Ganga Dhyan Part 1- Arrival in Rishikesh

22/01/06-26/01/06

As the tempo wound through the streets of Haridwar and out onto the highway, two things struck me. First, the bitter cold- apparently, the cold snap that blitzed north india in the winter of 2005/06 had just finished, but coming from chennai, it didnt seem that way. The second thing that caught my attention was a vast, dry riverbed strewn with rocks and pebbles. The opposite bank was lined with deciduous trees whose skeletal outline was visible through the thick fog. This was like a scene from a horror movie or something. What was even more horrifying was that i thought initially this was the river Ganga. Its not unimaginable that in india, even the Ganga could be dammed off completely and used for electricity and irrigation. So u can imagine my disappointment that after enduring a 48 hr train journey from chennai, i arrived in haridwar to find that the Ganga is really not a river anymore. But luckily, this was not the case. A sign up ahead clearly indicated that this was in fact the Chandrabagha river, which was being expoited and reduced to a fragment of its past glory........

So after the relief provided by the signpost, i sat and breathed easy. Not that easy mind you- there were eight people plus luggage (ie my backpack, a stack of blankets this guy was probably going to sell, some suitcases etc) in a tempo meant to seat maybe six smallish people. As we left the town limits, the scenery became even more beautiful. Somewhere in the middle of a forest, we came upon a train track- in fact, i noted that it was the very same Dehra Dun Express that i had travelled on. The Delhi-Dehra Dun line is notorious for its delays- this is in the framework of a train system that is generally behind schedule i.e. it takes a lot to gain notoreity for being late in india. Earlirer, it had taken my train 8 hours (!!) to do the 140 km from Delhi to Haridwar. People told me to take a train to Delhi and then a Shatabdi or a bus to Haridwar- i ignored them and took the chennai-dehra dun express- a ridiculously fatiguing 51 hr journey (i will write a seperate entry on the train trip because some sections were absolutely amazing).

So anyway, i finally reached Rishikesh, which is where i planned to stay. By this time, i had had several glimpses of the immortal Ganga and was reassured that it was in fact, rushing to the floodplains in its full splendour. The tempo refused to take the road down to the banks of the Ganga, which is where i was staying. But the guy gave me decent directions, so i only had to ask one other person for further directions. Its actually easy to get lost in the alleyways of Rishikesh- i did this a few times. I find the best way to explore new areas is to get lost in them. Just walk wherever your fancy takes u. In this way, i think i learn much more about the place than i would by keeping to the well-trodden paths of tourists.

I keep getting sidetracked- in rishikesh, i stayed at the swami dayananda ashram, called "arsha vidya peetam". It is a beautiful construction that melds into rishikesh almost unnoticed- if u see some of the monstrosities that have sprung up on the banks of the Ganga, u will understand what i mean. It is a cosy (metaphorically, not in terms of the actual temperature) set of buildings right on the western bank of the Ganga. There is concrete walkway leading from the eastern end of the shiva temple right down to the edge of the water. The Ganga is shallow in rishikesh, having just come down from the outer Himalayas- so the flow is fast!! With the temperature rising (as spring was approaching), the amount of water cascading down was increasing every second, and the noise is palpable- the very air could be felt to be vibrating. I was absolutely certain that the noise level increased during my four day stay from day one to four. If only i had a decibel metre, or whatever a sound measuring device is called, i could prove it to all u skeptics...........