Happy Holi

Every year around March, and when the full moon is out, Indians and Nepalese celebrate Holi.

Holi is a Hindu spring festival that lasts for two days and means, "festival of colours" or "festival of love".

It's celebrating the victory of good over evil, the arrival of spring and the end of winter. It's done by meeting family and friends, enjoying great company, eating, drinking and covering one another in copious amounts of coloured powder!

Our morning started peaceful enough. We walked the back streets and had a bit of fun with the local kids who were out and about with their water pistols.

We gently applied colour to the faces of people passing by and we knew it was going to be a fun day.

By the time we got to Lakeside, around 11am, things were starting to heat up a bit.

Water pistols had been traded in for buckets and the colour powder was flying. Needless to say I was drenched at this stage and my face and clothes were starting to look like a rainbow.

We walked some more, continuing to spread our coloured powder over anyone we passed and receiving our fair share at the same time.

It was about 1pm when we ventured to the concert stage that had been set up in the middle of the main street. By the way, traffic was still flowing. No need to restrict that, this is Nepal after all.

First on was a DJ who got the crowd pumped, followed by a local heavy metal band!

As you can imagine, a bit of music, a few beers and packets of powder makes for an interesting time.

Buckets of water and powder was flying all over the place. What was earlier a gentle massage of colour to the face became an assault by motley hands, smearing it in my eyes, ears and mouth. Mind you, I was doing the same.

At the end of the day my jaw was sore from smiling so much. My entire body was covered and looking through my sunglasses was like seeing the world through a kaleidoscope.

Crazy, crazy fun!