Angel in Darkness
Man on the Moon
dream
Kafal
Lukla Airport
Lukla is a town in the Khumbu region of eastern Nepal where most people visiting the Himalayas near Mount Everest start their journey. Lukla, at 2,860 metres (9,380 ft.), contains a small airport where most people begin and end their adventure in the region. Although Lukla means place with many goats and sheep, one is not likely to see many roaming around these days.
Looking across the township of Lukla, with the air strip of Lukla Airport in the foreground.Somewhere between 90-95% of the foreign nationals who reach Lukla will arrive by a ½ hour flight from Kathmandu. The remainder will mainly trek in from Jiri, about a seven to eight day walk. On organized treks, most of the Nepalese guides and kitchen staff will also walk from Jiri to Lukla, albeit in about half the time unless clients are also with them. When Tenzing Norgay and Sir Edmund Hillary made the famous first ascent of Mt. Everest in 1953, that expedition also walked in from Jiri.
Lukla has a variety of shops and lodges where one can have basic western style meals and pick up any last minute items for the trekking or climbing ahead. If one cannot find required items in Lukla, better luck can be had in Namche Bazaar. There are a couple of good climbing shops (e.g. Mountain Madness) in Namche where one can rent carabiners, helmets, ice axes, jumars and harnesses. However, plastic mountaineering boots and crampons are best rented in Kathmandu if they are needed.
From Lukla, most trekking groups will take two days to reach Namche Bazaar, a nice easy pace to help in altitude acclimatization. Distance wise, this segment is doable in one long day (~8 to 10 hours) but not advised due to increased risk of altitude sickness. If not in a formal trekking group, one should double-check tickets with the airline before leaving Lukla. Empty seats on flights between Kathmandu and Lukla are a rarity during the prime seasons and people being bumped off their flights is not uncommon.
Looking across the township of Lukla, with the air strip of Lukla Airport in the foreground.Somewhere between 90-95% of the foreign nationals who reach Lukla will arrive by a ½ hour flight from Kathmandu. The remainder will mainly trek in from Jiri, about a seven to eight day walk. On organized treks, most of the Nepalese guides and kitchen staff will also walk from Jiri to Lukla, albeit in about half the time unless clients are also with them. When Tenzing Norgay and Sir Edmund Hillary made the famous first ascent of Mt. Everest in 1953, that expedition also walked in from Jiri.
Lukla has a variety of shops and lodges where one can have basic western style meals and pick up any last minute items for the trekking or climbing ahead. If one cannot find required items in Lukla, better luck can be had in Namche Bazaar. There are a couple of good climbing shops (e.g. Mountain Madness) in Namche where one can rent carabiners, helmets, ice axes, jumars and harnesses. However, plastic mountaineering boots and crampons are best rented in Kathmandu if they are needed.
From Lukla, most trekking groups will take two days to reach Namche Bazaar, a nice easy pace to help in altitude acclimatization. Distance wise, this segment is doable in one long day (~8 to 10 hours) but not advised due to increased risk of altitude sickness. If not in a formal trekking group, one should double-check tickets with the airline before leaving Lukla. Empty seats on flights between Kathmandu and Lukla are a rarity during the prime seasons and people being bumped off their flights is not uncommon.
Prayer Wheel
Buddhist Prayer Wheel
"It is said that prayer wheels are used to accumulate wisdom and merit or good karma and to purify negativities such as bad karma. The idea of spinning mantras comes from numerous Tantric practices where the Tantric practitioner visualizes mantras revolving around the nadis and especially around the meridian chakras such as the heart and crown.
Therefore Tibetan Prayer Wheels are a visual aid for developing one's capacity for these types of Tantric visualizations. The spiritual method for those practicing with a prayer wheel is very specific (with slight variations according to different Buddhist sects). The practitioner most often spins the wheel clockwise, for the direction the mantras are written is that of the movement of the sun across the sky. However, on rare occasions advanced Tantric practitioners such as Senge Dongma, the Lion-Faced Dakini spin prayer wheels counterclockwise to manifest a more wrathful protective energy.
Before, during and after the practitioner turns the wheel, it is best to focus the mind and repeat the Om Mani Padme Hum mantra, as this increases the merit earned by the wheel's use. Intoning the mani mantra with mindfullness and the “Bodhicitta” motivation dramatically enhances the effects of the Tibetan Prayer Wheel. However, it is said that even turning it while distracted has benefits and merits and it states in the lineage text that even insects that cross a prayer wheel’s shadow will get some benefit.
Each revolution is as meritorious as reading the inscription aloud as many times as it is written on the scroll, and this means that the more Om Mani Padme Hum mantras that are inside a prayer wheel then the more powerful it is. The wheel must not be spun too fast or frantically, but held upright (if a hand-held wheel) and turned smoothly with the motivation and spirit of compassion and bodhichitta (the noble mind that aspires to full enlightenment for the benefit of all beings). Which, it’s been stated, are some of the benefits attributed to the practice of turning the wheel. It helps wisdom, compassion and bodhichitta arise in the practitioner.
The practitioner should also repeat the mantra as many times as possible during the turning of the wheel, and keep a calm meditative mind. Also, there’s a Tibetan Buddhist tradition of asking the Buddhas and bodhisattvas to dedicate any accumulated merits that you may have gathered during practice to all sentient beings. This is standard with Tibetans completing any Buddhist practice including the practice of the prayer wheel."
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