Hello!
I've been in Varanasi for 4 days now, but before I get into that I'll update you on Bodhagaya!
So Bodhagaya is a fairly small city, probably no bigger than 20,000. About 100,000 people come to listen to the Dalai Lama's teachings. So you can imagine it was rather crowded. It's also impossible to bargain since all the shops know that the next tourist will pay their overly inflated price. But anyway, expensive in India is still cheap compared to the US so I'm not complaining.
The teachings themselves were great...unfortunately the translator wasn't fantastic but I still got a lot out of them. If you've ever seen 'I Heart Huckabees' that's a really accurate representation of what it's like to be taught the Buddha dharma. You talk about emptiness and how everything is suffering but hopefully in a couple of eons (an eon is thousands of millions of billions of years) you can attain enlightenment and be able to love everyone and have true happiness free from attachment for everything in samsara. If you meditate on some things for enough time it really does feel like the fabric of the universe is coming apart and nothing is connected (so why does any of it matter??) but then you remember love and even though you know that any love you have is tainted by attachment it's a wonderful beautiful thing and if you focus on that then you'll be okay despite the sufferings of samsara.
Hahha sorry that's a long ramble and I don't know if it makes any sense to someone that hasn't studied Buddhism!!
Anyway. Varanasi. It's still a big city but we got a hotel in the same alleyway as this wonderful yoga studio (Yoga Training Centre) and I'm taking 4 hours of yoga a day. That's right, 4 hours. You want to know how much it costs to take 4 hours of good quality yoga class with a maximum of 8 students in India? 8 bucks. I'm getting to be really strong and really bendy!! I'll just have to work extra hard to keep it up. Tomorrow I start the 2 day Reiki level one initiation. I'll be officially certified to practice Reiki and balance the 7 chakras. Our yoga instructor balanced all of our chakras this morning, and it felt so powerful. I had so much more energy and flexibility for the afternoon class and my stomach feels worlds better (apparently my second chakra was screwy which has been making it difficult to eat much of anything).
That's it for now I suppose. Next I might be going to south India or Thailand...I am more than ready for some warm weather.
Thursday, January 14, 2010
Monday, January 4, 2010
Seatbelts....?
You'll all be happy to know that I was able to see a Tibetan doctor before I left Nepal and he set me up with some wonderful herbal meds that fixed up my stomach in a jiffy. I have an extra supply now too!
New Year's eve was wonderful...Andy and I spent much of it around the Bodha stupa with insense and spinning prayer wheels and went to bed early (though I was up before you experienced the new year!!). I ate at my favorite breakfast nook for the last time. It's a little family 'restaurant' without a name. You point at the foods you want to eat and it's all delicious and healthy! They even made veggie soup just for me one night :).
I've officially left Nepal and I miss it already. What a wonderful country! I highly recommend a spiritual retreat or a trek or both at once!
A quick summary of how I left Nepal:
The bus was suppose to depart at 4:30pm on Jan 1st but because of the 'strike' (something to do with Maoists is all I ever got from the locals) the bus was rescheduled to 6:30. At 7 we followed the ticket lady out of the office down a series of dark streets to another dark street and waited. I think we got on a bus around 9. We then waited...waited...waited....started driving, and stopped after like 20 min. We then waited until dawn. Then we started moving. I was lucky enough to sit next to a guy who liked to use my shoulder to lean on and smelled of rotting fruit. Andy had a window that wouldn't stay shut though the bus was all around breezy anyway.
We reached the Indian border at night. The couple of foreigners were led to a tiny office without power (the whole border was very dark and very crowded with traffic) to get our passports stamped (Nepal exit) then we walked more and got them stamped again (Indian entry).
We arrived in Bodhagaya Jan3rd probably around 3pm.
This is my experience of India so far:
I've seen too many people going to the bathroom....both kinds of elimination.
If you're a white women, everyone wants to know where your boyfriend is. (Thankfully Andy is pretending for me!)
No one cares that there's a line. Pushing and shoving are a way of life.
Beggars are WAY too insistent.
Samosas are DELICIOUS.
On a higher note, I got a quick glimpse of the Dalai Lama as he drove in today! The teachings begin tomorrow. Hooray!
New Year's eve was wonderful...Andy and I spent much of it around the Bodha stupa with insense and spinning prayer wheels and went to bed early (though I was up before you experienced the new year!!). I ate at my favorite breakfast nook for the last time. It's a little family 'restaurant' without a name. You point at the foods you want to eat and it's all delicious and healthy! They even made veggie soup just for me one night :).
I've officially left Nepal and I miss it already. What a wonderful country! I highly recommend a spiritual retreat or a trek or both at once!
A quick summary of how I left Nepal:
The bus was suppose to depart at 4:30pm on Jan 1st but because of the 'strike' (something to do with Maoists is all I ever got from the locals) the bus was rescheduled to 6:30. At 7 we followed the ticket lady out of the office down a series of dark streets to another dark street and waited. I think we got on a bus around 9. We then waited...waited...waited....started driving, and stopped after like 20 min. We then waited until dawn. Then we started moving. I was lucky enough to sit next to a guy who liked to use my shoulder to lean on and smelled of rotting fruit. Andy had a window that wouldn't stay shut though the bus was all around breezy anyway.
We reached the Indian border at night. The couple of foreigners were led to a tiny office without power (the whole border was very dark and very crowded with traffic) to get our passports stamped (Nepal exit) then we walked more and got them stamped again (Indian entry).
We arrived in Bodhagaya Jan3rd probably around 3pm.
This is my experience of India so far:
I've seen too many people going to the bathroom....both kinds of elimination.
If you're a white women, everyone wants to know where your boyfriend is. (Thankfully Andy is pretending for me!)
No one cares that there's a line. Pushing and shoving are a way of life.
Beggars are WAY too insistent.
Samosas are DELICIOUS.
On a higher note, I got a quick glimpse of the Dalai Lama as he drove in today! The teachings begin tomorrow. Hooray!
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