Bikaner and holy rat temple

From Dharamsala/McLeod Ganj it was time to start heading on south and back east across the country for my flight out of Kolkata in several wks. On the way south I wanted to visit the Indian state of Rajastan, much of it situated in the Thar desert, and some intriguing cities in the state. The first city I was to visit was that of Bikaner, located in western Rajastan quite close to the Pakistan border. I wasn't too thrilled that the only direct route there was a day long train trip taking 13 hrs. With 2 wks left to go it is not my desire to spend and entire day cooped up in a train. My desire to visit Bikaner was to see the renowned Karni Mata Temple in Deshnok, about 30 km south. This temple is the site of 1000's and 1000's of holy rats running all over the place. They are venerated as holy according to the mythology of the Hinduism religion. Arriving at the temple after a quick 30 min busride from Bikaner on a road filled with countless camels and a quick walk down another road, I arrived at the temple and had to take off my shoes as is necessary at most temples in India. I had realized this was going to be the case before arriving even though I wasn't thrilled with the idea of walking barefoot on a filthy floor covered with rodent feces, I don't care how holy they are supposed to be. Walking into the temple, which was free in itself, I paid a small fee to use my camera and quickly spotted hordes of rats scattered throughout the premises. There were large basins filled with what looked like milk being drank by the thirsty rats. Otherwise they were scattered throughout the place, sleeping on top of each other and climbing all over guardrails and whatever else they could find to climb. In spite of being generously fed by the Indians and guests many of the rats did not appear to be in the best shape physically or healthwise. Many were quite ragged looking and corpses or nearly dead rats were lying throughout. I found out later on that a probable cause of the rat's bad health was their constantly being fed sweets and candy type products. This has the effect of creating diabetes and of health defects in the rats, inspite of their holiness. Perhaps a lesson for humans to learn in eating healthy and avoiding too much sweets.


The floor of the premises were definitely quite dirty although it wasn't quite as littered with fecal matter as I thought it may be. I still did my best to kind of tip toe around or at least mnimize my foot contact with the soiled floor. While their were many thousands of rats throughout the temple, along with a generous supply of pigeons, I was told they really come out of the walls and their hiding places after dark. I was their around noontime, avoiding absolute rodent mayhem apparently. I was told there existed 3 white rats amongst their brown pack that were considered particularly lucky or auspicious to see. Hence I was keeping my eyes open for these lucky white rats. At one point in one of the dirty corners of the facility there was a small mob of Indians trying to peek around a fenced corner, apparently in effort to see a rumored white rat. When the group scattered I attempted taking a peek myself around the corner, which was next to impossible unless I stuck my camera out and took a picture using the flash. I didn't see anything but piles of dirty brown rats and filth.


A short time later several young Indian girls who were standing in a slightly different area by themselves caught the attention of an Indian man next to me. We walked over and looked where the Indians girls were pointing and sure enough, there just happened to be a filthy white rat sleeping on a pipe or something squeezed in amongst the rest of its brown brethren. It was no doubt a white rat, although a bit discolored from dirt and other grim caked onto its holy fur. I was thrilled to be able to see one of these rare specimens and surprised there weren't more people clamored to try and get a glimpse of it. I was able to get several pics of the rat before it woke up and disappeared back into the bowels of the temple. My luck has not been too bad lately, however hopefully this occurance will add an extra punch of positive benefit to my life. I think at least if I believe in the power of the holy white rat something of fortune will happen for me. I feel lucky enough to be able to travel to such an amazing country as India and experience such moments. Perhaps also some extra luck will keep me from acquiring some obscure disease from walking around in the bizaare atmosphere and filthy floor. I was the only tourist or white person I noticed at the temple. While Bikaner and Deshnok are a bit off the beaten track, I was surprised not to see any fellow Europeans or other travelers. For such a bizaare and unique temple, one would think more travelers would make an effort to check out such a holy place.

My second night in Bikaner I wound up in a guest house in one of the neighborhoods of the city. I would up being led here by an Indian guy whose name escapes me I met at the restaurant below my guesthouse of the first night. After walking several hrs in the fascinating old city with its narrow and congested alleys, lanes and bizaares, I took a rickshaw along with my new friend to my new guesthouse. It turned out to be a nice family house several blocks in from the chaos of the noisy main street, and not too far from the bus station where I was to move on the next day. The guest house was also in the biz of leading camel safaris into the Thar desert, although I had to disappoint them in saying no to their sales pitch of such a trip. Sounded like it would a memorable experience riding a camel in the depths of the Thar desert, however I don't think it would be quite as much fun doing it by myself. Next time I am fortunate to make it to this part of India with either some friends or a nice lady I would definitely take part in one of the camel safaris. They are quite popular in this part of India, particularly in the city of Jaiselmer west of Bikaner.



My room at the guesthouse was quite nice and peaceful without their being any other guest. I only noticed 2 rooms available for room in the dwelling. Otherwise there was the owner and his wife and 4 kids, along with my friend who stays there and elsewhere from what I gathered. The weather was a bit warm and humid in my room so I decided to give it a shot sleeping with the rest of the family on the roof. The father and my friend were gone at the train station till around 2am scouring the trains and crowds for tourists newly arrived and potentially looking for a room and a camel safari. Sleeping on the roof top on a cot was quite nice for a while as their was a nice breeze flowing through the air cooling things off. On top of that the moon was mostly full and shining brightly, 2 days ago it had been full, which added to the exotic ambiance of being far off city in the Indian desert. Unfortunately the mosquitos were out in abundance as well nipping away at my feet and legs. In addition the neighbors 2 houses down had decided it was a worthwhile wk to have themselves a kirtan in their backyard. This included a number of people singing on a microphone and playing various Indian instruments. It sounded nice to listen to at first but as the hours started flying by into the middle of the night it started to get quite annoying. By around 3am I had had enough of the racket and noisy sound checks on the microphone. For whatever reason the family I was staying with had no problem whatsoever with the kirtan going into the late hours of the night. I however decided to pick up my sleeping bag inner liner and head on down into the less noisy but slightly warmer confines of my room.

The next morning, after getting up and having some tea, I took a short walk with my friend to the bus station and was on my way to Jodhpur, about 5 hrs south on a bus. This was 2 wks ago at the time of writing this journal. Several days ago I read in the news that at the main fortress in town I had stayed near and visited there was a pilgrimmage that went horribly awry. Over 160 people were killed and countless others injured an exodus of people that went crazy after some bizaare circumstances involving a rock slide or something. One reads about this sort of thing happening all the time in India during religious pilgrimmages as tens of thousands of people are walking with little to no crowd control.