Parotas, on the way to Tiru

After we left Ganeshpuri and the Nityananda shrine, we flew from Mumbai to Chennai (now Madras), in the state of Tamil Nadu. We spent the night at the Radisson, a good choice in India. That's where we discovered India is in love with Jon Bon Jovi and Bryan Adams' music. The server in the Regency Club played it loudly over and over and said it was the latest rage.

The next morning, after I received an ayurvedic foot massage that came complimentary with the room and Marty ate another dosa, we set off for a four hour drive to Thiruvannamalai (known as Tiru). Tiru is a small town in southern India, famous for its gigantic Shiva temple, Mount Arunachula, and the ashram of the great sage, Ramana Maharshi who died in 1950.

Along the way, our driver, another man named Ganesh, continuously beeped. It was so irritating that we were so relieved to pull off to a road side chai shop. Marty decided to eat whatever the man at the grill was making, because it was in the shape of a pizza. These "little pizzas" were later identified as parotas. This lunch was proving to be both fascinating and dangerous for our health.

The whole time the cook is making the parotas, you'll see a man brushing his teeth and washing up right behind him. Watch how the cook 'manhandles' the food after and serves it to us on a banana leaf.


We also ate the guavas that a woman was selling by the road. YUM! The chai was delicious too. We'll have a video on how to make that later from Rishikesh. We eventually made our way to the Sparsa EcoResort, a perfect place to stay while visiting Tiru.

Ramana's Enlightenment Experience at the Age of 16

Ramana Maharshi was an Indian Sage (1879 – 1950) best known for his teachings of self-inquiry. The most popular book he wrote was called Who Am I?

Ramana was born to a Brahmin family in the state of Tamil Nadu. At the age of 16, he had a life changing experience during which he spontaneously initiated a process of self-inquiry that culminated, within a few minutes, in his own permanent awakening.

He left his home for a mountain named Arunachala in Thiruvannamali where he lived in a cave for many years. He radiated a powerful silence which attracted followers and quieted minds. When asked for advice, he recommended self-inquiry as the fastest path to liberation, or moksha. His primary teaching is associated with Vedanta, and Jnana Yoga, and he recommends a variety of paths and practices.

Below is the video of his words as they are posted on the wall in the ashram. The sounds you hear as you read it are the sounds of the peacocks that surround the ashram.

Here is the transcript:
"It was in 1896, about 6 weeks before I left Madurai for good (to go to Tiruvannamalai - Arunachala) that this great change in my life took place. I was sitting alone in a room on the first floor of my uncle's house. I seldom had any sickness and on that day there was nothing wrong with my health, but a sudden violent fear of death overtook me. There was nothing in my state of health to account for it nor was there any urge in me to find out whether there was any account for the fear. I just felt I was going to die and began thinking what to do about it. It did not occur to me to consult a doctor or any elders or friends. I felt I had to solve the problem myself then and there. The shock of the fear of death drove my mind inwards and I said to myself mentally, without actually framing the words: 'Now death has come; what does it mean? What is it that is dying? This body dies.' And at once I dramatised the occurrence of death. I lay with my limbs stretched out still as though rigor mortis has set in, and imitated a corpse so as to give greater reality to the enquiry. I held my breath and kept my lips tightly closed so that no sound could escape, and that neither the word 'I' nor any word could be uttered. 'Well then,' I said to myself, 'this body is dead. It will be carried stiff to the burning ground and there burn and reduced to ashes. But with the death of the body, am I dead? Is the body I? It is silent and inert, but I feel the full force of my personality and even the voice of I within me, apart from it. So I am the Spirit transcending the body. The body dies but the spirit transcending it cannot be touched by death. That means I am the deathless Spirit.' All this was not dull thought; it flashed through me vividly as living truths which I perceived directly almost without thought process. I was something real, the only real thing about my present state, and all the conscious activity connected with the body was centered on that I. From that moment onwards, the I or Self focused attention on itself by a powerful fascination. Fear of death vanished once and for all. The ego was lost in the flood of Self-awareness. Absorption in the Self continued unbroken from that time. Other thought might come and go like the various notes of music, but the I continued like the fundamental sruti [that which is heard] note which underlies and blends with all other notes."

Mumbai (Bombay) to Ganeshpuri

While writing this entry, we hear that Slumdog won eight Oscars! The movie is about Mumbai, otherwise known as Bombay, a city that 19 million people call home (almost 3 times the population of Arizona). We are no longer in the state of Rajasthan, we flew Jet Airways to Mumbai in the state of Maharastra (one of the 24 states of India).

You'll see in the short video below that there are a LOT of slums, sidled right up to the new construction of huge highrises. The insanity of Bollywood's home is profound - tens of thousands of stray dogs, beggars, cows, mothers and children all competing for food in the garbage dumps, which are everywhere and mostly consist of plastic bags. This is the other side of India: it's living close to the earth.

There is a huge, thick layer of dirt that has landed on the plastic bag roofs of these huts and hangs in the air from the burning of diesel fuel, and the soundtrack to this place is the constant, high-pitched horn beeping. Beeping isn't done to get someone out of the way, it's mandatory if one is passing another cow, dog, person, bicyclist, truck, bus, car, or tuk tuk (the three-wheeled rickshaw.)

As we began this 1.5 hour ride north from Mumbai to Ganeshpuri, a tiny village where Marty lived in 1977, we listened to our Om Mane Padme Hum CD from Nepal. Then, we suggested our driver, Ganesh, who spoke almost English, choose the music. Between the incessant beeping and the Ganesh's favorite Bollywood song, the trip seemed like its own movie.

Next Stop: Ganeshpuri

We arrived in Ganeshpuri, a small village that sprouted up around a guru named Nityananda (1897? - 1961). It was said that he went there because of his arthritis and there were mineral hot springs right next to the temple. If you've been to our home in Sedona, you might have seen a large bronze statue in Marty's office. That is one of Nityananda which Marty had made on his last trip to India. Nityanada is best known as the guru of Swami Muktananda. To get a real flavor of Nityananda and who he was, read about Muktananda's The Play of Consciousness.

The small village of Ganeshpuri is now a pilgrimage site and you'll see in this video the temple, his home, and the place where he took mahasamadhi (died) in 1961. That was the place we sat and meditated after putting in our feet in the hot springs.

It's said Nityananda's mother abandoned him and he was found/adopted by a woman who worked as a servant. Even as a child, stories report that Nityananda seemed to be in an unusually advanced spiritual state, which gave rise to the belief that he was born enlightened. As a young man, he became a wandering yogi, spending time on yogic studies and practices in the Himalayas and other places.

Nityananda gained a reputation for affecting miracles and wonderful cures. He said, "Everything that happens, happens automatically by the will of god." He built an ashram in Kerala, and then wandered through the Maharastra state. In 1936 he went to Ganeshpuri, a tiny village with hotsprings and a tiny Shiva Temple (5' x 5'). The family that looked after the temple built a hut for him, the recognized him as an advaduta, (a person absorbed in the transcendental state.)

Nityananda didn't teach verbally: he was mostly silent. Some believe that he transmitted spiritual energy (shaktipat) to people. He could also be extremely fiery and intimidating in his behaviour, even to the point of throwing rocks - his way of deterring people who were not serious in their spiritual aspirations, or who came to him with ulterior motives.

Lunch in Ganeshpuri

Here is where we had lunch in Ganeshpuri.

Valentine's Day in Rajasthan

Valentine's day dinner was ours at the Lake Palace Hotel in the light of candles, surrounded by fresh flowers, exquisitely served by men with turbans. We felt, once again, that we were having our own personal concert, this time with music from a tambura (a long-necked instrument with four or five wire strings, plucked one to create a harmonic drone) and a sitar (pictured here - made famous by Ravi Shankar in the movie The Concert for Bangladesh, 1971.)

We ate a traditional meal of basmati rice and dahl, nan, followed by a coconut creme dessert. No word, no pictures even (too dark). It was our first real Indian meal (outside of the pretty good food they serve on airplanes here).

After breakfast the next day (see the blog entry below), we checked into the "other" hotel by the lake (this one is on the shore), the Oberoi Udaivillas. The Lake Palace hotel is said to be the most romantic hotel in the world, and according to Travel and Leisure, the Oberoi is ranked as the #1 hotel in the world. It's only 6 years old and no expense was spared building the hotel of 87 rooms. We had a room with a semi-private pool. This is not your father's Buick, nor the India that Marty and I remember from years ago.

When we checked in we were greeted by yet another security check through the luggage, our taxi, and our bodies, and once we passed, we were greeted and adorned with a bindi (sandal paste on our third eye) by a woman dressed in a beautiful sari. We were served my favorite new drink, a pink iced tea that tasted like rose petals. I found out it was made with rose syrup. I will be serving this at my home this summer.

We wanted to play the Om Mane Padme Hum recording we brought with us from Kathmandu. In our room there was a combo TV, DVD, CD player. I turned it on for the CD, and who was on the television? Yup, in his ruby-studded glasses, there was Deepak Chopra talking about non-violence. And his vow of non violence. (Most people I run into don't know who he is - though keep in mind I meet mostly service personnel.)

When I first heard about the vow of non-violence, we were leading a meditation Radiance Retreat in Sedona in November. Could I honestly take the vow of non violence in thought, word and deed? I know I can't control ALL of the thoughts that I hear. It's not that I am particularly violent, but it can be a reaction in my mind when I encounter a story or see people hurting each other or animals for no good reason. I often meet these thoughts with inquiry, and eventually experience the sense of non-violence, but nevertheless, these thoughts do occasionally arise without my permission, so to speak. But as I listened in my hotel room in Rajasthan, Deepak clearly said it's a vow of non-violence in speech and actions. I can do that.

The Oberoi Udaivillas in Udaipur, Rajasthan

Here is a peak at this fabulous hotel and what goes on during our dinner as we dined lakeside. This traditional Rajasthani village dance, called the Chari. is meant to express the happiness felt finding drinking water in the desert. Cottonseeds are set aflame in the pot balanced on her head.

Welcome to India's Rajasthan

We left Nepal,flew into Delhi and connected to Udaipur, a sweet colorful town of the state of Rajasthan. We arrived at a time of many weddings, it was an astrologically auspicious time, Friday the 13th. And the weddings here go on for days. We caught some of the fireworks one family had set off for their newlyweds. You'll see that in days to come.

India has many a palaces, this one is set amidst Lake Pichola. It was heavenly. The Lake Palace hotel has been featured in magazines and travel books and for years I had hoped that I'd visit it. Then there we were for Valentine's day. It wasn't the India I remembered from my trip in 1997, this was a fantasy India experience: clean, easy, quiet, and set to the most beautiful soundtrack of birds singing, and sitar playing.