Yoga capital of the world - Rishikesh

---

Yay, finally catching up with myself!

Instead of doing another rotation I've already done before, I decided to join the Traditional Medicine folks (all new people in the program, now that it's another 4 week rotation!) and go to Rishikesh for the week, since we only really passed by last time for our trek. Rishikesh, as I think I mentioned before, is the yoga capital of India, and therefore really of the world. It's a bit touristy (see a lot more Westerners here than normal) but overall not a bad city. The Ganga (Ganges) runs right through it, and unless you want to go way down the river the easiest way to cross it is a large pedestrian (though motorcycles, bikes, and cows all seem to think they count as pedestrians) suspension bridge or taking a motorboat. It's interesting to see the differences between to the two sides - they both have lots of shops, but the pharmacies on one side only sell Naturopathic medicines, while those on the other side sell Allopathic! Which, I learned of course, by falling sick to another stomach bug. =P This time was actually pretty bad, I ended up having to take my Levoquin (like Cipro, but fewer things are resistant to it) and then still having to call Dr. Gandhi because I was still having issues. He told me to pick up this drug from the pharmacy, so we wandered all over the area looking for it, and ended up having to take an autorickshaw to Rishikesh market (for which the guy tried to overcharge me, literally, 100x!) to find a pharmacy that carried it. But get this - guess how much my drug cost me? Truly, just pick a figure in your mind.


For three pills, I paid 3 rupees!! Remember, it's 45 rupees to the dollar, so you do the math yourself. I truly couldn't believe it. Makes you wonder how much the drug companies really are overcharging us in the States, no?

So, yes, Rishikesh. We're studying Naturopathy (the idea that all diseases can be attributed somehow or another to the buildup of toxins in the body and that a cure means removing the toxins that way. They don't believe in drugs at all, even herbs, but instead work with hydrotherapy, massage, yoga, and diet/fasting) and it's certainly a much more regimented schedule than I'm used to so far. Clinical is from 7:30 - 8:00 AM, yoga is from 8:30 - 9:30, then breakfast, then theory of Naturopathy from 10:30 - 11:30, lunch at 1:00 pm, practicals from 3:30 - 4:30, yoga from 5:00 - 5:30, and dinner at 7 pm-ish. They seem much bigger here on doing things before breakfast than I'm used to. The first day I felt like it was already the afternoon by 10 AM, since we'd already done so much stuff before eating.

There are so many more cows here in Rishikesh than in Than Gaon. They're truly just everywhere, wandering the streets, lying down in the middle of the street, the bridges, in front of your room. Also a lot of monkeys, little lizards, and frogs. Truly, we're almost in the jungle or something. =P

Yesterday night I had the most amazing experience. Mahesh, the guy who owns the trekking company we've been using is a friend of Mayank's, our coordinator, and he is friends with the pastry chef at Anada Spa, supposedly the #1 spa in the world that's right here in the mountains above Rishikesh! We gave him a call and arranged to get to go there for a tour and have dinner in the restaurant, which normally only people staying at the spa are allowed to eat at. The place is absolutely *amazing*. It used to a palace that the Maharaja built in 1910, and the giant building you see when you first pull up is the reception *building.* It houses the most expensive suite in the spa, costing $1515/night, and it's absolutely gorgeous. It's about the entire top floor, has its own complete wrap-around terrace that overlooks Rishikesh and the Ganga, has a bathroom with its own steam room, shower, indoor and outdoor jacuzzi, and of course is a good ~ 4 rooms total. We took a golf cart to the restaurant from the reception building, past bamboo forests (the first time I've seen bamboo in India), and gardens, and was greeted by this fancy octagonal (I think) room with columns arranged in a circle in the middle, decorated with wallpapered vines. There was live music - one guy playing the bongos and another playing the sitar, and it was absolutely the most amazing thing I've ever seen in India or otherwise. I'd been planning on spending a little extra money at least once while traveling to pamper myself a little and get a decent toilet, some good food, and A/C, and this definitely fulfilled that craving. The chef who is Mahesh's friend actually came out to thank *us* for coming, recommended some excellent dishes, and we had the most amazing meal that I definitely think I needed. I felt a little underdressed, having come in shorts and a normal shirt, but nobody seemed to care (though the other patrons were probably trying to figure out how 3 girls our age could possibly afford to stay in such an expensive place). I ordered the roast lamb, which was sooooooo amazing - melt in your mouth, is this really lamb? wow this is good..., and fresh-squeezed pomegranate juice (mmmmm...... soooo good, and so good for you!), and the two other girls had vegetable strudel, which I tasted and was also very, very good. Other than the meat I had, though, it was great to just have some of the veggies we eat back home! Red and green peppers! Carrots! Cherry tomatoes! Even the asparagus (which strangely, though I love basically every vegetable, usually can't stand) was acceptable at this point. And best of all, not a single potato in sight!! Thank the Lord. (Almost every here meal involves some sort of potato, usually mixed in with the vegetable. We were even served potato sandwiches for breakfast a few times at the home stay....)

Anyway, yes, yummy yummy yummy! We didn't end up leaving till 10 pm (but didn't actually get to the spa till around 7:00 and probably started eating at 8:00 so it wasn't *that* ridiculous), took us till 11 pm to get back to Rishikesh, by which time it was just slightly unnerving walking back. It was fine, of course, there were 3 of us and truly no one was going to bother us, but when we got to the Ashram that we usually go through to get to our guest house, the gates were closed! The security guard there was no help at all - simply kept staying no, but another man behind him gave us directions back around to our house, so it was ok.

If I ever get rich and come back to India, I'm definitely coming back to that spa. It's the most amazing, calming experience I've ever had. Oh, and did I mention? Our entire meal, which included the fresh squeezed juice, dinner, dessert, and tea, came out to about $27 each! Too bad actually staying at the spa and using its resources aren't also so reasonable. According India standards, though, that was a ridiculously expensive meal. The last meal I had at a restaurant came out to 67 rupees... about $1.50. =P

Today I'm actually going to go back to DehraDun, a day earlier than normal. I want to go and do one more shadowing experience with Dr. Gandhi, who is absolutely marvelous at showing you things and testing you in ways that make you learn, and I only got to do 2 days with him because I got sick and then we had our 3 day trek. As for Naturopathy, I find it interesting, but a lot of it I'm still very skeptical about. Some of the things they say just don't correlate with that I've learned in med school this year, and some of the treatments, while I could see them working while you're doing them, seem more like symptomatic relief rather than curative. Though, they claim that if you do them often enough and regularly enough, it is curative. We'll see, I'm still very new to the idea. Gotta go now, though, in 10 min I've got my practical session, where the doctor is going to look into our iris and tell us what's wrong with us. According to Iridology there's sort of a homunculus in our iris that corresponds to different organs and such, and from it you can tell if there's a problem with some part of a person. Let's see if she can figure out that I've been having some neck and shoulder pain and just got off being stomach sick again, yeah? 😉

---