Early Childhood Development Center (ECDC)

This is Pushpa Basnet, Founder of Early Childhood Development Center (ECDC) and Butterfly Home,. While in her 20s, she visited women prisoners as part of her undergrate work, and was dismayed to see the prisoners' children having to stay in horrible prison conditons with their parents. One by one she brought them children out of prison to stay at her shelters. In 2012, for her contribution, she won the CNN Hero of the Year Award.

We took the opportunity to visit her centre while at Nepal. We brought from Singapore hundreds of toys and stationery to give to the kids. We also bought some chickens for them as we heard they were poor and did not have enough meat to eat.

 This little 3 month old boy was the latest addition to the centre when we visited in 2011 Nov. Apparently his mother was burnt alive by his father during a family dispute and there was no one looking after him.

 

Everyone was excitedly taking out their toys and books for distribution.

Durbar Square

Sign post at Durbar Sqaure

Durbar Square holds the ancient palaces of the past Kings of Nepal. It is a UNESCO World Heritage site. You can see spectacular architecture of very old temples and courtyards.

Nice door !

At Durbar Square you can find people selling things everywhere

This is Hanuman the Monkey God

This is Kumari Ghar, the court where the living girl goddess called Kumari Devi stays. Worshiping a chosen pre-pubescent girl is an ancient practice done till this date. She is worshiped on all religious occasions. We are trying to get a glimpse of her. But she didn't come out to her window that day.

An area just outside Durbar Square

Swayambhunath Temple (Monkey Temple)

Swayambhunath Temple is an ancient temple situated on top of a hill in Kathmandu Valley, Nepal. There are many 'holy' monkeys living in the temple so it is also called Monkey Temple.

Devotees throwing coins into the pool for good luck

Buddha eyes overlooking the city of Kathmandu

Doing our round of prayers round the temple for world peace..

Selling candles and stuffs

You can see Valley of Kathmandu from the temple

Nagarkot

Nagarkot is a very scenic place at 2195m offering views of the Langtang range. It is very popular with tourists and is only 28km from Kathmandu.. To get to Nagarkot our coach had to take a very windy road 1 hour up the mountains.

At Nagarkot, on a good day, you could even get to see Mt Everest.

Our room at Hotel Country Villa, Nagarkot. Absolutely gorgeous.

It can be freezing cold at Nagarkot. You definitely need some fleece and jackets to keep warm.

It is very nice to elfresco outside the hotel. Nice view but cold weather.

Arhhh... enjoying the weather and view. I am afraid there is nothing much to do at Nagarkot except to just drink tea and chill.

HOTEL COUNTRY VILLA, NAGARKOT

Sarangkot

There we go again..

Our next venue after Dhampus was to Sarangkot, another beautiful place in Pokhara. Our bus brought us to a stop on top of a hill, after which we did another half an hour of hard climbing to reach our lodge for the night.

Half an hour later, we reached our 'hotel' for the night, 'View Top Lodge.'

Our little room

Our favourite past time was again to visit the people around Sarangkot and giving away presents to the under privileged children.

Dusk at Sarangkot

 FUN, FUN, FUN, during sunset at Sarangkot!

Our porters!

Night view of Pokhara from Sarangkot

The next morning, we woke up to another glorious Nepal sunrise with great mountain view.

Yes we brought our own tuna for breakfast :P  After breakfast it was time to head down back to Pokhara.

Cute little Nepalese boy

Walking down at Sarangkot towards Pokhara city.

Paragliding was a very popular activity at Sarangkot. It cost $USD100 for a half hour ride.