The Varanasi Project

After two and a half weeks in  Rishikesh I felt as if I was leaving home. The place is full of love and the people there made my stay there forever memorable. With a smile on my face, and a little happy-tear slowly going down my cheak, I continued my journey through India to the holy city of Varanasi.

My plan was to meet the incredible people of the Sankat Mochan Foundation (see link on the site).  Despite continually increasing pollution of the holy river, these people keep  fighting for a clean Ganga. Unfortunately my timing was bad, and they were very busy finishing an important report and therefore could not accept any help. I did however have  good conversations with these good people. This was very enlightening.

A tragic fact about the pollution is that 95 % of it is due to the work of informed and educated people, that is the industries and savage systems. Another is that there is an easy solution to the problem, however the government has little real interest in the project. All they want is the public goodwill… and they can easily get that by stating wonderful – but unrealistic – facts in the media.

Another huge problem, counting the other 5% of the pollution,  is the mentality of the people of India. The River is the Mother of India, mother of life, and is the destination for millions of Hindu pilgrims every year who travel great distances to take a bath in the holy river. But this does not mean that they respect the river – their mother. They treat it severely bad. Rubbish is floating by every ghat (bathing place), the cows shit in it, the aches from the burning ghats go into the river, and dead children and others that cannot be burned are thrown into it. It is difficult to imagine it being holy, or cleansing, let alone seeing any life thriving well in such an environment.

Talking to the people of Varanasi it seems that they take the rivers severe condition as an unavoidable fact. They do not see that they can prevent this. They do not see what they are doing wrong. They do not know the concept of respect for nature and the environment and hygiene. That I thought was hard to deal with.

Since I did not get the change to work with the SMF I decided to do my own little project. I got three disposable cameras and ten packages of biscuits and head down to the river one afternoon. I got some children with me and asked them what they thought of the situation. I then tried my best to explain to them that the Ganga should not have to be like this, and asked how they thought it could be better. After a little chat we all walked together as they took photos of the dirty Ganga. After a good hour of photoshooting we sat down for a long-awaited-biscuit brake.

It was interesting to see the childrens approach and I am excited to see the results. I know that it needs further development, but this project is something I think could become something more. Now in Delhi, I look forward to going to Chennai (Madras) for the World Comics Workshop, where I will get a change to work with children again. I am sure I will learn alot from that.

The Yoga Themepark : Rishikesh

Rishikesh titles itself  ‘The yoga capital of the world’. No more – no less. This seemed like the perfect place for me to come to get to know the magic world of yoga and get accustomed to travel the country of billions on my own. Rishikesh is different from everything else I have experienced in India so far. In many ways the town resembles a theme park, similar to Walt Disney World in Florida. The atmosphere is different, the menus are different, the people is different. Sure, the cows are still eating plastic wrapped cookies, and the sadhus bathe in the Ganga. I´m not saying this thempark is not in India. But the otherwise unavoidable crowds are nowhere to be seen. There are more pasta and hummus dishes to chose from than Indian curries. Here I feel that I can safely walk around after dark.

In Rishikesh there are Yoga Ashrams on every corner.
Between the yoga ashram there are yoga shops.
In the shops you can get yoga trousers, yoga mats, yoga meditation music, yoga books and curious yoga equipment of various sorts.

In this yoga town, this yoga theme park, I have learnt that yoga is not just yoga. Yoga is a lifestyle, yoga is a religion.  Here, yoga is more than stretching, breathing, meditating. The philosophy of yoga is that the universe is all one big system and everything we do affects our physical body.
Our teachers preach for vegitarianism, or veganism, daily. We get lectures on materialism. And healing. And yesterday I decided to follow there advice and saw an Ayurvedic Doctor.

But Yoga is not as innocent as it seems for the uneducated eye, as myself. Yoga also means (I advice sensitive people to skip the rest of this paragraph) … pouring water up your nose every morning -  drinking your own urine -  drinking liters and liters of water before jumping up and down and through it up again … or getting it out from the other side – ect. ect. ect.

All of this is very appealing to me. I believe that this is what the modern world needs.The so called ‘developed contries’ can learn alot for the ancient Indian yoga and ayurveda science. Im not saying that I will do all of this on a daily bases. You can relax, I will not be offering you warm urin instead of the normal chai when you come over. But this is what I hoped to find in my jurney to India. This brings us closer to nature, closer to humanity.

There is no need for wealth,  modern medicine should not be used for every aliment we have. Better yet, we should  be able to live much healthier lifestyles than we do up in the wild wild west.

a few things that are going through my mind

cultureshoks:  I have still not had ‘the culture shock’ and I think I never will. Things are different. There is bacteria. There is pollution. There are rules. There are castes. There is the bad bad smell. And there is the extreame poverty. Different languages. I am different. 

The reasons I have not had ‘my cultureshok’ are many. First, i think it is the fact that I acknowledge that I am different here, not the surroundings. Other facts include globalization. There is always something similar around me to damper the shock. Familiar weahter here in Rishikesh – Backstreetboys tunes on the train – cafes. India is not quite as different to the western world as I had imagined. I have indeed had some beers here and even a dram of (very bad very illigal wiskey) in Gujarat (the dry state).

me and weather: I have always thought of myself as not depended on weahter. Not so true.  Now i am starting to plan my trip according to weather… and guess what! Yes… im heading to the south for the sun! The thing is, that i want to get the best out of my stay in india. naturally. and right now South of India is the place to go. The fog here up norht doesnt only affect activities being less available, it also blockes the sights to the marvelous mountains.  So I learn from my dearest colleegs at ITM:  follow the sun. Perhaps that will be my no.1 advice when i come back… in stead of my normal: ‘there is no such thing as bad weather, only wrong clothing’.

indian food: I love Indian food. I even think I can say that I have aquired the tastebuds for it. I want my food spycy! But … after I got sick, 4 days ago, i cannot even think about rice. I just want water and a banana. Please tell me this is temporary!

internetcafes: It is too easy to spend time in places like this. I will go now.

the better guidebook to india

Lonley Planet is good for certain things… finding a place to stay and how to get there. “The Elephant, The Tiger, and the Cell Phone: Reflections on INDIA – The Emerging 21st-Century Power” by Sashi Tharoor (currently the Indian Minister of State for External Affairs)  is another kind of book on India. I feel that I know so much about the hole subcontinent after reading it that it feels like I have been here for years.

I recomand it to anyone traveling to the country of billions.

The problem to big for the helpful Indians

After 3 weeks of traveling in India my stomach couldnt take any more currycovered backteria. I am amazed how long I managed without any trouble. With good advice from friends, a phonecall to mum, and the good support from Marie, Jakop and the Indian cousin, I can include this horrible experience in my good Inidan experiences. This is an avoidable part of traveling here.

But it made me realized that my own bad physical state affected how I saw the hard life of the misfortunate in India. For those who have read and\or seen Slumdog Millionare you might be familiar with the term ’Organized begging’. Organized begging is very visible in Delhi. 

Organized begging is a huge operation. Children as well as adults are made suffer in different ways, limbs are cut of, they made blind, or they are made addicted to drugs at young age so that they will do anything to get the next dose. These very misfortunate individuals fill the streets of Delhi and beg for money or food or just anything they can get their hands on. But it does little help to them personally to give them anything. They will not see the money ever again because it goes into the hands of a higher person, the organizer of the begging. These men make alot of money off the unfortunates, who might get their daily drug-dose, but their lives are only going to get worse. 

Driving in a taxi yesterday, feeling like crap, a crippled begger cryed out a wish for money. I asked myself, What keeps these people alive? What stoppes them from commiting suicide?

There seems to be no easy answer to the question, but a large part of it is their religion, hinduism. They believe that if they make the efford in this life they will be reborn in a higer caste (that is what they call the classes in Inida). Taking ones life is against everything they belive. Life is holy and does not belong to you alone, but to god. This reason  only brings up a new question in my mind, as unreligious as I am, What makes them religious if their god makes them so unfortunate?

Never have I realized how lucky I am in life as much as I did at this moment. And sheldomly have I felt as powerless. There is really nothing I can do to help these people. And although Indians are in general extreamly helpful people and the do take care of each other this seems to be  too big of a propblem. But I have faith that there is a solution. It might take time, but it must be possible to help.