East Of The Sun, South Of The Sky: Splish Splash I Was Takin' A Bath

Okay, finally time and a computer. Sorry it's been so long. Where to begin. A few days after I last wrote, still spending all my time climbing in Hampi, I sprained my ankle. So that put me out of commission for a few days. I was working on the greatest bouldering project of my life, a 7a (V6) over hung problem in a place called Airplane Cave. You hang upside down on a rock shaped like the wing of an airplane, and make you're way, hand over feet, down the length of the stone, to the crux, you have to throw and reach under the wing to the other side, hang like batman, dyno to the top, and crawl back to the side you started on. That may be really confusing, I'll have a video of me trying it some day, when who ever filmed it gets home. But anyway, I was working on that for a few days, getting really really close, and after the best session I had, getting everything but the top out, we were leaving the cave, I had my backpack on one shoulder, and a huge crash pad on the other, took a step down some temple stairs outside the cave, and twisted my ankle. I heard a loud crack, and felt that I wasn't going to be able to walk, let alone climb. Quickly I hobbled down to the river, and put my foot in the not so cold water, to try and reduce swelling quickly. After slowly making it back 20 mins to home, I couldn't put any weight on my swollen ankle. Injuries suck. But I was really surprised at my recovery time. (all that Raw Food at home :) and after spending only 3 days (!) only caring for my ankle. It was back up and running, and I could walk again, just in time for Holi.
4 weeks ago I experienced one of the best holidays in the world. Holi. I would trade every holiday we have for one day of Holi. Holi is a festival that's really a big color party. From when the sun comes up, till about 2:00 (It gets unbearably hot by then) the whole of India gets painted. I spent Holi in Hampi. Waking up, wrapping my ankle for the big day, buying packages of color powder, we made our way across the river, to the town and temples, not sure what to expect. Entering the first street, we were instantly bombarded by color. Powder and Paint, Water and Hands, kids and adults and travelers threw and sprayed and slapped paint anywhere they could. No one was safe. Hearing a beat, we made our way towards it, and found a drum circle being formed. And it seemed like everyone from the small town of Hampi, had found it to. It soon exploded to kids on my shoulders, color in my eyes, and dancing on my two feet during the most fun I think I've had. The parade of color, sweat and music, made its way from the streets of the town, by roofs pouring green, yellow, orange, purple, pink, and every color possible onto the streets bellow in a waterfall of paint. Up to one of the hundreds of ancient Hindu temples, for a bigger festivity, and then wrapped back through town as the parade got hotter, more color filled, shirts where ripped off, and smiles got bigger. I've never been anywhere so apparently alive and everyone exceedingly enjoying the moment of throwing color on people. The happiest crowed I've seen. After the sun became to hot to bare, we swam back across the river, washing what color we could, (I was bright pink for 3 days, even with washing) and laid to rest until the sun went down.
I ended up spending four weeks in Hampi. A really long time. After Holi and my foot healed, I was back to climbing, and sleeping, and climbing. Enjoy all that Hampi had to give, the lake, rocks, views, food, friends. And living on $7 a day, including all food, sleep, and renting a Bouldering pad or two everyday.
After four weeks I still found it hard to leave. But the heat was to great, and the lure of the rest of India to strong. And so I left for Varanasi, and eventually, Nepal.
Me and a girl I met in Hampi, Amanda, left Hampi for what seems like a standard amount of travel time in India, a 56 hour train journey north, to the holiest city in India Varanasi. Hours and hours of trains, stop overs in strange towns and fruit markets, more trains, and sharing my bed with 3 Indian men, given the floor was all full, I've recognized how much I love trains. And really India. You see a really interesting side of India. From general class to sleeper, nice people, mean people, everyone is on the train. You really become comfortable in being uncomfortable. Personal space, both physical and mental, is pushed to a point where you don't really notice it anymore. Being white, you'll always have from 1 to 15 pairs of eyes on you at a time, all the time. And maybe spend 20 hours with some part of you body touching someone else.
Varanasi. I really attached to Varanasi. It's a place, like few other places, Burning Man being and example. That I get a feeling that I want to become Varanasi. It's so full of mystery, and appeal, and darkness and light, that I cannot understand really what make it what it is. The same for Burning Man, there to much sensory overload in both places, that you cannot see it all. And in my head, I just want to meld with it and know all that it has. Varanasi is easily the strangest place I've been. It's the holiest city in India, Shivas city, and is placed on the Ganges. Just walking down the riverside at night, the street and buildings you walk along are over 2000 years old, there's naked Sadus smoking to much weed, kids playing red light green light, cows upon cows upon cows living side by side with people, hundreds of cramped alleyways, and cremations going on 24/7. This was a seriously intense side of Varanasi. The Burning Ghats. There are at least two in Varanasi, and these are places where people whom have passed, are burned, and their ashes and bones placed in the Ganges. I was really affronted by the casual nature that they approached death. For the past 3500 years, 24 hours a day, they've burned bodies here, from the same Shiva fire that hasn't gone out in all that time. And you can watch, anytime, as they happen outside the Ghats, on piles of wood.

My last day in Varanasi, was one of the strangest, and most intense days I've ever lived. It started off with a sunrise boat ride down the Ganges, see the mourning rituals, people in mourning prayer for the river, Sadus smoking, people bathing, and corpses burning. We rowed up and back down the river. And to a point where I decided, even though it's one of the most dangerous things I've down, was to swim in the Ganges, and get some good Karma. The stretch of the Ganga in Varanasi, is easily one of the most polluted placed on earth. The trash, sewage, dirt, from the millions of people living there, on top of the rotting bodies of cows littering the side of the Ganges, and above all else, the decomposing human remains of those not burned placed in the river. Who knows what you can catch from the water. But I came to India thinking if I go to Varanasi, I'm swimming in the Ganges, and did. After taking off my clothes, and stepping off the boat into the most polluted water I've seen, I started to walk to the middle. The locals who bath in it every day, rarely see a foreigner get in, where cheering me on, and while humming "Splish Splash I was Takin' A Bath" in my head, I plugged my noise, closed my mouth, and fully submerged into 3 and a half thousand years of filth, and surfaced, feeling I really accomplished something. What ever you might think about Karma, I was the only one from the boat who got in the water, and come that night, was the only one having not fallen that day and hurt themselves, or fallen violently sick. Maybe everyone should get in the Ganges. I now feel like a million Rupees. (Video of my swimming, coming soon) The ending of the day, I spent at a Burning Ghat, watching up close as a corpse burned. Heavy, intense, and dark, I felt a real distance away from what I've known, and the mystery of Varanasi grew even more.
Having to cut my time in Varanasi short, I could spend months there, and will be returning I'm sure at the end of my trip. I left the holy Ganges, for the roof of the world. Nepal. To try to make it in time for Nepalese New Year. Traveling general class from Varanasi, India to Kathmandu, Nepal was some of the crazier times I've had transporting. Before I had just taken sleeper class. Crazy and hectic, and even sharing your bed with others, sleeper was nothing like general class. General class is the cheapest way to travel, there's no reserved seats, and no limit. It cost about $1.50 to travel 8 hours. And general class is a war zone. You really have to fight for you spot. People are elbowing others, standing on feet, squished with not even enough room to bend you legs. A friend from Belgium who was also going from India to Nepal, and I climbed on top of the luggage racks, and wedged ourselves on the wooden, slatted shelf above heads, between backpacks, and bags of vegetables for the most cramped 8 hours. But I had a strange revelation, being squished and uncomfortable for such a long time, I really felt the most like myself. It's difficult to explain but I really felt like I was who I am supposed to be squished there like that, and really loved it. Traveling dirty. So from 3am in Varanasi, till we arrived in Nepal, 5am the next morning, I've never felt more like I've been beaten up. The general class train, out of our 3 transports that day, was the most comfortable. The second being a bus so small, hot, and bumpy, and with the lack of sleep attached, I felt like I was losing both my sanity, and body, only to be topped off the final leg of the journey, once in Nepal, from the border to Kathmandu, another 11 hours, where I still have a bruise on my head from sleeping against a bumpy window, and a two bruised knees, it really took a day to recover. But success is sweetened when laced with suffering. And now here I am, it cooler Kathmandu. Ready for mountains.

I'll do my best to keep updating when I can. It's considerably more difficult than I thought to keep this blog updated. But ah well! I'll do it when I able. It may also be a while, seeing as now I'm in Nepal (!) I'm going to do some trekking. And in a few days, may be leaving for 10 days in Da Himalayas So I'll post when I'm back from the cold roof of the world!
Love you all, and here's photographs!
Noooaaaahhh!