The Ghats

Along the the river are the world famous Ghats which are used to burn the bodies of dead relatives, for bathing in the holy water of the Ganges which cleanses the soul of all sins. The local Durga temple was full with monkeys and therefore nicknamed "Monkey temple" but unfortunately non-accessable ton non-hindus which includes me, too bad but at least i saw the outside.

Varanasi

Varanasi, 02-03-1994. At the other side of the holy river the Ganges which is full with playful sweet water dolfins and dirty like hell,an old fort is situated and accessable to the public. The fort itself is not much fun but makes a nice day s excursion the way i see it. The place house a dirty and dusty museum that contains a set of rusty weapons one used to cut peoples heads off and now there to amuse the foreign visitors. Don t worry about the rust, that is dried up blood mister. hahahaha

Chaotic Indian Life

Varanasi, 28-02-1994. Together with Anne i took the bus to Siliguri and on to Varanasi leaving beautifull Sikim and its friendly inhabitants behind, back into the chaotic scenes of India. The weird and almost incomprehensible chaos of daily indian life, trains that are cancelled, people that refuse to understand even your most basic questions < hoping for baksheesh really > street husters, irritating rickshaw wallahs that never seem to be able to bring you to your destination, fowl exhaust fumes from the indescibable chaotic trafic that is constantly fucked up, let us not forget all the stary animals that criss-cross the dirty streets at will. I wonder how long it will take for my tolerance to drop to the zero level again.

Pancakes

Geysing, 26-02-1994. The shortcut from Pelling to Geysing goes straight down the mountain but Anne and Sandra did not complain, obviously being hardy ladies and travel hardened. Our hotel in Geysing is called Nonim but I mbaptised it into No Name, the place is really in the middle of no where with extreme nr. of guests. The locals in the hotel asked the ladies to show them how to make western pancakes for witch they carched us afterwards, funny.

Pelling

Pelling, 25-02-1994. Making a hike way above Gangtok in misty and magnificent scenery I ran into Anne and Sandra who where on the way to Pemayangse Monastery inviting me to come along. This monatery is the oldest in Sikim and we arrived just in time to witness Puja-the religious gonig on-Two rows of monks seated and facing each other chanting, beating a drum and blowin away at big steel trumpets with a haed monk seated at the top of the row on a slight elevation, around these monk i see idols of local deities and -presumably- a statue of Buddha. In another room we see a replica which took one monk five full years to built and what they call the perfect heaven. The monks in Sikim are dressed in bright red to deep red robes and wear only wooden sandals on their bare feet, i try not to think of the biting cold in this place.

Sikim busses

Every second shop in Gangtok seems to have to be a "beer and wine shop", handy to help me while away the boring, cold and lonely nights in my extremely dirty hotel. I don t dare to leave on the wood fed rusty heather in my room of fear of suffocating during my sleep. The Sikimese busses in this small Himalyan state are so small i bumb my head everytime i need to get up from my hard wooden seat.

Phodang

Gangtok, 23-02-1994. taking my backpack with me on the 2,5 h. bustrip to Phodang this morning. I felt fit and ready for a strenuous hike in forested and mountainous terrain, the purpous of my hike was the monastery of Phodang on top of a steep hill. Arriving at the place i found most of the residing tibetan monks involved in full prayer ceremony chanting and making religious music. The murals of the inner sanctum took my breath away. In a small room in the back i found more muralsand a lone monk chanting in a loud voice, the murals depicted devils and demons, scenes out of a hellish world looked like something out of a bad LSD trip. With the lone monk starting to bang away at a gigantic drum and throwing yak milk aroundcompleted the other worldly feeling.