Written during
New Year’s Day on a train en route back to Mumbai
Varanasi:
The City of Stairs. And Laundry
Dominated by
the River Ganges, Varanasi is the famous epicentre of Hindu rituals and
activities. The river is believed to be the mother of life and is
used extensively to cleanse both spiritually and physically. From birth, Varanasi’s
people bathe, clean their clothes and brush their teeth with its holy waters. At
the end of their lives, are cremated at the riverbanks (or, in some
circumstances, tied to stones and cast into the river). Holy men and cows, as
avatar of the gods, litter the city scape.
Alluring Varanasi
Despite what
it’s famous for, two things impressed me about Varanasi. First, its staircases. Because the water levels of the River Ganges changes drastically between dry and wet season, a lot of freakin’ stairs are needed in this city. Some were magnificently
painted with bright colors which provided real unique sightseeing and photo
opportunities.
Stairs galore
Goats on stairs
Dads on stairs
Bored girls on stairs
Dawgs on stairs
Holy men on stairs
Secondly,
the laundry of Varanasi impressed me. The people of Varanasi must work up quite
a stinky sweat making their way up and down the stairs, creating huge demand
for river-side laundry services (this is a strictly unconfirmed Henry theory).
I have a strange fascination with Indian laundry. It is the most beautiful
laundry I have seen in the world.
Bedsheets on stairs
More bedsheets on stairs
Even more bedsheets on stairs
Sarees on stairs
Pants, bedsheets, sarees, shirts, underwear and socks on stairs. How I managed to hold in my excitement at this point is beyond me
Henry’s Morning Dip
in the Ganges
Since I was
young, I always wanted to bathe in the Ganges but upon seeing how disgusting
the river was, this bucket-list item nearly got dropped off my list. Notwithstanding
the holy cleansing attributes of the water, it was littered with garbage, filled
with cremated human ashes from two different cremation ghats, and seeping with sewage
water flowing into the river from the city. Oh, and did I forget to mention
where the urban cows sometimes poop?
It took
inspiration to give me the courage to hop in. As often happens in a man’s life,
I met a beautiful Japanese girl who gave me that inspiration. Her name was Kie
and she looked like an archetypical high maintenance Asian gal. I couldn't believe she dipped in the Ganges until she showed me pictures on her camera. By logical
deduction, if a high maintenance Asian babe could do it, so could a low
maintenance Asian dude. Minus a lack of swim trunks, conditions were optimal
for a dip.
Initial
scepticism. I almost wiped out while making my way in from stepping on slippery
green mould growing on the riverbanks
I washed my face and my hair in its holy cleansing waters. It was surprisingly extremely refreshing
Chilling like a boss who just bathed in the Ganges in his underwear
I am Not
Afraid of Death, But Deathly Afraid of Not Living
Warning for
any sensitive readers: this section of the entry is a bit morbid.
The River
Ganges is believed to have an ability to spiritually cleanse the soul before it moves on to the
afterlife, making Varanasi a real auspicious place for the dead to be cremated.
A local told me that the two most expensive events in an Indian’s life are
marriage and death. The wealthy will even fly in the corpses of their loved
ones from afar for their funeral ceremony.
This is the
Manikarnika Ghat where 500 bodies per day are cremated. The
Haris Chandra Ghat with roughly half the cremation capacity is 1km upstream
Out of
decency and respect in a time of mourning, photos are not allowed in close
proximity to the cremation ghats. I don’t need a 16gb SD card to capture what I
saw there. I will never forget the sight of a burning human corpse getting
prodded and turned over by a stick. Or the pedicured feet of a woman sticking
out of a pile of cremation wood, with the flames yet to reach that part of her
body. Or the many people, locals and tourists alike, observing the ghats with a
shared fascination of death. It was
mesmerizing, not because of the completely different cultural practices for
funerals, but because what I saw was a glaring reminder of my own mortality.
I don’t fear
death. We all have to face it. What death really means to me is that I have a
finite amount of time on this planet. I tick closer to death every second that
passes and one of my greatest fears is that I spend too many of those ticks not
living my life to its fullest.
I spent an
evening meditating beside the Manikarnika Ghat and contemplating my own
mortality. I find it strange that found my own sense of aliveness in proximity
to a place of death. I don’t know when or where, but someday, I will be a
corpse as well. What I do until then is the question that torments me.
When Tourist-fication of a Place Isn't Tastefully Done
More ads than an online porn site
I swear someone
took the Lonely Planet guide book and regurgitated it all over the walls of
Varanasi’s old city. Even the main walls of the main concourse are littered
with advertisements for guest houses, lassi joints and restaurants. It really
bothers me when a place that is so historical and spiritually significant
becomes a zoo for Asian guys with big cameras. Desperation for monetization
should never take away from what makes a place special to begin with.
I kept seeing a fake sadhu who was a total tool. He clearly made a living off naïve tourists. He made begging gestures upon eye contact and was often spotted at all the main tourist events. He literally got angry at me several times for not giving him money when my camera was pointed at him. I’m not religious by any means but becoming a fake holy man just to make money off tourist photographer wannabes is approaching an unprecedented level of low.
He even had a habit of putting his hand up to block any photo attempts
I really
wanted to get a picture of him just to troll him. So I slung my camera off to my
side, turned on its good ol’ timed machine gun mode, and snagged this photo while
unsuspectingly walking past him. BAM. Take that, asshole.
In contrast,
here’s a real holy man who let me take this photo. He is a Ram Babu which means
he is so pure he is legally certified to run around naked like a boss. He ran a
small shrine on the Ganges and had a no-pressure donation request for visiting
his shrine. I can’t describe in words the mystical presence that he had to him.
Plus he was smoking up as we chatted so he’s all-around a super cool dude.
Needing a
break from the touts and madness of Varanasi, I took a day trip to another
place of Buddhist pilgrimage: Sarnath. Behind me is the place where Buddha
delivered his first sermon ever.
The
Unstoppable Backpacking Machine Takes a Pause
I got real
sick during my last day in Varanasi. Total lethargy. A fever to the state of
mild hallucination. Upset stomach. Nausea. I’m not sure what did it. It could
have been caused by all the street food I’ve been eating to save money because
I misplaced my bank card. Or exhaustion. Or my dip in the Ganges. Or the
beating sun. Or adjusting to my new vegetarian diet. Or carrying around heavy
camera gear all the time. Or maybe I climbed a few too many stairs.
Anyways, I
spent 14 hours sleeping through New Years Eve. My own 2014 countdown was done
while curled up in the foetal position in bed and missed a great fireworks show
in the process. My brain was producing crazy imagery throughout the night so I
applied some of my meditation training and accepted nothing as truth but my
breathe. It worked. I managed through the night and woke up feeling a
sufficient state of health.
For the last
30 hours I have eaten nothing but soups and fruits to avoid risking a relapse
into a pathetic state, or even worse, having to use the toilet on the train
(yuck).
Hello to you
too, 2014.
