A dozen westerners in a small rowing boat on a Holy river are involved in a discussion that soon becomes an argument. ‘Please, no. I’ll vomit’ one says, his voice straining with repulsion. ‘Close your eyes then’ responds another. Sanjay the boatman yawns, oars still, waiting for a consensus. He’s been up since 4, fishing.

Eventually the posh girls from Cheltenham and the skinny Canadian who seems likely to collapse with heat exhaustion at any moment agree on a compromise: 10 metres. Deal done. We will row 10 metres, no more, no less, from the human corpses washed up on the sandy embankment. Close enough for the photographers but far enough to appease those worried about the smell.

You’d be forgiven for wondering what the hell was going on, and it’s true, observing this debate was pretty surreal. But I’d been in Varanasi for a while and was quickly becoming immune to surprises. In fact, if cities had a middle name, this place’s would probably be ‘surreal’ or ‘surprising’.

Or possibly ‘unexpected’ or ‘dreamlike’ or ‘absurd’ or ‘capricious’, ‘delusive’, ‘otherworldly’ or ‘quixotic’ (Yes, I know including that sounds well pompous, but several of us from the hotel spent a whole evening considering this question and I didn’t want to waste the ‘effort’. The influence of bhang - the local whacky ‘backy ’- on this conversation cannot be understated. It’s legal for religious reasons – some of the holy men are high as kites – and it apparently expands your vocabulary)

Blabbering though I now undoubtedly am, talk of middle names isn’t complete nonsense. Varanasi does have two other, admittedly Indian, names - Kasi, Benaras - used interchangeably by locals to refer to the city on the Ganges where the Hidu god Shiva lived. A centre of learning and spirituality for over 3000 years, hundreds of thousands of pilgrims visit annually to visit temples and bathe in India’s holiest river.

The city’s most notable buildings are squashed against the river bank for miles, below which large steps, known as ghats, lead down into the water. During daylight hours, the ghats swarm with people: locals and visitors alike, washing themselves, their clothes or their cattle in the holy water, getting a shave or massage from an outdoor barber, cooking chapattis on impromptu barbecues, paying respects to holy men in temples or drinking chai. It’s a lot to take in – the intense colours, smells and sounds of a typical Indian city, multiplied several times and then squashed into a confined space.

But the vibrant atmosphere on the ghats is not the city’s only attraction. Varanasi is well known as India’s foremost cremation destination, Hinduism’s premier location to die; a resting place that offers believers the chance to swap the otherwise perpetual cycle of death and re-birth (after a while this apparently begins to grate) for nirvana (a preferable alternative).

As far as I could gather, the mere act of kicking the bucket within the city limits lets you off any past misdemeanours and gets you on the first soul chariot to eternal paradise. So it’s maybe not surprising that many Hindu’s like to spend time here, especially in their twilight years.

The Hindu approach to mortality seemed completely different from what’s common in Britain. People are much less squeamish; death is openly acknowledged and discussed. It’s not that people don’t see it as a bad thing, but it’s accepted as an inevitable natural process and thus not befitting of a strong reaction; like defecation, I guess.

The more time I spent in these surroundings, the more antiquated the typical Western treatment of death – if possible, don’t mention it, but if absolutely necessary be sure to avail yourself of one of numerous awkward euphemisms – began to seem. A bit like Victorian views on bare skin or sex. And just as a Dickensian upbringing can make things complicated on your wedding night, many Eastern societies feel that sweeping death under the carpet stores up emotional problems for an unknowable point sometime in the future. (Which could be tomorrow, who knows?)

With that in mind, I resolved to get more comfortable with my ultimate destiny. And I was certainly in the right place, because in Varanasi - and they don’t tell you this in the tourist brochure - death can’t be avoided.

Curious or not, you’ll eventually come across the burning ghats, the waterfront open air crematoriums.  Here, volunteers construct mini bonfires with wood bought by relatives of the dead. The dead themselves are then slotted in between the logs and burned.

At the main burning ghat, five fires blaze all but continuously. A cremation takes 2-3 hours, so they get through 50ish in 24 hours. And they are busy, because even if you are careless, or unlucky, and die somewhere else, being burned here is still said to bring benefits in the afterlife.

 There’s no ceremony and no great scene – passers-by look on as the bodies are brought out, washed in the river and then placed on the logs. In the flames, bones are clearly visible, and on occasion the eldest son will smash his father’s skull after a while to let the soul out. The ashes are then tossed into the river.

The buildings behind the steps are hospices where the old or infirm with no immediate family come to die. Spending your last days breathing the thick smoke of funeral pyres would seem an odd choice back home, but here it’s perfectly normal.

Not all of Varanasi’s deceased are burned. Children and holy men are considered too pure for cremation, while lepers and victims of snake bites are also excepted. Those not incinerated are tied to large boulders, taken to the middle of the river and dropped in (one evening as I watched a man carrying a baby-sized bundle walked past and got into a small launch). As you can imagine, this, along the constant discharge of civic waste, begins to affect the clarity of the water. And sometimes the rope breaks and the bodies float to the surface or are washed up on the bank.

And that explains the little altercation amongst our tour group on the rowing boat.

As we approached the agreed proximity, some covered their faces, others stared in shock, while a suddenly enthused Korean girl clambered across the vessel to get a better angle for a photo. Dogs and crows took it in turns to inspect the carcass, although the dogs soon retreated looking a little queasy.

Sanjay, part-time fisherman, full-time guide, was used to clients freaking out at about this stage of his nightly tour. Despite never having left Varanasi, his constant interaction with foreigners gave him a good understanding of other cultures. Taken by my interest in his experiences, he invited me to spend the night on his tiny rowing boat out on the river.

‘There’s no telling how people will react. In general, the Japanese are more reserved, whilst Europeans get quite emotional. I’ve had people vomit. When one group voted to stay well away, a German guy leapt off the boat and swam to the shore to get a closer look. He said he was an undertaker’

An eerie calm descended over the river as night fell, although nearby a few pilgrims still bathed in the water and a game of cricket was finishing on the steps in the distance. We bedded down on the hard wooden decking at the front of the boat.

A giant advertisement for a local swimming school was painted on a wall opposite our mooring. I pictured a small group of toddlers getting to grips with doggy paddle amongst the raw sewage and former people.

Though she didn’t get the same reverence from me as the locals, the Ganges was kind enough to rock us to sleep, until Sanjay woke me for a spot of fishing. Sensing my disgust as he brushed his teeth with river water, he upped the stakes and downed a pint or so of the grimy brown liquid. ‘No problem, it keeps my stomach tough’ he announced with a grin, wiping his lips, as if a large glass of corpse squash should be on everyone’s breakfast menu. Recent attempts by the city council to reduce the levels of bacteria and sewage were a waste of money, he argued. ‘Mother Ganga is beautiful as she is’.

The sun rose quickly as Sanjay cast his net, signalling the start of another scorching day. Already, families were swarming over the riverbank, soaping up and scrubbing reluctant babies. If the sign was correct, a swimming lesson would be starting in two hours. A middle-aged man, perhaps the teacher, passed us exhibiting a professional looking front-crawl. Within minutes he was just a speck on the horizon, heading towards the imposing road bridge at the West of town.

I reluctantly agreed to help Sanjay get the net in. There was an odd feeling in my stomach, like when you watch a horror film and the music that goes with all the scary bits starts. The net wasn’t heavy, but there was something in it, and the myriad nightmares lurking below could be all manner of weights.

I squinted as the contents emerged. And there it was; Varanasi’s final twist. I thought I was immune, but this was the biggest surprise of all: two glistening silver fish, one small, one very big. Both looked pretty healthy; dare I say it, clean. ‘Not bad. Three hundred rupees for the big one and I’ll take the other home for my family. Would you like some?’

‘No thanks Sanjay. I’m not eating anything that lives in there.’

I looked over towards the market where the fish would be sold. In front, the ghats were already heaving. A herd of buffalo was evading a man with a stick, heading down to the water’s edge. Rows of luminous saris were hanging out to dry from a long balcony above - only in India can you enhance the aesthetics of the neighbourhood by airing the family washing.

And suddenly it was clear. The fish were a riposte from Mrs Ganges to cynics like me who get all het up about the dirt and squalor; a gentle reminder that, although Varanasi is undoubtedly full of death, it’s full of life too.