The holy river Ganges - the most sacred river to the Hindu. It is not dirty, it is your soul and your heart that are dirty if you think it is dirty. People bathe, pray, brush their teeth, dump the ashes of their dead, wash their clothes, dump their sewage, dump figurines of the goddess Saraswati, meditate, recite scripture, sell souveniers. They come to the river and wait to die, for if you die in the river, you reach Nirvana.
As soon as I stepped off the bus, I was blessed with the red tika dot, further on down the road, a yellow one adjoined the red. Red tika powder was thrown all over to celebrate the last day of the festival for the goddess Saraswati. Fantastic.... Another sensory overload.
Sarnath, the place of Buddha's enlightenment and first sermon, Buddhist's believe he is the enlightened one, hindu's that he is the 9th reincarnation of Vishnu. Maroon and yellow robed monks, walked the peaceful ground. Pilgrims meditating and praying.
Back to the river to watch the nightly cremations and the evening prayer ritual.......they say a picture is worth a thousand words, experiencing it is about a million, so my words are worthless....but it was amazing.
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