Back in Auroville

We got back from our trip last night after a 13 hour bus ride. It was a great 3 weeks! wow. First we took a night train down south. Had the best masala chai on the train. Once in tirvandarum we took a bus to the Sivananda ashram. What a place, hahaha! 5:30 wake up, 6:00 Satsang (meditation and chanting mantras, ugh, I think they should call it brainwash hour instead!) 7:30 tea, 8:00 yoga, 10:00 brunch, 11:30 karma yoga (cleaning toilets, not joking...), 2:00 lecture, 3:30 yoga round 2, 6:00 dinner, 8:00 satsang round 2, 10:30 lights out. whew. What a trip. I'm not gonna lie, at the time it was hell. If I have to sing Jaya Ganesha Shree Ganesha again, I might puke. The yoga was intense! I can know hold my breath for like 2 minutes and do a head stand. In retrospect however, it was a great experience. I learned a lot, and honestly I would do it all again. One of the coolest things that happened was one afternoon after lunch I went for a walk across the dam and saw some crows attack an owl nest. I saw the crows drop a baby owl so I rescued the little guy and brought him back to the ashram. That little guy got me out of yoga and satsang! he was so cute! That night we took him back and hoped his mom would take him back. So neat!
Also on the day off we went on a trip to kanyakumari. the southern tip of India. We visited like 5 temples with Swami G, and swam in the ocean. It was so beautiful. Its where the Bay of Bengal, the Indian ocean, and the Arabian sea all meet up. Pretty sweet.
After that we went to Ammas Ashram in Amrita. the drive there has nice. The ashram was cool, it has the tallest building in all of Kerala, 16 stories tall! haha. Amma is really amazing. She is a living saint. they call her the Hugging saint. She has hugged millions of people. She builds hospitals, tsunami relief housing and helps soo many people. She lives her life just loving everyone. I know it doesn't sound like a big deal, but can you imagine spending everyday of your life hugging and serving those around you. I cant even do her justice with my description, look here up.
From there we took a boat on the backwaters. It was amazing. We arrived in allopy and then the next day bused up to Perriyar Tiger Sactuary. No, we didn't see any tigers :(. But the landscape was lovely. A few days there, then we bused again to Kodai Kanal in the western Ghat mountains. We stayed an hour out of Kodai in a picturesque terraced landscape. We were at about 7000 feet elevation so it was pretty cold. We all slept in this shack overlooking the terraced farms of carrots and beans and I don't know what else. We hiked to a waterfall on our second day, and most of us got killer sunburns. It was the first time we had worn tank tops (shoulders are pretty scandalous in India) and the elevation plus our pasty blades didn't add up well. Our Amma Vasanta was a great cook, and we had camp fires every night. Frederick and his son Hero were our hosts. Frederick is basically the original pioneer of Auroville. He arrived in 1966 to see the Mother in Pondi, and he never left. He joins my list of certified bad-ass Aurovillians. 73 and still doing his thing. He has some amazing stories, as does his son. Our third day there we picked out spots in the forest to do our solo and then day four, we headed out, each with matches, some warm gear, and water. My spot was great. I was on the edge of a meadow (it reminded me of the meadow where we watered horses up at elk camp (bear spring meadow?) to give some of you a feel for it). So yeah, our solos were a time for us to be completely alone, no distractions, to think about... everything. Everyone should do this. 2 days at least but I think 3 would be better. It was so cool. 2 days of no talking, not seeing another human, no food, no books or tv. Its weird the things you think about. So after that, we all met back up at camp. two more fantastic days, and then back on the bus to go back to Auroville. The ride was crazy. going from 50ish degrees back down to 110+ degrees is ridiculous. We got back about 10 pm. Everyone was so excited to take showers. hahaha. 8 days of dirtiness is too much for some people, but most of you know I have low standards.
So now we have another week of classes, then two weeks of community stay, and then our final week. Only a month left, wow.
(pictures soon I hope)

xo