Pennies for a Puja

We spent four days in Varanasi and it was a rather inspiring place, so this is not the last Varanasi blog post.



At night the river bank is crowded with people (mostly men because you don't see a lot of women out at night). There's singing and praying as the town puts the river to sleep for the evening.


Women and children sell small offerings to make a puja (a prayer) with. You're meant to give the river the offering.






The first full day Emily and I were in Varanasi it happened to be the same day as the Kite Festival.


There were hundereds of kites in the sky over Varanasi that day. Children and adults take part in the kite flying and cutting and running. We were lucky enough to meet Vishnu, a local shop owner who invited us up to his roof to take part in the festival.


It was great to see Varanasi from a roof top. To get away from the crowded, tourist-cramped labyrinth below, families who own shops in the city find refuge above. They eat, play and even sleep on their rooftops when the weather is right. Today especially, the whole city was out to watch the kites.


This is one of the little fellows we met on Vishnu's roof. He was wearing a Canadian tuxedo and ear muffs even though it had to be at least 25 degrees Celsius. He was quite the kite flyer, as was Vishnu. I wasn't too bad myself, either. Emily may have had a few problems, though.

Varanasi on the Ganga

From Delhi we headed West to Varanasi, one of the holiest cities for Hindus on the Ganga. Pilgrims swarm to the river bank to bath in holy water of the Ganges, they congregate in the evening for music and prayer during the evening ceremony, and they bring loved ones to die in the city and have their ashes spread along the river.

Varanasi was one of those cities where I could sit by the river for hours doing absolutely nothing and I was completely content. While we sat in the sun on the steps by the river, kids flew kits, travellers played music and pye dogs (stray dogs) wrestled one another. There was even a pick-up cricket game taking place on the river bank.

After a relaxing first day hanging out at near Pandey Ghat we woke up early the next morning for two Varanasi musts: a sunrise boat tour and early-morning yoga.


The boat tour was about an hour and cost each of us 100 Rupees, or about $2 CAD.




Our guide told us that lots of people think the Ganga is dirty and polluted, but he swore it wasn't. Nevermind the human remains that float down the river, the garbage on its shore and general lack of waste removal in all of India. But, it's their river and they can do whatever they'd like with it, I guess.






There were a ton of seagulls out in the morning. But, they weren't overly aggressive and didn't try to steal my french fries like they do in Vancouver.


Everything in the city, and pretty much the whole country, is painted some sort of brilliant colour. It's beautiful and even on dreary days the colours really put a positive touch on things.

Bang the Peace Gong

The majority of travellers of India agree on one thing: Delhi sucks. It's overcrowded, it's stinky, it's smoggy and it's loud. Emily and I stayed two nights and just one day in the city. We spent the whole day out and did what we could, but didn't go crazy with sight seeing. Old Delhi in the morning, Gandhi Smriti in the afternoon and a Bollywood film in the evening.



Sunrise in Delhi.



Check out those power lines. Emily's bun got tangled and them once and really, that's just an octopus waiting to catch fire.



If there's any place to find solace in Delhi it's at the Gandhi Smriti (meaning "that which is remembered"). Ghandi spent his last days living in a modest house in a government-type area of Delhi. A few months after moving in, Gandhi was assassinated. This memorial marks the spot where Gandhi fell.



Part of the Gandhi Smriti includes a museum and a peace gong. Everybody was lining up to bang the peace gong. But, you weren't actually allowed to bang it. Lame.


The entire Gandhi Smriti, including the museum was free. Emily and I expected to spend about a half hour throughout the memorial, but ended up being there two and a half hours. The museum was super interactive and the history lesson was far from dry. After spending the morning being jostled around Old Delhi, the Smriti was a welcome break from the crowds. Plus the real Gandhi was there! See!



We went to a cinema to watch the Bollywood film "Tees Mar Khan" then stopped for a fresh jalebi from the Jalebi Walla at Chandni Chowk in Old Delhi. Hot damn that jalebi was hot and fresh. The deep fried, orange batter tastes like a sweeter chewier donut.

Old Dilli

On our way from Munnar to Dehli, Emily and I made a quick stop in Nagpur to check out the grave site of Em's great-grand aunt, Sister Aimee. She had been a nun in Nagpur back in the early 1900's and it meant a lot to Em's grandma that we stop by to see if we could get a picture of it.
I was hoping the hunt for the grave would lead to some epic novel I could write and make a ton of money off, but it actually turned out to be quite easy to find. We had the help of the Sisters of Saint Joseph and, of course, God was on our side.



We flew into Delhi from Nagpur. We arrived late so my first experience of Delhi, pronounced Dilli by the locals, was from the backseat of a taxi. It wasn't until the next morning when we took the subway into Old Delhi that I really got a taste and smell of the city.




If you can't carry it on your head, you're not Indian.


If your uncle doesn't have a shop that you want me to go to, then you're not Indian.


If you don't cheat tourists out of hundereds of Rupees by pretending to not know English, then you're not Indian.


If you don't sell trinkets outside holy places, you're not Indian (actually, you're not human if you don't make money off spirituality).


If you don't sleep in the middle of squares, you're not a pye dog.


If you don't find the most practical, "non-progressive" way of doing things, you're not Indian.