A good friend of mine lived there for six months, producing electronic music. He made some superlatively innovative tracks by recording environmental sounds and local musicians with a portable DAT recorder and subsequently mixing the ensuant rich array of samples with the output of synthesizer emulators and other audio processing software on his laptop.
I am not a musician, really. But my friends' description of the place made it out to be an environment unlike anything a traveller bound to the Western world could possibly envision without experiencing. Furthermore, his success with audio suggests that a visit to Varanasi might be happily further augmented with a greater array of media recording and playback devices.
If awarded these frequent flyer miles, my project in Varanasi will involve the production of as-of-yet-unquantified media projects. From what I've seen, most everything is photogenic, and the locale gets a marvellous light. I would travel with a g4 laptop (the same one that has served me for video and web stuff in trips to Melbourne, Australia and London, England), a sony pd150 dv camera, a stripped-down arri lighting kit, assorted gels, power converters, and other relevant assorted hoohah. I would document the natural splendor of Varanasi, the Ganges River, and outlying areas (a trip to the Himalayas is certainly warranted, for example).
The point of all this is to wring the most out of the assuredly inevitable mindfuck that would befall me in transplanting myself thusly. I'm sure that travelling to Varanasi would seriously warp, if not completely obliterate, a large portion of my production capacity.
The focus of my work is urban space and subspace (for examples of writing and artwork I've done on the subject, contact me at this email address) and I'm confident that the trip would provide more than enough opportunity for a solid comparison of Indian and American architectural axioms and whatnot. I'm reluctant to talk too much about work I haven't yet completed or fully spec'd out, but that'll most certainly be the thematic thrust of whatever I do.
There you have it. I hope I win. I love your web site. Yes.
-fish