Holy Ghats and Cricket Bats.

Namaste everyone.

We have decided to be 'good' with our blog since we only have about two weeks of travel writing left and want to keep the updates going until we are home.

We are currently in the Hindu holy city of Varanasi. It is an ancient and beautiful place, the winding lanes of the Old City are filled with new discoveries, wondrous silk shops and plenty of paan stands. The city sits upon India´s holiest river, the Mother Ganga. All along the river are Ghats (stairs that lead to the water), which have various functions. For example, early in the morning several of the Ghats are used for the performance of Puja (offerings to various Deities, Shiva is particularly popular here...) but perhaps most famously is the Ghat closest to where we are staying, known as the ´Burning Ghat´. As Varanasi is the most auspicious place to die, Hindus come in droves to spend their dying days here or their bodies are brought from all over the country to be cremated and washed in the Ganga. It is believed that if you die and are cremated at Varanasi, you will acheive Moksha or in other words, you will be liberated from the life cycle of re-incarnation.

Admittedly, the first sight of the Burning Ghats is overwhelming. As we approached, I thought, well...maybe no one died today and we won´t see any corpses burning! But, silly Maeve, over 250 people are cremated at Varanasi every day and so there is almost no chance you will not see a corpse being cremated on the several pyres which are lit. We sat for a good while and watched the processes taking place, and essentially saw every aspect of the ritual. It is a beautiful thing to see and not at all gruesome, but oddly peaceful. Holy cows, goats and dogs peruse the piles of logs awaiting their fate, and children play happily and swim nearby. For everyone here, there is nothing morbid about death, cremation, corpses, ashes...it is just a necessary part of life, one we will all experience some day.

The process from start to finish takes about three and a half hours. Firstly, the body is carried by 'untouchable´ (yes, the caste system is alive and well in India, sorry to tell you Gandhiji) down to the Burning Ghat through the winding lanes of the old city. The bodies are covered in the most beautiful shrouds, fabrics which one would expect of India. Upon reaching the Ghat, the family takes the body, which is on a sort of bamboo stretcher, and washes it in the Ganga. Well, it is more like a total immersion of the body in the river, to ensure it is completely covered. Once this has taken place, the pyre is built for the body to rest on. The family removes the shroud and covers the face with a white sheet (the rest of the body is wrapped in it already, under the shroud) and they place the body on the pyre. The ´untouchables´ who handle the pyre and the wood then place several more pieces of wood on top of the body and set it alight. The fire comes from the Holy Fire Temple, which has a fire said to have burned for over 10,000 years (we heard 5,000 and 15,000 so I average it for you) that was lit by the God Shiva the destroyer himself. The body takes three hours to burn. Once the body has turned completely to ash, another ´untouchable´ comes to sift through it, in hopes of finding left over jewellery or gold that may have been spared. The ashes are then spred into the Ganga.

The cremation is exempt for the following, who are already considered to be pure: babies, pregnant women, victims of cobra bites, lepards, holy Hindu Sadhus and animals. In all of these cases, the family ties a large stone to their bodies and releases them into the Ganga.

It is quite a process. The wood for the pyre can be very expensive, sandalwood being the most expensive of course. Relative women are not allowed to come to the Ghat. You can all imagine my outrage when I was told this, in my western mindset I was unable to fathom the gross injustice of disallowing women from being part of the final funerary process. It was explained to me that this was so for two reaons...firstly, it is believed that crying during the process of this liberation would disrupt the soul of the deceased to be released and would be bad luck. (Okay, I thought grumpily, so women are the only ones who cry?!) but secondly and perhaps slightly more sensical, is that women are disallowed from being present in an effort to cut down on the problem of Sati - widows throwing themselves onto their husbands funeral pyres. So that is that.

Varanasi is a wonderful and religious city. We took an early morning boat ride along the Ganga yesterday to see the performance of Puja. Hundreds of Indians happily swimming and washing and going about their daily business. We have stayed here a bit longer than anticipated which is because of the spirit of the city but also because I had a terrible bug yesterday (I suspect the pakoras...) and am still recovering from it. Tomorrow night we leave for Agra, home to Dr. Aziz Assam (if you are familiar with Midnight´s Children) but most famously home to the Taj Mahal.

We have been spending a good amount of time on the train here, and have still a bit more to go until we are in Delhi. The trains are a curious thing but quite lovely when you get used to it (and when you are not the unfortunate victim of having your fingers crushed by the steel window shutter, which I was, but the bruises have subsided and I am still enamoured with the train).

Not much else to write now, expect that we are doing off tonight to enjoy some lovely classical Indian music. Must soak up all we can, in the little time we have left.

Lots of love to you all,

Maeve/Jay