Varanasi, India

We were awakened on our first morning by the Hindu chants that sounded from below our guesthouse situated on the banks of the Ganges River.  Stepping out in bare feet onto our cold balcony, hugging myself to keep warm and still in a sleepy haze, I gazed at the lively scene below me.  Hundreds of small wooden boats rowed up and down the holy river.  Pilgrims bathed themselves (and washed their clothes!) in the murky waters along the banks, while others offered prayers and floating candles drifted near the shore.  A family of monkeys kept leaping onto and off our balcony from the adjacent apartments; I kept my distance on the hanging wicker chair ready to scream if they attacked (they didn’t).  Looking south in the distance bodies were undergoing cremation.  The magnificent orange sun peaked over the horizon and the spirituality of the place resonated in the thick polluted morning air - even those who knew little of Hinduism could not take indifference to such a shocking wake up call.

Yesterday we trained from Agra to the holy city of Varanasi (one of the oldest continuously inhabited cities in the world), an overnight trek originally scheduled for 12 hours but ended up taking over 17.  Thankfully we had bunk-bed type accommodations so we could sleep and a bag full of cookies to tide us over.  Stepping onto the dirty train platform the wave of humanity overwhelmed unlike any place we’d been before.  Thousands flooded the station, in tow with their large family groupings, melange of mixed luggage - everyone pushing to escape the frenzy.  In the chaos a large black cow strutted down the platform like he was looking to catch the next train to Kolkata.  Scruffy backpackers (the real kind) appeared to have just returned from Everest, women from rural villages in full makeup and neon saris dressed in their finest.

Our rickshaw dropped us to within ten minutes of the guesthouse - the last leg would be on foot because the roads were too narrow for cars: walking down a crowded colorful market streaming with honking motorbikes and ancient bicycles; climbing to the left up the narrow painted alleyway; taking a series of right / left turns impossible to remember; stepping (literally) over anorexic cows, sleeping disabled beggars, and fresh cow poop; ducking under low hanging awnings; and finally arriving to the banks of the ghats where thousands lined the concrete steps and boats filled with pilgrims and tourists docked to watch the evening ritual of incense burning and praying.  In the dark night sky, the candles burned as they floated and reflected off the river, mounds of incense burned smoking the scene, and everyone contemplated the religious ceremony in near silence offering their prayers to various gods.

Over the next days we strolled the Ganges ghats, Ken received a massage, and we attended a yoga class (contrast: American yoga instructors are stereotypically young, female, in shape, and wearing trendy yoga outfits; whereas our teacher was not young, not female, not in shape, and wearing a ridiculous (by our standards) outfit... oh and he was missing his front teeth... but he was very patient, pleasant and laughed louder than Ken does - I know that’s loud!).