Trip to Varanasi

Although I didnt expect Rani Mukherjee to pop out on the roads singing " hum to aise hai bhaiya" and things getting as bad as they were in the movie, the trip to Varansi was a SHOCK !. Broken ( almost non existent ) roads, shabby traffic, wild people ready to pounce at you at the sight of money, lost culture is my impression of Varansi.
About a year ago, I had to visit Varansi for official purposes. Travel freak that I am, I was excited about visiting the"kashi vishwanath" temple. So I quickly got my train bookings done.

Reaching Varanasi , what I saw was a shock ! Roads outside the station were non absent, traffic was wild and the place was just so crowded. Ofcourse once we reached the hotel, the ambience and the food was just GREAT. Next day my client drove me down to see the BHU campus. Woa !!! what a mind blowing campus. Its amazing to see such a huge campus planned out years ago in the pre independence era. Ofcourse we havent done much for the campus post independence other than to use the facilities. The campus looked old and shabby.
The next visit on the cards for the Vishwanath temple. Once back from the meeting, I told a colleague of my intentions to skip lunch and quickly o and visit the temple. My colleague inquired " with whom was I going" and I told him " alone". What followed was a dramatic scene with my colleague insisting that I shouldnt go alone and in the end I found it easier to just give in ( Thank God that I did) than to argue. So one of collegaues subordinates accompanied me to the temple.
The temple was inside a maze of lanes and the pandits were ready to pounce every penny out of the tourists. When I tried to pull out a note which was tangled in a bunch of notes from my purse, the pandit present in the temple quickly grabbed the whole bunch out of my hands. I was left looking at him open mouthed. Thankfully the guy who was with me quickly reacted and pulled out all the notes from the pandits hands. Post this incidence I quickly finished my darshan and came back to the office. Uff what a visit !!!