Indra Jatra (Yenya)

The festival

Indra Jatra — Yenya in the Newar language — is the largest street festival in the Kathmandu Valley, established in the tenth century under King Gunakamadeva. For eight days, the old town honors Indra, god of rain, to thank him for the harvests, and commemorates the dead of the year. The feast opens with the erection of a wooden ceremonial mast in Basantapur, in front of the palace of Hanuman Dhoka.

His heart is the Kumari Jatra, added in the 18th century: the procession of the tanks of the Kumari, the living goddess of Kathmandu — a girl venerated as the incarnation of the goddess Taleju — and Ganesh and Bhairav, drawn in the alleys of the old town in front of immense crowds. In the courtyards and on the squares, masked dancers (Lakhey, deities and demons) chain sacred dances, and the great mask of Sweta Bhairav lets the rice beer pour to the faithful.