Our Many Moons of Honey: India: Starting on the Holy Ganges

After much anticipation and some trepidation we were finally ready to set foot on Indian soil. Crossing the border from Nepal into India on foot was quite an experience. It is an open border so it looks like any Nepali or Indian city main road with loads of people walking and the only way you know you’re at a border crossing is by the fact that there is a large wooden arched sign welcoming you to India. We walked into India and were looking everywhere for immigration to be told that it was 500 meters down the road to the left. It ended up being a small shack we almost missed had it not been for some French tourists with their big packs out front. To top off the informal entry into India the guy at the office helping us fill out our forms and guiding us to the bus also tried to sell us drugs just a few steps away from the “immigration office”. Too funny.

almost across the border into India

That was just the beginning in ‘all business India’ where they sell as much as they possibly can. A good example of this was our bus ride. We scored the first seats right by the door so we had the perfect vantage point. The bus ride started off as it would have in Nepal with our bags on the roof and a guy hanging out the door looking for passengers. The only difference being that the people in India weren’t as friendly and the town was much more crowded, dirty and therefore polluted but at least the roads were paved so there wasn’t all the dust that Nepal had. But twenty minutes into the bus ride we saw the way things were done in India. The man hanging out the door did just what he was supposed to, he sold and sold and rammed that bus full of men, women and children. And we mean full. At one point, we commented ‘that’s it, there is no way one more person could possibly be crammed in here’ as M had three people partly sitting on him, there were people hanging out the door and a few women with infants and children were squatting on the ground in the aisle with people standing and practically sitting on them. Absolutely unbelievable chaos. Then the bus pulled over and the guy talked seven more people into getting on the bus. Astonishing.

The train we had to take was much more comfortable and we finally arrived in mystical Varanasi. In the past it was known as Kashi (Shiva city) or Benares (what the locals still call it) but is now internationally known as Varanasi, which means the city between the rivers Varuna and Assi. It claims to be one of the oldest living cities in the world and Mark Twain once said: “Benares is older than history, older than tradition, older even than legend, and looks twice as old as all of them put together”.

Varanasi, India

Varanasi sits on the western bank of the Ganges which is considered the holiest of all rivers by Hindus and is worshiped as the goddess Ganga in Hinduism. Many Hindus believe that life is not complete without taking a bath in the river Ganges. Not surprisingly Varanasi is one of the most important pilgrimage sights in India with a nightly Hindu prayer at the main ghat, Dasaswamedh Ghat. There is so much life to see and experience walking along the river from ghat to ghat with over 100 ghats in Varanasi. Not much is private here as everything happens along the ghats; most are for bathing, others for washing laundry and two of them are used for cremating the dead. All life unfolds along these ghats (including men urinating along the walls and we even saw a few performing the other bodily function) and it’s unlike anything you’ll see anywhere else in the world.

a large laundry ghat next door to our hotel

While all the ghats have a unique charm to them the two types of ghats that stood out the most for us were the laundry ghats and the burning ghats. You know you’re near a laundry ghat when you hear the sound of wet laundry being rhythmically beaten against a slab of rock along the shore. We learnt that 90% of the hotels and guesthouses in the area do their laundry at the ghats in addition to the rest of the city - now that’s a lot of laundry every day.

Then there are the burning ghats which are such a strange and eerie place to visit. There are bodies being burnt (cremated) at the two ghats from sunrise to sundown every day. Understandably no pictures are allowed so we will do our best to relate everything that we have learned. First of all, there are no women at the burning ghats at all as the fellow told us that women are too emotional so they stay at home. We were also told that this was for their own good so as to make sure that a woman doesn’t throw herself on her husband’s burning body. Sure, like the women used to do that willingly. As a side note, women used to have to burn themselves with their husband and this ritual was not abolished in India until about 50 years ago. Naturally a woman’s life is not worth a penny without her husband.

wood for sale (mango is cheaper than sandalwood)

So a little about the cremation process. The dead bodies are handled by outcasts known as doms and are carried through the old city to the Ganges on a bamboo stretcher covered in cloth. There are huge piles of firewood stacked along the top of the ghat and the wood necessary for the burning weighed so the price of the cremation can be calculated. Once at the river’s edge, the bodies are washed and covered in white cloth and then a coloured sari depending on who you are: married women in her red wedding sari, married men in a gold sari and everyone else in a white sari. A male member of the family is to light the fire but before he can do this, he must shave his head then bathe in the Ganges and wear all white. Before the body is lit it is sprinkled with sandalwood, incense snf clarified butter. The body is then surround by wood and set on fire next to the Ganges - the distance from the river depends on your caste with the lower castes closer to the water. The fire usually burns 3-4 hours and then the body is doused with water, after which the ashes are poured into the river. Following this funeral, the men return home to the women. None of the immediate family members of the deceased are allowed to leave the house or work for 15 days following the funeral and cannot eat cooked food. The man that was in charge of burning the body cannot shave for the 15 days, must continue to wear white and cannot sleep with or share a bed with a woman. Once the 15 days are over the final ritual is for the male members of the family to come back to the holy Ganges to give a puja (a sacred practice of Hindus to either worship, pray to or show respect to their deities).

the small burning ghat with a laundry ghat next to it

The last bit of information on the cremations we will give you is that not everyone gets cremated. The following people get their bodies thrown into the water weighed down by a big rock: (i) holy people, (ii) babies under 6 months, (iii) pregnant women, (iv) people who have died of snake bites and (v) lepers. The reasons are as follows: (i) a holy person is a pure person who gets everything they need from God and does not need a body for their next life; (ii) a baby of less than 6 months is also considered a pure life; (iii) likewise a pregnant women is considered to be pure as she is caring a pure life inside her; (iv) as a cobra snake saved Shiva’s life by sucking poison out of his body (except his face, which is why you sometimes see it blue), a person who has died of a snake bite is considered to be pure; and lastly (v), the reason we were told for lepers is because their previous life was full of bad karma so they paid for it in this life and thus have paid for their sins.

view of the temple we visited from the river

We noticed a few things in Varanasi, first of all, similar to Morocco, there were mostly men everywhere (working, sitting, talking, bathing or just lying around) and the few women we did see that were not working were walking with a purpose. Compared to Nepal we also noticed many more cows and dogs roaming the streets and catching rays along the ghats J . The increase in the bovine and canine population (and all the human urine) made walking the narrow streets of Varanasi a difficult task. We weren’t sure we’d have a chance to see anything around us as we were so concentrated at avoiding all the booby traps. One thing we did get a chance to see while walking around the old town was the inside of a very important Hindu temple and we got to experience our first puja. This Hindu temple has a lingam that came about naturally (that is, not man made) and our guide said it represents the legs of Vishnu - the head is at Mt. Kalish and the front and back at Pashupatinath (near Kathmandu). It was very cool to be allowed inside such a sacred temple where most non-Hindu’s are not allowed, unfortunately, some were not happy with our presence and others tried to use the situation to their advantage (i.e. donations).

We have to admit that at first we were a little hesitant to go to Varanasi as there was a bombing at the main ghat a week before our scheduled arrival with one dead and 27 injured. However, we were blown away by this city, which has been one of the highlights of our trip and so glad we went. This is definitely a city not to be missed in your travels in India and we would recommend spending a little extra money to have a room overlooking the ghats for the spectacular people watching and sunrise and sunset views.

Find more pictures of this beautiful city HERE (password: holy).