Varanasi

The city of Varanasi lay gloriously bustling behind him. Its ancient walls and streets echoing with the noisy murmur of humanity that had inhabited it for thousands of years now. How many bloody wars had stayed clear of its holy walls? The longest continuously inhabited city in the world itself. What other laurels had this old conglomeration of dwellings, temples and markets accumulated in its rich history? Every which way the eye could see in this place, there was the spiritual attempt of man to reach something beyond his reality. Salvation from suffering. Was that the divine purpose of this ancient place? The assortment of humanity that filled these cobbled and brick lain roads was a curious sight in itself. This city calls souls that suffer to its womb, they say. Men, women and children, the rich and the poor, the young and the old, they all travel from the far corners of the nation to trudge these paths and stand humble among these arcane constructions, no doubt with some personal human purpose that encroaches upon the divine one. The saffron garments of the monks and the sages, wandering with stern intentions, speckle the crowds with their promise of purity. But beyond all, what gave this place the air and enchantment of holiness was that mother of all rivers that flowed through it. Ganga the pure. Or maybe Ganges, as those of a Western persuasion referred to her. The river flowed silently, bathing the saints and sinners alike, and taking all the filth and aspirational rituals of death and life that man could conjure up. She flowed like she had been flowing for millennia, perennial and proud. The chants and prayers from thousands of lips would ring through the city now. It was that time of the day, as dusk spread its golden colours on the rippling waters of Ganga and painted the city a sleepy yellow, the symphony of spiritual starvation would reach its crescendo. And in that moment, the city would resemble what she always had… and probably always will… a beacon of human distress calling out to the heavens.