Varanasi was supposed to be the highlight of my trip, but my experience was very much crippled by sickness in the group due to Delhi Belly as well as the worrisome news of COVID-19.
It was early in March, the outbreak just started in the US, and we were all glued to the news every morning on the number of cases while wondering when this would hit India or if it had already hit India but undetected due to the lack of medical resources.
Varanasi is breathtakingly beautiful, unlike any place that I have ever been to. I have the fondest memories of attending Aarti and waking up at dawn to the morning ritual for many at the River Ganga, but I was also left with sadness about the pollution, poverty as well as the handling of prostitution and widowed women.
A Brief Introduction of Varanasi
Varanasi is a city in the Northern Indian State of Uttar Pradesh, with a long history that dates back to 11th century B.C. It is regarded as the spiritual capital of India and it draws more than 3 million visitors each year. It sits on the bank of the most sacred Indian River: Ganga River.
According to Hindu legend, Lord Shiva unleashed the Ganges from a knot of his hair. For centuries, it brought fertility to the soil of the central plains and was credited for nourishing some of India’s most prominent ancient civilizations.
The Good
There are a total of 88 ghats in Varanasi. Ghats are riverfront steps that lead to the bank of the River. It would take months to explore each one of them!
Dashashwamedh Ghat is the most famous one as it is where the nightly Aarti happens. The Ganga Aarti is a nightly spiritual ritual where the Hindu priests use lamps that are circled around in a clockwise manner, accompanied by chants and songs in praise of Mother Ganga. When the ritual is complete, the Goddess showers her blessings onto each individual present there. Every night, thousands gather to receive the blessings. We attended the ceremony on the first night. I was so deeply touched and felt the peace and divinity in and around me. Unfortunately, the COVID-19 outbreak really escalated and we were not able to go back to take photos due to the safety concerns. It is a ritual that hasn’t missed a day for more than a thousand years, but it is stopped today amid the outbreak.
Below are a few images I took on my phone on the first day.
While Dashashwamedh Ghat is a not to miss big tourist attraction, the most fascinating ghat for me is cremation ghat. There are two cremation ghats in Varanasi named Dashashwamedh and Manikarnika. People travel from all over India to Varanasi to be openly cremated and have their ashes scattered in Ganga River in the hope to reach instant moksha - the liberation from the cycle of death and rebirth known as samsara.
Sandalwood is used to avoid any bad smells whilst the body is burning, as well as ghee which is smothered over the body. Women are not allowed on the cremation grounds and the flame for the cremation has been kept going for more than a thousand years!
There are certain groups of people who are not allowed to be cremated:
Pregnant women
Children under 8
Priests
Those who die from snakebite
Here are a few photos from the beautiful morning, where we witnessed the daily ritual for many locals: bathing, praying, and paying their respects to Mother Ganga.
I visited a Kushti school when I was in Varanasi. Kushti is mud-clay wrestling which dates back to the Mughals and is passed down from generation to generation. Often Kushti provides support to the poor families in the area as well. It is a dying art and the sport itself has strict rules applied.
Every morning, the students will prepare the reddish mud, by using a centuries-old formula: dirt, red ochre, buttermilk, and oil. They turn it over and over again until it becomes a crumble texture.
While Varanasi is known as the sacred place for Hinduism, you might be surprised to know more than 30 percent of the population are Muslims. We were in Varanasi when the unsettling violence just took place in New Delhi, but in this corner of India, the two cultures are living quite peacefully in coexistence. The Muslim community is known for weaving and silk-making, which have also become the dying craft with the rising mass production in far east Asia.
The Bad
Varanasi is a concentrated glimpse of what India travel looks like. The traffic, the noise, the dust, the cows in the middle of the street, the stray dogs, tuc tucs honking nonstop to get by. It is constant and overwhelming stimulation.
Indian people are some of the most friendly people I have met, but I am so disheartened to see poverty everywhere. Varanasi is developing towards urbanism but at the same time, poverty is accelerating. A good portion of the Varanasi economy also depends on tourism which is hit badly during COVID-19.
The Ugly
Pollution
I highly recommend watching this video by Film Director Pete McBride. It examines the paradox of the Gange Rivers: from its pristine source 18,000 feet in the Himalaya, it follows the journey of the water 1500 miles to its terminus all while studying water samples and pollution levels.
Ganga River is the holy water for Hindus, and it is also the place where people bath, dump dead bodies, pee, brush teeth, spill sewage and toxic industrial waste, and so on. I tried to avoid the discussion of the water pollution with our local Indian colleges, worried I would offend them in certain ways. After all, this is holy water for them.
You can read more about one of the most polluted rivers here and its cleanup effort here:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pollution_of_the_Ganges
Prostitution
I highly recommend you read a book called “Kaleidoscope City: A Year in Varanasi”, which gives you a very realistic look at all of the good, the bad, and the ugly parts of Varanasi.
Varanasi has one of the highest prostitution populations in India, including sex trafficking, minor sex workers. In addition to Indian women, many of them are from nearby countries such as Pakistan and Nepal. This is the dark side of Varanasi I don’t think I will visit, but it is heartbreaking to read the stories of those women, and the very little help they get from the family, police, and government.
Widowed Women
Varanasi has more than 40000 widowed women. In Varanasi society widows are considered to be inauspicious. When a woman gets married at a young age, she receives a blessing to stay married. But when she outlives her husband, her family abandons her at an old age home or just on the street. Widow remarriage is still frowned upon so most of them chose not to remarry.
They wear white clothes, so they are very easy to spot in Varanasi. Without any source of income and a home to go back to, they live in poor conditions. In Varanasi, a woman has no value once her husband dies.
Just the thought of this breaks my heart.
Varanasi is beautiful and intense. For some, they become addicted to the charms of Varanasi, and go back again and again. For me, I would need a break from all of the overstimulation before I will visit again. The good, the bad, and the ugly, that is my bittersweet Varanasi.