Homecoming in Banaras

---

Although I will continue to insist that I want to travel and experience the whole world, I would be lying if I said I didn't have some special attachment to South Asia. When I was considering this job in Bangladesh, a small part of me hesitated to return to the sub-continent, afraid that I would start to accumulate a resume that suggested regional specialization. But of course there was that other part of me--the one that wanted to be able to visit my old stomping grounds in North India, the one that wanted to be as close as possible to Nepal, the one that wanted to check another country off of the regional list.

So here I am in Bangladesh, loving the new perspective on South Asia--learning new things about Islam, about what it means to be a country full of water, about relationships between local super powers (India--ahem) and their poor country cousins (Bangladesh). But again, I would be lying if I didn't admit to taking my first opportunity to take a break from the 'desh and run back to India. With my three month Bangladeshi visa approaching expiration and with the major local holiday of Dev Dipawali (or Deep Diwali, or Deep Dipawali, or Dev Diwali--or some combination thereof) set for the middle of November, I took off last week for Varanasi (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Varanasi)--the city where I spent my junior year abroad and the place that initiated my love affair with the subcontinent.

It has only been 18 months since I was last in the city (also known as Banaras, or Benares, or Kashi, or something along those lines--India has a thing for multiple names). But the changes are remarkable. For a city that is popularly known as being "at least twenty years behind the rest of India," Banaras is doing a rather impressive job of closing that gap. Globalization, new job markets, and India's rising middle class are bringing grocery stores and girls on motorbikes to Banaras at a pace that makes you realize the unavoidable creep of "modernity."

Looking across the new ghats (sets of stairs leading to the Mata Ganga, or Ganges River) that were built by the tourism board or listening to rumors of the government's plans to bulldoze parts of old town (believed to be around 3,000 years old) and build a "security corridor," I had visions of myself in 50 years: an old woman in a salwaar suit telling anyone who will listen about what Banaras was like when I lived there. It's a frightening thing to realize how quickly the world changes and how quickly you grow old with it.

The signs of a growing tourism industry in Banaras are unavoidable. Where once the evening aarti (a worship ceremony designed to put the goddess Ganga who lives in the river to sleep) at Dashashwamedh was conducted by 5 priests, the number has doubled and the display has been tidied up, with fancier platforms and bright lights to showcase the priests in their synchronized movements. But change, of course, is not necessarily a bad thing, and the Deep Dipawali version of the ceremony was somewhat progressive in that it involved women as attendants to the priests, who had previously held a fairly strict male dominance over the performance of public religious ceremonies.

The holiday itself was a bit different than I remembered it being three years ago. The word "deep" refers to a small candle set in a homemade clay pot, and the holiday of Deep Diwali is so named because millions of these deeps were traditionally lit on this day in offering and prayer. This year the city seemed to have adopted a considerably more modern interpretation of the term and used white strings of electric lights instead of candles to hang from building facades and decorate the ghats. Of course deeps have not been completely obliterated from the tradition, and I do recall electric lights from my first Deep Diwali, but the balance seems to be tipping toward these snazzier and longer lasting "candles." This year's celebration also seemed to involve alot more blaring Bollywood pop from the ghats, an effect that I'm fairly certain clashed with my memories of Deep Diwali as a beautiful and peaceful time.

But I cannot bemoan every consequence of tourism, and I am quite happy to report that the ghats no longer smell overwhelmingly of urine and that the streets are no longer dotted with burning piles of trash (though the air quality doesn't necessarily reflect this exciting turn of events).

The most noteworthy changes are those that relate to the people who defined my time in Banaras. No longer when I sit on the ghat can I count on the candle selling kids or the boat men to strike up a conversation. The kids I once knew to harass tourists to buy deeps for making offerings have now grown up and most have disappeared. The one who remains is, at the probable age of 14 or 15, now a bit of a "big kid" on the ghat and runs his own chai stand; with obvious pride he invited me to drink a cup of tea with him but I had to refuse, afraid of how old I would feel if one of the ghat kids was able to act as my host.

Simiarly my friends Bharat and Pradip can no longer be counted on to sit and have a chat on the ghat; their family boat business has exploded and they now run a fleet of various sized boats that run along the ghats. It's not that I want these people to sell flowers and struggle to feed their families as boat rowers for the rest of their lives, but for the first time I know what it is like to return to a place and discover that it and its people have moved on without you.

Thankfully there are some constants, and I was relieved to walk into my old bangle shop and find my old bangle-wala smiling at me with remnants of glitter on his face (the hazards of working in a women's jewelry store). Past the entrance to the Vishvanath temple and into the depths of the old city lanes, I made my way to Banaras Art Emporium and discovered that Arun-ji still sells beautiful handloomed silk scarves from a small room on the ground floor of his apartment. He still insists on talking about weather and politics for the first forty five minutes of your visit (and does an impressive job of steering conversation away from your intentions to purchase), and he still conducts the eventual interaction with an air of art and ritual. He still buys famous Banarasi kheerkadams for his well-known clients and still insists that you pop the whole sweet (made fresh in the city's oldest sweet shop around the corner) into your mouth at one time.

Arun-ji still sounds like an Indian version of Kermit the Frog, especially when he yells; but now when he yells up to his sons to help him fold up piles of silk, these tall grown young men emerge from the upper levels of the centuries old house. The youngest son now speaks impeccable English and has taken over many of the steps of the purchasing process. But it is unlikely that he will take over the family business. Arun-ji reports that he now employs 1/3 as many weavers in his loom factories, and that it is increasingly difficult to find workers who want to work in traditional cities. Instead they are all running off to the cities, seeking jobs in shopping centers and offices. Arun-ji predicts that in two years production of his silk scarves will come to a complete halt, and he will have to find a new industry for the family business.

If I had my way I would stop the passage of time in a few instances. I would will Rozi's family to delay the upcoming visit of a potential marriage suitor, so that she could continue to take vocational classes from a local NGO and improve her chances of being able to realize her potential as an independent minded and strong willed young woman. But at the age of 23 Rozi is already avoiding the inevitable, and it is unlikely that she will be able to forestall an arranged marriage for much longer. Her cousin Ferdous, with whom I also used to visit, is now married and five months pregnant, putting more pressure on Rozi to start a family life of her own.

I would halt the influx of tourists and demand a return to the simple aarti ceremonies that I remember, but I would hesitate to do so if it meant that the ghats would always smell like pee and the air would be clouded with the smell of burning plastic.

I would insist that the old lanes of Dashashwamedh remain small and cramped, and that the government forget its hideous plan of wiping them out to build large roads. But in the wake of last year's Sankat Mochan Temple bombings that left more than twenty people dead, such an argument against the security measures required of our day would be futile. I only hope that my favorite tree, growing from the front of a home that is older than most of us can imagine and crawling up through the layers of century-old architecture toward the open air above old town, will be spared. I imagine that as I return to Banaras over the years (if I continue to be lucky enough to do so) I will find in this tree a testament to the timeliness of a city that claims to be one of the oldest continually lived in cities in the world, and I will share with it the knowledge of what it means to be a witness to the march of time and the development of a nation.

---

Photos

Crowds walking to bathe in the Ganga
on the auspicious day of Kartik Purnima

My very large Indian family
This is only a quarter or so of the people who live in the household

The roommates
Who were gracious enough to let me drag them around Banaras and subject them to explanations of how the city used to be

New ghats
These ghats didn't exist when I lived in Banaras--they were just muddy banks of the Ganga, populated by water buffalo and dotted with impropmptu land fills. Now it looks like a circus.

The glare of the main ghat
lit up on Deep Diwali

Comments

[harp]

hey there
i happen to be in banareas first time few weeks back it was most amazing trip in india i took so far. even though knowing how dirty they have made the city but i still happen to find beautfiul things out of i t. like your blog very interesting...though..