At the Mysore Sanskrit College. This photograph is in the Yogasana room, where Sri Krishnamacharya taught Yoga. This college premises belong to the Mysore palace.

I cannot help finding parallels between Timothy and so many yogis that I meet, including myself. This is a typical day in Mysore, for the westerners who hang out there for months. They return to Mysore summer after summer, just like Timothy going back to Alaska. Their agenda is fascinating.

The yoga class for the morning supposedly starts at 6 am. But all the yogi nutcases  are there by 5.30 am. So the class starts at 5.45 am instead of 6. This can happen only in Mysore. After this, they talk about all things mind, yoga, stillness and mostly what sounds like onset of madness to me. Most yogis then attend a back bending session which is one of the toughest classes, I hear. Then some more self practice or free classes by yogis. At the end of the day, yet another astanga class. I am usually done for the day after my first astanga class in the morning and do not seek enlightenment at such a pace. But the Timothy yogis do yoga all the waking hours running from one class to the other watching their grizzlies and sometimes recording it on film. I am not sure who the grizzlies are in this movie. May be it is the wild minds of the yogis. The Mysore story ends with the mind eating all the yogis. Consumed, that’s what it is.

I wish someone would make a spoof of this film with Mysore yogis as Timothy.  That would be such a fun film to watch.

This happened 10 months ago. Sivananda ashram in Kerala is notorious for its factory style boot camp yoga teacher training classes, it is absolutely ridiculous. I have been practicing yoga for many years now that I know what I can do or cannot do. I usually will not push myself to get into any contortion my body is not ready to do. But in this class I did not even realize when I was getting hurt. The teacher is simply yelling into the mike to go into the poses deeper and deeper. The blocks are only in the mind and not in the body. All I remember is after the session I limped back and cannot remember walking correctly ever again or sit without pain even in a simple sukhasana.

The next day I spoke to the teacher about it and he tells me these injuries are mostly in the mind. Huh! I did not know that a block in my mind can hurt my knee so bad. I thought what a ridiculous explanation for my injury. I left the ashram after that and will not step back into it. This is not my first injury in all the years of my yoga practice. I have been injured before and I know injuries are great teachers to stop and make you think. It never made me question my choice of teachers or the course. I was the one always at fault. But not this injury. This should not have happened. Anyway, I have to deal with my knee injury and the wrong yoga choices I had made. Sivananda ashram is probably the only event in my life that I regret getting myself into.

I have complete faith in Yoga that it can heal my knee back. If I do the right kind of Yoga, as in KYM style of therapy yoga or at least mindful yoga. I do like this Indian saying a lot- do not give a garland to a monkey.

Indian Railways has been one of my highlights traveling in India. For most part, the trains were on time and it was way cheaper than traveling by bus, with the exception of Shatabdi. Shatabdi was an especially nice train, with great views. Non-stop from Mysore to Bangalore in less than two hours!

This is Bhagiratha, a king who did tapas to bring Ganga to earth. He did one tapas after another to bring Ganga down, as there were so many hurdles on his way. He is a king and his ancestors had been turned to ashes by a sage. Bhagiratha wanted to bring them back to life and the only way to do that was to ask Ganga to flow over the ashes.

Bhagiratha’s ancestor Sagara performed aswamedha, a horse sacrifice. He would let a decorated horse roam around and wherever the horse went, that land would belong to Sagara. If somebody wanted to claim the land, he would have to fight Sagara. This partiular aswamedha would gain him some powers that rivaled Indra. So, Indra did not want this to go well and he tied the horse in sage Kapila’s ashram. Sagara and his men accused  the sage of stealing the horse. The sage gets so mad that he turns them to ashes.

After many years, Bhagiratha gets to know of this and he decides to bring his ancestors back to life. He does a penance asking Brahma to let Ganga come down to earth. After many years of penance, Ganga is released from the heavens. Ganga flows down extremely forceful and Siva arrests Ganga in his hair. Bhagiratha has to convince Siva to let Ganga flow. Siva opens out a few dreadlocks and Ganga is released again. This time the flow is peaceful but accidentally flows over sage Jhanu’s fields and penance. Jhanu drinks up the entire Ganga. So, Bhagiratha does another penance to sage Jhanu. Ganga is once again released from Jhanu’s ears. After all these hurdles, Ganga flows over Bhagiratha’s ancestors ashes and the story ends well. Ganga is sometimes referred as Jhanavi and Bhagirathi because of this story. Ganga is still believed to be flowing from Siva’s hair, who resides in the Himalayas.

Bhagiratha was used to explain the previous sutra that I wrote about. He is said to have a heart of steel and that he did not give up, even when the tapas took years to please the gods. Bhagiratha in this pose has inspired an asana and it is called Bhagiratasana. Many people call this pose Vrkshasana.

I took this picture in Mahabalipuram, which depicts the story of Bhagiratha and Ganga.

PS  tapas means penance

I got rid of all my yoga notes. It weighed about 6 kilograms. I sold it for 5 rupees per kilogram. Made some money off of my yoga notes that I have been carrying around. I am sure some one in Bangalore is bound to see my stick figures while buying peanuts in a paper cover. I hope they break into a yoga session after they eat the peanuts.

Technology has its uses. I diligently took photographs of all my notes before selling them.  I have stored them on my laptop. Now, I can only hope my laptop does not crash or it does not get stolen. There is no guarantee of either but to be detached with this entire thing. I considered getting it scanned, but it is very expensive in India. I thought of getting my yoga text books and related books scanned. They cost a lot, way more than the cost of the books. I have decided to let go of a lot of books that I do not have space for. I like each and every book that I have, but I have to rank them to select the top 3. Or I will have to leave behind other important things.

I do prefer to hold a real book or sheets of paper than reading it on my monitor. Now the decision is between not having the notes or reading it on my monitor. So, it is not too bad. And, I also think I have read my notes so many times, that it is stored in my brain too. But, that is not too reliable. A compromise is not bad in this case. While I am on the use of technology to simplify things, I want to point out an excellent article written by Papi for Mint, which questions if technology does simplify things.

This is tough. What do I take, what do I leave behind?

White people are actually mini celebrities especially in places like Kerala. The way Indians gush while speaking to the white people is sickening to the stomach. I was always aware that fair skin is what is considered beautiful. I remember having conversations with my male friends in my teens that they wanted to marry a girl so fair and had a complexion like cheese. I always wished them they would find their cheesy girl. I somehow thought in 2009, such things would have gone away. I was taken aback to what extent it is practiced by common Indians everywhere.

While I was in Kerala, there was this international film festival going on. I wanted to watch Nandita Das’s Firaaq. So, I go in on the very first day of the festival and ask for a pass. I was told that the last date for registration is over and there is no way I can participate in the festival. I was thoroughly disappointed.

Then I meet some new classmates in my Kalari class, just landed the previous weekend from France. They tell me they checked out the movies at the film festival. I asked them how they managed to get the pass. They said it was easy. They were even interviewed on a local TV channel asking for their opinion about the movie. They said they loved being in India and how friendly the people were at the festival. These new friends of mine even managed to get a VIP pass for the closing ceremony. Boy, was I pissed with Kerala.

It took me a while to understand it was not just Kerala that loves the white people. It continues into Chennai, Madras. I go to this hotel called “Paradise” with a couple of my white girlfriends. It is a cheap hotel and I wanted to stay there until I found a better place to stay. I was told I could not stay there as I was an Indian. I thought I didn’t hear the manager right, I told him to repeat what he said. Indians are not allowed to stay here is what I hear. I had never heard anything like that before, ever. I do not know why the images of Rosa Parks and Gandhi are flashing in my mind. It was so weird that I could not feel my feet and said this is simply wrong. I asked the manager why Indians cannot stay there and he says it is just their policy. I stomped out of the place after yelling at him and my white friend who was already staying there checked out of the place saying it was wrong that Indians are not allowed in Paradise. It was quite a scene.

Then back to my hometown Bangalore. I had gone to an awful place just outside of Bangalore which I did not want to go. I remember having made fun of the place about a year ago. Then somehow I ended up there with my white girlfriend. It was quite pseudo called “Our native village”. A super expensive place where you can play simple games like gilli danda and learn to milk the cow and churn butter. They had advertised the bullock cart ride and I remember seeing it on bbc news website. We went on this bullock cart ride for six hundred rupees, for 10 minutes!  I thought it was included as part of the package. But, no. I could have bought the bull and the cart for six hundred rupees.

Anyway, I wake up in the morning and go to the dining place. I see there is someone in the kitchen. I waited for him to ask me if I wanted anything. He did not bother. Then I go inside the kitchen and ask for chai. After a few minutes he leaves the chai at the counter which I was not aware of. I ended up having a luke warm chai. Then my white girlfriend shows up at the table. The guy comes running out and offers her all different types of beverages- decaf, full caf and what not at “Our native Village”. He even makes small talk gushing awkwardly. It simply makes me sick, how Indian men can act so dumb.

Just being white makes one a star in India, yikes.

This is what happens when you eat too many fries!

This post is for Phaedrus.

PS These gods were made in Mamallapuram. Click on each picture for a higher resolution picture.

Actually this is all I possess right now. I do have some more books, a sleeping bag and a suitcase  which I will pick up later from storage. The most expensive thing I have in my life right now is a laptop.

The laptop itself causes a lot of anxiety for me. I get nervous leaving my bag anywhere. I am constantly thinking if someone will break in to the hotel room and steal my laptop. I am quite attached to it and it would be a nightmare to lose it and the data in it. I know if it comes to losing my laptop I will have to make peace with that and be yogic about it.

Traveling this light is quite useful, especially in India. I can take my bag with me right inside the toilet and not worry about leaving it outside. If you have traveled in India, you would know what I mean. And, I could walk long distances and not have to agree with the huge sum that the auto drivers ask for even a short distance. It gives me so much flexibility.

It took a long time to downsize to the things I have right now. Before I left San Francisco, I had to sell or donate everything I had accumulated over the last decade. It feels real good to be so light and I don’t want to add anything more. I can’t remember myself being this light ever. Often times I have felt that this bag I carry is quite heavy to walk long distances in the super hot tropical sun in India. I read in a travel book that even a feather is heavy if you have to carry it for a long time.

I get tempted with books and I did end up buying a few books at Krishnamacharya Yoga Mandiram. I did not want to buy any of these books, but I would go to the book shop every day and ended up reading most of the books. I liked a lot of books and bought a few of them as I am fascinated with Sri Krishnamacharya. I did make a conscious decision to see if I would be rereading these books. And, I am reading all the books that I purchased.

Nowadays, when I see anything I like, I immediately visualize how it would be after a few months. I end up seeing  the entire life cycle of the object in my brain in a few milliseconds. I can see how it is going to weigh me down. I think this is the vision of clarity, vidya in yogic terms : )

I can see how much time it would take me to clean up all over again. I think it is simpler not to buy much than to spend all that time to lose all the unwanted things. This thinking has helped me not buy  those lovely clothes that I saw at Fabindia ( fabulous shop in India that sells beautiful cotton clothes). when I return to reality and civilization, I only hope I keep this lesson learnt about being light and buying just those things that I really really really need.

I guess this is why I took to backpacking so well. Why possess more than you can carry? Sounds nice while traveling and being enlightened, but I know I will need few more things to be a civilized woman. For now, I am so enjoying being a minimalist.