India: Essence of Diversity [Part One]

One billion people. Imagine! A culture that cannot be defined as a culture as there are too many individual cultures within the people of India. Persisting, the people search for a sense of national identity; or, often times they resist such a thing from developing. The diversity of India is matched by few places in the world, if any.

My time in this most unique country was phenomenal! Truly, it was one of the more amazing experiences of my life. Limited to five days in a country that demands months of travel from its visitors, my itinerary packed with adventure and life-long stories!

Prepared to disembark the ship, I waited anxiously as time was in demand. My flight was at 1:40 p.m. The customs clearance process in India for SAS has been known to take hours. Luck was on my side. I was off the ship by 11:00 a.m. as the gate officer informed me that the ship was clear. The official announcement of the ship’s clearance, and when everyone disembarked, did not happen until nearly two hours after I had stepped foot on Indian soil! Connecting in Delhi, I arrived shortly after 10:00 p.m. in the “most dangerous large city in India.” I was unaware of this when I booked the flight. As I would have been subjective to a cab driver’s morality, I was thankful that I had met a friendly businessman on the plane who willingly drove me to my hotel. As we passed through the fiercely dangerous-looking streets of Patna, I decided on which hotel I was hopeful of staying at. Availability was a prayer. Hitting the streets in search of another place to stay in the encroaching darkness of this “most uncivilized” city was not enticing.

Sleeping soundly in my bed of first choice, I arose with the goal of venturing to Bodhgaya. My desire was to take the bus. This was shot dead when my taxi driver, whom had seemed to understand “bus station,” took me to a large, deserted office building. It seemed that drug transactions and murders would be common in such a place! After excruciatingly directing my drivers to the train station, I arrived and was in Bodhgaya several hours later.

As I sat meditating under the infamous Bodhi tree, I finally reached enlightenment. This was of tremendous satisfaction to me as Siddhartha had done the same over 2500 years ago! Does this mean that I am now the Buddha? Nevertheless (and back to reality), I stood amongst Buddhist believers from across the world observing the place in which Buddhism once originated. On both sides of the tree, groups led chants of worship and bowed in unison. It was fascinating.

Sleeping four hours in a $5 dollar hostel, I was quick to awaken to my 1:30 a.m. alarm; I had a train to catch! With nearly 20 hours of train travel ahead of me, I began my trek to Delhi. The first stop: Varanasi. Thankfully, I was traveling through Varanasi. Semester at Sea had prohibited all travel to Varanasi just three days prior because of two terrorist bombings that resulted in 28 deaths (one was located in the train station that I would pass through).

TS