SO! Since my last blog (which has been too long in between Im sorry) I have been from the sister cities of Rishikesh and Haridwar across to Amritsar to see the golden temple. The Kumbh Mela festival in Haridwar was probably a bit disappointing because I didnt see many Sadu (the naked holy men) bathing, but was still amazing. Ive got a couple Kumbh Mela festival shots attached - the one with all the people along the ganges river bathing is them taking their dip on the auspicious new moon day, it is a VERY important day for Hindus to wash in the holy water and around 600,000 bathed on this day. Another shot is of a little boy carrying a heap of white bottles along one of the bridges for people to take away holy water with them after their bathe. My favourite shot from the festival is of a group of women performing a really important ceremony for women ... they tie string around a tree for Puja (I guess like a prayer, an offering to the gods), trees are really holy to women here because they beleive they are like women in that they flow and give life... the cloth they are tying to the tree represents their wishes and prayers - old women put white cloth on the tree to wish for a peaceful end of their life, and young women put red cloth on the tree to wish for a family, healthy children/ husband, they walk around and around the tree tying string around it and praying for what they wish, it is truly beautiful to watch, I was mesmerised. The last festival shot is of a man who is only allowed to come near the holy tree after the women are finished or unless the older women let him come in ... he is giving his blessing with smoking incense around the outside of the tree. Again, beautiful to watch. After Rishikesh and Haridwar it was off to Amritsar on another grueling overnight train, "sleeping" with what feels like half of India on the same train.... watching us sleep, watching us eat, put on aroguard, drink water ... watching watching more fucking watching! I woke up with a man sitting on the end of my sleeper bed (again watching) ... he got more of a fright than me when I sent him packing! Amritsar was really beautiful, the Sikhs are amazing people, their sole religion believes in equality of all humans and rejects discrimination on the basis of caste, creed, and gender.. and they ACTUALLY live to that. Sikh women have all the same access to religious heights that men do and are truly treated equally (atleast in theory). They are very proud strong people and were keen to see my canons!!! People were saying quite often that I was like a Punjabi (they are generally alot physically stronger and stockier) ... Ill take it as a compliment! In Amritsar I went to a really confronting memorial site where the British slaughtered hundreds of Indians ... was sad, embarassing, shameful and everything in between. So from there I did a day trip to Atari, for the Indian Pakistani border closing ceremony ... what a BIZARRE thing that was. Not only was it extremely hot, but the kicking in the air, the bizarre screaming at each other from across the border was definitly a weird display of patriotism. I met an amazing family on the jeep ride out to the Atari border closing ceremony whose little boy sat on my lap the entire way out there, when we got there the white people were all ushered into the first class sitting area to watch the ceremony, we asked if the Indian family could come in with us and sit with us, but no ... no low caste Indians allowed. Fucking India is such a love/hate experience for me. The shots Ive attached from Amritsar are all from the Golden Temple. One of a group of boys who were SO excited to have their photo taken, and when I showed them the photo of themselves the oldest one called out to their friends "WE"RE ON T.V, COME AND LOOK!!!" .. really gorgeous. Two are of the temple itself, what an amazing building - obvious why its the most important Seikh temple in India. The other is of a man in the temple leaning against the amazing marble pillars of the temple.

So .... after that, on bus from Amritsar/Atari to Bikaner in the desert .. sooo fucking hot! Arranged a camel safari from Bikaner to Pokran, half way to Jaiselmer. The camel safari is an epic tale unto itself ... one I'll tell tomorrow!