And goats and donkeys and water buffalo but no cats. The Indian people are a superstitious lot and cats are considered bad luck mysterious so they are missing from the menagerie of animals. There are plenty of animals in the mix; in the middle of the street, eating the garbage, on the sides of the roads. Most of them are
We flew from Varanasi to Khajuraho, home of one of the many Unesco World Hertiage sites in India. As our tour manager keeps saying, India is a land of myths and legends. Legend has it that Khajuraho was founded by Chardravarman, son of the moon god, Chandra. (Just an aside for the non-yoga people, one of our yoga poses is
Dividing into three cars, our group was delivered to a drop off spot again for a walk to the Ganges for a sunset boat ride. Raja, our 13 year old boat driver was ready and waiting for us. We boated to the area where the cremations take place. There were eight or nine fire burning with three or four bodies
Literally next door to the hotel was a silk weaving business. Most of the weaving is done as a cottage industry with looms in weavers’ homes. There were four of five looms and two weavers doing their work while the owner gave a talk of how the looms worked. The pattern is both known in the head of the weaver
Our 4:15 wake up call gave us just enough time to get ready and gather for our 5 am bus ride to the Ganges. At 5 am the city is surprisingly active. Although the shops are closed, some of the street vendors are already set up, selling their wares. The bus took us as far as he could and then
We met our tour manager, Mansi, in the lobby of the hotel. She is in her late 20’s and unmarried, which is unusual for an Indian woman of her age. She is engaged to be married to a man she has met for 22 minutes. But we learned this much later in the day. I digress. More later as she
After lots of preparation I got my suitcase packed with about half clothes and half “stuff” (lots of health stuff -anti malaria, anti diarrhea, antibiotics, soap, shampoo and a decent size jar of peanut butter to name a few) and it was under the 50 pound weight limit United has and under the 44 pound weight limit the Indian airlines
“Only those who will risk going too far can possibly find out how far one can go.” ~ TS Elliot Tuesday I jet off to Asia, spending six weeks in India. The first couple of weeks traveling in the northern part and then studying yoga for the month of October in Pune. As I have shared this upcoming journey, many