After Bodgaya Norman and I kept up a torrid pace through India visiting three other minor Buddhist sites before arriving at Kushinagar. Along our journey to Ragjir and Nalanda Norman requested that we see one of the many brick manufacturing “plants” along the way. It turned out to be very educational.
Ragjir
Stuppa at Ragjir. I believe that Buddha was supposed to have spent 7 years in a cave around here before he descended to Bodgaya. It wasn’t all that interesting except for the great views at the top of the mountain.
We rode this ski lift type machine to get to the top. You can see Norman in front of me. During ski season, I’ve never been all that confident in ski lifts. However, at some point you reason with your self and say well at least there is a couple of feet of semi compacted snow beneath me to break my fall. It was 105 degrees that day.
These monkeys were at the top by the stuppa. I believe Norman said they were bonables. Anyway, there were big, mean and aggressive. That’s kind of a bad combination when it comes to large groups of tourists.
Bricks
Brick Manufacturing! At first I thought that ALL of the bricks were stacked in the bottom of the chimneny. After about 2 seconds of thinking about it Norman and I both agreed that was ridiculous.
Norman in the race track type mound where the bricks are fired.Â
Fire in the hole!
Through out India you will see more people on top of cars and buses than in them.
VaishaliÂ
Our driver Ganu told us that one eight of Buddha’s remains were buried at Vaishali. When I asked our driver how he knew that factoid he didn’t respond.
The stuppa built by the Japanese almost exactly the same as the one in Ragjir. Its also not at the exact site of the ashes… Lame
Fishing at a fish pond next to the Stuppa
The actual site of the ashes just on the other side of the pond.
One eighth of Buddha lies here!!!
Nalanda
Apparently Nalanda was the site of one of the first Universities ever. Buddha adherents from all over (even china) came here to study. It could hold up to 500 monks at once. 
Â
The crazy thing about how Muslim conquerors destroyed religious sites in India, is that they buried them in mud. As you can see this place is built out of 2 billion bricks. Fire wasn’t going to take this baby down.
I think a monk lived here. They had some complex internal drainage system in place.