Tales from a Sunday fun day in Rishikesh, India

What the hell is an Ashram?

I could not have answered this question before having read Eat. Pray. Love.  Honestly.  Ashram.  It sounds like a fungal disease you could pick up from living in the jungle or something.  Apparently, Rishikesh, our current home, has been the sought out destination since the ‘60s for foreigners looking to master meditation and spiritual equilibrium.  In fact, Rishikesh owes its initial popularity to The Beatles, who performed a concert at one of the ashrams here back in their heyday.  So, indirectly, we have The Beatles to thank for the heightened enthusiasm for seriously disturbing spiritual behavior.

This town is like an addiction.  After spending a single day here, Missy and I have decided to plant ourselves in Rishikesh for ten days.  Well, that and the fact that my backpack is currently housing an alarming amount of souvenirs and I am bored of carrying it.  Honestly, we have gotten so good at jerry-rigging contraptions to the straps of our backpacks that we look like walking Christmas trees.  Last time I tried to put it on, I had to grab Missy’s arm for stability.  When I topple over backwards I will send a shipment home.  Rishikesh, India is built for those individuals who literally want to put the real world on hold and practice yoga and meditation all day, while eating small vegetarian meals in between.  These are the kind of people I used to call "crazies" because they sit Indian style in a park, alone, contemplating the meaning of life, and making zero contribution to society whatsoever.  You can usually find the extreme ones wearing the same thing seven days in a row, with a full head of dreadlocks, and some sort of necklace-thing hanging down to their chests.  I realize that I am completely stereotyping right now, but this is my blog, so if this is at all offensive, just swallow it and move on.  

However, after spending four years in the real world, living in several cities, and meeting many different kinds of people, I now realize that these "crazies" are people too.  If they want to preach the good word about spiritual bliss, then who am I to stop them?  In fact, maybe they are onto something.  The entire reason I am in India is to be thrown outside my comfort bubble.  If I wanted to be comfortable for three months, I would have done an East Coast tour of the United States.  So, while I am in Rishikesh, my goal is to interact with as many "crazies" as possible, and maybe even mimic them.  This is why I have booked a one week stay at an ashram.  That's right people...Missy and I are staying in an ashram to meditate, practice yoga twice a day, and eat mush meals for seven days in a row.  While the rest of the world will be trick or treating at the end of the week, I will be making best friends with my soul.  It's like my own personal Eat. Pray. Love. experience.  So, this forum will be vacant for the next week as I dive into the world of spirituality.  Someone have a beer and a bag of Cool Ranch Doritos waiting for me on November 1.  Thanks.

Pampered Princess

Here is the schedule I followed on Sunday: 

8:30 – 10:00        Stretch Yoga

11:45 – 12:30      Israeli breakfast

1:00 – 2:00          Full body ayruvedic massage

2:00 – 3:00          Pedicure from the sweetest woman that exists.  Her two year old son painted my nails and   fingers purple for me.  What a gem.

3:30 – 4:00          Hummus and Pita lunch with old man Rod

5:00 – 6:30          Beach sunset

8:00 – 9:00          Carb overload dinner with Missy (Getting ready for the ashram)

Tomorrow I am taking a one hour drum lesson.  I am seriously excited about this since I bought my own drum in McLeod Ganj and have been carrying it around since then.  

Rod from England

Rod…what a character.  We met Rod immediately upon our arrival in Rishikesh.  He is English and I am guesstimating around the age of 60, with a full head of white hair, brown teeth, and a cigarette permanently attached to this hand at all times.  After interacting with him for 1.5 seconds, I decided he is the perfect hybrid of Austin Powers and Billy Mack from Love Actually.  He is seriously eccentric, which is why Missy and I are probably so drawn to him.  On our first run in with Rod, he gave us the “low down” on where to eat, what Ashrams to visit, and a bit of a historical lecture.  Rod used to teach yoga in the ‘70s in the ashram where the Beatles played and has been visiting India every year since.  He proudly announced that he spends about $9 a day on the act of living.  I wanted to say, “Well if you eat cigarettes for breakfast and lunch, then I could see how that is possible.”  But, Rod is the man, so I refrained.  

I was secretly hoping to run into Rod again.  And I did.  On Sunday, Missy and I took personal days to run around the town on our own and give each other some breathing room (like she really needed it).  I was lucky enough to run into Rod while I was eating lunch.  He looked high as a kite on something and didn’t seem to remember me, but I went with it.  Once he registered who I was, he asked all about our first day and if we heeded any of his advice.  I gave him a brief itinerary of what Indian cities we would be visiting during our last six weeks, and he regaled me with tales of his own travels to those cities.  My personal favorite was when I mentioned we would be visiting the town of Hampi.  Without a change of tone or facial expression, Rod replied: “Ahhh Hampi.  I spent one Diwali there with an Italian woman I met.  We took some very strong narcotics and all I remember is smashing eggs in her hair…hahaha.”  He then proceeded to casually sip his tea.  I left him in his reminiscent stage for a few minutes without interruption before I said, “Sounds fun Rod.”  He also told me that if Missy and I continue to do yoga and meditation for the next few days then we should be enlightened by Friday.  “How will I know if I am enlightened Rod?”  “Oh you’ll know!”  I guess I will take his word for it.  Rod also announced to me that he should have really been a pop star, but the combination of him being lazy and not knowing how to play any instruments has really held him back… Mom, can we please have Rod to Christmas dinner this year?

Israelis in India

This evening, Missy and I sat in a tree house, on cushions, munching on chips and guac, while we watched a large group of Israeli travelers pass around multiple joints to one another, chain smoke hand rolled cigarettes, and kick some hacky sacks around.  In Pushkar, every sign has Hebrew subtitles.  When we talk to Indians they ask if we are from Israel.  What is with the huge amounts of Israeli travelers all over India?  I will tell you...

From our brief conversations with what seems like hundreds of Israelis in their very early twenties, we have learned something new.  Upon completion of high school, at the age of 18, all Israeli boys and girls enter the army for three and two years respectively.  It's mandatory with very few excuses.  This way, they have explained, should any of Israel's hostile neighbors attack this very small country, their entire population knows how to defend itself.  This honestly blows my mind.  Requiring all citizens to spend time in the army would obviously never fly in the United States.  As I write this, I can automatically think of one hundred civil rights groups who would be throwing stones at the White House.  So, it is for this reason, that I find it fascinating that young Israelis are so complacent with the idea.  Many of the people we have spoken with just shrug their shoulders and say, "It's just how it is...".  

So, back to the initial point.  Why are there so many Israelis traveling India?  Because after they spend two to three years serving their country, they want to spend six months to a year prancing around cheap Asian countries, smoking as any cigarettes and as much hash as possible, with very few responsibilities. 

I guess that is one way to do it. To each his own...

Why on earth would you pick the cow to be sacred?

Have you ever doused your shoe in a huge pile of cow shit?  No…you probably haven’t.  The only real reason you would is if you spent a weekend on a dairy farm, and no one does that anymore.  (Did anyone EVER do that?)  Well, I have stepped in a huge pile of cow shit.  You wanna know why?  Because they are sacred animals in India; which means they are allowed to procreate in mass amounts, eat whatever their mouths can reach, and roam the streets as they please.  They halt traffic, their tails have left whiplash on my arms, and they take massive dumps EVERYWHERE.  Honestly, the creatures just leave their droppings wherever they please…and these droppings are the size of a small child.  I mean, they look like they could have come from something that lived during the dinosaur era.  The worst is when these creatures have upset stomachs.  In that case, you can find toddler size droppings, just spaced one foot apart, for about half of a mile.  It blows my mind that an animal so mistreated and abused in America can be so special on the other side of the world.  Let’s not beat around the bush; the American meat industry could singlehandedly be the most disgraceful, foul, revolting business in our great country.  These sacred creatures that have a better life than 50% of the human population in India, are stuffed with steroids and slaughtered to be slapped between white bread, slathered with packaged condiments, and delivered in frozen patty form to American food chains for $0.99.  On this side of the world, these animals are feasting on the day’s best produce remains and taking a snooze in the middle of a major interstate, not to be disturbed.  The most baffling thought of all is that if you exported Indian cows to America and American cows to India, they would not even notice a difference in lifestyle.  Cows have to be the most blatantly unintelligent, anticlimactic, big shitting animals to roam the earth.  What in the world would any religion, society, civilization find holy or sacred about these mammals?