The Lamp
and the Epic

Arrive, and learn how to watch

Arrive Varanasi and settle on the river. Late afternoon, your interpreter sits with you for two hours before you see anything at all: who the swaroops are, why they are not actors, what the nemis are doing with those books, and what will happen when the lamps come in.

Evening at leisure on the ghats. Dinner at the hotel.

Tulsidas's city, then the first night

• Morning: Tulsi Ghat and the Sankat Mochan temple — the poet whose Ramcharitmanas is the text being sung every night, and the city that produced it
• Afternoon rest; an early, light dinner — the Ramlila runs late
• Dusk: private boat across the Ganga to Ramnagar
• First night among the nemis

The sites by day, Ravana by night

• Morning: Ramnagar Fort and the Maharaja's collection — the patron's side of the story
• Walk the Ramlila sites empty and in daylight, which is the only way to understand the geography you crossed in the dark
• Evening: Ravana Vadh — the effigy night, and the largest crowd of the cycle

A nemi's own account, and the city's own Milap

• Late morning: chai with a nemi who has attended every night for decades. This is not a performance; it is a conversation, and it is the memory most guests carry home
• Afternoon: the Nati Imli Bharat Milap in Varanasi city — a different event from Ramnagar's, five minutes long, five hundred years old, and attended by lakhs. The Maharaja leaves Ramnagar to be there
• Evening at rest, deliberately

Bharat Milap at Ramnagar

• A slow morning; the ghats on foot with your scholar
• Evening: Bharat Milap at Ramnagar — the summit of the cycle, and the night the field weeps

Dawn on the river, and out

A last dawn boat along the ghats before the city wakes. Breakfast, and transfer for departure.

Mylapore, and the first house

• Arrive Chennai and settle
• Late afternoon: Mylapore on foot — the Kapaleeshwarar tank, the flower market, the sabha noticeboards
• Evening: your first golu, in a family house, with the doll tiers explained by the woman who built them

Four front rooms in one evening

• Morning: a golu doll-maker — terracotta and papier-mâché figures, and the families who have supplied the same houses for generations
• Afternoon: Kalakshetra, and the revival of Bharatanatyam
• Evening: three further golus with a Carnatic vocalist travelling with you. Expect to be sung to, and possibly asked to sing

Kanchipuram

• The temple city — Kailasanathar at opening, then Ekambareswarar
• A silk weaver's loom, and an honest account of what the power loom has done to the trade
• Return to Chennai; a private Carnatic recital in a drawing room rather than a hall

Mahabalipuram, and Ayudha Puja

• Morning: the shore temple and the rock reliefs, an hour and a half down the coast
• Evening: Saraswati and Ayudha Puja, when books, instruments and tools are placed before the golu and not touched until they are taken back up

Vijayadashami, and out

A last morning — in many houses one doll is laid on its side to signal that the golu will come down. Transfer for departure.

The city as it opens

Arrive and settle. Evening: your first bonedi bari as the goddess is unveiled — Sovabazar Rajbari, where this has happened every year since 1757. Your host is a member of the family, not a guide.

Kumartuli before it fills

• 05:30 — the idol-makers' lanes at first light, when you can stand inside a studio rather than shuffle past it
• Late morning: an art historian on ek-chala, daaker saaj, and why these houses look the way they do
• Evening: two further bonedi baris in Darjipara and Jorasanko, each with rituals of its own

The forty-eight minutes

• Morning in a Bengali kitchen — the bhog, cooked at scale, and why the menu is what it is
• The day is then built backwards from Sandhi Puja, whose time is fixed by the panchang and non-negotiable
• 108 lamps, 108 lotuses, and a silence you will not have expected in this city

Drums, and the last night

Morning free — or the Marble Palace and a slower look at old Calcutta. Evening: dhunuchi naach, danced with burning coconut husk, and the last full night before the goddess leaves.

Sindoor khela, and departure

The women of the household mark each other with vermilion and the immersion begins. A short, emotional morning, then transfer for departure.

Into the valley

Fly to Bhuntar and drive up the Beas. Settle in Kullu town or the Bajaura stretch, twenty minutes from the Dhalpur maidan rather than the two hours Manali becomes in festival week. Evening: your folklorist on what you are about to watch — who the devtas are, why they outrank the temple, and what the gur does.

The chariot, and the gods arriving

• A pre-dawn start up-valley, and the walk down with a deity party as it comes in — the descent happens on the opening day, and it is the morning guests remember
• Late morning at Dhalpur as palanquins arrive from every direction, each with its own drums
• Late afternoon: the rath yatra — Raghunathji's chariot pulled on ropes across the maidan by whoever can get a hand to it
• Evening among the deity camps, where the real festival happens

The temple the devta came from

• Up-valley to the deity’s home temple and its treasury of masks, with the folklorist
• Afternoon back among the camps, which is where the festival actually lives

Naggar, and the painters

• Naggar Castle, five centuries of stone-and-timber kath-kuni building
• The Roerich estate — a Russian painter who settled here and never left
• Evening back at the maidan

Down the valley

A slow morning, then the drive to Bhuntar for departure.

Into Bastar

• Fly to Jagdalpur — the direct hop from Raipur, or from Hyderabad; both are short and both are thin, so we build a buffer
• Afternoon at rest. Bastar is further from anywhere than the map suggests
• Evening: your anthropologist's first session — why this Dussehra has no Ravana, who Danteshwari is, and what you will be asked not to photograph

The chariot, and the goddess arriving

• Morning: the rath in build — the Bilori and Jhar Umargaon carpenters, the joints cut without a nail, and the families who have held the commission for generations
• Midday: the Danteshwari temple in Jagdalpur, and the old palace
• Evening: Mavli Parghav — the palanquin of Mavli Devi is received from Dantewada, and the ruling family goes out to meet her

Dantewada by day, Bhitar Raini by night

• Early: south to Dantewada, eighty-four kilometres, to the Danteshwari temple at the confluence — the source of the authority everything in Jagdalpur is borrowing
• Afternoon: back, and a rest that you will want
• After dark: Bhitar Raini. The eight-wheeled chariot pulled through the town, and the crowd that moves with it

Kumhdakot, and the asking

• First light at Kumhdakot, three kilometres out, where the chariot was taken in the night and where the Maria are keeping it
• The party from town arrives to negotiate its return. This is the oldest political theatre in central India and almost nobody outside Bastar has seen it
• Afternoon: a weekly haat — the tribal market, which is where Bastar is most itself and least on display
• Evening: Bahar Raini, the chariot's return run

The Durbar, then the falls

• Morning: the Muria Durbar at the Sirhasar Bhavan — the assembly, the grievances, and the historian beside you explaining what is actually being contested
• Afternoon: west to Chitrakote, the widest waterfall in India, on the Indravati
• Night above the falls, which after four days in town is the right decompression

Kutumb Jatra, and out

Back into Jagdalpur for Kutumb Jatra — the farewell to the village deities who have been in town for the cycle, and the quietest good thing in the whole festival. Then the airport.

Arrive, and the crow

Arrive Kathmandu. Rice is put out on rooftops for the crows. Evening: Patan Durbar Square as the lamps go up, with your historian — the finest square in the valley and the best place to understand what a Newar city is.

The dogs, then Laxmi

• Morning: garlands and tika for the dogs — at a police kennel and then simply on the street, where it is better
• Afternoon: the potters' square at Bhaktapur
• Evening: Laxmi Puja. Rangoli paths from the lane to the door, oil lamps on every ledge, and children going house to house singing bhailo

Bhaktapur, properly

• A full day in the best-preserved Newar city in the valley — the Nyatapola, the woodcarving workshops, the juju dhau
• Evening free; the lamps are still up everywhere

The worship of the self, and a new year

• Afternoon: how a mandala is laid — sand, grains, oil, and one for each member of the household
• Evening: Mha Puja with a Newar family, and the sagan that follows. Nepal Sambat 1147 begins

The seven-coloured tika

A short morning — sisters marking brothers, and garlands of globe amaranth that keep for a year. Transfer for departure.

First sight, after dark

Arrive Amritsar. We take you to the Harmandir Sahib late, when it is lit and the crowd has thinned — the first sight of it across the water is best had at night and without commentary.

Three in the morning, then the illumination

• 03:00 — the langar kitchen. Roti by the tens of thousands, cooking vessels the size of a small car, and volunteers who will hand you a rolling pin if you want one
• Pre-dawn: the Palki Sahib procession
• Back to the hotel for breakfast and a blocked, non-negotiable sleep until mid-afternoon. The day is twenty hours long and we build the rest into it rather than leaving you to find it
• Late afternoon: Jallianwala Bagh and the Partition Museum — the necessary weight against the day's celebration, and the reason this city is what it is
• Evening: the illumination and the fireworks over the sarovar

Kirtan, and the history behind it

• Morning: a session with a raagi — the raags, the rababi tradition, and what was lost in 1947
• Afternoon: a Sikh historian on Guru Hargobind, the two swords, and miri-piri — temporal and spiritual authority held together rather than apart
• Evening: a quieter darshan, and the sukhasan when the Granth Sahib is carried back

Dawn, and out

A last dawn at the sarovar as the marble is washed. Breakfast, and departure.

Patna to Rajgir

Arrive Patna and drive to Rajgir, about two and a half hours. Evening: the ropeway to Vishwa Shanti Stupa, and a first orientation on why five hills in one valley hold so much of two religions.

Rajgir and Nalanda

• Morning: Griddhakuta, the Vulture's Peak, where the Buddha taught; the Saptaparni caves; Bimbisara's jail
• The Jain temples on the hills — twenty-six of them, and the reason Rajgir matters to both traditions
• Afternoon: Nalanda, the ruined university — brick on brick for a square kilometre. The library is said in the Tibetan sources to have burned for months; that is tradition rather than record, and your scholar will tell you which is which

Dawn at the Jal Mandir

• Pre-dawn, on foot from the dharamshala — three hundred metres — and the causeway across the lotus tank before it fills
• The Nirvan Laddu offering, and what it commemorates
• Mid-morning: your scholar on ahimsa, anekantavada and what liberation means in a tradition with no creator god
• Evening: the lamps, and a quiet dinner

Kundalpur, or Bodh Gaya

A choice: Kundalpur, held by the Digambara tradition to be Mahavira's birthplace, and a slower Jain day — or the drive to Bodh Gaya and the Mahabodhi Temple, where the Buddha was enlightened.

Patna, and out

The Didarganj Yakshi if time allows — she moved to the Bihar Museum some years ago, and is worth the detour — then the airport.

Into the Aravallis

Arrive Udaipur; drive forty-five minutes to Delwara. Evening: a Pushtimarg scholar on why Shrinathji is served rather than worshipped, and what that distinction changes about everything you will see tomorrow.

Pigment, and the old temples

• Morning: a pichwai atelier — stone colours ground by hand, a border of cows laid in with a brush of three hairs
• Afternoon: Eklingji and the ruins at Nagda, eight kilometres away and five centuries older
• Evening: Diwali at the fort — lamps along the ramparts, and dinner

The mountain of food

• Pre-dawn drive to Nathdwara for Mangala, the first darshan
• The annakut raised before the image — and the moment it is released
• Return for a late breakfast; a food historian on the chappan bhog, dish by dish, and why the number is fifty-six
• Afternoon at rest. Evening on the lake at Udaipur as the light goes

A second darshan, and out

An optional early return to Nathdwara for a quieter darshan, then the drive to Udaipur and departure.

The river before it fills

• Arrive Varanasi and settle on the ghats
• Late afternoon: a walk south of Assi with your interpreter — the city undressed
• Evening: the ordinary Ganga aarti at Dashashwamedh from a boat, deliberately on a normal night, so that you understand what Dev Deepawali changes

The city that makes the light

• 05:30 — dawn boat from Assi to Panchganga, and the akash deep: sky lamps raised on bamboo the whole month of Kartik, lit for the dead
• Mid-morning: Sarnath, ten kilometres and a complete change of key — taken in daylight, as the site and museum close by late afternoon
• Afternoon: the potters' quarter where the diyas are thrown, and the akhara whose wrestlers will lay them tomorrow
• Evening: a Sanskritist on why the gods came down to Kashi at all

A million lamps

• Morning free; optional observation of the Kartik snan
• 14:00 — on the ghats while the lamps are still being laid out, row by row. The city preparing rather than performing. This is the part nobody photographs
• Vehicles are excluded from the ghat approaches from early afternoon and parking closes around 15:00, so the last stretch is on foot — expect one to two kilometres with your host, and wear shoes you can walk in
• 16:30 — board at a contracted mooring. Hand-rowed boats are prohibited on this night and only licensed, fitness-certified motor vessels are permitted on the river; life jackets are compulsory and we will not put you on a boat that has not passed inspection
• 17:15 — the lighting. Six kilometres of riverfront goes up within minutes
• Aartis running simultaneously at several ghats; late dinner on the terrace above a lit river

The morning after

06:00 — the river empty, the stone slick with wax, the same ghats simply a place where people are washing clothes. An hour with the boatman family. Breakfast, and departure.

The old temple city

• Arrive Bhubaneswar
• Afternoon: Mukteshwar, Rajarani and Parasurameswara — eighth to eleventh century, and among the finest temple architecture in India
• Evening: your maritime historian on who the sadhabas were and where they went

Konark, and the coast

• The Sun Temple at Konark — a stone chariot with twenty-four wheels, and a navigational landmark for the very sailors this festival remembers
• Puri, the Jagannath town, and the connection between the temple and the trade
• Evening: transfer towards Cuttack

Boats at first light

• 04:30 — a household making its boita, and the chant explained line by line
• Dawn at Gadagadia Ghat as the boats go on the water
• Mid-morning: rest
• Evening: the Bali Jatra fair on the Mahanadi bank, which is enormous, loud and entirely unlike the morning

Dhauli, and the caves

Ashoka's rock edicts at Dhauli, where the Kalinga war ended and the emperor changed his mind; then Udayagiri and Khandagiri. Transfer for departure.

Into Port of Spain

Met at Piarco and transferred. Nothing scheduled: from India this is two connections and the better part of a day, and the first evening belongs to sleep.

How the Indians got here

• Morning: the Caroni plain, and the cane. Your historian on the 1845 crossing, the depot, the five-year indenture and what it actually meant
• Midday: the Indian Caribbean Museum at Waterloo, and the Temple in the Sea — a man jailed for building on Crown land, who built the next one on water
• Evening: your first night at the Ramleela, Green Park, Felicity. You will understand almost none of it and that is correct

Chaguanas, and a house that became a novel

• Morning: the Lion House on the Chaguanas main road — Naipaul's grandfather's, and Hanuman House in A House for Mr Biswas
• Afternoon: a tassa yard. The Trinidadian drum tradition descends from Bhojpuri village drumming and has gone somewhere India never took it. You will be handed a stick
• Evening: Ramleela again, now with your historian narrating quietly beside you

Inside a Ramleela family

• Late morning: a household in Felicity that has held roles across four generations — the costumes, the coaching, the succession, and the honest question of what happens when a grandson would rather not
• Afternoon: Carapichaima — the eighty-five-foot Hanuman at the Dattatreya Centre, and a temple built by Trinidadians with craftsmen brought from India
• Evening: Ramleela

The kitchen, and the birds

• Morning: food, properly — doubles at a roadside stand at seven, then a home kitchen for the long version: the curries, the roti, the pepper, and how a Bhojpuri repertoire met Africa and China on one island
• Late afternoon: the Caroni Swamp by flat boat, and the scarlet ibis coming in to roost at dusk in numbers that make the mangrove turn red

Ravana burns

• Day at rest, or the north coast at Maracas if you want the sea
• Evening: the final night at Green Park. The effigy goes up, and the field is not watching a play
• Afterwards: whatever the village is doing, for as long as you want to stay

Port of Spain, and out

A morning in the capital — the Queen's Park Savannah, the Magnificent Seven, the National Museum — then Piarco and the long way home.

Up from the Doon

• Met at Dehradun and west along the Yamuna. Kalsi on the way — the Ashokan rock edict, cut in the third century BCE at the point where the plains stop
• The climb to the ridge: ninety kilometres, three and a half hours, and the deodar closing in
• Settle at Kanasar. Evening: your researcher on what Jaunsar-Bawar is, who the Jaunsari are, and why the calendar here runs a month behind

The losing side

• Morning: Lakhamandal, down in the Yamuna valley — a temple complex the tradition ties to the Pandavas and the lac house, with sculpture stacked in the courtyard
• Afternoon: a village where Duryodhana is the presiding deity, and the honest conversation about what that means and why it has survived here
• Evening: the household you will be with tomorrow — the dibsa baskets, sown eleven days ago and now green, and the rice being beaten into chiura

Diyai ka baraaj

• The day in the house. The cooking, the walnuts being cracked, the preparation that nobody photographs
• Dusk: the bhimal torches lit and carried down through the village
• The fire at the pandav chauri; the sprouted seed and the chiura going in; walnuts handed round as prasad
• Then the Harul, the Rasau and the Barada Nati, in linked chains, for as long as the village wants — which is usually until it is very late and very cold and you have stopped noticing either

A second village, which is not the same

• A slow start, deliberately
• Afternoon: a walk to a neighbouring village over the ridge, where the festival runs to a different order and the songs are not the same ones. This is the day that stops it being a single evening and starts it being a region
• Evening: the second night, quieter and easier to follow

Hanol, and the Mahasu

• North-west to Hanol on the Tons — the Mahasu Devta temple, ninth century in parts, built in the Himachali wooden style, and the seat of the authority every village you have been in defers to
• The drive itself is the point: the Tons gorge, deodar, and villages built in stone-and-timber kath-kuni that has not changed method in centuries
• Back for the last night on the ridge

Down, and out

Down through the deodar to Mussoorie or Landour for a long lunch and a hot bath, then Dehradun. Guests wanting one soft night at the end take Landour, and we would recommend it.