You know they wrote the White Album here

Hello friends! I have just arrived in Rishikesh, the famous ashram-riddled town in the northern Indian state of Uttarakand where the Beatles came and wrote the legendary White Album. I am extremely happy to be here for one reason: it's not triple-digit weather. This town is quite near the foothills of the Himilayas so the heat isn't ridiculous and there are more breezes to cool you down. Today is the first day we didn't book a hotel with A/C. The tab? A whopping 300 rupees, which split down the middle equals 3 bucks a day. Not too bad.
So since my last posting, we had a few days in Varanasi, considered by many to be the holiest city in India. Varanasi is one of the oldest continuously occupied cities in the world, having been constantly inhabited for over 3,500 years. What makes Varanasi different from other ancient cities like Athens, Jerusalem, and Beijing is that religious tradition hasn't changed one bit over the millenia. The practices we observed along the ghats (steps) of the holy Ganges river were the same thousands of years ago.
We took an overnight train from Tundla (about 30 minutes east of Agra) to Varanasi in a 4-person sleeper car which we shared with two Muslim pilgrims from Indonesia. They were on a religious pilgrimage from Indonesia through Bangledesh and India which was to last about 4 months. The more talkative pilgrim, Habib, told me that my name in Indonesia means "tiger." Cool. After a surprisingly pleasant sleep, we woke early in the morning and observed the pilgrims in their morning prayers, which was very interesting to me. One of them even had a compass to insure the prayer was directed in the appropriate direction, which in this case I would assume to be West, since India is east of Mecca.
We arrived at the Varanasi train station very early in the morning, but not too early for the rickshaw drivers, who came up to us immediately with offers of rides. Since we were both still tired and dirty, we took the first offer presented to us, which turned out to be quite a fortunate decision. Our driver, Khan, ended up being our driver for the entire stay in Varanasi and somewhat renewed my faith in the rickshaw drivers in general, because while they're all trying to make money, there are in fact some who are trying to make it honestly and fairly. Our hotel was quite comfortable, but in Varanasi there is a shortage of electrical power and the city is prone to frequent blackouts during the day, which means no A/C at times. This proved to be frustrating since Varanasi was the southernmost location so far on the trip and it...was...HOT. But we just sweated it out and dealt with it. Most of the first day was spent indoors trying to stay cool. A bit later Khan took us to a few temples, including one founded by Ghandi himself. To our amazement, we actually heard thunder and it even rained a little bit! This was only temporary though, and along with the rain came strong winds which created terrible dust storms which made riding through the choatic streets nearly unbearable.
The next day we woke at 4:30AM and Khan took us to the Ganges river for a sunrise boatride. This was my favorite part of the trip so far, due in no small part to the fact that it was cool and breezy. The boat ride took us along all of the ghats of Varanasi, where we saw locals bathing, fishing, washing clothes, playing water polo and cricket, and of course, burning dead bodies. In Hinduism, Varanasi is considered a holy place to die, and if you are cremated along the banks of the Ganges you get an instant, one-way ticket to Nirvana. Funeral processions led by Hindu holy men are quite common in the streets and always lead down to the banks of the Ganges. There is a very precise science to using the right amount of wood to cremate a body, and prices can vary from a few hundred to many thousands of dollars, depending on the type of wood you use. Photography of the burning ghats is strictly forbidden, but I got lots of good pics of everything else.
After the boat-ride, we were taken to several Buddhist temples about 20 kilometers north of Varanasi. We went to one Buddhist temple where the Buddha himself gave his first sermon. Kind of a big deal. We also saw the Indian Archaeological Museum which featured many carved stone depictions of Buddha from the 11th and 12th centuries. I also had an amazingly refreshing mango creamsicle.
We had lunch at a very nice hotel and invited our driver to eat with us, since before he always waited outside for us in the scorching heat while we dined in comfort. We spoke with him for quite a while about his life, his family, his goals and ambitions and this made me realize how incredibly fortunate we Americans are. Khan has no education of any kind and driving the auto-rickshaw is all he is able to do to make money. He said he wanted to be a police officer, but since this requires bribing the police academy many thousands of dollars, this dream will forever be just that. The average Indian citizen earns about 95 dollars per year, yet I had spent this much in my first 3 days in India. Wow. Khan did say he was very happy though, because he had a wife he loves very much and two wonderful children. Indians place great importance on family and divorce is nearly unheard of and is treated as a shameful act in Indian society.
The next morning we took a train from Varanasi to Haridwar, which was a journey of 18 hours. This was actually quite enjoyable, since we got a chance to speak with a very intelligent and friendly Indian man about life, philosophy, cultures, and family. It was nice to see that even though our cultures are quite different, they're also very very similar. Towards the end of our journey we found out that he is a very high-ranking police officer in the Indian Police Force (he's in charge of 1,200 officers) and even though he had several Indian police officers come on the train with him, carry his bags, and salute him, I didn't detect one trace of ego or entitlement from him. A very pleasant experience.
And now, after a noisy and dusty busride from Haridwar, we find ourselves in Rishikesh, the yoga capital of the world. This place is quiet and clean, and surrounded by mountains and tranquility. I am relieved to be here and wouldn't mind staying a while...it's nice to get away from the crowds and noise of the Indian cities. There are many tourists here, most of which have come either to learn yoga and meditation, or go trekking and rafting. I look forward to just sitting and relaxing for a bit, and not hearing the constant honk of a rickshaw or bus horn. Maybe I'll even pick up a sitar and write my own White Album. Or maybe I'll just take a nap.
Yeah, that sounds good :)