Teej Festival

Teej festival is celebrated by women all over Nepal for three days. Women clad in beautiful red saris with shining potes (glass beads), red tika, and bangles, sing and dance to traditional folk songs for days. It is especially significant for married women when they get a special invitation to visit their maternal home for a feast also known as Dar.

Following the feast, on the next day, women observe a fast and pray to Lord Shiva for the long, healthy, and prosperous life of their husbands and their families. It is a sight to behold at the Pashupatinath temple, where thousands of women draped in red and green throng the premises of the temple. Observers can take photos of these women dancing merrily, where sometimes foreigners, especially women tourists are requested to participate in the merry-making.

Unmarried women too observe the Teej festival with unabated zeal with the hope that they will get to marry good husbands. From early dawn, women queue up in the multiple lines in Pashupatinath to offer their prayers to Lord Shiva.