Varanassi

Looks like no trip Jaipur and Agra. The roads are closed due to protestors; the tribe Gujjars. Their request to remain lower castes which would have allowed them specific benefits was rejected by the state of Rajasthan. As such, protestors have stopped highway traffic and trains to all roads leading to Agra and Jaipur from Delhi…Like everything in India, all plans are subject to change. So this last weekend, we went to Varanassi, the holiest city in Hinduism.

The overnight sleeper train ride to Varanassi was basic. Bunks, no AC, gated windows, mosquitoes. I didn’t bring any sheets. The trip was literally planned on the spot. I usually sleep like a champ, anywhere, anytime, but my senses were assaulted all night and there was no way I would get sleep. Sellers would up and down the aisles repeating “Chai, chai, chai” or “pani, pani, pani (water) or “omelet with mango chutney. Very good!” I would wake to my skin sticking to the dingy plastic bed, or some smell burning my nose or swooshing, cracking noises as other trains rushed by. Flickering fluorescent lights did not help. Rough night. The AC train on the way back from Varanassi was 150%+ like the cost of the ticket.

After arguing with the TAXI driver, we finally arrived at the Ganges Guest View House at Assi Ghat. The place has a British colonial era feel to it. Stepping outside our room is a larger, brighter room with windows framed with light curtains overlooking patios and the Ganges. This room was my favorite place to journal this weekend. Artists (Varanassi is known for art and music) work round the clock painting miniatures and large murals for the hotel. Two dachshund roamed about the black and white tiled floors. Dinner was fantastic.

Varanassi is described as the “quintessential India,” and it’s trippin’. The wide display of human activities and emotions are unbelievable and overwhelms the sense as you walk down the ghats. Everything revolves around the river. Cows, water buffalo and goats are shitting as they meander along the stone ground while a man shits nearby while ten feet away are boys splashing around in the Ganges while 200 meters downstream a grandson gives his grandfather last rites in the same water while a pyre, where the body will be cremated, burns 5 feet away while a man fishes in the river as gigantic bats fly overhead. The Ganges This is only the evening.

The next morning at 5:00 AM, a different jumbled events are happening; a priest welcomes the sun with smoke and incense as sun worshippers meditate while staring directly at the orange orb rising above the Ganges, while Aghoris meditate, skin gray from the ashes of the recently deceased, and a yoga class is amplified through speakers and illustrated above a crowd of children and chanting is sung round the clock. There is more bathing, this time by the women. The men overlooking the cremation are now turning over the Grandfather's skinny body with a long stick. The ghats are where everything is happening at the same time at the same place. Varanassi it like a page from Where’s Waldo India except living it is more of a shocking realization of the bare essentials of human living in one scene rather than an amusing scene of antics on a page.

More pics to come