Holi festival was the day we had been looking forward to and dreading for the last month. Since our arrival in India the shops had been full of huge baskets of every coloured powder (including glittery) imagineable as well as ahuge array of water guns, streamers, hats, masks and all sorts of colourful and crazy things. We'd been warned in Varanasi that Matt should not go out before 12pm because he'd returned multi-coloured and without his trousers, and had changed our plans so we could be somewhere in a city on the right day. We'd even nearly missed it because it was held on a different day in Nepal.
We'd asked last night about what people in the hostel were up to for the festival but they'd seemed a little vague. When we got up however, plans were being made for us to head out into the town and Surita had bought us powder and some squirters and had made some home-made water guns for us out of plastic bottles. Before we'd even made it a few metres from the hostel, half the group were already bright pink.
As we headed throught he main streets of Patan there were groups of boys roaming the streets with faces painted in grease paint and pockets full of powder ready to mob us, some more friendly and well-intentioned than others. Children were popping out from small alleyways to fling water and then scarper, usually chased by Megan, the only one who'd thought to wear trainers. Buckets of water were thrown from the top of 4 and 5 storey buildings, often coming quite keen if particularly unexpected but always a real shock, especially if it was really cold.
As we progressed up the street, our faces were smeared with more and more colours, sometimes thrown from a distance but mostly wiped on our cheeks, noses and foreheads. We got to the point where we'd actually offer our faces to people because it prevented us getting so much paint in our eyes and mouths, which was pretty uncomfortable and none of us were convinced about the non-toxicity of the stuff. Because we were building up layers of paint on our faces and clothes, we made it a game to try and get an even range of colours and so searched out people with powder that we 'needed'.
After a particularly prolonged attack from a bunch of boys in silver and black face paint, and a few incidents wth kids collecting more water from the gutter, we decided to take some time out and stop at a pub for a beer and a break. We thought we might find struggle to find somewhere to let us in but the bar we found seemed more than welcoming and even had it's own pile of paints, which we used to decorate our bags and clothes. We were also grateful for a chance to dry off, though the paint felt more uncomfortable when it dried and cracked on your face. It was a nice opprtunity to get to know the people from the hostel a bit more and I chatted to Betsy and Paula quite a bit.
After our beers we set off towards Kathmandu but since it was after 12, it had all calmed down quite a lot. A couple of the lads seemed to take a bit longer to notice this and so seemed to annoy a few locals by carrying on but it was all good. There were still a few groups of boys around lots of people were highly entertained by the state of us all so there was still a good atmosphere.
The only low-point was a group of guys who attacked us with really foul pink paint. They mostly caught us from behind and so quite a few of us had our eyes and mouths open when they put it in. Unlike the other stuff, it really stung and tasted disgusting and seemed to take forever to wash away. It also left a stain that looked much less likely to wash away. The add insult to injury, one of them also managed to get a good grab of all of the girls boobs. I didn't realise this at first and kicked off when he grabbed at me, but I couldn't help but laugh when I turned round and Paula had two wet, pink patches on the front of her hospital scrubs.
At the main Durbar square, Paula, Betsy, Matt and me managed to sneak in without paying the exorbitant fee (to be perfecty honest, I didn't realise and just wandered in oblivious) and Betsy went back to find the boys but we'd lost them. We stopped for momos in a restaurant overlooking the square so we could look out for the boys and watch the festivities going on there. There was a stage with music and loads of street stalls as well as other smaller ceremonies. We had to wash our hands 7 or 8 times to get the water to stop running pink but our hands were still very stained.
We looked around the square for a while and watched a line of ladies queueing with bowls of offerings so they could tie coloured string around a tree and pray. There were groups of ladies also sat on the floor, rolling up mud and sticking in pieces of grass to sell for the offering plates. We wanted to find out more but it didn't seem appropriate to disturb them.
Betsy also showed us around some of the pornographic carvings on the pagodas in the square and they were absolutely disgusting, though quite fun. She also pointed out the house the Kumari, the 'living goddess' in the Hindu religion. The current Kumari is 4 years old and was installed in 2008. Kumari is selected from lots girls who are presented as possibilites due to their possession of a number of attributes. Likely candidates are then examined for 32 other 'perfections' and along with their family, are put through a rigourous testing procedure to confirm her legitimacy as the vessel of Durga. Look it up on Wikipaedia because it'd fascinating stuff.
We went to meet some of Betsy's friends in an interesting bar in the tourist area of Thamel. It was very dark with cushions scattered on the floor around low tables and black light, making decorations hanging from the ceilings and walls glow. Betsy's friend's told us all about their trip to Everest base camp. It was something that we would both have liked to do but didn't have time for in the end and they made it sound like it was quite enjoyable. They did give the impression that even though it was possible to organise by yourself, it was probably better to go on a tour so maybe it'll be something we organise when we get back home.
Back at the hostel we showered (mostly in cold water but Surita brought us warm water buckets) but no amount of scrubbing would get all the paint off. The boys had come back earlier and were almost perfectly clean but we'd been out longer and had dried out more. I was pink in the most peculiar places and there was nothing I could do to get my ears, chest and hands clean.
After dinner, we all had a party on the roof and Forrester plied us with wine, rum and all sorts of stuff as we chatted and giggled until the early hours of the morning. It was really good fun and we really enjoyed chatting with everyone and sharing silly stories. One by one we drifted off to bed feeling a little more woozy than was sensible.
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