Durga Puja - The morning after

After an exhaustingly long day – we finished our Durga Puja hopping quite late, and then went out for a meal to celebrate Petra’s birthday – we were awoken on Saturday morning by my mobile’s alarm clock at five. It was time to get up and go for a dawn-breaking boat ride on the Ganges. Remarkably the kids struggled only a bit; they got up and got dressed in time to get down to the river for the 5.30 appointment without my even having to bribe them – really an heroic effort on the part of the kids.

When we got down to the river the other volunteers were already there trying to work out a good place to board the boat. The level of the Ganges had dropped dramatically in the previous weeks exposing mud deposits that in places were more than two meters deep. As a result the steps of the Ghats could be taken only so far, and then there were several meters of muddy banks to tread to get to the boats. We saw one young boy carrying some supplies to the boats and with each step he was sinking right up to his waste in mud… so we needed to find an alternative. We followed the boatmen up the steps of the Asi Ghāt to the narrow streets above and wound our way to the next Ghāt further north where we could board the boat directly without having to use both hands to yank our legs out of the mud with each step.

It was a good size boat considering there were 10 of us going for the ride and as it approached we could hear and smell the diesel engine put putting along. For  moment I was worried all that noise would ruin the trip; I had imagined a quiet splash of the oars would take our boat along the Ganges river bank. But as soon as we were on board the two boatmen pulled out two long and heavy bamboo oars, sat down with a smile and moved us slowly and quietly past the ghāts.

The ghāts at that hour have more worshippers than at other times of the day, so it was the first time many of us were able to witness the ritual ablutions that are carried out every morning here. We passed the cremation ghāts, and although there were no cremations going on at the time, the fires from which all the cremations are lit were burning. 

Mankarnika Ghat (the main cremation ghat)

The kids had a keen eye for any “wildlife”. They loved seeing the monkeys clambering and swinging from the temple tops as if they were in complete command of everything above and below, and there were the steppe eagles that came swooping low enough to admire their wide wingspans and raptor beaks. Finally the camera lenses were aimed at the myriad architectural styles which were the backdrop to all the Ghats and their worshippers. No two buildings looked anything alike, and all the usual criteria for judging what is good and what is beautiful seemed completely meaningless – I just took it all in as it passed before my eyes.

Well, the pictures speak for themselves… and there are lots more in the gallery.

Paul