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2. SHIVA RATRI Pashupatinath, Nepal |
Hindu devotees wait in line before dawn to enter the main Shiva temple at Pashupatinath in Kathmandu, Nepal. This temple, dedicated to Shiva as lord of the animals and Nepal's patron god, was built in 1696, but the site was sacred long before that. It towers above the sacred Bagmati River, lined with bathing and cremation ghats, or platforms, and hundreds of smaller temples, dedicated to Shiva and other Hindu deities. |