Hindu Insanity and Sikh Inclusiveness

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Namaste loved ones!!!

Business first: Deb, thank you so much for reading my blog and if you are reading this post please feel free to email me at [e-mail]... I would be happy to touch base about my experiences here, and I am home on May 4th so will have a lot more time to answer any of your questions! And secondly, I don't ACTUALLY want my brother to stab anyone with a knife, you can just get these really cool carved antique daggers and I thought what better present for a 21-year-old guy? Let's be real here...

So. Varanasi. I don't even know where to start except that when I arrived I had initially planned on going to this place Bodhgaya for a couple days as well but Tessa was horrified at that idea and said simply "Shannon you can't go this city deserves so much of your time". I think that phrase sums up Varanasi in a nutshell. The city IS India, in every way; unashamed, unapologetic, wild, in-your-face and in the moment.

I forget whether I explained in my last post but this is the city where it is considered auspicious to die, because to die here, on the banks of the Ganges, you achieve moksha, which is the release from the cycle of birth and death and your spirit is let free. If you do not die here, then it is the responsibility of your eldest son to bring your body here for cremation at the river's edge and to have your ashes put in the river in order to purify the spirit and achieve a higher level on your next incarnation.

The city is laid out along the river's edge with a series of ghats, or steps, leading down to the water. Every facet of life takes place along this river where the pollution level is about 3000 times what is considered safe for bathing. At any given moment, alongside burning funeral pyres where bodies are being cremated, there are people taking swimming lessons, washing themselves, drinking, doing laundry, praying, fishing, shaving, cooking... It is one of the most intense places I have ever been and as usual I apologize because the words I am using here cannot capture the energy of this place so I am going to copy what I have written in my journal about the burning (cremation) ghats because I think it might give a better idea of what it is like:

This place. I was expecting to feel horror, to see chaos, but instead it was like every other aspect of Indian life I've seen - ordinary. People travel for hundreds of kilometres to burn their loved ones' bodies. And it is so, so just how it exactly should be. I sat with Tessa while a man explained it all to us.

Women aren't allowed because they are so emotional and make such a fuss, which is one of the reasons it is so important in India to have a son, a male heir - the eldest son is supposed to be the one who is in charge of arranging the cremation of his parents' bodies when they die. Although I am strongly opposed to the gender inequality here that I have seen and experienced I understand that it is stemming from a tradition that is hundreds of years old and traditions like this don't disappear easily.

Pregnant women, holy men and children are not cremated because their bodies are already considered pure. Their bodies are simply weighed down with stones and put into the Ganges. People from the highest caste are burned on a level further up from the water to denote their special place within the caste system. The son, wearing a piece of white cloth, first shaves his head in the river before beginning the ceremony. Women are shrouded in red and men in white; each body is dipped in the Ganges and walked around 5 times by the eldest son, who is chanting prayers. The body is brought back up to the shore and is placed on a pile of wood containing about 360 kg of wood, some of it sandalwood, which is used for purification of the spirit. Straw is lit with fire from an eternally-burning flame which is never put out and brought over to the funeral pyre. The son walks around the pyre 5 times, again praying, carrying the burning straw, and then lights the wood. He turns away from the burning pyre, pours an urn of water from the Ganges over his head, throws the urn over his head, and walks away without looking back.

The people tending the fires are of the Untouchables caste, the lowest on the totem pole, the caste which deals with human and animal waste and performs the most menial chores. While they are marginalized within Indian society, their role in this cremation process is essential and the soul's journey would not be able to occur without them. They are responsible for ensuring the flames don't go out - they smash the skull of the body at a particular point in the process so that the spirit may escape - they place the ashes and the unburned parts of the body in the river once the process is complete. In men, the ribcage and in women, the pelvis, don't completely turn to ash - these are the strongest parts of the body and are given as an offering to the river that they may be eaten by fish which in turn will be caught and nourish the people, completing the cycle of life.

Tessa and I were able to sit and watch about 5-6 different cremations taking place at different points in the process. Again, there was no shock or horror, only contemplation. To see a body being cremated and a man fishing and children splashing happily in the water within metres of each other illustrated beautifully how India has nothing to hide - it is all out there, in the open, for the world to see. It's not to say that it wasn't a powerful place or a powerful energy I was experiencing - on the contrary, I was very moved sitting there by the simplicity of the ritual. This is just another step on our souls' journeys, nothing to get excited about, nothing to shout over, because life ends only to begin again in a different time, a different place.

So that was the burning ghat... the rest of my time in Varanasi passed by too quickly, with many a cup of chai drunk from a small clay jar looking out over the river or a hilarious conversation with a kid trying to sell bindis or postcards or turning around to see Sam being spontaneously massaged by grinning Indian men.

Those of you who have been reading this and waiting for a "Shannon Lees trip and fall" moment will be happy to know that I had a really spectacular incident one morning when Sam and I decided to get some chai and sit at the burning ghats for a while. To get to the main ghat you have to cross an area of concrete where what I believe to be the entire city's sewage comes spewing out of a pipe and is washed into the river by a crouching man holding a fire hose. We had done it successfully once, stepping over rivers of liquid shit onto semi-solid islands of shit to make it to the other side, but this morning I don't know what went wrong, whether there was an extra heavy flow or something, but it was treacherous... I was laughing because Sam's flip-flops were flinging gross shit-mud all over the back of his shorts when all of a sudden I got stuck the way you do when you step into mud and my sandal started sinking, I panicked and tried to pull it up but then the strap broke, and then by that point my other sandal was stuck, so I had to walk the rest of the way across BAREFOOT THROUGH SHIT. I got to the other side but of course the ground was hot and I was so upset at the loss of my sandals I was seriously considering just carrying on barefoot when all these Indian men started yelling at me alternately that the ground was too hot so I shouldn't be barefoot and that I'd left my sandals in the river of shit. I wailed back that they had broken and one man took fully charge and told me: "No problem. Go wash your feet in the Ganges and we will get your sandals for you", so I did, and came back up the steps from the river with clean (although how clean my feet actually were after putting them in a river which is polluted to 3000 times the safe level for bathing, I don't know) feet to find my sandals all cleaned and fixed waiting for me... and no one asked me for rupees! It was another great moment of Indian friendliness and care for a very silly and clumsy girl....

I also got to spend a day with Tessa on the job with the mobile library for the NGO she is working for that I mentioned in my last post. This library is a little truck that visits different villages around Varanasi 6 days a week, bringing books to rural areas that children can read or check out. It was amazing - as I am a super avid reader and understand the importance of children and women's literacy I was so so excited to be able to spend the day with her on this project. The kids are SO excited, sitting there reading to themselves and each other, and Uttam, the driver, also makes extra stops so women can check books out as well. A lot of the kids end up taking books home for their parents to read which is so fantastic too... I've said it before I know but the spirit of the children here is awesome. Tessa and I played a few games with them that I had done with the kids while I was volunteering, so I got to contribute a bit too which was fun. Uttam the driver is amazing and so patient with the kids, explaining the rules to "What time is it Mr. Wolf" in Hindi and running along with them while they all learned it... Seeing that kind of patience and amazing ability to work with children in an Indian male was so heartwarming and refreshing. I haven't really said anything negative in this blog about India because I really have had a beautiful experience here but my experiences with the men have definitely not been great - waking up on the train to find a guy taking photos of you on his cell phone is something I've had happen more than once and isn't exactly conducive to me having a favourable opinion of the guys here - but seeing Uttam and the work he's doing has really redeemed the male population here in my eyes 😊

This was Varanasi, a place which can't possibly be captured in words or images, but in emotion only and so I will close things out here. I had a very peaceful and loving goodbye with Tessa, knowing that we will see each other again in a few months and that we have many, many more amazing times ahead of us. I had a slightly more dramatic train-platform goodbye (I know) with Sam when I got on the train to Amritsar, which consisted of him saying "Kiddo! This is so gutting (devastating)! I'm really shattered (bummed)!" and me promising to go to the UK someday soon to go to some dirty dubstep clubs with him... One of my favourite parts of traveling are the people who come into my travels when it is time for them to do so and the fact that we will always be a part of each other's special India journeys, whether or not we actually do ever see each other again. It is just another experience arising and passing away, that existed and no longer exists, but that can always be appreciated.

Much love,
Shannon

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