Gurukula

Happy Valentine’s day.  After an overnight bus trip from Pondicherry to Bangalore (sleeper bus, quite comfortable, except for the really bad patches of road), we stickhandled our way through the local buses to get to Oso Dodi Gate, where the Gurukula is located.

A Gurukula is a place partially supported by followers of a guru based in Varkala, Kerala.  They have other spaces as well, and this one is on twenty acres of land outside Bangalore.  Ma (Margaret) is the one who lives here and manages everything.  Visitors come during the year, and especially on this weekend for the annual Guru Puja, where the guru comes and people come from all over to celebrate and hear his words.  There has been a legacy of spiritual masters who have influenced this place, starting with Narayan Guru, and the the Nataraj Guru.  The current master, Muni Narayan Prasad, arrives tomorrow morning, and Amy and I will volunteer to help set up the place for an influx of perhaps hundreds of people on Sunday.  There will be music on Saturday night, and I have already played guitar with Abe and Sajeev, Abe playing wonderful bamboo flute and singing simple ragas that I am able to accompany.

This place is beautiful, natural, very simple.  It is a place of contemplation, reading, yoga, and helping with the cows and gardens, preparing food for people, setting up canopies for the yoga space and some tents for people to stay.  There are many other animals here too, four dogs, three cats, many varieties of birds and butterflies.  Tonight we watched the quarter moon setting to the west, and it was quiet and peaceful.  I am really enjoying my time here already, and looking forward to Guru Puja and beyond.

Ma is an amazing woman, yet another “little guru”.  She is older, but looks very young, beams with love and light, and works through everything that needs to be done in this busy place.  Things are hard to get done, with workers making promises and then not showing up.  In the past two weeks, with financial help from donations, she was able to install a new pump for the drinking water well, so we now have fresh clean well water that is safe to drink.  The cow provides milk, paneer, yogourt, and food for the two new calves born a couple of months ago.

We also met Ma’s daughter and son-in-law, Manjeri (Manju) and Henry.  They are a wonderful couple who have many “children”, including several species of animals, dogs, cats, and even a pet monkey.  However a traumatic think happened today to Mommy Manju.  Her pet monkey, Rhea, suddenly got sick and died after Manju and Henry left them with people to come here.  Rhea was rescued at a few days old, when here mother was killed.  She ended up coming home with Manju and Henry, and as they said, she is more human than most humans.  Her sudden death was the loss of a child for them.  The are taking the bus back to Hyderebad to deal with the situation, and to make sure there is no virus that can spread to other animals in the household.  They will return by bus tomorrow night, arriving Saturday morning.  What an intense day for them (and us).  Our love goes out to them.

More to come on Gurukula experience.  (Sorry no pictures – our camera was stolen!)

Tiruvanammalai

Where to begin?  It’s been a while since I’ve posted a blog, because the Internet has been either absent or very intermittent.  We were spoiled in Kochi, with steady Internet at our homestay.  Since then, we were off the grid completely in Kodaikanal, even without cell reception for four days.  Then in Madurai, there was no wifi.  Now, here in Tiru, we have wi-fi in our room, sometimes, and we never know when it will work and when it won’t.  Frustrating, but I just have to let go.

Over the past week, there haven been so many adventures, I’ll never catch up.  So I will write about here, Tiruvanammalai, home to a magic mountain, Arunachal.  The road from Madurai to Tiru is very flat.  Then as we approach Tiru, the mountain Arunachal looms above the town, where legend says Shiva manifested.  Magic mountain, power spot, this place is a magnet for spiritual seekers from all over the world.  Here is where Sri Ramana Maharshi was drawn at 16 years old.  He spent many years living in and around a cave on the Arunachal mountain, silent, ascetic, meditating.  Years!  Then, responding to the urgings of many disciples, he came down and started to establish an ashram at the foot of the mountain, which is the main centre drawing people from all over the world, to meditate, pray, chant. The guru died in 1950, and his legacy lives on.  He spoke little, and when he did it was in simple language.  He didn’t talk philosophy or Bhagavadgita or Vedas.  He said: “Who am I?”  He taught people to seek the True Self within.  That is all.  He never sought disciples or followers, didn’t want to be called guru, he only wanted to life a simple, ascetic life.  To me, he was “the real thing”.

Arunachal from the bus stand in Tiru

The energy of the devotees is very intense, though I must say, most are absorbed in their own practice, and quite honestly, most are unfriendly, even miserable-looking.  I don’t quite get it.  “If you are doing so much spiritual work, why are you so miserable?” Amy says.  Still, I do sense a mystical energy here that affects me as well.

We have spent four days here in Tiru.  We climbed to the caves on Arunachal, sat and meditated with many devotees, and visited the ashram and heard wonderful chanting.  Still I didn’t feel very comfortable.  I wasn’t really “getting it”.

Kids near the ashram on the way up Arunachal

Then we went to visit a friend of Sajee’s.  Anand is from Kerala, he married a western woman named Gayathri and is raising two sons.  He came to live in Tiru five years ago and bought some land outside of town, facing the mountain.  He is gradually building an organic permaculture farm, growing many varieties of fruit trees, vegetables, with a cow.  He also built a simple “open studio” and several huts where people who are meant to come would stay for days or even months.  He and his family live a beautiful simple peaceful life.  Gayathri is a very accomplished visual artist and potter, and is preparing a gallery exhibition of her work for Kashi Café and Art Gallery in Kochi (we were there), and then another in Cuenca, Spain (we were there too many years ago!).

On the day we went to visit Anand we got up early and rode our bikes to the farm for 7 am Yoga with Krika, a visitor from Italy who is living there.  After, we sat with Anand for several hours, and I could have just stayed.  I felt so fulfilled, so peaceful, and was touched by the magic of Arunachal.  I felt Anand spoke to my soul.  He seemed to identify my particular mind-space at that moment, and I learned valuable lessons from him.  He spoke about just being, not doing.  Of course, he said, there is much to do, but once we let go of our need for ego gratification, our need to be recognized for our “achievements”, everything in life is a meditation.  “I could tie the cow to the post, instead I walk with the cow – cow meditation.  I could build an irrigation system, instead I carry small buckets of water and water the plants and trees by hand – water meditation.  I have no need to prove anything to anyone.  Here, I experienced ‘death’ and ‘annihilation’ of my ego self, and now I am only here with Arunachala, and I am very happy and peaceful.”

Sitting with Anand and Amy facing Arunachala, I got it completely.  I realized I could easily stay here for months.  We will return.

Temple Elephant in Tiru

Of course, as everywhere in India, there are many contradictions.  In town, big signs were posted all over announcing the death of a very important man.  Apparently two thousand people came to his funeral to pay their respect.  There were lots of fireworks, an elaborate procession with music.  It turns out (someone said) he was the biggest crime boss in the area!

Sadhus at the Temple

And there are so many miserable-looking western “seekers”, unfriendly, “self”-absorbed, no smiles, nothing.  Because of the very strong presence in Tiru, many local people have become jaded and also unfriendly.  For the first time ever in India, the host of our homestay was nasty, miserly and unkind. 

There are hundreds of people persistently begging all the time.  This is a town where there are many many ashrams offering free food to everyone daily.  One time Amy bought some chai for a woman begging, to avoid giving money.  She smiled gratefully, and after she drank the chai, she came back to Amy and asked for money again.  It never ends.

Tiru is a magic place, and like everywhere in India, is full of contradictions.  It’s everything!

Next stop, Pondicherry.

Leaving Fort Cochin

Ginger Restaurant Jewtown with Amy

Our time is almost up in Fort Cochin, though we return for a few days in March before we fly home.

It’s hard to describe how wonderful this place is.  Though people are friendly all over India, especially when you get out of the biggest cities, here is even friendlier!  Many mornings I park myself on a bench at the beach to write, contemplate and watch the ships pass through the channel.  I see Sandia there each morning, since it is her spot to clean on the beach.  We have become friends.  This morning she approaches and says “Uncle (!), do you remember the words I taught you in Malayalam?  Name?”  I say “Peyre!”, she taught me that.  She asks about our children and about where we live, and tells me about her two children, of whom she is clearly very proud.  I will miss Sandia.

And each morning I pick up a little cardboard cup of masala chai from Sobehr.  He knows I don’t want sugar, and so makes a fresh batch for me without my asking.  Yesterday we were at the repair shop of our bicycle man Kumarek.  As we left a “2-wheeler” scooter pulls over, and it’s Sobehr, who saw us on the side of the road, and had to stop to say hello.

Cherrai Beach with Amy

It’s a little sad to leave, and my heart is filled with gratitude for our time here and for the fabulous people we have come to know.  We’ll be back I know.

Paul on the bike

One of the greatest gifts of our Cochin time has been Yoga with Sajee.  Sajee is a Yoga Master, and Yoga is life, not just postures.  I want to remember his teachings, and integrate them into my life.  In a way, it’s nothing new, all spiritual teachings lead to the same place.  Yet I am learning from Sajee and it’s sticking.  Some sayings (approximate):

We are all lonely travellers in this world.  We are born alone and we die alone.  We spend a few minutes with each other.  When we love someone, we are really loving ourselves.  We can only really love ourselves.  This is our purpose.  We are one in the cosmic conscious (sic).

In the child pose, he says: “Feel that you are an unborn baby in the mother’s womb.  We’re not doing anything, all is provided for us by the cosmic conscious.  We breathe the oxygen, we do not make it, it is given to us.  We eat food, we do not create it, it is provided.  If we can be like the newborn baby, then we experience the true self, and remove the ego.  Ego says ‘I did this, this is mine, this is not yours, I am this, you are that.’ All illusion.  If we are free from Ego and duality, all is one in the cosmic conscious.”

Paul and Sajee Backwaters

I have received a lot of healing energy from Yoga, Ayurvedic Massage (thank you Vivek!), and from living in Fort Cochin among these wonderful friends. 

Paul and Sandia

Thank you India, thank you Sajee, thank you Fort Cochin.