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Like a brick canyon, Bhaktapur's main commercial thoroughfare runs from Taumadhi west to the city gate. Roughly 150m along, you'll reach a kind of playground of sculptures and shrines, and a shikra that rejoices in the name of Jyotirlingeshwar Mahadev , freely translatable as "Great God of the Resplendent Phallus" - a reference to a myth in which Shiva challenges Brahma and Vishnu to find the end of his organ (they never do). Further west, where the street's brick cobbles temporarily give way to flagstones, the Jaya Barahi Mandir commemorates the shakti (consort) of Vishnu the boar; you have to stand well back from this broad edifice to see its pagoda roofs. Non-Hindus aren't specifically barred from entering the upstairs sanctuary, but this intimate space wasn't designed for spectators. Dark, damp alleys beckon on either side of the main road - north towards Durbar Square and south to the river. An obligatory destination in this area is Kumale Tol, the Potters' Square , a sloping open space southwest of Taumadhi Tol. Until recently, Bhaktapur's potters ( kumal) worked here fairly anonymously, cranking out simple water vessels, stovepipes, disposable yoghurt pots and the like. Nowadays the square has blossomed into quite a little tourist attraction, and as its output has shifted to tourist knickknacks, workaday pottery is increasingly being produced in other, smaller squares in the eastern part of the city. Ironically, the tourist market gives these potters an incentive to stick to mostly traditional methods. You'll see them kneading their clay by hand, and a few still form their vessels on hand-powered wheels: using a pole to spin the wheel to a dervish pitch, the potter gets four or five minutes' working time before the wheel gradually winds down to a slow wobble and needs to be cranked up again. The finished creations are set out in soldierly rows to dry in the sun for a day or two before firing, which turns them from grey to brick red
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