And I don't even think it'll be my last.
Varanasi has to be one of the most intense, mind blowing and excruciatingly frustrating cities out there. But I feel that every little thing that makes this city tick, everything that makes it such a potent assault on the senses, they all seem to work together in unison to create that one of a kind Varanasi experience that can't be neither imitated nor duplicated. To change one thing would alter the rest, so it's best to just sit back and enjoy the ride, even if it might drive you to the breaking point sometimes.
As hot, smelly, and loud as it is here I am still finding it a bit hard to escape the grip of this riverside city. That's because for every tout and rickshaw driver that manages to almost get a kick out of seeing you lose your cool, there's countless other friendly chai salesmen and food vendors that bring you right back down to Earth. Life's just too damn short to get upset over trivial things like a swindled buck or 2, I'm constantly telling myself this whenever I get hassled or overcharged.
The time has come to move on to the next city though, it has been 4 days after all. Tonight I'm boarding a 22 hour train down South to the state of Orissa -brand new turf for these virgin eyes. I bypassed it out of pure ignorance on my last trip, I just never saw it tucked away down there on the map! My compass will be stuck on south for the next month or so as the holidays approach, because If I want my Christmas tree to have palm leaves & coconuts I have a lot of ground to cover. Only thing I need to do now is make the oh-so tough decision on where to lay my beach towel... hard life choices I know.
In the past 4 days here in India I'm pretty confident that all the weight that I left back in Nepal has returned, minus the muscle mass of course. That 20 day lentil-rice-potato cleanse that I subjected myself to on the trek wreaked havoc on my physique, but it's nothing the country of India can't handle. After all it's the magic that these street vendors perform with food that really brought me back here, and there's nothing quite like satisfying an almost 2 year old culinary craving.
Safe to say that it was the tastiest Masala Dosa I've ever had.
