
I was having the nicest breakfast in the garden this morning – best coffee I’d had in India – when I was ambushed by Pith-Helmeted Drunk: Mornin’, Mate! Miss’t ya las’ night! I excused myself and checked out of the hotel, leaving a big tip to the guy who made the coffee.
I was finally going to get to see the Golden Temple, the holiest temple of the Sikhs. Read some about them before I got there and was surprised to find out that there are fewer Sikhs in India than Christians – less than 2% of the population and mostly located here in Punjab. These are the guys with the distinctive turbans and full beards/moustaches. I’d gotten a chuckle most of the previous day seeing these harsh-looking guys riding their motorcycles with veils over their lower face; I guess the air going through all that facial hair is distracting. Anyway, they wrap themselves up pretty funny on their motos on the highway.
Sikhs are some of the nicest, easiest people to deal with in India, though I still have trouble getting past the fierce façade. Sikhism is a pretty new religion, only getting started about the time Columbus was trying to get here. The founder, Guru Nanak, was a genuine utopian; he objected to the caste system, rejected the religious hierarchy of both Islam and Hinduism, and preached the value of hard work, simplicity, honesty and integrity. His best bud was a Muslim, and I think recall reading that, when he died, he bequeathed his guru/leader status to a highly qualified lieutenant over his own son. Today, you can still see these basic qualities of integrity, observance and acceptance in the Sikh faithful. There’s also a Sikh code of the warrior-saint, and this is why, despite every encounter I’ve ever had with a Sikh being wonderful, I’m still uncomfortable in approaching one.
Well, there were a lot of Sikhs at the Golden Temple, and I think this is one of the most impressive religious sites I’ve visited. To begin with, all these scowling guys are as friendly as it’s possible to be. You couldn’t tip anyone for anything (like for guarding your shoes or showing you something), and if you faintly smiled at someone, you had a friend. They encouraged my photography, proud of their main temple and of their faith. They had reason to be.
I dropped off my shoes at a big booth and walked to the entrance in the wall surrounding the temple. This wall – inlaid white marble with buildings topped with domes and spires built into it – frames an area about the size of two city blocks. It was impressive from the outside, but that didn’t begin to prepare me for what I saw when I went in. I walked up the stairs and suddenly, through the arch, I saw an ornate, two-story temple, shining like sunlight itself and seeming to float in a city block of water. And all this surrounded by the ornate, white, marble wall and a broad, white, marble promenade. The effect was fantastic. Thousands of devotees were walking quietly along the marble walk in a clockwise direction, some stopping to undress and bathe in the pool and others fingering their prayer beads. Even the young were subdued.
And that’s not all. As you walk around this enormous tank, you constantly hear chants accompanied by music that are being performed in the Golden Temple at the center of the scene. In the temple is the Guru Granth Sahib, the original Sikh holy book, and there are four priests chanting continually there.
I was so struck by the beauty and devotion of the scene that I hesitated to go in. However, a guy who looked like he’d as soon kill me as look at me smiled and motioned me in, so I took the plunge and joined the perambulators, snapping pics and being absorbed in the atmosphere. I wish there were a way to evoke the feeling of the Golden Temple complex…no photo I’ve seen or music I’ve heard has done it. And there’s the kindness of the people there. While I was taking one photo, one of the priests tapped me on the shoulder, and when I turned and saw that big white beard and gold robe, I knew I was going to lose my camera. Instead, the told me there was a vantage point that tourists never seemed to go to, and he led me up a stair to a great view of the complex. I snapped a few pics, and when I turned to thank him, he was gone.
I could have stayed there all day, but we still had to make Dharamsala, so I began to make my way back to Bharat at the entrance. Doing so, I passed the entrance to the causeway that led out to the temple itself. I hesitated a long time, not only because of line waiting to walk though the temple and pray at the Guru Granth Sahib, but also because everyone in line was so intense. I decided not to see the priests chanting, not to see the sacred scrolls, not to see the inside of the Golden Temple and not to be in the presence of such devotion. I walked on past the entrance and then turned back around and got in line. The Dalai Lama could wait another half hour.
And it wasn’t even a half-an-hour. The causeway was set up with real consideration for worshippers. There was a white canopy over the whole thing to protect people from the sun, and there were huge fans at regular intervals to keep the air moving. People waited quietly in line to be admitted in groups. When my group got in, I walked to the side of the small chamber and watched the four priests play their instruments and chant while the main priest presided over the scrolls, covered with a brilliant pink cloth and garlanded with marigolds. Impressive. Outside again, I walked slowly around the balustrade of the temple, noticing hundreds of gold koi in the tank the temple was sitting in.
This time I really did leave, declining the priests’ invitations to eat and offers of a place to stay. When I rejoined Bharat (a Hindu), he told me he always went around the tank and prayed in the temple when he came. He really likes and respects the Sikhs.
Before we left Amritsar, though, I wanted to see the Jallianwala Bagh. My time in India corresponds with the 160th anniversary of the first armed uprising against the British, and the papers have been full stories about it. With independence in the air, there’s also been a lot of rehashing about the 1919 massacre here when General Dyer (sort of the Indian version of our Gen. Sherman) ordered his troops to open fire on 20,000 unarmed Indians in this walled plaza, killing or wounding one-in-ten. The well here is especially notorious since many perished from diving into it to escape the bullets.
Things were calmer while I was there. Some government minister was going a photo-op the memorial, and a couple of Sikh kids skipping school asked if they could walk along with me. How could I refuse?
I finally got back to the car, though, and we once again headed into the hot plains…but not for long. About an hour out of Amritsar, the car suddenly started heading up at a 45-degree angle, and we were on our way in the Himalayas! It’s incredible the way these mountains start, reminding me of the way the Rockies just jump out of the Great Plains. As we wound our way ever upward, I could feel the temperature go down, too (couldn’t run the AC…my Ambassador needed all its power for lift). We went from hot plains, to hot hills to cool mountains in the space of an hour.
This all looked familiar to me from Darjeeling ten years ago. The road follows the side of a river
bed that is mostly gravel, and the sides of the canyon seem almost perpendicular to the river. The little Ambassador just puttered its way patiently upwards, ever closer to Dharamsala and McLeod Ganj, the site of the Tibetan government-in-exile and home of the Dalai Lama.
Dharamsala and McLeod Ganj aren’t exactly a collection of monasteries. Both are major tourist destinations, especially for international backpackers and the many, many Indians who flee here to get away from the heat on the plains. Add to that the crowds who come to study Tibetan Buddhism and meditation. And on top of that, I think this is the largest collection of Tibetan monks outside of Tibet. It makes for quite a mix. My first impression of Dharamsala was being stuck in a traffic jam for half an hour as a truck and bus tried to pass each other on a one-lane road that had cars parked on both sides. Ah…those Indians love their horns. The mix of hiking boots, saris and maroon robes made the wait bearable, though.
And I finally found a hotel and settled in fairly quickly, the end of quite a day.
I was finally going to get to see the Golden Temple, the holiest temple of the Sikhs. Read some about them before I got there and was surprised to find out that there are fewer Sikhs in India than Christians – less than 2% of the population and mostly located here in Punjab. These are the guys with the distinctive turbans and full beards/moustaches. I’d gotten a chuckle most of the previous day seeing these harsh-looking guys riding their motorcycles with veils over their lower face; I guess the air going through all that facial hair is distracting. Anyway, they wrap themselves up pretty funny on their motos on the highway.
Sikhs are some of the nicest, easiest people to deal with in India, though I still have trouble getting past the fierce façade. Sikhism is a pretty new religion, only getting started about the time Columbus was trying to get here. The founder, Guru Nanak, was a genuine utopian; he objected to the caste system, rejected the religious hierarchy of both Islam and Hinduism, and preached the value of hard work, simplicity, honesty and integrity. His best bud was a Muslim, and I think recall reading that, when he died, he bequeathed his guru/leader status to a highly qualified lieutenant over his own son. Today, you can still see these basic qualities of integrity, observance and acceptance in the Sikh faithful. There’s also a Sikh code of the warrior-saint, and this is why, despite every encounter I’ve ever had with a Sikh being wonderful, I’m still uncomfortable in approaching one.
Well, there were a lot of Sikhs at the Golden Temple, and I think this is one of the most impressive religious sites I’ve visited. To begin with, all these scowling guys are as friendly as it’s possible to be. You couldn’t tip anyone for anything (like for guarding your shoes or showing you something), and if you faintly smiled at someone, you had a friend. They encouraged my photography, proud of their main temple and of their faith. They had reason to be.
I dropped off my shoes at a big booth and walked to the entrance in the wall surrounding the temple. This wall – inlaid white marble with buildings topped with domes and spires built into it – frames an area about the size of two city blocks. It was impressive from the outside, but that didn’t begin to prepare me for what I saw when I went in. I walked up the stairs and suddenly, through the arch, I saw an ornate, two-story temple, shining like sunlight itself and seeming to float in a city block of water. And all this surrounded by the ornate, white, marble wall and a broad, white, marble promenade. The effect was fantastic. Thousands of devotees were walking quietly along the marble walk in a clockwise direction, some stopping to undress and bathe in the pool and others fingering their prayer beads. Even the young were subdued.
And that’s not all. As you walk around this enormous tank, you constantly hear chants accompanied by music that are being performed in the Golden Temple at the center of the scene. In the temple is the Guru Granth Sahib, the original Sikh holy book, and there are four priests chanting continually there.
I was so struck by the beauty and devotion of the scene that I hesitated to go in. However, a guy who looked like he’d as soon kill me as look at me smiled and motioned me in, so I took the plunge and joined the perambulators, snapping pics and being absorbed in the atmosphere. I wish there were a way to evoke the feeling of the Golden Temple complex…no photo I’ve seen or music I’ve heard has done it. And there’s the kindness of the people there. While I was taking one photo, one of the priests tapped me on the shoulder, and when I turned and saw that big white beard and gold robe, I knew I was going to lose my camera. Instead, the told me there was a vantage point that tourists never seemed to go to, and he led me up a stair to a great view of the complex. I snapped a few pics, and when I turned to thank him, he was gone.
I could have stayed there all day, but we still had to make Dharamsala, so I began to make my way back to Bharat at the entrance. Doing so, I passed the entrance to the causeway that led out to the temple itself. I hesitated a long time, not only because of line waiting to walk though the temple and pray at the Guru Granth Sahib, but also because everyone in line was so intense. I decided not to see the priests chanting, not to see the sacred scrolls, not to see the inside of the Golden Temple and not to be in the presence of such devotion. I walked on past the entrance and then turned back around and got in line. The Dalai Lama could wait another half hour.
And it wasn’t even a half-an-hour. The causeway was set up with real consideration for worshippers. There was a white canopy over the whole thing to protect people from the sun, and there were huge fans at regular intervals to keep the air moving. People waited quietly in line to be admitted in groups. When my group got in, I walked to the side of the small chamber and watched the four priests play their instruments and chant while the main priest presided over the scrolls, covered with a brilliant pink cloth and garlanded with marigolds. Impressive. Outside again, I walked slowly around the balustrade of the temple, noticing hundreds of gold koi in the tank the temple was sitting in.
This time I really did leave, declining the priests’ invitations to eat and offers of a place to stay. When I rejoined Bharat (a Hindu), he told me he always went around the tank and prayed in the temple when he came. He really likes and respects the Sikhs.
Before we left Amritsar, though, I wanted to see the Jallianwala Bagh. My time in India corresponds with the 160th anniversary of the first armed uprising against the British, and the papers have been full stories about it. With independence in the air, there’s also been a lot of rehashing about the 1919 massacre here when General Dyer (sort of the Indian version of our Gen. Sherman) ordered his troops to open fire on 20,000 unarmed Indians in this walled plaza, killing or wounding one-in-ten. The well here is especially notorious since many perished from diving into it to escape the bullets.
Things were calmer while I was there. Some government minister was going a photo-op the memorial, and a couple of Sikh kids skipping school asked if they could walk along with me. How could I refuse?
I finally got back to the car, though, and we once again headed into the hot plains…but not for long. About an hour out of Amritsar, the car suddenly started heading up at a 45-degree angle, and we were on our way in the Himalayas! It’s incredible the way these mountains start, reminding me of the way the Rockies just jump out of the Great Plains. As we wound our way ever upward, I could feel the temperature go down, too (couldn’t run the AC…my Ambassador needed all its power for lift). We went from hot plains, to hot hills to cool mountains in the space of an hour.
This all looked familiar to me from Darjeeling ten years ago. The road follows the side of a river

Dharamsala and McLeod Ganj aren’t exactly a collection of monasteries. Both are major tourist destinations, especially for international backpackers and the many, many Indians who flee here to get away from the heat on the plains. Add to that the crowds who come to study Tibetan Buddhism and meditation. And on top of that, I think this is the largest collection of Tibetan monks outside of Tibet. It makes for quite a mix. My first impression of Dharamsala was being stuck in a traffic jam for half an hour as a truck and bus tried to pass each other on a one-lane road that had cars parked on both sides. Ah…those Indians love their horns. The mix of hiking boots, saris and maroon robes made the wait bearable, though.
And I finally found a hotel and settled in fairly quickly, the end of quite a day.
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