After a great week with my IIT buds in Delhi, I finally was able to leave for Varanasi. It was extremely foggy at the time, and after rushing to get to the train station on time, my train didn’t actually leave for another 15 or so hours. Then the train had to go extremely slowly and stop often which caused our final arrival to be 30 hours later than expected and a total of 42 hours traveling. Combined with the terrible cold on the platforms and in the train, it was pretty awful. Luckily, I managed to find a friend on the platform which made the journey much more bearable. He was the same age as I am, from Brazil, and totally one of the sweetest people I’ve met. He was wayyyy into the Mayan prophecies, and how that all overlapped with hindu beliefs and every kind of astological, spiritual thing you could think of. My brother gave me the term which I think fits quite well of “galactic activator”. Anyway, when we finally arrived, we went to meet a friend of his (the most sadhu baba looking western guy I’ve seen yet) at a wonderful guest house called Munna house. It’s run by a really nice family, the head of whom, Munna, is really friendly and honest. Prices are super cheap (around $1.50/night for a single room) and the place is full of interesting folks from all over, mostly staying longer periods, lots of musicians, lots of dreadlocks, etc. It was the only place I had seen that was actually homey, since most of the other hotels have a restaurant in them and are always trying to sell you stuff and rip you off. This was just home…

I was completely taken by the city and it’s energy. Varanasi has to be the most psychadellic place on earth. It is if not the oldest, then one of worlds oldest living cities. The entire city is just layers and layers of amazing old architecture and layers and layers of sacred splatters of sacred cow feces. The ganga (ganges) goes through everything in the city (including your bowels). It is always full of pilgrims and worshippers who are either there to die, or have brought their dead loved ones to be cremated because the belief is that if you die or are cremated in Varanasi, then you are released from the cycle of reincarnation. So there is a giant river that runs through the city. On one side, there are many bathing stairs called ghats and all kinds of old buildings. On the other side of the river, there is a giant wasteland of nothingness. Its really creepy and its said that the souls of those who are not cremated properly are stuck over there, making the place haunted, and forcing you to spend more money on wood to properly cremate your loved ones. The river itself is completely full of sewage, burnt bodies, and all kinds of trash, and yet thousands of pilgrims all bathe every day in it. Walking along the ghats at night is one of the most beautiful sights I have seen, especially when it’s foggy. Unfortunately, I only took a few pictures of the city that I’ll get online soon, but there are tons of amazing photos online from the million other tourists with big fancy cameras that are visiting (flickr feed of varanasi). Speaking of other tourists, there were many, which means its easy to meet people, and there’s always good food and coffee accessible.

Originally I had planned on going to Varanasi for an entire month to properly study tabla, but in the end I was only there for about a week and a half. I felt a bit ridiculous even asking a tabla teacher if I could study for just a week, but I did manage to take some tabla lessons and I think my technique is better now. I definitely need some more lessons when I return home, but I think I have a solid base to work from. Also, I think I will definitely return to Varanasi for a longer period of time in the future. Once you pay for the flight, it really costs nothing to live there. Its definitely under $10 a day including a room, food, coffee, and music instruction. So really, if you can avoid paying rent and bills back at home, you can actually save money by coming to India and learning an instrument. I highly recommend it for anyone looking for a break from their normal life. You won’t regret it!

So I left Varanasi on Feb 2nd to head to Calcutta. My train was almost on time this time, and wasn’t too cold, although by the time I arrived in Calcutta, I was absolutely sick. I spent the entire day there in bed with a fever and fasting. So it was a very crappy goodbye to India, but it’s alright. The 6 months that I’ve had there have been absolutely incredible. I’m sure that I will be back, and probably somewhat soon. You meet a lot of people in India who are coming back again and again, making it a regular part of their year.

Photo Cred: http://www.lexphoto.co.uk/albums/sadhus/