City of Shiva... City of ghats... City on the river Ganges...So after exploring one corner of Uttar Pradesh, I made my way to other. All the way to Varanasi! It is, without a doubt, the holiest city of the Hindu religion in India and, if the claims are to be believed, one of the oldest continuously inhabited cities on the planet. 1. A sunrise boat ride on the Ganges Taking a sunrise boat trip on the Ganga was truly one of the most memorable early morning experiences I’ve ever had. To make matters better, I was hanging out with Indian visitors who were able to haggle for the local price, not the exorbitant foreigner one. It’s wonderful to travel a country with domestic tourists and experience how Indians explore their own country. Washed in quiet sunlight, Varanasi felt to me like a city that is simultaneously from another time and out of time entirely. Hindus come from all over India to Varanasi and other points along the river to pray and perform sacred rituals. Bathing in its waters is said to cleanse an individual of their sins and having one’s ashes scattered in it is said to bring them closer to breaking the cycles of death and rebirth. And as many of you know, it is also one of the most dangerously polluted rivers on the planet. I’m talking urban sewage, industrial chemicals, pesticides, and astronomically high levels of fecal coliform bacteria, among other ingredients. So unless it is part of your belief system, don’t dip your hands in the Ganges as I did! (The water is surprisingly lukewarm.) Life and death. Energy and slumber. Purification and pollution. What a wild place. 2. The Ganga Aarti at Dashashwamedh Ghat The must-see Ganga Aarti is a devotional ritual to the Goddess Ganga, the personification of the Ganges, conducted every single evening at dusk by Hindu priests on the river bank. The crowds were huge. The spectacle was highly choreographed. It managed to be both a deeply spiritual event for believers and a light-and-sound extravaganza for foreigners at the same time. There was fire. There was clapping. Hands flew up into the air and, regardless of whether everyone in attendance understood it or not, we were all shouting “Jai!” (“Victory!”) by the end. I was certainly thrilled. 3. A day trip to Sarnath Sarnath, an archeological site ten kilometres north of Varanasi and one of the four most important pilgrimage sites associated with the life of Gautama Buddha. Buddhists believe it was here that he gave his first sermon after attaining enlightenment. And check out that massive stupa at the heart of it all! That’s the Dhamek Stupa, which supposedly marks the exact spot where the Buddha first preached. Some real Big Dharma Energy right there. Terrible jokes aside, I found Sarnath a superbly serene place with monks and pilgrims chilling alongside their more basic tourist counterparts. I recalled the words from the Buddha's first sermon: “Unshakable is the liberation of my mind. This is my last birth. Now there is no more renewed existence.” Sadhu! Sadhu! Sadhu! 4. Foods of Varanasi I like food. Varanasi has food. It also has streets. Which have food. I like Varanasi street food.
5. A city of death Varanasi is a city of death. That is a fact. People come here to die in hospices and corpses arrive here to be cremated at the banks of the Ganges. All in the hopes of escaping the tormenting cycles of rebirth. My photo below is of Manikarnika Ghat, Varanasi’s main burning ghat, in a rare moment at dawn when there were no cremations. I passed through this site three times by foot (completely fine, as long as you don’t take photos), each visit less daunting than the last. On my first visit, I was guided through inferno by my own third-rate Virgil — a scammer-cum-guide who I tipped modestly. It was worth it, I think. The huge log piles. The open-air fires. The choking wood smoke. The barely tolerable heat. The endless sound of conflagration and axes hacking at logs. It’s hard to explain. My favourite lassi shop in the city is also in death’s firing line. As you sit there, drinking your mango/pomegranate/cannabis lassi, you can watch bodies being marched down to the river on bamboo stretchers every fifteen minutes or so. “Ram Naam Satya Hai!“ chant the bearers. “The name of Lord Rama is the truth!” And without God’s breath in a body, its truth disappears. I also spent time at Harishchandra Ghat, a smaller burning ghat to the south. Here I was able to watch the whole process (corpses being doused in river water, the priestly rites, workers adjusting semi-burnt bodies in the fire) without being bothered. But proceedings here were more amateurish. Goats wandered around the ghat. Stray dogs napped next to pyres. Kids bathed naked a few metres directly downstream from where the ashes were being dumped. The grisliest thing I witnessed was a dog that had snatched a piece of charred human bone from a smouldering pyre. He chased away another mutt, sat between some tired pilgrims, and began picking at the strips of flesh that still remained on the bone. No one cared. Things are different here. Truth be told, I became a bit clinical about all of it towards the end. But I’d like to think I gained a little wisdom from my visit. As for now, life (and its eternal counterpart) goes on. 6. Concluding with Varanasi Varanasi. Benares. Banaras. Kashi. Call it whatever you want. It’s a city of the ages that collects names, temples, pilgrims, holy men, mystics, scammers, druggies, and backpackers from all over the globe. White, dreadlocked hippies stoned out of their minds mingle with face-masked Chinese tour groups. What a place. What to see? What to photograph? Everything and nothing. Because Varanasi is all about motion — the motions of people, animals, rituals, flags, sunrises and sunsets. There is no obvious cynosure, no apparent focal point for your attention. Life drums on here and your awareness dances with it. The literal rat warrens of the old city with its maze of dead-end alleyways. GPS doesn’t work here. There is barely any mobile reception. Heaven forbid you asking for directions and then trying to understand them! Monkeys swinging on powerlines. Scooters vying for cobble-space with swollen bovines. Armed soldiers protecting temple entrances. Hand-painted shop signs reminding you that we can still make things with our fingers. What a place. As I currently write these words, I am sitting at King Khalid International Airport waiting for a connecting flight to Egypt. This place is the literal opposite of Varanasi and so much of India. Flat. Orderly. Quiet. New. Unbelievably clean. A motionless desert view. Though I think this might just be a restful interlude to even more chaos. The only way to find out is to board my next flight...
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AuthorMing is an economist, traveller, and creative writer from Melbourne, Australia. He’s a nebulous collection of particles on the lookout for a good corner to sit with a book and a cup of coffee. Archives
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