For all its filth, the Ganga is indeed the “river of heaven” for Hindus. And some of this sanctity reaches out to the tourists and everybody else. But why, really, are we in Varanasi? Is it not perhaps to experience the closeness of death and its frightening everyday character?

The oarsmen who row the tourist boats know what their customers want to see. In my own case, I was rowed past the most famous cremation grounds where huge dark piles of wood seemed to be moving in the heat beyond the smoke from the fires. The boatman pointed to the wood salesmen while I stared at the fires where pale extremities were jutting out.

“Many poor people can’t afford to buy enough wood, so many half-burnt bodies are thrown into the river,” he said. I think he wanted to shock me, rather than reacting to the injustice of a society that follows its citizens even beyond death.

Death is everywhere. And so spectacular in Varanasi that it becomes a marketing stunt for the tourist industry. In one of the alleys I saw an advertisement for a hotel trying to attract guests with the slogan: “close to a cremation site”.

After the boat trip I walk from one ghat to the next. I pause beside a small temple not far from the electric crematorium where the burning of a dead body is far less expensive than at the wood burning sites. The crematorium is out of order.

In fact I spent an entire week exploring the ghats and alleyways until I began to feel that my value judgements had been jolted. At times I felt something akin to panic, and decided to leave Varanasi earlier than planned. On my last day I found a well-stocked bookstore in the southern part of the city not far from the university. I bought a copy of Plato’s The Republic and Raja Rao’s Allegory from Banaras.

Later, on the train to Patna, I read Rao, who maintains that “virtue does not grow easily in Banaras. And vice has no better place. For all come here to burn.”

By Ingvar Oja

My driver Ramesh was waiting for me at the crack of dawn outside the main doors of the Varanasi hotel.

We moved slowly along the narrow lanes of the holy city, driving as close to the Ganga as possible. And then alighting from the three-wheeler to find our way by foot, in semi-darkness, passing a number of shapeless piles of cloth lying on the floor. Ramesh explained:

“They’re old people who’ve come here to wait for death. Varanasi is said to be the best place to meet death.”

His use of the English language inadvertently suggested he did not believe in the holiness of the Ganges. But as soon as we crossed over a high threshold, out onto Kedar Ghat, he performed a ritual that demonstrated his reverence toward the befouled waterway where Hindu believers perform dips — bowing their heads toward the sun now rising on the eastern banks.

“Do you usually go down to the river to bathe?” I asked Ramesh.

He immediately understood why I’m asking.

“Sure, but not so often these days, because the water is so filthy. And I never take the water in my mouth. The river may be holy, but not the bacteria. You know that. I saw that you wrote down what Mahant ji had to say about the Ganges and the filth that flows by here,” says Ramesh with a smile.

Ah yes, Mahant ji.

A few days earlier we had visited Dr. Veer Bhadra Mishra, the Mahant (religious leader) of an illustrious temple near the Ganga. This hereditary calling has been in his family for over 400 years.

But Dr. Mishra is not only a Mahant; he is also Professor of Hydrology at the famous Benaras Hindu University in Varanasi. That night Ramesh and I listened intensely as Dr. Mishra presented revealing statistics about Ganga pollution; statistics coming from a learned man who knows a lot about spiritual purity, and even more about man’s tendency to befoul his own environment.

They write poems and ribald songs about this heart-shaped leaf. It is even mentioned in the Buddhist Jataka tales and, over the centuries, it has gathered its own legends as a symbol of celebration, friendship and romance. The Kamasutra mentions it as necessary to the rituals of courtship and courtesans reddened their lips by chewing a paan, a rolled betel leaf. You welcomed guests with a tray of paan, it was shared to seal alliances of business deals, and at times even used to slip poison to an enemy. it is said that only courtesans and wrestlers were allowed to chew paan in the presence of the king. The banarasi paan is an important part of the city’s culture of masti. The leaves that range from pale to dark green in colour, are halved and a lime-and-catechu paste smeared on them. Slivers of areca nuts, tobacco powder, camphor, cardamom, coconut, mint and sweeteners are added to taste. The leaf is folded and pierced with a clove. And if you are so inclined, your paan can be spiked with aphrodisiacs. intoxicants, even ground pearls and covered with gold leaf of silver foil varansi’s lanes are studded with paan shops,and connoisseurs claim they can tell the special blend of each paanwala.

Most of the shops haveai fly-spotted mirror, bright lights and shelves stacked with cigarette and beedi packets. the panwala sits with selection of betel leaves soaking in a brass pot and the ingredients in a row of shiny bowls before him. as he swiftly folds the leaves, a radio behind him will be blaring out the latest Hindi film songs. The local paan shop is a place where people gather for a chat. here you can get the hottest gossip and the latest cricket score with your favourite beeda. In Sanskrit it is called tambul and chewing betel is an ancient habit. Old medicinal treatises like the Charaka samhita list thirteen qualities of a good paan including its look, teste and fragrance. Its medicinal properities include digestive or cough-repelling powers. Usually a paan is taken after a meal but addicts chew paan all day, often adding a few grains of aromatic tobacco called zarda. At the paan wholesalers, baskets of freshly plucked leaves are auctioned early every morning. The most expensive variety is the soft Maghai, and the other valued ones are Bangla, Mitha, Kapoori, Banarasi and Mahoba. The rich have turned the making and serving of paan into an elaborate ritual. The ingredients are kept in paandaans of engraved silver, and the folded paans are offered on trays or impaled on silver chains. The areca nut is sliced fine with carved natcrackers and silver spotoons are kept nest to divans to receive the red paan juice. style and panache sem to come naturally with the banarasi.