Amritsar
Our day off in Amritsar was refreshing. After we leisurely woke up and did our laundry, posted my blog, it was already late afternoon. We decided to go to the Wagah border which we were told was about 15 km away. So we carted ourselves off in 2 autos. instead it was almost 30 km away and got us there just before sunset. (see photo). This is the border check post between India and Pakistan. There is a ceremony every evening as the nations’ flags are brought down. It has become quite a spectator sport and permanent bleachers have been set up on both sides. It was packed with cheering crowds and at the end, the gates are closed for the night.
We then headed back in to town and a few of us decided to go to the golden temple, the holy shrine for the sikh faith. I had previously seen pictures of the place and was aware of he gun battle that took place there between the Indian army and the Akali dals(?) in 1984. The temple is located in the middle of the city and we got there just around 7pm. We had to take off our shoes and cleanse our feet in a shallow foot bath. Had a glass of their drinking water which was so much cleaner and tastier than any bottled water and then went in to the inner courtyard area (see photo). There in the middle of the lake was the glistening temple in pure gold. There were a lot of people just sitting and lying around the water and listening to the lovely singing of the bhajans from the inner temple. There was a lovely calmness in the entire place. The air was cool and breezy. As we walked around the outer courtyard making our way to the inner temple, it started to rain. It lasted until we were done and left the temple. Very cleansing. The city felt very different getting back to he hotel as all the dust had settled. It rained more later n that night giving me a little concern for the ride next day. Had a nice hot shower and very good tandoori food, a speciality of Punjab, and got to bed by 1 am.
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