A Tissue Full of Desert Sand

By Mary Abbott

It was pouring rain and the wind blew the water sideways, the puddles dancing as though they contained invisible little dervishes. It was impossible to see out the taxi window so I kept lowering it and sticking my head out to take in as much as possible before leaving this magical place. There was little time and I had gone through so much to get here.

I kept telling myself that it was better than nothing, but was it? I had looked so forward to seeing this land that when stormy seas decided it was impossible, I actually felt like going home. The trip was over for me.

My friend and I, with two strangers, found a taxi driver who would show us what he could. He was a kind man who spoke no English. At one point he stopped the car so that we could gaze at a rainbow. The rainbow lied, weather only got worse.

It was time to leave if we were to make it back to the ship before it sailed. Through the rain and mist I saw something white an image of a perfect white horse.

It wasnt just the horse or location that affected me; it was as if he was looking right into my eyes and saying, Come, I will show you all of Patagonia.

I held my camera out the window and pushed the button.

• Language: English
• Publisher: iUniverse
• Release date: Apr 4, 2017
• ISBN: 9781532015809

Mary Abbott

Mary Abbott lives in Brighton, Ontario with her husband and ever-present dog. This is her second book.

Book preview

Copyright © 2017 Mary Abbott.

All rights reserved. No part of this book may be used or reproduced by any means, graphic, electronic, or mechanical, including photocopying, recording, taping or by any information storage retrieval system without the written permission of the author except in the case of brief quotations embodied in critical articles and reviews.

iUniverse

1663 Liberty Drive

Bloomington, IN 47403

www.iuniverse.com

1-800-Authors (1-800-288-4677)

Because of the dynamic nature of the Internet, any web addresses or links contained in this book may have changed since publication and may no longer be valid. The views expressed in this work are solely those of the author and do not necessarily reflect the views of the publisher, and the publisher hereby disclaims any responsibility for them.

Any people depicted in stock imagery provided by Thinkstock are models, and such images are being used for illustrative purposes only.

Certain stock imagery © Thinkstock.

ISBN: 978-1-5320-1579-3 (sc)

ISBN: 978-1-5320-1580-9 (e)

Library of Congress Control Number: 2017901025

iUniverse rev. date: 03/31/2017

CONTENTS

Dedication

Preface

Chapter 1 India

Chapter 2 Croatia

Chapter 3 French Polynesia

Chapter 4 China

Chapter 5 Romania and Bulgaria

Chapter 6 Antarctica

Chapter 7 Scotland

Chapter 8 Peru

Chapter 9 California.

Chapter 10 Tunisia

Chapter 11 Iceland

Chapter 12 Ecuador

Chapter 13 Another shot at China

Chapter 14 Central England

Chapter 15 Bhutan. That’s it, I’m done.

Epilogue

DEDICATION

First of all I want to thank Kelly and Phil for all of their technical help. I know that I am not a writer. I love words and have a very vivid imagination. This book, and I feel uncomfortable even calling it a book, is for my family. The periods and commas don’t matter. I am just giving them a homemade gift made up of pieces of my memories, pieces of me that no one else has access to.

Names have been changed to protect both the guilty and the innocent. Events are as I remember.

PREFACE

I don’t know when the desire to travel eased into my consciousness but I do have a memory of an incident that occurred when I was about eight years old. My parents were quite dedicated to their church… my Father a little more so than my Mother.

One day I got to thinking about how wonderful it would be to become a missionary when I grew up. I handed the news to my Mother on a silver platter. She could hardly wait to get to church to tell everyone that her little princess had seen the light at such an early age. Yes, Mary had decided to become one of God’s helpers. There was an ulterior motive in my little girl mind. I didn’t tell my Mother… I couldn’t bear to disappoint her; but I had decided to become a Child of God so that I could travel. I could spread the word in India, just like Mother Teresa (minus the poor and sick.) It was always India that I dreamt about and read about. I was so fixated on that country that I wondered if it was somehow genetic, if one (or more) of my ancestors had lived there.

If I had a lighter personality I could laugh at it all. I am sure that many people lapsed into a self-induced coma when I began my seminars about the sights that could be seen after a simple eighteen hour plane ride. If anyone needed to know about a different country or culture I was their go-to person. The Atlas was my favourite book.

Finally I had the money to see all of the things that I had read about. I had studied the world the way a geologist studies rocks. I should have known what I was doing. I shouldn’t have made the same mistakes each and every trip. I should not have ended up under a priest’s cassock or picking bugs out of my bra after a Shaman whacked me with a bundle of roach infested herbs. I should have kept currencies straight in my head. I should have read the small print. And I sure as hell should have known better than to buy little dead snakes from a pharmacy in China.

I should have but I didn’t. After a lifetime of study I failed my exams.

CHAPTER 1

India

My family and friends all knew how obsessed I was with India (some thought disturbingly so) but few imagined that I would ever have the courage to go. I was proving them wrong; I was leaving in the morning. What a remarkable woman! everyone would say. I would be a hero to my children and grandchildren. Some hero. The night before departure I had to leave my bed and lay on the bathroom floor for over an hour waiting to be sick. The vomit cleared my stomach but did nothing for the fear

When I finally fell asleep my dreams weren’t the soft magical India dreams I’d had since childhood but images of streets lined with the poorest of the poor, reaching thin claw like hands towards me. I’d wake up and then slip back into my media-induced horror. I would see a bag of bones that resembled a horse pulling a cart and the laying on of a switch when the thin creature didn’t move quickly enough.

I turned on my bedroom light at 2:30 a.m. and asked myself who on this good earth would want to go to such a place? The chances were quite high that I would get diarrhea and the malaria pills were making me feel sick even before I left. Could I pick up some untreatable disease through the chronic open sores in my mouth? What about the snakes? I didn’t fear being bitten, but the mere sight of one could cause my heart to stop beating. Maybe the earlier stomach rebellion meant that I was coming down with the flu. Had I made a mistake spending all that money? No, there was no choice; there had never been a choice. I wouldn’t be a whole person until I went to India.

I worried about something bad happening. The one thing that nagged at me, would give me no peace, was that I wanted things to be as easy as possible for my family in case of an accident. I couldn’t completely attain that peace because of my husband Ralph. Every time I brought up practical details, important details: like where wills are kept, banking information, insurance policies and money hidden around the house he would turn me off like a radio. He refused to listen or even entertain the thought that something could go wrong. This was my first solo trip and with each one that followed I always felt unsettled because my life wasn’t wrapped up in a tidy little box.

On the big day I watched the sun rise and knew that I was as ready as I would ever be. I called the kids to tell them goodbye one more time and then sat down in my favourite chair for a final cup of coffee. I turned my attention to Ralph. The freezer and fridge are full and there is extra money in my desk drawer. If you need me just call the tour company, the number is on the phone. All of the insurance papers are on the dining room table. Ralph glanced at me sitting in my chair and for some reason tears began running down my face. He gave me the kind of look you give a magician after he has just performed an amazing trick … a look that asks ‘What the hell?’ The patience that he’d been able to hang on to for the last few weeks disappeared. I’ve been hearing about bloody India for forty years and now it’s time to go and you sit in a chair bawling. Get moving your airport pickup is scheduled for noon.

The phone interrupted our little drama and it was my airport driver telling me that due to an accident on the 401 (the expressway leading to the airport) my pickup would be early. The phone rang again saying that everything had changed and that I would be picked up even earlier. I quickly dried my tears, blew my nose and somehow managed to be ready when the van pulled into the driveway. A quick peck on the cheek from Ralph with his parting words, Be smart and I was on my way.

As soon as I set foot inside the airport I became another person, the person I had always dreamed of being. I was suddenly independent, alive and special. I was going to India, how cool was that? Speaking of cool, I was freezing. The terminal was cold and sterile and there was no one there. I just hoped that I was in the right place. I knelt down on the floor and unlocked my suitcase to retrieve a sweater. My carry-on was so heavy that I had to stay put instead of going to look for my Tour Rep. This had to be the right place; I was just early due to the change in pickup. What was in my carry-on that made it so heavy? Why hadn’t I brought a bag on wheels?

Finally the Tour Rep. arrived and my companions for the next two weeks began to congregate. Half of the people wearing the distinctive bright pink wrist band representing my tour company were going to Tunisia and the other half to India. I kept hooking up with the wrong half only to be told, We are going to Tunisia. The India group went that way. I finally got to talk to our leader Michelle. She was excited to be returning to India after five years and as an extra bonus there were only thirteen travellers in the group.

We boarded on time and I couldn’t believe how small the plane was. It didn’t look up to the task of crossing an ocean. I sat beside another woman travelling alone named Lisa. She was good company and I liked her. We arrived in Milan, Italy at 1:45 a.m. our time and I changed my watch to 7:45 a.m. their time. Things had become slightly weird since leaving Toronto. It had been dark outside most of the flight and then suddenly the sun was reflecting off the plane as we landed in Milan. I barely had time to go to the washroom and brush my teeth before we boarded another plane.

I slept until turbulence woke me and when I looked out the window all I saw was my reflection against a black background. I fell back into a fidgety half sleep until it was announced that we would soon be landing in India. I felt disoriented. It was Saturday morning and we had left Toronto on Thursday night.

It took a long time getting out of the airport and to our hotel and in my weary state I had trouble finding my room. Round and round I went, dragging a suitcase and a heavy carry-on that weighed me down. When I finally opened the door to my room I wondered if exhaustion was toying with my head as my blurry eyes fell on obscene opulence. As I climbed into a bed large enough for four my last thought was, I’m in India. I’ll wake up to the sound of crows in the morning.

The sun was defeating the blinds and someone was banging on the door. I woke, tangled up in my dreams and sheets. Lisa was pounding on my door all excited and ready to go. It was noon and I’d missed breakfast. We got on a bus that had seen better days. We had a tour of New Delhi which was modern and (aside from the Indian population) typical of most large cities. We visited a Muslim tomb built by a wife for her husband. It looked like a miniature Taj Mahal. In India Muslims are buried south to north … feet south, head north and turned west towards Mecca.

This was still the first day and it hadn’t yet registered that everywhere I went would be crowded. Of course I did know, but knowing and seeing are often quite different. We stopped at a park. Women wearing brightly colored saris seemed to float instead of merely walk while men slowly strolled along holding hands or with their arms draped casually around each other. Fathers carried toddlers on one shoulder, the child straddling as if riding a pony, one leg in front and one in back holding on to their daddy’s head. This didn’t look like India, it was too… ordinary.

The blue sky was full of long tailed kites. I didn’t know where to look next but the thought popped into my head that a thing as minor as how a father carries his toddler was something I’d never seen before and it should become a memory. That’s what I wanted to see, the little things. I was pleasantly surprised that almost all of the women I saw on the trip wore saris. I hadn’t expected that.

I watched a tunnel being dug by the side of the road. Men filled a pan with dirt and rocks, balanced it on their heads, and then straining every muscle in their thin bodies climbed out of the hole and handed the pan to a waiting woman. She put it on her head and climbed to the top of a pile of rocks and dumped it. It was like an assembly line and I wondered if I returned in a year’s time if the tunnel digging would still be going on? Probably not, they seemed to be working pretty hard.

Some little boys came running up to shake my hand and then dissolved into gales of laughter and ran away. Their father asked if he could take a picture of me with his family. I put an arm on the shoulders of the two little boys and felt them tremble with joy or excitement or maybe even fear.

We got back on the bus and within an hour were in Old Delhi and everything made sense. Cattle and goats were disrupting traffic and women were following the cows waiting for manure to make a fire to cook the evening meal. Men were pissing everywhere and emaciated old men and women were pulling ridiculously heavy carts. Even the frightening roadways were the same as in my dreams. There were hundreds of three wheeled tuk-tuks (little taxis) and motor scooters with children piled precariously on top of each other. I had never seen so many bicycles. Some were piled high with wooden crates stuffed with chickens. The poor creatures couldn’t move and I warned myself not to eat chicken. I thought about my Father when I saw the occasional tractor that had not seen better days but better decades. Everyone was attempting to find just a tiny bit of highway as cars and buses barrelled along oblivious of any traffic rules. Did rules of the road even exist? It was an orgy of pandemonium.

Everyone, no matter what their means of transportation, used their horns or bells as a polite warning, ‘Don’t pull over I’m coming through’ or ‘there is an elephant in the middle of the road up ahead.’ Watching out the window of the bus was frightening; we were constantly swerving to miss a scooter or an animal. Cars pulled up to within inches of our bus and an accident seemed imminent. All I could do was close my eyes and hope that the idols hanging from our bus’s rear-view mirror would keep us safe. To make things even more congested farmers were slowly pulling along carts loaded with vegetables heading to or returning from the market. I noticed a bike piled so high with rolled carpets that the rider couldn’t see where he was going or where he had been.

We were held up in a traffic jam for what seemed like an hour, but I didn’t mind. There was a real live mini movie playing outside my window. A young man riding an elephant slowly passed the motionless bus. Even with all of the noise and confusion the animal looked calm and content. I raised my camera to take a picture and the man looked directly into my eyes. He had the most serene, beautiful face I’d ever seen. To this day all I have to do is close my eyes and I can bring that face to my surface.

Finally we were on our way to visit a Hindu temple. Temples were very strict about two things, no shoes and no cameras. Inside the Gods and Goddesses looked like dolls made from plaster and not by gifted artists. Their faces were heavily painted and had a garish look that reminded me of the kewpie dolls we used to win at county fairs when I was a child. They held no beauty to a Westerner. Men and women were feverishly praying, oblivious to everyone around them. There were holy men sitting cross legged in little cubicles who offered to put a bindi on my forehead for a small donation.

Note: I mention bindis a lot in this chapter. Simply put, a bindi is a red dot that Hindu women wear in the centre of their foreheads. It is placed between the eyebrows and is said to represent wisdom, beauty, energy and concentration. Here in the west, the most popular explanation of the bindi is that it represents a third eye, an extra eye against evil. But Hinduism isn’t that simple. I could write several paragraphs on other reasons for the wearing of a bindi.

Outside the temple was a huge courtyard. It was in the courtyard of this temple, on our very first day, that a woman in our group named Martha fell. It was also here that gigantic ants started crawling up Lisa’s legs. Horrified at their size she quickly brushed them off her body and stomped them to death for good measure. Our guide looked on in genuine horror, wringing his hands and pleading, Madam, madam, now they will have to start their life cycle all over again.

We had been warned by our Delhi guide that when we went out for a bus tour in the morning we should take everything that we would possibly need for the day (a special warning for diabetics) because due to the traffic we often wouldn’t make it back to the hotel until late afternoon or evening. On this first day the bus got back to the hotel at 5:45 p.m. and we had to be ready to leave at 6. I filled the tub and was in and out, changed and ready to go in fifteen minutes flat. Today was only the beginning and everyone was adjusting to a foreign (very foreign) land with bodies thrown off balance from jet lag. Was it really necessary to do so much on the first day?

Before dinner we went to a performance of Indian dance. At first the presentation was boring. I was far too tired for this and a brief glance around showed that I wasn’t the only one. Some of the group were sound asleep, heads leaning back on the seats and mouths wide open. The women on stage wore red saris with bright yellow trim. They didn’t sing but moved around the stage playing sitars (stringed guitar-like instruments.) Does anyone remember George Harrison?

Suddenly the stage was quiet and a man walked out carrying the biggest drum I had ever seen. He was a huge man and proceeded to sit on a stool with the drum between his legs and two giant drum sticks with round rubber ends. The dancers came back and he alone beat the drum that provided the music for the dancers. There were no other instruments. What a talented musician he was. The sleepers were now wide awake. Unfortunately his skills were wasted on such a bone tired audience. The performers deserved better than us.

We left the little hall to walk to a restaurant. By this time it was quite dark and we followed our guide through smelly, dirty back alleys. The ground was so filthy that each step I took felt squishy and wet through my sandals. Was I stepping on rotted fruit and vegetables or something much worse? The smell made me wonder if I would be able to eat. Having rushed to have a bath now seemed simply ludicrous. After blindly climbing rickety stairs we entered a pretty decent looking dining area where the manager met us and proudly announced that we would be eating on the balcony.

It was our first meal as a group, a chance to sit down and form cliques, to decide who we wanted to spend time with and who we would be wise to avoid. This was definitely a get to know each other dinner. Almost immediately one man began to complain. What about malaria? Dusk and dawn are the times when mosquitos are most dangerous. I felt like telling him that maybe he and his little wife should have taken malaria pills like the rest of us. Lisa told him that if he didn’t want to sit outside to stay inside by himself; no one was forcing him to join us. This man turned out to be a thorn in my side and I had the miserable experience of running into him on yet another trip. His name was Thomas, not ever Tom mind you, but it didn’t matter because the women in my little group called him Toad because he looked exactly like a toad. No one really cared when Toad and his wife decided to take the risk and eat on the balcony with the rest of us.

When you combine a small group, extreme exhaustion, several drinks and a scrumptious four course feast the end result is usually a party. We laughed and talked and made new friends, our fatigue forgotten, like my promise to myself not to eat the chicken. There was a small musical band wandering along the communal table that included two little boys dressed as Rajahs. One was especially cute. He wiggled like a girl and made faces to the music causing his turban to move up and down on his forehead. He would wink and then bump up against you making clicking sounds with his tongue. When offered money he would say, No, no looking cautiously at his father, then as soon as his father looked away he’d let you slip coins into his pocket. What a charming little scam.

It got cool and charcoal barbeques were set up for warmth. They made the setting feel homey but I feared that someone might drink too much and crash into one of them. The sky was full of stars and the moon as bright and orange as a harvest moon back home. Between courses I got up and leaned on the railing of the balcony staring up at the sky and down at flood lit ruins. I was so full of emotion and fatigue that tears were close to the surface. I thought back through my life and wondered if I had ever felt such strong ties to a place. It was on this very first night, through a fog of exhaustion that I knew, without a doubt, that for the next few weeks I was where I belonged. Life is way more brilliant than we ever give it credit for. It always seems a negative thing … like John Lennon’s famous quote, ‘Life is what happens when you are busy making other plans.’ This time it was right on the mark, it meshed. It was as perfect as it had ever been.

I felt thankful to have met Lisa and she became an important partner in my future travels. I loved her French Canadian accent and even when she was put off with me I couldn’t take her too seriously. Lisa would stand up to anyone and could be rather formidable. She always had my back but didn’t hesitate to tell me when I needed to be told. We latched on to each other and didn’t let go.

Martha was 83 years old, and within a few days it became obvious that she was in way over her head. Martha’s claim to fame was that she had almost died of malaria. Lucinda was 75 years old and looked to be 55. She had been born in Burma and her dual passport caused a lot of scrutiny at every single security point we passed through. She and Martha had signed up to be roommates even though they had never met. The drama that resulted from this coupling became a source of breakfast entertainment.

Judith was delicate and beautiful. Her husband had been a diplomat in India and had recently died. She felt as if this country was her second home but coming back alone was bitter sweet. Dennis and Audrey were a very good-natured, kind couple. Not one complaint came out of their mouths the whole trip. Actually nothing much came out their mouths, they were uncommonly quiet. Doug and Kate were the couple that Lisa and I would go to when we needed a man. Kate was a little high strung and Doug a very patient man. He kept an eye on the three of us and would sit for hours while we shopped. He was a good, decent man who reminded me of my husband back home.

Margo was a beautiful young woman from Ethiopia. She was bubbly and friendly and loved to shop. Her husband Thomas was an uncouth, classless oaf. He liked to tell anyone who cared to listen how he had met Margo when he was on a shooting safari in Ethiopia and didn’t return to Canada with the other men in his group but stayed and married Margo within a few weeks. When he could he brought her back to Canada to look after his five kids and of course him. He obviously could afford to buy her things and looked so proud when she would show up for dinner wearing low tops with her boobs hanging out. Actually her boobs didn’t hang, they were pretty firm, but that’s not the point. He was the one we called Toad. There were others in our group I can barely remember. The ones that I have introduced played a big part in my Indian journey.

Sitting cross-legged on my huge bed after that first full day I couldn’t stop writing. I put down pen and paper when the clock called out that it was midnight. I was so tired and looked forward to my dreams. The next day promised to be no less hectic. We had three major tours scheduled: the Red Fort, a mosque and the Raj Ghats where Ghandi was cremated.

As we drove to the scheduled destinations I realized that it was market day and the stalls literally stretched for miles. They took up half of the street so traffic was double the volume. I wanted to leave the bus and walk. Our guide gave us an interesting bit of news in response to Toads question about ties between India and Hitler. Can you believe he asked that? Anyway, the swastika is an ancient Hindu symbol and has been around for eight-thousand years. It means pure. The Nazi symbol circles in the opposite direction and Hitler chose it because he wanted a pure race of people.

When the British took over in 1858 they named Calcutta the capital city, then built New Delhi and it became the new capital. I wondered what it would be like to go to Calcutta. Tours never seemed to include that city. I have never once seen it offered as a tourist destination.

The Red Fort was truly magnificent. It consists of two hundred and fifty acres condensed within two and a half kilometers of protective walls. I had a little bit of trouble wrapping my mind around that information and when I got home I asked my hubby if it was possible. He thought for a while and said it was. The fort was built by the Shah Jahan over a nine year period and housed the royal family. At one time it was surrounded by a moat filled with crocodiles. No commoner ever entered the royal courtyard, and once a week merchants brought their wares and set up tiny shops just outside the palace gates. After the British exiled the Moguls in 1857 the Red Fort was pretty much ignored but has finally regained some of its former glory as a tourist attraction. It was interesting to see, but our guide turned the excursion into a high school history lesson and just like in high school I was distracted most of the time. There was just too much to take in.

Small groups of young men followed us everywhere, not saying a word, just watching as if every movement or gesture we made was something unique, something they had never seen before. Sweepers with twig brooms were clearing the courtyard of any debris, even leaves. It was spotless.

We headed to a mosque and because the traffic was so bad our intrepid leader Michelle and the local guide decided to hire bicycle rickshaws, two to a cart. It was amazing and at the same time very, very dangerous. A huge truck brushed up against my leg leaving a smudge of dust on my pants. At one point Lisa and I looked at each other and squealed with delight. I felt as if I was twelve again and experiencing my very first roller coaster ride. Happiness mixed with fear. I’d forgotten that emotion.

At the mosque we had to remove our shoes. I had learned already to keep a pair of temple socks in my purse. The mosque was interesting enough and had a huge paved courtyard. All around there was a columned area for the women to pray. Women could only enter the mosque itself when it was not the call to prayer. Between the columns, in the shade, men were sleeping or feverishly praying. We saw the pool for ritual washing before prayer but were not allowed into the mosque itself. I heard my very first call to prayer. It was like a symphony with only one voice, beautiful and haunting.

Ghandi’s tomb had a simple peace, like the man himself. It was surrounded by acres and acres of perfectly manicured parkland. There wasn’t even a paper blowing in the breeze. A stone path led to a roped off enclosure guarding a plain black marble platform so shiny that it reflected the eternal flame burning in one corner. Marigolds were strewn everywhere. This was the spot where Gandhi was cremated and his ashes were then taken to the Mother River, Ganges. Visitors could go directly to the cremation spot or view it from a beautiful lookout over the site. I chose the lookout because I didn’t want to take my shoes off again.

That night it all caught up with me. I knew it had to and wondered when it would happen. I don’t get headaches and the throbbing in my temples alarmed me. I felt as if I might throw up. Maybe that’s what I needed to do, to get rid of whatever was causing the distress. Chanting a mantra of ‘you gotta do what you gotta do,’ I stuck my finger down my throat several times and brought up a load of undigested, spooky looking guck and immediately felt better.

I didn’t want to be the first sick casualty; the one the others whispered about. For the first time I felt a little flat and emotionless, but then in the afternoon when Lisa and I were in the hotel pool she looked at me and said, Just think Mary, we are floating in a pool… in India! That night I climbed into my huge bed and wondered what tomorrow would bring. We had to get up at 5:30 to catch a plane to Varanasi (Benares). Of all the mornings to have diarrhea! I prayed. Please Lord don’t let it be today, not when we are going to Varanasi. I beseech you to just let it be a hangover from the two huge plates of dessert I ate last night. I promise I will give up all forms of gluttony. The Lord must have heard my plea, and even gave me extra time to spend in the washroom, because Lucinda and Martha were having a disagreement that Michelle had to straighten out before we left.

On the way to the airport I noticed an old man dressed in rags hobbling along the side of the road. When the bus stopped he looked up at me in agony and pain, clasping his hands in the prayer gesture and then rubbing his belly. All I did was look away and pretend I didn’t see him, but every time I looked out the window there he was. I am so ashamed; I still feel the bad karma years later. I could have fed him for a whole day for almost nothing. And do you know why I ignored him? Because it was too much of an inconvenience to dig out carefully hidden money and I figured that by the time I got the rusty, ancient window open the bus would have moved on. Good excuse eh? He was starving and I didn’t want to be inconvenienced.

In Varanasi (I prefer to call it by its old name) the airport security was tough. I entered a curtained cubicle and a female customs officer patted me down. She was no nonsense and after my attempts at conversation were ignored I decided it was better to just shut up. We had left our suitcases in Delhi and brought only one small bag. I was surprised at the presence of such heavily armed guards and then remembered that this was the holiest city in all of India. This was their Mecca, their Jerusalem. This was what I wanted to see, the place I thought about most, but I would have to wait.

The drive to the hotel was long but not for one second boring. I watched dusty towns go by with little shops, cattle and fruit vendors. The whole time I was in India I could never rest or read on long bus rides. The sights were constantly changing, yet staying the same. Every town, no matter how small, had a sidewalk barbershop and scooter/bicycle shop. There was always a pissing wall fully visible from the street. If the bus window was open I could smell those walls. Roads were full of tractors and bikes and the ever present cattle. In most towns the roads were not paved and there were no designated lanes.

After we reached our hotel, Lisa, Kate and I went shopping in the hotel shops while Doug patiently sat on a chair. I wanted to get some pictures so we decided to leave the sanitised grounds and go out into the street. Immediately we were surrounded by tuk-tuks and one English speaking driver said he would take us on a tour for a dollar. Doug sat up front with the driver and the three of us ladies barely squeezed into the back. We chuckled at the thought of our children’s reactions if they could see their mothers in the back of a tuk-tuk lost in the chaos that surrounded us. It was just so ridiculous, so very risky. The driver spent a great deal of time going the wrong way on a one way street. I noticed two men trying to attach the wires on a broken neon sign and one guy was putting the wire into his mouth to wet it to try to attach it to another wire. Of course the driver took us to an outlet, that’s the way things work in India. I bought a box for Ralph and then we headed down a dirty back alley to more shops. It was so much fun. When he dropped us back at the hotel the driver said that he knew someone in Canada and pulled out a battered notebook with an address in it. The person he knew lived in Kingston!

The next day the bus headed to Sarnath, ten kilometers outside of Varanasi. The octagon shaped Dhamek Stupa is forty-four metres high and supposedly erected on the exact spot where Buddha gave his first sermon after enlightenment. There was a young Chinese couple walking around this holy monument with tears streaming down their faces as they kissed the structure every few feet. I was thirsty and bought a coke from a man who finally got it across to me that I was to return the bottle directly to him. The immaculate grounds were not to be desecrated by an empty coke bottle. Half way through the drink I’d had enough. A mother, her little girl, and a younger boy were sitting on the grass. The little girl held out her hand and I handed her the coke, first removing the straw. She gave her brother a drink and he sputtered and choked and was so dramatic that his mother and I both burst into laughter. It wasn’t so funny when I tried to explain to her that she had to take the bottle back to the vendor! The other kids at this site were a real pain - begging, attempting to steal and just being plain annoying. They were darker skinned than the other Indians I’d seen, with dirtier clothing. We were told in hushed tones that they were gypsies.

Next we had a brief stop at a Buddhist temple. It wasn’t the biggest, but was apparently the most colorful in India. The outside setting was serene, dotted with pine trees and monks strolling around or sitting on the grass reading. Inside was far different. It was a riot of color with every corner filled with streamers and ribbons. There were huge statutes of the Buddha and brightly colored alcoves in the walls held tiny statutes. The temple was empty except for one western woman stretched out on her belly with her arms straight out in front of her, slowly inching her way towards a statute of Buddha.

Back on the bus Toad started to hassle our guide about money and the Buddhists, comparing their tiny temples to the Catholic Church’s. He just made me so mad and I shouldn’t have been. He was just an ignorant buffoon accusing the Buddhists of taking money from their followers for their own gain.

Our local guide and Michelle had made arrangements to give us something a little different to finish the day. We were going to a typical Hindu village and we were the very first tourists to do so. It can only be described as a compound; the homes connected by a dusty lane full of cattle, goats and chickens. We walked around and were invited by the village elder to look inside some of the homes. The people were shy and curious and I would never enter their private domain. It was a tiny village, the homes all made from weathered boards haphazardly nailed together, or in many cases, just leaning against each other. Clothes were drying on every available space, some lucky homeowners had rope strung across their doorways that were actual clothes lines. Chickens, chickens, everywhere there were chickens. The dogs looked pretty rough and Kate actually let one lick her feet! Good Lord, had the woman not read all of the warnings about rabies? The people that called this tiny little village home followed us with expressionless looks on their faces. Aside from the elder there was not one smile offered. He showed us around and described, with our guide acting as interpreter, the day to day drudgery of living here, the constant battle just to survive.

There was one young kid shaved bald except for a top knot right on top of his little head who kept staring at me, just me. After a while I began to feel a little self-conscious, no that’s not the word … confused. I couldn’t figure out what it was about me that intrigued him so. Was I so different from the others in the group? Smiles and peek-a-boo didn’t work. His expression never changed he just stared. I wondered if it could be my blonde hair, but I wasn’t the only one in the group who had ‘natural’ blonde sun streaks. As we were leaving I noticed a huge mound of about a hundred tiny clay cups. They were for the untouchables to use and then they were smashed. Anything an untouchable touched, including food, had to be thrown out. Looking back, I wished I had of pocketed one. Sad but true.

Our Indian guide announced that we would make a quick stop at a silk shop and the complaining began. We didn’t want to go to a silk shop. We wanted to go back to the hotel and have a bath, rest, and maybe even write a little. Tomorrow was going to be a very, very early start. It didn’t matter how we felt, our guide was determined to get his commission. And so he should. At the small factory men sat cross legged outside the door working on looms while inside, in sweltering heat, women bent over sewing machines. I wondered what happened to these people when their eyes or fingers gave out, when they got old. Where would they go? How would they survive? It’s not as if they would get a pension. All of this so that some swarthy fat man in a suit could lead tourists into an immaculate air conditioned showroom, offer coke or tea, and marvel over the beauty of the glorious silk items as if he himself had made them.

Tomorrow we were heading for Varanasi, the city that intrigued me the most. As soon as we got back to the hotel I emailed the kids to share my joy and excitement. Kelly kept that email because she said that I had never, ever sounded so happy. At 4:30 the next morning a group of bleary eyed travellers climbed on a bus. I wasn’t one of the sleepy ones. I was too excited. The Ghats, the Ganges and cremation sights represented India to me.

Note: Ghats are long flights of steps leading down to the holy river. Varanasi has eighty four.

The city of Varanasi stretches seventy-seven kilometers and holds two million people, most waiting to die so that their bodies can be cremated and the ashes scattered in the river. We wanted to be there early to see the sun rise over the river. Because of security we had to leave the bus and walk. The closer we got to the Ghats the more depressing it became. We made our way down narrow alleyways and walked passed dingy little shops where no one pressured us to buy anything. The shop keepers looked out of their establishments with dull lifeless eyes, too defeated to even try to make a sale.

The most wretched of the people live on the steps leading to the Ghats. I had never imagined that such a mass of human suffering existed, well actually I did - this was the India of my nightmares. These people had somehow made their way here where they just sat and waited to die. Many were too weak to even beg, and let’s be real here, begging defeated their purpose. They sat in the same spot every single day, whether the season brought rains, drought or monsoons. They didn’t dare move and risk losing their place close to the river until death finally released them and another quickly took their place. In the west we line up for rock concerts or movie openings. In Varanasi the people line up hoping for a divine end to this life. Ashes or a corpse in the Ganges promises a direct route to God and an end to re-incarnation and suffering.

We walked down to the river and got into a boat, a simple little row boat. The Ganges was dark and I had imagined that it would have a slight odour. Not so, it was just a pretty river.