42 — Sunday Territorian, Sunday, March 7, 2010 www.sundayterritorian.com.au

PU

B:

NT

NE

WS

DA

TE

:7

-MA

R-2

01

0P

AG

E:

42

CO

LO

R:

CM

YK

Indian life floats along

THAT’S LIFE: The Ganges is a hive of activity every single day. Picture: TERRY SWEETMAN

TERRY SWEETMAN

sails down the Ganges

and into the heart of a

nation trapped between

poverty and progress

GANDHI made thespinning wheel theemblem of India, but

the brass bucket is the shiningsymbol of the villagesalong the sacred rivers ofWest Bengal, Bihar andUttar Pradesh.

I saw buckets hung from shopawnings, slung under villagepumps, toted on women’sshoulder and then stacked in theirglittering hundreds in Matiare, theHooghly River centre of the brassindustry.

The Indian papers trumpetmuscular growth rates for even thepoorest states, but the benefits oftrickle-down economics are notapparent in the villages. Poverty isthe common currency, but it is adifferent coin to the hopelesssqualor of the alleysof Kolkata.

The villagers seem at onceburdened and strengthened by afatalistic life of routine and ritual, aoneness with the earth, a relianceon cottage industries and anundisturbed faith in simple virtues.

They don’t ask for much and they get evenless, but what they do have in abundanceis a friendliness and a frank curiosity thatsometimes verges on the embarrassing.

Every daylight minute we ran an affablegauntlet of shouting children and silentlygawking adults as we chugged alongabout 200km of the Hooghly upstreamfrom Kolkata on the good ship Pandaw.

This seemingly never-ending escort ofhumanity was a reminder that the Ganges

and its tributaries support a largish chunkof mankind.

The Ganges referred to by even the mosturbane of Indians as Mother Ganga is attimes as wide as the horizon but in placesno deeper than a bathtub. It was there thecautions of Pandaw Cruises founder PaulStrachan became reality. Theseexpeditions are ‘‘highly adventurous andshould not be booked by the faint-hearted’’, he warns.

‘‘All depends on water levels and flow

rates, the weather, local bureaucracy anda hundred other factors that make andshape a cruise.’’

So there were few surprises when ourSlowly-on-the-Ganges cruise began withan extra night at Kolkata’s marvellousOberoi Hotel thanks to a bureaucraticentanglement over an imported propellerand running out of navigable water longbefore we reached the holy city ofVaranasi.

In between, and on connecting bus trips

(life on an Indian highway seems aprecarious affair), we nibbled at succulentsnatches of rural life.

We wandered the Hazarduari Palace, nowa museum of princely extravagance, andjoined the happy devotees at Mayapur,birthplace of Sri Chaitanya and wellspringof the world Hare Krishna movement.

We trod ancient mosques, temples anduniversities, shuffled along with thepilgrims at Bodhgaya, where Buddhafound enlightenment, rode rathershamefacedly behind sinewy rickshawdrivers and sensed the faith at riversidefestivals.

Slowly on the Ganges up or down river isa voyage through the rural heart of India,a series of seamless transitions fromHinduism, to Islam and to Buddhism. It isan insight into the resilience of ordinaryvillagers and into the challenges facing theworld’s second-most populous nation.

Wish you were hereGETTING THERE: The author flewto Kolkata and from Varanasi viaBangkok with Thai AirwaysInternational. Alternativeconnections are via Delhi.

COST: This 14-night cruise(including hotel nights at each end)was $6995 (single occupancy) buta 25 per cent increase is in thepipeline because of multiple taxes.

CONTACT: Travel agents orwww.pandaw.com