a great day for up

I made it to Thailand! What a completely different place from India. Bangkok was a bit of a culture shock after almost three months of being enveloped and devoured by dirt and filth and sweat and smiles and curiosity and poverty and pride and devotion. I'll have to share more about Bangkok itself later, as I transferred all those photos off my camera and don't have the disc with me at present.

However, I have since made my way down to the south western Andaman coast of Thailand near Phuket to where the earth has thrust up spectacularly unreal deformations of limestone pinnacles and softened them with impossible jungle growth. After landing in Phuket I immediately bumped over to the sea town of Krabi as a jumping off point to the islands. I managed a full day boat tour of four islands with some decent snorkeling, and a couple of nights of great Thai street food eating at a nighttime market, but the real thrill was spending two days at the isolated peninsula of Railay, cut off from all wheeled transport by huge limestone cliffs and only accessed via boat, typically the Thai long boat which has an elongated streamlined shaped wooden hull and both powered and steered by a 20 foot steel pole with a small propeller at one end and balanced in the middle by an attached outboard engine... they move the entire engine balanced on the pole in order to steer. The Railay peninsula is a series of three calm beaches (one more of a mangrove swamp) linked by walkways and developed with many resorts, bungalows, bars, and restaurants, but most known as a world class rock climbing spot, as well as a spectacularly beautiful landscape. I took the opportunity to challenge my fears a little and spent several hours exhausting my fingers and forearms and legs scampering up and sometimes clinging with dear life to the beauty.

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heavily meditated

Who knew the path to enlightenment would be so excruciatingly painful?! Real physical pain, not the meta variety. This particular method of meditation known as Vipassana (insight) as taught by SN Goenka is said to be in direct lineage from teachings and techniques of Siddharth Gotama, the Buddha. Apparently this meditation technique was lost in India a long time ago, but was preserved in the neighboring country of Myanmar (Burma) and brought back to India by Goenka about 30 years ago. The basic technique of meditation starts with taking a vow to adhere to 5 moral precepts... no killing, no lying (not speaking really helps that), no stealing, no sexual misconduct, and no intoxicants. A vow of silence is observed for the entire 10 days, although you are allowed to speak to the teachers and assistants if necessary. Accommodations, food, and even laundry services are provided free (minimal charge for laundry) and by volunteers who have completed the course before. The whole environment is purposefully set up to allow the meditator the best possible chances for success with focus and determination. But it's hard... really really really hard! The pain, the mental frustration, living like a monk for 10 days. From the outside the technique involves sitting in silent, eyes-closed, meditation 10 hours a day for 10 days. Ouch.

For the first three days, the meditator is asked to focus on the breath, in-out natural breath, as it is not as you would like it to be, gently bringing the attention back to the breath whenever it is found to have wandered, without judgement or frustration. The technique does allow you to adjust your sitting position if you become uncomfortable to the point of pain, which is inevitable. After the third day the mind should be able to focus for long periods of time, and the body should be better adjusted to sitting for long periods, which is when they ask you to sit unmoving and with concentration for three one-hour sessions of the full 10 hours each day ... and you thought it was uncomfortable before! The technique then asks you to shift your attention from the breath to the entire body, part by part, scanning slowly starting with the top of the head and moving down to the feet, focusing only on any physical sensations you feel (didn't you know pain is just a physical sensation?) at the surface of the body, remaining perfectly equanimous with those sensations (neither clinging to the good sensations nor rejecting the bad ones), and bringing the mind back to the breath if and whenever you find that your attention has shifted away to la la land. It's on this day four when the Vipassana method actually starts. The technique directs that you sit in meditation, focusing only on the physical sensations throughout the surface of the body, continually scanning from top to bottom and bottom to top in an orderly manner, and with the intention that you will soon be able to feel a free-flow of subtle energies or sensations simultaneously throughout the entire body... but you must remain equanimous to any of those feelings, either gross sensations (i.e. - pain) or subtle sensations (i.e. - flow).

The proposition of Vipassana technique is that life is misery and the only way to be free of this suffering is to gain mastery over the mind and retrain yourself to become equanimous, neither attaching nor rejecting, simply observing the sensations and events and not reacting, in all aspects of your existence. Once you are able to achieve equanimity with all of your present moments the mind and body will start to dig up all of your past sufferings, which you are to simply observe, and with this equanimous observations the past sufferings will be dissipated, leaving you free and enlightened if not in this life then in the next. The technique uses meditation and the focus on the mind/body sensations as a way to provide the observer with direct experience of the nature of their existence, not intellectual games or untested faith, but the personal truth of personal experience. The following was my experience for these 10 days...

Day 0 (5/12): the overnight bus from Goa to Mumbai somehow manged a broken window around 1am and it took two hours to clear the glass and block up the opening with wood and fabric?, running late!, anxiety, rushing, jumped off the bus early on the outskirts of Mumbai, hired an expensive private taxi to drive the 2-1/2 hours to the center, made it just in time only to find out that I could have easily arrived several hours later with no repercussions, annoyance, registration, vow of silence, sleep by 9pm.

Day 1 (6/12): meditation focusing on breath, familiar, easy, no problem but difficulty finding good position, shifting a bit, mind quieting, enjoying the silence and stability after 10 weeks careening around India.

Day 2 (7/12): narrow focus to breath and physical sensations at nostrils and triangle above upper lip below the nostrils, mind quieting, constant cacophony of loudly burping Indian men is becoming annoying and distracting, uncomfortable aches in back and knees bordering on painful.

Day 3 (8/12): narrow focus to breath and physical sensations at nostrils and triangle above upper lip below the nostrils, mind surprisingly quiet and calm, finding few distractions... this should be easy enough, happiness!

Day 4 (9/12): strong commitment requested to sit for three 1-hour sessions without moving... stabbing pain in the back! feels like someone is literally jabbing a knife in my back and twisting it around! I thought I was a yogi... what's all this body pain about?! resolve, commitment, ugh... shift position, now laughing at the burping... a welcome distraction from the pain.

Day 5 (10/12): pain! dagger twisting in the back but mind is able to remain equinimous (sort-of), observe the pain as merely sensations, not avoiding pain, gross sensations turning to subtle tingling, mind expands to awareness of entire body simultaneously, complete (or almost complete) physical dissolution! sensation of dissolving of the entire physical body with only slight awareness of heat/light at areas of former pain in the back and knees, spine seems to elongate to 10 feet high, body becomes vibrating particles at one with the universe.

Day 6 (11/12): similar but lessening awareness of simultaneous all-over subtle sensations, mind chasing vibrating sensation, attachment, clinging, frustration.

Day 7 (12/12): less pain, no dissolving, mind wanders, past relationships, childhood, family, friends, lovers, sex sex sex breath breath breath sex sex sex sex sex breath sex sex sex sex sex sex sex sex sex sex.

Day 8 (13/12): breath sex sex sex sex sex breath need to find an apartment breath apartment apartment sex sex sex sex sex worries about money breath breath breath sex apartment money sex apartment money sex apartment money sex breath sex sex sex sex sex sex.

Day 9 (14/12): the stabing pain in the back is back and has now spread to include a staning pain in the chest! I'm over this whole experience, frustration, sex apartment money sex apartment money sex apartment money, resolve to go beyond threshold of willingness, determination, breath breath breath.

Day 10 (15/12): the end is in sight! loving compassion meditation technique taught, breath, loving compassion, anticipation, silence is broken, uneasiness about return to normalcy, discussion with fellow participants, shared experiences, loving compassion.

Day 11 (16/12): happiness in completion, understanding of technique as a start on the path towards enlightenment, long road ahead, commitment to practice, India is shouting just outside the gates, expulsion, packed onto a train, barely standing room only, remain equanimous, loving compassion, just observe, equanimity..

silence is golden

After preparing myself by spending a week tanning and relaxing and eating good food at the beaches of Goa, I'm about to embark on a more inward journey... I'll be spending 10 days in silent sitting meditation in the Buddhist Vipassana (Insight) tradition as taught by SN Goenka at a center just outside Mumbai. I hope to come out of this with my head still attached but perhaps a few insights.

The daily schedule is as follows...
4:00am wake up
4:30am - 6:30 sitting meditation
6:30am - 8:00 breakfast
8:00am - 9:00 group meditation
9:00am - 11:00 sitting meditation
11:00am - 12:00 lunch
12:00pm - 1:00 rest
1:00pm - 2:30 sitting meditation
2:30pm - 3:30 group meditation
3:30pm - 5:00 sitting meditation
5:00pm - 6:00 tea break
6:00pm - 7:00 group meditation
7:00pm - 8:15 teacher's discourse
8:15pm - 9:00 group meditation
9:00pm - 9:30 question time
9:30pm lights out

Wish me luck and I'll update everyone on the other side... who knows, I may not have much to say after this. If you're interested in learning more check out http://www.dhamma.org/

cochin

After the wildlife of Periyar I spent a few days feasting on the hip and chilled scene of ex-pats and tourists in Fort Cochin, Kerala. In contrast to the neighboring modernizing port town of Ernakulam, which essentially is the city of Cochin, Fort Cochin is a sleepy, leafy, old-world town with a heavy Portuguese, Spanish and French influence. There's even a Jew Town with the remnants of an influential community now trading in spices, artifacts, and jewelry. I loved the huge plates of fruit with the special breakfasts at the Kashi gallery/cafe, and the fresh fish with beer and chips to cool off at night... I think my traveling is revolving more and more around food... I saw a classical Indian dance performance of Kathekali where the dancers pantomime emotions and stories from classic literature such as the Ramayana using gestures of hand (mudras), feet, head, eyes, and arms accompanied by a singer and drummer. Traditionally the female characters were played by men, and the dancers are encouraged to use invention in their movements. The tourist-packaged dance wasn't really all that exciting, but the true dances performed in temples and on festival days actually last all night and the Indians, who have grown up with these stories, understand the language of the movements in a way that I never will.

where the wild things are

Periyar Wildlife Sanctuary in Kerala is supposed to be a place of refuge for elephants and tigers, but the only evidence I ever saw of the big animals was their poop... which I suppose is just as well because I certainly wouldn't have wanted to see the tigers or elephants caught in the flashbulb glare of the thousands of tourists who take the noisy motorboat trip around the lake. I really don't know what anyone was expecting to see making all that noise between the motor and the chatter... I hope the animals were far away living in their natural habitat without any intrusion. I did join the evening party boat cruise and, although the wildlife was non-existent except for a few deer and some tormented birds trying to settle down for the evening and instead finding their nests encircled by photo-snapping predators, I was able to meet some Indian girls finally instead of my usual entourage of boys. I ended up on a boat full of high-school girls on a three-day class trip out of Cochin accompanied by their biology teacher and their Hindi teacher. It took until most of the 2-hour boat ride was over, but a few girls were bold enough to ask my name and we started conversing about the usual stuff. These girls were all beautiful and well spoken and they had a good time laughing at each other for talking to me. Young women are really not supposed to talk to strange men in public, but the boat offered a more private atmosphere and their teachers (both men) also joined in the Q&A.

The next morning I took the early dawn nature walk with a young French photographer/filmmaker and her mother and really got to see the natural environment in a more intimate and educational way... we were clad in high canvas booties which we would occasionally rub with tobacco to keep the leeches at bay. Our guide was a bird enthusiast and pointed out many species while whistling and warbling his way through the jungle. We saw black monkeys, kingfisher birds, grey-billed warblers, an orange-breasted bird, a rare Sri-Lankan Frog-Moth bird?, spotted wood-peckers, wild boar, a bamboo snake, a giant wood spider, bison (in the distance), mushrooms of all sorts, turmeric, cinnamon, teak trees, rosewood trees, grey mongoose poop with evidence of a meal of blue scorpions, porcupine poop (funny, I didn't think Bryn was going to be in India until January?), week old tiger poop, and elephant poop (which apparently dung beetles gather and bury and then bears? dig up to eat the beetles). The jungle sounds were really haunting with the chirps and chatter of the birds, the steamy hissing of unseen water, and the distant "oooa-oooa" echoes of monkeys invisible in the trees.

in god's country

Kerala is described by the inhabitants as 'God's Country' (probably under the direction of the State Tourist Bureau) and the obvious influence of Catholic missionaries, the deeply beautiful natural environment, and the relaxed manners and easy smiles of the people have the effect of lulling one into a state of charmed agreement. Not that I'm agreeing to the existence of any of god's hands (2 or 6, take your pick) in the creation of this world but Kerala is a lovely place to drift, and the people's obvious pride in their home is justified... they often ask where else I've traveled in India and then sort of suggestively ask for a comparison between Kerala and the north, and when I say that Kerala is my favorite place so far they nod and smile in agreement as if it were obvious.

After the crush of pilgrims at the southern tip of India I made a quick escape to the cliff-side euro-touristy beach town of Varkala, Kerala for just a couple days in the sun, sand and surf before heading back out into India. Yes, Kerala is still India, but the beach towns are so full of foreigners fattening themselves on cheap seafood and beer and tanning their hides in the sand while locals hawk the same loose-fitting hippy-print clothing ("hello-sir/madame-please-you-come-look-my-shop-looking-is-free") that it sometimes doesn't feel like India. It is good though to have a break from the self-perpetuating movement of trains-buses-rickshaws and just stop for a few days, so I joined in the fat beach life.

I soon felt the pull of movement again and hopped a half-hour train ride up to Kollam to catch the 8-hour ferry ride through the backwaters up to Alleppey. The train ride was typical... by which I mean that after 5 minutes of climbing aboard I was once again surrounded by at least 10 19-year-old boys who just wanted to talk and be friends, and by the time I got off 30 minutes later one had his arm around me and another had kissed my cheek (both just signs of friendship and not a come-on... at least I think so?). The boat ride was slow and relaxing and a little boring, but a good way to see the canals and backwater life without paying huge sums for a private houseboat trip... I'd had enough of houseboats from my time in Kashmir, ugh. The canals aren't so much waterways cut through land as the opposite... a vast watery everglade cut by strips of reclaimed land shored up by stone walls and barely held together with palm trees. The thin strips of land are lined with small houses, gardens, cows, chickens, Chinese fishing nets, and schools served by boat landings.

The ferry landed in Alleppey at dusk to a rainstorm and I sloshed my way to a guest house without really knowing much about where I was except that it looked and smelled like little more than a town made up of a boat junk yard and an open sewer where the described "delightful leisurely shaded walks along green rimmed canals" were supposed to have been. The morning brought a different perspective and I did discover the lovely parts, along with a curious pervasive culture of organized socialism. The day I spent in Alleppey was a day of workers strikes from 6am until 6pm and almost everything was closed except an eatery behind a large gated door called the "Indian Coffee House" where funny fan-hatted waiters served masala dosas and chai tea in the front rooms and operated a coffee packaging and distribution collective in the back. The canals in town were lined with old state collective operations and workers union halls along with high-end guarded jewelry stores and the requisite sidewalk travel agents talking up good deals on houseboat tours... no thanks, I'm leaving in the morning to see some elephants and tigers in Perriyar Wildlife Sanctuary.