Varanasi - the religious city

Welcome again to some more travels through the fascinating and strenuous India! After having left Rajasthan, the province of the kings, and after having visited the Taj Mahal, our route and the Indian trains finally took us into the direction of Darjeeling (our ultimate destination) far east to Varanasi! With our normal luck here in India we couldn't get the train tickets we wanted and so we had to travel all the way back to Delhi and then on to Varanasi. We were lucky to do so because otherwise, we would have missed out on so many terrible, crying, and annoying children, stopping us from sleeping at night, and on some of the most disgusting people we have ever met, starring at us as if we were green somethings from Mars, belching and spitting freely, throwing rubbish out of train all the time, dropping food wherever they sat or went, and smelling strongly of unwashed feet, onion and sweat. We even had the pleasure of meeting an nice family who were so obliging as to take up the space of 6 instead of 3, offering us to put our backpacks in the middle of the walkway so that passing people could either trample on them or steal them right away (locals here stow their luggage as close as possible to them and lock them to their berths with steal chains). The inspector was not much help either, he only snorted at us in the usual grumpy Indian manner. In the end, the two other Indian men in our compartment helped us sort out the problem and, discussing with some other locals, found some space underneath a berth in the compartment next door. Even though I did not quite like the idea of having our luggage out of sight, the choice was either this or to sleep with it on the berth (0,8mx1,8m)... I can tell you, traveling in India on a low budget is really fun!

Well, we nevertheless got to Varanasi, even though I was in a rather terrible state because, since Agra, I had been fighting with the cold and fever, David had passed on to me and which was much enhanced by the fridge temperatures on the train... Varanasi, as the picture above shows, is another one of India's terrible, ugly, and poor cities but it is also a very special place - one of the holiest cities in the country. Hindu pilgrims come here from all over the country to bath in the waters of the holy Ganges river and they believe that dying in Varanasi frees them of the cycle of rebirth and death. The city is thus a place where you can experience religious traditions first hand, a very interesting aspect for us foreigners as the whole Indian life is dominated by religion but usually we are rather kept apart. So, after a couple of hours of rest for me, we ventured out for our first experience of Varanasi, a religious celebration called "ganga aarti"
held every evening at the main ghat (ghats, just to remind you, are quays where people wash themselves and their clothes). We figured it might be a sort of reverence to the Ganges. Hundreds of people assemble on the river bank, they set small wreaths of flowers with candles in the middle floating down the Ganges, and then priests from different temples start a sort of prayer. While religious chants and music from a CD fill the air and people ring hundreds of small bells, the priests, standing on small platforms over the riverbank, move and wave different objects (candles, pots with burning fire in them, fans,...), sometimes they sprinkle holy water,... and all of this goes on for over an hour, finishing with the priests and all the people around singing a song together. I have to admit, we did not understand much of what was going on, but it was a very special feeling to be able to share such an intense moment with the local population.

The next morning, very unlike our normal habits, we got up before sunrise in order to take a closer look at the 8 km of ghats lining the riverbank. Yep, we rented one of the local rowboats, oarsman included of course, and off we went for a very enjoyable in interesting two hours on the water. The sunrise was fantastic and for once we saw an Indian landscape without the normal layer of pollution covering it up. The ghats really make up all the riverbank, no matter if they are public or private (former maharadjas), they usually consist of a set of concrete steps leading right into the terribly polluted water of the Ganges, making it easy for people to wash themselves without needing to swim at the same time. The picture on the left shows Dasawamedh ghat, the main ghat in Varanasi where we saw the spectacle in the evening. The three pictures below show a calmer ghat further North, the general riverbank, and a group of people bathing in the river. Of course, the women wash themselves with all their clothes on and sometimes you can see them right next to drainpipe... we shuddered at the thought of what they are actually bathing in! Ah, of course we also saw the so-called "burning ghats" the places where the Hindu burn their dead people but it is not allowed and would also seem rather strange to take a picture of this.



Besides the many different ghats and the people washing themselves in the river, swimming, or praying, there were also some curiosities for us to admire. Soon after sunrise we had the first reminder that we are still in India where people try to sell you anything. The locals here have actually transformed rowboats in order to follow the tourists on the water! Sometimes we could see a tourist boat with several sales' boats around so that the poor guys rowing couldn't even advance anymore. The highlight was a boat completely filled with batteries which provided electricity for a TV and a video recorder so that the vendors could show the documentation of Varanasi they were trying to sell on the water! Impressive! Moreover, there were also some strange sights of tourists. The two doing their yoga yoga on the riverbank were apparently not at all disturbed by the masses of tourists and locals starring at them from the water!

It was truly a very special morning with a lot of laughter and a lot of astonishing views. In the end, Varanasi turned out to be really worth-while the stopover and I guess we would have appreciated the city even more, had we known what horrors of travel were waiting for us only a couple of hours later. This, however, is another story for another post, a lot less convinced of India and Indians but for now, Varanasi was great, a lot of fun, and I would definitely recommend it to anyone visiting India!