Varanasi

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As we exited the Golden Temple of Varanasi, I began to realize that, although I was again on a normal Indian diet of curry, rice and naan, I was still having some slight stomach issues. Klaudia had walked into a jewelry store with Vicky and Roman - the very positive couple we’d met in Khajuraho, she from Azerbajain, he from Kiev, both now living in New York – while I waited outside because I was hot and not in the mood to shop. My stomach grumbled…



“Oh, man… This is it…” I groaned to myself. I quickly walked into the store, gave Klaudia the money in my pocket – leaving myself some in the event I’d have to pay for a bathroom – and went in search of relief.



In short, there was none to be found: I turned left, I turned right, then left again… Nothing… Finally, I spotted a guesthouse and quickly entered the lobby.



“Can I please use a bathroom?” I asked frantically.



“No, manager not here. No bathroom.”



“What does the manager have to do with me using the bathroom?”



“Manager not here.”



“Please…” I moaned.



“Manager not here.”



I heaved expletives out loud as I left the guesthouse; I noticed a cyber café not far away and proceeded towards it.



“No bathroom,” was the regretful response to my request.



“Where do you go?” I asked.



“At home.”



“Of course you do. Unbelievable...” I heaved more expletives out in the street; the situation was becoming dangerously dire when my context shifted: I’d seen it a hundred times in India already. Why not? So what if I was a tourist? I have to go… I noticed a cow going right at that moment… There were only three little kids around… Who cares what they thought?



“This is it,” I thought as I reached for my belt buckle. Slowly, I undid my belt, but hesitated a moment… I scanned the narrow alleyway I found myself in once more - still only the same three kids, who were now observing me inquisitively.



“Yep, I’ve seen the Indians do this a hundred times already. And I doubt I’m the first tourist to do this… This just can’t wait and it’s going to happen whether I like it or not,” I whispered to myself as I was now grabbing my pants’ button. Suddenly, I heard a “Hey!” and I turned around. A man was waving to me.



“Toilet?!” he yelled.



“Yes!” I replied. We waved to me to come over.



“My home,” he said once I’d run over to him. I thanked him and barged into his house, quickly noticing the dusty concrete floor and the complete lack of furniture except for a TV stand and one wooden rocking chair; a woman in a sari was lying on a mat on the floor with a child; it was very dark. The man led me to an Indian-style toilet; there was no door and it could partially be seen from the living area: if anyone turned their heads from the TV, they could easily see me squatting. “Thank you!” I said again as he walked away to allow me as much privacy as I could have in a one-room home with a toilet with no door.



“Crap!” I thought when I’d finished: I’d forgotten to take toilet paper with me. “Looks like a totally Indian bathroom experience,” I thought as I looked at my left hand. I was grateful when I noticed soap and washed my hands thoroughly. It saves on paper, that’s for sure.



As I was leaving, the family of three smiled; I reached into my pocket in expectation when the man said, “No,” with a bigger smile. Up to this point, the majority of my dealings with the Indian people was with the tourist industry, which is, simply put, full of chicanery; and I had forgotten that a human being can do something for another human being without seeking reciprocity. I thanked him again while he patted me on the shoulder as I left, both of us laughing (he more boisterously). Walking back towards the jewelry store, I thought, “Yes, if there is a God – and if that God is a vengeful one that created a hell, where he decides to send me – He will give me diarrhea and send me to Varanasi”.



Indeed, Varanasi, India’s holiest city, is the best and the worst of India comingled into one wacky microcosm: it is the filthiest city I have ever seen in my life, yet, in an oddly metaphorical sort of way, is the most colorful; the hassling is absolutely nonstop, but the shopping is great; I’m certain giardiasis is rampant, yet the food is some of the best I’d had in India.



Our time spent there was leisurely: we walked the ghats with Vicky and Roman, watched water buffalo bathe in the Ganges - along with the locals and Sadhus - and Klaudia shopped while I ate. The four of us took a sunset boat ride one night, mesmerized by the fading light on the ghats and the hundreds of lit, floating candles in the river. We lit our own candles and said a wish as we let them go in the river. We visited the esteemed Varanasi University, which had a lovely – and clean – campus and attended the nightly Puja during the evening, amazed at the size of the congregation in attendance that clapped and sang along with the esoteric religious chants. At night, the stray dogs rule the streets as the cows and people sleep.



Our first day there, we witnessed the cremation of bodies on the ghats. Naturally, people who have not yet been to Varanasi ask us about our impressions of watching a body be cremated on the shores of a river. At this point, after a month of desensitization, one might as well ask me what it’s like to see Indians eat with their hands: it’s just something they do. Put another way, in survey form, which of the following choices do you find most “normal”:

1. Cows are considered holy and you can go to jail for hurting or killing one. They are allowed to roam the streets almost wherever they like and you have witnessed them cause traffic jams on busy streets, defecate everywhere, including near produce stands, and eat burning trash on the side of the road. Miraculously, you have only stepped in cow poop once, but it was really bad that time. As you’re trying to clean your shoes, you’re intrigued by the fact that you have to look out for it in a city.

2. You’re walking along the street minding your own business when, suddenly, a woman runs over to the street and, lifting up her sari, releases an explosion of diarrhea on the street within a yard of your feet. You run for your life.



3. Sadhus, or holy men, are everywhere in Varanasi. You learn that there are more than 30 castes of sadhus and that the members of the lowest of these castes spend their time in complete public nudity, rubbing only ash on their bodies. As you’re walking along the ghats, you notice one of these naked holy men and stare a bit - being the heterosexual male that you are, you do your best not to glance down. However, having gone to an American high school where you played some sports, you’ve showered with other boys and know that sometimes the eyes will inadvertently wander. What you’ve never seen though – again, as a heterosexual male – is an erect penis, outside of pornography of course. Well, the sadhu has one… You are embarrassed…



4. You’re walking along the narrow streets of Varanasi when you hear your wife scream. There is a stream of water falling from a balcony. At first you think someone may be watering some plants, but when you look up, you see that it’s something peeing... Perhaps a child? Nope, it’s a monkey that’s peeing on your wife. It’s another Asian monkey attack!



5. Walking along the ghats again, you watch a ritual that is thousands of years old, wherein a family bids farewell to a loved one. Instead of an open casket wake, which has people gawking at a dead body for 3 days, they place the deceased loved one on a large pile of wood and, after a male family member, usually a son, walks around the pile of wood seven times, he sets the wood on fire. The body is reduced to ash, which is then spread in the Ganges River, which the people consider holy. It would not be India if even this ritual was not without, from your viewpoint, some controversy: women are not allowed to attend the ceremony because, as explained to you, they cry too loudly. There are also certain exceptions as to who is cremated and some deceased are simply dropped in the water, such as pregnant women and people with disabilities, the thought being that the former does not need to be burned because she was carrying a being without sin while the latter has suffered enough already. But, as someone who has experienced the death of loved ones, you understand that it’s just a different type of funeral.


Yes, Klaudia got peed on by a monkey and I stepped in cow poop, avoided a dangerous splash of human poop, and tried not to look at an erection. Varanasi’s an interesting place, to say the least. Although I personally think one would have to have a screw loose to live there, I’m not surprised to see foreigners, with some screws loose, living there: it is the spiritual home of India - as wondrous as it is perplexing, as enticing as it is repelling - in the backdrop of a septic river that has possessed a status of holiness for thousands of years.



When it was time to leave – we to Bodhgaya, Vicky and Roman to Rishikesh – we left the narrow alleyways near the ghats and reached a busy Indian road, where we decided to share a tuk-tuk to the train station. As we were negotiating with one the drivers, I noticed I was standing in the street and moved closer to the parked tuk-tuks. My thoughts wandered a bit when I noticed a cool t-shirt; suddenly, I felt a tug on my backpack. I immediately pulled myself forward, but to no avail as the tug strengthened and I was air-born momentarily before crashing on top of a fallen motorcycle. I swiftly stood up and started yelling at the motorcyclist who’d just hit me – India could not kill me with bacteria, so now it was sending in the crazy drivers. Luckily, a policeman showed up to calm me down and the entire situation. The driver’s bike was damaged more than I was, so I let it go.



The four of us crammed into the tuk-tuk and were off to another Indian adventure.

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