The plan is to go for a month. Originally I thought I had to go for 6 months to begin to understand India, but that was an unrealistic goal. Then I cut my expectations back to 3 months, but years went by and I was still waiting for the right opportunity. Now I've pared my trip down to one month and have actually set a date, October 17th, 2011. This is a good time to travel there, the weather is good, no monsoon and there is the huge "Festival of Lights" called Divali. So the plan is to fly to Kochi in Kerala, visit the backwaters for which Kerala is famous. I want to visit an Ashram there as well, that of Ammachi, the hugging mother, where I can stay in return for an offering of
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