11/28 – Yikes! It’s been a while since I posted! And it will be a while longer. I am heading off for a 16-20 day trek on the Annapurna circuit in the Nepal Himalayas. I’ll be back in touch around December 16, hopefully with loads of pictures and a good story to tell.
November 2006
Monthly Archive
PrintPosted Tuesday, November 28, 2006 under Asides
11/25 I jumped in last minute on yet another 10-day silent Vipassana meditation retreat, this time in Kathmandu. Although a bit less comforting (read: cold) than the centers in the US, the Kathmandu center had a beautiful garden, and Vipassana is still the best thing I have found for my mind and body. Purity. Insight.
On the Banks of the River Ganges
Posted Saturday, November 4, 2006 under India , Travel|
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Varanasi -From the prayer flags flying from the hilltops of the Tibetan community of Dharamsala to the yogis, ashrams, temples, and yoga centers of Rishikesh, I went from Buddhism to Hinduism on an overnight bus. Waking up bleary-eyed and short of sleep in Rishikesh, I thought: I’m back in India. Shopping ladies in colorful saris, ochre-robed wandering sadhus, huge trash-eating cows lounging about blocking traffic, destitute crippled and diseased beggars, families of Hindu pilgrims with red dots or straight lines on their foreheads visiting temples and shrines, the hum and bustle of people filling every space, garbage and raw sewage underfoot, mangy dogs, and constant honking.
For the next couple weeks, I followed the course of the Ganges, the holiest river in Hinduism (personified as a goddess, the mother of all). I tried to get to its source in remote Himalayan Gangotri, but couldn’t get all the way because the temple there had just closed and no transport remained. I meditated on its banks in hilly Rishikesh, where the tributaries converge into roaring headwaters, running fast and glacial blue. I bathed at the ghats in the Holy city of Haridwar, where the river is still cool and clean. I watched the cremation ceremonies at the ghats in Varanasi, a city older than history itself and the center of the Hindu cosmos. Varanasi is thought to be a gateway between the worlds. It is said that if you die there, you achieve instant liberation. (more…)
Posted Saturday, November 4, 2006 under Asides
11/4 – I will be at a course on Tibetan Buddhism at the Kopan Monastery in Kathmandu between November 8 and the middle of December. I will be out of contact the whole time.
