Haridwar: First Glimpse of the Ganges

On the banks of the Ganges, I sit. A river made holy by the myriad believers who, for centuries, have gathered at her banks to wash, to pray, to sit in stillness and watch her water flow. The steps leading down to the swift brown current, fast and full with the recent rain, are covered in leaves, trash, dung, peanut shells and floral offerings. A child bathes happily under the sweet gaze of his young mother, beginning the day with a thick soap lather and a shivering giggle. Sadhus cloaked in orange gather together under the shade of the riverside Bodhi trees. Women use hand mirrors to apply make-up and bindis before stepping riverside for a morning ceremony. The riverside is alive with chatter: temple bells and singing bowls mapping the sun's journey over the horizon.

Just minutes after I arrive on the ghats, I am approached by a semi-official man with a semi-official book of receipts who asks me to make a donation to the maintenance of the riverside community. "Free feeding for poors-beggars, old sages and for all who wants," he says with a salesman's cheer, his eyes just inches from my own and leaning closer. "And for ceremonies, too," he adds. I smile and hand over a hundred rupee note, still slightly skeptical but encouraged by the enthusiasm of the twenty eyes staring at me from all sides. "100 rupees very little contribution," says the officer. He flips through his companion book and finds a few words of English with amounts of 2000 rupees and beyond. "I am a student," I respond, keeping my reasoning simple. "Please accept what I offer." The riverside women, hand -mirrors held close, darken their lashes and eyes before smearing themselves with whitening cream. No rain in the sky today and still I am soaked by India' unfailing sensory overload from sun-up til sun down and into midnight's shadows.

I sit on the steps with my shawl veiling face and eyes, hoping to dissolve into the hypnotic Ganges flow and evade the curious eyes of the riverbank dwellers for just a moment. And as a single moment dawns and faces, like a firefly, a larva, an aphid born and laid to rest in the same instant, Mona Lisa is by my side. Mona Lisa, the spirited young woman who speaks with confidence in broken but practiced English explains to me that I should come with her to Calcutta. "Two single women traveling alone can become friends traveling together," she smiles. In another time and place, I might say yes, impressed by her sweet persistence, which includes stories of her paramedical training, her life as a classical Indian singer and a thorough explanation of her identification card. She pulls out a handwritten and carefully preserved business card that in another hand could be easily mistaken for a laundry-drenched pastime. "And look here," she adds, showing me an immaculate florescent print out of Ram Dev and his wife with bloody-mouthed Kali and Tara in a totem-pole like arrangement. Mona Lisa sings to me and waves her henna-laced hand like a Bollywood star. "God bless you," she says as she makes a tentative gesture in the shape of a cross. "And God bless you, Mona Lisa," I reply with my hands folded in Namaste. "Good luck in Calcutta."

I continue walking. The sun rises high. I miss the breakfast hour completely, hunger dispelled by the buzz of morning activity. A happily naked toddler looks up, her eyes thickly defined with black powder, shielding her young pupils from the sun and subsequently making her look like a princess. Her mother smiles, six or seven months pregnant with the next. This is who I would give the hundred rupees pocketed by the riverside official. We hold our gaze for a long moment and continue walking our separate ways.

The banks of the Ganges are bursting with color. Hundreds of locals and Indian tourists flood the water's edge with marigold and bugambilia offerings and bathe happily or not so happily by the bucketful. One of the not so happy bathers is a toddler on holiday with his young parents. He is adorned with blessing necklaces and a thin string around his waist, nothing more. Dad drags him to the water as Mom tries to focus the camera. The young boy screams in protest as he is dunked into the current. I step away, embarrassed to maintain my sideways glance any longer. I make my way up river where children and women are squatting on small mud and rubbish islands, fingering through the trash in search of something. Fresh water mussels? Snails? Discarded jewels? Coin offerings? I sit down, feeling comfortably anonymous with my veil. But not two breaths do I take before I feel a tap on my shoulder.

"Namaskar, madame."
I turn around to see two orange-clad sadhus gazing at me. White beards, black umbrellas and neutral business-like expressions.
"Namaskar," I reply, knowing they've got me cornered.
"Country, please," continues the alpha of the pair.
"U.S.A." I say with a smile.
"It is not money we want," the leader continues. "Rice, flour, vegetables: this we want. Come."
I follow willingly, knowing the rule that once sadhus have you you are to respect their request, if at all reasonable.
"10kg of rice, good," states the sadhu, sure that I will continue to comply as easily as I have thus far.
"100 rupees of rice," I say. "100 rupees is what I offer."
The sadhu shakes his head in disappointment, but I know my offering is appropriate and stand my ground with ease. I hand him the money, snap a photo, receive his blessing with folded hands and bowed head and slip quietly from the shop and back to the clamorous street. A plump woman whose heavy eyes witnessed the transaction is quick on my heels.
"50 rupees, sister. Chapatti, rice."
"No, sister," I reply, not slackening my pace. She persists thirty meters more and gives up.

I duck out of the river boardwalk and onto the busy alley-way streets, bursting at the seams with vendors on bikes and surplus cheap merchandise: bangles, plastics, blankets, incense, metal-ware, spices and balls of dough deep-fried in oil. I dissolve into the noise and chaos just as I dissolved into the Ganges flow of morning. I walk with a playful confidence and smile: the kind of confidence that comes from deep humility and a willingness to put judgment aside and just be.