NO peeing in Rishikesh
Okay, so as you may, or may not have guessed, I am now in Rishikesh, and we don’t pee here, why? Too hot, literally I feel like all I do is drink and sweat, right now, and it doesnt even feel hot, the creases in my pants behind my knees where i ate dinner are drenched in sweat, then I put my backpack on my lap for 3 minutes – my thighs soaked. Despite the heat, for some strange reason I feel great, bounds of energy, relatively. Normally, though I love India, I feel sort of drained and muzzy headed the whole day, but here, it’s clearer. Maybe it’s that I feel more confident than i have before, both speaking a bit of hindi and having a friend travel with me, who knows, I dont want to jinx my current condition. This morning Vasi and I left our room (which we found last night, and which she kept comparing to the Brothels in Born into Brothels (not really a bad comparison), to find a new place to say. We walked through the main street, packed full of people, sadhus (holy men) or saddhu -wanna bes lined the streets. To the left — the ganges, swimming, running playing, cows eating garbage on the stairs, in the streets, defacating on the streets, oops, me stepping in it. Oops, me stepping in it again, ahh. Men tauting Bindis, toys, bananas, “Yes Madam, please come in we have sandalwood” and then the ubiquitous honking horn, a car, motorbike or cart splitting the sea of humanit Moses like. Actually, this sounds overwhelming, but it hadnt been too bad. No emaciated children had approached us asking for food, people were generally friendly and the streets, despite the cow dung, were freshly cleaned. The whole city is a major tourist hub, and thanks to the “off season” (extreme heat) there are few westerners. Wait, im digressing. I was trying to say that normally I’ve had a lot of energy, but today we walked a few Km’s found a new place to say, a small “ashram” overlooking the ganges, and then walked back to our “brothel” (say bye to the cute Reiki Teacher, the one upshot of the first place) to go get our bags. Huge back on back, backback in front, the smells and sounds and crowds were just too much, we hadnt eaten breakfast, and by the time we found a suitable lunchary i though I’d puke. I kept eyeing a small blue bag holding vasis bananas, ready to use it, but luckily when I sweet lassi (yogurt drink) arrived, it soothed the nausea and all was well. Okay, so other than that no health problems (hmm, except the red bumps on my legs Vasi thinks is scabbies, we’ll see).
Tags: Travel
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