In which Alison is a river bum on the Ganges, but at least has not grown crazy dreadlocks like lots of the other tourists here

I’d like to open this entry with a HAPPY SINTERKLASS to the two Duchie’s in my life, Michelle and Lisette. I hope that you got lots and lots of good surprises and were not taken to a coal mine by six-to-eight Black men (especially since I’d have to pay more rent). Appropriately, this is story contains a little Sinterklass miracle, straight from Holland, with a little pick-me-up mixed with a kick in the butt.

So, after I arrived in Varanasi, I was pretty tired, a little confused, and trying to figure out where to go next. Sounds like a good time to go to eat. I went to a little place recommended in the Rough Guide, which had live music and apparently good food. Since it’s recommended, it was totally packed, and about 4 minutes after I sat down an older couple was seated with me at my table. I didn’t mind at all. They were 60 (they told me, since they got their first senior citizen discount on the Indian train) and when I asked where they were from, they said “Holland”. I was so excited, telling them about my roommate who was Dutch, my friend from Tamil Nadu who was Dutch and how Dtuch people seem to be following me through the world. The woman, Esil (I think that’s what she said) was a music teacher in Holland who came to India every two years to teach at a school for street children. She showed me pictures of the murals she helped them paint, in between complaining about the food (“Do you like Indian food? I don’t! But I like India”) and the music (“It sounds like a sick cat!”) in the funniest way possible. I told her about my travels, and though she seemed to assume that I had had a much more intense experience than I had (Her tone implied that there must have been lines of the dieing on the hospital floor, waiting to be released from their suffering. She really didn’t believe that it was pretty much ok) we had a lovely dinner. She’s been to India 6 times over 12 years, and I confessed to her some of my troubles with being alone and deciding where to go. She poo-pooed Amristar (“The Golden Temple is lovely, but it’s a day to get thre and a day to get back, and in between you are in Amristar. It’s phfffft”) and provided some good common sense (“You like it here? Stay here.”) which should have been obvious, but of course wasn’t since I was too close to the situation. So, I’ve decided to stay here in Varanasi (which I do really like, it’s relaxing somehow) until the 7th, then head straight to Agra (“You have to do the Taj. It’s like a mountain, it’s there, so you go”) and then to Delhi on the 12th. This gives me lots more time in each place, which I think that I need. I need time to decompress, and to stop moving around every two days. Also, dinner was another new amazing Indian food, Kofta. They were staying at the same hotel as me, so we walked back together (stopping at a roadstead for Gulab Jamon on the way). It was nice to have guides, since it was dark.

The next morning, I got up early for no reason except that prayers to the river started at 5:30 in the morning. I was up to watch the sun rise, then walked by the river and trough the Old City, look for an internet café or food place that was open. One thing I don’t understand about India is why, if everyone gets up at 5, does nothing open until 10 in the morning. I made a “friend” who offered to show me around for no money, just the chance to visit his shop. I let him walk up to the burning Ghat with me, and he seemed like a genuinely nice guy, leaving when I said I wanted breakfast and needed to write to my parents. I eventually ended up back at the hotel, using their overpriced (if really, really fast) internet and eating a lovely breakfast on the rooftop, while the boats took group s of yellow-hatted tourists up and down the river. That day, I was very lazy. I just wandered the Ghats, then when to the train station to change my tickets. This was a bit of a nightmare, as I bought them using my debit card and the station here has no credit card machine. So, I had to fill out a form that they will send to New Delhi which will enable them to credit my accout. About 2 hours into this, I realized that it wasn’t worth the ten dollars, but the process had started by then and you can’t stop burocracy. The worst part was when I came out. My ricksaw, which I hadn’t paid but had asked to wait “10 or 15 minutes!” had gone. So, somewhere in this city is a cheated angry ricksaw driver, and I feel terrible about the bad karma I accrued. I found another rickshaw and then visited a Durga temple, which was a ways away from the Hotel, but worth a visit. The whole thing was painted red, and the floor was clean marble, the statues gold and very different than the ones in the South. These were less representational, more just mask shapes, except for the tigers that Durga rides, which were standing guard over the main shrine and looked like the Lions at the Art Institute. I walked back to the hotel, wandering through the Old City streets, stopping at a restaurant for the best paneer I’ve ever tasted (I know that it sounds like I describe the food a lot, but it’s so good and I don’t want to forget it. As my nutrition book would say, I eat because of external cues (emotion, food being appealing) as often as hunger). That night, I read in my room, finishing The God of Small Things, which takes place in the backwaters of Kerala and late at night, I stopped up at the roof for a midnight drink of hot milk. Dill, the head waiter, sat with me and we chatted through a hot milk and a hot lemon water that someone had made two of by mistake. He is getting married “in 3-5 years” and told me that I need to come back to visit when that happens. I’m really tempted.

This morning, I took a boat ride at dawn, watching the sun come up from the middle of the river, alone in my boat but surrounded by dozens of others. I put a flower candle into the water, not exactly sure what I should be thinking or saying or praying but just sending good wishes out to the world. I saw my first floating baby (children, pregnant women, lepers, and snake bite victims are not cremated, just placed in the water), which was being snapped at hungrily by a dog. Surprising, then that I could eat puri with the richest vegetable curry I’ve ever had for breakfast. The problem with my eating here is that I get starving for breakfast, eat a lot, am not hungry till 3 or 4, then eat a lot again and get hungry by morning. I need more than two meals a day (though I have started to supplement meals with curd, fresh yogurt they sell in stalls in the city out of clay bowls).

Today, I mostly shopped, though for the afternoon I relaxed on the terrace of the hotel , reading abnormal psych. Tomorrow, probably more of the same, but I will write again before I leave for Agra.