Lost

7th July 2008, Benares

There is a certain joy to being lost in Varanasi. A city older than time allows you to think that you may not be the first to have been so. Disorientation does not lead to dismay here but rather to discovery. Important enough for Gautama Buddha to rush to once he acquired enlightenment. He could not think of a better place to make his first sermon. And that was about 2,500 years ago. I hear that order is the new mandate for its ghats and that laser lights are phasing out lamps. I hope that in the long unbroken sequence of humanity that this inherently mesmerizing city has seen, such ideas are merely a blip on the surface of smooth, well worn wisdom.