We woke up before the sun today to make our descend from Darjeeling to catch a 20 hour train ride to Varanasi. When we boarded the train a security guy came up to us warning us to be VERY careful with ourselves and our belongings. This is the first time I can recall anyone warning us about safety and theft while we have been here. He told us not to sleep because our possessions were not safe and told us not to take any food other passengers offered us because it could be laced with drugs. Repeatedly he said "be careful, be careful."- So we were. Luckily nothing happened, but there was definitely a different vibe on the train this time around. A few men were attempting to get a little too close for comfort, and as soon as the realized we were not girls to be messed with (we have all perfected our stare downs), they backed off.
The train got us to Varanasi around 5 in the morning. Varanasi is believed to be one of the oldest living cities in the world. Which is kind of ironic because this is where they burn bodies and dump the ashes in the river, or for pregnant women or children they just get dumped right in. We got checked into our guest house just in time to take the sunrise boat tour on the Ganges River. Ghats lined the river with two of them there specifically for body burnings. It wasn't as morbid as I anticipated it would be. I noticed only men were present at the ceremony, and later we found out that women are not allowed to go because they are unable to control their grieving which would prevent the deceased's spirit from passing on in peace. I thought that was pretty interesting. The streets of Varanasi were like none other I've ever seen. At one point today we were riding in a bicycle drawn rickshaw amongst hundreds of bikes, motor bikes, motor vehicles, ox drawn carts and men riding elephants. If that weren't bizarre enough, there would be processions or men chanting, carrying bodies on stretchers, made of bamboo garnished with gaudy tinsel, down to the river for burning. I almost walked head first into one of these stretchers when I came around a corner in the tiny backstreets of the old district.
The streets were a little more chaotic than usual while we were there due to elections. You could barely walk down the pedestrian roads because they were so congested with voters and police. It took us a while to figure that out, but once we did it made the elbows in the stomach and the shoves a little more bearable. We were in Varanasi for nearly three full days, and unfortunately I was in bed with heatstroke for two of them. It was pretty miserable, but a doctor came to see me and loaded me with some goods to make me feel better. This being said, I didn't get to see the full potential of this holy city but I did get a taste. We were supposed to head down to Badhavgarh National Park before heading to Agra, but with me being sick, we missed our train and ran out of time. I was really excited about trying to find me some tigers but I guess that will just have to wait until my next visit to India.
A little story to share:
We were eating lunch at the rooftop restaurant of our guest house and a monkey crawled up and sat on the corner of the wall. He seemed unimpressed with what he saw and he left. Then another monkey came up and surveyed the scene before settling on the table next to us. He walked along the ledge and pounced on the table and snagged a brand new pack of cigarettes. He took off to the roof below us, opened the pack and put half of them in his mouth like he was going to smoke them, spit them out and proceeded to do that with every last cig. Not sure what he was expecting but it definitely was entertaining. The monkey's are pests here but without fail will give you a good laugh.
Wednesday the 8th, we arrived in Agra: home of the infamous Taj Mahal.
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