We started our Indian stay with Amritsar, trivially, this being the first biggest city near the border. Also, this is the city which hosts the great Golden Temple, which is one of the most recommended sights in India. The Golden Temple is a Sikh temple, and Sikhism is a religion. Most Sikhs live in the Indian state on Punjab, they wear colorful turbans on their head (well, men do, women wear scarves), they never shave or cut their hair (I mean literally, not even once in their lives). This is the reason they have the big turbans, because it under it hides their long-long hair. Sikhs carry a knife or sword, some big, some small. Guards of the Temple all have swords or this spear-like thing. And they are in very colorful dresses, barefeet.
We were stupid enough not to take any good pictures of these guards with swords, but you can find good pictures on the web if you're interested. I liked their colorful clothes :)
Around the Golden Temple people walk in circles all the time, while some guys play the drums in the middle 24/7. Amritsar and the Temple itself is a pilgrim destination for the Sikhs, they come here once in a while and pray and walk around the temple. And they do this in no little numbers: by the temple there is a (free) pilgrim dirmatory offering place for ~10.000 pilgrims (although many people sleep under the sky). Luckily we found place for ourselves too, there is a small separated dorm for foreigners with 2-3 old guards with long beards and swords. It was supposed to be free, but it wasn't completely: when we left they wouldn't have let us go until we donated them something, voluntarily... Hmm...
Besides the lodging there is a canteen too, also for free (and this one is really for free), and they make very tasty food: some quite spicy dal, chapati (Indian bread-like thing), milkrice and if you're lucky, some soup too. They are extremely affective: when you enter you are given a tray, spoon, small plate for water, then you're taken to a huge hall where huge rolls of plastic foils are laid down forming long tables. Some people walk around holding buckets containing the different kinds of food, and each of giving you a huge splash from their bucket onto your plate. You can eat as much as you want, they don't care. People keep on coming without stop, about 20 meters of the "table" gets occupied in every half a minute for sure. The dining hall has two levels: the one not in use is being cleaned, then in about each 30 minutes as it's ready, they switch and start cleaning the other one. They don't stop.
When you're finished with your food, you walk out, give away the tray to the chain of Sikhs, dumping any remains of food, then washing it off, cleaning it etc. Like a machine, they feed about 10-20 thousand people per day. They keep the place open 24/7, free for everyone, although donations are accepted in huge boxes. As I interpret the situation, these Sikhs are quite wealthy people, so they give food to the poor. By the way, every (bigger?) Sikh temple has a dining hall like this, but the others are certainly are smaller.
So, that's it about the Sikhs. Amritsar, on the other hand is a city of one million, which was only interesting as the first Indian city we saw, so for the memories I uploaded a video about our arrival. It's 7 minutes and it can be boring because it's uncut, but I didn't cut in on purpose, I wanted to show you the real 7-minute rickshaw ride as it was, from the bus station to the Golden Temple (actually, 200m from it, because the driver wouldn't take us closer). We paid fifty Indian rupees for the ride but you can enjoy it free here&now:
