traveling with scissors: September 2010

And that is the truth. My habits good and bad have followed me around the world, which is why I decided to try Vipassana meditation in India that I have heard so much about. It's run on volunteering and donations only so I had nothing to lose and everything to gain. They have the Dhamma centers around the world and the technique has been around since 2500 years ago, so I knew it was legit. The course is ten days. No speaking, no eye contact, hand gestures, reading, writing, listening to music or eating a meal after lunch at eleven in the morning. I can't remember ever going a day in my life with out doing at least several of these. Oh yeah and no killing, which I wish I could say I was successful at. Not even an ant. While on my way to brush my teeth I heard a crunch and lifted my foot to reveal a snail with fragments of it's own shell protruding from its shapeless corpse. I looked up to see everyone staring back at the murderer with silent gasps. The no talking was great, after having a life with an excess amount of small talk, it was really a relief to become introverted. Waking up to the sound of a gong, two delicious Indian meals a day, watching a family of about fifty monkeys swing from tree to tree in the forest were the perks. Eleven hours a day of sitting in the same place was one of the most painful things I have ever put myself through mentally and physically. Moving meditation is usually how I calm my oh so scattered mind through yoga, knitting or walking. With this technique you don't use something that is outside of your body because everything that you need is within you. Which is true and like most things the best way to go about doing something or the correct decision is usually the hardest. Sometimes I was going strong with clearing my mind and other times I let the reel of thoughts go like bats in the belfry. One day I took a mental day off and decorated an apartment that I don't even have with wall hangings and lanterns that I made in my mind. I knitted things, had themed dinner parties, got singing lessons, played short films, met a knight with an English accent who wrote to me in calligraphy, lived in a castle and bestowed gifts upon me and songs? Try entire albums. Including Diana Ross and the Supremes anthology, Dark Side of the Moon, Ziggy Stardust and Beyonce. On day five, the physical pain became unbearable. So bad that I walked out of the dhamma hall back to my dorm and sat on my bed cross legged with a blanket over my head. I thought that my exit went unnoticed until a knock came to the door. I was told that I have to come back inside and that the physical pain of throbbing knees that felt as if they were whacked with a nine iron, the steak knife being plunged into my left hip sensation and the anvil falling from the sky and crushing my sacrum were all good things because it is my impurities being eradicated. I went back in and baby did I let-it-burn! I felt like I was breathing through labor. Either this was going to leave me crippled or relieved in the end. After about six hours the pain began to subside and I was glad that I had faith and took the advice. Repressed memories. Those are fun aren't they? Spring, 1988. My first holy communion. My white lacy dress with a necklace sewn on it(it was the reason I chose it) zipped up my back, my hair curled and the veil placed over it and a huge glass of cold milk before heading off to Saint Rose of Lima. While standing in line ready to take our place in the pews, I was poking my head around to find the closest bathroom when a repressed nun startles me by grabbing my arm and whispering in my ear with a clenched jaw, "Do I have to put you in a straight jacket to get you to stay still?" Defenseless and ashamed I stood in line with a lump in my throat. Standing in the pew, I hear nothing of what the priest has to say because of the nuisance of my full bladder. Shifting my knees back and forth and trying to build a dam with my little eight year old thighs was unsuccessful. I let it rain down my white nyloned legs and onto the kneeler before me. I'm almost positive the boy next to me saw but I wouldn't know because I didn't wear my glasses for the occasion. I quickly stooped down and mopped up the little puddle with the trim of my dress and proceeded to receive the body of Christ. I wore the same leggings all day at my party so that no one would suspect my misfortune. This was my deep dark secret for years to come. I had a complex about consuming beverages of any kind in fear of losing control. Anytime I was in public and passed a restroom, I had to go, which became a running joke with friends and family. I was envious of kids in school because they didn't take a whiz all over themselves at a religious ceremony. The boy that was next to me grew up to be a very nice looking gentleman. He was always so sweet, even if he did see, he wouldn't have said anything even back then. He approached me at my high school reunion in 2008 and asked me if I remembered him. I felt like I was in the third grade again just talking to him and wondering if he knew. Obviously I grinned at the absurdity and thinking that it was going to haunt me for the rest of my life. To this day, I can't even look at stained glass windows with out having to use the toilet.
Dharamsala- tranquility, peace, lush forests, breathtaking mountain views, ayurvedic doctor appointments, Indian cooking classes for $6, guesthouse $2.50 a night, yoga, home of the Dalai Lama. I'm going to be here for a while, but I suppose nature is just balancing things out to keep me connected to the real world before I enter this alternate reality never to return(my mom would kill me). I came to Dharamsala from Delhi in a filthy seventies volvo with an Indian guy to my left falling asleep with his head on my shoulder, the one in front of me had his seat back so far that I couldn't even cross my legs and the toothless one behind me with the Buddha garb on was trying to hock loogies out the window all night but I think most of them just landed on himself. Sleep was not an option for me through this fifteen hour freakshow. Every time I looked out the window we were getting closer and closer to the stars, it literally took my break away. Every hearbeat was telling me that I was going to a special place, and I was right. You could stay for years and there would still be something new to discover everyday.
If you need me, I'll be at the Krishna Cafe listening to music, drinking chai and hanging out with all my new friends from vipassana. I met Cheri, who is thirty three and from Utah who has been living here or four months. I am so fortunate to have someone who can introduce me to locals and give me some priceless advice. Daniel from Sydney had hair like Jesus until we decided to trek to a waterfall and chop it all off on the side of a mountain. Sukomar, a doctor from New York who volunteers his time in the Himalayas, Adina, an Australian kinesiologist, Mari, my roommate from vipassana who is a Japanese scuba diving instructor, and Antoine, a photographer from France just to name a few.
People from my former life are dropping like flies. Including extended family who ignore messages including birthday wishes. I try to see it their way, I mean legend does have it that if you swim out too far into the ocean at the Jersey shore that you will just fall right off the face of the earth so I don't blame them for their lack of interest in places that don't even exist and the people who are allegedly there.

Me about to cut off Daniels locks

Cheri buying feathers for her hair from Diana, a dreadlock specialist

Diana's work station

Rita giving me Indian cooking lessons

I can't get enough of these people

or their goats

or rolling hills

and enchanted forests

me and Beth Reilly on that fateful day

is more then enough. On Sunday morning I woke up and forgot what country I was in. I hate it when that happens. Stretching my weary body and filling my lungs with my first breath of the day, I was promptly reminded. Nothing like the smell of mildew in the morning. Let me paint you a small picture of what the first step outside of my guesthouse was like:

feel- pouring rain, humidity that hits you like a brick wall, mud squishing under my feet, a film of sweat and pollution on my skin, mosquito bites all over my legs from the guesthouse the night before, tightness in my upper left chest

see- trash, tuk tuks, motorbikes, rickshaws, mangy dogs, cows, the steam of streetfood vendors, electrical wires tangled in a massive knot, western hippies, sikhs, monks, women in bright saris, lots of stares, children playing barefoot, shops selling wall hangings, pashminas, artwork, anything you can imagine, people begging for anything and everything

sound- horns of every kind,"where are you from?", "where are you going?", Bollywood music blaring from shops and cars

smell- incense, shit, vomit, streetfood, mold, strange, indescribable and hopefully forgettable

taste- this is where it gets good: chai, the breads, cholle, basmati rice, thali, dosas, samosas, lassis- this surpassed my imagination

It was almost midnight when I arrived the night before. I was anxious to rest my jetlagged bones. The first place made me throw up in my mouth a little bit. I walked up the stairs(a few stacked bricks) into a dark and narrow building. My though process was as so: what the hell is that splattered on the wall?,what is that smell? why is that skinny brown man naked laying in the hallway floor laughing?, a lot of buckets to catch the water from the dripping ceiling huh?, yeah, I'll think about it, thanks. I ran out the front door and back out on the street and did that a few more times before I finding a decent place. This blog would be ten pages long if I included all of the details of the next few hours of my night. The place I chose looked great from afar, shiny tile floors and neatly made bed but when I started getting comfortable I noticed a few odd features. The place was loaded with mosquitos, the sheets had peculiar stains on them, the bottled water was just an old bottle with tap water, the ceiling fan shook like a furious tempest when I turned it on and nothing but ice cold water in the shower. Something told me to take the blanket from the airplane and thank god I did because I wrapped myself inside it and slept in it like it was a cocoon. This is what you get when you are desperate in the middle of the night.
The next day, I met a tuk tuk driver, Amit, who drove me around all day for next to nothing to all of the temples,religious sights and markets. He even took me to the slums where everyone gathered around to see the real live white girl up close. A man even handed over his infant daughter for me to hold and wanted a picture. An adolescent boy also wanted a picture and begged me to have it developed so he could show his mom. He said she would never believe it. Amit had his heart broken by a Bengali girl and got really choked up when he talked about her. I told him, "Hey buddy, your preaching to the choir, I have scars all over this thing", pointing to my chest. He told me he was living his dream by being seen with a white girl. Making dreams come true is what I do but this was all too much for me so I went back to the guesthouse.
This all sounds chaotic and a bit mad and it was, but I wasn't afraid at all. If I wasn't afraid here, then I could make it through India for sure. I have heard stories that scared me to the core about getting parasite or deathly ill or dead dogs and babies floating in the Ganges. Perhaps my being raised Catholic prepared me for the worst?(Epiphany#163 The world is not scary, for I hath no fear.)