Artistic Brilliance of the Ancient Newar City of Lalitpur-patan in Nepal

OUTLOOK TRAVELER 
By Bibek Bhattacharya

NEPAL---Patan is crowded and noisy, full of banal hoardings and traffic going haywire. It’s an ordinary modern city, its outskirts practically a part of Kathmandu. But Lalitpur, ah, Lalitpur is the stuff of dreams. An ancient and prosperous city on the principal historical trade route between India and Tibet, Lalitpur (Patan in Nepali and Yala in Newari) is emblematic of the way the Kathmandu Valley has been the repository and interpreter of the cultures of its two principal neighbours; especially in its role in keeping alive traditions that have long vanished from India.Visiting Lalitpur is like going on a pilgrimage in search of beauty, and like thousands before me, I start my wanderings in the Durbar Square. [link]