The holy city of Varanasi

Since a few days, I’m in Varanasi India.

Varanasi is a place you either love or hate. I tend to love it, remembering that stillness is within and not outside.

Varanasi is one of the holiest cities in India. A Shiva town situated at the sacred river Ganga.

It is a noisy place with all the motor beeps and car beeps. The music plays loudly on the street. The city buzzing and sometimes overwhelming with colours and smells in front of you. Then at the same time, it is the perfect place to be still and to meditate on the river bank of the Ganga.

Every corner has a little temple. The people of Varanasi worship every tree in town with a Shiva statue.

The best way to discover Varanasi for me is by sitting still and drink chai (tea) on a street corner or slowly walk along the Ganga. I am taking my time not having any goal to reach.

Children are playing on the streets between cars, people taking holy baths next to cremations grounds. Men are drinking holy Ganga water next to dead bodies wrapped in cloth, lying partly in the water of the Ganga. The corpses are cremated on big open fires. The strange thing is there seems to be no space between the dead and living.  Life and death, are welcomed at the Ganga.

Tomorrow I move to Allahabad for the Kumbh Mela.

Next meditation and mindfulness day is 1 December follow this link NL or ENG

Or FB event: here