June 13 Day 118
I didn't sleep too well because of our noisy AC and the 4:30 alarm came too soon. Unfortunately, our bathroom window was across from our neighbour's so we got to hear our hotelmate go through what sounded like a violent vomiting session but way probably a local phlegm ceremony, similar to what one can hear in public spaces in China. We groggily dressed and met our guide in the lobby at 6.
He walked us to the boat and we crossed a huge procession of several hundred tourists all walking along the ghat in the other direction. Our guide led us down to the water and woke up our skipper who was sleeping on his boat. He woke up, came in close enough for us to get on and we set off.
He rowed us slowly down the river, fairly close to the shore and only spoke a little, although his English seemed okay. The ghats were already active, with many people washing and swimming in them, boats going to and fro and lots of activity on shore. As we headed away from the main ghat there were pockets of people in the water but it generally petered out. One of the main things to do was to take a boat across the river to the huge sandbar on the other side of the Ganges and enjoy one of the makeshift teahouses there. We stuck to our own route.
Once we got got what he said was a power station we turned around and headed back a little further away from the shore. Another floating store approached us but went after other boats when we repeatedly said "no thanks" to his doodads.
The large group we saw when we first waked down seemed to be going by us on several huge motorized boats and we were glad to be in a boat where the only sound was the soft splash of the paddles. A few local boats went by us full of women singing, which was nice. It was a misty morning and so the sunrise was an indirect one but the air was still cool and there was lots to see.
We docked and our 90 minute tour ended up being less than an hour but we were okay being on land and so tipped our captain. We then walked along the water towards the burning ghat. This is where families cremate their loved ones, so it was tactical to give them space and not take pictures. Two men came up to us as we approached the area and told us where we should be walking, but this was India and there was no way to decipher whether they were giving good information of whether they were trying to lead us into some touty trap. We decided to observe from where we were and then head back.
Going the other way we hit the main ghat and tried to puzzle out where the main elements of the night before's show were held. There was a big stage which had a table laid with potted plants and a long line to approach it but nothing happening on it as we passed. Of course, the line went directly through the tightest bottleneck on the ghat so people were forcibly pushing their way to get through the area.
We continued walking through the crowds of people, who usually took no notice of us other than to say "boat, sir?" (lots of that). They were swimming, socializing, selling and buying and we were nothing special.
Back at our ghat we sat for a bit and watched what was happening. Several swimmers wore strings over their shoulders and chests which apparently designated them as brahmens. There was a guy mixing paste under an umbrellas who watched people's stuff and would bless the foreheads of those who requested it with some of the paste. Otherwise lots of people were going in all directions, getting in and out of boats and mainly getting in and out of the water.
Bacl at our room Meg had a quick shower before breakfast. We started breakfast on the roof but the day was already getting so hot that we retreated down below to eat. Our regular waited had been abandoned by his support staff so we were a little late in meeting our walking tour guide Suneil.
Our guidebook describes Varanasi as a place to take in the entire atmosphere rather than visit specific sites, which seemed to be proven true from our tour. Suneil led us on a path we could never reproduce through narrow passages and constantly forking streets. There were beggars and cattle and dogs, motorcycles buzzing by with almost no space between them and us and often packs of people dressed in their finery, having come as pilgrims to Varanasi. The path was so labyrinthine you expected a minotaur to pop out and start chasing us at any moment.
We looked in at several Hindu temples. It reminded us of Kathmandu where at the end of a deserted alley or through a deserted building a large, ornate temple would appear crammed between several shops or apartments. He took us to a formerly grand mansion which now represented faded glory, though it was only 80 years old. As we got closer to the main temple, the shops were selling more and more flowers and offerings and the crowds were getting thicker and thicker. On the main street we saw the line which was already 3 to 4 hours long. There were offerings made of ice and people giving out free drinks which we didn't dare drink.
Suneil pointed out the spires of the temple and the nearby mosque but we never got a proper view of the temple due to the crush around it. We could have done some paperwork to get a ticket and then waited with everyone else for several hours in the sun on a street buzzing with traffic, but we didn't entertain this options.
Back to the narrow but shady streets we went. None of these places looked far apart on a map but we walked a long and indirect way to get from anything to something else. Suneil did his job adequately but obviously wasn't passionate about his work. He was able to answer a few cultural things that we saw (what is that? Why are they doing that?) which was nice. He answered our questions but using few words and had to be pressed for detail. we saw many people with narrow carts, scraping garbage off the ground and Suneil told us that they were paid by the government to do this everyday and people could just dump their garbage outside of their homes and it would be picked up. I guess that they also picked up the dead and dying animals that we saw several times while walking the streets of Varanasi.
We emerged by the burning ghat and saw piles of wood used for teh purpose and watched what was going on from a respectful distance. Apparently there is no booking system, you just show up with a body, buy some wood and wait your turn. This is the most auspicious place in India to be cremated but there was no visible corpse lineup that we could see.
We saw the mosque close to the temple but it was closed and them walked through and area of rubble and half-demolished buildings. Apparently Modi is dealing with the crush to get to the temple by buying 300 buildings close to it and demolishing them to create a parking lot. So much of the character of the place was the crush of buildings that it seemed a shame to create such a thing but the temple is apparently always dysfunctionally crowded.
We visited a Nepalese temple which had fine wood carving and a some pornographic depictions and watched a mongoose scamper around the grounds. Our guide then told us that we had seen everything and invited us to look in on a Muslim weaving shop, but we were warned about hotel guides taking you shopping by our guide book so we declined.
Instead we went to the Blue Lassi for some cool treats. They churn the yoghurt for a good long time and then place it in a clay pot with your fruit toppings and you eat it with a wooden spoon. They were delicious and we ate them sitting on the couch surrounded by passport photos donated by previous diners.
We asked our guide to take us to the Brown Bread Bakery but he said it was too far away, which turned out to be correct (our out of date guide book had it much closer, but it has moved) so we went back to our hotel. We thanked our guide and then went down for a nap after such an early morning.
We got up and weren't really functional until mid-afternoon and so went out seeking lunch in the middle of the day, with no proper map and only vague directions of how to get to Brown Bread. Outside the crowds were reduced to next to nothing as anyone sane had found somewhere cool to have a siesta. We walked along past the main ghat and looked for signs leading us on. Seeing none, we headed up into a busy market area and asked directions from some young guys calling everyone into their shop. They pointed us down an alleyway, which we followed for an uncomfortably long time. At times it seemed to peter out but we kept on and occasionally asked someone until we found it.
We had some drinks and nice hummous and salad. The menu had the sort of their charity and the women and children that helped. They offered a tour but this being off season there was nothing to be had in June. We had a nice chat with an Indian man before heading out.
We followed the painted signs backwards from the bakery until we hit a ghat and noted how to get back there. We then entered the narrow streets from another spot and looked for Meg's scarf and my anti-perspirant. She soon found a fabric store that had pretty much what she wanted at a decent price. She promised she'd be back to try a shalvar chamese the next day and we set off looking for a pharmacy.
Our situation was a familiar one in countries where you an't say no to a question. Everyone spoke of this big pharmacy which had everything but pointed us deeper into the market until we came to a street we had been at and they pointed us back in the other way. Eventually one vendor speculated that it had probably closed so we gave it up and went back to our room.
After a quick freshening up, we headed out to the big show at the main ghat, in person this time. On the way the boat captains desperately wanted our attention, one suggesting that if we saw it on land we'd just see their backs. We walked past the big stage which had a traditional Indian band playing but only a few spectators. The big crowd was waiting just after the band, as the steps of the ghat were quite packed and people were moving back and forth, making it slow to get by them.
We headed down by the water where we saw large boats by the shore with rows of chairs. We were approached by several vendors who said it was 300 rupees per seat but we said we could get our own boats for 200 rupees. We had to walk away but he agreed to our price.
We were in the second row of the boat, behind a man with a big head and various members of his family who sat next to us taking turns. We asked an older couple behind us to take our picture and they asked a perplexed younger man to take it and directed him to take it from the opposite direction that we wanted.
While we waited people were putting floating candles with flowers in the water, boats were showing up and the band could be heard quite clearly. Around 7:00, seven guys in gold lamee suits showed up and spent quite a while placing wreathes and praying to what we thought was a picture of someone (we only saw the back of it from the water.) They then came down to the river with platters and scooped stuff off of the platters into the hands of some probably locally well known people. Then they lit fires on their platters and waved them around while one of their number continuously chanted.
They returned to their podiums and blew in conch shells to signal the start of what they started next. They stood facing in various directions while they swung stuff around with one hand and rang a bell with the other. At this point a large group of audience members began to ring bells too and the sound was really hypnotic. They swung around incense sticks, then smoking incense and finally flaming incense burners. They were each given a flaming Christmas tree and swung that around for awhile.
After this the chimes stopped and a few songs were played over the speaker. At the first one everyone stood, which caused our boat to rock to the manager demanded that everyone sit. The old guy behind me had to be asked several times before he complied. A few other songs many in the audience sang along with or clapped to. The guys on the podiums then threw flower petals into the air, then waved big dusters around and then waved some green fans around. The blew into their conch shells one more time and stepped off the podium. Finally, they came down to the river with metal pots with some petals in them and poured those into the river. After that they came back to tidy up their podiums and talk to the audience.
Many people had left early and we left at this point, after almost 90 minutes of show. The crowd had thinned and the band had taken off so the walk back was easy, if not as cool as the night before. We had a quick dinner at the hotel restaurant and then headed down to bed.
I didn't sleep too well because of our noisy AC and the 4:30 alarm came too soon. Unfortunately, our bathroom window was across from our neighbour's so we got to hear our hotelmate go through what sounded like a violent vomiting session but way probably a local phlegm ceremony, similar to what one can hear in public spaces in China. We groggily dressed and met our guide in the lobby at 6.
He walked us to the boat and we crossed a huge procession of several hundred tourists all walking along the ghat in the other direction. Our guide led us down to the water and woke up our skipper who was sleeping on his boat. He woke up, came in close enough for us to get on and we set off.
He rowed us slowly down the river, fairly close to the shore and only spoke a little, although his English seemed okay. The ghats were already active, with many people washing and swimming in them, boats going to and fro and lots of activity on shore. As we headed away from the main ghat there were pockets of people in the water but it generally petered out. One of the main things to do was to take a boat across the river to the huge sandbar on the other side of the Ganges and enjoy one of the makeshift teahouses there. We stuck to our own route.
Once we got got what he said was a power station we turned around and headed back a little further away from the shore. Another floating store approached us but went after other boats when we repeatedly said "no thanks" to his doodads.
The large group we saw when we first waked down seemed to be going by us on several huge motorized boats and we were glad to be in a boat where the only sound was the soft splash of the paddles. A few local boats went by us full of women singing, which was nice. It was a misty morning and so the sunrise was an indirect one but the air was still cool and there was lots to see.
We docked and our 90 minute tour ended up being less than an hour but we were okay being on land and so tipped our captain. We then walked along the water towards the burning ghat. This is where families cremate their loved ones, so it was tactical to give them space and not take pictures. Two men came up to us as we approached the area and told us where we should be walking, but this was India and there was no way to decipher whether they were giving good information of whether they were trying to lead us into some touty trap. We decided to observe from where we were and then head back.
Going the other way we hit the main ghat and tried to puzzle out where the main elements of the night before's show were held. There was a big stage which had a table laid with potted plants and a long line to approach it but nothing happening on it as we passed. Of course, the line went directly through the tightest bottleneck on the ghat so people were forcibly pushing their way to get through the area.
We continued walking through the crowds of people, who usually took no notice of us other than to say "boat, sir?" (lots of that). They were swimming, socializing, selling and buying and we were nothing special.
Back at our ghat we sat for a bit and watched what was happening. Several swimmers wore strings over their shoulders and chests which apparently designated them as brahmens. There was a guy mixing paste under an umbrellas who watched people's stuff and would bless the foreheads of those who requested it with some of the paste. Otherwise lots of people were going in all directions, getting in and out of boats and mainly getting in and out of the water.
Bacl at our room Meg had a quick shower before breakfast. We started breakfast on the roof but the day was already getting so hot that we retreated down below to eat. Our regular waited had been abandoned by his support staff so we were a little late in meeting our walking tour guide Suneil.
Our guidebook describes Varanasi as a place to take in the entire atmosphere rather than visit specific sites, which seemed to be proven true from our tour. Suneil led us on a path we could never reproduce through narrow passages and constantly forking streets. There were beggars and cattle and dogs, motorcycles buzzing by with almost no space between them and us and often packs of people dressed in their finery, having come as pilgrims to Varanasi. The path was so labyrinthine you expected a minotaur to pop out and start chasing us at any moment.
We looked in at several Hindu temples. It reminded us of Kathmandu where at the end of a deserted alley or through a deserted building a large, ornate temple would appear crammed between several shops or apartments. He took us to a formerly grand mansion which now represented faded glory, though it was only 80 years old. As we got closer to the main temple, the shops were selling more and more flowers and offerings and the crowds were getting thicker and thicker. On the main street we saw the line which was already 3 to 4 hours long. There were offerings made of ice and people giving out free drinks which we didn't dare drink.
Suneil pointed out the spires of the temple and the nearby mosque but we never got a proper view of the temple due to the crush around it. We could have done some paperwork to get a ticket and then waited with everyone else for several hours in the sun on a street buzzing with traffic, but we didn't entertain this options.
Back to the narrow but shady streets we went. None of these places looked far apart on a map but we walked a long and indirect way to get from anything to something else. Suneil did his job adequately but obviously wasn't passionate about his work. He was able to answer a few cultural things that we saw (what is that? Why are they doing that?) which was nice. He answered our questions but using few words and had to be pressed for detail. we saw many people with narrow carts, scraping garbage off the ground and Suneil told us that they were paid by the government to do this everyday and people could just dump their garbage outside of their homes and it would be picked up. I guess that they also picked up the dead and dying animals that we saw several times while walking the streets of Varanasi.
We emerged by the burning ghat and saw piles of wood used for teh purpose and watched what was going on from a respectful distance. Apparently there is no booking system, you just show up with a body, buy some wood and wait your turn. This is the most auspicious place in India to be cremated but there was no visible corpse lineup that we could see.
We saw the mosque close to the temple but it was closed and them walked through and area of rubble and half-demolished buildings. Apparently Modi is dealing with the crush to get to the temple by buying 300 buildings close to it and demolishing them to create a parking lot. So much of the character of the place was the crush of buildings that it seemed a shame to create such a thing but the temple is apparently always dysfunctionally crowded.
We visited a Nepalese temple which had fine wood carving and a some pornographic depictions and watched a mongoose scamper around the grounds. Our guide then told us that we had seen everything and invited us to look in on a Muslim weaving shop, but we were warned about hotel guides taking you shopping by our guide book so we declined.
Instead we went to the Blue Lassi for some cool treats. They churn the yoghurt for a good long time and then place it in a clay pot with your fruit toppings and you eat it with a wooden spoon. They were delicious and we ate them sitting on the couch surrounded by passport photos donated by previous diners.
We asked our guide to take us to the Brown Bread Bakery but he said it was too far away, which turned out to be correct (our out of date guide book had it much closer, but it has moved) so we went back to our hotel. We thanked our guide and then went down for a nap after such an early morning.
We got up and weren't really functional until mid-afternoon and so went out seeking lunch in the middle of the day, with no proper map and only vague directions of how to get to Brown Bread. Outside the crowds were reduced to next to nothing as anyone sane had found somewhere cool to have a siesta. We walked along past the main ghat and looked for signs leading us on. Seeing none, we headed up into a busy market area and asked directions from some young guys calling everyone into their shop. They pointed us down an alleyway, which we followed for an uncomfortably long time. At times it seemed to peter out but we kept on and occasionally asked someone until we found it.
We had some drinks and nice hummous and salad. The menu had the sort of their charity and the women and children that helped. They offered a tour but this being off season there was nothing to be had in June. We had a nice chat with an Indian man before heading out.
We followed the painted signs backwards from the bakery until we hit a ghat and noted how to get back there. We then entered the narrow streets from another spot and looked for Meg's scarf and my anti-perspirant. She soon found a fabric store that had pretty much what she wanted at a decent price. She promised she'd be back to try a shalvar chamese the next day and we set off looking for a pharmacy.
Our situation was a familiar one in countries where you an't say no to a question. Everyone spoke of this big pharmacy which had everything but pointed us deeper into the market until we came to a street we had been at and they pointed us back in the other way. Eventually one vendor speculated that it had probably closed so we gave it up and went back to our room.
After a quick freshening up, we headed out to the big show at the main ghat, in person this time. On the way the boat captains desperately wanted our attention, one suggesting that if we saw it on land we'd just see their backs. We walked past the big stage which had a traditional Indian band playing but only a few spectators. The big crowd was waiting just after the band, as the steps of the ghat were quite packed and people were moving back and forth, making it slow to get by them.
We headed down by the water where we saw large boats by the shore with rows of chairs. We were approached by several vendors who said it was 300 rupees per seat but we said we could get our own boats for 200 rupees. We had to walk away but he agreed to our price.
We were in the second row of the boat, behind a man with a big head and various members of his family who sat next to us taking turns. We asked an older couple behind us to take our picture and they asked a perplexed younger man to take it and directed him to take it from the opposite direction that we wanted.
While we waited people were putting floating candles with flowers in the water, boats were showing up and the band could be heard quite clearly. Around 7:00, seven guys in gold lamee suits showed up and spent quite a while placing wreathes and praying to what we thought was a picture of someone (we only saw the back of it from the water.) They then came down to the river with platters and scooped stuff off of the platters into the hands of some probably locally well known people. Then they lit fires on their platters and waved them around while one of their number continuously chanted.
They returned to their podiums and blew in conch shells to signal the start of what they started next. They stood facing in various directions while they swung stuff around with one hand and rang a bell with the other. At this point a large group of audience members began to ring bells too and the sound was really hypnotic. They swung around incense sticks, then smoking incense and finally flaming incense burners. They were each given a flaming Christmas tree and swung that around for awhile.
After this the chimes stopped and a few songs were played over the speaker. At the first one everyone stood, which caused our boat to rock to the manager demanded that everyone sit. The old guy behind me had to be asked several times before he complied. A few other songs many in the audience sang along with or clapped to. The guys on the podiums then threw flower petals into the air, then waved big dusters around and then waved some green fans around. The blew into their conch shells one more time and stepped off the podium. Finally, they came down to the river with metal pots with some petals in them and poured those into the river. After that they came back to tidy up their podiums and talk to the audience.
Many people had left early and we left at this point, after almost 90 minutes of show. The crowd had thinned and the band had taken off so the walk back was easy, if not as cool as the night before. We had a quick dinner at the hotel restaurant and then headed down to bed.
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| Early morning Ghat action on the Ganga. |
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| Water buffalo come home along the ghat, they're not sacred. |
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| A performer with his flaming Christmas tree. |
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