Amritsar is a city in the northwestern state of Punjab, 28 kilometres from the border with Pakistan. Amritsar is only a one hour flight or an eight hour train journey from Delhi but what a different place we found ourselves in. Again full of colour but here the colour is being worn by men too. The Sikh men are wearing turbans of bright colours. They look proud, friendly and totally at home here. Why wouldn’t they be.
Our hotel was a short walk from the holiest of *Gurdwara and the most important pilgrimage site of Sikhism. The Golden Temple, also known as Harmandir Sahib, meaning “abode of God” was the main reason we came to Amritsar.
*A gurdwara (meaning “door to the guru”) is a place of assembly and worship for Sikhs.
I am typing this blog as we sit in front of the Golden Temple at sunset. There is wonderful music being played on loudspeakers around the whole ‘complex’. Musical instruments such as Sitars are being played and someone is singing, it’s very peaceful. We’ve been here for an hour and the music has just stopped and they are saying what I assume are prayers. There is a huge screen in one corner of the grounds which is translating the words into English and other languages. I can’t focus that far so I’m just enjoying the atmosphere and people watching. There are people all around the complex sat crosslegged with their eyes closed. The man is now singing the words and it puts me in mind of the Muslim call to prayer. For a couple who do not have a religion we do enjoy learning about other people’s.
I’m now having a hot flush and It’s taking all of my selfcontrol to stop from pulling the scarf from around my head and neck! I’m sure I would get arrested and put in one of the towers if I did! The Harmandir Sahib is an open house of worship for all men and women, from all walks of life and faith but everyone has to cover their head and remove shoes and socks.
People are now joining in with the prayer. I do feel like we are intruding but we were told that everyone is welcome, not just Sikhs. Everyone has now moved forward and are stood around the lake. It’s quite strange, it feels like everyone is waiting for a spaceship to land! I’m obviously hopeless at feeling the spiritual vibes of a place!
The Golden Temple holds the Sikh Scripture Guru Granth Sahib which is ‘seated‘ on the lower square floor for about 20 hours everyday. Every time we visited here there was a very long queue of people waiting to view it. The temple itself sits in a square man-made lake.
For those who wish to take a dip in the pool, the Temple provides a shelter for the women and holy steps to Har ki Pauri. We saw many people bathing here. Bathing in the pool is believed by many Sikhs to have restorative powers, purifying one’s karma. It seems that it is always about the water!
All the while it’s getting darker, Glen is discretely taking photos. The signs say ‘strictly no photography’ but the guards at the entrance said we could “have a few clicks” but all of the Sikhs in here have their mobile phones out and are taking selfies and group photos regardless of the signs. I’ve not seen the guards use their long sharp spears yet, instead they give the Indians a gentle telling off with a smile on their face.
I’m stood here on my own taking the chance to write the blog while Glen walks around taking photos. For one, because I would feel awkward if he was approached and asked to “stop clicking” and two, because he has his head covered (as are the rules) with a bandana that he bought in Indonesia back in 2013 which is black with a white marijuana leaf design! 🙈
It all looks very special lit up in the dark.
We had visited here in the morning of our first day in Amritsar and we were made so welcome by so many people. I didn’t do my usual photo bombing, it wasn’t the place for that, instead I approached anyone who was taking a photo of someone else they were with and offered to take a photo of them together. It’s a great way to start a conversation with people. Some people just come up to us and start a conversation anyway. Others came to us and thrust their babies on our laps and said “photo“ and took a photo of us! Or gave me their phone so I could take a “selfie” of myself and their child!
We had read that the *Langar here is the biggest in the world. We have seen it on travel documentaries on tv but couldn’t believe we were actually here!
*Langar (Punjabi for kitchen), is the term used in Sikhism for the community kitchen in a Gurdwara where a free meal is served to all the visitors, without distinction of religion, caste, gender, economic status or ethnicity. The free meal is always vegetarian. People sit on the floor and eat together, and the kitchen is maintained and serviced by Sikh community volunteers.
The langar at the Golden Temple serves a massive number – 50,000 people a day! On holidays and religious occasions, the number often goes up to 100,000!
The kitchen has two dining halls, which have a combined capacity of 5000 people. People come and sit down to eat on the mats on the floor, are served food by the volunteers, and are then ushered out politely to make room for the next round of diners.
So we queued up with the 100’s of people already waiting with tin trays in hand. I couldn’t believe we were doing this! We looked at the cutlery, bowl and a compartmented ‘silver’ tray we were handed and wondered how clean they were!
We sat on the floor in rows, everyone was crosslegged but I couldn’t do that… not if I was going to be able to get up and walk out afterwards!
Anyway, volunteers walked by at speed ladling Dhal, rice and vegetable curry into each tin tray, or thereabouts! I was busy taking photos so hadn’t had time to put my hand gel on so when the man came with a basket full of chapatis I just held my tray up for him to put one on….. now I hadn’t been taking in what was going on around me, Glen had on the other hand, as always so he nudged me and whispered “put both hands out together!” So cringing inside I did so! anyway it was all good and we ate it…. and also some kind of milky pudding that was ladled in by yet another volunteer at a frantic pace. Oh we were also given a bowl of water. Unsure whether it was to drink or wash our hands in we decided it best not to drink it!
So, lunch eaten we then made our way out of the dining hall along with the others and queued up to first, tip the water into a gully running through and along the corridor, then scrape any left overs into a huge metallic container. One man held his hand out to take our dirty spoon, and we had to give the bowl to another, until finally the tray was handed to men who passed them along from one to another like people handing buckets of rubble from one to the other after an earthquake decimates a building. The guy at the end of the line then threw the tray at another man who then threw it into a huge container to be washed. The three guys ensuring that the dirty trays were interlocked to form a high flower petal type stack we’re covered in curry sauce and dhal! I so wanted to donate a long plastic apron to each of them. Anyway the slick system then had the circular pile of dirty trays start down the long line of washing up sinks. Each one went in to five difference sinks of water before being stacked to dry. It was such an impressively organised system.
In another area we saw women sat peeling and cutting huge bags of onions, garlic and cauliflower.
I continually sought permission from anyone we saw working there to ensure it was OK to take photos of the food, the food preparation area and the washing up area etc. In the end a group of older Sikh men by the doors of the dining area gestured for us to sit on the floor next to them. They poured themselves some milky tea (chai) into bowls and gave us some too. They couldn’t understand what we were saying so they beckoned a young Sikh man over to join us. He was a lovely young guy who could speak good English and he told us that his name was Harman and he was (an enviable) 22 years of age. He told us that he is a volunteer in the Langar. He answered lots of our questions. He introduced us to his Mum who walked over to us and then Harman walked off with her. Within minutes he was back saying he was now free. I looked at him quizzically and he said “I will show you around”. So we walked into the building and behind the scenes of the impressive organisation that copes with serving 1,000’s of meals in one sitting.
We were taken everywhere, the area upstairs where they were making and cooking chapatis with a huge machine and also to a area where women sat making them by hand. I could have joined them too, but I didn’t. Other volunteers were sat around buttering piles of them.
The huge vats used to cook the curry’s and boil the milk for the chai were massive! And they were being cleaned properly too. In fact it’s the cleanest area and kitchen we’ve seen in the whole of India! We were very impressed.
We were honoured that Harman took us to the top of the building which gave us a perfect view over the whole of the complex.
We saw sacks piled up and when I asked what was inside he said “all of the wasted chapatis that were left on people’s plates” We walked outside to see the floor covered in them, drying in the sun before being put into sacks. They are then given to the villages to feed their cattle, so even the waste doesn’t go to waste!
One afternoon we drove out to the border with Pakistan. The Wagah Border [also known as Berlin Wall of Asia]
We went to see the famous Wagah-Attari border ceremony (I thought about Michael Palin’s documentary as we watched it!)
At breakfast that morning we were sat on the communal table on the open roof terrace of our little hotel and I asked the group of ‘Holy Bikers’ (self named) who had driven up from Delhi, if it was safe to visit the border ceremony and they laughed and asked “why would it be dangerous?” I couldn’t articulate my thoughts so said nothing. Anyway before we went ‘I googled it up’ and this is what I read!
‘On 2 November 2014, approximately 60 people were killed and at least 110 people were injured in a suicide attack on the Pakistan side of the Wagah-Attari border. An 18 to 20 year-old attacker detonated a 5 kg (11 lb) explosive in his vest 500 metres (1,600 ft) from the crossing point in the evening right after the Wagah-Attari border ceremony ended.’
So I was right to have been concerned, I thought it was an obvious place for a terrorist to strike!
It didn’t stop us! Off we went, sharing a taxi with Aaron, a lovely half Indian, half Kenyon guy from Essex.
There was an electrifying atmosphere when we arrived, the sun shone, the crowds chanted and the women danced. Eventually the ceremony began and it was just a daft as we had heard! The ‘ministry of funny walks’!
The lowering of the flags ceremony at the Attari-Wagah border is a daily military practice that the security forces of India and Pakistan have jointly followed since 1959. The drill is characterised by elaborate and rapid dance like manoeuvres and raising legs as high as possible. It is alternatively a symbol of the two countries’ rivalry, as well as brotherhood and cooperation between the two nations.
The ceremony was all very well and jolly but the reason for this border with the then newly created and named country, Pakistan, came about because of Partition.
We learnt the truth about what happened at the time of Partition in the museum in Amritsar. I wish I hadn’t. If the idea of Partition wasn’t bad enough then what actually happened in the implementation of it was horrific. I won’t dwell on it here except to say WHAT WERE THEY THINKING!!!!?
This guy was some sort of ‘crowd excitement manager’! Lol!
I felt a bit sorry for the Pakistan side of the gate. Their ’crowd excitement manager’ didn’t seem to be creating quite the same level of excitement, there wasn’t as many of them for a start.
Once the interaction between the two countries began (I think of it as the kick off!) it was all a bit “c’mon then” “no you c’mon then” and a bit like young boys pretending they would give a good ‘ol hiding if the other side came closer, in a jeering gesture kind of way.
Finally the time came to stop the silliness and lower the flags at exactly the same time so that a sort of unspoken tie was declared……. until the same time the following day when the seams of their beige, and black uniform trousers would be tested once again.
On another morning over the communal breakfast table we met two couples who were particularly good company. A couple who were originally from Mumbai and now living in Singapore. The husband of which comes to England regularly as he works for Shell. The other couple we’re old school friends of his….. anyway they asked where we had been on our travels and we said we had started out in China but not to worry about the virus as we had left three months ago, I then did a massive timely sneeze and we all laughed! ….nervously!
One morning there were a group of Monks at the table (not sure what the collective noun for a group of monks is)
As we walked around Amritsar with the mainly Sikh community we thought what a happy friendly place it was. That day the news headlines reported about the religious riots in Delhi!! Why can’t everyone play nicely together!?
I’ve heard say that religion keeps people on the straight and narrow but I see no evidence of that around the world… people use religion as a reason or excuse to kill each other…. what God, Deity or Goddess wants that!?
Within a few hundred meters of the temple they had developed the shopping area. The buildings were relatively new and the streets were clean and traffic free! However if you wondered just a little further in any direction you were back to the ‘real’ India.
On the night before we left I was woken at 11.30pm by loud noises outside, nothing new there but it sounded like happy noises. I looked out of the window and saw a wedding procession. We had seen this type before in Agra, where the Groom is on horseback and light and speaker wires circle the wedding party as they make their way along the streets. The beat of the Music being played through the speakers, the instruments being banged and the brightness of the ornate lights was filling the dirty little road with happiness and excitement.
It was time to leave here and make our way by train to Delhi in readiness for our flight home to the UK on the 3rd of March.
We got up early to make our way to the station, the train journey would take eight hours. Like I said we had read in the news the last few days that there had been terrible fighting in the northeast of the city between Hindus and Muslims and many people had been killed or injured. There always seems to be some sort of trouble or something to worry about everywhere we go! Luckily though, Glen had booked to stay in the south of Delhi. Anyway the lovely hotel manager got up early and ensured we had a good send off. He had arranged for us to have a cup of Masala Chai (spiced tea) before we left even though it was 90 minutes until the kitchen opened for breakfast. We finally said our goodbyes and packed the bananas he gave to us, and jumped into the tuk tuk. As we made our way to the train station we were shocked at how bad the area was. We had arrived via the airport at night.
We were being driven through the streets of the poor and dirty town strewn with piles of rubbish, and there were cows and goats stood in it. There was the largest pack of dogs that we had seen in India, and we had seen a lot! This was the real Amritsar!
This is only half the number of dogs in the pack.
Anyway the driver suddenly pulled over, just missing an old man crossing the road! I thought he was definitely going to hit him.
The driver said “bag…..fallen out!” We then noticed a car was beeping and it pulled alongside us. The man opened the car door and we could see that he had Glen’s backpack on his lap! It had fallen out the back of the tuk tuk without us realising. Thank goodness the very kind man in the car saw it, picked it up and was able to chase after the tuk tuk! Otherwise we would have got to the train station and only then realised it was missing. We have no idea if it would have been left on the side of the road or picked up by someone and taken off!! The area was so dirty and poor it’s the worse we’ve seen. It made Varanasi look clean! There was unbelievable squalor in such a famous/important tourist/pilgrimage area. How could this be!?
The whole eight hour train journey from there to Delhi was a sad site. Every time I looked out of the window there were little dwellings with rubbish just thrown over the wall or piled up by the side and strewn along the length of the tracks with people walking amongst it, I assume looking to see if there was anything to be salvaged. I grew up with the phrase “Cleanliness is next to godliness” but it’s not the case in this country! Even with all of the different faiths and gods!
What a great experience at the Langar kitchen! You said in your earlier Fort Kochi post that “the people are the reason you should visit here”, and what comes across so strongly in this blog post (and the earlier ones) is how both of you go to great lengths to make contact with the local people and embrace their culture in a respectful way. I am sure that is what earned you the privilege of the behind the scenes tour.
Terrific photos, especially the night time ones. All the best.
Amazing photos- what a privilege being shown around the kitchens etc. Wonderful. Safe travels xx