Michael's Round-the-World honeymoon

Varanasi is a place I had been intending to include in our Indian itinerary from inception, but every person without exception we spoke to about it while travelling said the place is incredible, not to be missed. So we were really looking forward to going to a place in India that was so universally recommended. People were, however, quite selective in their choice of adjectives when describing the place; nobody said it was “lovely”, “nice”, or “pretty”, for example. Some people had even said that it certainly isn't a place you would describe as nice, but that it is amazing.

We were so exhausted from the little luxury of the freezing cold A/C carriage we had “treated” ourselves to that we just let the auto-rickshaw driver take us to his hotel suggestions, presumably ensuring that we paid about a quarter more to cover his baksheesh for taking us. By the second hotel we were desperate for bed and I thought the place seemed quite nice anyway, but the main reason I decided we should stay there was that the hotelier seemed very friendly and was certainly quite a character by Indian standards: he had his quiff, popular with Bollywood heroes and therefore many Indian men, bleached to quite a light orangey colour. I assumed it was something to do with promoting the place, which is called Elvis Guesthouse. It was being run by four brothers, but they each seemed to adopt a group of guests as their own; our brother was called Haroon. From the beginning he was keen to tell us all about India and Varanasi, take us to tourist sites, and generally baby-sit us. We insisted that we needed some rest first and went up to bed.

Elvis Guest House

Varanasi was very hot. The day we arrived it was 44C, but it rose to 46C over the next couple of days. I'm sure this is the highest temperature I've been in. It didn't seem to be at all humid, though, so I didn't feel all that uncomfortable. In fact I think the humidity was a bit too low for comfort: after about five minutes without drinking any water I could feel my eyes drying out and my mouth parching. Cold water is almost impossible to come by because, even if you buy it nicely chilled from a fridge, it only takes about ten minutes before the whole litre is warm. At that temperature everything is warm to the touch which is really quite unusual: the mattress on the bed feels as if it has an electric blanket on it; the wooden cupboard in the room is hot; my phone was hot; the cold water from the shower or tap comes out hot and doesn't run cool; clothes from my rucksack felt like they were fresh out of the tumble-drier; and strangest of all the marble floor, which normally keeps you cool in hot weather, was hot underfoot and quietly glowed with heat all night, ensuring the bedroom stayed warmer than the outside temperature. I'm not sure why it seems so strange; it seems you get used to the air temperature but when you touch a solid object and it's hot it just seems wrong. I assume it happens when the air temperature is above 37C, body temperature.

Since re-entering India I had been thinking about what it is I like about the place. We had been finding it so frustrating that it was easy to come up with things not to like about the place, but I didn't feel I was giving it a fair chance, after all I had not found it so difficult last time. The first thing that hit me after we re-entered is that the country inspires a sense of awe: the fact that there are so many people virtually anywhere in India (Al had said he find there are always twice as many people as there should be, no matter what you are doing in India), that the country is so massive, and yet it still works quite well. It really is an incredible place but, like Varanasi specifically, I hesitate to use words like “nice”; more fitting are “fascinating”, “awesome”, “amazing”, and “incredible”. Unlike peoples descriptions of Varanasi, however, I would not hesitate to describe (bits of) India as “beautiful” or “pretty”; in fact another aspect I love about India is the art: the stone work on the temples, the patterns on the textiles, the women's jewellery, and the henna on skin all tends to be incredibly intricate, which I like. I love the fact that everything is covered in pretty designs or perfumed with oils and incense, whether it's wooden boxes, beads, or statues of Hindu gods. It reminds me of Eurasia Craft on Great Western Road in Glasgow – and of being about sixteen. Culturally the country is fascinating as well: like the art, the rest of culture seems to be very intricate as well. The caste system may be awful, but it is fascinating and complicated. Then Hinduism alone must be by far the most intricate religion with thousands of different gods, each with several incarnations, each with several manifestations. When you add all the other religions into the mix it makes for a very interesting place, which brings up another wonderful thing about the country: tolerance. India must surely be the model for a multi-cultural state, with all these different religions and castes living side-by-side yet unified under the idea of the Indian state. Although it happens, ethnic or religious violence is rare, and people do not seem to discriminate when choosing their friends; I think that most Hindus have Sikhs or Muslims as friends.

Back in Varanasi, Haroon had told us that people just stay indoors and maybe sleep between 11 and 3 every day in hot weather. Unfortunately our across-the-hall neighbour had clearly not heard about this. While we were trying to catch up on our over-night transport lack of sleep, he was practising scales on a musical instrument. I think it was an oboe and I would guess that he bought it in India. Quite a lot of people seem to use their trip to India to explore their spiritual side, which almost invariably appears to mean making lots of noise, either on a musical instrument or simply by singing. I suppose they think that the Indians are all making lots of noise so it's OK for them to do so too. After failing to sleep for a while Joanne knocked on his door and asked him to stop playing his “flute” because we'd just come off the overnight train. To his credit he stopped for a bit, but we were already over-tired and now it was far too hot to sleep. Eventually we gave up and went downstairs to consent to Haroon's tour.

Shiva temple at the university in Varanasi

Haroon had offered us a free tour, but he was only talking about his time and we still had to pay for the auto-rickshaw. The tour wasn't actually all that great. He took us to the Shiva temple at the university, which is a huge campus on which over 40,000 students are taught. He said it was a very prestigious institution, often known as the Cambridge of the East. The temple wasn't very interesting though. Next he took us to the “monkey temple” to the man-monkey god Hanuman. Like all Hanuman temples there are hundreds of monkeys all over the grounds. I asked Haroon if they build the temples where the monkeys are or they bring the monkeys to the temple. He said that he thought the monkeys just come to where the temples are. He may be right, although I think it's less likely because of some sort of spiritual affinity, and more likely because Indians tolerate and feed the monkeys at Hanuman temples, whereas they normally throw rocks at them or hit them with sticks. No wonder they are “drawn” to these mystical places. Finally we were taken to the Mother India Temple, sponsored by Ghandi, apparently. Quite a bizarre temple, but again I didn't find it very interesting. I like my temples to me pretty and intricate, but all of these seemed quite dour. In this case, all the temple contained was a 3D relief map on India on the floor. While we were inside, Haroon had got speaking to a couple who were looking for a particular restaurant and he had offered to give them a lift. But, as always seems to be the case for a tour in India, it was time for the visit to the shops. The couple didn't seem to mind as we were shown to a silk weaving factory, but none of us bought anything and they were duly dropped off at their restaurant.

Licensed boats waiting for customers on the Ganga

Later Haroon suggested that we take a cruise on the Ganga. We were certainly intending to do this as most people we had taken advice from had said this was a highlight, but we hadn't decided whether to go at sunset or sunrise, reportedly the most beautiful times. In the end we decided to go once for each, so followed Haroon down to the river where the boats were waiting. He explained that this was one of only two government authorised places to take a cruise; elsewhere were unlicensed boats which sometimes run into trouble with the police. The light was already failing, but we could still see that the riverside is quite an impressive sight. Through the town the river is lined with ghats, which are large stone steps leading down into the river. Most are bathing ghats to give access for swimming in the river, which some people were doing, washing clothes, washing buffalos, and so on, but a few are burning ghats with platforms for cremation and religious ceremonies. The stairways ascend for quite a height so that they provide access to the river whether it is flooded during monsoon or in spate. At the top of most of the steps are large stone buildings, the bottom of which must be under water during monsoon.

Puja on the ghat

Our boatman

Just as we were pushing away from the bank a child selling floating candles boarded and we bought one each. More, he insisted – one for you and one for your father... and one for your brother and your mother, but we in turn insisted that we were only buying one, and were taken back to the bank so he could get off. We floated them in the water then were rowed slowly down the river to the main ghat, where there was a puja in progress; the ceremony is performed every evening, and another one every morning. Our boatman slid us up to the jam of boats parked in front of the ghat and tied on to our neighbour, so that we could sit and watch for a bit. Boys zipped about from boat to boat selling chai and others sold floating candles. A few candles were floating around the hulls of the boats and I wondered about the safety of floating fire next to wooden boats. People all around us were splashing the river water over themselves and, in the next boat, one of the chai wallahs leant over the side of the boat and drank several scooped handfuls of water thirstily. By contrast, Joanne was flinching every time a splash of water went near her legs; I wasn't quite so paranoid, but I certainly didn't want any on my lips or in my eyes or ears. Along this stretch of river all the sewage from the city is pumped directly into the river, most of it untreated; the water is horribly murky and there is lots of rubbish floating on it; and not just ashes, but entire dead bodies are dumped in the river.

Boat park in front of the puja

The purpose of the cremation is to purify the body before committing it to the Ganga, from where the dead will be taken to heaven; however there are five cases where cremation is not necessary and the body can be put straight into the river. The first case is children under eight, who are considered too pure to have accumulated any bad karma; try telling that to the tabloid press in Britain! The second case is pregnant women, whose pure unborn child makes them pure too. Third are lepers, who are believed to have already suffered all of their bad karma during their lives, so have no need of the purifying flames. The fourth case is those who have died from snake bites; I think a similar bad karma argument applies as to lepers, but the logic of it escapes me: what about people who have lived through cancer, or a disability, or any manner of horrible ways to die? The final case is monks, who are already at the top of the reincarnation ladder and poised to achieve moksha, release from the endless cycle of death and rebirth, the state of perfect nothingness; a state that a friend once remarked to me is sought after and achieved by Hindus only after living through countless increasingly pure lives, but which atheists reach the first time they die.

The puja was vaguely entertaining and the atmosphere among the boats was fairly reverend, but I failed to see or feel what it was that people we had spoken to had found so profound and moving about Varanasi. As we were untied and rowed back towards the ghat we boarded from Joanne lifted her camera to take a photo of the pyres on the burning ghat, not realising what they were, but the boatman shouted “no photo”. I'm not sure why this specifically is disallowed; is this supposed to be the moment that the soul leaves the body or something? It can't be when the body dies, otherwise there would be no point going through all these purifying rituals, as it would be too late and the soul would already have been reincarnated in some womb down the purity ladder. And what is the point in having all these complicated rules about dharma and karma if your family can just burn away all of your bad karma anyway? Religion really is odd. Varanasi is considered such a holy place that anyone dying there achieves moksha, skipping countless less than pure lives, and moving directly to Go, as far as I can understand it regardless of how they have lived that life. That would make it a fairly popular retirement destination you would think but there didn't seem to be any sign of large piles of Peoples Friend for sale in the newsagents.

Puja

I remembered that everyone who had recommended the place had seen a dead body floating in the water. At the time I had not found the thought very appealing at all, not being much of a fan of ghoulish or horrific experiences, but I now realised that I had unconsciously been hoping to see something similar so I too could be shocked into feeling like it was a profound experience. However we saw nothing gory and we returned to our hotel feeling a little disappointed. The puja was OK, but nothing special, and another expectation I'd had about Varanasi was that it would be absolutely teaming with people so that it would be almost impossible to push through the crowds on the ghats; in fact it seemed to be the emptiest Indian town we had been in.

When we got back to shore, the guy who Haroon arranged the cruise with told us it had been over two hours so asked for double what we had agreed. I checked the time stamp on the photos I took from the shore just before getting in the boat and it was only about 65 minutes ago. I told him that he was talking rubbish and besides we only asked for one hour, so if it had lasted for longer it was his problem, not ours. The cheating never stops in India! He didn't seem upset, just realised he'd been caught out, and accepted the Rs300 each which is apparently the government set rate. Thankfully, he sent someone to take us back to our guesthouse, which Haroon had arranged as well. There had been one of the very frequent Varanasi power-cuts in our section of the city and we had no idea how to get back. We went to bed, looking forward to catching up on sleep, and hoped that the morning cruise would be more interesting. We went to bed early, but we were going to have to get up very early for the sunrise cruise. In fact it was still so hot – about 39C at night – that we struggled to get any sleep at all, so when we got up at 4:30am we only had to look in the mirror to see a dead body.

written by

The Happy Couple on June 16, 2009 from Varanasi, India

from the travel blog: Michael's Round-the-World honeymoon

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Haroon was already waiting for us when we dragged ourselves downstairs at about 5am. A group of English public school gap-year kids, who were also staying there, were also downstairs for the early morning cruise. One of the other brothers was taking care of them. They were being taken to the ghat directly nearest to the hotel, where you can only get unlicensed boats. Haroon asked “OK, we're going this way?” pointing to where the others had just gone. Joanne complained that those boats were unlicensed, but this time he didn't seem worried. We could go with either, he explained, only sometimes this way it's not so nice, he again indicated the others' exit route. Joanne did not want to risk it, so he agreed to take us back to the government boats.

Fisherman

The boats await

The cruise was a bit more interesting in the morning. We saw a beautiful sunrise then, because it was getting lighter rather than darker, we were able to see the impressive ghats ever more clearly. The water was lovely and quiet but there were already people starting to crowd on the steps for their morning bath and laundry. At the burning ghats, last night's ashes were being cleaned up. Dogs were going through them, presumably looking for leftovers, and in the water in front of the pyres a couple of men kept diving under, looking for gold teeth, Joanne suggested. Meanwhile piles and piles of new wood were being brought in for the day's cremations. It was piled up in boats and all the way up the steps it was piled high. Again I marvelled at how people could happily splash about in such filthy unhygienic water, but as far as they are concerned they are bathing in a goddess and the water protects them and promotes well-being.

A tourist gets all spiritual

A burning ghat

Our boatman

A guesthouse on the ghats

On the way back to the guesthouse I remembered to take a couple of photos of something we had seen repeatedly in India. Disgustingly, it seems that most of India's holy cows are fed on rubbish, at least that is the only thing we have ever seen them grazing on there. To look at them, though, you wouldn't say it can be too bad for them as they all look pretty fat. I suppose greasy Indian leftovers must have the same effect on cows as the food does on my waist line.

Yum yum!

Space Invader!

Back at the hotel, the French guy across the hotel was playing scales again. He obviously did not care that people usually sleep during the hottest part of the day in Varanasi, so we soon gave up trying to sleep and wandered out into the baking heat. I wanted to see the ghats close up so we just walked down to the river then started making our way along. The place was almost completely deserted.

Old Varanasi street

Some people were dozing in the shadows, but we were the only people walking around in the midday sun; even the mad dogs were nowhere to be seen. Buffalos were wallowing in the river to keep cool. We passed another group of silly Caucasians heading in the other direction, but the ghats remained free of locals. I was enjoying this much more than anything else we had so far done in Varanasi; up until that point it felt like we were being baby-sat: on the cruises and on the city tour. This was the first time we'd had to ourselves. The ghats are all really ancient looking, many of them looking like forts, but we came to one and saw something very incongruous that I thought I had seen from the boat: a Space Invader painted onto one of the buildings' stones.

Indian truck

Lazy cow and two burkas

Soon after that our feeling of freedom was ruined: a young Indian guy, who was “just trying to be friendly” and was a “hhonest man” intercepted us and tagged along next to us. After establishing that we didn't want a guide, he decided that we should visit his brother's shop. Joanne had been looking for a top for India that would be reasonably cool but still stop Indian men from gawking at her or groping her, and she was also looking for a scarf to do as Indian women almost universally do, and drape over the bust for exactly the same reasons. It's easy to get irritated with the hustlers and touts in India because it is almost incessant and I could see Joanne bristling at the guy's presence. I don't have much time for them when they're trying to sell things we don't want or when they are taking us to someone else's shop for commission, but this guy was taking us to the family shop and he said they sold what we were looking for so I thought we should treat it as a fortunate coincidence and give him a chance. He even offered to take us to the post office which was one place we were really trying to get to, so that we could finally get rid of the letter we were given to post by the tea house owner on the way back from the Langtang trek. The post office was down a tiny wee street and didn't much look like one: it was a cramped little room with monitors and keyboards piled up on shelves, but there was nothing computerized about the place. Even the purchase of a few stamps was handwritten, double-entry no doubt, into a huge ledger. It took about fifteen minutes just to buy stamps and hand over the letter. But I suppose post offices are at the cutting edge of efficiency the world over, aren't they?

Temple near our hostel

In the young man's shop, which was little more than a kiosk with a big stock cupboard, he made us chai and took us through what they had to offer. Joanne was looking impatient because he wasn't showing us what she wanted to buy, making sure we saw everything else first, but I was quite happy; we were sitting just off a busy little street, too narrow for cars, and all around were little old-fashioned shops. It wasn't too hot, I was sitting down, and I had chai. He was actually also a very friendly guy, incredibly friendly by Indian standards, and just trying to make a bit of money. In the end he got around to showing us the tops and scarves, and we bought them for what seemed like a good price. He kept saying, “I am hhonest man, I am hhonest man”.

View down the Ganga

Boy washing his buffalos

Letter, scarves, and top ticked off, next on the list was to find an off-licence. There was one listed in the Lonely Planet so we headed in that direction, stopping off at a restaurant, where I reasoned we might be able to get a drink. My heart sank when I saw the menu: “Pure Vegetarian” means no alcohol. Why are Indians so puritanical? Or is it just that alcohol was never part of the culture before the Raj? Or were Indians not so puritanical until they learned it from the Raj? The food looked nice anyway and we ordered some. At the next table was a couple, the girl with wearing a bhindi on her forehead and dressed in the short top Indian women wear under a sari: it's underwear and equivalent to walking around in a bra and nothing else on top. Very inappropriate, Joanne said. The girl started singing out loud and continued to sing loudly all the way through our meal. It sounded like it was Indian music. Quite bizarre, the people who are attracted to India. All full of finding themselves and spirituality and expressing themselves and all that nonsense. Bah!

We left the restaurant and failed to find any off-licences. Drinking in India is really difficult! The walk back took us through the edge of the old town which looked quite interesting, with even more cows in the streets that an average Indian town, so we decided we would explore it a bit more the next day. It had also been nice to escape Haroon; they were very nice at the guesthouse, but so helpful it was a little suffocating.

That night I finally got a decent rest. In the morning we saw Haroon had got rid of the bleached quiff in his hair. He explained that a guest had done it for him recently, but Indian people are very conservative and people had started talking about him, so he'd had to restore his more conservative hair style. I was very disappointed because I hadn't yet had a chance to take a photo of him and I had assumed it was his usual haircut, part of promoting the Elvis name of the guesthouse. He suggested that we take a day trip to a nearby town famous for being where Buddha delivered his first sermon, but we wanted to explore the old town more.

Space Invader

We walked along the ghats, passing another incongruous Space Invader, to the main burning ghat, where we stood around for a while with the crowd watching the pyres. We headed back from the river and, passing huge piles of wood, we were passed by a couple of groups of men carrying bodies wrapped up in sheets. We found a rooftop restaurant, where we stopped to check the view, but there's not as much to see from above so we headed back out deeper into the warren of streets that make up the old town.

Cremation wood piled high

Here I began to really like the town because it is so chaotic, with hundreds of little shops selling everything from food and pann to tourist souvenirs, and pedestrians fighting for space as they edge past bikes and cows. Joanne wasn't enjoying it so much, though, and was getting really annoyed with the constant harassment from people trying to sell us stuff or “help us”, so we headed back to river, arriving just in time to see some people row out to the middle and dump a body wrapped in sheets straight into the water. We wondered which of the five categories of purity the deceased fell under. Quite a strange thing to witness, and enacted with relatively little ceremony.

Varanasi from above

So now we had seen a few dead bodies, albeit wrapped I sheets, so our Varanasi experience was complete. I can't say that I ever felt the magic most other people seemed to have felt there, but the old town is fun, the ghats are very impressive, and it's fascinating to watch all the activity in the water.

Joanne looking at a shop in old Varanasi

Nearly back at the guesthouse, a mystery was cleared up for us. I had been wondering what happens to all of the dung the cows presumably produce all over the towns in India. The streets may be filthy, but cow manure is unusually absent. It turns out people collect it all, dry it out, and then sell it as fuel. The cow is so holy, even its shit has value!

Street in old Varanasi

We were running late and had to take a taxi to the train station as soon as we got back. Another overnight train journey awaited us, but this time we had opted for sleeper class again to avoid being frozen.

Drying cow shit

written by

The Happy Couple on June 18, 2009 from Varanasi, India

from the travel blog: Michael's Round-the-World honeymoon

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Michael's Round-the-World honeymoon

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