Varanasi

Learn Hindi with teacher Binit Kumar Mishra. Mr. Mishra can teach anyone enough Hindi in a few days to conduct the kinds of simple business that travelers must do every day. A little Hindi opens many doors.

A sexual health, drug, and HIV education NGO. There is always demand for foreigners to visit because there is always work related to public health education to be done. A great volunteer opportunity.

Benares Hindu University

(http://www.bhu.ac.in) offers a wide range of classes on topics related to classical indian studies in english.

Bathe

Over 60,000 people come down to the waters edge every day to take a dip in the sacred waters of the ganges. try not to think too much about the dozens of sewage pipes and sunken corpses in the waters around you and you'll find it's not nearly as bad as you expect once you're actually in it. although medically, bathing in water in which a corpse rests risks infection with numerous blood borne diseases notably hepatitis and many infections.

Boat rides

Are very popular, especially at sunrise and sunset. the most popular sunset ride is to start at dasaswamedh ghat and head up to manikarnika ghat to see the cremations in progress, and then return to dasaswamedh and watch the evening aarti from the boat. sunrise is another magical time for a ride, when the ghats are filled with hindus bathing and starting their day - one of the most famous sights in india. you can bargain the price down to around rs 30/person per hour even for just 1 person in the boat, but expect to be quoted much higher — the current bargained down 'foreign tourist' rate for a boat ride is rs 300! in fact there is a price limit set by the city in 1998 but still in force today that sets a price range from rs 50 for boats up to four seats to a maximum of 125 for very large boats. that's per hour and boat not per person. at dasaswamedh there is even a huge sign in hindi only alerting tourists to that fact. if you go nishadraj ghat, a few minutes walk from assi, you can find a boat driver named bhomi, a local singer renowned for his incredible voice and charming, beautiful songs; during the boat ride he sings anything from local folk songs to modern film songs and old devotional ones, and often improvises lyrics over his own songs to communicate with you and the various people gathered on the ghats.

A place to interact with contemporary art in the city of Varanasi