Golden Temple

Amritsar is the holy city of the Sikh religion, because it is home to the Golden Temple. That's real gold on the outside of the temple; when wealthy Sikhs die, they often leave their money to the church to buy a little more gold for the temple. We happened to arrive just after a months-long project in late 1998 and early 1999 to polish all the gold plating on the temple.

Very few tourists go to the Golden Temple, and on the days we went there people would stop and stare at us openly. You have to remove your shoes and walk through a little water trough to clean your feet, and you have to cover your head before entering the temple grounds. They have loaner scarves to put over your head if you don't have a hat or a turban.

People walk along a wide walkway around the pool that surrounds the temple, and there is a constant din of scriptures being read in the temple, amplified through loudspeakers. The men in particular are very passionate about the temple; we saw men chanting while facing the temple, tears on their faces, and others prostrating themselves before the temple. There were many sights I would have liked to photograph, but didn't because they seemed like intimately felt moments for the participants.

The India-Pakistan border crossing at Wagha is near Amritsar, on the road to Lahore, Pakistan. We went to the border to watch the nightly ceremony at sundown, when Indian and Pakistani soldiers do marching drills on both sides of the border before closing it down for the night. Hundreds of people crowded around to watch and cheer, and the atmosphere was like a college football game in the United States.