Its a long way somewhere: Varansi and Faces of The Ganga plus Chentys view on India

OK Dude you look so cool!!

Trevor outdid himself with the people photos today, its not difficult on the Ganga!

The River Ganges The Holiest and STINKIEST River
in INDIA

India, when asked what do I think of India after riding thru it for one month?

I think spending time in India is like being in an intense session of psychotherapy! You are forced to be in situations and emotional thought processes that you don’t want to be in and so you get to see your true colors under these conditions. I think I now understand what the fascination of coming to India is, it pushes you beyond your comfort zone, its so different from our lives at home.

In your normal life at home when you are having a down day, tired or fed up you have ways of making yourself feel better, go for a massage, have coffee with a friend, some yummy food perhaps, a walk in nature, listen to some great music or do some exercise, yoga and maybe meditation, a drink! However, in India its like your out of your comfort zone and you have no way of grabbing onto something to make yourself feel better because there are none of your normal comforts here, so you just have to ride it out.

For instance, in India you get to listen to the sound of horns all day long, see people taking a dump on the side of the road, dodging spit from windows of the buses as you pull past them, breathing in all the pollution that leaves you with a hacking cough for days and black faces, cows, water buffalo, dogs, wild boars and goats on the road who don’t care to get out of the way, big pot holes, garbage everywhere, no respect for human life or the environment, dirt roads which are supposed to be the main highways, roads that turn to goat trails or worse dead end, nowhere you would want to stop for a coffee break or a snack, cars coming at you from all sides, no traffic rules, 90% of the vehicles on these roads would not be allowed in Canada, there are no safety standards here, no laws, no consequences for any actions in India.

If you have an accident here, your dead, we have seen maybe two very small ambulances and they drive as crazy as everyone else and you are usually miles from anywhere, well there are always villages but they don’t have any facilities at all to cope with an accident.

So what you have to then do is just be in it and watch yourself, thats the fascinating part and why I think people have a draw to come to India. You see, how often in your life are you forced to stay in a situation that you don’t like, usually you can change it and get yourself out of it so therefore you never see how or what you will be like in it. What happens is that when you have got thru the angry, frustrated, confused, tired stage then your left with just being in it again, like a child who has lost its temper and when their done with their paddy they see that nothing has changed but somehow they just feel better, they just finished having there moment and like me you find yourself past the point of being all those emotions because you realise that there is no point, its not going to change anything anyway and its just the way it is in India, caous, this is life for them.

We ride from 9am to usually 4-5pm without a stop, cause you really don’t want to anyway, accept perhaps for gas, by the time you get thru your 400km day your tired, filthy and hungry and just looking for a place to spend the night. Our average speed is down to 50km/h because of the traffic and road conditions in all of India. Part of my mistake, which I have now learnt, is thinking that today will be better, the roads will be good, I will come across some nice place to have a coffee or stay for the night, not!

I simply don’t understand how in the 21^st century this country can be so far behind the rest of the world. I however now know why this is where yoga and meditation came into being, think about it, if you have this much caous 24/7 in your life then you would need to develop a practise to take yourself out of it for a while and what better way than doing yoga or meditation, brilliant really, its the ultimate test.

Lets see how calm I am if I get spat on or step in any human fecies during our last few days here, this will be a real test to see if I pass the “India Emotional Course” or not.

You may ask, so why do it then, because there is a curiosity inside all of us that wants to know how far we can be pushed and that when we reach that point, “what will we do”? There is something down deep inside of us that tells us “go for it” there is a prize to be had, a knowledge to be learnt and an understanding, this is our path. Ill admit though, it takes courage, thank you India for exposing me.

Chenty

I read this by Paulo Coelho what he says about travelling:

“I am first and foremost a pilgrim. I say this because to me all wanderings are important since you can extract from anything in life a teaching, something that will make sense to you. You have to look at life itself as a pilgrimage. You must get as much as you can from the journey, because-in the end-the journey is all you have.

For me being alive-meaning being able to meet people and travel-is what brings me joy. Its only living intensely that I’m able to gather enough experiences and emotions to later guide me when I decide to write.”

I like this!