Varanasi

Varanasi is like looking into a fish bowl of other people lives, watching every aspect of daily life and death.  You could sit in one spot in the ghats (different sections of stairs that lead into the river) and see someone brushing their teeth, someone bathing, someone going the bathroom, someone being cremated, someone doing laundry, someone fishing…you get the idea.  The Ganges River that goes through Varanasi is considered a holy river to both the Hindus and Muslims in India.  Being cremated in it is supposed to end the cycle of reincarnation and set the person free to rest peacefully.  Thus cremations at certain ghats is a huge business or ordeal, and they have it down to a science.  They know exactly how much wood to use to make sure the body is cremated completely but not using excess wood.  There are different qualities of wood that are at different price levels, sandalwood being the most expensive (bits of facts I found interesting, sorry if it is too much information).

Anyway, Varanasi.  The river is considered holy so everyone wants to do everything in it.  There are ghats that go down to the river and serve different purposes (burning ghat, bathing ghat, etc.).  My major observation while here, besides being scarred for life of seeing too much man thigh, was how much the river takes a beating.  It makes me cringe.  There once was a large dolphin population which is quickly diminishing because of the pollution.  People throw everything in the river from statues of goddesses, plastic, manure, you name it.  Mike quoted an interesting fact while we were there.  Healthy bathing water has 500 faecal coliforms (bacteria)/100 ml of water…the Ganges has 1.5 million faecal coliforms (bacteria)/100 ml of water.  If that was too much science for you, the point is that the Ganges River has 3,000 times more bacteria than healthy bathing water, yet hundreds of people (men, women, and children) bath in it every day.  It’s incredible and makes you wonder of all the diseases the water carries.  Mike and I brainstormed different studies we’d like to do on the river (talk about nerdy biology conversations), but there is so much going on and so much effects that seem to be ignored in the river ecosystem. 

Enough talk, here are some pictures of the daily life we saw a glimpse of:

There are shaving stalls everywhere.  I wish I had a beard just so I could feel cool as I sit in a street in a green chair getting a shave.  Maybe not. 

These are bike ricksaws carrying ridiculous loads.  This is just the beginning, you’d be amazed at what they can carry. 

 

Fishing poles at the ghats  (not sure what fish could survive in this water nor what diseases they’d carry). 

I took this for all the nurses in my family. They do laundry in the ghats and this was  hospital scrubs drying on a slope.  I can’t imagine they are what hospitals in the states would consider sanitary.  There were surigical masks, surgery coverings, and scrubs.  The second one is saris (the dress Indian woman wear) drying. 

It was the end of a festival so hundreds of people came to the Ganges to drop in these statues of godesses made of straw, plastic, paint, and other materials into the water.  Again I cringed for the poor river. 

The buildings are really, really close in Varanasi and create dense alleyways that you are for sure to get lost in.  The alleys themselves are backed with small temples, cows, goats, and even more people. 

We went on two boat rides when we were there.  Boats are a huge business here.  It was extremely foggy as you can see on all the pictures, but it added a certain aurora to the city.    The paddler usually has many interesting facts to share in broken English. 

   

Animals were also everywhere near the ghats, which added to my concern for the river with manure pouring into it.  There was one ghat that was mostly water buffalo and goats were literally everywhere.  Luckily I got a picture of my favorite goat, who single handedly convinced me Mike and I will have a goat in the future and name it Baba (old man in Hindi). 

We took our first cycle ricksaw ride here in the midst of CRAZY traffic.  I seriously don’t understand how there are not accidents every time we go somewhere.  It boggles my mind.   

  

Then there were just some pictures of us that were fun.  We’re still alive and well!