Sunrise on the Ganges

Varanasi certainly did not disappoint. Happy that we had daylight to get our bearings, Cheri and I checked into more of a backpacker hostel on day two. We were centrally located and surrounded by other travelers. After talking to many travelers from various locations (UK, Australia, Sweden) we realized that our one month jaunt is the shortest trip we've heard of. Travelers on their second of three months also wail about how much they will miss and how much there is to see in India. With less than three weeks, I feel that I have seen a lot without too much stress.

While in Varanasi, we wandered the labyrinthine streets while dodging cows, dogs, beggars, motorcycles, cow pies, monkeys, streams of betel nut/tobacco spit and processions of chanting men carrying a dead loved one on an orange shrouded stretcher. Our new hostel was a ten minute walk (once we stopped getting lost) from the main burning ghat. Fires are burning 24 hours per day and as many as 300 bodies will be burnt every day. This particular ghat burns only Hindus and all Brahman that want to be burned will be burned with the exception of children, pregnant women, holy men, sufferers of small pox, lepers and those who died by cobra bite. It is believed that these individuals are either blessed or pure and do not need the cleansing process provided by the burning. It takes three hours for a body to burn and it is a very strange experience to stand among ten pyres as bodies lay in various degrees of transformation. We went to visit this ghat each day but never stayed more than fifteen minutes or so. In our few visits, we saw a skull literally explode (does anyone know why this would happen) as it burned. We also saw one of the fire tenders try to move a body to help the burning process. He used a large bamboo pole to move the body and threw the bamboo pole aside when he finished. Almost instantly, two of Varanasi's countless dogs sidled up to gnaw the burnt flesh from the end of the bamboo. I am sorry to focus on the gruesome aspects as the process seems much more cathartic and happy than any funeral I have ever attended. The cremation process is a happy event as it is the end of the cycle of rebirth. Understandably, photos were not permitted during this process. Even when trying to take pictures from a great distance to give a sense of the layout, I got a good tongue lashing.

On January 30, we went for a sunrise boat ride on the Ganges. Having taken a free boat ride during the previous evening sunset, we had a sense of the area and it's beauty. January 30 was a festival day. We heard that it was a Punjab festival and we also heard that it was a Sikh festival so we weren't quite sure what to expect. Either way, we quickly saw the crowd that the festival provided. The ghats flowed with undulating colors as men, women and children ventured to the Ganga (local pronunciation). Sarees, orange flowers and the deep orange of sunrise made for a truly unbelievable start to the day. This hour long ride was riveting enough to allow the fatigue from our 5am wake-up to subside temporarily. The only other signs of a festival that we saw during the day were at a seemingly heated demonstration in the center of town. Men screamed into a megaphone and were echoed by an emphatic crowd. Wary, Cheri and I took a detour and a few blocks later saw a constant stream of stern looking police officers headed right where we had come from. No news spread of any trouble but I was happy to distance myself from the pulsating energy.

We are now in Allahabad, another holy city that drew 70,000,000 people to the confluence of the Ganges, Yamuna and Saraswati rivers for Kumbh Mela. We arrived one day after a smaller gathering of holy men and lugged our bags through a sea of bearded, painted holy men in all orange. Quite a sight indeed.

We intended to continue to Jaipur in Rajasthan today but we were unable to get a ticket departing before mid-day tomorrow. We will spend about a week in Rajashtan before heading south to see Mumbai and Goa.

Still great here!

Love to all.
Ira