Goldie Hawn’s spiritual trip to Varanasi
“Bardhokkey Varanasi” (old age In Varanasi), so goes the Bangla idiom. It might not have been so for 63-year-old Oscar-winning Hollywood actress Goldie Hawn but she came calling in the famous pilgrimage town of Varanasi early this week on what was by most accounts a spiritual journey.
If it was Julia Roberts less than a month ago, now it was Hawn in India but for contrasting purposes.
While Roberts was near Delhi for the shoot of her latest film, Hawn spent three days in Varanasi in Uttar Pradesh state on the bank of the river Ganges from Saturday to Monday when she visited her spiritual guru Acharya Devki Nandan Shastri's hermitage and offered floral tributes on his portrait. Her guru died last year.
Shastri's son Gokul said the actress had first met his father way back in 1982, after which she visited them at least five times.
The actress, known for her roles in films like "Private Benjamin", "Wild Cats", "First Wives Club" and "Cactus Flower", used her visit to Varanasi not only to pay her respect to her spiritual mentor but also to enjoy a trip down the bank of the river and to meditate on board a boat.
Clad in white and with a vermilion 'tilak' on her forehead, Hawn performed 'Ganga Aarti' at the Dashashwamedh Ghat and had only one word to describe her relationship with India, "fascinating". She was also seen clicking away with her camera and jotting down notes as she walked along the riverbank.
It was not immediately clear if Hawn plans to shoot a film in Varanasi. But the buzz is that she has in mind a film about a New York widow coming to the city with her husband's ashes only to lose the urn containing the last remains.
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