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Published: November 26th 2006
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West Bengal
Kolkatta Cab Life Greetings all
This is now my last entry in India before I move onto Nepal and the mighty Himalayas.
After leaving the lovely Andaman Islands, I travelled back to West Bengal, Kolkatta where I stayed for 2 days before heading to Varanassi and onward from there to Delhi, my final destination in India.
West Bengal is apparently the culture capital of India and true to this, it was yet again another altogether different experience of Indian culture and life. I had been warned that Kolkatta, the capital of West Bengal was quite a brutal place even by Indian standards and true to these words it was indeed. The stench and pollution in Kolkatta, and again the general hygiene evident everywhere in the capital was just another repeat of what I had seen in many of the capitals cities before but with a certain cutting edge only found there. This cutting edge cannot be described really, but anyone who has visited this city does understand this and perhaps anyone who does visit in future will know what I am talking about not of course that I am recommending it as a future holiday destination.
A morning working as
Jain Ghat - Varanassi
Let the onslaught begin. a volunteer with my good spanish friends from our Andamans trip in a Mother Theresa home for the 'dying and destitute' and a tour of the city where I got a good taste of the street life of the City so to speak was inspiring and an eye opener. It was also severe enough to result in my first loss of appetite of the trip which was to follow into Varanassi!!
Another manic experience in probably one of the busiest train stations yet, this time with the added pleasure of viewing sheer police brute force to form the train queue to the 2nd class carriages for the Bengalis and I was off again on a pleasent train journey to Varanassi.
Varanassi is known as the holy capital of India and in terms of India with a population which now well exceeds 1 billion, is the City where apparently you want to be born and where you come to die. It lies at the main stretch of the Ganges 'holy' river and is based around the Ganges and the ghats which are used for various purposes as described below:
.1 Bathing, especially in the morning at Sunrise and
Bath time - Varanassi
Bath time.. for the buffaloes. at sunset.
.2 Washing, including teeth brushing and rinsing of teeth in the river water .
.3 Laundry although apparently not the tourists
.4 Swimming and other general leisure activities.
.5 Nearly forgot this one.. The disposal of burnt bodies -Following the burning of dead bodies at the 3 main burning ghats along the river of course! The ghats burn all day and night. but i would estimate that at any one time they are burning 10 bodies at a time which I now know for a fact take 3 hours each to burn fully so i would estimate a good 50-100 bodies per day in the water.
.6 Disposal of unburned bodies and 'body parts' due to being unable to burn them for other reasons . This is estimated by 'other' sources at 45,000 per year.
.7 Boat rides for very wary and scared tourists to view the specacle that is Varanassi.
.8 Gold searching: Of course after the bodies are burned some with their jewellery on, there are many people of the 1 billion people + from
Bath time - Varanassi
Bath time.. for the people.. India who are happy to make a living searching through the muddy water/ashes of the river with their sieves for gold and anything else of value.
.9 General animal use: Including home for many water buffaloes and disposal/drowning of other more handable animals.
.10 Other - tbc on my next visit or through further research but I am sure that this river water is used for/finds it way into other activities such as cooking for the locals.
I stayed in Varanassi for just 1 day because I had to get back to Delhi to meet my travelling companion from England who would be joining me for my trip in Nepal. This was an unforgettable experience and whilst I could gladly have speant a little more time there, it was enough to see the 'tourist sights'
On a more unfortunate note however, these sights combined with another 12 hour train journey into Delhi was enough to instigate my first bout of illness for 2 days... after 7 weeks and 4 days in India without so much as a bout of diorheaa...gutted but that is life eh!!!!Delhi belly in Delhi eh..how appropriate..
My last stop was Delhi
and Agra and after the usual sights of the Taj and the forts I was on my way to Nepal and my 2 months in India have now come to an end. I am happy and sad to leave India. The country has shown me many things that I can only believe now that I have seen them. After travelling India I trully believe that I can travel anywhere in the world without being shocked which can only be a good thing.
Will I return, who knows. One thing for sure is that after being here for 2 months, I can only agree with what many people have told me before. You could spend a year in India and still not see everything there is to see in this mad mad country...
The mighty mountains and white rivers of Nepal next.
Best Wishes.
AC.
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Vashinta
non-member comment
Belly is going to get ya!
Hi Andrew - after 7 weeks that wasn't bad going! It really does sound like the kind of experience everyone should have in their lifetime - hope I get to see a small part of it at least (could do without seeing the conveyer belt cremations though!) You are obviously a natural at all this backpacking stuff and should do it for a living. You are North London's answer to Michael Palin and that is high praise coming from me :-) Hope the Himalayas don't seem like an anti climax after your weird and wonderful experiences in India... Take care V x