INDIA. VARANASI

Its our last night here tonight, and we've had a really chilled out time for once, compared to all the rushing around that we have been doing since we got to India! Despite other peoples warnings, we have really enjoyed Varanasi, and would like to stay longer, but the Andaman Islands are calling us, so its time to go।

Despite being sick on the first day here (we had been on a train all night, and I had been ill before we left), we are both feeling much better, and it helps with us having a nice hotel room to chill out in and relax.
We have seen a few dead people around here, on the ghats (water banks), being burned, following the Hindu religion. That was one of our first views when we walked down the ghats, and we watched the whole process of them dipping him in the river Ganges, piling the wood on top of him, and lighting the fire, and it was only when the son of the deceased was taken away wailing, that it really hit home that it was actually a person there, and it was a funeral. That sounds strange, but its just so public, and so open and common, that you can easily forget.
The river Ganges are extremely polluted. If you can imagine the amount of dead people, their diseases, the sewage system here, the fact that some people cant afford a full cremation, so the unburnt bits go into the water, Lepers cannot be burnt so have a stone attached to them and then sunk, its an extremely dirty river. YET, people swim, bathe, fill an empty bottle with it to take home and bless friends and family, wash their clothes, clean themselves, and their teeth...wow, its disgusting! The people that live in Varanasi must have built up such a great resilience to infection that they must actually be quite healthy!, we watched all of this going on this morning, as we took a boat ride down the river. We are on the last Ghat, Assi Ghat, and we took a boat up to the main burning ghat and walked back from there.

I have gone off Indian food. OH NO! since I have been sick, just the thought of a curry turns my stomach, but hopefully I will be getting over that soon!, Luckily, we have found a great place to eat here, so have been having wonderful European foods, really well made...yummmy (just in case anyone I have met in India comes now its called the Lotus. Just past the Main burning ghat!)
We have also met quite a few people here, and had lovely lazy (but hot) afternoons sitting under fans in the hotel or trying to catch some breeze on the roof of the Lotus as there has been nothing better to do in the heat, but sit and make friends!
If I dont write again for a while, I am on the beach ahahahaha.