It Ain’t Half Hot Mum!

STATS: Day count=69; Current Illness count=1 (Chris just recovered from more major bout of “Delhi Belly”); theft count=0; rip-off count=1; tourist screw-up count=1.7; Chris’ photo count=717; Emma’s photo count=31

The trip from Bodhgaya to Varanasi was interesting. We had got ourselves onto a private bus (i.e. not a standard scheduled service) which ran overnight – from 8pm to 4:30am. When it hadn’t arrived by 9pm we were getting a little concerned – the travel agent was waiting with us, to his credit, though the bull**** he fed us about an argument between driver an agent at the town prior to ours where the bus started didn’t wash and our suspicions that the bus had actually broken down and they were busy phoning around to try to get another one sorted was proven to be probably correct when it arrived at 9:30pm, already packed with people (we had reserved seats, as had everyone else, but there were not enough to go around). So we’re pretty certain they piggy-backed on top of another service that was already full. However, they did make us sit in our own seats, turfing out the people already sitting there, and no one complained at all. There were people standing in the aisles, struggling to sit down, but they all just helped each other as best they could and didn’t moan about it, or even try to jump into each other’s seats at the toilet / food stops. It’s another trait we have noticed here more and more – one minute people are arguing vehemently and being in each other’s faces (the concept of personal space isn’t really honoured here, but then in a country with a population of over 1bn and nearly half of people living as families in 1-room houses, I guess there’s no such thing as ‘personal space’!) and the next minute they are being really helpful to one another and always just making the best of a bad situation. We’re growing to like India, as we get used to the cultural differences!

Varanasi is another big city, somewhat like Kolkata – unfortunately for us! We deliberately went for a more expensive hotel to ease us in gently. We also opted for a couple of tour trips, rather than doing everything independently as we usually do – turned out to be a good idea as the trips were fairly cheap and we were the only ones on them. Not too impressed by the guide, who was somewhat arrogant and disinterested (and we didn’t really trust him!) but the trips were good – we can certainly see why people who visit India on tours come back loving it – without the ‘struggle’ (that the two of us had, at least) of needing to adjust to the culture, deal with it minute by minute and live in the middle if it, the place is really interesting. A boat trip on the Ganges past the different ghats (long flights of steps leading down to the water’s edge) at sunrise watching the people flock to bath, wash clothes and / or spiritually welcome the sunrise was well worth the 5am start! The ‘burning ghats’, where they carry dead bodies to the waterfront and then cremate them, were especially interesting. We also visited numerous temples – both Hindu and Buddhist – and to the guide’s credit, he got us into a large temple to Vishnu just as they were performing a morning ritual, which was really interesting to watch. We visited the nearby town of Sarnath, which is where the Buddha gave his first sermon after enlightenment, so we are really following the Buddhist trail at the moment! Yet more Buddua statues – I tend to agree with Sue – I’m not sure He would have approved of this sort of idolatry!

We had booked our next 3 train journeys in advance (as the trains were still really booked up) and just as we were about to leave Varanasi, I came down with a more severe bout of ‘Delhi-belly’ than before. The prospect of a 7 hour train trip followed by a 4 hour bus trip didn’t really appeal at that stage, funnily enough, so we abandoned that leg of the trip and holed up in the same hotel for another few days – I stayed in the room until the worst was over – Em enjoyed the swimming pool (yep, the place even had a pool – although I think that may have been where I got the illness from!) and the food (which is REALLY good in India – shame I lost my appetite for 4 days!). So we missed out on our trip to Khajuraho, but instead progressed to our next destination, Jalgaon, via Satna.

The train to Satna was a day train, 7 hours, no problem. Lots of people selling chai (tea) and snacks on the train – would have been great if I wasn’t off food! We had an overnight stop at Satna, which we were expecting to be dire – given reviews we had read, but we liked it – the people hassled us a lot less, were helpful in our struggle to find a hostel and it came across as a laid back, friendly place. We got a lot of stares – the place isn’t visited by Westerners very often, and the kids were really curious, but it all came across as friendly.

Next morning, another train – this time a 12 hour journey which got a bit boring after a while! Past lots and lots of farmland, massive brick making areas, small villages and desert-like landscapes. People sat around us were very friendly, though without much English (and our Hindi has not progressed past the obligatory ‘hello’ and ‘thank you’ yet!). Surprising how tiring it can be sitting down for 12 hours! We are reading a lot of books!

Got to Jalgaon which is another nice, friendly, laid-back place. Not sure if we are liking India more as we are adapting to it and getting used to it, or if it is because we are moving south to new places that seem friendlier, and somewhat cleaner (still poverty around, but a stronger sense of pride in the town) – probably a mixture of both. Nice hostel here – very clean with a really helpful (sometimes overly-helpful!) manager and a great restaurant round the corner (my appetite is returning!).

We have used Jalgaon as a base for exploring a couple of cave temple areas nearby – one is 1.5hrs away by bus, the other 4.5hrs away (‘nearby’ is a relative term). These were really interesting places to visit – some cave temples date from about 200BC and the temples have all been cut out of the rock by hand and contain really impressive sculptures (again, hewn from the solid rock), paintings, ornate pillars and entranceways etc.

One temple (Kailasa Temple around 760AD, photos below) took 150 years to build, effectively by just digging it out from above and is massive, with many intricate and interesting sculptures lining the walls. We would have loved to have spent a little longer in that temple, looking around, but there was a swarm of bees that was busy chasing people out of the temple all day, so we made a fairly hasty, though of course dignified, exit. The mixture of religions in one place (Jainism, Hinduism and Buddhism) shows a great acceptance and integration too – if only that could be expanded further! By the end of our 2 day cave-temple visits we were a little cave-templed out, having walked around (in 40+ degree heat) about 50 temples!

 

Much less spitting going on here, too. Which is nice. Plenty of cows and goats wandering around the streets – even the stray dogs are friendly! You still take you life in your hands when you cross the street, however, and if you ever feel the need for a roller-coaster ride in India – just sit at the back of a local bus. It has the added excitement of playing ‘chicken’ with the lorries coming in the opposite direction.

The caste system is alive and well in India, despite rumours to the contrary and attempts by the government to dispel it. Our tour guide in Varanasi spent most of his time telling us that he was a member of the Brahmin priest class, in case we didn’t quite get it the first 8 times, and refused to come in to the weaving factory we visited as it is a place for a lower caste. It is also funny how the manger of our hotel has to wait for his ‘boy’ (a bloke of around 50+ years of age) before we can get a bucket of hot water – even though it is a 2 minute job filling the bucket from the tank nearby!

Why do people seem to spend a lot of effort drying out the cow pats here? I’m guessing they use them for burning, but if anyone knows better, let me know. And – in a place full of dust and grime, and little clean water, how do the women keep their brightly coloured saris so clean?

We have become celebrities. Everyone seems to want to take our photo. Or they pretend to be taking a photo of something else, but are actually taking one of us. I expect to be on the next front cover of Hello magazine. Emma is getting a little fed up with being unsubtly photographed. I’d be hypocritical if I felt the same, as it is usually me doing the photographing! We’re obviously in a place that doesn’t see many Westerners, though. And we have made a resolution to be nicer to tourists in the UK – it isn’t always easy, this travelling lark, and more importantly, we’ve found that for us a simple smile or some help from a local can mean the difference between hating a place (be it a town, city or country) and loving it. We’re so fickle!

Rip-off count increased slightly as everyone here seems to want to rip us off. Must be a national pastime or something. Even when the price of a bottle of water is written in both Hindi and English above the door of the shop, and on the bottle itself as 12 rupees, they still only try to give us change for 15. It’s now become a notable event when they do charge us the right amount! We’re learning though – the longer you spend in a place, the easier it is to laugh that sort of thing off.

Emma didn’t get the reference in the title of this post. Hopefully others will! For our younger readers – google it! It is hot here – the further south we go the hotter it gets, and it’s more of a dry heat than the humidity we had in Thailand. I reckon it’s in the 40s. Phew, what a scorcher!

Got the train to Goa – 2 trains, total 24 hours travelling. It’s not as bad as it sounds! The overnight train was busy, but you get a berth each and we did get some sleep. Then a 10 hour daytime journey on a relatively empty train which was really nice – caught up on some sleep, tanked up on the chai that they try to sell you every 5 minutes, and chatted to a couple of nice Indian guys who gave us some great insights into Indian life and culture, and were really interested in Western views on things. Chatted about religion, marriage, spitting, traffic, tigers, social work… Quite a diverse discussion, really (well, when you’re stuck on a train for 10 hours, you get bored easily!)

Update: This post is a little behind the times – it’s not easy finding wireless internet in India. More detail in the next post, but Goa is fantastic!