One of my New Year’s resolutions is to update this blog more regularly.
Another one is to go to India. I have been talking about going for at least a year but now I have started to think, if I don’t go now, it would be harder and harder to go. So I have decided to go for 2 months this autumn. I was told the best time to be in India is between November and February, so if I go from middle of October I can be back before Christmas.
I have been to India before but that was a long time ago. I went to what is known as ‘the tourist triangle’ – Delhi, Jaipur and Agra. Even from the short trip, I was quite taken aback by its poverty , lack of sanitation and the general disorderliness. It was before I took up yoga and by a strange coincidence I started yoga the week after I came back.
I had a friend over 30 years ago in Japan who was a flight attendant for Air India. She said there were three types of travellers to India from Japan. The backpackers, people in fashion industry and Buddhism and Indian Philosophy scholars.
My trip will have specific purpose, too. I want to spend one month in Mysore to do Ashtanga Yoga and spend another month visiting ashrams, namely Amritanandamayi Ma’s ashram in Kerala, Sathya Sai Baba’s ashram in Puttaparthi and Ramakrishna Mission near Kolkata. Also I have a friend near Delhi, who I met though online Hindu study course. She suggested I should visit her and we go to Vrindavan, where Krishna spent his childhood, together. It would be nice.
There are a few more ashrams I want to visit, but I want it to be a leisurely 2 months so perhaps best not to add too many places on my itinerary. I will probably have to plan another trip.
So I have about nine months to plan and research! Exciting time.
