Varanasi – a totally crazy and very colourful town

(Varanasi, India, 15th of Sep 2016)

It’s hard to describe Varanasi with words as there is so much going on at the same time. There are women bathing in Ganges, men praying, children playing, flowers being sacrificed, bodies being burned, holy men begging and a lot of cows just hanging around. And this is all happening in a colourful, breathtaking mess.
Varanasi is a city that must be experienced, words are not enough to describe it. It is a beautiful city, but only because of the people and the colours in it. It is actually a city in big need of restoration with houses falling apart and roads in really bad condition.

Varanasi  is also an incredibly chaotic city where the traffic situation is a little worse than in all other Indian cities we have visited so far. A road in Varanasi has very many holes, a huge amount of holy cows, loads of bicycle rickshaws and of course a lot of other vehicles.

We took a boat ride on the Ganges and we walked for hours along the many narrow streets where we saw lots of shops, cows, motorbikes, colourful women and holy men.

Varanasi is India’s holiest city and all Hindu people wish to, at least once in their lifetime, visit the town and bath in the holy Ganges (grey dirty water …). The ritual will keep (save) them from getting reborn after death, this is called Moksha.

Just below our hotel was “Dasaswamedh Ghat” situated where there is a fire ceremony each evening.