在加德满都的时候,遇到色彩节,Holi。尼泊尔的节日很多,其中这个色彩节是比较大的节日,全国人民,不分男女老幼,这一日都会把储备多时的“武器”拿出来,就是一些混合了颜料粉的,用塑料袋装的水弹来互相攻击。我那天,没有事先预见到这场战斗的激烈和无所不在,当我从老人院采访回来,要回到背包客集散地Thamel区时就被一群人围攻了。
我那天晚上就在Thamel区久负盛名的Helena里写了这篇日记,记录了自己的“悲惨”遭遇。呵呵。
非英文专业,水平很有限,谬误之处,请咖啡馆里的高人指点一二。我自己知道有些用词不太准确,例如,文中的fall upon,但我一时找不到更合适的词,希望得到大家的帮助。
Holi, A Fighting Day
From Kathmandu. 2007-03-04
As a country of poverty and politically unstable,Nepal is surprisingly a land of joy and celebrating festivals.
Holi, the festival of colours ,fell upon the country yesterday, and it made a scene of overexcited atmosphere and chaos.
Being an outsider of Nepalese culture,I've been totally confused by the way the locals celebrated the Holi.
Gangs of youth and children with lolas(water-filled balloons)and coloured chemical powders in hands were seen everywhere the city Kathmandu.Most of them smeared in different colours and had a look of exciting and merry.they were looking for targets anytime anywhere.
in the form of throwing out lolas or powders on each other or to passbys, to some degree, Holi is a day of fighting.figting between men,women and childrens.only those aged ones had no interests to be involved in the battle.
In high residential areas, It was more of a roof-top balloon fights, people hurled balloons and splashed water from their terrace. At places like Thamel, an area of tourist, where I stayed, the celebrations were more on the roads with fighters blocking every exit or entry of this area.
Though it's a Nepalese Festival, tourists were no way to be exceptional, actually, It's quite a threat to foreigners since they had no weapons to fight back.
Unfortunately, I was a victim of this fighting day.
Yesterday afternoon, I got back to Thamel from the Pashupati temple by taxi.When we arrived in an interscetion of crossed-roads, the car was stucked by the crowd and coudn't move.the men surrounding us spontaneously found me a perfect target to attack.They throwed red powders on me through the opened-window beside the taxi driver, some of them even opened the back cover of the car to share me some powders.
In such a terrible situation, I had no choice but shouting at the driver: your country is crazy, get out of here,quickly.
The teenage taxi driver made no response but a loud laugh, he was so happy about it.
When I finally stepped inside the Sun Rise Cottage,the hostel I stayed,people working there greeted me with big smile, and I just said: it's really dangerous outside.
Though it's a festival to be celebrating nationwide and most nepalese people really enjoyed it , there was still some different voices about the celebration.
An article published on "The Kathmandu Post" labled the celebration activity as "anti-soceity". Another one which was on today's The Himalayan has viewed it "vulgar" and worried about its negative affect on tourist.
A victim of the festival myself, I agree with the latter totally.
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