Golden Temple in Amritsar

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I arrived in Amritsar in the night, and slept IN the Golden Temple. Amritsar is in Punjab, and the Golden Temple is considered the mecca for the Sikhs. Sikhism is an interesting religion - I find their religion to be honest, and they are out to help the less fortunate. This is why no matter what race or religion you are, if you need a place to stay, you can always stay IN the Golden Temple for free.

I was brought to the Golden Temple, and when I arrived I saw people lying absolutely everywhere on the floor. I turned to find a hostel (I don't mind sleeping on the floor, in fact I'm sure it would be cooler that way, but what about my backpack? It certainly wouldn't be there in the morning)... and a Sikh called out to me. I went to him and he showed me a door through which lay only foreigners. They had a section for tourists. It wasn't luxurious, but they had wooden lockers.

In the morning I visited the Golden Temple with a really nice Isreali, Ran. The Temple is stunning. It really is beautiful. It is very large and in the middle is a tower, C.O.M.P.L.E.T.E.L.Y covered in gold and kitschigly over-decorated with ornaments that make it so beautiful. The top of the tower is said to be of 700kg of pure gold. Surrounding this tower is holy water, and the Sikhs went in only to the knees or completely submerged themselves. It was very nice to be allowed to witness this, and they seemed proud that foreigners were taking interest in their religion. Here I encountered only kindness.
Inside the tower were 4 priests who were chanting (all day, constantly) from a pink book - the holy book. The inside of the tower is even more kitshig and beautiful, and they would hand out this brown, cookie dough looking substance. You must take it with both hands, touch your forhead, nose and then eat it. It is just flour and butter, and sweet. It is from God and is eaten as a blessing (and very yummy!). I befriended 2 young Indian girls who explained this to me.

Afterwards, Ran and I went to the dining hall of the Golden Temple. Up to 400,000 people eat in this hall (literally a huuuuuge hall with no tables or chairs) per day. You hear the clanging of metal dishes all round the clock. (even at 11pm when I went to sleep that night I could hear dishes being washed). We took our metal plates and went into the hall, sat in a row on the floor. Some Sikhs would walk along the rows, with large buckets and army style gave us Dahl, curry with chickpeas and naan bread. This was delicious (i especially enjoyed the dahl). We ate with our right hands. I was humbled by their kindness - the Sikhs let anyone in, and were so ready to share.

In the afternoon, I squeezed into a minibus that took us to the Pakistan/India border, to watch the ceremony that took place everyday for 20 mins at Dusk. This was a H.I.L.A.R.I.O.U.S. experience. The way the Indians would cheer and dance in order to be louder than the Pakistanis was funny. (Of course, being muslim, on the Pakistan side there was hardly anyone). We watched the guards open the gates, and shake hands .. and then proceed to literally STARE at each other. The Indian guards, who already had the funniest march to begin with, would then march up to the Pakistani guards (who likewise had the same march), and then turn their hands and pose in a funny way for a moment and then stand at attention to stare, stare, stare at the other country. I took so many videos ... alternatively you can try look it up on YouTube.

This is where I met Rosalynn from Mumbai, Thomas from Switzerland and Jugeon from Holland - Afterwards we went for a coffee and dinner in Amritsar. It was a good day.

I highly, highly recommend visiting the Golden Temple.

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Comments

[kishan]

Just so you know
Just to let you know, one of the founding stones of sikhism was to collect everyone (hindus/muslims) and feed them together so they learn to live together in peace and friendship. The food service comes from doanations and is called Langar. You can enjoy a langar anywhere in the world in any sikh temple. A very nice blog,