Musical instruments with a difference

Never having been to Nepal, I had not heard before about this surprising aspect of its version of Buddhism (from a recent travel article in The Times):

Rosa had been asked to take this particular damaru back to England for some Buddhist friends, and was understandably nervous about it. The hand drum was just as she had described. It was made out of human skulls — children’s skulls, to be precise. Over the highly polished craniums was stretched a thin membrane of human skin.

“One skull is female, the other is male,” she explained. “It symbolises the union of wisdom and compassion. It’s very powerful. If you get one made out of babies’ skulls, that’s even better — something to do with the energy flowing through the opening in the fontanelles.”...

The shops around Boudhanath are full of similar objects. In one, I was shown a selection of skull offering bowls; in another, half a dozen trumpets made from women’s thigh bones. Dusting one off, the shopkeeper put the hip joint to his lips and blew, making a noise like a hunting horn.

Rather disturbing to a Western mind, especially those instruments made out of kids or babies skulls.