The Bangalore-Patna 'Express' it was not.
We had survived enuchs (India's answer to Lady Boy's), Fakirs (holy beggars), blind singers, lepers, men with snakes, +45 C in a non-ac compartment, little boys urinating on my shoeless foot, and 'Sleeper Class.' Sleeper Class; not a mobile slum, but not exactly the Hilton either. I was okay with this, for $10 Canadian you can't really go wrong.
51 hours after a 44 hour train journey Richard and I staggered off the train into North India, Varanasi to be exact. The site of the Hindu's holiest river, the Ganges, the place where Hindus wash away their sins, but more importantly, where Hindus go to die.
We were sweaty, filthy, and sick. Very sick. Varanasi and its burning ghats loomed heavily as the ash of human flesh singed my nostrils. We spent 3 days sweating in bed sheets in a room with sporadic power in +45 degree weather feeling like death in a place filled with death. The thought that Richard and I had accidentally taken a pilgramage to the Holy Ganges was not far from my mind.
Bodies are wrapped and humbly carried throughout the winding alley ways of the Old City. Drums bang, Doms (Outcasts) stoke the fire, and men sit silently on the stoop, watching their loved one burn. 24 hours a day. 365 days a year.
To describe it seems peverse, and to watch silently in the shadows of death is surreal.
In the end I didn't die, nor did Richard. Even after excited boys splashed their beloved, Holy, absolutely filthy river Ganga on me.
I'll be back to Varanasi one day, but definitely not too die.
