Sigh of relief in Benares/Varanasi

Ah...
I must admit, my first impressions of this place were not positive - more touts following me around - but once I put my backpack down, it's really been smooth sailing. I was able to walk up and down the ghatts relatively bother-free. A couple kids trying to sell postcards and boatmen trying to get me to go for a ride, but all were willing to take no for an answer, which was great.
My guesthouse is pretty cool. It's right off the ghatts so I can look out over the river from the balcony. The opposite side of the river is entirely undeveloped, so I can look out and pretend there isn't a teeming metropolis behind me. I can see why the place is holy, it's quite pretty. There's a festival in town today and tomorrow. I stopped to listen to some Indian classical music on one of the main ghatts, and will probably go back once I sign up for yoga and dance classes for tomorrow. Tonight is ganga aarta in the same place, which should be cool since it's reputed to involve people swinging fire and chanting.
And better than anything, I've finally had some "just people being people" moments. A little girl selling postcards came over to me and wanted me to buy some, which I wasn't interested, but her eyes lit up when she saw my journal and pen. She drew me a picture on the back page, which was really cute (and good marketing, I totally bought 8 postcards). I also met a very old lady on my way up the stairs from the ghatts. She was carrying a little plastic bag full of Ganges water up the stairs to the shrines in the neighborhood, but she was having a really hard time getting up the stairs (steep, uneven, and no railings, of course). I offered my shoulder to lean on and so the two of use went from shrine to shrine splashing water on the various lingams inside them. We didn't understand a word between ourselves, but it was nice just to be two people who didn't want anything from each other. Ah...humanity...