Ayurveda School in Pune

We spent the month of December in Pune (pronounced Poo-na) studying ayurveda with our new favorite Americans, Dr. Indu Arora and Montserrat (pictured below). Our schedule included daily lectures, evening clinic visits, and weekend outings.



We attended an Indian wedding our first weekend in town.

We enjoyed eating dinner in our apartment and learning how to cook Indian food from Indu. Now living in Chicago, she is from Delhi and travels internationally teaching yoga seminars.

We went to B.K.S. Iyengar's 91st birthday celebration. What a fun night!

Rickshaw rides were polluted and stinky so we took to wearing scarves for protection.

We toured two ayurvedic hospitals and pharmacies. The tree pictured here is good for skin disorders.

This carving depicts the five elements that govern the life force in all of us.

Aloe vera awaiting processing.

Pomegranate ripening

We searched for more cheap books at this cramped ayurvedic book store.

Our graduating class and some of the faculty from the International Academy of Ayurveda.

After our course, we took a weekend to sight see with Indu. We saw many impressive temples and ate delicious strawberries along the way.

Our weekend trip was the perfect ending to a month of study. We can't wait to visit Indu in Chicago when we return home!

Yog: Of the body for the mind

Since our journey began, it's been operating on a plan as you go basis. We've had a general idea of places to go and things to do, but have mostly relied on the universe to direct us to the right places at the right time. India has been no exception. Of course, there is a slight level of discomfort in the unknown. We knew we wanted to attend an Iyengar yoga school in northern India, recommended by our yoga teacher in Peru, but without a visa or a plane ticket we couldn't exactly reserve a space. Yog-Ganga's website recommends students apply for a course four months in advance. We sent our application in with 7 days to spare. Luckily, in an otherwise full year-round school, there was space for us in the next session.
Within a few days of receiving our visas in Dublin, we found ourselves in the foothills of the Himalayas in the beautiful quaint town of Rajpur, state of Uttarakhand. As our yoga teachers Rajiv and Swati say, we had a featherbed landing in India. Our prearranged lodging was in a sizable home with a marble staircase and massive garden, our dinners were cooked for us, and our twice a day yoga classes were focused and challenging. As we visited with our fellow classmates after orientation, we discovered many of them visit the school annually for several sessions in a row. By the end of our first day at Yog-Ganga, we decided to apply for the following course. The second three week session had an ayurveda focus, something we didn't want to miss out on.

Our home during the first course. Nice!

Outside the yoga school

Outside the studio

Inside the studio

They say “everything's bigger in Texas”. A similar adage can be said for this country : “everything's more intense in India”. To walk down the street is to experience extra sensory overload in many ways. On the ten minute walk home a few days into our first course, we saw a dog's ear falling off while he licked up his dripping blood from the ground, a large colorful dancing wedding procession in the middle of the street, then a preteen girl carrying a dozen bricks on her head to a construction site. It is one thing to witness these events, process them or put them in one's journal and then move on. It is another thing to stay in a place long enough to see the dog's ear heal (somewhat), and the young married girl carry bricks in the same sari for days on end. Staying somewhere makes it a bit more real, for better or worse. Perhaps staying somewhere for a very long time, like home, creates an opposite effect. We are so accustomed to our surroundings that we stop noticing things. It does seem, however, that there's simply more to look at in India.
There is no trash collection in Rajpur, but dozens of well maintained temples. Rubbish is either dumped off the sides of hills or burned. The free range cows munch on sidewalk garbage, as do monkeys and dogs. It is interesting to think that in an American city, we create much more trash, but it is neatly collected and hidden away in a landfill. Seeing the trash created due to higher consumerism makes us more sensitive to it. The trouble here is that prepackaged goods are more modern, so instead of taking your cooking oil can to the store to get it refilled, people buy plastic bottles of oil. Thus, the problem unfolds. Swati, our yoga teacher is trying to clean up Rajpur and to get trash collection going but it seems it is an uphill battle. It is probably very hard to convince people to reduce and reuse when it is opposite to the perception of progress and attainment/status.
On a lighter note, our classmates helped us celebrate Josh's birthday on October 4th by going out for breakfast after class and hiking to a nearby waterfall. Well, the hike had to be delayed for a couple days due to rain, but it was a wonderful trip nonetheless. Thanks to all our friends and family who sent warm birthday wishes via email and Skype.

Nice view on the way to the waterfall

The waterfall

Happy Birthday Josh!

We've had several chances to enjoy and participate in local cultural celebrations as well. There was a grand celebration for Patanjali's birthday (the father of yoga) at our school a week after Josh's birthday. Our class helped decorate the studio by creating sand paintings (called rangolis) and making garlands of mango leaves and marigold flowers. There was a musical performer and a wonderful feast for students and local families.

Getting ready for the celebration

Josh working on the tiger rangoli. After five hours of concentration (and some assistance) his masterpiece was finished!

Our class completed three rangolis

Our tallented classmate Rick snapped the following three pictures:

We used a lot of marigolds!

In the week between yoga courses, we were invited to Mussorie (funny enough, pronounced much like our home state) to celebrate Diwali, the biggest Hindu holiday of the year. The mountain top town has long been a honeymoon destination for Indians, and the views are spectacular. We sat in on a long puja (ceremony with readings of Hindu scriptures, offerings and prayers) and again enjoyed a wonderful feast. We also watched our yoga teacher's faces light up (literally and figuratively) as they lit small fireworks in the yard and watched bigger firework displays below. Situated high up in the hills, we were able to see the fireworks in all of the Derhadun valley below. It was a magical sight. There were no official city fireworks displays, but rather thousands of individuals all over the valley setting off their own fireworks. It was the first time we had watched fireworks from above the explosion line.

The sun sets behind a "moon line" during the winter months. One of only two places on earth (and Sweeden) where a false horizon is visible.

We also made two overnight trips to nearby Rishikesh, a holy pilgrimage site for Hindus. The Ganga river runs through the city, and there are many ashrams and yoga schools to visit. We especially enjoyed shopping for Indian printed English books. Our ten kilo shipment home consists mainly of ayurveda books that cost three times more in the states.

The Ganga is a beautiful shade of blue

Six weeks of Iyengar yoga classes have almost passed; we feel very fortunate to have found Yog-Ganga. We recommend the school to anyone who wishes to deepen his or her yoga practice, even if you haven't studied Iyengar before. The only danger is, Rajiv and Swati might just turn you into an Iyengar practitioner!

Our classmate performing a traditional Indian dance for our class

Our traditional pumpkin carving...

Happy Halloween everyone!



Om Shanti!

Kundalini Yoga and Road Tripping in France

Following an all night bus ride to Barcelona, we received a warm welcome from Julia (our yoga friend who used to live in Edwardsville, IL). Since we accidentally left our camera at Sunseed, we don't have many pictures to share. We made the best of our one night stay by sightseeing and wandering the colorful busy streets. Thanks Julia!

An arduous overnight train ride left us at the gates of the European 3HO Yoga Festival in the Loire Valley of France. We arrived a day early to train as volunteers in the kitchen and registration desk. It was fun to pitch our tent in an open field, then watch it fill up with hundreds of tents as the days progressed.

Around 1800 people from all over Europe attended the yoga festival. Yogi Bhajan brought Kundalini Yoga (the Yoga of awareness) to the West in 1968. He founded 3HO (Healthy, Happy, Holy Organization) to help spread the teachings of Kundalini yoga. Kundalini yoga combines asanas (physical postures), meditation, mantra (chanting), pranayama (breath techniques) and music. Together these techniques help build and maintain a Healthy body, Happy mind, and Holy spirit. Read a great article about Kundalini Yoga on the 3HO website (What is it all about?).

According to Yogi Bhajan's teachings, sadhana (or daily spiritual practice) is the base, or foundation of all spiritual endeavors. Sadhana is whatever you do on a regular basis to clear your consciousness in order to relate to the infinite spirit within you. Every day we encounter new stress and every day we would benefit from some sort of spiritual practice. Include physical exercise, meditation, and prayer to cover all your bases and attune to your highest spirit.

In keeping with his teachings, each day of the 10 day yoga festival started with morning sadhana from 4:30 to 7am. The highlight of the festival was 3 days of White Tantric Yoga. White Tantric Yoga is done in pairs as a group meditation. It is designed to quickly break through mental and subconscious blocks. Practitioners sit facing their partner and do 6 to 8 kriyas lasting 31 or 62 minutes. A kriya is a meditation including a yoga posture (asana), a hand position (mudra), a breathing technique (pranayama), a mental focus, and/or a mantra. The kriyas were intense. Sometimes we meditated for 62 minutes holding our arms above our heads, or linked arms with our partner, chanted a mantra, stared into each other's eyes and did a breathing technique for 31 minutes. That is a long time to be doing something over and over but it makes for a very nice meditation. After a while you just let go and flow. At times we would lose focus and coordination, but often the mantra we were chanting allowed us to recenter and refocus. At times the chanting and breathing techniques took us beyond time as we felt we could continue the kriya forever if we had to.

This year, the White Tantric Yoga was milder than years past We practiced for about five hours a day, as opposed to years past where it was up to ten hours a day. One of our last krias was a 62 minute blind walk. We went in groups of 11 with hands held in a long chain chanting "wahe guru". It was quite a powerful three days of yoga.

When we weren't practicing, we were working with the awesome kitchen group pictured above. We were from about eight different countries, and by the end of the festival we had all become great friends.

We didn't cook meals at Sunseed because we weren't sure how to prepare food for 45 people. Well, we learned how to cook for 1800 during the festival. The above recipe made one day's worth of hot sauce for the festival. We both worked in the kitchen preparing dinner for several hours a day.

Josh was one of four strong men working in the kitchen, so he was called upon several times a day to pour food and tea from the pots to the serving buckets.

Our dish washing operation was massive. During meal preparation, 16 people each stirred a pot to make kicharee. If the pot was not stirred properly, it would stick to the bottom. This made the washing up quite challenging, some pots taking up to a half hour to clean. But we were working with friends, chanting and chatting so the work was never mundane.

The last day of the festival was called Peace Prayer Day, and a large feast was prepared. Za helped all day making the special meal of eggplant, potato and tomato. Twelve batches from the above cooker were eaten! Everyone was so excited to eat garlic bread and butter, it was a nice change of pace after eating kicharee and vegetable soup for a week.

On the last night, there was a huge dance party under the big top. The DJ played lots of Indian dance music and everyone celebrated a great week coming to a close.

Happy Yogis!

We knew we wanted to go to Amsterdam after the festival, but we weren't sure how we were going to get there. We solicited a ride from a supremely nice man from Hamburg, Germany. He said he wanted to take a few days to camp in France, then would drop us off in Amsterdam. We were excited to load into his Mercedes station wagon for a good old fashioned road trip. Volker was a great travel buddy, he liked to stop by the side of roads to make coffee on his camp stove and take back roads because they have better scenery.

We camped for free on the northern coast of France and had crepes before driving through Belgium.

The three days and nights were filled with great conversation, lots of laughter and general camaraderie. We were grateful to have met such an awesome person through yoga. Thanks Volker! We hope to visit you in Hamburg someday!

As our new friend drove away, we were back on our own with a new city to explore. We were looking forward to having some free time after our month of yoga and volunteering.