. I was a bit surprised as I thought that the Nepalis looked after their old people in the family. But apparently, families dump their old folk in the home and forget about them. That said, it's very convenient for the cremation pyres, no hearse required.
Actually, they are conscious of the amount of wood used in cremation and of the air pollution caused, so they are planning to build a modern crematorium further down the site.
Got back to the hotel for dinner, hoping it was not a barbecue.
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