McLeod Ganj 31st August - 17th September

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It’s high time to update my blog again. The time in India has been so amazing that I kept postponing the update.

By the time I got to McLeod I was very tired yet again from moving from place to place within 2 - 3 days. I know it sounds ridiculous; especially since most who read this sit in the office and work hard and I’m travelling complaining about getting tired of fast pace travelling. But amongst travellers this is a common problem, trust me. I believe that travellers who are on the road for longer than 3 months most certainly will start stopping at every place for around 1 - 2 weeks to chill and really experience the places of visit. That’s my theory anyway. McLeod Ganj was where I started to stop for longer than 3 days.

So my decision to do Vipassana meditation was very good for me as it is a 10 day course in silence. Vipassana is a form of meditation whereby you observe first your breath and then sensations throughout your body to achieve a balanced mind. You must abide by the 5 rules - which are: don’t steal, lie, take any intoxicants, commit any sexual misconduct and don’t kill any beings. So you should not even kill mosquitoes that bite you. Instead you should observe it and realise that - in this case - the pain or urge to scratch will pass away. It was very though and challenging. Sometimes very boring, but you have to continue conditioning your mind. As you were not allowed to communicate with anyone - not even eye contact was allowed - or read any books or listen to music, the only entertainment we found were the mountain monkeys. They would visit us religiously at meal times - watching them was fun. Everyone would giggle, but we would still try to abide by the rules; sometimes with failure. For 10 days all I did was eat, sleep and meditate each day for 10 hours. Indian food was amazing. We were served the best Thali’s in India I think - every day a delicious Thali for lunch with dhal and mixed veg curry, but not much for dinner. For dinner we would only get some kind of rice crispies and tea or hot milk. Unexpectedly, on Day 10 we were allowed to talk after 10am. You can imagine that everyone did not stop chatting for the entire day and everyone was full of smiles and so happy to talk. On that day I finally was able to speak to my roommate, Bindu Sharma. It was very strange to share a room with a person and not communicate at all. Ok, I must admit that sometimes we would share certain gestures.

During the course I was ready to leave every single day as I would be experiencing so much pain in my legs and my back and with each day passing the pain would only increase and definitely not pass away. But I stayed on and now with continued practice the pain does pass away. It’s not only pain you learn to observe. You also accept that pleasant feelings pass away and pain will come again. Sound like a vicious circus, but after god-knows how many years you can achieve enlightenment. Not that I will ever get there, but if meditation makes me a happier and kinder person, then that’s good enough for me to continue practicing. I’m not explaining Vipassana properly here - those who are really interested should visit the Vipassana website for further details. The above is only a tiny description of how I perceived Vipassana and my personal experience, which varies from person to person. I certainly would recommend this course to everyone though.

After Vipassana most people stayed in McLeod Ganj, so we kept meeting up in this little village. For the first time during my trip I felt like home as I knew most of the people from Vipassana and we kept meeting up for breakfast, lunch, afternoon tea, some shopping and dinner and I also met some people who I went for a Yoga class with.

BTW McLeod Ganj is where Dalai Lama resides and holds teachings in the Temple I visited. I missed him by a couple of days, but I didn’t miss the 5 day prayer with piles of food given to all pilgrims. Mc Leod Ganj is predominantly Tibetan, so it didn’t feel like India at all.

It was such a nice place where you would find yourself chatting to a monk in the evening on a path that is pitch-black or where you spend hours online chatting to your best mate as the chocolate cake is so delicious (it wasn’t just the chocolate cake of course) or where you meet many genuine people who are there to enhance their spirituality. There are so many reasons why I loved McLeod, but the most important was that it made me feel home for a while. But at that point I didn’t know that it would get even better in Jammu.

I stayed in McLeod for 18 days (including 12 days for Vipassana) and am very knowledgeable on good restaurants and cafes around that area, but not on the great trekking or the great variety of jewellery, yoga and cooking courses you can do there. I saved that for another trip:-).

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Photos

Day 10 of Vipassana
when everyone can final meet and talk