Days 4-6: Varanasi (23-25 December 2007)

Varanasi. Aka Banaras. Aka Kashi. Ancient city on the Ganges. Holy city. City of Light.

"I don't think I get Varanasi." This was what I told the seasoned traveler seated to my left in the queue at the Varanasi train station's foreign tourist bureau. I realized once I said it that it was something of a silly thing to say, as I had at that point only been in Varanasi for a little under 24 hours. But I had been expected something grand, something moving, something spiritual from this city, which had been described to me as "astounding," "exotic," and "amazing" by some trusted fellow travelers.

Instead, I found filth. I found frustration. I found harassment. And I wasn't quite sure whether I was finding that quality I and so many other travelers crave: authenticity. These Varanasi failures threatened to ruin my experience in the city, but by the end of my three-day stay (always too short to get a true feel for any place, but some places speak to us immediately, others over time, others never), I felt like I was at least beginning to see what makes Varanasi one of the most special places in India.

Some of the failures were of my own doing. Much of the frustration came from the peculiar moment in my travel itinerary in which I happened to be, which had me spending far too much of my time in Varanasi at its (naturally) chaotic train station. I arrived on a Sunday at the train station, returned on Monday to makes some ticket bookings (one hour line at the foreign tourists' bureau - the office had closed just before more 6-hours delayed train had arrived on Sunday), again on Tuesday to change my tickets after getting updated availability information from the friends I was planning to visit, and finally on Wednesday mornign to depart. Let us just say that Varanasi's magic does not happen at or near its train station.

That magic happens in the old city and along the Ganges, and it is this location along the banks of the holy river that is Varansi's raison d'etre. The heart of Varanasi is its river bank and the ancient city of alleyways and lanes that emanates from its western bank. Along the river is a extended walkway with steps leading down to the river and up to the city proper. These river steps are called "ghats" ("ghats" also refers to hills: the mountain ranges in the southwest and southeastern parts of the country are called the "Western Ghats" and "Eastern Ghats," respectively), and every hundred meters or so is divided is demarcated as a separate ghat, with its own name, meaning, and type of activity. My guest house (the Sahi River View Guesthouse, with clean rooms, hot water, a tasty kitchen, and an attentive staff) was located near Assi Ghat, the southernmost ghat of the main strectch of ghats along the old city. Assi Ghat is a relatively more tranquil location (tranquility in Varanasi is always relative) - the main flurry of activity happens further up the river in and around Dasaswamedh Ghat).

Since the ghats seemed the most important part of Varanasi, I devoted my initial attentions there. My train had been so late that I had little daylight left upon my arrival, and so I set out for an early evening walk from Assi Ghat north to Dasaswamedh - about a half hour's stroll. Here: harassment and filth. I was regularly (not quite constantly, but regularly) approached by boatman asking me to hire their boat for a short river trip (cheap price!), by beggars with the ubiquitous extended arm, and by those horribly unhelpful "helpers" offering various pieces information, suggestions, and other unwelcome chatter, all in expectation of a handout. In Bangkok, where these folks are often telling deliberate untruths in hope of luring you their way ("Wat Po closed today! Didn't you see on the the news?") I labeled these touts as members of a vast "misinformation campaign." In India, they are more often giving correct information (though not always) but often it is something you could have just as easily figured out yourself. The feeling that others view you as being made of money, and that their sole aim is to extract some of that money from you, wears thin on the patience. And the filth: the ghats, and the Ganges itself, were something like a communal toilet. Not merely the stench of urine, but the regular sight of men urinating onto the walls. And feces - cow, dog, and, as I'd later discover, human. This city-as-latrine wasn't confined to the ghats: the streets had open sewers into which men would urinate, some (those with pants) in the usual standing posture, others (those with some sort of wrap-around covering) by squatting down. And in the train station: directly onto the tracks. Public urination everywhere.

My stroll up the ghats that first evening did provide two interesting glimpses onto life onto the banks of the Ganges. I lingered at Harishchandra Ghat, one of the two "burning ghats" where corpses are cremated on huge piles of firewood and the ashes left to float in the Ganges. Varanasi is considered one of the most auspicious places to be cremated, as those whose final resting place is the Ganges are released from the cycle of death and rebirth (i.e., achieve "moksha"). I watched, without too much disturbance, as the funeral pyres were stacked, as the corpses were paraded in, wrapped in white linen and gold cloth, and as they were placed on the mounds and set alight. There was some hierarchy to the affair, or so I overheard (overhearing is free!): those cremated lower, nearer to the water, were poorer; those higher up, on platforms, were richer.

As the sun was setting, I reached Dasaswamedh Ghat, where there was a flurry of activity. A large crowd had gathered - one or two thousand people by my imperfect estimation, mostly Indians but a fair smattering of foreigners - to watch the nightly "Ganga Aarti" ceremony, in which priests performed an elaborate, coordinated dance to the river. The dance involved the waving of various lamps, torches, and other sources of light, the burning of incense, the constant ringing of bells, and the playing of music. As Dasaswamedh Ghat, they have the biggest Ganga Aarti, with seven platforms on one side (one priest per platform) and five on the other. The ceremony lasted for near on an hour, and I couldn't quite tell if it felt touristic or not. On the one hand, there were a number of Westerners in the crowd, the group playing the music pitched its CDs during the breaks, and there were plenty of beggars and postcards salespeople; on the other hand, this was the Ganga Aarti ceremony that was performed all along the river, not only at Varanasi but elsewhere, and the crowd were mostly Indians (tourists themselves, perhaps? Or locals? Or some other type of spiritual visitor?). I wasn't sure, but perhaps because of the mood I was in and because of the other disappointments along the Ganges, I left feeling like I had seen something more of a "production" put on for my foreign, prying eyes.

The next morning I arose early for that other quintessential river experience: the sunrise river trip. I took a few moments to sit on Assi Ghat and take in the pre-dawn activity: groups of pilgrims coming to buy flowers to put in the river and prepare to bathe. And no shortage of flower-selling children and boat-ride offering youths coming up to me. But this time, the latter, at least, was welcome, and I quickly negotiated a 1.5-hour boat ride with a seemingly affable and well spoken guy (Rs 200). His English was good, and he turned out to be my age, and we quickly moved from the antagonism of the negotiation to friendly relations. And the ride: again, something short of expectations. First, the pervasive morning haze that seems to drape all (or only where I've been?) of India this time of year essentially nullified the sunrise. No marvelous colors, no slanted light, in fact, no sign of the sun until well after it was fully light outside. Second, I couldn't get beyond the filth. The central morning activity along the Ganges is ritual bathing and the performing of "puja" (a form of ritual prayer). This morning, perhaps because it was uncomfortably cold, the bathers were few, but even there I couldn't believe they would venture into this cesspit of a river to bathe. And it wasn't just a quick dip: they would fill their mouths with Ganges water, slosh it around, and the spit it out, or sometimes swallow. No fewer than two times on that short morning jaunt I saw young men walking to the lower part of the ghat, dropping trou, squatting with their asses facing the river (i.e., pointed my direction) and defecating. Right there on the ghat. My boat driver told me he felt lucky to live in Varanasi because it allowed him to bathe in the Ganges every day, but all I could see was fetid river and a grimy, overcrowded, aggressive.

So, that was how I felt about Varanasi after the first 24 hours as I sat in that train station waiting room: a filthy, frustrating, harassing, and (maybe - not sure yet) touristic city. Over the next two days, I would would experience, in snippets, some things that would challenge my initial reactions and would help me begin, just begin, to understand Varanasi.

It didn't happen that afternoon. That was when I took a day trip to Sarnath, a village some 10km away from Varanasi that is one of the four key pilgrimage sites in Buddhism. It was here that Buddha gave his famous first sermon, and I thought it would make for a nice, soothing escape from Varanasi, not to mention a good precursor for Bodhgaya, the most important of the Buddhist pilgrimage sites. I got everything right except for the nice, soothing part. My first mistake was hiring an autorickshaw and not a taxi, which meant I spent the 40 minute ride inhaling the toxic fumes of the various vehicles in front of me - and there were always vehicles in front of me - an dealing with the constant horn honking and swerving that seems unavoidable on any trip on the roads. There is some sort of strange hierarchy of the road here, based on size and speed of transport, with the bigger vehicles honking their way through and the faster vehicles zipping around on the right, often into oncoming traffic. The hierarchy (from top to bottom) is something like car, autorickshaw, cycle-rickshaw, bicycle, pedestrian, cow. The cows really screw things up, but at least I only have to worry about stepping in, and not inhaling, their exhaust. I have begun holding a extra shirt or the sleeve of the shirt I have on in front of my face to lessen my inhalation of the fumes - an imperfect and rather unpleasant technique. So I spent these unwelcome 40 minutes in transit, only to find the Sarnath wasn't at all secluded, but just a temple and gated compound that appeared in the midst of the endless sprawl of dirty village. The large, fat stupa in the center of the park was a nice site, as was the ore modern temple next door, but all that was merely a brief interlude before the unwelcome 40 minutes of commute back to Varanasi. Oh, and my autorickshaw driver was a bit of a twerp. Next time, take a car, or just chill in Varanasi. (That said, Sarnath does seem to be pretty well known - I've seen references to it popping up all over India, and Sarnath plus Bodhgaya do get me to 50% of the major Buddhist pilgrimage sites in India, an unexpected accomplishment on this seat-of-the-pants trip.) (Also, Sarnath did provide a bit of quiet, though dodgy mobile reception, for me to field a call from my friend Tem confirming that I am welcome to visit him and his family in Andhra Pradesh on the New Year: the journey east is on!).

It [beginning to understand Varanasi (I'd like to keep the same rhetorical structure, but after that long, rambling paragraph, I think my pronoun needs an appositive)] did happen later that evening, at a Christmas Eve dinner at a delightful little rooftop restaurant called Karki (ooh! I found a link to it!) that I had stumbled across the night before. It is owned by a Italian-Nepali couple and serves a curious but delicious mix of Italian and Nepali food. I saw that there were serving a special Christmas Eve Italian menu for which one had to sign up in advance, so I signed up. Being a solo traveler once more, I've rediscovered my ability to sidle up to people and to make myself welcome, and I did just that with a group of folks sitting at one of the low tables, the kind where you sit on pillows and eat and lounge and relax. It turned out to be two groups: one bunch of French people, another threesome of Italians. I can't resist: with each group, after introducing myself in English and making some initial small talk, I bust out with "I can speak a little ... " in their respective language. Turn to the right: chat in French with Daphne, a lovely French girl my age or a little older, who has come to Varanasi for a month to do a yoga course at a small riverside studio. Turn to the lift: chat in Italian with Gaia, Valentina, and Luca, the former two Italian designers on a work-cum-leisure trip in India, and the latter a recently-divested entrepreneur here for a three-week yoga visit and to unwind as he transitions from his successful advertising start-up to his next project (he tells me he's planning on applying for a Ph.D. in social psychology, and that his first choice is Berkeley - good taste he has). It was refreshing to meet some travelers who were a little more like me - not like me to the extent that they had come to one place to stay for a good while, whereas I was constantly on the move; but like me in that they were early 20s/late 30s, were educated professionals in their back-home lives but keen and devoted travelers when they could manage it, and were not dirt poor, penny-pinching backpackers. Like me in that they prefer to avoid the main backpacker drag of a town and instead stay in one-rung-above-cheapest places in a somewhat more quiet area. Like me in that we snigger at the "India backpacker look" that is so pervasive here among traveling foreigners: some mishmash of loose fitting pants, shawls, wraps, bangles, and the like. Clothes bought in India, but that clearly call out "backpacker" and not local. We, instead, self-conscious but content in our performance wear. (I'll break here to note that my friends Michael and Lauren did their recent India travels in *real* local attire: kurta for him and salwar kameez for her - see photos and the like on their blog.) Oh, and how this relates to me beginning to understand Varanasi: I was intrigued by these thoughtful, well-spoken people and the fact that they had chosen to spend their entire India trip in Varanasi. They helped me to see that Varanasi is, and has been for centuries, millennia, a place of knowledge and learning. In their case, the knowledge they had come to seek was yoga, and they had found a spiritual community of fellow learners here.

It continued later that night when the Italians invited Daphne and me to accompany them to a musical performance happening at the nearby Hotel Ganges View (note: if you have a slightly higher budget, and can book further in advance, stay here). We sat for an hour in a packed room listening to a tremendous sitar and tabla concert. Varanasi: creative cultural center: on this evening, to Indian musical virtuosity. Even I, normally subdued, was swaying, tapping, and nodding to the music, though nothing like some of the more expressive in this crowd of rapt (and rather amusing) foreigners. It was quite an array of people in that audience, a good selection of the slightly-tripped out, aging Indophiles. None more so than the eccentric woman seated to my left, who has having something approaching a religious experience at the concert. She stared directly at the sitar player throughout, and at moments in his playing that seemed random to me would call out, "Yes! Oh, yes!" She would tap and hum in a state of near ecstasy - more annoying than amusing, like singing along at an opera. I don't know if she was merely so transfixed by the performance that she did not notice that she was encroaching on others' enjoyment of the show, or if she was so lost in her own world - not just then but always - that she was no longer able to recognize her own anti-social behavior. Quite the lot that one finds in India, and not just the Indians!

It didn't happen the next morning, which was another logistical pain: finding a hotel near the train station (to facilitate tomorrow's trip to the station for my 5:30am departure), which meant wading through the less desirable parts of town and dealing with the attendant harrassment, and, worse, the constant threat of harassment. Then, a logistical triumph: short lines at the foreign tourist bureau where one of the most patient and competent ticket agents in the country worked with me to assemble my precision travel from Bodhgaya to Calcutta to Orissa to Visakhapatnam. He and I got the schedules to work perfectly (as perfect as three overnight journeys in six days can be), and I canceled the tickets purchased the previous day. All tickets bought for the rest of the trip! And a handshake and appreciate compliment for the gentleman ticket agent.

It did happen that afternoon, which I spent walking through Varanasi old town. How long this was overdue! It was silly of me not to have walked through the old town until then, because here was a magical Varanasi that I had begun to see on the stroll along the ghats on on my boat trip, but was only now getting as I wondered through the tiny alleys and steps of this ancient town. (For potential visitors, Assi Ghat really isn't the old town. It is a nicer and relatively quieter place to stay, so I recommend it, but the heart of the old town are the alleys around the central ghats.) These alleys were teeming with life: pilgrims pushing their way to the ghats, a herd of sacred cows rambling along and stopping and creating a backlog of pedestrians and motorcycles, corpses being carried to for cremation at Manikarnika, the main burning ghat. Had I more time, I would have been content to get lost in these alleys (never too lost - the tourist cafes and guesthouses have signs and arrows painted on many of the walls). As it was, I wandered to the burning ghat and lingered at the intense, smoky theater of the riverside cremations. I made my way back, following the signs, to a small upstairs yoga studio, where I attended a two-hour hatha yoga class (very slow and relaxing, with an emphasis on breathing - here, the principal transitional pose was not the upward-downward dog sequence (chaturanga dandasana), but corpse pose (savasana). I know now: if I return to Varanasi, it will be for an extended yoga course.)

It was on this afternoon that I achieved my main Varanasi revelation, that I understood (though didn't quite overcome) my main grievance with the place: the filth. I realized that Varanasi MUST be filthy. It is a place of pilgrimage, and pilgrimage is an inherently dirty, grimy experience. Think about the pilgrims of Europe, of elsewhere, crawling to their holy sites, in rags. We may have luxury pilgrimage opportunities now (like the Japanese in Bodhgaya, say - read the next entry), but in India it is still the old-fashioned arrival of the poor. It is a city for the pilgrims, where they perform their both their daily rituals and their life-cycle rituals of birth and death. It's inevitable that there will be some shit produced in the process.

And, that evening, another important, if smaller revelation. At dinner, again at Karki, I was unexpectedly joined by Luca, who pulled from his pouch a book: Banaras, City of Light. The author was none other than Diana Eck, Harvard professor and famous in my world as the master of Lowell House, home to a number of my good friends. Seeing this book, silly as it may sound, prodded me into the realization that Varanasi is a place of genuine historical and cultural significance, worthy of scholarly attention by an academic luminary. And it helped me with another filth-grasping fact: Banaras is ancient. Older than Jerusalem, Rome. So, I can cut it a break that it's crowded, dirty, overwhelming. It's old and it's alive, and thanks for letting us tourists come in for a glimpse.

Now just please stop harassing us.