Varansi, ville sainte... et pleine de surprises!

Par ou commencer? Varanasi est la ville ou les Indiens veulent venir mourir (pour se sauver du cycle de la reincarnation) et se faire incinerer. Vous avez surement tous vu des photos des "ghats", les escaliers qui descendent dans le Gange ou les gens viennent faire leurs ablutions? Eh bien, c'est ici. Je dois avouer que c'est assez surreel d'etre dans un lieu si mythique. Et pourtant, malgre toute la spiritualite de ce lieu, le profane se mele avec le sacre d'une facon tres surprenante pour mon esprit occidental. Le long des ghats, on peut voir des gens qui font leurs ablutions, qui prient, qui meditent, qui font du yoga, mais aussi qui se baignent, qui se brossent les dents (ewww... mais s'ils veulent mourir ici, ils s'y prennent bien pour se rendre malades!), qui jouent au cricket ou qui lavent leurs vetements. Les vaches s'y baignent elles aussi.

This craziness (to my eyes) is also present in temples. We visited a Shiva temple (this is Shiva's city) and it was nothing like any other temple I'd ever seen. Dark, dirty, no apparent logic. The little room where people went to pray was very small and crowded, people sitting around this shape on the floor (I think it was a linga - phallus) where a little mound of flower offerings were rotting. When we left, they started chanting and clapping their hands. How anyone can find spiritual fulfillment here is beyond me.

Je dois dire que j'ai ete heureusement surprise ici. Je m'attendais a me faire toucher, achaler, sollicitee, volee... Et bien entendu, les vendeurs nous appellent de leur boutique, d'autres veulent nous offrir une balade en bateau, certains nous suivent pendant longtemps pour avoir notre attention, tout le monde veut notre argent, mais ce n'est pas vraiment pire que ce l'etait au Vietnam, alors on sait comment reagir. On n'a pas ete malades non plus (pas a cause de la nourriture en tout cas) et les prix des souvenirs sont tres raisonnables, on n'a pas vraiment besoin de trop marchander. La pauvrete est omnipresente, evidement, mais supportable. Les rues sont sales et pleines de mouches, de vaches, de chevres et de singes, mais ce n'est rien qu'on ne puisse pas supporter.

I guess it's like anything, people hype up something for you to the point that you have really high expectations, and then it's not that great... or that bad! So I'm happy I was so worried about coming here, because now I know I didn't have to be. Sure, you always have to be on your guard and you can't trust anyone (It's a bit sad actually: I can't even answer when a cute child says hello, can't even look at him, because he probably wants my money and will latch on to me as soon as I pay attention to him) but it's really not that bad!

Oh, and by the way, I did get attacked by a monkey. I came out of my room yesterday evening to find out where some music was coming from. I was looking towards the entrance to the hotel, not paying attention to my surroundings, when I felt someone grasp my arm. I thought it was Nick trying to scare me and I turned around, only to see a little monkey grinning at me. Yikes! I tried to get his paws off me without touching him, struggled a bit while his grin got bigger and he was showing his teeth, and finally got away, right back into the room! In the courtyard below, I could hear some tourists laughing at what had just happened. Nick went outside to get a look at the monkey, but it was already gone.
"Get your hands off me you damned dirty ape!" (Nick told me to write this, though I don't get the reference:P)