Blog : Varanasi

We arrived to Mughal Sarai station about four or five hours later than scheduled and feeling a little bit frazzled. We'd enjoyed our first train experience, bar the icy cold and ferocious air conditioning which left us all shivering in the night and I had managed to get an alright nights sleep. Pulling into the train station it reminded me very much of Sri Lanka, the relatively bare station platforms but hundred of people jostling at the door to the train trying to get you to come to their guesthouse, their taxi, their boat, their anything basically! Whilst we'd been on the train of been in touch with our hotel man who in turn was letting our pick up driver know our new arrival time, so we were hopeful that we would be able to get off the train and into a car and so ignored all of the touts. As Mughal Sarai is not the usual station for Varanasi, this very local place did not seem very used to seeing western tourists, especially for girls and the ogling really did pick up as we walked through the station. I was feeling quite glad I didn't have my big backpack on as well, just my day sack, like we will for our next journeys... At the station entrance, amongst the many bodies sprawled asleep or relaxing on the dirty and hot concrete floor a man came over and almost grabbed us, saying he was our driver. We were very cautious and on the advice of lots of people asked him for the name of our guest house - Ali Baba and also to call the hotelier that I'd been in contact with, to confirm that he was. He must have thought this was all if a fuss because to him we were very obviously his customers - the only western tourists for probably 10 miles! He had a 4x4 which we all hopped in and rolled the windows down, his air con didn't work and it was 35C if not hotter outside!

Varanasi was the city I was most excited about visiting having read so much about it in my book - Holy Cow, apparently a book synonymous with backpacking around India and as someone put it, a bit of a bible for religion (the writer experiences many different cultures and faiths during a two year long period stationed in India). I'd read about how Hindus believe that Varanasi, the holy city and as one of the oldest in the world, is the city of god Shiva, who is the creator and distructer of all things. Varanasi was built on the side of the holy Ganges river, where many people believe is the most spiritual place to die as it 'breaks the cycle of reincarnation', although I don't really understand why that's a good thing(?) Here I was expecting to see yet half dreading many intimate rituals performed pretty openly, like the burning of bodies and people pissing and s***ting just any old where. The lonely planet book said something like it would be your favourite place in India if you were ready to embrace everything you saw and look for the beauty in it, so that's exactly what I was going to do.

The taxi driver stopped in the middle of a very authentic and much more sterotypical looking street than those wed seen in Delhi and Agra, with cows roaming free; tuktuks, motorbikes and rickshaws all weaving in and out of each other and just people everywhere. As with any hot country or place, it was dusty and many of the buildings and shop fronts looked run down and dirty, selling fizzy drinks in bottles encased in probably two years worth of roadside grime! Always drink through a straw, I had thought at the time! Lots of people stared at us as we sat in the stationary car waiting for we weren't really sure what... After ten minutes or so, three skinny men turned up and introduced themselves. One was the owner of our guest house that I'd been speaking with and I recognised his impeccable English from the telephone and he'd brought to lackeys with him to carry what he was expecting to be a large amount of luggage although unfortunately none of us were keen to part with our day bags and most of our valuable belongings. He led us down a very small looking alley way which we very quickly understood that the car would never have fitted and that we were going to walk the last bit to the guesthouse through the Galis - the maze of very narrow streets that form the old town. Perversely they reminded me slightly of the Brighton Lanes, that narrow and ancient feeling although with the added super strong smell of piss; cow s*** and god knows what else all over the floor and loud beeping motorbikes squeezing past every couple of minutes. It was so colourful though and amazing to see all the women in beautiful looking saris and fabrics and with shaven heads (offering your hair to the gods is considered the highest thing I think). It made me think of home a bit passing massive cows just sitting in the shade in an alley or roaming free through the Galis! It was about a ten minute winding walk to the guest house and one I thought I'd never be able to do alone, as I'd get so lost! The street layouts were like a complete labyrinth or maze, not logical at all but were covered in painted advertising in the style of street art, directing you in various ways to a bakery or guesthouse or yoga class, which looked really cool. Arriving at Ali Babas guesthouse, that the chaps from Woodcastle had helped us to book (at a cheaper rate) we were wowed at the tranquility inside. It was very peaceful and clean and although the rooms were basic, they were spotless and both had working fans, bonus! We quickly unpacked the bulk of our day sacks and headed down to the reception to go in search of food, as we'd declined the offer of lunch on the train because we hadn't realised how late we were actually running and our tummies were all grumbling loudly having not eaten all day. The hotel man said he'd send a lackey to take us to a nice place nearby, which we accepted as we weren't feeling quite confident to start navigating the tiny streets ourselves yet and once again we had been warned to keep our wits about us in Varanasi so we thought a local boy couldn't hurt. As it turned out he only walked us about another 200m to a little cafe that had a few of the hardened backpacker types in and so in we went! I ordered the Spinach and Paneer curry with a chapatti which was absolutely delish but with just a few to many lumps of Paneer. It is basically just boiled and set full fat milk so I don't really like very much if it as it's led my stomach churn and when the texture is quite runny like cottage cheese I can really live without it, but when its a bit firmer like feta or something, in small doses its uh-mazing! I had to pick quite a lot of the paneer out of my spinach curry as it was a bit of an overload but I really enjoyed it and love trying new things and just know I'm going to be that really weird girl when I get home and have an Indian, that orders all the strange sounding stuff on the menu and chats about curries like people do wines and just sound prattish, but I don't care! I was so hungry that I managed to demolish my entire portion and half of Nelens! She ordered chilli chips as well, which I didn't like but went down a storm with the others. I thought they sort of tasted like potatoes that had been fried in a Chinese sweet and sour sauce and were quite sticky - bleurghh! When we were paying the bill it absolutely amazed me how little the food had cost. In Thailand we impressed by £5 meals, in Singapore £1 snacks but here we'd had a good few drinks, curries, bread and side orders for less than £7 total!! Brilliant!!

After lunch, armed with our concealed money belts and cameras we thought we'd go for an explore and see if we could find the river and wander up and down. On our way, literally waddling, we passed a tiny shop, which was much more of a front room, selling offerings to the gods - flowers and coconuts etc but that also had a small sign saying Mehndi. We sifted through some magazines and each picked a design to have on one of our hands, mine was all triangles and intricate details on my fingers. Each design was hand drawn, copied by eye from the pictures we'd chosen and took about half an hour. It wasn't the cleverest of ideas having it done just before we were going for an explore as it was wet and sludgy and we couldn't touch it else we'd smudge it and were told it would take an hour or so to dry! Ggrrr so we were walking around the river front with our hands up in the air scared for them to come in contact with anything, which drew even more attention to four girls on their first afternoon in Varanasi, gawping at everything!

The way down to the river was along more winedy back alleyways, coveted in mud and rubbish and scrawny dogs and the Ghat nearest us (the steep stairway leading right down to the Ganges below) Munshi Ghat or something had the most incredible view ever. I don't know whether it was because it was the first time we were all actually just seeming the River Ganges, I suppose so, but it looked so tranquil. The river was very wide, maybe 50 or 60 meters across and no where near as dirty looking (at least from afar) as I'd expected - Even the Mekong was browner! And there was stuff happening everywhere, but not in the usual Indian chaotic style, well it was but weirdly everything felt in slow motion for me in the first few minutes of being near the riverside. As a none spiritual or anything person, there was definitely a great sense of something there! We walked along the riverside and the Ghats, which were one next to another down the entire stretch of the Ganges and we saw boys playing cricket games with make-shift wickets, buffaloes and cows bathing in the water and walking around s***ting, men just pissing everywhere and we kept walking through clouds of horrendous urine smells yuckkkk! It was quite strange to see so many personal rituals done so out in the open as well - I saw a man having a a poo in a corner, leaning against a wall, another couple of men washing themselves in the Ganges, only meters away from where a woman was scrubbing a saree and further along where small boys and buffaloes were splashing about. We walked towards one end of the Ghats, stopping to admire much of the hand painted adverts for cafes and restaurants on the sides of the steps and walls. They were really well done and have a cool vibe to the place. There was also loads of the Hindu cartoon drawings and lots of spiritual phrases on the walls, which we spent a while admiring and taking pictures of. It was quite shocking to see the rotting skeleton corpse of what looked like a dog on the side of the steps, still attached to the rope that tethered it to the wall. We saw lots of men dressed in orange robes, holy men and a couple that were painted white and naked - gods of sex or something apparently. Our hotel man told us that they do all these terrible things to their penis's to 'brake' them and become more god like - they were just kinda freaky looking to me! We did get quite harassed down on the river side by men offering us boat trips and other younger boys who "just wanted to talk to improve their English" and then would go on to say they didn't want any money for whatever info they'd just given up but that perhaps we'd be so kind as to come and visit their silk shop/convenience store where "looking is free!" We sat on a bench when we got to Harischandra Ghat, the secondary cremation Ghat and saw two bodies being burnt. I thought that I would find seeing bodies on fire pretty distressing but actually somehow it was interesting to watch and not harrowing. We couldn't really make out the actual bodies from where we were sitting, a little way away or see any of the details. The body is weighed and the exact amount of wood required to fully incinerate the corpse is collected - all different types of wood can be chosen but the most expensive and sacred-est is Sandlewood. We saw the second body being carried down to the river and blessed with the holy water, wrapped in a gold cloth and then a wooden structure was built around it and a fire started. Apparently as a women threw herself on the fire of her burning husband, no women and children are allowed to stand near the site of the fire anymore so half of the relatives and funeral party retreated back to the top of the first flight of steps. Again I didn't find it anywhere near as brutal or violent as I'd thought I would and wasn't disturbed at seeing so many pits of ash where obviously other cremations had taken place. I think perhaps this was because I liked the Hindu concept behind the burning. They believe that a person Is made up of five elements, fire, earth, water, the sky and the ground and that when someone dies the elements need to be separated back out again. I think this is quite a nice way to view dying and splitting your body back into its original elements - peaceful rather than seemingly destructive. We heard many people saying "Burning is learning and cremation is education" which although none of us were really sure what it actually meant, we all felt that we had actually learnt a great deal, even just from the boys we'd spoken to. As we were watching the flames, we noticed a group of three other western girls nearby talking to another boy and attracting a lot of attention. They all had on really inappropriate clothes, one a strapless top and really short skirt and another denim shorts - outfits that none of us should have thought twice about wearing around south east Asia but here in India and especially within such a spiritual and religious place as Varanasi old town we all thought they looked absolutely disgraceful, like complete sluts with no regard or respect for the Indian culture. More of the men nearby were watching the girls, than were watching their own friend or relative's funeral procession. I did also feel a moment of pride as we to them obviously looked like the hardened backpackers that we are, embracing the local clothing and adopting a permanently trampy look!

We carried on walking and just soaking up all of the atmosphere and literally its so hard to describe being in a place where everywhere you look, there's things you've never seen before... Children begging with facial deformities; cows roaming free in the narrow Galis; vegetable samosas being fried in giant woks full of oil; vivid colours and a mixture of wee, sweat and spice smells everywhere and just people, so many people! Women in beautiful sarees, women looking stunning with bald heads, girls as young as ten with nose piercings and men everywhere, some sleezing, some chewing tobacco, some spitting, some pissing, some rearranging their bits and all just chatting and seemingly doing nada! Varanasi was my new people watching heaven! As we wandered the opposite direction to the one earlier in the day, we came to Dasawamedh Ghat, where the Ganga Aarti Ceremony takes place every evening and was due to start. There was a hubbub of people, chatting, colours and beggars and everyone seemed to be crowding round a small area near the water where the puja - prayers and offerings to the gods, would I guessed be taking place shortly. It never ceases to amaze me that Indian's have no qualms with just plonking their selfs down anywhere with what appears to be with no care for what they're sitting or lying on. Old grannies sat cross legged on the dusty concrete floor whilst men lay on wooden outstretched planks over the river and children just lay sprawled everywhere, half asleep. I don't think you've ever find such a large collection of people so happy to gather and sit on a flight of steps as though they were seats, for a ritual that occurs everyday, anywhere else in the world! As we were looking for a place to sit I saw a little girl sat in a barbers chair, in the middle of all the commotion, with absolutely no privacy, having her head shaved with a cut throat razor. She was crying a lot and a boy nearby came up to us and told us that the offering of your hair to the gods is the biggest sacrifice that one can make but told us its extremely painful to have your hair cut in this way, hence her tears. I felt so sorry for her until I saw how dotingly her parents were looking on at her and how proud they obviously where - religion is a funny thing that I don't think I will ever fully understand! We took our places on some free space on a step and watched the ceremony unfold. It was as interesting watching everyone around us as it was the actual rituals. The music and singing was extremely loud and played through a terrible quality speaker so it crackled and there were about five boys at the front dressed in traditional garb waving different ornaments with flames and saluting the water almost. There were loads of boats with both local and tourist 'spectators' on it as well, watching the ceremony unfold. We guessed that many of the people around us were families of those who's bodies had been burned in the day and who were now celebrating the last of whoever's life and offering their prayers to their gods. I spent about ten minutes watching a young Hindu family, the mother looked no older than 21 and was dressed in a beautiful dark green saree with lots of shiny embellishments. She was absolutely stunning, she really was and moved with such grace that I was completely transfixed. She had a small boy with her, her son(?) who looked no older than 3 or four and was perfectly well behaved and then following behind was obviously the husband (I could tell she was married by the bindi, red chalk in her hairline and her saree - all things reserved only for partnered women, instead of a ring) who was surly looking and grumpy. I just found it absolutely amazing as to me it looked like the most stereotypically arranged marriage and I found myself thinking how lucky we are that our culture doesn't 'force it upon us', whereas over here Kamal, our Delhi driver, told us that more partners are coupled by parents than they are by love! I did have to have a bit of moment there to just reflect in it and soak up how different life was in Varanasi and in India versus at home!

After 30 minutes or so of the ceremony and constantly having people treading on our toes, poking their knees in our backs and standing blocking our view we decided to call it a night and head home. We followed the crowd up the big Ghat's steps and our to the main road where the hustle and bustle was incredible! There was so many people walking in the middle of the main road but still scooters and tuktuks bleeping an trying to navigate their way through, it was crazy! We sort of stumbled across a big market, selling everything from jewellery to saree silk to minutiae statues of all the Hindu gods. We wandered around for a little bit looking, but got pretty harassed by all the stall boys and with so many people found it difficult to concentrate on looking at anything so we decided to retreat and come the following day to explore at an earlier time. As we walked down the narrow Galis back to Ali Baba guesthouse we passed what looking like a cow milking station and a cute little cafe where we stopped for a snack for dinner. I had the worlds tastiest vegetable kofta which left me hankering for more and already excited for breakfast the following morning. We were absolutely exhausted so all retired to bed pretty much immediately and Al and I passed out in bed instantly. We all promised to be up around 9:30 for our second day of exploring though.

The following day we got up after a nice lie in and went for our second wander along the riverside. It was bizarrely quite a pleasant temperature, perhaps 25C or so, compared the previous days 30C+ and so it was my first day in India that I didn't have sweat streaming down my face and in between my boobs!! We went past the Ghat where we'd watched ceremony the previous evening and contained up to Manikarnika Ghat, the biggest cremation site on the river. I found it more shocking this time to see several bodies burning but I think this was down to the surrounds of the Ghat - meant to the the most holy and spiritual place to die and be cremated - were disgusting. There was rubbish everywhere, great piles of ash and cows and show rummaging through everything, taking s***s wherever they pleased. At any other 'holy site' normally you'd expect to find it in its most preserved and proud state but here, this Ghat to me seemed to be in its worse and I couldn't sympathise with the concept in the same way. We all felt a bit... Upset and miffed are the wrong words, but they come closest to describing our disappointment I think at the state of the place. Lonely planet wrote about how its the low life that handle the dead bodies and manage the fires and unfortunately you could get a real sense of that here. Our of respect none of us wanted to take any pictures but many people - all locals - warned us against it too, telling of a big fight that had erupted the day before, between a Japanese tourist and a grieving family, who'd been seen taking pictures of the cremation ceremony. Feeling a bit weird we headed into the Galis and began to wander around looking for the Brown Bread Bakery, an LP recommended restaurant to have breakfast/lunch. We passed he Golden Temple, which had many armed guards stationed all around it to ensure no non-Hindus entered and to police the place, as it was noted on the Internet as a prime terrorism target at one point. There were lockers outside of it to put all belonging into as no bags or anything were allowed in. Obviously not being Hindu we couldn't go in either, but we did manage to catch a glimpse of the huge domed roof through the security entrance, it looked impressive. We finally found the bakery after following the painted signs on the walls and asking shop keepers along the way. There were two bakeries next door to each other, both claiming to be the authentic one, but I'd remembered from the book that it mentioned an organic produce shop which only one had so we knew we were heading into the right one. We went up about six flights of stairs to a rooftop restaurant where we could see right across the city and out to the Ganges and whilst we were waiting for our food we all watched a pack of monkeys scampering around the roofs nearby, playing together. The restaurant was similar in style to our favourite one in Phnom Penh, Friends, run by staff trained from the streets an donating much of its profit to a local school etc. I ordered a carrot and apple juice which was delish and so refreshing and the special vegetable curry of the day, which was cauliflower (Mum you'd be so proud of the amount of vegetables I'm trying and learning to love out here!) Apart from a massive portion of very sub standard steamed rice, my curry and chapatti was nice, although overpriced(!) but the girls, who all ordered European food were all quite disappointed with their meals and left feeling hungry :(

Next off we headed back to the market from the previous evening and we ended up looking at jewellery stalls (I decided not to buy any tat but put all my money towards buying something really nice in real gold instead as a keepsake and something that will last more than a few days and make my skin go green!) although the girls embraced all of the cheap costume jewellery, blinging themselves up and ending up looking pretty Indian actually!! We were harassed at every turn my men and boys trying to pull us one way or another, telling us they sold scarfs or Ali Baba pants like we were wearing at their stalls and staring price slashing ears before we'd even acknowledged them near us! We followed one man who said he had kaftans similar to the one Kate was wearing, which Nelen wanted and Al and I got into negiotiations with two stalls next door over a scarf for her and a decorative hanging for me, which I didn't even want, I just was interested to know the price of. We got so harranged and surrounded by five or six men that we had to put our hands up, firmly say no and walk away, telling the other girls we'd meet them round the corner. We were then followed by several if the men begging us to come back, discounting and discounting the price further and further so that in the end, the wal hanging I liked went from being 1000rs (just over £10) for one, to 400rs for two! I should have brought them there and then actually but they were big and bulky and I was worried about having to carry them for the next three weeks in my already heavy backpack - even though I'd thrown loads of clothes out!! For about half an hour we were pestered as we continued to browse looking at all the front displays of the little shops, jewellery, bindis (which Kate and I are obsessed with buying!) Hindu god postcards and statues and material galore, in the end I had to turn around to the men however and tell them rather rudely to STOP, GO AWAY, WE ARE NOT INTERESTED and f*** OFF. It did the job and at last we were free! We stopped at a nice looking material shop as a green silk pattern had caught my eye so we all settled on the mattress floor and sieved through all the patterns and colours. The owner offered to wrap me in the material to show us how to tie sarees and also I guess to show me how the pattern would look, so I'd buy it! I attracted quite a lot of attention by the local women who all thought it was hilarious to see me, a blonde westerner in a saree!! I liked it though and we all decided that we would try to all find our saree outfits for the wedding in Hyderabad, that day! I thought I'd keep looking to make sure I couldn't find anything more special and so after quickly finding a smart ish hotel and paying a little bit of money to use the toilet in one of their rooms, (as there are no toilets for miles - no wonder everyone pisses in the open - and the female public toilets were disgusting we'd been warned) we went back and found ourselves a big enough saree shop to have a big selection of colours, materials and designs, but without overwhelming ourselves and patient staff who were happy for us to rummage through the shelves and basically pull half of the material down before discarding it! They brought us all a cup of chai tea and we must have been in the shop for 3 hours perhaps trying on loads of different sarees. Nelen fell in live with here first, a floral pink and white number which had a bit of a vintage looking print on it and was absolutely gorgeous. Kate was next, loving a bejewelled turquoise number, after being on the look out for yellow! We all had to convince her that it looked so stunning and to pay the extortionate(!) £20 for it haha! It took Al and I a long to e to work our what it was we liked as we both liked a similar teal-y colour which admittedly looked a lot better on Al than me, and the simple designs. But I kept thinking in my head that I was only going to get one opportunity to wear my saree probably and so I wanted it to be as bright and brash as possible, properly Indian! I tired on loads and the girls really tried to convince me that a salmon pink and silver number was the one for me but. Christ I don't even own anything pink and felt like such a prat in it, I just couldn't even see it looking 'nice' at all! Al went for a sort of dark green number in the end with a pretty embellishment on it and a delicate pattern which made here look really sophisticated, so it was only me left and I was feeling the pressure as I knew everyone wanted to wee and was hungry but I was determined to find what I liked! In the end we'd pulled out so many of the materials on to the mat that I couldn't work out what I had seen or tried and what I hadn't and I was trying to find a colour that looked good whilst ticking all of my Indian boxes, without being too close in colour to either of the girls in blue or green, which left me in quite a state and by the end of another hour I was feeling really disheartened and questioned why on earth I wear colours at all, as everything was looking terrible! We left the shop because I was feeling a bit saree-d out. Kate and Al went for water and to wee whilst Nelen bullied me into another material shop, pulling out different colours and holding all the different styles I liked, before we short listed about five for me try on. One got immediately booted after I found out the price - £40!! And another because up close the light green and white pattern actually looked like one often dads Hawaiian shirts - not the best look for an Indian wedding!! The man wrapped the most expensive material around me first (of course) and the inevitable happened, I fell in love with it... I began to try both the second and third styles but even as he was tying them, I knew it was the first one that was the best. It was a mustard yellows colour that faded into a light colour with loads of jangly gold bells on it and sparkly bits everywhere! It was much more brash than my second choice, which although probably more beautiful, felt more conservative, which would not do for an Indian wedding!! Just as I was paying, a bit more than I'd hoped but £18 was still a steal really(!) the girls got back and said they'd found the best local restaurant that we should have our dinner in - so obviously at the mention of food, off we all went! We went crazy with the ordering as per usual and Al told us the veg samosas were amazing do we half millions of then! I had the most incredible mixed veg and paneer spicy curry which was hot and soooo delish! One of those dinners that I will actually dream about and probably can't be beaten, ever...! Id been given a dud 500rs note from the cash machine a few days earlier, which has a rip in the corner and that no one would accept so after dinner a bloke pointed us in the direction of a place where for a small fee I'd be able to change it. We walked ip the main road for a change, instead of the galis and found the place and as i pulled the note out of my money belt, the zip slid off the end of it...really frustrating! opposite the money exchange place was a lady who ran a beauty parlour and so for 60p Al and I had our eyebrows threaded, Al was terrified but the lady actually did a good job, although I lost my bindi of the day in the process! The lady pointed us on the direction of a tailors who might be able to fix my zip she said and so off we toddled again on our weary legs to try and get it fixed! The first tailors couldn't fix it but the man knew of someone else, a 'zip doctor' who he led us to. He fixed my zip for 30rs and put a little clamp in the end so it couldn't happen again. I was so happy, but sadly whilst we were waiting for my zip to be fixed two little s***s had tried to take Nelens moneybag from across her body, which pit a bit of a sour end to our day :/ Once again in the evening we collapsed into bed and fell fast asleep, after another long and brilliant day of exploring!

The following morning we got up at 4:45am to head down to the river and catch a boat up and down the Ganges, to see all of the morning activities on the holy day - Sunday. We got up and outside and were very surprised to be caught in the rain!! It was drizzling with a pretty chilly breeze and we all sat in this rowing boat with no cover, and a bloke that spoke no English, so wasn't exactly the best 'tour guide'! As we climbed in to the little wobbly boat and pushed away from the shore, we passed a floating dead and freakily inflated goat with a rope around its neck, bobbing in between the rubbish and the tethered boats. Pretty disgusting! The boat trip was quite disappointing, considering we were all hoping to learn some more about the Hindu rituals and understand the culture some more but instead all we saw was a very overcast sky so no sunrise, more bodies burning at the main crematorium ghat and what we thought looked suspiciously like a body bobbing in the middle of the river :/ We paid for a one and a half hour tour and were on the boat less than 40 minutes, which was fine by us as we were all shivering, wet and feeling a bit disappointed! The girls got back into bed for a few minutes after we'd walked back to the hotel, passing two twitching and very thin looking dogs on their last legs, dying, which was pretty disturbing :(

After a few hours Al woke up and we went for a walk to go and find some breakfast. We ended up at a local dosa restaurant, which was pretty basic looking, but amazing tasting and there were two other backpackers in it, which were interesting to chat to about their travels across India. I tried to order the Banana and chocolate dosa (a big crispy pancake thing) but I ended up getting the savoury masala dosa which had tomato and onion I it with banana and no chocolate - it was an odd combination, but I managed to scoff the whole lot!! We checked out of the hotel next an had to wake the girls up and then we went to the restaurant from the following night for vegetable samosas, which were UH-mazing!! We walked a little around the market before deciding it was quite same same and with lots of shops closed it wasn't the same... We went for a really long walk along the ghats again, all the way to the end to the last ghat, Aassi Ghat, where we found a street food stall selling mashed potato cakes with spicy tomato and chickpeas which was absolutely delish!! I had to use the public toilet there and it was beyond disgusting...- and I had to pay for the privilege!!! I won't tell you what was in it but just know that it actually brought vomit to the back of my throat and this me, Queen of toilets here!! We wandered back to the hotel again as we wanted to have a quick shower and wash of all the sewage etc from our feet, which we'd been squelching in all day thanks to the rain, before packing up and catching our train back to Delhi and starting the massive journey from East to West India.... Back at the hotel (after a quick trip for some more cheeky samosas (yes plural!) the guy gave us the best quote about India, which for some reason I suspect is a Rudyard Kipling line but whose ever it is, I liked it... "India is like LSD, you can either have a good trip or a bad trip, but at least you had a bloody trip", which when said in a thick India accent just sent us into fits of giggles for ages and was a nice high to leave Varanasi on!!