At the Triveni Ghats I met Ganesh, the sadhu who said he drew strength from walking by the water at sunset. People were gathering to release their deepums, little flames floating in ghee, down the Ganga. It is here that the river tumbles out of the mountains, clear with patches of green like the Feather River coming out of the canyon near Chico. We saw a man lean down and drink water in the cups of his hands and Ganesh turned to me and said,
See how much faith he has? He thinks it is safe to drink the water because it is holy. I would never drink the water here. I saw wild elephants last summer on the other side amongst the trees. They always drink where the water moves fast enough. So do I.
Every September we take clay sculptures of the god Ganesh down to the water in the Bay Area and return him to his home. At the bottoms of oceans in India there are millions of elephant-headed bodies of half eroded clay left by families over the years. Underneath the foot of the Golden Gate Bridge, ours have begun to crumble.
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Mar 25, 11:37 PM