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Published: November 14th 2007
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thiruvananthapuram
these flower wreaths are everywhere in the temples and smell gorgeous Welcome to the first travel update of the trip - although I managed to spit on the whole concept of the ashram experience by using the internet, it has still taken me this long to sit down and actually tell you all about it - but Ive found myself a lovely little cafe overlooking the arabian sea with a bit of prem joshua in the background (no i haven't suddenly developed amazing music recognition skills - the man just told me who it is).. are you jealous? you should be! Its lovely here and a million miles (not literally) from the ashram where i hid from india for the first 2 weeks. Its not real india here either - there are more foreigners than indians - and all of them have shoes - the disparaties here are very small compared to elsewhere. The pavements have fewer pot holes, and as long as you dont look over the cliff, you're spared the piles of litter found everywhere else. The sea is weirdly warm - a strange experience being used to the english channel, the coast is rocky but just an hours walk north through fields of pink morning glories are beautiful deserted
thiru..am again
no one in this city has read this sign beaches lined with coconut palms and dotted with long canoe-like fishing boats and little fishing villages made out of dried palm leaves - it sounds like a sickly cliche but its actually like that. There are no seagulls here, just hundreds of huge eagles and kites.
Arrival in Mumbai was a shock - i didnt close my mouth for the entire 2 hour taxi ride from the airport and am still surprised that i survived the trip.. let alone that i survived the following 24hours. The place is mad - imagine a massively wide street, and then imagine an amount of taxis and cars and rickshaws that would have trouble getting down a street double the size, then imagine each one travelling at 80km/hour honking their horns every 10 seconds at the very least - then imagine that the road hasnt been re-tarmaced for at least 35 years. Finally, imagine that at one end of the street a 3 year old child with no shoes or shirt who looks dazed from hunger. At the other end - Louis Vuitton and Moschino (sp?). Its mad - i ran away the next morning.
From there I got the overnight train
to Mangalore, then again to Thiruvananthapuram. Next stop - the welcome haven of the Sivananda Voga Vedanta Ashram. This place was amazing - the whole point is that everything is decided for you so that there's space in your head to think about 'higher' questions. Really packed schedule - starting (6am) and finishing with meditation and chanting. I felt like one of those anthropologists who goes to a secluded community to learn about their livestyles and get involved with all their rituals and practices. I meditated, chanted, ate blessed food, cleansed myself with burning campher, swam in a crocodile infested lake while the head priest bathed an effagy (sp?) of krisna. I pretended to meditate by the lake as the sun came up, listened to the lions (apparently mating - noisy buggers), gossiped about the sexy swami, and the two women who seemed to be really in charge - Durga (her spiritual name), Lolita (not her spiritual name!!) - very very bad for the karma that idle gossip. As yet i am still wildly rejecting hinduism and vedanta but watch this space, its fascinating to talk to experienced meditators about the theory and their experience - i might come home
Kanya Kumari
where the arabian sea, the bay of bengal and the indian ocean meet - we had a day out from the ashram and also climbed a holy mountain to meditate at the top (they called it a hill - but im telling you - mountain!!) spiritually enlightened yet..
Left the day before the nose cleansing with salt water and pipe in nose and out mouth demonstration and came here - Varkala - and bumped into everyone that I had met at the ashram. The time here has passed so quickly, i arrived saturday and its already wednesday.. i think im getting stuck. I;ve been told this happens a lot though so im not worrying too much as yet. And you can get mojitos and chocolate here. Its a very small place and parties and dinner arrangements are made with no mobile phones - just tell one person in the early afternoon and everyone turns up on the beach in the evening. I've found people who will be travelling in the same kind of places as me at various points so its already looking like I wont need to be on my own much if I dont want to. There's a man at my hotel who plays the harmonica beautifully - he played for me on the roof yesterday - que sera sera (sp?) - and thats exactly how everyone here feels. I could be here for a while..
Thank you to everyone who
has sent me emails and texts - my phone is seriously on the blink which is why I havent replied, and personal emails are on their way I promise. Special thanks to Lotts - my torch is
the most useful possession I have - tied with the scrubbing brush for my feet (thanks Mum!!). All in all Im sure you'll be delighted to hear I havent got sick yet - but watch this space - tonight ive scheduled my first fish curry - i watched the fishermen pull the net onto the beach this morning. Please keep up the emails - i need news from home reassuring me that real life is still going on somewhere!! :-) Love from Amy XXX
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