CULTURE
At once
a time machine and a magic carpet, Nepal sweeps you along crooked,
timeworn streets flanked by irregular, multi-roofed pagodas, stupas
and stone sculptures, and into rooms cluttered with horror-eyed
masks, spinning prayer wheels, trippy thangka scrolls and Tibetan
carpets. Muttered chants, esoteric tantric hymns and Nepalese
music hang in the air, whether it be the twang of a four-stringed
saringhi or the plaintive notes of a flute. Traditional folk musicians,
or gaines, gather for an evening of singing and socialising; classical
dancing and trance-like masked dances enliven the Kathmandu Valley
and Bhaktapur regions; while no wedding would be complete without
the raucous damais - Nepal's modern ensembles.
Religion
is the lifeblood of the Nepalese. Officially it is a Hindu country,
but in practice the religion is a syncretism of Hindu and Buddhist
beliefs with a pantheon of Tantric deities tagged on. The remainder
of the population that isn't Buddhist or Hindu are either Muslim,
Christian or shamans.
Nepal's
food is surprisingly dull given that it lies at the intersection
of the two great gastronomic giants India and China. Most of the
time meals consist of a dish called dhal bhat tarkari which is
a combination of lentil soup, rice and curried vegetables - hardly
the makings of a dynamic national cuisine. On the other hand,
Nepal has adapted famously to Western tastes, markedly evident
in Kathmandu's smorgasbord of menus: Mexican tacos; Japanese sukiyaki;
Thai chocolate; Chinese marshmallows; onion and minestrone soup;
borscht, quiche and soyburgers; and some of the best desserts
- apple and lemon pies, almond layer cakes, fruit cakes - found
anywhere in the world. To wash any (or all) of these offerings
down, try a lassi (a refreshing mixture of curd and water), the
locally produced beer or chang, a Himalayan home brew made from
barley.
