"Varanasini varninche naa geethika
naati sreenadhuni kavithey
vinipinchaga
mukthi ke margam choope manikarnika
allade annadi naa ee chiru ghantika"
These were the lyrics of the telugu song playing on my phone until it told me the battery was critically low. That is when i finally stopped playing the song and put my phone to rest. At a height of 30,000 feet above the ground, the song was giving me glimpses of varansi in my mind. Even after the song stopped playing, my thoughts about varansi were cruising at a speed faster than that of my airplane. It was going to be my first ever visit to the holy city of varanasi and naturally my excitement had no limits. Little i knew about the holy city that stood still for ages, but what i knew was enough to ignite a spark to know much more about this destination of faith. The scenes from the day when we had to choose a course for social ecology, just flashed in my mind for a while. When my college announced a list of social ecology trips two months ago, Varanasi was also one of them. There were wide variety of options for us to choose from, but somehow the name varansi was strong enough to create an impact on my mind that finally led me to choose this trip. I knew that the memories from this trip would be long cherished in my life, I knew the learning in this tour would be great. The city of faith created a faith in me, of having a once in a lifetime experience which in turn created an immense amount of curiosity that finally brought me aboard the Air India flight to Varanasi. After a comfortable flight from delhi I landed at the Varanasi airport with a smile on my face when I suddenly realized that I had to collect my heavy check-in luggage from the luggage belt. My heavy luggage was a little annoying but it did not deter my curiosity about the land of shiva.
The Journey
The first day of our tour was pretty simple. We arrived at the Varanasi airport that is located at a distance of approximately 30 kms from this ancient city. We travelled by cars for a long time since the roads were not very good. Everyone in the car was asleep except me and the driver. We finally reached the guest house in the Benaras Hindu University after getting lost for a while. Each one of us at that moment were very concerned about that one thing which would save us in such a situation. FOOOODDD !!!! We then decided to gorge upon the tasty food in the guest house. After everyone had a satisfying meal, we proceeded to our rooms to experience the best part, REST. After a required break, we decide to go to the Vishwanath Temple inside the campus of the university. To my surprise, the temple was pretty big and i did not expect such a big temple for some reason. It was already dark and the litte amount of lighting to the temple made it a sight worth seeing. We then went inside the temple and offered prayers. After this, we had a talk about the dawn of Vaishnavism and shaivism and its impact on people. We then got back to the temple premises and that is when the harati started. The drum beats and the sound from the Shankam created some sort of vibrations all around the temple. It took us into a trance and some of us stood until the harati ended. After spending a lot of time in the temple we were back to the guest house. After the dinner, we had a short talk with our groupmates and retired to bed. I could not sleep early as my excitement to see the ghats interfered in my relartionship with sleep. I somehow sorted it out and slept.
The sunrays and the light protruded into my room and i then noticed it was already morning. As usual my excitement also slowly lost its sleep and woke up. We had our breakfast and left for the ghats, we started walking from the university main gate are called as Lanka. We could feel a sense of hurry and panic among the people there. We had a long walk on the road that led to the ghats, on the way we had many contrast sights like a photo studio that had an age old camera, a group of veda pathshala kids in dhoties and a group of old people doing ram bhajan in a ram temple in the land of shiva. We first entered a narrow lane and kept walking to see the ganga first, we were on the first ghat of kashi, Assi Ghat. This ghat was a very busy ghat as this was the place where many of the boat owners docked their boats and naturally the boat men kept annoying us to take a boat ride. We kept walking and after crossing the small ghat called prabhu ghat we reached the tulsi ghat, this is believed o be the place where tulsi das lived and also penned the ramayana. We then took quick break for lunch in a local restaurant and resumed to seeing the ghats. After a little walk, we reached the famous harischandra ghat. The sights of this ghat were very different from other ghats as this is a cremation ground where people would perform the last rites of their expired family members. We were in an all new thinking and some of us stood still without an expression as it was the very first time we saw such site. We gained nerve, then stated our walking and walked through many different ghats like kedar ghat and finally reached the most impotant dashaswamedh ghat. It was getting drk by then and the arrangements for the ganga harati were being made. Seeing the crowd we decided to give miss to the harati for that day. We came back to the guest house, after a stomach filling dinner, we had to sleep early. This was to make sure that we all woke up early the next morning as we were going to take a sunrise boat ride on the river ganga.
We reached Assi Ghat the next morning at the right time just as the sun was about to rise. We quickly got into the boats and started our boat ride. We could see the ghats getting soaked in the golden rays of the sun. The river ganga was reflecting the light from the sun and looked shimmering. We took a look at the ghat from the other side. Thi view was probably the best to look at the ghat life earlyin the morning. The ghat life was a little different from what it is in the afternoon and that of the evening. People took holy bath in the river ganga with their families. Some of the priests were performing their rituals on the banks of the river. The kids were all hyper early in the morning and could find them all over the ghats running here and there and playing. While the ghat life had a totally different look from the previous evening, the only things that were similar to the previous day were the burning pyres on the harischandra ghat and the manikarnika ghat. According the little knowledge i had, i thought manikarnika was the last ghat of all. To my surprise, there were ghats even ater we crossed manikarnika ghat on the boat ride. Ghats like panchganga ghat and raja ghat had people on them, but people were very less when compared to the other ghats upto manikarnika ghat. This was because of the less importance of the ghats and also the popular belief that manikarnika is called the mukhti karnika and there is nothing beyond mukthi. After the very long and beautiful boat ride, when the boat was just about to be docked, i noticed that half of the friends on my boat were just waking up. It was not funny as we woke as early as 5 in the morning and it was 10:30 by the time we finished our boat ride. It was natural that some amount of sleep would attract. But as far as I was concerned, I looked at each and every thing around me on the boat ride without the question of a nap. We were already 3 days into our journey and that is when our instructors Urvashi and Narendra decide that we all would be exploring varanasi with a line of enquiry in our minds from the next day. We were all determined and we had well prepared line of enquiries to work on, from the next day.
The next day we woke up with an intention and an idea to understand and have a deeper meaning of varanasi apart from the spiritual and religious side that already existed. I wanted to probe into the history of varanasi keeping it simple and also informative at the same time. I was keen on hearing stories from people of varanasi about varanasi. I knew this 5000 year old city had a lot of history in it. I was curious to know the history of varansi. I started of my work by reaching assi ghat and decided to walk and interact with people on the ghats. As I kept walking I could see many people and i wanted o speak to some of them. Itried speaking to some of them and that is when i realized it was not an easy task to talk to people and larn from them the history of thei city. I walked for a long time and could not speak to many people and could not gather much information. I reached a comparitively empty place after crossing the kedar ghat. I could see some hard working dhobi there. I was clicking pictures of them and then started my walk to find people that i could talk to. When i came close to the dhobi and was about cross them. A dhobi called me and asked me if he could see his picture that I clicked, I was happy enough to show it him. After that he asked where i was from and whether i liked varanasi or not, like this a conversation between me and this guy sparked off and i started asking him various questions. He said me his name was Balu and his earning was through washing clothes of different people. When asked about his family he called his daughter who was helping him with his work. I asked her if she was going to a school. She told me she was in class 12. I asked Balu if he was intereted to bring his kids into this business. Quickly replying to my question, he said he didn't want his children take up his job after him but rather he wanted to educate them and see them in a good position. I felt happy listening to what he said and asked the girl what she wanted to pursue next. Reply to my question was given by balu saying that she could not study anymore as she was going to get married in a months time. I did not want dig deeper in this matter as I could see the girl very disturbed about this. I later asked him about history of Kashi to which he told, there was no other city like kashi and there is no match to its spirituality and religious value. He told me he considered himself lucky to be born in this city and also told me if he is lucky enough he would die in this city. I then left from the place after thanking balu. The thoughts he had in his mind about this holy city of shiva were very interseting. I wanted to probe further about such thoughts the next day as it was already evening by the time i spoke to some people and gathere little information abot the historic city. Me being a photography enthusiast, wasted no time and kept clicking a lot o photographs that kept me engaged all over the days when i could not find any people to talk to. On the way back to the guest house, I taste the famous banarasi paan and then i knew why it was so famous. I still remember that distinct taste of paan from the mystic city.
The next day I woke up with a festival spirit. It was dev deepawali here in varansi, celebrated as Karthika poornima in some other parts of the country. As far as Varansi is concerned it is a festival celebrated on a large scale. Since the festival is celebrated after the dusk, we decided to utilize the day by visiting the fine arts college of Benaras Hindu University. We got a chance to see the students getting trained in makig sculptures. They were all dedicated to their work and their final pieces in the display showed that. We spent about an hour there and then came back to the guest house. After the lunch we took a break for a couple of hours and then all ous left for the ghats, to see the beauty of dev deepawali. When we reched the ghats, it was a sea of people there. We saw the sights of our life, all the ghats lighted upand the whole stretch of ghats was a belt of lights. There were huge crowds everywhere, making it tough even to walk. But the environment was a different world in itself. All the ghats were illuminated with diyas and we could see the night time ghats all lit up and glittering in golden color. The diyas on the ghats gave them an all new look and it was such a beauty to look at. The crowds, the lights, the dances, the music, the overall environment made it worth a watch and I can simply say it was a once in a lifetime experience. After a long walk, we all decided to take the route back as it was tough for all of us to manage in such huge crowds. We then took the same route and walked back through the heavy crowds and finally made it to the end of the ghats. All of went back to the guest house, had our dinner and decided to sleep as it was a tiring day for all of us. All the glimpses from the festival were flashing through my mind and I finally fell asleep.
Waking up late the next day, we had no chance of leaving the guest house and going out as there was security everywhere and it was hard to go anywhere on that day. The security and the curfew look was on because the prime minister of India, Shri Narendra Modi has come to varansi that day. We all decide to have a session on our progress in the line of enquiries as we had no other option than staying back at the guest house. We used this time to talk and listen to our group mates and the way they were working. It was in the evening that I decided to go to the ghats and I could somehow reach the ghats. But what i saw there dazed me. All the ghats wore a deserted look and there were hardly any people on the ghats. My intention of talking to the people and learning more about varansi has all just come to a pause just as the city came to a pause on that day. I walked in search of people on the same ghats where i walked in a sea of people the previous day. I was all lost and didn't know what to do. I sat at a ghat looking at the ganga for some time and then decided to leave to the guest house. When i went back, i learnt that everyone of our group more or less had a same kind of situation. I slept that day with a hope to find the answers to my questions the next day.
My day started with trying to find someone to talk to and find answers to my questions. I came across an old lady who was selling malas and some sort of loclly made ornaments. I bought a beads chain from her and initiated my conversation. The lady's name was shanti and she was in this business of selling ornaments from 15 years on the banks of river ganga. I asked her what is that which makes Varanasi such a holy place. She told me that Varanasi was the kingdom of lord shiva and thus it gained a huge place in hindu religion. I asked her more details and she answere all my questions patiently. At last I asked her what made the city stand for 5000 years without collapsing. To my surprise, she asked me a question in return. She asked me if i believed in god, to which i said yes. She then told me a gem of an explanation. " People believed in god from thousands of years in this city be it hindu, muslim or any other religion. This belief in god created a self belief in people and made this place an intellectual's paradise. When everyone believes in themselves and others without any other thought why wouldn't it be successful. All the people and their faith in this holy city made it stand for 5000 years and it will stand for many more age to come." With this explanation I realized whyVaranasi, such an ancient city could stand still without collapsing until today. After the conversation i felt i found an answer to my question by just speaking to woman for five minutes. I was very satisfied and the satisfation did not leave me for the whole day as i went on to speak to more people.
I woke up early again. Why??? Oh yeah ! We are going to visit Sarnath today, the ancient city where Bhuddism was born.We took the local auto rickshaws and travelled for roughly around half an hour to reach Sarnath. The first place we visited in sarnath was the buddha temple, which was calm and peaceful. We then went and took a look at the sarnath stupa, the stupa which is believed to have the relics of buddha. We then took a look at the history of sarnath by visiting the museum present there. This museum kind of takes us back into past with its thousand year old statues and findings upon excavation in this place. It was worth visiting as there was thousand years of sarnath's history in there. The last place we went in sarnath was the buddha statue and a temple which were constructed recently i.e a couple of years ago. After completing the visits in sarnath, our group was divided into two. One group that was totally exhausted and left back to the guest house, the other group of people interested to visit the Ramnagar fort of Varanasi. This fort was a beautiful old fort constructed on the other side of the river ganga. It had a museum that showcased all the ammunition of the royal family from their history. We took a look at the old cars and palanquins that were once used by the royal family. We then took a look at its architecture. After spending a couple of hours here we finally left to the guest house. All of us have really enjoyed this trip very much and it was evident. This was going to be our last night at Varanasi. It felt just like yesterday that we came to varanasi and the tour is already coming to an end. Time in varanasi just keeps flowing with the pace of river ganga. I decided even befor coming to varanasi to visit the Kashi vishwanath temple and only then I'll leave this place.
As scheduled, I woke up early and left for Kashi Vishwanath mandir. it was approximately 5:40 in the morning and by then the queue line was as long as a kilometer. We stood patiently in the line for a time of 4 hours. In this 4 hours i could see how people's faith and belief in god are, that is when i realized it was the same belief in god that brought me here. People were all doing bhajans and praying to the all mighty Shiva the whole time they were in the queue. After 4 hour of standing in the queue i came close to the main temple premises. All the devotees were happy and joyful, some singing songs, some praying calm. All this reminded me of the lines in a song that go like this "Sadaa siva sanyaasi taapasi, kailaasavasi......Nee paadamudralu mosi pongipoyinaade palle kaasi." These lines roughly translate to, "Oh lord siva, the meditator, the resident of Kailasa........This city of varansi has become holy and completely joyful after you set your feet here." I could sense a spiritual joy among the people who were seen in the temple and i could feel some sort of power in the environment. After a successful darshan I went back to the guest house and joined the rest of people who were sharing their experiences with each other in a group talk.
All of us then quickly went back to our rooms to start re packing our luggage. Unforunately, mu heavy luggage beacme even heavier. We left varanasi and went to the airport. we were waiting for the flight and all the memories from the trip started as a showreel in my mind. All the new learning experiences, the spirituality, the cultural diversity, the occupational diversity, the hustle bustle of the city, the people from the ghats, the burning pyres from manikarnika and harishchandra, dev deepawali, kashi vishwanath mandir and the list goes on. What i learnt about the city is a lot, but it is just a fraction of a percentage of the deep thousands of years of history that can still be found intact. As of what i felt, everyone should visit the city atleast once in a life time as it is not only a city of the religion or spiritual value, but also a place of learning, a place of all new experiences. I would say that the place is another world and one has to experience this heaven on earth.
|| Jai Kashi Vishwanath ||
The Journey
The first day of our tour was pretty simple. We arrived at the Varanasi airport that is located at a distance of approximately 30 kms from this ancient city. We travelled by cars for a long time since the roads were not very good. Everyone in the car was asleep except me and the driver. We finally reached the guest house in the Benaras Hindu University after getting lost for a while. Each one of us at that moment were very concerned about that one thing which would save us in such a situation. FOOOODDD !!!! We then decided to gorge upon the tasty food in the guest house. After everyone had a satisfying meal, we proceeded to our rooms to experience the best part, REST. After a required break, we decide to go to the Vishwanath Temple inside the campus of the university. To my surprise, the temple was pretty big and i did not expect such a big temple for some reason. It was already dark and the litte amount of lighting to the temple made it a sight worth seeing. We then went inside the temple and offered prayers. After this, we had a talk about the dawn of Vaishnavism and shaivism and its impact on people. We then got back to the temple premises and that is when the harati started. The drum beats and the sound from the Shankam created some sort of vibrations all around the temple. It took us into a trance and some of us stood until the harati ended. After spending a lot of time in the temple we were back to the guest house. After the dinner, we had a short talk with our groupmates and retired to bed. I could not sleep early as my excitement to see the ghats interfered in my relartionship with sleep. I somehow sorted it out and slept.
The sunrays and the light protruded into my room and i then noticed it was already morning. As usual my excitement also slowly lost its sleep and woke up. We had our breakfast and left for the ghats, we started walking from the university main gate are called as Lanka. We could feel a sense of hurry and panic among the people there. We had a long walk on the road that led to the ghats, on the way we had many contrast sights like a photo studio that had an age old camera, a group of veda pathshala kids in dhoties and a group of old people doing ram bhajan in a ram temple in the land of shiva. We first entered a narrow lane and kept walking to see the ganga first, we were on the first ghat of kashi, Assi Ghat. This ghat was a very busy ghat as this was the place where many of the boat owners docked their boats and naturally the boat men kept annoying us to take a boat ride. We kept walking and after crossing the small ghat called prabhu ghat we reached the tulsi ghat, this is believed o be the place where tulsi das lived and also penned the ramayana. We then took quick break for lunch in a local restaurant and resumed to seeing the ghats. After a little walk, we reached the famous harischandra ghat. The sights of this ghat were very different from other ghats as this is a cremation ground where people would perform the last rites of their expired family members. We were in an all new thinking and some of us stood still without an expression as it was the very first time we saw such site. We gained nerve, then stated our walking and walked through many different ghats like kedar ghat and finally reached the most impotant dashaswamedh ghat. It was getting drk by then and the arrangements for the ganga harati were being made. Seeing the crowd we decided to give miss to the harati for that day. We came back to the guest house, after a stomach filling dinner, we had to sleep early. This was to make sure that we all woke up early the next morning as we were going to take a sunrise boat ride on the river ganga.
We reached Assi Ghat the next morning at the right time just as the sun was about to rise. We quickly got into the boats and started our boat ride. We could see the ghats getting soaked in the golden rays of the sun. The river ganga was reflecting the light from the sun and looked shimmering. We took a look at the ghat from the other side. Thi view was probably the best to look at the ghat life earlyin the morning. The ghat life was a little different from what it is in the afternoon and that of the evening. People took holy bath in the river ganga with their families. Some of the priests were performing their rituals on the banks of the river. The kids were all hyper early in the morning and could find them all over the ghats running here and there and playing. While the ghat life had a totally different look from the previous evening, the only things that were similar to the previous day were the burning pyres on the harischandra ghat and the manikarnika ghat. According the little knowledge i had, i thought manikarnika was the last ghat of all. To my surprise, there were ghats even ater we crossed manikarnika ghat on the boat ride. Ghats like panchganga ghat and raja ghat had people on them, but people were very less when compared to the other ghats upto manikarnika ghat. This was because of the less importance of the ghats and also the popular belief that manikarnika is called the mukhti karnika and there is nothing beyond mukthi. After the very long and beautiful boat ride, when the boat was just about to be docked, i noticed that half of the friends on my boat were just waking up. It was not funny as we woke as early as 5 in the morning and it was 10:30 by the time we finished our boat ride. It was natural that some amount of sleep would attract. But as far as I was concerned, I looked at each and every thing around me on the boat ride without the question of a nap. We were already 3 days into our journey and that is when our instructors Urvashi and Narendra decide that we all would be exploring varanasi with a line of enquiry in our minds from the next day. We were all determined and we had well prepared line of enquiries to work on, from the next day.
The next day we woke up with an intention and an idea to understand and have a deeper meaning of varanasi apart from the spiritual and religious side that already existed. I wanted to probe into the history of varanasi keeping it simple and also informative at the same time. I was keen on hearing stories from people of varanasi about varanasi. I knew this 5000 year old city had a lot of history in it. I was curious to know the history of varansi. I started of my work by reaching assi ghat and decided to walk and interact with people on the ghats. As I kept walking I could see many people and i wanted o speak to some of them. Itried speaking to some of them and that is when i realized it was not an easy task to talk to people and larn from them the history of thei city. I walked for a long time and could not speak to many people and could not gather much information. I reached a comparitively empty place after crossing the kedar ghat. I could see some hard working dhobi there. I was clicking pictures of them and then started my walk to find people that i could talk to. When i came close to the dhobi and was about cross them. A dhobi called me and asked me if he could see his picture that I clicked, I was happy enough to show it him. After that he asked where i was from and whether i liked varanasi or not, like this a conversation between me and this guy sparked off and i started asking him various questions. He said me his name was Balu and his earning was through washing clothes of different people. When asked about his family he called his daughter who was helping him with his work. I asked her if she was going to a school. She told me she was in class 12. I asked Balu if he was intereted to bring his kids into this business. Quickly replying to my question, he said he didn't want his children take up his job after him but rather he wanted to educate them and see them in a good position. I felt happy listening to what he said and asked the girl what she wanted to pursue next. Reply to my question was given by balu saying that she could not study anymore as she was going to get married in a months time. I did not want dig deeper in this matter as I could see the girl very disturbed about this. I later asked him about history of Kashi to which he told, there was no other city like kashi and there is no match to its spirituality and religious value. He told me he considered himself lucky to be born in this city and also told me if he is lucky enough he would die in this city. I then left from the place after thanking balu. The thoughts he had in his mind about this holy city of shiva were very interseting. I wanted to probe further about such thoughts the next day as it was already evening by the time i spoke to some people and gathere little information abot the historic city. Me being a photography enthusiast, wasted no time and kept clicking a lot o photographs that kept me engaged all over the days when i could not find any people to talk to. On the way back to the guest house, I taste the famous banarasi paan and then i knew why it was so famous. I still remember that distinct taste of paan from the mystic city.
The next day I woke up with a festival spirit. It was dev deepawali here in varansi, celebrated as Karthika poornima in some other parts of the country. As far as Varansi is concerned it is a festival celebrated on a large scale. Since the festival is celebrated after the dusk, we decided to utilize the day by visiting the fine arts college of Benaras Hindu University. We got a chance to see the students getting trained in makig sculptures. They were all dedicated to their work and their final pieces in the display showed that. We spent about an hour there and then came back to the guest house. After the lunch we took a break for a couple of hours and then all ous left for the ghats, to see the beauty of dev deepawali. When we reched the ghats, it was a sea of people there. We saw the sights of our life, all the ghats lighted upand the whole stretch of ghats was a belt of lights. There were huge crowds everywhere, making it tough even to walk. But the environment was a different world in itself. All the ghats were illuminated with diyas and we could see the night time ghats all lit up and glittering in golden color. The diyas on the ghats gave them an all new look and it was such a beauty to look at. The crowds, the lights, the dances, the music, the overall environment made it worth a watch and I can simply say it was a once in a lifetime experience. After a long walk, we all decided to take the route back as it was tough for all of us to manage in such huge crowds. We then took the same route and walked back through the heavy crowds and finally made it to the end of the ghats. All of went back to the guest house, had our dinner and decided to sleep as it was a tiring day for all of us. All the glimpses from the festival were flashing through my mind and I finally fell asleep.
Waking up late the next day, we had no chance of leaving the guest house and going out as there was security everywhere and it was hard to go anywhere on that day. The security and the curfew look was on because the prime minister of India, Shri Narendra Modi has come to varansi that day. We all decide to have a session on our progress in the line of enquiries as we had no other option than staying back at the guest house. We used this time to talk and listen to our group mates and the way they were working. It was in the evening that I decided to go to the ghats and I could somehow reach the ghats. But what i saw there dazed me. All the ghats wore a deserted look and there were hardly any people on the ghats. My intention of talking to the people and learning more about varansi has all just come to a pause just as the city came to a pause on that day. I walked in search of people on the same ghats where i walked in a sea of people the previous day. I was all lost and didn't know what to do. I sat at a ghat looking at the ganga for some time and then decided to leave to the guest house. When i went back, i learnt that everyone of our group more or less had a same kind of situation. I slept that day with a hope to find the answers to my questions the next day.
My day started with trying to find someone to talk to and find answers to my questions. I came across an old lady who was selling malas and some sort of loclly made ornaments. I bought a beads chain from her and initiated my conversation. The lady's name was shanti and she was in this business of selling ornaments from 15 years on the banks of river ganga. I asked her what is that which makes Varanasi such a holy place. She told me that Varanasi was the kingdom of lord shiva and thus it gained a huge place in hindu religion. I asked her more details and she answere all my questions patiently. At last I asked her what made the city stand for 5000 years without collapsing. To my surprise, she asked me a question in return. She asked me if i believed in god, to which i said yes. She then told me a gem of an explanation. " People believed in god from thousands of years in this city be it hindu, muslim or any other religion. This belief in god created a self belief in people and made this place an intellectual's paradise. When everyone believes in themselves and others without any other thought why wouldn't it be successful. All the people and their faith in this holy city made it stand for 5000 years and it will stand for many more age to come." With this explanation I realized whyVaranasi, such an ancient city could stand still without collapsing until today. After the conversation i felt i found an answer to my question by just speaking to woman for five minutes. I was very satisfied and the satisfation did not leave me for the whole day as i went on to speak to more people.
I woke up early again. Why??? Oh yeah ! We are going to visit Sarnath today, the ancient city where Bhuddism was born.We took the local auto rickshaws and travelled for roughly around half an hour to reach Sarnath. The first place we visited in sarnath was the buddha temple, which was calm and peaceful. We then went and took a look at the sarnath stupa, the stupa which is believed to have the relics of buddha. We then took a look at the history of sarnath by visiting the museum present there. This museum kind of takes us back into past with its thousand year old statues and findings upon excavation in this place. It was worth visiting as there was thousand years of sarnath's history in there. The last place we went in sarnath was the buddha statue and a temple which were constructed recently i.e a couple of years ago. After completing the visits in sarnath, our group was divided into two. One group that was totally exhausted and left back to the guest house, the other group of people interested to visit the Ramnagar fort of Varanasi. This fort was a beautiful old fort constructed on the other side of the river ganga. It had a museum that showcased all the ammunition of the royal family from their history. We took a look at the old cars and palanquins that were once used by the royal family. We then took a look at its architecture. After spending a couple of hours here we finally left to the guest house. All of us have really enjoyed this trip very much and it was evident. This was going to be our last night at Varanasi. It felt just like yesterday that we came to varanasi and the tour is already coming to an end. Time in varanasi just keeps flowing with the pace of river ganga. I decided even befor coming to varanasi to visit the Kashi vishwanath temple and only then I'll leave this place.
As scheduled, I woke up early and left for Kashi Vishwanath mandir. it was approximately 5:40 in the morning and by then the queue line was as long as a kilometer. We stood patiently in the line for a time of 4 hours. In this 4 hours i could see how people's faith and belief in god are, that is when i realized it was the same belief in god that brought me here. People were all doing bhajans and praying to the all mighty Shiva the whole time they were in the queue. After 4 hour of standing in the queue i came close to the main temple premises. All the devotees were happy and joyful, some singing songs, some praying calm. All this reminded me of the lines in a song that go like this "Sadaa siva sanyaasi taapasi, kailaasavasi......Nee paadamudralu mosi pongipoyinaade palle kaasi." These lines roughly translate to, "Oh lord siva, the meditator, the resident of Kailasa........This city of varansi has become holy and completely joyful after you set your feet here." I could sense a spiritual joy among the people who were seen in the temple and i could feel some sort of power in the environment. After a successful darshan I went back to the guest house and joined the rest of people who were sharing their experiences with each other in a group talk.
All of us then quickly went back to our rooms to start re packing our luggage. Unforunately, mu heavy luggage beacme even heavier. We left varanasi and went to the airport. we were waiting for the flight and all the memories from the trip started as a showreel in my mind. All the new learning experiences, the spirituality, the cultural diversity, the occupational diversity, the hustle bustle of the city, the people from the ghats, the burning pyres from manikarnika and harishchandra, dev deepawali, kashi vishwanath mandir and the list goes on. What i learnt about the city is a lot, but it is just a fraction of a percentage of the deep thousands of years of history that can still be found intact. As of what i felt, everyone should visit the city atleast once in a life time as it is not only a city of the religion or spiritual value, but also a place of learning, a place of all new experiences. I would say that the place is another world and one has to experience this heaven on earth.
|| Jai Kashi Vishwanath ||
