The Boudhanath Stupa is situated in the Northeast of Kathmandu, capital of Nepal and is one of the largest and holiest Buddhist sites in the world. The word stupa translated from Sanskrit means “mound to cover Buddhist relics”, and many Nepalese and Tibetan kings, including a piece of Lord Buddha himself, are claimed to be buried at this sacred site.
History of The Boudhanath Stupa
The Stupa was built around 500 AD by a Nepalese king, although there are a number of contradictory accounts. It was destroyed by the Mongols and then rebuilt in the 14th century. In the late 1950s Tibetan refugees fled there to escape invasion of the Chinese, and in the 1980s it was opened up to tourists.
The Stupa itself is a large white dome, or mandala, topped by a pinnacle with eyes to denote the Principal Lord Buddha watching over us; a third eye for wisdom; the nose a Sanskrit number 1 to mean wholeness, and no ears or mouth so evil cannot be heard or spoken. Layers of whitewash are ceremonially thrown over the dome during the three-day Tibetan New Year festivals, known as Losar, and subsequently about 35 inches are scraped away annually to prevent further expansion.
Religious paintings, called Thankas, can be bought at various stalls, but the best one is the painting school, about a third of the way round. Painters have to study for six years, and the actual thanka takes around 6 months to complete working 12 hours a day, with gold leaf and brushes no thicker than a single human hair. Due to such close, intense work, the painters unfortunately suffer with eyesight problems after a few years.
