Varanasi’s Ghats are a labyrinth of alleyways and narrow corridors leading down to the Ganges. They are dirty, chaotic, and utterly wonderful.
Holy cows nose and nibble at garlands of flowers strewn amongst piles of litter where gnashing puppies play hide and seek. There is shit of every kind: spread, skidded, or piled pristine on the ground. Monkeys clamber, chuckle, and scrap amongst the rooftops and balconies, occasionally draping themselves in stolen clothes or stopping to eat apples, all the while dodging stones flung by irate shopkeepers. There are motorbikes, goats, bicycles, old men with older guns reclined in chairs, holy men in states of stoned reverie, children chasing, all sharing the same metre wide channel.
Then there are the bodies, covered in bright orange shrouds and carried on stretchers on the shoulders of chanting untouchables. Some of the bodies are impossibly thin, flat and formless under fabric, but some are large with noses, feet, bellies protruding – reminders that these are people. These noisy processions make their way down towards the burning ghat and the eternal flame, the crowds bending, ducking, folding themselves out of the way. They strut onwards through the great piles of wood being weighed and sold before finally negotiating the crowds that watch and warm by the pyres.
There are at least eight fires burning brightly on the banks of the Ganges at Manikarnika Ghat and several more built. The bodies have been carried down the steps and doused in the river, and are being delicately de-robed until all that remains is a simple white sheet. The bodies are now placed on top of an unlit pile of wood. Several larger logs are arranged on top. The heat from a fire burning the final remains of another body nearby begins to dry out the new body.
After around half an hour, a man carrying a large bunch of dry leaves lights the fire. Soon the flames start to lick around the corpse before engulfing it completely. The fat and flesh bubbles and pops, occasionally forcing a large plume of smoke up and into the crowds. This is how Varanasi breathes: life and death in each claggy but vital inhalation.
