Two days on the Train

We had been riding in sleeper cars up until this point, but because the journey from Delhi to New Jalpaguri takes over 36 hours, I decided to splurge for an air-conditioned two-tier which I hoped would be more comfortable and less crowded.

For the first few hours, I found myself alone in my section. I immediately closed the curtain over the opening to the hallway, bundled up in a blanket and fell asleep. Some time later, I was joined by an Indian business man, who talked to me about his family and his job at an American telecom company. It was interesting to see a face on the other side of all of the American outsourcing to India.

When he left, I was alone again for a few more hours until I was joined by a family consisting of a mother, a father, a son and an older man who appeared to be the grandfather. When they entered, I was sprawled out on the bottom bench reading my book and they all piled in on the adjacent bench facing me. The audience made me somewhat uncomfortable, so I sat up and offered up the end of my bench. The father moved over to my side and I went back to reading my book.

After a few more hours, I began to get sleepy and decided to move up to the top berth where I could spread out and leave the bottom berths to the family below. They all watched as I hefted my bag and then my blanket and pillow up to the top. I then climbed up and settled in, feeling quite anti-social, but reasoning that, when I fell asleep, I would prefer the relative privacy of the top berth to the fishbowl exposure of the bottom. My privacy soon became all the more private when I found that the air-conditioning vent was located right above my new bed and the only way to escape the onslaught of freezing air was to burrow completely under the blanket from head to toe. I’m not sure what the Indian family thought of me, but I must have been a strange site.

I had bought some cereal bars at one of the mini-groceries catering to westerners in anticipation of my long train ride, but after 24 hours on the train, I found that I hadn’t brought enough water and was extremely thirsty. When I finally emerged from my cocoon, the family who had been there previously had left and a new family had taken their place. There was no longer any room for me on the bottom benches and so when I returned from my quick dip out at the train station for water, I had to return to the top, where I had no choice but to duck right back under the covers.

Finally, the train arrived in New Jalpaguri. Somehow I got from the train station to the hotel that I had chosen from the guide book – memories that escape me now. When I walked into the hotel in New Jalpaguri, I was told that they had no more vacant singles, but that I could have a double at a discounted rate. I agreed and asked to see the room. A man showed me to the room and, as in most of the hotels and guesthouses I had stayed in, encouraged me to settle in before coming out to check in. I was not hungry, but I was feeling the effects of the lack of a consistent sustainable diet, so I decided to check in, take a quick shower and inquire as to a good local restaurant.

Upon leaving my room, I found that I could not get the key to work, so I left the room unlocked and went to the front desk to sign in. Everywhere I went in both Vietnam and India, each time you checked into a new hotel you were required to sign a guest register with your name, passport number, country of origin, previous destination and subsequent destination. Just as I had finished filling in all of my information and had handed my passport over the counter to the hotel manager, I felt myself becoming extremely lightheaded and the realization that if I did not make it back to my room quickly, I would soon find myself on the floor, rushed through my mind. As I turned and hurried back to my room, I was grateful that I had been unable to lock the door.

I laid in the bed until the feeling subsided and soon heard a knock at the door. When I answered it, the man who had showed me the room asked me if I was feeling okay and I explained that I was fine, but I had not eaten in a while and needed to get some food. He recommended a restaurant just down the street and I thanked him and got ready to head out for some food.

The restaurant that he recommended was unlike any other I’d been to in India up until that point. Very much like a North American fast food restaurant, there were pictures of menu items on a display above the counter, behind which young adults in paper caps stood ready to punch your order into an automated cash register. It was more than a little strange given my surroundings. I ordered a Chinese dish (Chinese food is big in India) and ate what I could in order to get me through to the following morning. I was getting used to forcing myself to eat and not finding food appealing, but I was not enjoying it.

After dinner, I walked back through the dimly lit streets to my hotel, aware of curious looks from people standing in the shadows and happily settled into my bed, glad to finally have had a decent meal and to be able to sleep in stationary bed.

Sharon Goes to the Hospital

The following day we woke early and moved our things down the street, to a slightly pricier, slightly cleaner, hotel. I had contacted the Cross Cultural Solutions in Delhi and arranged to stop by for a visit after which they would take me to the hospital that they took their volunteers.

I took an auto rickshaw to the Cross Cultural Solutions house, where I was greeted by the director, program staff and office staff. Although I was not very hungry, I accepted their offer for lunch and engaged in conversation about the differences between India and the United States. I asked them about their policy on volunteers giving money to people begging on the streets, which they responded they were completely against because of the criminal element and the availability of social services. The director mentioned how they had found it amusing when Californians had made such a big deal about the blackouts when that is something that Indians have learned to deal with on an ongoing daily basis. One of the program staff even offered to pay homage to a picture of me if I would assassinate the president.

After lunch, I was escorted to the hospital, where I met with a doctor who asked me numerous questions about my symptoms and concluded that since I was feeling better, I should simply continue to take the anti-biotics I had started taking in Varanasi and that I should be fine. As I left the hospital, I found myself frustrated at myself for not speaking up and asking to be tested for Typhoid or Dengue, two of the diseases I’d heard most about travelers coming down with in India that were the most concerning. I was feeling better, but I still had not regained my appetite and was still not feeling completely recovered.

When I returned to Paharganj from the cool, sterility of the hospital, the stench hit me like a brick wall. I immediately felt ill and headed straight for bed, vowing to make the trek back to the hospital the following day if I was still not feeling any better.

The following morning, I still was not feeling back to normal and so I made my way back to the hospital, if nothing else, to see what I had had. This time, the doctor agreed to admit me for testing as well as to hook me up to an IV for some much needed re-hydration. I am not a big fan of hospitals, but I was willing to be admitted because I wanted to know exactly what was wrong with me and also because it was much brighter and cleaner than my hotel room. I settled in on my gurney where I spent most of the day sleeping, woken intermittently to be stuck with another needle or to have the bag of saline, that they were pumping into me, refilled.

When afternoon began moving on to evening, I started to get restless to make it back to my hotel. After numerous attempts, I finally flagged down the doctor who seemed surprised at my anxiousness to leave. I explained that I had a train out of Delhi the following morning and was ready to get back to my hotel to pack. She told me that they had planned to keep me over night in order to monitor my condition and to get the test results in the morning. Being stubborn and maybe not the most practical person on the planet, I had already made up my mind to leave and had no intention of staying in a hospital over night. Besides the inside of the hospital, what I had seen so far of Delhi, was limited to Paharganj and the road between there and the hospital, but I had no desire to stick around to see the rest. The next stop on my brief India tour was Darjeeling, what I imagined to be similar to the French Hill Stations in Vietnam, a slow paced, casual city with a beautiful view, and I was anxious to get there. I was feeling much better and I figured if anything else came up, I could deal with it when I returned to Bangladesh.

With these plans in mind, I promised the doctor that I would call for the results when I returned to Bangladesh and returned to my bed to wait out the next two hours that it took for me to be discharged.

The following morning, Mark and I parted ways. He was to catch a plane back to Dhaka that afternoon and I was on the early train to New Jalpaguri, where I would get a jeep to Darjeeling. Luckily I had given myself plenty of time, because when I arrived at the Old Delhi train station and handed a conductor my ticket, he informed me that I was at the wrong station and that my train was leaving from the New Delhi train station. He said that I still had enough time to make it and that I could get a rickshaw driver from the pre-paid rickshaw stand in front of the station. I thanked him and hurriedly made my way out to the rickshaw stand.

When I walked out of the station, I was immediately inundated with offers for rides. I told them that I was looking for the pre-paid rickshaw stand. One of the men said, “Where are you going? I will take you for cheap.” I told him, “Thank you, but I want to get a ride from the prepaid rickshaw stand.” He was insistent and continued to ask where I was going and offering me rides. When I revealed that I was going to the New Delhi Train station, he said he would take me for 500 rupees.

Knowing that this was an exorbitant offer and set on finding the stand, I continued on, assisted, finally, by a man who acquiesced and pointed me in the right direction. As I walked towards the stand, the man who had offered me the ride of 500, came down to 200 and even attempted to physically pull me away when I came within 10 feet of it of a pre-paid ride.

Shaking him off, I walked up to the stand, where I purchased a ride to the New Delhi train station f0r 80 rupees and arrived at the station with time to spare.

The Dirtiest Place in Delhi

Our cab ride – yes, they have cabs in Delhi – from the train station to Paharganj, where we hoped to find a hotel, gave us a view of a very different India from the one we’d seen so far. Delhi is a very clean, modern city with very few, if any, of the rutted, dusty streets; mud housing and traditional transportation of the other cities we had seen. I did not even see one cow during the entire ride! Unfortunately, I cannot say the same for Paharganj.

Paharganj, Delhi’s “backpacker ghetto;” in all my travels, is the one that most lives up to its reputation. From the wide, gleaming streets of Delhi’s center, one enters familiar narrow, crowded, dirty, polluted, cow infested streets lined with cheap guesthouses, internet cafes, and shops selling everything from traditional Indian garb and souvenirs to western snacks and travel guides. The air was thick with exhaust and the smell of spicy food mixed with fresh cow dung and I was anxious to get inside and out of the heat and the stench.

Just as we began walking, we were approached by a man hoping to lead us to the guesthouse of his choice. We had had one in mind, but Mark decided to see what this man had to offer; being too drained to protest, I followed without complaint. By this point in the trip, we both had well formed ideas of what we would pay and what conditions we would tolerate and the first few options all fell short of these ideals. After a number of rooms that were either too expensive or too dingy, we settled on one that was acceptable, with the agreement that we would look for another room for the rest of our stay in Delhi when we were rested and had stored the packs that made us easy prey for the guesthouse vultures.

The evening, we decided to check out Connaught Place, an area nearby with shops and restaurants. The first thing we came upon was a large movie theater. We had tried to see a movie in Calcutta, but could never time it right, and had not gotten around to seeing one. The movie that we had both expressed interest in earlier was playing, so we decided to see one that evening after getting something to eat.

I had not had much of an appetite since I had gotten sick and still was not feeling up to much, but when I saw the beautiful site of a Pizza Hut sign, there would have been no tearing me away. Although I could only eat a few pieces of garlic cheese bread and one slice of pizza, it was heavenly.

After dinner, we headed back to the movie theater, where we watched Mangal Panday, The Rising, in Hindi. I was really impressed and enjoyed it immensely. It was unlike other Indian movies I had seen in that there was more dialogue than singing and the romance scenes did not overwhelm the rest of the movie. It was an epic film, focusing on the relationship between an Indian man and an officer in the British military before the beginning of the first Indian War of Independence. Although it was in Hindi, there were a few scenes in English between the British officers and there was so much action that it was very easy to follow.

After the movie, we made our way back to our room with plans to rise early the next morning to move into our new hotel.

The Taj

At the train station in Varanasi, a long metal staircase leads up to an elevated walkway spanning six rows of track. Mark left me seated on the walkway with our bags while he went back to the main platform for a cup of Indian tea. While I sat waiting, I watched as the other passengers walked by or settled themselves similarly on the sides of the walkway to wait for their trains. The most curious passenger that passed me by was a rather large white cow, leaving me amazed at the places you see cows in this country.

As Mark was buying his tea, I noticed that our tickets to our next destination, Jhansi, were instead, tickets to Jaipur. Fortunately for me, Mark was not the least put out by my mistake and, even more fortunately, Agra, where we had planned to go after Jhansi, was on the way to Jaipur, so we needed only to get out a stop early and we would only miss out on one city without any unnecessary hassle.

When we boarded the train, I asked our seatmates, who all happened to be fellow travelers, if they would moving their luggage from the top berth so that I could sleep, which they agreed to amicably.

When we arrived in Agra, a man outside of the train station told us that we would not be able to bring our bags into the Taj Mahal, but that we could store them at the train station. Since I was not feeling well and Mark was anxious to finalize his departure plans, we had decided to just stop off in Agra long enough to see the Taj Mahal and then catch an afternoon train to Delhi. Because trains between Agra and Delhi run so often, we needed simply to buy a ticket for that day and could use it on any of the hourly trains.

We checked our bags in a room luggage store room and headed over to the rickshaw stand where we found that you could purchase rickshaws at an hourly rate. I had originally wanted to simply flag a rickshaw down at the corner, but Mark convinced me that it would cost approximately the same amount for the hourly rate as it would to go there and back, and in the former instance, we would be guaranteed a ride back when we wanted it. I agreed and we paid for a four hour guide, who turned out to be a really friendly man who spent the ride telling us all about Agra and the history of the Taj Mahal.

When we reached the gates of the Taj Mahal, we joined the queue waiting to pay to enter. The entrance fee for Indians is 250 rupees, about $6 US dollars, while the rate for foreigners is 1500, about $35 US dollars. While this fee might not seem like much to people paying entrance fees for attractions in the States, I could feel all eyes on me as I counted out the fifteen hundred rupee fee.

I had been talking about going to see “The Taj” for months now and since that time, I’d never even looked up a picture of the building, knowing it only as an abstract idea. Now that I was there, I was duly impressed and could finally see what all the fuss is about.

The Taj Mahal is situated on lush landscaped grounds housing smaller marble buildings, similarly exquisite. The gate itself particularly impressive with its imposing grandeur, inlaid marble flowers and towering turrets. We spent about an hour wandering around inside, marveling at the beauty and detail. After our requisite “me at the Taj Mahal” pictures, we headed back to our guide for the ride back to the train station.

A Site Only Seen in Varanasi

One evening, before we left Varanasi, I was sitting in an Internet cafe and I heard the sound of shaking bells which seemed to grow louder with each passing moment. As the sound neared, it was joined by the sound of stamping feet and chanting men. When I looked towards to open door to see what was happening, a group of men tromped past, shouting and chanting loudly, carrying between them, a stretcher, upon which lay a body prepared for cremation at one of the city's burning ghats. As soon as they appreared, they were gone, the sound of the bells receeding with their passing. I smiled to myself and shook my head, amazed at the things one can experience so far away from home.

During the hour that I was in the cafe that evening, at least six more bodies were ceremoniously carried past the door on their way to Nirvana in Indian's holiest city.

Down and Out in Varanasi

That evening, in response to the unending invitations to dine from a man standing outside each time we passed, we decided to have dinner in the restaurant around the corner from our guesthouse. By this point in the day, I was feeling exhausted and sore from all of the walking in the heat. Also, the thought of solid food was, for some unknown reason, very unappealing, so I decided to order a simple soup, much to the chagrin of the owner, who had so vividly and tantalizingly described all of their home-style Indian dishes.

After dinner, we returned to the room to get some much needed sleep. After lying in our beds for a few minutes, we heard a great racket begin seemingly just outside our window. It appeared that the celebration, of which all of the carts in the streets on our day of arrival had hinted, had begun. From our second story window, we began to here the sounds of shouting, chanting, fireworks and what sounded like the banging of pots. I briefly contemplated wandering outside to join the festivities, but I was so tired that the mere thought was an effort. Finally, I feel into a fitful sleep.

Later that night, I woke up with a sudden urge to make a run to our communal restroom. I had toyed with the thought that I might be getting sick earlier in the day when my legs had begun to ache more than I thought was normal and my stomach had tightened at the thought of ingesting food, but my suspicions were not completely confirmed until that moment. When I awoke, my whole body ached, down to the joints in my fingers and I was unusually dehydrated. I barely made it to the squat toilet in time. As the night wore on and I wore a path from my door to the toilet, I began to think that maybe this was more than a simply case of food poisoning.

There was a table on the landing between our room and the bathroom and throughout the night there were two men about my age, playing cards. At first I was embarrassed at the obviousness of my situation as I rushed past them every 20 minutes, but I soon felt so ill that I ceased to care. After my 10th or so run to the toilet, I decided to ask them if they had ever traveled with anyone with Typhoid or Dengue or if they would recognize the symptoms. As I stopped on my way back to the room to explain my plight, I barely had the words out of my mouth when the room started spinning. The next thing I knew, I was sitting on the floor with both of the men were crouched next to me, looking quite concerned.

After describing my situation, one of the men informed me that he was a medical student and proceeded to ask me detailed questions about my symptoms, accurately describing everything I was going through. They offered to take me to the hospital, but my wariness of Indian medical care overrode my concern of my condition at that point and I thanked them and said that I thought I would wait to see if it got any better before rushing out to the hospital. The medical student then said that if I began to feel better, that I should wait 24 hours to see if the symptoms went away, but if they did not, I should go to the nearest drug store for Cipro, an anti-biotic for the symptoms I was experiencing, until I could get to a hospital. The other man offered me a packet of hydration salts and said that they would be up for another hour or so and if I was still not feeling better that they could take me to the hospital at that time if I wanted to go. I was extremely grateful for both their knowledge and their gracious offers of assistance and went back to my room feeling better overall.

Amazingly, I slept through the rest of the night and when I awoke the next morning, I was feeling somewhat better, but well aware that I was ill. Feeling week, but alert, I decided to walk to the drugstore to pick up a packet of antibiotics and some hydrating salts. Because we would be in Delhi within the week, I had decided to wait to see how I felt up until then and if I was not any better, I would to check in to the hospital in Delhi, where I assumed the facilities would be more modern than Varanasi.

A Change of Plans

The following day, Mark was feeling better and we decided to check out Banaras Hindu University and to see the sights of Varanasi outside of the Old City. We stepped out of the maze of the Old City on to the wider streets of Varanasi and were immediately approached by Indian men, one after another.

“How are you? Where are you from? How long have you been in India? Would you like to come see my shop?”

“Oh, Hello. Is this your first time in India? Yes? Oh, how wonderful. Would you like to come see my shop?” “

“Good morning. Come see my shop?”

And when we were free of them, the richshaws circled in.

“Hello. Going somewhere? I can take you.”

“Need a ride? Where are you going?”

“Do you want to see the burning ghat?”

On man even told us that he was not just a rickshaw driver, but he was superman. He could get us anywhere we wanted to go faster than anyone else in the city. We considered taking him up on his offer simply for his originality, but decided to stick with our decision to walk, to see the sights.

The dusty, rutted streets of Varanasi were lined with shops and restaurants with brightly colored, welcoming storefronts, displaying their merchandise for passersby. We stopped in an office supply store so that I could buy envelops for cards I had purchased in Calcutta and a convenience type store to buy some drinks and a bag of snack mix to eat along the way. It was extremely hot and these short stops were as much to get out of the heat than for the purchases.

We found the University and after the ornate entryway, there was little to see outside of nondescript, cement buildings and a few scattered trees, none, of course, close enough to the road to give us any shade from the sweltering sun.

After leaving the University grounds, we walked back out into the street, dodging rickshaw drivers as we went, and found a nice, modern, air-conditioned restaurant for lunch.

After lunch, we walked along the streets of the old city nearest to the river to see the different ghats along the banks. Entering where we did, we found that the maze of streets was even more immense than we had originally thought. As we walked along unfamiliar, yet familiar, pathways, I marveled at how different our current surroundings were from anywhere I had ever been. The narrow pathways were lined with tiny shops filled with colorful materials, even smaller internet “cafés” with four or five computers lined up against a wall occupied intermittently with travelers typing away madly or staring out the door waiting for the electricity to come back on; shops selling trinkets, statues of Hindu gods displayed in indentions cut out in the walls; cows blocking the already crowded alley ways, seemingly oblivious to the traffic jam they are causing.

On the way back to the guesthouse, we noticed that the electricity was up and running and decided to take the opportunity to check our email. Erica had written to Mark, telling him that she would be unable to meet us in Delhi. We were both disappointed and set about making arrangements for the remainder of our trip. Mark decided to head back to Dhaka, whereas I would continue on in India. We would both travel together to Agra and Delhi as planned, where Mark would catch a plane to Dhaka and I board a train for the two day ride to Darjeeling.

That evening, I asked the owner of the guesthouse to purchase two tickets for us for the train from Varanasi to Jhansi, a small city just south of Agra where we would spend a few days before heading to Agra.

India's Holiest City

We boarded the train early the next morning. Since we were not on an overnight trip, we did not have the choice of the upper berth, but instead simply took our seats on the crowded lower bench and settled in for the ride. Unlike my experience on Thai trains, which either had food served on the train or had food vendors at various stops hop on to sell their wares only to hop off at the next stop and catch the next train back, Indian trains did not seem to offer any opportunities to purchase food, other than jumping off to get what was available at the larger stops. We had not thought to bring any food, so I just watched hungrily as the Indian couple unpacked their heated, pre-packed picnic and thought about the possibility of some good Indian food once we reached Varanassi.

Not only is Varanassi India’s holiest Hindu City, but it is also believed to be one of the oldest cities in the world. India’s Hindu’s believe that if you are cremated in Varanassi, you will be able to escape the circle of life and death and go straight to Nirvana. The banks of the Ganges River, where it runs past this holy city, are dotted with ghats, or holy sites with staircases running down into the water where people can bath in the sacred waters of the Ganges. A few of these ghats are ‘burning ghats,’ where the cremations take place and from where, afterward, the ashes are thrown into the water. While it is ideal for India’s Hindus to be cremated at these sites, it is not an affordable option for everyone, nor are all allowed to be burnt. As one of the readily available local ‘tour guides’ informed me, there are five categories of people who cannot be burnt: pregnant women, children under a certain age, holy men, lepers and a fifth group that I cannot now recall (I believe it was a group afflicted with another type of illness). The first two being prohibited because a child under a certain age or an unborn child has not experienced enough of life yet, a holy man, I think, because you just do not burn holy men and the last two because of a fear of releasing the illness into the air through the cremation process and causing widespread illness. So for these groups, they simply throw the bodies into the river, one of the many reasons I did not partake in the ritual bathing in the Ganges.

We arrived at the train station in Varanassi and were immediately approached by eager taxi drivers willing to take us anywhere we wanted to go. One man latched on to me before we had even left the station and told us that he could take us to the Old City for 500 rupees (approximately $11 USD, an exorbitant rate). I told him that we did not want a taxi and that we would find an auto rickshaw to take us where we wanted to go and that there was no way we were paying 500 rupees. He came back, telling me that it was much nicer to travel in a taxi and that 500 rupees was the standard fare to the Old City. I repeated that we did not want a taxi. He continued to follow us dropping his fare from 500 to 400. At this point in my travels, I had learned that you could pretty much get a ride for whatever you were willing to pay as long as you played the game. If you took the first offer you received, you would inevitable pay way too much, but if you walked past enough guys and refused enough rides, there would be at least one guy who would not let you walk away and would take you for the fare you offered. I always offered what I thought was a reasonable fare, knowing that it was most likely much more than the locals pay, but also knowing that I was not going to be scammed out of more than I decided to be scammed out of. I told the man again that we did not want a taxi and continued walking, now getting closer to the exit where we would be prey to a whole hoard of taxi and rickshaw drivers. The man wouldn’t let up and asked me how much I was willing to pay. When, I told him that I was willing to pay 200 rupees, he laughed and told me that I would never get a taxi to the Old City for 100 rupees. I said that I agreed and that was why we were going to take an auto-rickshaw. His offer dropped another hundred. I told him that now I wasn’t going to take him regardless of his price because he had lied to me, telling me earlier that the regular fare was 500 and that he could not take less. Undeterred, he continued to follow us, but at this point we had reached the throng and word had gotten around that we wanted an auto-rickshaw. We were approached by a man who offered to take us for 300, to which I responded that I could get a ride in a taxi for 300 and kept walking. At this point, I’m sure Mark was ready to take anybody up on their offer, thinking that 100 rupees was not worth all the hassle, but I was enjoying the game and I refused to give in. The man with the taxi then offered to take us for 250, an offer I refused as I continued walking. Another man, who had heard, from the ripple through the crowd, of the woman who wanted an auto-rickshaw to the Old City for 200 rupees, came forward and motioned to us, telling us that he would take us for 200. At this point, the taxi driver also came down to 200, but we had already given our affirmative nods to the auto-rickshaw driver.

The guest house that had been recommended to us was the Yogi Lodge. I had been warned that there were countless knock offs of the Yogi Lodge, i.e. the New Yogi Lodge, the Golden Yogi Lodge, but that there was only one true Yogi Lodge, a fact that our driver did not know or simply refused to admit. He offered to take us to another guesthouse, but I was adamant. I knew where I wanted to go and I planned to get there. Because he did not know the location of the Yogi Lodge, the driver dropped us off at a spot that Mark had deemed ‘close enough’ to where we wanted to go.

The street where he left us off was wide and dusty. Dirt was kicked up continuously by the hoards of bicycle rickshaws, carts and motorized vehicles that constantly filled the street, making the air heavy with dust. Rows of street level shops lined the road selling sari’s and cloth, western-style clothing for children and men, electronics, beauty products and every other imaginable item. Carts also stood in the middle of the street selling what appeared to be decorations for a celebration of some sort along with cheap plastic toys and costume jewelry. As we began walking in the direction of the Old City, we were bombarded with offers for rides, tour guides and the all-pervasive, “would you like to see my shop?” By the time we reached the entrance to the Old City, I had said, “No, Thank you,” so many times that I was beginning to get it out before they could even begin their spiel.

The Old City is nothing like anything I had ever seen before. It seemed more of a labyrinth than a city, with narrow corridors twisting and turning giving you the feeling that you could easily get lost for years. We were immediately approached by a man who asked us where we were headed and when we told him the Yogi Lodge, he told us that it was no longer in business. Not willing to believe him until I had found the spot where the Yogi Lodge was on the map, I told him that I did not believe him and that I planned to find it. He offered to show us another guest house, but I continued to refuse and continued to follow my map. We were soon joined by another man, who was appraised of the situation, “They want to go to the Yogi Lodge. I told them it was closed, but she doesn’t believe me,” and corroborated the earlier mans tale saying that the guesthouse was closed, but that he could show man a nice one. What were we looking for? How much did we want to pay? I was getting closer to the destination on my map and I continued my forward progress as I repeated my desire to stay at the Yogi Lodge. Yet another man approached us, who, after hearing that I wanted to go to the Yogi Lodge pointed to the left, down a narrow alley way. I thanked him and after walking around a few bends, as well as a few standing cows, we found the Yogi Lodge, and when we got to the door, I noticed that our “guides” were now no where in sight.

The Yogi Lodge turned out to be a favorite with the backpacker crowd and with its cozy restaurant and communal living area, seemed like a good place to meet other travelers. There were no private baths, just a shared bathing area with a sink, two showers and two squat toilets, a fact that Mark was not to pleased with, but I convinced him to stay at least one night, saying that we could move the following morning if he was not happy. He agreed and decided to test out the room that afternoon because he was not feeling too well and did not feel up to hours of sightseeing. I was excited to be somewhere new and decided to head out to get my bearings a bit while Mark rested up.

As soon as I left the hotel and turned the corner out of the alley onto a narrow pathway lined with shops, a young boy of about 12 got my attention. He introduced himself and told me that he was not a guide, that he was out of school that day and just wanted to practice his English. He said he didn’t want any money, but was willing to show me around. I told him that I really just wanted to walk around for a while and that my friend was not feeling well, but would hopefully be feeling better the following day when we would go sightseeing together. He seemed to believe my story, but continued to walk with me, telling me how it was dangerous for a woman to walk around alone because there were so many men who would try to get me to give them money and how I shouldn’t trust anyone, but that I could trust him. Finally, realizing that I wasn’t going to shake him, I decided that if I went to an internet café, that maybe he would wander off and leave me to wander around on my own. I asked him if he knew of any internet cafes and he immediately perked up and said that he did and that he would show me where it was. He led me through the maze of narrow alleys past countless tea shops, clothing shops, fabric shops restaurants and guesthouses before finally leading me into a small Internet café with four computers. Just as I sat down to type the electricity went out and all of the computer screens went blank. After Vietnam, I had learned to be patient with the black outs and I sat quietly until the power was restored via a generator a few minutes later.

Although I was in the internet café for a little over an hour, my young guide was still waiting for me when I got up to leave. I told him that he had not been necessary for him to wait for me, to which he replied that it was no problem and again fell in step beside me. Knowing now that I would not shake him that easily and also that I would not be able to find my way around being led by someone else, I decided that I would go to check on Mark and hope that the boy’s patience would not withstand another long wait. I told him that I wanted to check on my friend and he asked me if I thought Mark would want to go sightseeing if he was feeling better. I said that I did not know what Mark would want to do, but that most likely we would go sightseeing tomorrow. He said that he would show us around tomorrow and pressured me to agree to a time to meet in the morning. I repeated that I did not know what Mark would want to do and that I could not make any decisions until I talked to him. I told him that if we saw him in the morning, then maybe he could show us around. At this suggestion, he countered that if I did not agree to meet him then I would run into countless other boys who would offer to show us around and I would go off with them, leaving him sad and alone. I finally agreed that I would not go off with any other boys and that if Mark was not up for sightseeing that I would accompany him around to the local sights. He tried again to get me to promise to meet him in the morning, but I told him that I did not want him to come all that way, just in case we decided not to go sightseeing. He then reminded me that I said that if Mark was not feeling better that I would go sightseeing with him and that if he came and I had left, he would be very sad. When we reached the entry way to the alley that led to the Yogi Lodge, he finally left me, repeating his desire to meet with me in the morning.

Relieved to be free of my enterprising young tour guide, I went back to the room where I found Mark resting and still feeling somewhat poorly. I decided have lunch at the restaurant downstairs before heading out again. At this point, I had given up on ordering Indian food in restaurants geared to tourists, having found it to be decidedly unlike any ‘real’ Indian food that I had at home, so I decided to try out India’s Chinese.

After I placed my order, I talked briefly to the hotel managers about the possibility of having them purchase train tickets for us. We had found purchasing train tickets quite easy up until this point, but after just a few hours in Varanassi, I was willing to pay a convenience fee to have someone else run the gauntlet for me. Our plan at this point, was to get a train from Varanassi to Delhi where we would meet up with Erica, my good friend and Mark’s wife, who would join us for five days, before flying back to Bangladesh. I had been spending some time looking at cities around Delhi for us to visit during her stay. We had already determined that we wanted to tour Delhi and take a trip to Agra to see the Taj Mahal, but had not decided on anywhere else. I found a few that I was really interested in seeing, but all of them required a long train ride from Delhi and I wasn’t sure if Erica would want to spend the majority of her time on the train.

The city I was most interested in was Jaisalamer, a town filled with old forts and castles lying right on the border of the desert, offering overnight camel safari’s. Another city, just west of Delhi, Jaipur, was another option, also filled with picturesque old forts and castles, yet more practical being less than a days train ride away. Even more practical, was Jhansi, a small town just south of Agra, which was interesting and would not take us too far off our path. I decided to wait until Mark was feeling better and we had conferred with Erica before making any decisions on train tickets.

My food arrived after about half an hour, making me wonder what it was they were doing all that time. Apparently chow mien at the Yogi Logde equates to a dry packet of ramen noodles crushed over a gelatinous mystery vegetable mix. I managed to eat enough to keep me until the next meal and wandered out again, in an attempt to find my way around.

I had bought three salwar kameeze in Bangladesh, but had managed to ruin one of the pairs of pants and forget the other and so I only had one functional outfit to wear other than pants and t-shirts, which although were more common among tourists than I had thought they would be, still made me feel like even more of a spectacle. I decided to check out some of the local shops to find some long Punjabi style shirts, which were less covering that the Salwar Kameeze, but covered enough to be respectable and might also translate into something I would wear at home.

The shops in the Old City are mostly very small and are raised about three feet off the ground. The floors of the shops are covered with a flat wall-to-wall cushion, on which you sit, after removing your shoes in the alley, while the proprietor of the shop unfolds garment after garment for your viewing pleasure. The first shop I visited was about the size of a janitors closet, with a cushion on the floor and walls lined with shelves piled high with Punjabi shirts, salwar kameez and dresses in numerous colors, textures and styles. I had stopped in because I had liked a shirt that was hanging out side of the shop, but after seeing it close up, I decided that I wanted to look a little further.

Shopping in other countries is a lot more personal than shopping in the States and you really can’t get by with just saying, “No thank you, I’m just looking.” The pressure is real and in your face and if you are like me and feel bad about things like watching someone unfold twenty shirts and then walking away without making a purchase, it can be quite an ordeal to get away. The men who work at these shops know that there are at least 10 other shops right around the corner all selling similar products and if they do not get you to purchase something before you leave, it is a very real possibility that you will never be back, no matter how many times you try to assure them. At one store, I was warned that when I came back, to be sure I was on my own, because if I came with someone who asked to show me a shop, I would have to pay more to cover their commission. After begging my way out of a few more shops, I settled on two reasonably priced Punjabi shirts and a plan to find some loose fitting pants to go with them.

Upon leaving my final shop, I was approached by an older man who asked me if I wanted to see the burning ghat. Apparently the burning ghats are a big tourist attraction because he was the sixth or so person to ask me that afternoon. Not wanting to go back and sit in the room or risk another meal from the Yogi Lodge kitchen, I decided to see what the burning ghat was all about.

As I mentioned before, the Ganges River banks in Varanassi are lined with ghats, but only a few are distinctly ‘burning ghats’ where bodies are cremated. As I followed the man through the winding alleys, my feeling of pride at the fact that I was beginning to recognize things soon diminished as we took unfamiliar twits and turns that led us out of the maze near the river. Before we arrived, I was warned repeatedly not to take any pictures. The man emphasized the sacredness of the ceremonies and how disrespectful it would be to take pictures, not to mention the mandatory one-year jail sentence that one would obtain for such an offense.

The alley let out into a crowd of people milling around a pile of tinder and we walked through the crowd to the steps of the ghat. The man introduced me to an attractive young Indian man, saying that he was an official guide and would take me from there. The young guide welcomed me to the burning ghat and led me up to the viewing platform while giving me the history of the ghat and some details about Hindu beliefs about Varanassi. The top platform looked down on a lower platform from where, as my guide told me, the family members of the deceased watch the ceremony. Below the lower platform, was a stone platform raised about 20 square feet, approximately three feet above the ground where the bodies were cremated. At that time, there were four bodies being burnt, laid out on the platform and covered with timber and set aflame. My guide told me that it took about three to four hours to burn the body, after which time, the ashes where sprinkled ceremoniously into the river.

After watching for a few minutes, I turned to go and I was hit with the inevitable plea for money. The cremation ceremony is expensive, I was told. It is hard for poor families to afford to wood for the ceremony and would I be able to provide a donation of 500 rupees to supplement the cost of the wood. I said that I did not have much money, but would give what I could, an amount that was apparently not enough reading the look on my guide’s face.

When I reached the ground level, I was met by the man who had led me to the ghat, who now offered to take me to see a fortuneteller. I had been playing with the idea of having my fortune told, but my idea of a fortune telling experience was one in which I passed by a blind woman mumbling to herself in a dark alley who would put her hand on my arm, look up at me in a brief moment of clarity, and say, “beware, my child, you will soon die a long and painful death” or “you will do great things one day” or something like that; not being led to a man in a turban, who asked for my credit card number before telling me that I would have 2.5 kids and grow old with the man I loved and then waving me away in time for his appointment with the next sucker. Figuring that I was probably less likely to stumble on my version, so I agreed to visit the man, but said that I would decide if I wanted my fortune told after meeting him.

As we began to walk away, we were joined by the boy who had followed me around earlier that day. He gave me a look of grave disappointment and told me that I had promised not to go with anyone else. I told him that I hadn’t planned to do any sightseeing, but had just decided at the last minute when this man offered to take me. I hated feeling that I had to defend myself or that I owed my allegiance to one particular person. I pledged not to give my word to anyone in the future, even if it meant being less than polite. It turned out that the man and the boy knew each other and together led me to the house of the fortune teller.

They led me back into the maze of alleys and through a doorway that led into a cement room that was empty except for a wooden desk against the back wall and two cushions on the floor along the wall adjacent the desk. The man disappeared into another room and returned followed by a slightly heavier man, with a think, full beard and a head wrap. The man motioned for me to sit down on one of the cushions and proceeded to settle himself on the other one.

The man then asked me if I wanted my fortune told, to which I replied that I did, but that I wanted to know how much it was going to cost me first. He said that that was something that we could discuss later, but first he wanted to know my birth date and time. Immediately on alert, first because he brushed off my question regarding the fee and secondly because he asked for information regarding my birth, I began to think of ways to escape. I did not want my fortune told by someone who was probably going to excuse himself to the back room where he would type my birth date into some website and hand me a printout of my fortune. If anything I wanted the palm reading or even a crystal ball!
I asked again for the price, at which the man finally quoted an exorbitant fee, leading me to thank him, apologize and hastily make my exit saying that I would think about it and possibility return the following day.