The last days of Rishikesh

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Rishikesh is the seat of spiritual materialist tourism. Whatever you want you can get. Holy men called babas, sannyasins, saddhus* wander the streets, ghats and bathe in the ganges.

People's everyday lives are easily interwined with the religious and ceremonial. The man who owns the place I go to for breakfast says his prayers and conducts his ceremony, which consists of lighting incense, delicate bells and singing, in between serving breakfast. It is really nice to witness but timing is kinda tricky - you have to make sure that you don't get arrive when he is in the middle of his prayers and that you don't need to leave before he is finished. This morning, having finished his ceremony, he plugged a hole by the door with some rat poison and some incense, presumably covering all bases.

The yoga course ended last week. Aswell as yoga we had two lectures on some Hindu text. The guy who was giving the lectures is apparently a renowed scholar. He was also the yoga teacher's son. He didn't hold my attention for very long. As I drifted in and out of his talk I'm sure I heard him talking about a turtle but I am not clear why the turtle was getting special mention. I felt I was in the scene from "The Life of Brian" where the guys are listening to the sermon on the mount and they heard him say 'Blessed be the cheesemakers' and after discussion they decide it applies generally to all dairy producers and not just cheesemakers. Maybe he was referring to all slow creatures who carry their homes on their backs. He also spoke about how everthing was perfect, but in the next breath he explained that it was a long and hard road and that the path (to where, I am not sure) was fraught with dangers. It was a long couple of hours!!

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Aarti is a popular fire ceremony carried out on the banks of the Ganges. Across the river, at Parnarth Niketan Ashram, crowds progressively gather every evening during the two / three hour ceremony. I went across one night and as I sat waiting for the ceremony to began the priest gestured me and two others to come down to the water's edge where he was conducting a ritual. People generally don't pitch up until later so me being selected was purely due to a lack of any other bodies!! He lit some incense, smudged our foreheads, did some stuff with flowers, lit various things and recited large texts in a fast low (for family members - he reminded me of Fr. Frank doing his office!). In the middle of this "serious ceremony", his mobile phone rang. Undeterred, he continued in his recitiation, seamlessly removed the phone and handed it to his assistant (altar boy equivalent) to deal with while he finished the cermeony.

At sunset little bells ring along the ganges as people carry out their own, smaller Aarti ceremonies.

Puja (I think it means worship) to Mother Ganga is big here. At the departure points for the boats vendors sell bowls of small round balls which are then offered to the river while on the boat. Orange flowers that look like marigolds are also offered as puja. Given the popularity of the little white balls I have a feeling that if they drained the ganges the river bed would no longer be visible but a carpet of white balls would be seen instead. I asked the owner of a cafe what they were. Once he understood what I was talking about he said they were "little flour balls of piss." At least that's what I thought he said initiallly. It slowly dawned on me that he, in fact, had said "peace."

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As it is nearly time to leave Rishikesh I decided I should go and visit the Maherishi Mahesh Yoga ashram where the Beatles stayed when they came to visit Rishikesh and where they reputedly wrote all the songs for the White album. I got directions and set off. As I walked out of Rishikesh and up the mountain I was astounded by the absence of people, cars and most of all, noise. The silence was amazing. While I relished the absence of chatter I was slightly disconcerted by it, having become so used to the persistent buzzing of India. I walked for 45 minutes to the top of the mountain, meeting the odd person and seeking more directions to the ashram. Retracing my steps I finally came to the path for the ashram and made my way down a long since deserted lane. A sannyasin had advised me that the gates were closed and that I should go around the side, climbing over some boulders. I'm sure he was an actual sannyasin 'cos when I offered him my bottle of limca (lemonade), it being the only suitable thing in my bag, he wrinkled his nose in disgust (then again, maybe that's 'cos he would have preferred coke). By comparison I had earlier met another sannyasin who refused to give me directions until I made an offering to him. When I got to the end of the lane all thoughts of climbing over boulders or getting through gates rapidly deserted me when I saw a large troop of monkeys, self appointed sentries to history, guarding their turf.

Having spoken to a couple of people the next day I discovered there was an easier, more accessible entrance, from the other side. It only involved a steep climb up the hill, hanging over the water's edge. As I climbed it I wasn't sure if, instead, I should have chanced my fate with the monkeys. The deserted complex has a couple of large main buildings but the rest of it is covered by mushroom-like structures. The cells were apparently designed for meditation for one, with a little meditation room on top and a living area at the bottom. The complex is now overgrown, the Maharishi having left for Holland six or seven years ago. There is some dispute as to why he left. He and his supporters maintain that it was because he was tired of all of the visitors to the ashram but the locals say it was because the forest authorities refused to renew his lease because of drugs and strange goin' ons at the site.

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I started a massage course at the end of last week. The woman who is running it is very nice, if also well endowed with Indian tact. On the first day she saw the freckles on my back and she asked me if I had a skin infection. Myself and an English guy started to laugh and explained to her that it was just Irish skin and the sun and that freckles (okay, maybe not the size of the ones on my back!) were quite common. It was clear the next day that she hadn't entirely understood when the matter arose again and we were laughing with her about my 'skin infection'. She went to console me, explaining that it was "how do you say it, a jenetic mutation ...", similar to an extra limb. I slowly removed my claw hands and crooked little fingers from above the table, furling them into fists underneath the table, lest she see them and call the Indian eugenics team.

On the last day of the course we were to receive two massages - one from each other and one from her. I gave first and as I lay down with eyes closed, I was delighed because it meant I was now going to receive two massages. My relaxing peace was slightly shattered when, I heard her say "You are very fat". I opened my eyes, looked up and saw her beaming over me as though she had just said 'Would you like a piece of fish for tea?". My English buddy, in an attempt to be of assistance said "Oh no, she is not fat, there are many people who are much fatter than she is." The next two hours of relaxing thought were not to be. Instead, thoughts of parasites and doses of delhi belly resulting in rapid weight loss, dominated my consciousness.

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So it is goodbye to Rishikesh tomorrow, to pigs snouting amongst the rubbish and debris at the water's edge, to shopkeepers who politely raise their left hand to their nose while they pick with their right and to the boat that has ferried me back and forth for the last couple of weeks. Onwards to Varanasi, via Delhi and then to the moutain heights of Darjeeling. So it is goodby from me and goodbye to Rishikesh.


* Yet another name for a holy man. It seems "holy man" is a little like the word for snow amongst the Inuits - there are many many words to describe the phenomenon. I am still looking for a word to describe a holy woman, but it seems that may be a little more akin to the phenomenon of "hen's teeth" in English.

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