From the Golden temple, spiritual home for the Sikhs, we now come to Varanasi, spiritual home to the Hindus. Varanasi sits on the banks of the river Ganges, believed to be a sacred river, a Godess on earth. One story says that she was sent her to earth so that the water would release King Sagar's sixty thousand sons warrior sons from their ghostly existance. She was unhappy at being sent away from the land of the Gods, and planned to plummet down in a destructive water ball, so Shiva broke her fall and the water spread out through his hair, making the various tributaries of the great river.
It is a great and no doubt sacred river, but it's also filthy. Excrement, heavy metal (the bad kind) factory waste and dead bodies are just a few of the delights to be found floating in her waters. People's faiths are so strong, or they are so desperate, that they go to the Ganges to bathe and be cleansed. The old and the ill gather in Varanassi, that they may be healed or absolved before death. It was astonishing and touching to witness.
What is in some ways most surprising is the way that such a holy place is both venerated and disrespected - even by the bathers who we watched throw their plastic bottles and spit their paan into the water. There is still so much we don't (and probably never will) understand about this country.
As with other big tourist destinations here, the city has more than it's fair share of touts, scam merchants and tat shops. Possibly because of its religious significance, there are also more beggars than we've seen elsewhere. There are various ghats (steps into the river), surrounded by a maze of narrow passageways. We spent an enjoyable afternoon trundling from ghat to ghat, often slightly lost, and getting increasingly muddy. There are several tourist friendly stops overlooking the river, which made welcome interludes and bad pizza.
Another early start, this time for sunrise by boat, bobbing along with other boatloads of sleepy tourists and pilgrims, watching the early morning bathing and rituals. Several people were using the water to clean their teeth, priests waved flames around, worshippers chanted and immersed themselves. We then made a brief tour of Varanasi's temples, which, given the location, were fairly unremarkable.
In another last minute change of plan, we left on the night train to Kolkata.
