Varanasi

Just walking along one of the larger streets (Varanasi is a maze of tiny passageways) when this dog jumps up at me and rips through my trouser leg. At first I thought the skin wasn't even broken, but there was a tiny bite. Rabies is widespread, and there are a lot of stray dogs everywhere I went in India. Fortunately I'd had a course of three pre-exposure vaccinations. A month later, following two post-exposure vaccinations, I seem to be safe...

One great thing about India is the many tailors. They have tiny shops all over the place, and many of them are happy for you to walk in and ask for a them to do a repair - typically while you wait. I had several repairs made to my small rucksack, as well as the dog-shredded trouser leg fixed, each for a cost far smaller than that of replacing the item in Europe, and far less hassle than trying to find a replacement in India.

On an early morning boat-trip, we saw several dead bodies floating in the Ganges. It seems that not everybody's cremated in Varanasi - certain people who have died, including children under 10, pregnant women, sadhus (monks), cobra-bite victims and leprosy sufferers, are weighted down with rocks and dumped in the river. But sometimes the rocks come loose and the bodies float to the surface again. This is the same holy river where people are washing themselves and their clothes, fetching water to drink, and making offerings to the gods.