Step 6: Breakdown

Step 6: Breakdown

We are currently sitting on a train, another 7 or so hours until we get to our destination of Haridwar, a town at the base of the Himalayas, just south of Rishikesh, where yoga has its roots and where we are truly headed. We are relegated to one of the third and top level bunks since our seats seem to have been taken over by a family who have made it clear to us that this is not their designated seating area but that they have no intentions of moving. We are listening to the sweet sounds of Stuart McLean and the Vinyl Cafe, snacking on our 10 hour stash of bananas and cookies. Its been about a week since our last blog post and we don't know where to start.

Last we wrote we were wide eyed, but healthy and adjusting to Kolkata and life in India. A few hours later a street side lassi (a yogurt fruit drink, very common and popular around here, and extremely delicious) brought us to our knees... in front of the toilet... and garbage can... and provided the first fierce challenge of this journey. Delhi belly, travellers diarrhea, stomach illness, or whatever you want to call it is hell. People often share that they get sick while travelling in India in passing, but this experience is still fresh enough for us to say that it is awful and nothing like what either of us had ever experienced. Until a few days ago Alyx was still suffering and finally decided to give in and pick up some antibiotics. We were teary eyed messes and half ready to book a ticket on the first flight back to Canada and probably would have if we'd be able to stand for long enough to walk to the Internet cafe. In the end we recovered enough to move and shakily got onto our booked train to leave one of the loudest, busiest cities in the world. We left never having actually made it to the house of Mother Theresa, and approached our second destination feeling weak and terribly unhip.

Varanasi.
Corpses, pilgrims, travellers (both Indian and non), a beautiful river, pollution, cows, cow shit, touts (people looking to take you on boat rides, rickshaw rides, to temples and silk shops), Western style coffee shops.

It was still very busy, crowded, smelly... Still a city. We fell into the trap of inexperienced travellers and got picked up by a rickshaw driver who had no intention to bring us to the guesthouse we wanted to go to, but rather the one that gave him commission for bringing in two "Canadian princesses." The guesthouse had a beautiful garden restaurant area and the rooms were fine, there is a limit to how many times you can say "NO" to their various tour offerings but we avoided being dragged around by sneaking out into the streets when nobody was looking.

Varanasi is along the river Ganges and it is as beautiful as it is maddening. Pilgrims from all over India come to this holy city to bathe and drink in the holy water, as well as pray and burn corpses. If you die in Varanasi it is said that you are relieved of continuing on in that vicious cycle of rebirth. It is also a place where silk has been made by hand for centuries. Tourists flock to see this, as well as the spectacle of people so publicly engaging in the most personal acts of life and death, and the result for foreign tourists is a city where every interaction we tried or tried not to have revolved around tours, money or selling things. Everyone, from 6 year olds to adults won't leave your side until  succumb to their demands or else learn to ignore all socialized western instincts of "polite conversation" and just walk by, harder than it sounds. They've even set up a brilliant system whereby kids get foreigners to buy these little candles to light and send floating down the Ganga for good karma... Something that none of the locals do (they do things like pray and do good deeds to improve their karma) and which is surely contributing to the pollution in the river. It is hard not to cringe thinking about millions of little candles at the bottom of this beautiful river.

We met one particularly interesting 12ish year old (he claimed to be 14 but we doubt it) who wanted to bring us to his uncle's shop. He was charming, funny, and used great lines (ex: let us just sit and drink chai, become friends, no pressure-no purchase, for without talking, what do we have?) and was frankly a wonderful canvasser, informing us that his uncle paid for his school and gave him 20 rupees for bringing people (unlikely it would be that high). When we made it clear we weren't going with him he stuck around and chatted with us anyway (but like a good salesman never actually giving up, casually offering us Hindi lessons, hand massages, and even marriage). He told us a bit about the ceremony we were witnessing and showed us his many tattoos, one with his name and others with the names of gods. We in turn showed him our tattoos and told him about looking out for clean needles and safe body art practices (harm reduction!). No surprise but it was definitely one of our highlights to spend some time having frank conversations with a local friendly youth.

In Varanasi, or maybe as a result of being slowed down by a bacterial infection, we started to find a more comfortable travelling mode. Lots of breaks, rest, water, occasional pizza or other "international" food, even a classic action hero movie or 2. And not always pushing ourselves to the limit. We hear that tackling these two overwhelming and chaotic cities first on our route may not have been a wise decision for a smooth intro to India, but we've definitely been initiated.

Oh and we keep forgetting our signature, how very unhip...
a&a