Discover India - The cultural side

India the country of temples,mosques,gurudwaras and churches in short it is the land of believers. you can have a lot of options like Banaras, kerala, and goa  to see its culture to experience its spices and to feel its beauty. Its your part to decide what you wanna see first, according to my opinion you should first see its culture. For Culture you can go Haridwar, Hrishikesh and Varanasi.

In Haridwar there is lot to admire.If you want to see Hindu culture or you want to learn it, there you would get ample options. Let me first tell you the meaning of "Haridwar" Hari(Vishnu) the renowned god in Hindu mythology and Dwar is Gate so Haridwar is gate that can lead you to god Vishnu, he took many Avatars, one of them is Krishna avatar, he took that Avatar to kill his uncle Kans. Kans was notorious for his cruelty against people of his kingdom.Someone predicted that he will be killed by his nephew so he started killing his own nephews, he locked his brother in law(Vasudev) and his sister(Devki) in jail and after some time devki gave birth to a child, that child was Krishna.

Foster parents Yashoda and Nand raised Krishna in Vrindavan. Later on he killed his uncle and he became leading prince of Mathura. In Mathura you can find many temples of Krishna some of them are really very aesthetic. In some temples of Mathura you can find a mysterious warning written on board "Mandir mai raat ko rukna sakht mana hai" that means residing in temple at night is strictly prohibited, some people say that at night god Krishna himself come and make "raaslila(dancing with his wives)" and whoever sees them in the act,  turns blind or crippled or in worst case may die. I heard it from my grandmother so i am not certain how true it is but i find it interesting. Anyways i was talking about haridwar, it is a holy place, people came here to wash out their sins in Holy river Ganga.

 

If you wanna know more about Hindu culture, you can talk to local sadhu(saints) they will satiate your curiosity.You can have a mesmerizing view  of "Ganga Aarti"  at Har ki pauri ghat situated in west bank of river Ganga. You can sit for hours by Ganges and enjoy the rhythmic calliphonies of incantations reverberating in atmosphere. After that you can have a look of Hrishikesh it is 18.9kms far from Haridwar. Hrishikesh is famous for Yoga centers and Ashrams. Ram(avatar of vishnu) and his brother lakshman crossed river ganga from Rishikesh that's why two bridges "Ram jhula" and "Lakshma jhula" are named after them. some shops of souvenirs can be found near these bridges and you can do shopping from here. Rishikesh is also famous for river rafting if you are into adventurous sports you can camp and raft as much as you want.

In my next post i will write about India's cosmopolitan cities,lifestyles,cuisines etc

Cheers