Varanasi (part 2)

When I last posted, we had been walking south along the ghats. Upon reaching the south end of the ghats (more or less), we paused to evaluate our own exhaustion. The past two nights of little sleep were catching up with us, along with the brightness of the sun and the thirty-something Celsius heat. We decided that, while we wanted to go exploring and shopping inside the city and wanted to walk back up the ghats to see things like the Aurangzeb Mosque and the Hanuman Temple, we needed to take a break beforehand. At this point, it was around 10 am, so it wasn't near lunch time, so we headed back to the hostel to rest and cool off. On the way back, we passed a man who offered to take us to see a cremation (whom we ignored), which remains, for me, one of the strangest things about Varanasi. While I understand that major life events in India are more community-oriented than in the US (broadly speaking, marriage processions are inclusive of everyone on the streets, and funerals are more open than the hearse-processions of the US), I imagine it extremely uncomfortable to pay to witness and gawk at someone's cremation rituals. Something like mourning should not, in my mind, be used to appeal to the curiosity of religious foreigners with no connection to the deceased. Besides, we passed the cremation ghats going both south and north, and I've inhaled the ash of more strangers than I'd like to, anyway.

A painting of Shiva dancing on a defeated demon, painted onto what is probably a temple along the ghats. Photo courtesy of AJ.

Several hours later, after a lunch with unsatisfactory service and a visit from my बड़ा फ़ुफ़ा and a relative whose grandparents were my great grandparents (I think; he's related through my grandmother and is an “uncle”), our small band of Americans found our way to the ghats and to a German bakery called Brown Bread Bakery. It is situated on a fourth-floor rooftop, with a gorgeous view of the river and rooftops of the old city, and a grate to keep out the monkeys on the nearby trees. Not only were the smoothies delicious (and iced with mineral-water ice), but we got to meet some lovely people from England who were touring the subcontinent. The others all decided to come back in the morning, and I'm sure they had a great breakfast there. It was refreshing to be in a place with familiar food and people whose English was easier to understand, and while I will always advocate for us to spend more time interacting with Indian people, given how stressful the day had been (and, though I didn't know it, would continue to be), it was nice to be able to relax in that way.

Me with a mixed-fruit smoothie. Yum.

That night, after some shopping in which I tried to convince AJ to buy a Ganesh statue to go with the Shiva statue he bought for his father, we made our way to the ghats, where a night of Navatri festivities were in full force. The ghats were covered in people and idols of Durga and company, and we were able to get quite close to a ritual involving blessings of fire. From what I could tell, different ghats had similar ceremonies under the purview of various different temples. The others took lots of pictures (Ryan and Rachel each used my camera briefly), and I'm sure Rachel's blog will have more details.

A ritual performed on the ghats for Navatri. There was lots of fire and it was more amazing than this picture, which is also amazing and was taken by Jenny.

After that, we headed back to the hostel to get ready for dinner (or so I thought) with my relatives. At that point, however, I didn't know that Pranjul-didi's estimated time of arrival home from attending an engagement in Lucknow was 11 pm, far later than anyone in our group was willing to be gone from the festival. I was taken by surprise, then, when my uncles showed up and we left my friends behind. Though we eventually were able to contact each other and communicate our plans, we were unable to all have dinner together. In retrospect, after the lovely day we spent in Sarnath, it wasn't that big of a deal, but that, combined with the crowds and noises of the festival, and the aforementioned sleep deficit (advice: don't go to Varanasi sleep deprived; it's far too intense of an experience to deal with on depleted physical and emotional reserves), left me extremely stressed and touchy. I tended to snap more than I would have liked at my uncles, who I eventually managed to communicate with a desire to just go ahead and go to my cousin's (Pranjul-didi's) home so I could get some rest (since due a computer error Ryan and I were left without a room that night; adaption is key in India, or I guess in life in general). The great thing about family, though, is that they understand when you're tired and cranky, and know how to make you at home.

The sweet shop from which we got lavanglata and mango sweets.

Buddha teaching his first five students. It's now beneath a sapling of Bodh Gaya but was not at the time.

After a blissful night's sleep, a lot of catching up with family, and a visit to a sweet shop which sold the Varanasi-favorite lavang-lata (which tastes a lot like baklava), my didi, jijaji, and fufa went to meet AJ, Jenny, Rachel, and Ryan at Sarnath, which was the location of the Gautam Buddha's first teaching (that is, the birthplace of Buddhism as a religion, since Siddharth Gautam was the first person to achieve enlightenment and be known as Buddha). There was a gorgeous temple there with walls covered in murals depicting scenes from the life of the Gautam Buddha and a golden statue, but the heart of the pace was a tree, grown from a sapling cut by the Emperor Ashoka's daughter from Bodh Gaya, the tree under which the Buddha meditated and received enlightenment according to Buddhist tradition. Sarnath is the second of four pilgrimage sites that many Buddhists take, following the enlightened journeys of the Buddha. All the inscriptions were written in Nepali and English, which I found strange being so used to Hindi and Marathi scripting. There were also these metal cylinders that are to be rolled while meditating, which reminded me (here betraying the depth of my American-centrism) of the symbolism of the Air Nomads in Avatar: The Last Airbender.

Inside the main temple at Sarnath.

Detail of mural. The Gautam Buddha is being tempted away from enlightenment by demons.

My didi also showed us a place where silk is woven into these beautiful-designed cloths, and all of my friends got an item or two. Before my didi and company took us to the airport, we all went to this restaurant called Annapurna's Kitchen, which had various different cuisines from around India and around the world. We all tried a drink that was flavored with black salt, and I had sattu paratha, which is sort of bland on its own but went well with Rachel's vegetable dish. It was a delicious and communal way to end the trip, and my family and friends got along well with each other. Overall, I think that early afternoon meal, not the religious sites or the ancient beauty of the river गंगा, was the most beautiful experience I had in Varanasi. It left me satisfied (and not just because the food was amazing).

All of us enjoying ourselves at Annapurna.

Interactive portion: In your experience, do you find that your memories are more meaningful when they're made with other people?  Or do you find that the fundamental subjectivity of your experience and the knowledge (experiential, spiritual, emotional) is impossible to communicate and share fully?