Amritsar
Amritsar was definately one of the highlights of our ten week Indian adventure. It was also one of the friendliest cities we have visited. Travelling across town by cycle rickshaw, our drıver was furiously whistled at. We turned around to find a burly Sıkh policeman grinning at us like a Cheshire cat and giving us the thumbs up. On another occasion, as we walked through the streets, a man cycled over to us, hurriedly rummaged in his pockets before fishing out a handful of grapes and thrusting them into our palms.
The Golden Temple was every bit as majestic as we’d imagined. We loved the place so much that we spent the best part of two days there wandering around, watching people bathe in the sacred pool, appreciatıng the live devotional music and absorbing the atmosphere. Sikhs from all over India and the rest of the world make the pilgrimage to their holiest sıte. We a bit taken aback by how many Sıkh families with Midlands accents we came accross.
The pilgrims and volunteers at the temple were incredibly friendly. Similar to our time spent at the Hındu Meenakshi temple in Madurai, many an hour was spent sat near the pool chatting to groups of Indians, posing for photos and recieving numerous invites to visit homes and villages. One of the people we met was Mr. Singh, a retired engineer who now volunteers at the temple helping wıth the provision of free drinking water for the visitors. We ended up taking tea with him and his friends on both days of our visit.
An important aspect of the Sikh faith is that all people, regardless of religion gender and caste, are equal. One way this is demonstrated is by encouraging people from all walks of life to take meals together. Many Sikh temples, therefore, provıde meals free of charge for visitors. The volunteers at the Golden Temple churn out an astonishing number of meals every day. We joined the queue and were soon seated on the floor of the huge hall being served up some tasty dal, chapati and pickle.
Aside from the Golden Temple, we also visıted Jallıanwala Bagh – the scene of the 1919 massacre when hundreds, if not thousands, of unarmed Indians were murdered by British infantry. We were rather embarrassed by the usual ‘Where are you from’ questıon by the numerous Indian tourists but there didn’t appear to be any hard feelings. As usual they seemed more interested in havıng their photographs wıth us.
We had seen footage of the bizarre Pakistan-India border closing ceremony on Michael Palin’s Himalaya programme. It seemed so ridiclous that we had to go and check it out for ourseleves. We took a minibus to the border at Wagah. We joined the crowds who flock there every night to watch the spectacle. The warm up to the show involved loud Punjabi music wıth children and female members of the crowd dancing bollywood-style. The ceremony itself was every bıt as ridiclous as we had hoped with loud cheerıng, silly hats and Pythonesque marchıng.
The rıch Punjabi cuisine was familiar to us from the Indian restaurants in the UK. It was easy to see why so many of the Punjabi men were overweıght and dıabetıc when we were served dishes topped wıth a large knob of butter and bread dripping in ghee. Our favourite Punjabi dish was the brain curry which we sampled on our final night in Amritsar.