My Ganga Darshana.

Last week, I visited the most ancient and holy place- Varanasi. Our main aim was to attend Ganga Aarati and visit Kashi Vishvanath temple.

Ganga river is worshipped as the Goddess in our country. There are so many texts which describes Ganga; not as just a river but a true mother by all means ( Ganga maiyya). It is said that; the Ganga is the only river which flows from all the three worlds- Swarga, Pruthvi and Patal. ( According to the puranas, there are three tributaries of the river Ganga- Swarga Ganga/Mandakini, Bhoo Ganga/Bhagirathi and Patal Ganga/Bhagvati.  People believe that a mere touch of the river can help attain salvation.

During my school days, I read somewhere; a humorous hindi story; telling the greatness of Gangaji.

” Once a landlord visited Kashi/ Varanasi to do some puja/rituals for wellness of his family and to gain material prosperity. He was a miser. When he reached the bank of Ganga, he saw many people sitting in the groups with many pandits; busy in various rituals. Landlord was in a hurry; so he called one pandit and requested to help him for the puja/rituals. Pandit was having many appointments that day.  But he was not ready to leave the opportunity to get big dakshina from the landlord. So he performed the puja hurriedly and in a short cut and then said; ” Puja is over. Now give me a ‘gau/ / cow as a dakshina. You and your family will be blessed with prosperous and healthy life.” Landlord was very clever. He understood the greedy nature of Pandit. He said to Pandit;
” Pandit ji, you have not applied chandan tilak on my forehead yet.” Pandit immediately took a pinch of wet fine sand from the Ganga bank, applied on the landlord’s forehead and said, ” गंगाजी की रेत तू, चंदन करके जान।’ ( I don’t have chandan paste, so assume the sand of holy Ganga as chandan). Landlord bowed before Pandit. Then he picked up a small frog/मेंढकी from the Ganga water, and asked Pandit to hold it and said, ” गंगाजी की मेंढकी तू, गऊॅ करके जान।” ( I don’t have a cow, so assume this frog from the holy Ganga as a cow.)

Now, humour apart, this is the way our ancestors mentioned the greatness of Gangaji.
We adore the beauty and the fragrance of all the flowers. But the flowers; we offer to the Lord, become most auspicious and divine. We accept and  preserve them as the most valuable things. We can buy many japamalas from the shops. But the one touched by Swamiji’s hands, becomes the most auspicious for us.
Even the tiny and torn hankerchief of a beloved is precious for the lover.
Those who see Gangaji as the divine mother, everything from her becomes divine and holy for them.  It depends upon our bhaava towards her.

मानो तो;  मै गंगा माँ हूँ…ना मानो तो;  बहता पानी।
There are many people who criticises the vision of the devotees. The dry intellectual and nastika people see her just as a river…बहता पानी। May Lord bless them!

Once; Swami Ramakrishnanandaji ( from Chinmaya mission), in his Valmiki Ramayana class; told us about the spiritual significance of the holy Gangaji. He said, ‘Most of the people think Ganga just as a river. But go and have darshana of her, you will feel the divinity for sure. One must spend some time with Gangaji, at least once in a lifetime.’
From that day only, I was very eager to go for Gangadarshana.

Whenever you express the wish for Gangadarshan; most of the people usually say- “Is this the age; to have a Gangadarshan? Let’s enjoy the life…when we will be old enough, we will have a Gangadarshan.”  Very funny….isnt it?Usually these tours of holy places are considered for the old people; when they get retired from the prapancha.
My take is, one must visit such places(of spiritual significance) early in the life. Because experiences at such places are very much helpful in our life to be at peace and contented. Material and spirutual wealth must grow simultaneously and not one after another. ( In ‘Yogvashishtha’, it is mentioned that Lord Rama had visited all the holy places at very young age, before entering in the state affairs/ राज्यकारभार. The experiences he got there; were proved to be helpful in his decision making with detached attitude.)

When I asked my son whether to visit Varanasi this time instead of other picnic places, he agreed without cross questioning. Although he is a software engineer, He studies vedanta with much interest. Among his many friends, one agreed to accopany us. My husband is fond of eating street food. Varanasi is very famous for tasty street food. So; we added 2nd goal- to eat the Varanasi street food.  So he searched a lot about the famous and special street food of Varanasi on google and you tube and made a very big list of the food items and their respective centers.
My mother is 78 years old and according to the common belief, the most eligible person for kashi tour. So we took her for granted.
On 26th Jan, at 5am, we started our journey for Varanasi by our car ‘Brezza.’
I regularly meditate through the  black lotus app for short duration and advait meditation of long duration. So even if I don’t get enough sleep, I don’t feel drowsy or tired. This habit has benefited us many times in our long tours.
At 5am, I was on driver seat. For next half an hour; everyone was talking with excitement about the tour; but later on , they started feeling sleepy. In that silence, I kept on driving, listening to the divine Nirvan Shatakam first and then; beautiful instrumental old classic music.
It is said that, your car also needs frequent rest just as your body. Our body is the vehicle for our spiritual journey. And our car is the vehicle for our worldly journey. So one should take care of both.
We took 1st break at roadside ‘tapari’ (In maharashtra, tea stall is called ‘a tapari’ ) for a tea. Hot tea with fumes in a very cold weather definitely gives us heavenly experience.

All of us got in the car and I started driving again. After half an hour; other members started carrying forward their dreams.
Around 9 am, the hunger pains started waking up all and we started searching places for the breakfast.
There were so many dhabas and restaurants with beautiful names; on the way but all were closed and this situation added more fuel to our hunger fire/ जठराग्नी. But somehow; we found one dhaba, where owner and workers were awakened enough 🤪 to understand our hunger. We decided among ourselves to eat whatever they would serve us without kitkit and complaints.
Yes…when you are not really hungry, then only you pay unnecessary attention to the taste, contents and looks etc. Real hunger makes us all obedient and like minded. There were flames of Jatharagni rising up in our stomachs and we were waiting for the Ahuti material eagerly. ( At such moments; we understand the meaning of -” Eating food is the yajnakarma”. उदरभरण नोहे जाणिजे यज्ञकर्म.)

Dhabawala said; ” Paratha mil jayega, pakoda bhi mil jayega, baki khana hai to time lagega.”
So we ordered 3 Aaluparathas and 3 plates pyajpakoda.

After half an hour; they served us 3 big Aalu parathas and 3 plates pakoda with fried chillies. Usually we clean our plates with tissue papers; whenever we go to dhaba. But because of our hunger fire, we saw nothing impure….everything became purified and holy for us and thus we started putting the Havan samagri/ parathas and pakodas in to our stomach fire. We were eating as if we came from some draught areas.
There was a thin to none layer of Aalu( potato) in Aaluparatha. There was no pyaj in pyaj pakoda but the cauliflowers. But we ate them with devotion.  When four big pieces of Aalu parathas were left and no one was ready to eat anymore, we decided to finish them as if the prasada. Usually; when some portion of ordered food is left in our dishes, we distibute it among us equally; saying- ‘Hanumaanji ka prasad samaz ke khalo.’ This method proves to be very good. Nobody refuges it and food doesn’t go waste.
But suddenly a poor woman, working on the highway ; came and asked for food to the dhabawala. He prepared food only for us.  Everything was raw in their kitchen. So we called her and gave the pieces of parathas and few pakodas. She took them and smiled at us and went back.
This was our forceful and unplanned charity.

Then my son took the driver seat and our journey continued. Everyone was fresh and awake. We kept on talking about the places at Varanasi, food to eat, things to buy, etc with very much excitement.  
At 3pm, we decided to perform again; our Petpuja/ Yajnahuti. There were many good restaurants on the way. We were in indecisive state- to select ‘this one or that one’…
You know, they say, when you have many choices, then comes the role of agami karma or free will. We have to suffer or enjoy the results of our selection. ( Many options make one confused. If there is a single option, one has to accept it; as it is; as one’s prarabdha.)
So; we all agreed to go for the one; where there was Lord Ganesha’s idol; sitting at ease. Whenever you are in dilemma, just call your Ishtadevata. He definitly gives some hint.
So we took a sumptuous lunch- Paneer lababdar, daal tadka, rotis and salad. karmaphala of our yajnakarma was obviously seen on our faces- happiness and contentment.

Then my husband took the driver seat and we continued the journey. When our car entered the city of Varanasi, we started GPS to search the homestay which was already booked online; at agoda.com.
Varanasi is a very big city with very much crowded roads.  Gallis/ lanes of the colonies are very much narrow. I didn’t see such a huge traffic in Maharashtra. It was very difficult for us to drive our car through those narrow lanes. The skill of driving of locals was awesome. They were moving very swiftly through narrow lanes.
We reached our homestay around 7pm. Usually we book the hotels whereever we go. But at this time, we booked a homestay as per the suggestion by one travel lover you tuber.  The owner gives his whole apartment, flat, bunglow on rent to the guests. Our’s was 3 bedroom apartment. Facilities were good. Owner suggested us not to take out our car but hire an e- rikshaw for sightseeing. He said it will be easy to visit maximum places with minimum time. So we agreed.
As we were very much tired; we took simple dinner- daal, roti, subji in nearby hotel. I still don’t remember it’s taste. It was ‘eating for the sake of eating.’
Before going to sleep, I opened my mobile phone; to switch off the net. I saw the notification from the  black lotus app – “Hi varsha, pssst….it is time to complete your pending activity..”
This is the 3rd time, I missed the activities, since I started meditating through the black lotus app. I prayed to Swamiji and said sorry. I know His compassion…Tomorrow;  there will be another notification- “Varsha…Oofs….you missed day 7 of 21. But you can start today…you will not loss your progress… ” So with the firm detrmination of meditating in the morning and Surrendering everything to Him, I slept like a log…..
To be continued…..
      Hari Om !