Hello lovely people . . . . . No. 15

AMRITSAR

We leave Horridwar by train, our fourth, and first overnight, journey. It is another of those trains which start a long, long way away and a long, long time before but it ends in Amritsar, so we do not have to worry about oversleeping! We are again in a 3AC coach, but this time split into two  separate compartments. Alison M and Roberto take the two berths at the end of one compartment  and Andy and I have bottom and mid tier berths in another

Each berth is provided with sheets, a pillow, a blanket. ANdy and I sit for a while and provide refuge for Alison M, after she has despatched all the small cockroaches crawling up the wall of her lower tier end-of-compartment berth. We then make up our beds and settle – more or less – for the night. We all sleep on and off and actually quite well. The only major disturbances are the various wallahs through the night selling tea (“chai garam, garam” – it is an endearing cry!), soup, water, other foodstuffs we cannot make out

We arrive in Amritsar only a little after our 7.30 scheduled arrival time and go straight to our hotel. An old haweli with lovely courtyards. We breakfast and the staff make a huge effort to get our rooms ready hours ahead of the 3 pm check in so we are able to shower before setting off: destination (of course) the Golden Temple

We start on foot, we all love to explore a new place by walking, but do not last long. The traffic is huge, noisy, smelly. We head for the pedestrianised Golden Temple area by tuk tuk but first have lunch in an Amritsar institution: the Brothers Dhaba. It is packed, noisy, the veg curries are fabulous

We decide to visit the Partition Museum. It is fascinating, shocking, and brings the things I learned about in my 20th Century history lessons very much to life. And of course, the museum narrative is not written from a British perspective

Then to the Golden Temple complex. We cast off our shoes, don headgear and ready ourselves for entry

 

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It is breathtaking from stepping onto the white marble outer plaza, through the gate, for the first sight of the temple, glistening and almost floating on the tank…

We deplete our camera batteries quickly!

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The complex is pristinely clean, serene but also  . . .  happy, festive. Many people stop us to ask us where we are from and what we think of the temple and wish us well. Some are Sikhs visiting from afar, some are local who visit regularly

We are there as dusk falls and admire the temple as it gleams in the early evening light. The queue to enter does not look too bad so we join, Alison M, Roberto and I stick it out, Andy decides it is too claustrophobic. He leaves the queue and continues to walk the complex, chat and take photographs

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Despite the Indian queuing system which sees us lose places at every move forward, we seem to make good progress until the queue is held for 20 minutes – no-one is permitted entry to the temple when the sung chanting stops for spoken prayers

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We gain entry and the interior is like a jewellry box, so ornate, so elaborate. There is not much time to look: for the non devout sightseers (us!) it is a pretty quick walk through, reminiscent of the shuffle past the Mona Lisa at the Louvre. Nonetheless it is remarkable, memorable. Makes us interested to learn more

We rejoin Andy and head for more temporal pursuits – beers and snacks on the edge of modern Amritsar, first in a bar where we are driven out by the decibel level of a sound-checking band (when did we get this old?) then to an adjacent beer cafe. We are the only non-Indians and everyone is tucking into tandoori chicken wings, fries and beers. What’s not to like! 

Our second Amritsar day begins with a pleasant shopping experience: Andy lost his reading glasses in Jaipur so we find a local optician. He can have a pair made that day and delivered to the hotel. He is charming and recommends somewhere for dinner that night and books us a table

Then back to the Golden Temple area. First visit is Jallianwala Bagh. Another history lesson of the British in India made horribly real.  The garden is a charming monument. The story behind it awful. There are very few other non-Indian visitors when we are there but everyone we interact with is charming, and we each have requests for selfies . . .

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Back to the Golden Temple to see the Sikh Experience (we were expecting a museum, we found a very well done video presentation across four large theatres). The temple complex feels much busier today but it remains mesmerisingly beautiful. We go to the langar hall, not to eat, although we could, but just to witness the enormous operation which feeds between 50,000 and 100,000 people a day. We see and talk to some of the volunteers on food prep and watch and listen to the sounds of the catering – eating – clearing up operation for a while

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A final tour of the temple complex, some more photographs and a discussion about attending the evening ceremony when Granth Sahib, the holy book, which, if I have understood correctly, contains the words and teachings of Guru Nanak, is moved from the temple to its overnight resting place. None of us made the 4 a.m. morning ceremony which sees it taken to the temple so I suggest the evening one as an alternative

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A very late lunch at another Amritsar institution, Makhans, saw a change of plan and the evening ceremony attendance was abandoned. Alison M and I headed back to the old city bazaars and the boys to rest. A hair raising tuk tuk ride at Saturday evening rush hour got us to the bazaars. Our quest was for serving dishes, which we had seen used throughout Rajasthan and beyond, and was successful. Another tuk tuk ride back to the hotel nearly lost all Alison M’s dishes: an emergency stop saw her bag of bowls disappear out of the open back of the tuk tuk bench seat and clatter over the road. Another tuk tuk driver and passenger, a motor bike rider and a pedestrian all stopped, collected and handed over the remarkably undented tableware. Phew!

The optician’s recommendation for our dinner venue was strange. A European style cafe in a modern part of the city with a vast non-Indian menu . . . But none of us were hungry, too full of Makhans fish and chicken, so we eat sparingly and people watched instead

The following morning sees us bid farewell to Amritsar, and off to Delhi – and then the  final leg of this Indian adventure for the four of us. But that is for another time

Until then, Namaste

ALISON