Welcome to Varanasi

Blip number 900. In Varanasi...only one thing to do....

And so I awoke at 0520 to go out onto the Ganges in a boat for sunrise...except that it didn't really, but the light was astonishing and the boat ride was just quite a glorious sensory experience and I certainly got a lovely blip...got back to room, ditched fleece...it's still cold here in the night, dawn is still a bit chilly, daytime is now getting hot, properly hot today, but I digress...and set off along to assi ghat to buy a ten rupee breakfast of puri Marsala from a breakfast stall and some coffee from the coffee place...

When I stumbled upon him...not the first of the day, the fires were bright on the burning ghats, but, first I'd seen like this, laid out in the street in order for donations to pay for his cremation. I've heard it costs about 5000 to 7000. ...

Oddly the guy was a holy man who, I was told, was killed by a monkey falling upon his head...

And I don't know if this is an image which will upset or offend anyone. If it does then I apologise, but, this is Varanasi and I want my journal to remain an honest account of this trip...India offers up all sorts of beauty and wonder; it's a great game and a galaxy of delights but she also takes her toll...and here in Varanasi death is so much a part of the daily routine that you can't escape it...this is an integral part, it seems to me, of the experience of the place. I think its also the most striking image of the day...and, odd as it sounds to me, I think that it's a fitting one for the day....welcome to Varanasi....

And in the background in the shelter is one if the chillum babas....

Day by day this place gets more insane it seems, the bone fires for holi are many and huge; warnings have begun, wear old clothes....you'll need to shower at some point...I think for a city which appears to dance on the edge of chaotic implosion, holi is going to be bonkers, it strikes me as unlikely that Varanasi can outdo this first week for general wierdness but I get the feeling.....

Other news is that the that side dealers have gone feral....everyone leaving, prices collapsing, desperation...it's amusing to see until you get accosted, tonight we were followed by a couple of disgruntled ones looking to sell us some brown heroin...we ended up taking a wander in the alleys...where I got mosquito coils, first time needed since hampi....and then, accidentally wandering into someone's front room...

And that's it then...another day in this beautiful, chaotic, organic pantomime of a city