Road Trippin'

Seeing places and people with only a few weeks here in So Cal meant I had to be efficient. Therefore, a little nine day road trip was in store. Arrowhead to the high desert to Vegas to Joshua Tree to San Diego then Laguna and Huntington then up to Redondo Beach and back home with a few hours to nap before the royal wedding. Days spent visiting friends, some more than once. Days spent camping out alone in the desert, driving through more isolated areas for the first time, enjoying the rare greenery that lingers here for only a few weeks a year. The weather was perfect every single day, and now I'm ready to head up and enjoy what to me will be the tail end of the Alaskan winter.

Rishikesh and the Beatles Ashram

My last week in India was spent in Rishikesh. Although there were proportionately more Westerners here than anywhere else I was in India, it didn't ruin the atmosphere of the place because everyone is there in pursuit of their own form of spirituality. Rishikesh, by whoever determines such things, is considered the yoga capital of the world. I planned too poorly to stay at an ashram while I was there, but I was still able to experience many of the ceremonies and courses that I would have if I did. There is such a contrast in Western and Eastern knowledge, and a large part of this trip was planned intending to encounter new perspectives that I hadn't come across before, and Rishikesh helped with that. From doing Love Meditations with a group of strangers, to waking up at 4:30 in the morning to attempt to meditate with local saints, to yoga classes four hours a day, to learning that the path to contentment is found in an awareness of death; all these things were brand new to me and therefore severely difficult to feel successful in any.

A great view of the Ganges, the river I basked next to and bathed in throughout the week.

My last full day in Rishikesh I still hadn't made it to the Beatles Ashram, so it was top of my list. I don't know the details exactly, but the Beatles made the trek out here to stay at this ashram some forty years ago, where supposedly they wrote the White Album. The ashram officially closed fifteen years ago, and since has been slowly overtaken by the jungle surrounding it. It was incredible to walk around and think what all the minds have pondered passing through, and especially of the freedom and creativity in which the Beatles enjoyed while sitting in any of the rooms I'd taken notice of.

In Transit!

I thought two hours to get the thirty kilometers from Rishikesh to Haridwar, where I was to catch a train to Delhi, would be plenty of time. Turns out I was wrong by two minutes. After riding in three different rickshaws and sitting in an Indian traffic jam while a road construction crew paved a precious ten foot stretch of road, I ran through the entrance of the railway station to see my train pulling away from the platform a few rails away. The first time a train had been on time, possibly ever. Fortunately there was a bus station nearby and I was able to hop on one that would arrive at nearly the same time as I would've by train. The driver, thinking he was being nice, let me ride shot gun. Seven stressful hours later, after proving we had the loudest horn on the road and at one point literally driving into oncoming traffic for a few kilometer stretch to reach a restaurant on the opposite side of the center divider, we arrived just before midnight. At that point I didn't want to wake up the next day and think again about navigating public transport, and there were no hotels in the area around the bus station, so I took a shuttle straight to the airport. The guard at the entrance wouldn't let me in the terminal because my flight wasn't leaving for thirteen hours, so I was sequestered to the visitors lounge until I was able to check in. I slept surprisingly well there though. It was a quick flight to Kathmandu, where upon arrival they wouldn't let me leave the airport because my visa had expired the day before. They didn't know what to do with me, so just had me sit and wait for somebody to come along who did know what to do. That person never came, and it turned out all I had to do was pay five bucks for a transit visa and I was able to go and get my things I'd left at a friends' house. What was supposed to be plenty of time to relax and pack up my things and say goodbye to the family I had stayed with my last week in Nepal turned into barely enough time to hop in a cab, grab my things, say a quick bye, and head back to the airport where I rearranged my packing job on the cement outside the entrance. An overnight flight brought me here to Hong Kong, where I arrived early enough this morning to take a train into the city and walk around for a few hours, enjoying a ferry ride across the harbour and finding an authentic noodle and veggie dish. Now I sit leisurely and wait for my plane to begin boarding, then twelve and a half hours later I'll be home in L.A., surely missing the chaos that comes with life abroad.

The Taj Mahal and the Cricket World Cup

I decided to take a cycle rickshaw to the train station in Varanasi just as a thunderstorm passed through town. The winds picked up and dust began blowing everywhere. I switched to an auto rickshaw as the rain started coming down harder, but as long as we were going the right direction I was shielded from the water. That said, I arrived at the rail station pretty soaked, and then almost missed my train after bad information from two different men, but off to Agra I went.

I didn't find out until I arrived in Agra that the Taj Mahal is closed Fridays, so I went Thursday for the afternoon and sunset instead of Friday morning for the sunrise. It was crowded the entire time I was there, but I guess it deserves to be. It was strange looking at a building for so long and giving it so much attention, and I found that I was more moved by what the idea of the Taj meant to me and not by just its physical beauty, which was still incredible. My entire life it has been a symbol of an extremely distant place and different culture than anything I'd experience at home, and that somehow on this day my path had taken me here to be able to appreciate it in person. I think the picture below may be a bit crooked.




I arrived in Delhi yesterday, and the Cricket World Cup Final was last night, India vs. Sri Lanka. The match took about eight hours to finish, so the dramatics were a bit drawn out, but the streets were energetic and shopowner's had their tv's on their counters making sure not to miss a pitch. India did win, and I watched the final few minutes in the back of a large crowd gathered behind a projector. As the cheers began, I retreated to the porch of my hotel. Then the hotel owner came and grabbed me by the arm, told me to come inside, and locked the door behind me. At least I felt looked after. Fireworks and explosions and very happy people dancing and singing echoed through the narrow streets as their country won what was to them the most important tournament in the world.