Nepal: On religion & tradition

5 topics: Beads for prayer, Monasteries for prayer, Flags for prayer, 'Mani' for prayer, and rocks with prayer. And finally, the most weirdest, strangest, combination of symbols, until I realized it was backwards.

Beads:

If you remember my story of the kind Nepalese man, you might also recall I spoke of him playing with beads. This is important as it allows me to continue the story. Upon his return, he continues to play with this brown, beaded necklace. And I notice he is humming. I look up, slightly puzzled. He sees this and says 'prayer, 100 prayer'. I said 'I thought the spiritual number was 108'. He says 'yes' and gestures to the brown circle of beads. Then 'more, more' and gestures to a small strand of silver beads hanging off the necklace. I notice there are actually 6 such silver-beaded strands. After several grade-2 level questions on my part and much gesturing on his part, I come to the conclusion that everytime he says a prayer he moves his finger along one brown bead. After 108 repetitions of the same prayer, he completes the circle of brown beads. Then, he moves 1 silver bead from one of the strands. And he starts again on the brown beads, much like an abacus. Thus, he prays as much as he can all day, every day.

What is the prayer? This is what we've pieced together: 'Ohm Nami Padme Hum' or 'Health to the joyous and the lotus'. Seems a bit strange, we could be mistaken.

Monasteries:

So colourful, yet not tacky. Actually quite beautiful. On tuesday we visited Tengboche monastery, the largest in the himalayas. Notice also the buddas in Namaste position or Mudra position.

(Namaste - hands together)

(Mudra - the 'ok' sign)

(Stacks of books, each one holds scriptures & prayers)

Flags:

Prayer flags are all everywhere! The idea is that the flags have prayers written on them, and when the wind blows, the flags flutter and it is as though the prayer is uttered. The flags are 5 different colours.

Blue - sky
Green - water
White - air
Red - fire
Yellow - earth

Very cool.

'Mani' aka 'spinny things' (yes, their technical name):

Just in case prayer wasn't already in your daily life enough, these spinny things with rolls of prayers inside them can be found all along the trekking path and in abundance in the towns. It is customary to spin each of them as you walk by, again to symbolize the prayer being recited. They come in various sizes and colours, including black, gold, and brightly colourful.

(You spin them as you walk for good luck)

(This one was open (broken?), so you can see the sheets of prayer inside)

Rocks with prayer:

They also have beautiful calligraphy on rocks, in colours, absolutely everywhere.

And finally, the most weirdest, strangest, combination of symbols, until I realized it was backwards. Yes I know I hyped it up:

Swastica next to a star of David? Whaaaat?! SO weird. We'd learned previously that the star means good luck. Well, apparently the swastica does too. I've come to learn that when it doubt, an unknown symbol generally means good luck. I've also come to learn that the above picture does not depict the WWII swastica, but an older version originting in India, which has always meant good luck. Hitler (or somebody SS-affiliated, presumably) took this symbol and used the (essentially) mirror image to represent Nazi Germany.

I think that covers most of the Buddhist traditions. I found myself quite enjoying these quirky activities, and became more engaged with them as time passed. Hopefully I'll be able to keep it all straight in my head when it comes time for Hinduism back in Kathmandu...