Vaishali and Rajgir

     

   These hotels being much the same and the journeys by minibus being much the same ... well, it's the same but different and it's kind of hard to remember what has been going on.

          Last night I walked along the road with Alexandre, my roommate, and Catherine (one of the three Catherines, the one with the short hair) when it was dark. I do not like this. For some mad reason, they want you to walk on the left hand side and this means that the traffic comes from behind you. Of course, there are no street lights on most roads. Catherine told me it was because a group of people are regarded as a vehicle. What?

         Catherine had a torch since she's had experience with tramping on cow shit, and this did make me feel a bit safer, but still....
 
         The wee houses you see along the road didn't look so awful as they day during the day, with the lights shining through the woven mat walls and all, the goats tethered and all that. Of course, the traffic goes by their front door by about three or four feet.

         I was going down this road because I wanted to buy fruit. I'm trying to eat fruit and biscuits for lunch and dinner after having a big breakfast. I had chips this morning for breakfast; really good chips too. Plus, mango juice, burny tatties, spinach, toast and fried eggs this morning. First time for fried eggs.

         Yesterday we were in Vaishali where it seems the Buddha spent some rainy seasons (am I getting this right?), but I do remember some doings with a Monkey King and maybe he got a courtesan to become a nun, and got nuns into the sangha.

         We visited two places at Vaishali. The first one was free and it was basically a circular hole in he ground and it was closing at five, the man closing it with canes in their hands. It closed at five, but a bus load of Koreans or Taiwanese were still going in.

        The other park was a lot more impressive. Big pillar with a lion on it and the usual big mound of red bricks. It cost 300 rupees (about three pounds) to get in, but some kids seems to have managed. There was about eight wee kids of about eight and one big kid. I was told this was an organised racket. The big kid herded the wee kids to suitable targets for begging, and they had a routine of saying a mani mantra, and going through numbers and the alphabet. Somebody must be organising this organised begging, probably the folk controlling the gate.

          But it wasn't a bother. When the recitation/puja was done, I took myself off to a secluded spot to meditate away the next hour. Hat and shades on. The big kid came over and sat near me, but I didn't move. I thought I'd give her some money if she stayed there for an hour, but she left after realising I was a lost cause. After the hour was over, I looked over and the lama was sitting under a tree about thirty yards away, obviously having the same idea about meditating as myself. Anyway, there was a group of wee kids sitting in front of her in neat row. They got no money off the lama when she got up to leave with me. She told me they were telling her their numbers and doing the alphabet.

           I hope this is the place where we are spending three nights what with the telly working and having the internet in the room. We passed through Nalanda getting here and Vulture's Peak is maybe reachable as well. Take it as it comes.

           As far as the machines are concerned, Heather got me some extra storage for photies just before I left, but he phone keeps telling me the storage is full and to delete some files. Well, I can't get the photies onto this blog as it is and there might not be very many on the phone when I get home. Typical. Can't get the google photos to work and the One Drive is a mystery to me. Not that I care.