Golden Wonder

I'm in Amritsar and I have a new favourite place of worship. Given the location (and the title) you'd be forgiven for thinking that it was that there Golden Temple that had lit my fire. You're wrong though. That's number three on my Fave Amritsar Place of Worship list. Sri Durgiana, the Golden Temple's scruffy cousin takes second spot - way more peaceful and with bigger koi. And I felt a bit sorry for it.

Number one is Mandir Mata Lal Devi temple. It was bloomin marvellous. A temple for the limited attention span generation. I say Temple, it was more like something you would find at a funfair. Like an anti-ghost house. If all places of worship were like that...

Anyway Amritsar, the Golden Temple hey? That's a thing. Well technically it's not a thing, technically Sri Harmandir Sahib is a thing and that there pretty temple is a part of a thing. And Sri Harmandir is a thing with rules. I had to cover my head, which is fair enough, but wasn't allowed to use a hat. Which is odd; if there's one thing I think hats are good at it's head covering. I had to use a dayglo orange bandana, which is nowhere near as good at head covering as a hat is.

There are also a lot of people which makes the whole thing a bit more like a queue than an experience and this being an Indian queue there is a heap of jostling. And once you've been jostled you get the opportunity to drink holy water. Which is from the pool that people are dipping in. The pool that is so murky you can't see the fish.

This is the holiest place in the Sikh faith. This means that some people are having the most spiritual experience of their lives, drinking dubious liquids, surrounded by idiots in stupid headwear and with slightly stinky strangers so close they may as well be sharing pants. Thinking about it, I've pretty much described Super Furry Animals at Glastonbury '99.

This might be the most I've written about a building. There's still another paragraph to go though.

I can't not mention the canteen. It was immense. You got given a tray, sat on the floor and then a slick team walk the line dropping curry and rice on your tray. Not seen anything like it and all kinds of awesome.

I made it to the Wagah crossing to the Pakistan in time for the flag ceremony. It was weird. Some kind of patriotic war pantomime which the peeps both sides of the border were cheering like buffoons. Scary that a crowd could be frenzied up by some crotch-splitting marching and angry stamping.

Given how choreographed the whole shebang was, I can't help but think that the two sets of border guards must rehearse together. Bet there's a shared gym of happiness somewhere where they all practice there macho posturing together. Whilst holding hands.

Got my hit of post colonial guilt from the Jallianwala Bagh Memorial. They have hedges topiaried into British people killing peacefully protesting Indians. I always find that a point is best made with topiary. I've added a photo to prove it, the other photo? Well that's a tiny joke for my own benefit that not that many people who read this will get.