15 August 2000
I most recently visited
Varanassi. It is a nice place, but they do hassle
the tourist more than most cities. There was some Shiva festival
going on. It seems like there is always some festival happening every
week. This time there actually was a bunch of Indian tourist and
visitors
to the most sacred
Hindi
temple here in
Varanassi and a bunch of armed cops as well to
maintain the civility, otherwise these Indians don't know how to wait
in a line. The police were armed with long sticks and guns. I tried
to use the internet there, but for some reason they were all
incredibly slow, it would literally take days or the server was
completely down.
I took a few boat rides on the
Ganges river and saw the bathing, laundry, and
burning ghats. There was also a huge bloated dead cow floating down
the river. At one ghat they burn between 150-200 bodies per day, and
there was six fires going when I first saw it. Your not allowed to
take photos, otherwise I could of had a nice one with a sunset as
background. They actually get quite emotional about their Hindu gods.
They have a lot of small idols around town, and an Israeli guy was
saying they were really hostile towards him when he accidentally
stepped on one, not realizing what it was.
My boat guide drinking Ganges
water - yuucck \\ kids swimming - Varanassi
Varannassi
The old city had a lot of small
alleyways, which luckily didn't allow for rickshaw wallahs, but also
I was just finding my way around without getting lost when I left.
There are a lot of cows there as everywhere. I am always amazed they
find enough to eat with no grassy areas around. I always see them
eating cardboard boxes and some Dutch girls pointed out a couple of
batteries that came out the other end. You have to be careful where
you step.
There is water buffalo in
the Ganges, and we watched one take a dump with some people bathing a
meter or two downstream. My boat driver filled up his water bottle
with the brown Ganges water, and there were Chi (tea) venders
downstream that use the water for their tea. Mmm Yumm! The guide book
says you have to be prepared to see the occasional cadaver floating
downstream on the boat rides, but I didn't see any. Sadus (holy men that supposedly can gain special powers
such as levitation and the ability to appear and disappear at will)
don't need to be burned or children under a certain age either so
they will just throw the bodies into the river.
I am amazed at how
many
Israelis there are
traveling around. For a small country, they are a sizable percentage.
The Indians in tourist areas speak Hebrew as
well as English
and there are signs and menu's in Hebrew as well. There are hardly
any Americans. Since I've been in the main touristy towns, there has
been a bunch of Japanese as well.
Last night I took the night train
to Calcutta and will hopefully catch a flight soon
back to Bangkok
and see my parents for a couple of days. I am staying at the
Salvation Army guest
house here. It seems there
are a lot more tourists around than when I first arrived. Today also
happens to
be India's independence day so
there is a celebration going on down the street with a band and an
Indian lady singing. The local cinema is playing “The Patriot” with
Mel Gibson.
sayonara,
Duane
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