After breakfast, our bus took us
to Patan, to the house of the Patan kumari, the living goddess. Unlike the
Kathmandu kumari, this goddess’s family would allow us to enter the house to
see her, and be blessed by her. After a brief wait, we removed our hats and
shoes and walked up the narrow stairs to her audience chamber. She was eight
years old, wearing heavy makeup, and seated on a low throne. Her older sister
sprinkled our hands with water as we entered the room. We then each took turns
kneeling before her as she placed a tika, a small red dot, on our foreheads.
Abby and I each put a dollar in the offering plate as we did so. Then we
left the building and put our shoes back on.
We walked single file to the
Patan Durbar Square. Our first sight of the square was the octagonal stone
Krishna Temple that stands next to the ticket office. Yes, as with the other
Durbar Squares, tourists must purchase a ticket to enter the square. The
Krishna Temple was built in 1723 and survived the earthquake with little
damage. Lonely Planet says that its style is influenced by the stone temples of
northern India. 
The Royal Palace forms the
eastern side of the square. The palace was first built in the 14th
century and greatly expanded in the 17th and 18th centuries,
making it older than the royal palaces in either Bhaktapur or Kathmandu.
According to Lonely Planet, “The closed external Bhairab gateway leading to the
central Mul Chowk courtyard is flanked by two stone lions and colorful murals
of Shiva in his wrathful incarnation as Bhairab.” Strings of buffalo intestine
hang above the door in his honor. 
We walked through Durbar Square
to the Golden Temple, a Buddhist monastery founded in the 12th
century that has existed in its current form since 1409. Once inside, we were flanked by two gilded elephants whose golden riders have their palms pressed
together in greeting. On the west side of the temple, we could see a
representation of Buddha being born from his mother’s armpit – another version
of the virgin birth. We saw some gilded flags that look like a medieval version
of the current Nepali flag – double pendants. On the way out, I looked up at
the Dharmadhatu Mandala, embossed in the ceiling above the vestibule.
One of the best preserved temples
in the square is the Bhimsen Temple, dedicated to the god of trade and
business. Business people like to worship at this temple, and apparently like
to take good care of it, too. The temple was completely rebuilt in 1682 after a
fire and later restored after the 1934 earthquake. It seems to have come
through the 2015 quake in good shape.
We walked to a fair trade zone,
an area where more of the revenue is shared with the craft people. While
everyone else went to a presentation about “singing” bowls, Abby and I went
into a neighboring pashmina shop and Abby bought a couple of shawls. Then we
watched the end of the singing bowl presentation. George had bowl therapy. With
a bowl on his head, the salesman gently tapped the edge of the bowl with a
mallet. Then John had bowl therapy. While standing in a larger bowl, the
salesman rapped the edges of the bowl with a mallet. Both reported that the
therapy felt good. We went upstairs and purchased a necklace. The salesman
agreed to make the necklace longer by stringing two necklaces together. He
delivered it to the hotel that evening.
Our last stop in the Patan Durbar
Square was the Patan Museum in the former palace of the Malla kings of Patan.
Lonely Planet calls this one of the finest collections of religious art in
Asia. We had lunch in the museum café, and then had about an hour to tour the
museum. The cobra-backed throne of the Patan kings is displayed. Placards next
to the objects on display explained the pre-Hindu religion based on the god,
Indra, and dating to 3000 years ago. Placards also explained the basics of
Hinduism, Buddhism, and Tantrism (an aspect – in different forms - of both
Hinduism and Buddhism). The popular Buddhist god, Tara, was in evidence.
Visiting the museum was a tutorial in south Asian religions. 
We had dinner at the home of the
owner of Venture Travel, the local travel agency that subcontracts with Road
Scholar. Over hors d’oeuvres, we heard a presentation on the role of women in
Nepal. A lot of young Nepalese women are drawn to other countries for jobs,
often without proper work permits. Once there, without proper documents, they
can become victimized into sex slavery. Our speaker talked about the efforts of
her NGO to prevent that from happening and to rescue women who are trapped in
that way. After the presentation we had a buffet dinner in a dining room on the
lower level. Afterwards we walked down a dark alley, lit by smartphone lights,
to our bus.
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