In Varanasi

Until 5pm, the touts and beggars who approached me along the Ganges River were fairly innocuous. After that point, I was offered more drugs than throughout my entire four years of college. One guy especially latched on. I had fun with him. I constantly berated him because he told me that his shop was near the burning ghats. The burning ghats are where they cremate the dead. Now, while I don't do drugs other than NyQuil and dentist-prescribed valium (and a little anti-diarrhea medicine on this trip), it's really not my place to judge another's sense of morality. But selling drugs by the burning ghats goes above and beyond personal morals. So I let him have it.

I told him that his actions were disgusting. He was a terrible person. How dare he disrespect the dead like that. He smiled and slowly nodded. I shared with him the words of the Notorious B.I.G., "Don't get high on your own supply." It was advice he hadn't been taking, if anyone else had offered it as he was clearly not all there. Or even a little bit. I did dumb it down for him. When he kept making his pitch, I explained to him, first pointing to him, "You are a bad person," then pointing to me, "I am a good person. What makes you think a good person like me would ever go with a bad person like you." He tried to wrap his head around that one before reentering his tired sales pitch.

I tried to help one little kid who was trying to sell me a candle and kept saying, "Please. I have no business." I told him that those tactics clearly weren't working with me. It's important to know your customer and be able to adapt to meet that person's needs. But he stuck to his few lines. At one point he stopped following me, but I wouldn't let him get away.

I told a couple of touts that they shouldn't ask a Moldovan their age. If you know a person's age, you can figure out when their parents had sex and that's rude in Moldova. I've utilized the left hand twist as if you're saying something was just ok (which is like shaking your head no), and also neh-hee (no) and chalo (go), all methods of telling a vendor you're savvy enough that they should get lost. Sometimes when I say neh-hee, the guy starts talking to me in Hindi. I also know enough Hindi to say that I know a little Hindi, but unless they start counting to ten, at that point, I'm in trouble.

A little about Varanasi. The old city is filled with very narrow winding alleys. It feels like the old country. It's 1930 in some small Polish city. There are little stalls everywhere. Things are tucked into places you wouldn't believe. My hotel room was tiny. Width wise, I could touch one side with my fingers and the other with my feet. Last night there was a ceremony by the Ganges with fire and music. A little girl screamed at me, "Please come!" It was then that I realized a Buffalo was headed right for me and I safely jetted out of the way.