BURNING BODIES IN BENARAS

BURNING BODIES IN BENARAS

(Benaras is now properly called Varansi, but I liked the alliteration)

In my last post I said that the Ganges River and the holy city of Varanasi on its banks are believed to be a “crossing” or sacred place where mortals can cross over to the divine (and vice versa). That is why all Hindus want to die there or have their ashes thrown into the Ganges so that they can achieve moksha, the salvation of the soul from the cycle of birth, death and rebirth. (You may have seen in the film “The Namesake” that the family brought the ashes of the dead father from the United States to throw into the Ganges.)

As soon as we arrived in Vanarasi, riding in a taxi from the airport, we encountered a funeral procession – four men carrying on their shoulders the poles of a stretcher on which was a body wrapped in red silk and covered with flowers. (We later learned, if the body is wrapped in a red sari, it’s a woman. If it’s wrapped in gold cloth, it’s a man.)

When you walk along the ghats or steps on the sides of the Ganges you will see two cremation ghats where male untouchables cremate bodies all day and night. We went near with a guide but kept a respectful distance and did not take photographs, of course, because it would be disrespectful. The photos above of dead bodies are post cards I bought.

Later, after dark, like all other visitors to Vanarasi, we hired a small rowboat to take us down the river where we saw the burning ghats from a distance in the darkness and then anchored near the shore to watch the holy men perform their synchronized fire worship with torches. (They now perform beneath neon-lit “umbrellas” which represent the large umbrellas under which they sit all day.)

On the river there were two larger boats full of Japanese tourists who wore masks over their nose and mouth, which was not a bad idea since I managed to inhale enough ash in the smoky air to have a coughing fit. One can only wonder about the lifetime effects of breathing in that smoke (which casts a constant fog over the river). But somehow the natives don’t seem to become ill from swimming in the polluted river or inhaling the endless smog.


Fascinating facts about the cremation of the bodies on the huge wood fires made from logs of teak and sandalwood. The bodies, wrapped in silk, are first bathed in the river, then coated with a flammable paste and incense powder to hide the smell. Fat people burn faster, thin people more slowly. It takes about four hours for the body to be reduced to ashes which are then thrown into the river by a male relative. It’s also a male relative who lights the funeral pyre.

Our guide told us there are seven kinds of people who are not allowed to be cremated (due to bad karma, I guess, or the danger of spreading germs in the smoke.) I can name five of these: people who died of suicide, snakebite or smallpox, pregnant women who died with the baby unborn, and newborn babies. (I don’t swear this is accurate—it’s what I was told.) Those who are not cremated are wrapped with stones in the wrappings and tossed into the river, to sink. An estimated 45,000 UNCREMATED bodies are dumped into the river each year!)

Watching the fires burning at night from the distance of a boat on the river, it’s an awesome and beautiful sight. Even watching close up from the shore, it’s a moving and sacred thing to see these individuals being delivered into the afterlife with such ceremony and love. While we were there, the children were all practicing kite flying because the nationwide Kite Festival was approaching. As the dead were being burned, women in saris were doing laundry, the holy men were bathing and chanting, the children were playing and selling necklaces of flowers to throw into the river. On the banks of the Ganges in Varanasi the bustling activities surrounding life and death all take place side by side , unremarkably, because birth, play, work and death are all threads in the tapestry of life in India.

Naked Yogis, Clothed Goats & Recyled Cow Pies

Varanasi -- Naked Laughing Yogis, Clothed Goats and Recycled Cow Pies

No amount of photographs and words could convey how strange and wonderful, bizarre, surreal, jaw-droppingly amazing…is the holy city of Varanasi on the banks of the river Ganges in India.

Mark Twain described it as “older than history, older than tradition, older even than legend, and looks twice as old as all of them put together.”

Varanasi grew up on the banks of the Ganges. Long rows of steps called “ghats” line the banks, and the steps are crowded day and night with pilgrims and holy men and just plain folks who live there, as well as goats, cows, water buffalo, and the occasional monkey. Every day you will also see funeral processions and bodies wrapped in silks being burned on giant wood fires before their ashes are thrown into the river

Varanasi is considered a “crossing” (tirtha) or sacred place where mortals and gods can cross into each other’s worlds. Every Hindu wants to die in Varanasi or have his ashes thrown into the River Ganges because that is how to achieve moksha, the salvation of the soul from the cycle of birth, death and rebirth. (In other words the river is an express train to salvation without having to go through all that reincarnation first.)

For this reason, fires burn on the steps of the Ganges as people from the untouchable class cremate the dead 24 hours a day. But the cremations are something I’m going to write about in my next posting. Today I’m just going to list some of the other bizarre sights that soon become “normal” in Varanasi, which is perhaps the oldest surviving Holy City and the most efficient recycling plant in the world.

The banks of the river-–the steps of the ghats—are like a three-ring circus that can be viewed while you are sailing down the river in a row boat or walking along the steps.

You will see:
-- Herds of cows and water buffalo that are periodically bathed in the Ganges and decorated with leis of marigolds by the faithful (they’re sacred cows after all!)

--Women in saris and men in turbans doing laundry in the murky river and laying out rainbow-colored saris to dry on the steps. (Somehow the clothes come out clean.)

--Holy men, wrapped in saffron-colored loin cloths sitting under umbrellas, praying, chanting, waving torches in fire worship (after dark), stripping down to bathe and brush their teeth in the river. At dawn, the “Laughing Yogis”, swim out into the river (which was freezing when I was there) and shout out their loud Ha-Ha-Ha’s of laughter, as they are answered by guffaws from yogis still on shore. Their laughter is part of their worship.

--The goats in Varanasi wear shirts. At first I thought this was some sort of exotic religious practice – naked sadhu’s (holy men) swimming in the river and clothed goats on shore. But everyone assured me when, I asked, that they put shirts and sweaters on their goats “so they won’t get cold.”

--Everywhere you walk in Varanasi you have to be careful not to step into the cow pies left by the sacred cows and water buffalo. But in a brilliant example of re-cycling, there are men on the ghats who gather the cow poop and pat it into neat little patties and dry it on the steps (see the photo above). This way, everyone can use the product of the sacred cows to burn as fuel.

(Next posting: Burning Bodies in Benares.)

WHICH HINDU GOD IS IN OBAMA'S POCKET?

The Hindu gods are everywhere in India – streetcorner shrines, home shrines, temples on every block and images painted on walls. They really are a part of daily life, worshiped every day, and everyone has his favorite.

My favorite is Ganesh, the elephant-headed god who is the Remover of Obstacles. In Jaisalmar, when there is a marriage, Lord Ganesh is painted on the outside wall with the date of the wedding and the names of the bride and groom. It makes it easy to keep tabs on your neighbors.

When we were touring the Taj Mahal in Agra, our guide, Komar, was describing the attributes of the various gods (like super heroes, they all have their own special powers) and he told us that President-elect Obama always carries in his pocket an image of Ganesh, the Elephant god. We didn’t argue, because Komar seemed so confident he was right. (After all, Obama could have gotten to know the Hindu gods when he was a schoolboy in Indonesia.)

The people of India are ecstatic about Obama’s election and consider him one of their own. Last week someone forwarded a YouTube link to a catchy Hindi pop song with English subtitles—a tribute to Obana. (Check it out at
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=h96qtbEviUU ) “Obama, we love you” goes one repeated lyric. ”He is ruling everyone’s heart despite skin color”

About halfway through the song the lyrics say, ”“A follower of Hanuman [the Monkey god] he has Ghandian beliefs.”

Well, I don’t know which Hindu god is Obama’s favorite. Hanuman, the Monkey god is a symbol of strength and tenacity. In Varanasi we went to a Hanuman temple that was jam-packed with worshipers and live monkeys. I had been warned about monkey bites --India does not have the right rabies vaccine and I would have to be flown out of the country immediately. Although I was keeping my distance, two separate monkeys grabbed hold of the pashmina shawl I was wearing and I had to do a tug of war both times to get my shawl back.

On our last morning in Varanasi we had breakfast on the roof of the Shiva Ganges View guesthouse overlooking the town, and we watched a number of monkeys leaping from roof to roof. A mother monkey, with her baby clinging to her back, jumped down to the balcony of a English guest house where a door had been left open. She emerged from the room with toast, then went back and got an orange, flying to a higher roof to eat it. After the English tourist inside yelled at her and slammed the door , she came back in through the window and stole the girl’s book and raced away. I think Hanuman the monkey god should be a symbol of craftiness and maybe the god of thieves.

In Jaisalmar I bought a beautiful carved “traveling altar” allegedly made of camel bone, (it’s old) in the shape of two hands doing the “Namaste” salute that is used to welcome friends everywhere. (It means “I salute your inner being”.) When the hands are opened you can see my pal Ganesh riding on his vehicle (a mouse or rat) and Laksmi, the goddess of Prosperity, who is riding on her vehicle – an owl.

When daughter Eleni was beside the Ganges, a statue of Laksmi washed up at her feet and she took it home and is still waiting for prosperity to come in the window like a monkey. There are about 300 Hindu gods, but about nine are the important ones, from Shiva the Destroyer to Krishna the Supreme being to Kali, the dark mother of death and Parvati, the fair and lovely divine mother.

I think Obama should probably carry all of them in his pocket along with his Blackberry—he could use all the help he can get.

CHILD BEGGARS IN INDIA

Everyone who has not yet seen the film “Slumdog Millionaire” should do so at once. It’s an unrealistic fairy tale with an unlikely feel-good ending, but it graphically illustrates the lives of the countless millions of India’s children who live on the street with only one concern: “How will I manage to find enough to eat today so that I’ll be alive tomorrow?”

Everywhere you go in India you will find beggars. This is particularly true in the large cities like Delhi and Mumbai.

Mumbai is a city of 18 MILLION people and HALF of those people are homeless. That means that they live on the streets or in shacks made of tin or cardboard. A night-time drive from the airport in Delhi to Agra gave insights into these hovels and the families who consider home to be a piece of the median strip of the highway. It took an hour just to drive out of the city on a road that was jammed with rickshaws, camels, sacred cows and many, many beggars.

Frommer’s Guide to India in the “Mumbai” section deals with the problem of beggars: ”Families of beggars will twist and weave their way around the cars at traffic lights, hopping and even crawling to your window with displays of open wounds, diseased sores, crushed limbs, and starving babies, their hollow eyes imploring you for a few life-saving rupees…. In the worst of these tales of horror, children are maimed to up the ante by making them appear more pathetic. The choice is stark: Either lower the window and risk having a sea of unwelcome faces descend on you, or stare ahead and ignore them. To salve your conscience tip generously those who have made it onto the first rung of employment”

In India you quickly steel yourself to the crowds of children who are grabbing your arm, knocking on the window of your car, thrusting flowers into your pockets, repeating endlessly the only words of English they know: “Hello Madame, food, hungry, money, please, eat…”

If you give any of them money or even move toward your pocket or purse, their number suddenly increases tenfold and you cannot move for all the hands clutching at you.

In Mumbai, just outside our hotel, when we walked onto the shopping street of Colava Causeway, lined with stores on the right and street sellers’ booths on the left, all shouting their wares, there were two families of children who were particularly aggressive, following us for blocks, especially a girl of about 11 who kept thrusting flowers onto me anywhere they would stick, and her little brother who seemed to have no adult watching him as he skittered in front of us. I was so annoyed by them constantly clutching at me, but then one night, returning home about 11:30, I saw the family sound asleep on the sidewalk, the children curled into the prone body of their mother, and I felt guilt-stricken. The next day, before I left, I managed to give the girl a hundred rupees without anyone else noticing, and instead of unleashing a crowd on me, she grabbed it, grinned and ran. (It was worth only about $2.00 but that was probably a good day’s income to her.)

The beautiful and sad little girl from Jodhpur in the photo above, who was dressed and painted to look like a Hindu goddess, has a good gimmick, because the Hindu religion emphasizes giving money and food to holy persons as well as to sacred cows. On every street you can see poor Indians putting necklaces of flowers on the ubiquitous cows and feeding them. They also share their food with the bearded sadhus (holy men) dressed only in saffron loin cloths. These holy men live entirely on charity, renouncing all their worldly goods. Feeding them, like feeding the cows, is good karma for the Indians.

The little girls along the Ganges who sell small candles nestled in leaf-bowls are not strictly beggars – they’re actually young entrepreneurs, because everyone who comes to the Ganges wants to sail these candles into the river as an offering (as we did.) At night the boys in their rowboats row the pilgrims and tourists into large log-jams of boats gathered to watch the priests do their twilight fire worshipping on shore and the children selling floral chains, candles and pots of tea scramble agilely from one boat to another.

The children in India who manage to learn decent English are miles ahead of the ones who don’t—because they can move themselves and their families out of poverty and a life on the streets. All the tourists we saw – Japanese, Russian, Italian, Australian – use English as the lingua franca.

We hired Mark, a young man about 18—when we encountered him in Varanasi in a craft store that caters to tourists. His business card said he drove a rowboat and because his English was good, we booked him (at the usual rate of 150 rupees per person per hour) for a dawn trip down the Ganges the next morning.

As Mark paddled through the fog and darkness while the river woke up and the faithful began to bathe themselves and their cattle and their laundry, I asked him if the little girls who sold the candles went to school. He said all but one of them did – her parents couldn’t afford the 300 rupees ($6.00) per month that school cost. He also said that he personally was paying for one child to go to school. I learned that Mark was supporting his entire family of two parents and seven children with his three jobs (rowboat guide, craft store salesman and factory worker.) His father, formerly a carpenter, had TB. His mother had to stay home and care for his six younger siblings.

The biggest surprise was that Mark told us he, himself, despite his impressive business cards, could not read or write. “But how did you learn such good English?” we asked.

“From tourists in the store” he replied. If Mark had the leisure to go to school and become literate, he would probably become the Donald Trump of Varanasi.

I would like to find a philanthropy through which I could sponsor one or two children in India at six dollars a month to attend school rather than begging in the streets. (I already sponsor children through Plan but that goes to the community in Nepal not to the little girl herself.) I’ve been googling, trying to find such a philanthropy with access to Indian children, but without any luck so far, so if you have any suggestions, write me at joanpgage@yahoo.com.

It’s really appalling that a country like India, which is now enjoying a huge boom in industry and technical know-how; a country that has a very wealthy class evident in cities like Mumbai and Delhi, cannot manage to provide free schooling for the millions of Indian children who live on the streets.

INDIA WAS UNBELIEVABLE

Every day during our travels around India—three weeks in half a dozen cities—we encountered sights that left us gaping in disbelief. Some things were beautiful beyond belief – the temples, the Taj Mahal, the silks and jewelry and tapestries and palaces. Others were just shocking: bodies being cremated on the side of the Ganges, the families of beggars sleeping on the sidewalks, the traffic snarl of trucks and camels and water buffalo and rickshaws all playing chicken while driving on the left side of the overcrowded highways.

Daughters Eleni and Marina and I had great adventures and epiphanies that I want to blog about, but at the moment I’m too sick. Having made it all the way through India without a stomach upset, I flew 14 hours back to JFK from Bombay and got off the plane with a killer cold which has left me too weak to produce eloquent prose just yet, so instead I’m posting photos of some of the colorful people we met—will tell you their stories later. We got to know maharajahs and beggars, thieving monkeys and hard-working camels, temperamental Hindu gods and goddesses and saintly Indian sadhus (holy men.)

Here are photos of two tribal girls (sisters I think) who live in the desert near Jaisalmar and enlivened our camel safari with their dancing. Also an elderly seller of peacock fans in Jaisalmar who was very proud that his photo was once featured on the cover of a German magazine.

In downtown Jodhpur we encountered a little girl beggar who had dressed and painted herself to look like a Hindu goddess, and on the banks of the Ganges, young girls who sell flowers and candles to toss into the Holy River asked us to take their photo. And everywhere we went, sacred cows (and water buffalo) calmly blocked traffic, especially in the narrow streets of Varanasi. That’s Marina on the right trying to maneuver around one. The folks of Varanasi, however, know how to make the best of the sacred cows and water buffalo and the cow pies that make walking such an obstacle path – they mold the cow poop into patties and dry them on the stairs leading down to the Ganges and use the dried patties for fuel.

THREE CHRISTMAS MIRACLES

Everybody likes to hear about a Christmas miracle, especially in these not-so-merry times, so I’m going to share three that happened locally, close to our hometown of Grafton, MA.

First miracle: On the day before Christmas, a former firefighter named Lee E. Chauvette of Athol went to Town Hall to pay the food permit for his restaurant. But he discovered that he had left the check at home, so he went back to get it When he pulled into his driveway on the edge of a lake, he noticed a woman and her two young children on the ice. When he pulled out of his driveway a moment later and looked toward the lake, he saw the mother and children fall through the ice. He called the fire department and tried to get onto the ice but it was too weak, so he shouted encouragement until the firefighters and their ice rescue sled came and saved them. They were treated for exposure and released.

Mr. Chauvette told the local newspaper, the Telegram and Gazette, that it was just lucky he had to return home when he did to get the forgotten check. Luck or a Christmas miracle?

Second Miracle: Andrea Clancy of Holden was having a terrible year –her two-year-old Seamus had been constantly ill, the family lost their power in our famous Ice Storm, all their food rotted in the refrigerator, and Andrea had done no Christmas shopping by Friday Dec. 19 when her little boy got an earache and she had to take him to the hospital. She stopped at an ATM to take out $40 so that she could pay the valet at U Mass Memorial Medical Center. As she carried her crying toddler into the elevator she realized her wallet was gone with her credit cards, her gift card for toys and a memory stick with all her family photos.

Later that day the police called to say that someone had turned in her wallet. When she picked it up, everything was still in it, including the $40 plus two HUNDRED-DOLLAR BILLS.

Mrs. Clancy (as interviewed by reporter Dianne Williamson) learned from the police the name of the man who had turned in her wallet. She called him to thank him. He wished her a Merry Christmas and, when he heard about the extra $200, he insisted he didn’t put it in the wallet. He said the same thing to the reporter: “I was just trying to be nice by returning it, but I sure didn’t put any money in there.” He also asked that the paper not reveal his name. The reporter concluded it must have been Santa Claus who added the extra money.

Third miracle –Daughter Eleni, who discovered a week ago Friday that she had lost her passport with her Indian visa in it, (as reported in my last entry) has finally managed to replace the passport by going into Boston last Monday. Then on Tuesday and Weds. She visited the Indian consulate in New York and, although it looked problematical at first, she managed to get a new visa and make it home to Grafton to put the angel on the tree and go to church with us on Christmas Eve. There was joy throughout the Gage house.

Today (Dec. 27) Eleni and I are scheduled to fly from Logan to JFK and then from New York to Mumbai to begin the odyssey to India which Eleni has been preparing for so many months. Her sister Marina has already landed in Paris and will be joining us in India on New Year’s Eve as the three-day wedding festivities of Neela and Dave begin. And after today, I hope, even though I’m a novice at this blogging, to share our adventures with you via “Arollingcrone”.

Holiday greetings and here’s to the adventures (and miracles) that 2009 will bring!

GOING TO INDIA? A HOLIDAY CLIFFHANGER

It’s the day before Christmas and all through the house the bustle of wrapping gifts has been replaced by the drama of our holiday trip to India – it’s been in the planning stages for a year, but lately has suffered a series of setbacks.

First there was the terrorist attack on Mumbai which led to a State Department warning that U.S. Citizens should not travel to India right about now. (It’s in effect until Dec. 30.) Saturday, Dec. 27 is when daughter Eleni and I are supposed to fly to Mumbai and then to fly the next day to Jodhpur where Eleni’s former roommate Neela Pania, is getting married in a three-day series of parties and ceremonies beginning on New Year’s Eve. Eleni has worked hard all year to plan for us the world’s greatest trip around India, including a camel safari into the desert, visits to the Taj Mahal and a boat trip on the Ganges.

Although most everyone we knew advised us we should NOT go to India just now, we stubbornly stuck to our itinerary. Marina, Eleni’s younger sister, even expanded it into her own trip around the world -- leaving Boston the day after Christmas to stay with friends in Paris, then joining us in India for the wedding, then on to more friends in Sydney, Hawaii and back home to Los Angeles.

Next glitch – Eleni lost her passport with the Indian visa in it. She came home on Friday (during the massive snow storm) after three days spent in NYC on jury duty — days of living out of a suitcase and staying with friends because boarders had moved into her apartment for the month she'll be away. Then, when she got home to Grafton, she discovered that the passport had disappeared during her wandering about New York.

So on Monday Dec. 22 she spent all day at the emergency passport line in Boston and then Tuesday Dec. 23, she traveled with her new passport back to New York City in hopes of getting another visa from the India travel visa folks. She couldn’t get an appointment because they’re all jammed up now, but she stood in the walk-in (no appointment) line. She burst into tears when told she’d have to come back on Christmas Eve, then someone took pity on her and said that if she went to the Indian consulate around noon on Weds. Dec. 24, she could probably get her visa then, which meant, with luck, that she might get back to Grafton in time for joining the rest of the family at a Christmas Eve party followed by the traditional church service (with the children acting out the nativity scene). After church we'll put the angel on the tree and each open one gift and then it’s really Christmas. Let’s hope she makes it back from Manhattan in time.

Eleni has been to India several times with Neela and I was so amazed at the photographs she took that I’ve painted watercolors based on them. The two photos above show the same woman who sells plastic bangle bracelets in the Clock Tower market in Jodhpur (where the wedding will be held.) The first one was taken by Eleni in January 2006, when the woman had her infant son in her lap.

A year later, the little boy was a toddler when Eleni came back to the same spot and handed the woman her photograph. It caused a sensation in the marketplace. The lady had never owned a photograph of herself and was delighted. All her friends wanted their photos taken too.

I’m in such a fever of anticipation to see India that right now I’m afraid to even start packing my bags until Eleni returns with visa in hand. So Christmas Day will be a frenzy of preparation, packing saris we’ve borrowed along with western clothes. God willing we’ll all find ourselves in Jodhpur on New Year’s Eve. And I hope to photograph and write about what happens throughout our Indian adventure.... unless there’s another storm or electrical outage and we never get out of Logan airport.