Haridwar/Rishikesh Trip

Sorry for the late update. I was feeling a bit under the weather this week. I'm fine now though!

So, we arrived in Haridwar just before noon on Saturday, along with 5 of our fellow EAP friends. Getting there was a bit stressful since our taxi drivers didn't know where our hotel was, and didn't speak English very well. But we eventually found it, and it was definitely worth the trouble. The hotel was comprised of several bamboo huts surrounding a lovely courtyard garden, with steps that led down into the Ganges (literally into the Ganges - we were staying right on the bank of the river). Here are some pictures of the hotel:



This is the garden/courtyard area right outside our hut.



Me sitting on the steps with my feet in the Ganges. I spent a lot of time here - it was really peaceful, and I couldn't help but feel relaxed and meditative.

Possibly the best part of the hotel experience is that the hut was big enough to comfortably fit all 7 of us in it, and it only cost 1500 rupees for the night (that works out to a little over US $2 per person)!!

Anyway, after checking in we went out to find some lunch, and stopped at the first restaurant we came to. That was fun, since the only menu they had was in Hindi, so we got to practice our Hindi skills as we ordered lunch. Here's what the menu looked like:



The food was delicious, and we got to feel triumphant about successfully employing our Hindi skills. After that we wandered the town a bit, and went to the town center where people were bathing, swimming and playing about in the Ganges. All of us decided to go into the river as well, but the guys were the only ones for whom it was socially acceptable to actually dive in and swim around. Here's Jordan, thoroughly soaked:



Anytime we stopped for more than 15 seconds or so, a crowd would start to gather to stare at and/or take pictures of us. Sometimes it was several layers of people deep, and we had to push our way through to keep walking. This might give you some idea of what it's like:



It was so hot out that even after jumping into the river, we were all totally dry within an hour or two. We walked around the bazaar, didn't buy anything, and eventually went back to the hotel, where some people napped and some of us hung out by the river. Then we went to the fire ceremony, which was amazing. A huge crowd of people gathered, and we watched from a bridge above the festivities (we tried to go in, but we would have had to check our shoes, and we wanted to guard our stuff after a friend of ours had his shoes stolen under similar circumstances).

I was expecting it to be this solemn sort of religious ceremony, but people were totally talking and laughing and splashing around in the river (and taking pictures of us from below, if they happened to look up and see us). As the sun set, more and more flower boats were sent floating downstream. The people in the river dunked themselves in it 108 times (which is apparently a number that's pleasing to the gods). All the other girls went in and participated, but we didn't get to go because we were stuck watching everybody's stuff. Oh well. When it started to actually get dark, they played music over a loudspeaker and people started singing along. Then torches were lit, and people gave donations and put their hands above the flames, then touched their foreheads. Here are the other videos of the ceremony:





The next day, half of the group went back to Mussoorie, but Jordan, our friend Jen and I went on to Rishikesh. Rishikesh is built around two bridges that cross the Ganges, Ram Jhula and Lakshman Jhula (named after Hindu gods...I wish I knew more Hindu mythology). This is the two of us on Lakshman Jhula:



Another picture of the bridge:



And the view from the bridge:



We had lunch in a cafe here and chatted with an Eastern European guy and two Indian guys (who challenged us to read a sign in Hindi, and were shocked when we actually could). We spent the rest of the day walking around, visited a bathing ghat (a marble pavilion with steps leading down into the Ganges) and hung out in another cafe with a great view above the Ganges. We couldn't believe how many tourists we saw! We're so unaccustomed to seeing other white people, I actually almost felt compelled to take pictures of them myself.

Unfortunately, since we only had 6 hours (there was a time limit on our taxi's parking spot), we didn't get to see much of the town, and we didn't get to go to any ashrams or do any yoga. I wasn't too disappointed though, since I felt like I got to do lots of chilling out and meditating in Haridwar.

Anyway, all in all it was a very cool trip. There are way more photos on our Flickr photostream, and some more videos on our YouTube channel.

Tomorrow morning at 7 we're heading out for another weekend trip - our whole group is going hiking up to Yamunotri, where there's a Hindu temple. Hopefully when we get back we'll have lots of pictures of beautiful scenery!