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Published: September 25th 2009
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I thought instead of writing long, boring emails I’d just post a blog, so you guys can read about my experience whenever you like.
The journey here worked out quite well. My backpack didn’t get lost and inspite of it being pretty heavy (22kg/50 pds) I was able to carry it. When I got out of the airport in Mumbai I thought I’d seriously melt. It was so hot and humid! Fortunately my hotel room for the first night had an AC.
Getting to the ashram the second day was pretty adventurous. Appealingly the most important part of any Indian vehicle is the horn. There is a very complicated system of when you honk (e.g. if you pass someone on the street), but for anyone not familiar it seems everyone honks pretty much all the time. It took about 1 hour to get out of Mumbai (appr. 4 km) and on the “Highway”. Average speed for regular cars is about 50 km/h, since there are a lot of trucks, tuktuks, scooters, people and sometimes cows on the street. You drive pretty much wherever you find a space, Even on the opposite side of the road. Surprisingly, very little accidents happen. Probably
cause Indians are very tolerant and patient on the streets. Miss that attitude on German streets a lot!
Arriving in Nasik, we still had to wait a while to go to the ashram, which is 30km outside in the middle of nowhere. So I took the time to get my new Indian cell phone number (upon request )which turned out to be quite tricky, yet, I made it :-)!!!!
I share the room with three other girls: Hollie from Australia, Bettina from Texas, living in Berlin right now and Fanny from Hong Kong. The accommodation is pretty basic, but sufficient. More to come later…
Wednesday the 23rd
Wow, today it’s Wednesday and I’m here for an entire week, already. I pretty much adjusted to everything by now, and I’m finally able to sleep well on the rock-hard mattress. All days run in a pretty similar way:
We get up at 5 am in the morning, get ready and have tea from roasted soybeans (a kinda coffee substitute). From 5.45 till 6 we chant Mantras. They’re written in Sanskrit and it really took me a while to get the pronunciation right… Yoga class is from 6 till 8 am.
Then we do Karma Yoga until breakfast at 9 am. Karma Yoga is basically doing work without any selfish reasons. For example weeding, cleaning the common rooms, watering the plant etc. At 10.15 we have Yoga Nidra class, where we learn a special technique for relaxation (it’s commonly called naptime :-)) . Our first lecture is from 11 till 12. We learn a lot about the history and the theory behind yoga, but I don’t wanna bore you guys to death… Maybe, I’ll write about that later on.
So after lunch we have a two hour break that we use to study/sleep/do whatever. At 3 pm we have the 2nd lecture of the day. 4-6 pm is our 2nd yoga class and then it’s story/neditaion tome until dinner at 7:15 pm. Not much going on after that… except for hanging out at the small store they have here. I’m still getting along with everyone very well and the whole group of 20 people is working together fine.
Oh, and they’ve got lots of poisonous snakes here. Didn’t know that before, but this morning, they found a Viper in one of the girl’s lockers… There are also Cobras and lots of
different tipes of Scorpions (not the super- poisonous kind, fortunately). Generally, there’s tons of bugs around, but you get used to them sitting on you and stepping on them… Speaking of steps: In India you don’t go inside any room wearing shoes, you always leave them outside. So we’re walking around in flipflops all day, which is totally awesome… I just had to get used to my feet being constantly dirty.
Hmm, what else??? Electricity has been pretty well lately, but I learned to love my little flashlight :-) The water is cold, but the weather is so nice, it’s a relief to take cold showers. The only thing I still find strange is washing my clothes in cold water. Indian washing machines always wash cold, they just don’t have a button for temperature…
Overall, life’s really quiet and peaceful here…. If you wanna look at Google maps: I’m outside of Trimbak, which is outside of Nasik in Maharashtra county. There are beautiful Mountains all around and since Monsoon season’s just over, everything is very fresh and green…. I’m off for now, cause we have our first practical exam tonight, and I still need to practice some poses.
Hari Om
Thursday, the 24th
So exams went well yesterday... Today’s snake day… A cobra in the Library and another viper… And the Guavas are getting ripe! We’ve got lots of trees on the ground so you can pluck them right from the tree. I’m so excited about tomorrow. The best things are the coffee and the Internet :-)
Friday, the 25th
Ok, internet Cafes in Nashik are awful! Gonna post more pics soon, but the connection is just so slow!
Miss ya guys!
<3<3<3
Later... finally found a working and quiet internet cafe... This city's just overwhelming, but everyone's just so helpful and friendly... gtg...more, next friday!
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anonymous
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Finally I can read your blog. YEAH! I tried it several times before but all I did see was the entry "Meikes Blog"... Love your pics! I am pretty jealous. In Germany its getting freezing cold and dark... Work is okay, but its just about doing a full-employees job as a intern. And I finally found out that 650 Euro brutto in the end become less than 500 Euro...