Our Goddess Ganga presides at Varanasi too.
It’s one of the oldest, continually inhabited cities of the world. At Varanasi long stretches of steps, called ‘ghats’, slip down her banks.
Here people of India wash clothes, do yoga, offer blessings, sell flowers, get massages, play cricket, fly kites, wash buffaloes, take ‘holy dips’ and cremate loved ones.
It’s an intimate affair; this love for Ganga. A tough love …
Death tugs pilgrims towards Ganga. Come breathe your last here and escape the cycle of birth and death. Come incinerate your body here and reach heaven without a sin. Come to the holiest funeral destination.
And the beating heart stops at a Ghat called Manikarnika. It’s a busy place.
Outcasts (called ‘doms’) carry a corpse, a lucky corpse, on a bamboo stretcher. They pass through the old city to the Burning Ghat. Slow steps down to immerse the corpse in the waters of Ganga. Here family members negotiate with wood merchants and cremators. Piles of firewood stack high. Each wood has its own price, sandalwood is expensive. Each body has its own weight. It is an art to completely incinerate a body. Calculate the price and pay. A merchants weighs logs, a cremator lights the fire. Temple priests console loved ones. Bells clang. A body burns. Ashes soften in the Ganga. Complete and perfect. And again, 300 times a day.
Harry and I, stare with others, uncomfortably. But we don’t turn away.
An amazing experience!
Ongelooflik!
That’s amazing. Your pictures bring me right into the scene along with you.
WOW, …. what insights . Glenn is missing you. Almost home time. wishing you safe passage..
Fascinating. No ground being wasted on burials. Pity about the possible deforestation. Thanks very much for sharing. I suppose asking for a daily update is pushing my luck!!! :-)
Internet and time prevents this!
Amazing integration of daily life and death- all in a well orchestrated dance.
Water = life in most ancient cities. Just goes to show how much the water means to them. Thanks for sharing.
The Goddess Ganga—Varanasi—-just names we’d heard somewhere in the past——Not now——-amazing facts and again wonderful pictures !!
Awesome. You must have done a lot of research to follow what was going on. Worth the early rise. GJ