Kedar GHAT
Varanasi, India
July 2015
All of the gats are high above the banks of the Ganges River
and require climbing a tedious flight of steps.
So when I find a gat with railing, I am delighted. I have found one that I can visit with a bit
more ease. But I notice only men are
coming out of the temple. I ask them if
I can go up and they assure me it is fine.
So I keep going up the 45 steps and just as I am about to take my last
few steps, a man reprimands me because I am still wearing my shoes. Shoes, I now know, cannot be worn even near
the vicinity of the ghat. So I remove
them and negotiate that I keep my shoes closer to the entrance because I do not
want to walk down steps and then come right back up those same damn, hot
steps. Besides, the ground is too, too
hot. I complain about the heat and I am
allowed to carry my shoes to the top.
A man greets me and insists I start by going into a small
building to my right. He follows me and chews on my ear the whole time. There
is some great significance to what he is showing me but his message is lost on
me so I nod and add comments of admiration. This pleases him so he places a
chakra mark on my sweaty forehead. Then he asks me to make a donation. Once
money is dropped in in the donation book, he loses interest in me.
I enter the main lobby.
There are large groups on either side and they are intoning different
chants. They don’t seem to be in conflict with each other. But it would take a disciplined mind to
isolate just one of the chants.
A man sells flower petals as offering. I decline his offer
and he seems befuddled. As people enter the temple lobby, they ring a large
bell, rub the foot of the brass Vishnu, genuflect and enter a smaller
sanctuary. I sit outside and watch for a
while to figure out the rhyme of the visit.
I don’t want to be culturally crude.
People come and go with all sorts of discussion going on.
Some sit and pray. But people mostly come and make an offering to something in
that small sanctuary and then leave. Some people pray out loud in a mumbling sound
as they move from statue to statue around the outside perimeter of the sanctuary.
Whole families come together with various degrees of interest. And even in these temples, some people are on
their cell phones.
I get up my nerve and check out the smaller room and take a
quick peek in. Three men are sitting in
an enclosed area and accepting people’s offerings. I don’t go in because I don’t have gifts. So
I roam around the exterior of the sanctuary and find a small area where all the
wilted flowers are heaped in a pile, along with all of their empty plastic
bottles, and coffee cups.
A woman stops me and instructs me to follow her to a shrine
to honor Vishnu. She has me repeat a prayer after her and then she puts a flower
necklace around my neck and yet another charka spot on my forehead. Then she asks me for a donation as well. I give
her the 10 rubies I have and she is insulted.
“This is Vishnu,” she tells me. “It should be 100 rubies or more.” She is indignant.
I tell her that I don’t have any more money on me. She
doesn’t believe me so I show her my empty pockets. She tells everyone within
earshot that I am cheap. A man calls to me and tells me to come with hi. I wave him off. “No, come with me, no money,
no worry.” But I have been in these situations
before and it is always about the money so I move on. But I am stopped again because I am traveling
in the wrong direction. I am walking
counterclockwise around the altar. I
have to change direction and walk clockwise and I have to get out of this
temple before I make another faux pas and I become the offering o Vishnu.
