I'm attending a series of workshops this weekend presented by A.G Mohan and his son, Ganesh which is very cool; the Mohan family have studied yoga in connection to Ayurveda, physical and mental health extensively and I've been reading their books for years (A.G. Mohan and his wife, Indra, literally wrote the book on Yoga Therapy). Although I was looking forward to the workshops on an intellectual level, interested in what I might learn, I wasn't expecting to be this jazzed. Something happened tonight, I left the workshop filled with a sense of quiet excitement and found myself making plans as I drove home.

More and more I'm interested in yoga as a form of therapy. In keeping with that, more and more I feel like my Masters is just another step in preparing me for something larger instead of the means to an end that it was when I started it (this is both frustrating, another 'beginning' step?, and ridiculously exciting). Mohan studied with Krishnamacharya, as did my teacher Pattabhi Jois, however his approach is quite different from Jois'. Mohan, like Krishnamacharya's son, Desikachar, works with students in individual sessions assessing their needs and creating tailored asana and pranayama programs. I love this.

I planned on travelling to Chennai to study at Desikachar's institute in 2005 before the powers that be brought me to Mysore instead. I've no doubt that Mysore was where I was supposed to be at that time and I can't see myself ever leaving my ashtanga practice, it's as much a part of me as breathing is, but I've never really seen myself teaching it in the traditional way. Actually, I've never seen myself as a yoga teacher, period, but I have always known that I was going to work as a therapist with individuals/groups and that yoga would play some role in that therapy. Lately it feels like the drive to start moving towards that vision won't be put off much longer.

Desikachar runs a 2 year teacher training program that I expect to enroll in one day, there's a teacher training program beginning in Toronto in January and the Mohan's run a 2 month intensive training program every October-November, also in Chennai. It's a good thing I picked up some contract work to carry me through this school year because it looks like I'm going to be a student well beyond April as originally planned ;)

And the Mohans? They were knowledgeable, humble, light and filled with humour. I'm looking forward to the rest of the sessions.

Tuesday

So, yesterday was a good day.

Left the house at 5.30am and returned at 10pm. In between I practiced (lovely), prepared & delivered a presentation (went well), and had 7hours of classes (which were interesting) before catching the subway home. Like I said, a good day.

Except for the fact that yesterday I DROVE into the city.

Lately I've sensed an energy of questioning among those I've met both personally and professionally; not an unhappy or depressed questioning but more a curious one - what else is out there? It's a strange autumn in that sense; far from preparing for a long winter rest, we seem to be rousing ourselves to seek what it is we need. At the same point in time, there's an urgency there, a drive to figure it out now, have the answers now; this I feel very strongly.

Whether I feel frustratingly immobile or amazingly blessed depends so much on the situation. When I think about it, one of the biggest differences is the degree of commitment I bring with me; the very areas where I'm struggling are the same where I haven't actually arrived at a decision yet. In some cases they're also the ones where I've been waiting for others to help with decisions that are mine alone to make. Still, I'm reminded that there's no rush.

Playing with the possibilities is as relevant as committing to a dream. The beauty of this time of year is that the winter provides time to allow our questions to gestate and play with the possibilities that emerge, all we have to do is make room for the dream to form. And, really, there is no rush (I say this more for my benefit than anything else, I seem to have to remind myself a million times a day to just sit with it - whatever it is I'm struggling with - just sit with it. Surely it'll stick one of these days ;)

one elementary truth

This poem arrived in an email today and I'm happily posting it. There's something gorgeous and understanding and compassionate about it that I find timely.

Until one is committed,
there is hesitancy,
the chance to draw back,
always ineffectiveness.

Concerning all acts
of initiative and creation,
there is one elementary truth
the ignorance of which
kills countless ideas and splendid plans:
that the moment one definitely commits oneself,
then providence moves too.

All sorts of things occur
to help one that would never
otherwise have occurred.
A whole stream of events
issues from the decision,
raising in one's favor all manner
of unforeseen incidents,
meetings and material assistance
which no man could have dreamed
would have come his way.

Whatever you can do
or dream you can, begin it.
Boldness has genius,
power and magic in it.
Begin it now.

Johann Wolfgang von Goethe

Snow? What snow?

There was snow today. It only lasted long enough to make its presence known before disappearing into the cold, unforgiving corner from which it emerged. But, still, snow! The funniest part about it was our reaction: we happened to look out the window at the same time to see the evidence highlighted in the lights of a passing car and the conversation missed a beat as we registered that what we were seeing was not rain but snow - big, fluffy snowflakes - before we all began talking at once, as if to erase what we'd just seen. Snow? I didn't see any snow, how about those Leafs?

Coming from the girl who broke out her electric blanket in mid-August, this is not good news. If you need me, I'll be in bed where it's warm. Until June.

heaven's ass

Something came up with someone, somewhere in the family and although I forget who, what, and why, the outcome was the rescheduling of Thanksgiving for sometime later in October. Accordingly, instead of heading to my Aunt's for thanksgiving dinner, tonight my mother, sisters and I headed to my Grandmother's for a decidedly un-thanksgiving Chinese food dinner. To broke to buy flowers, but knowing my little sister would show up with a huge bouquet, I didn't want to arrive empty handed so I decided to bake dessert.

Forgetting that I always try to make cobbler and it always looks horrible, I made pear cobbler. Last week I bought a box of pears because they were both locally grown and on sale. It seemed like a good idea at the time but, I've discovered that I can only eat so many pears before I begin to dread opening the fridge just to see them sitting there, looking hopeful (pick me! pick me!). When I saw the recipe for pear cobbler I must have been so excited over the word 'pear' that I completely blanked on the 'cobbler' part.

Predictably, it looked horrible. Horrible enough that, if you happened to be behind my sister and I as we walked to our Grandmother's, you would have heard a conversation a little something like this:

Sister: Here, you carry this (passes the cobbler back to me), I don't want to carry it, it looks like ass
Me: But it tastes great
Sister: Yeah, well it looks like ass. I'm not carrying it through Grandma's place
Me: But, seriously, it tastes like heaven
Sister: It may taste like heaven but it looks like ass. It's heaven's ass. I'm still not carrying it.

For the record, we were both right. It did taste great and it did look like ass; I didn't want to be seen carrying it either, that's how she ended up with it. We compromised by hiding it in my bag under my computer and the family compromised by hiding heaven's ass under mounds of vanilla ice cream. Heaven's ass pear cobbler and Chinese food: a new Thanksgiving tradition is born.

i have a secret

Ok. Don't tell my dentist or anything but I am in absolute agony. I know, I know, telling my dentist sounds like the logical thing to do but here's the thing: the agonizing-please-put-me-out-of-my-mercy pain isn't coming from the tooth I had the root canal on yesterday. It's coming from another tooth. A tooth far, far away from the root canal tooth. Which means that my teeth have banded together and are engaged in a not so quiet revolution against me.

I've spent the morning engaged in countless activities designed to distract myself from the agonizing pain in my head. Fun things like cleaning and, when that failed, pinching myself because, yeah, introducing pain to some other area of my body does actually help distract me from the throbbing, all consuming pain that's colonized the right side of my skull. So why not call the dentist? Because I absolutely cannot, will not entertain the idea that I might have to add ANOTHER $3,000 to my already huge dental bill.

It's Thanksgiving weekend in Canada and, despite my toothache (did I mention it's causing agonizing pain? ;), I am thankful. I'm thankful that I'm writing in my lovely, clean apartment with the sun streaming in the window, thankful that I'll see my family this weekend and that we're all healthy and happy, thankful for my cat sitting on my lap purring, and thankful that my sister, as per my request, will shortly be sneaking into my apartment and clubbing me over the head with some kind of blunt object to put me out of my misery.

In lieu of further complaining and in recognition that it is Thanksgiving and there is so much to be thankful for, I leave you instead with a quote that I found scribbled on a piece of paper stuck way back under the couch this morning when I was cleaning. It's nice.

"Your daily life is your temple and your religion. And your body is the harp of your soul. And it is yours to bring forth sweet music from it or confused signs" Kalil Gibran, The Prophet.

Happy thanksgiving everyone. Hope you're able to find the sweet music in the realities of your everyday lives in your own unique way over this thanksgiving weekend :)

the cost of falling apart

I've been thinking a lot about my body lately. Not, of course, in any kind of self-congratulatory way (a North American woman with a positive body image? Isn't that grounds for expulsion?), but more in a 'Wow! You too!?' way. You see, it seems that I'm falling apart.

I know I've whined before the litany of physical complaints that accompanies big changes in my life and this time around is no different. I haven't been too frustrated because by now I expect them. You could say we have a gentleman's agreement: I continue to take a nice, stable life and throw it into upheaval and my body continues to respond by making it difficult to sit, stand, walk, climb - in general, to move. It works. But now my body is messing with my ability to eat and that is most definitely NOT in our agreement. At least, not to my knowledge. But then, as I thought back over the past few years, I realized something; I realized that my body has been breaking our agreement and tossing in random additional injuries for as far back as I could remember.

Here's the deal. Last week one of my molars broke (well, dissolved, really) so I need a root canal and reconstructive work. Up to this point I've just been irritated by the cost, pissed that I can't eat, and frustrated that this happens every time I leave a job and lose my dental insurance leaving me scrambling to cover the costs. Every. Single. Time. And then it hit me. It's not just my back that responds to change, it's my teeth too. My mind, unconscious, equilibrium - whatever - is so freaked out by change that even my teeth, those things that remain long after the rest of the body has turned to dust, they crumble at the sight of a bagel.

I've decided that I either succumb to a nice, stable life - stop changing careers, stop leaving great jobs to travel, stop ignoring the very stable lawyer type boys - or I get better health coverage because this shit is getting expensive. Whenever I contemplate spending a large chunk of money I usually think first about where that money could fly me if I were to put it to a plane ticket instead. That's why I still have a mattress on a floor instead of a bed. I could buy proper furniture but I'd rather go to New York for the weekend.

This root canal thingy I have going tomorrow? Two separate trips to India. That's all I'm saying.

salmon, soulmates and the meaning of life

I received a message from I. today saying only "the chinook salmon are running the Humber already, just thought you'd want to know". He didn't leave his name, but he didn't have to; other than myself, he's the only person I know who would actually care about something as mundane as fish swimming upstream.

Every year I look forward to the salmon run and every year I call/email people to let them know that it's 'that time' again with the degree of anticipation you might expect from something 'truly' exciting. Which, for me, the salmon run is. Which is why I absolutely love that I. thought to call. It's one of the many things that bridges our +30 year difference in age and makes him one of my most favourite people ever.

I love nothing more than sitting by the river, letting myself be awed by these fish. By their determination, tenacity, and unquestioning drive; if you think that's a lot to get from a fish then you need to get yourself to a river and watch. Watch the way they rest, gather their energy and then hurl themselves into the dam wall time and time again simply because that's what they do. Sometimes I'm inspired by their determination and others I despair over the futility of their struggle - so few actually make it. Which side I fall on can be an interesting gage of how I'm feeling about life that year.

Last year my friend K. and I sat by the river for hours alternating between talking and watching the salmon in silence. Several days later, I received this email from him: "ps. i've been thinking about those salmon and the question you asked 'how do they keep going through the defeat & the pain?' - i am sure they have lots of pain, and risk of life, and fear and many other things us humans find very discouraging. yet they keep going because it is their path. they are very inspiring - those fish".

It's true. They are inspiring. They'll be running for the next few weeks but particularly active next week leading up to Sunday's full moon, so, if you're in the GTA get yourself down to the Humber or the Credit River and let yourself be awed.

And, by the way, this year I'm inspired ;)

So, my friend made me cry yesterday. He didn't mean to but finding tears seems to be the one thing that's coming easy to me these days. He mentioned that he was wondering to himself whether or not I was "doing the work". This followed my comment that I felt like I was floundering but didn't feel like I was doing anything about it - that I forgot what I was supposed to do about it. When he commented that he noticed the same (about me) I felt like a failure which, in hindsight, seems like a strange initial reaction, but there it is. For all of my attempts to instill that sense of equilibrium that I so want to possess, it takes so little to chase it away, to send me into a panicked spin. I don't know anymore what 'doing the work' is. What that looks like. And it makes me feel ashamed. Aren't I supposed to know?

My tears often accompany confusion, anxiety, uncertainty; attached more to fear than sadness. I hate that I'm not sure what my 'calling' is anymore, I hate that I'm working so hard to apply myself when I'm not sure it's right for me, I hate that I'm pretty sure it is right for me but I'm afraid I'll suck at it so I'm throwing doubt up as a pre-emptive defense, I hate that I have one foot out of the country but am fighting to engage in life here too, and I hate not feeling grounded most of all. But then, I was thinking about all of these things last night and I decided to lighten up on myself.

I am groundless. I would say that the ground has been pulled from under me but, really, I kicked the ground away - quite happily . And I'm glad I did, I was sick of the old ground. I knew I needed change, that there was growth there and that it was really, really important that I make room for it. And I knew it would be hard at times and that I would feel like this at first because I jumped off a professional cliff, I jumped off a personal cliff and I don't know yet how the story ends. That's a lot for this girl to take on at once.

And do I need to mention that even as I type I'm smiling? That I'm shaking my head at myself because I know that in a few months I'll feel like an idiot for even posting this? That I know it'll pass, that this is exactly what I wanted out of this year? I feel like I do. Because no matter how many happy, inconsequential, chatty posts I publish, it's always the one kind of unhappy one that people seem to latch onto. Don't do that. This is good too.

note to self...

A bag of chocolate chips does not count as dinner.

And, no, the fact that they were actually carob chips, not chocolate chips, does not make them a health food. Nice try though.

Enjoy the upset stomach/sugar-rush-induced-insomnia combo. Sucker.

overheard at moonbeam cafe this weekend...

...two girls talking to each other about whether or not to pursue a research position this year with the one girl advising the other to go for it with the reasoning "...I mean, before you know it you wake up and you're 30...".

Yikes! I'm past the "before you know it you wake up and you're X" warning age? Someone should have told me. Or sent me the memo. Or whatever. Here I've been living under the impression that life just gets better each and every year.

Silly me ;)

reason #462 why i freaking love my country

Pope Benedict has had a busy week talking smack about Canada. It seems he's disappointed in our morals, values and politics. The headline of one newspaper informed me that the "Pope Slams Canada" while another, The Globe and Mail, quotes the Pope as berating Canadians for "excluding God from the public sphere" and tells us that "In the name of tolerance your country has had to endure the folly of the redefinition of spouse...". I had to read the articles a few times, I wanted to make sure I understood correctly, but I think I finally got it: the separation of the church and the state is a bad thing and tolerance is undesirable. Wait, no, I still don't get it. So what exactly is Canada doing wrong?

Despite the existence of recent (and self-indulgent) posts whining about my return home, the fact remains that I'm home because I like home. I like Canada and I'm incredibly proud to be Canadian - in large part for the very same reasons the Pope has 'slammed' us for. Separation of religion from politics, freedom of choice, the fostering of mutual respect by encouraging tolerance, call me a heathen, but I'm all for them.

As I walked home I was thinking about the articles and how glad I was to be a 'recovering Catholic' so I could disagree with the Pope without the nuisance of worrying about damning my soul to eternal hell when I was interrupted by an elderly woman. She greeted me by commenting on what a lovely morning it was before assuring me that "there is a healing coming". She wasn't entirely sure when but knew it would be sometime in 2008 and asked me to "spread the word" before she reassured me (repeatedly) that Pope Benedict would care for us all.

I don't know how she knew what I was thinking about but I didn't have the heart to tell her that I didn't think Canada was at the top of the Pope's 'to be rescued' list. She'll see a paper sooner or later.

even street santa got cleaned up

Although the film festival just began today, preparation for the madding crowds began weeks ago with restaurants undergoing last minute renovations, store windows dressed as their most sophisticated, cool, hip selves and freshly cleaned streets sporting new plants. I passed through Yorkville today, the centre of film fest activities, and was amazed at the number of very carefully dressed people very carefully lounging so as to see and be seen. The beautiful people were out in full force.

Street santa is the guy who hangs out in Yorkville dressed only in red sweatshorts and a red santa hat - regardless of the season. He's occasionally belligerent, prone to lying across the sidewalk or getting way up in your personal space while haranguing you for change. Loudly. More often though he's in good humour as he bounces through Yorkville singing or drops to perform an impressive set of pushups, the better to attract your spare change.

I saw him today but almost didn't recognize him; the santa hat and shorts had been replaced with a suit. A beat up, run down, been around the block more than a few times suit but, still, a suit. Looks like the 'see and be seen' gods that wrap their carefully manicured hand around Toronto at this time of year managed to extend their reach to the panhandlers as well. Who knew?

note to self:

Half a tub of peanut butter does not count as dinner. Even if you mix it with honey first.

the picture, big and small

A few postings back when I mentioned that I was having a 'wee bit of a hard time' I was being positive, it was more of a whole lot of a hard time. While things are definitely looking up, there's no doubt about it, North America and I are going through a rough patch in our relationship. There's a certain 'essence de North American urban jungle' that I'm having a hard time relaxing back into. Silly things like the article in Saturday's paper emphasizing the importance of finding just the right lunchbox for your pre-schooler and traffic jams that stretch a 10 block trip into 1.5 hours, things I used to shrug off as the cost of big-city life, now cause me to roll my eyes like a petulant 12 year old while blowing my bangs in disdain as if to say 'I can't even believe I have to be here'.

Yeah, ok, it's ridiculous to lump an entire continent into my complaint; but you know those stereotypical things people say about North America? Those are the ones getting to me. I don't feel like I belong yet. But that's just the big picture I'm talking about; on a smaller scale, day-to-day life in Toronto, I'm doing good.

My friend D. and I always spend our first visit after one of my trips at the lake skipping stones while we catch each other up on the months that have passed (and he mocks my attempts to skip stones). Today was our afternoon by the lake. The drive to the beach brought me along the lakeshore, packed with people waiting for the labour day airshow to begin, past Dempster's bread factory where, if you time it right, you're immersed in the scent of baked bread, and down Queen Street East where rollerbladers, bikers, baby carriages and dogs reign supreme - not cars.

At the beach the boardwalk was busy, the volleyball nets in full use, and the dog parks full of happy, wet dogs. The 'rock balancing guy' was there, as he has been for as long as I can remember, building his field of tall rock formations, playing his digereedoo and explaining to the tourists that this IS his job. He's one of my favourite Torontonians, summers wouldn't be the same without him. The rock labyrinth has been reinstalled in the sand by the water; after making our way to the centre to leave our offerings we headed to the monkey bars where we swung upside down for far longer than is advisable and talked about how much easier it was to 'hang' when we were younger (and lighter ;)

So, yeah, the very 'North American-ness' of life has been kicking my ass but it's nothing that a few hours spent watching the dogs play in the park or swinging upside down from the monkey bars can't fix.

mermaid cooking

The movie "Mermaids" was on tv recently. Most remember that movie because Cher was in it, or because of that strange scene where a teenaged Winona Ryder licked the leather coat of the guy she was crushing on, or because it also starred a young Christina Ricci. My sister and I remember it because it caused us no end of angst. In the movie Cher, the eccentric mother, never actually cooked a meal, she just prepared finger foods and called it dinner. When the movie first came out, virtually everyone my sister and I knew called us to tell us that they thought of us as soon as they saw it. By us I mean my mother, my sister & myself.

Not that I'm saying anything about my mother's cooking or anything; we ate, we were healthy and we were happy. But, you know, lets just say there were some similarities (purely hypothetical, of course). That could shed light on the fact that I can prepare a mean hummous but can't find my way through a soup recipe. It may also explain why my sister, who stayed in my apartment while I was away, left me a cupboard fully stocked with:

-1 can flaked tomato & basil tuna
-3 cans flaked lemon & pepper tuna
-3 cans flaked chicken
-1 can ackee in brine
-2 cans bamboo shoot strips.

Not withstanding the fact that I'm a vegetarian, what exactly does one DO with so much flaked meat?

by the way...

...despite the fact that, since returning home, I've disposed of 8 garbage bags of 'stuff', reorganized all of my closets, drawers and cupboards, and maintained an uncharacteristically organized apartment I still had to pluck a shirt out of my dirty laundry bin to wear to my first day of my practicum.

Shhh...don't tell anyone.

thanks deer

For years I've been frustrated by the fact that I've never seen a deer. Sounds silly, maybe, but my mom literally comes across them on her drive home from work while I take myself hours into the woods backwater camping and - nothing. At one point I got a bit paranoid wondering what the deer had to 'teach' me and why they wouldn't reveal themselves to me. While it's entirely possible that they do hold a lesson for me, I've never figured out what it is but I've also stopped obsessing over it because I finally saw a damn deer.

At the time I was struggling with a difficult decision and I took the deer sighting as a good sign; turned out, it was. Tonight while driving to a friend's place out in the country I saw my second deer, just hanging out in a meadow doing deer stuff. Although I'm not struggling through any decisions right now, tonight was definitely a good night for a 'sign'.

The transition back to life in Toronto has been a blessedly smooth and easy one. I began my practicum today and I'm excited about the experience I'm going to gain. I talked to a few friends for the first time since arriving home to make plans for the long weekend, had a great talk with my mom, and was welcomed back to the bookclub-that-never-reads-the-books with warm, open arms. I feel lucky and loved.

So don't let any of the following take away from that, it's just that I'm having a wee bit of a hard time this week. I'm trying to find the sense of this life I have in Toronto and I'm afraid that it's not here, I'm terrified that I'm going to 'break' someone in my practicum, and today while practicing at home in my living room I felt so overwhelmingly alone.

For that reason, I thank my family for being so sweet, my grandmother for her phone call, the friends who greeted me with such delight after all these months, and I thank the damn deer for hanging out in the meadow so I could see them because tonight was a great night to be reminded that it will all be ok.

reason 234 why i shouldn't be allowed in the kitchen

Ever seen the cookbook "Help! My Apartment Has a Kitchen"? If not, I can happily forward you one of the several copies gifted to me over the years by the well intentioned, usually given while accompanied by some variation of "I thought of you as soon as I saw it".

Having never lived down phone calls to family members asking how to know when broccoli is done cooking or what an ozen is (as if it's some kind of intuitive knowledge that 'oz' is short for 'ounce', not 'ozen'), I've stopped reaching out for help. Instead, I soldier on in silence, disposing of countless dollars worth of irreparably scalded pots and inedible food in the privacy of my own home. Although this has effectively stopped gifts of "Cooking for Dummies" and the like, it's done very little to improve my cooking. As if to remind me of my missing 'kitchen gene' after these months away, today I gave myself a cooking injury during my first real foray back into my kitchen.

Knowing that I return to the life of poverty-stricken student next week, I decided to get into the role a bit early by preparing a batch of soup from the most inexpensive vegetable I could think of - celery. My reasoning was this: celery is cheap, I'm broke and I distinctly remember going through a Cream of Celery Campbell's Soup phase; how hard could it be to make it myself?

To be fair, it's probably not the most difficult meal to prepare. And it may have turned out ok if I hadn't forgotten to secure the lid on the blender. And if the soup, fresh from the burner, hadn't exploded when I turned the blender on. And if I didn't have these welts covering the entirety of my left forearm. Who knew that celery soup, in addition to being an inexpensive meal, also holds the potential to scalds the @#$ out of your skin.

I will be accepting all meal invites for the duration of this poverty-stricken student year.

back home

British Airways taunted me with Finland throughout the flight home surrounding me with Finns speaking that inexplicable language, featuring Helsinki in their inflight magazine and playing "Sybellius" (Finland's unofficial anthem) on heavy rotation on the inflight entertainment system. Luckily, my seat mate was happy to distract me with incessant talk about her PhD thesis on health promotion in rural Finland. In between drinks, that is. A whole lot of alcohol was consumed in seat 28J, I think she must be still in the research stage regarding the definition of health.

The Canada customs team dedicated to implementing their ridiculous 'lets push these overtired passengers over the edge' procedures ('security measures' they call them) made the process of actually getting into Canada incredibly difficult. They put up a good fight but they were no match for this Canadian; me and my suitcase full of undeclared ayurvedic potions made it home with the help of my accomplice (aka: mom).

Toronto is sadly lacking in strangely flavoured sparking water, a city population that embraces summer with complete abandon, and men named Mikko but it's good to be home. As always, I'm amazed by the amount of space I have and more so by the amount of 'stuff' I have filling it. My first morning home found me, still in pajamas, buried in my closet pulling out clothes to send to Goodwill. I've been eating my weight in vegetables and have decided to plan all future trips so my homecoming corresponds with corn season.

Although I defied all odds by finding my mobile, I can't for the life of me remember how to turn it on. Yeah, I'm serious. Please email me your phone numbers, they're stored in the mobile phone from now on to be referred to as 'fort knox'.

unbelievable

The 'baby' in the apartment below me still cries every morning beginning between 3:30-4:00am and carrying on until well after I drag myself out of bed to practice.

Granted, I don't actually have a baby myself but I'm pretty sure that whole 'crying through the night' routine is something they're supposed to grow out of. Before the age of 2.

Sigh.

final dog story

Some final pictures from Finland. The first two are from Suomenlinna, an island fortress just a ferry ride away from downtown Helsinki. The rest are cottage pictures including one of me reading a Finnish children's book about, what else, dogs making this my final 'dog entry' for this trip. I promise.


Hobbit houses on Suomenlinna



More ferry traffic, moving between Helsinki harbour and Suomenlinna on their way to Tallin or Stockholm


Mikko & Utu whistling songs accompanied by Mikko's beloved apple


On my way to the sauna


Reading Utu a story about Koira's (dogs) where I butchered the Finnish language (but made her feel miles more confident in her English, I'm sure)

good intentions

Well, I've tried ignoring emails, news, blogs and just about anything else connected to that irritating little thing called 'reality' but it turns out, reality won't be ignored. This is my last post from abroad, I go home this week.

There are so many things I'm looking forward to: shopping at the bakeries and greengrocers along Bloor Street, taking a bath, rollerblading in the beaches, being back in my own kitchen, hiking the Bruce Trail, sitting in Yorkville watching the beautiful people drift by, early morning coffee in moonbeam cafe, painting my apartment, and rediscovering my city - it's such an amazing city.

The months before I left to travel were a waiting period of sorts, I felt disconnected and unenthused but it didn't matter because I was leaving. I remember this when I think about coming home and it worries me. Free from my job and a student again, I'm also free from the frameworks I've relied on for too long to define what I do, who I am, what I'm all about. This, of course, was kind of the point when I decided to make some changes and it's liberating but scary. 'Home' no longer holds a picture in my mind; I remind myself that this means that I'm free to create something new, I promise myself that I'll create something fantastic, and I work to keep that intention.

Yoga

In what I'm thrilled to find is, apparantly, a universal tradition, Finnish cottage-time consists of sleeping in late, eating too much food, taking afternoon naps and, in our case, yoga. To avoid 'mökkihöperö' (cabin fever) we drove into Turku for a great vegetarian meal, a movie and, first, some yoga in the Turku shala. Below, photos for avoiding 'mökkihöperö' becca & mikko style (the last one is me ;).

the summerhouse

For months I've been hearing about 'the summerhouse' - the lake, the sauna, the...sauna...and...did I mention the sauna? In what appears to be common knowledge to everyone except myself, the Finns are crazy about their saunas. For weeks after I arrived in Finland most incoming emails included the question 'So, have you had a sauna yet?'. How did you people all know this? Since arriving, I've learned a great deal about saunas, more, really, than the average person actually should have to know, including this: it's not just an outdated stereotype, the Finns really do like their sauna's. As it was best explained to me, the summerhouse is really just an excuse to have a sauna.

Originally, I was far more curious about the idea of a 'summerhouse', it's such a grand name, did summerhouse mean cottage cottage or Muskoka cottage? After a while, though, I cared less about the building and more about the sauna. The idea of voluntarily moving from lovely, warm room to cold lake and back again really didn't seem too appealing but, having had several nights of 'the sauna' I somewhat grudgingly admit that I'm a convert. It's a lovely tradition.

I can also report that 'summerhouse' translates to cottage cottage, as in a proper A-frame, wooden building fronted by a wall of glass windows overlooking the lake and a porch swing that I've made my temporary home. Pictures below.


Me & Hannu being rock people


Eppu & Katsa preparing to brave the lake


Eppu & Katsa rowing & the sauna off in the distance


Shaving

Contrary to what the Finns may think...

This


is NOT a Canadian Goose.

Stockholm

When I was a kid I, like every other girl my age, was ridiculously jealous of Vicki, the Captain's daughter from the tv show 'The Love Boat', because she got to live on a real, live cruise ship. I mean, how cool is that? Turns out, not very.

While it didn't take my fickle, pre-teen mind long to realize that Vicki had a bowl cut, a one way ticket to the land of the very uncool; cruise ships still seemed kind of neat, like a floating summer camp. This was before last weekend's 16 hour overnight ferry ride from Helsinki to Stockholm after which cruiseships, like Vicki, have been stripped of the illusion of coolness.

That's not to mean that it wasn't fun. I can't tell you how surreal it was to enter the disco in the middle of a karaoke cover of Nine Inch Nails' "I want to f* you like an animal" being belted out complete with strong nordic accent. Or how good the feeding frenzy, aka breakfast buffet, was even though they tried to be cute by disguising some kind of crazy fish pate as peanutbutter. And there was tax-free shopping (as they reminded us over and over and over) which we took full advantage of by buying a whole chocolate bar. No, it was all fun, just, not exactly cool is all I'm saying.

We skipped the bingo, magic shows, 23€ buffet dinner, disco, and lounge acts to chill on the top deck much of the time and it was gorgeous. The view presented from the deck as we approached Stockholm in the morning and of the archipelago as we departed in the evening is not something I'll forget anytime soon. Our time in Stockholm itself was lovely and lazy: meandering through the city punctuated by frequent stops in parks, cafes and an amazing vegetarian restaurant overlooking the harbour for a late lunch with the charming Christofer before returning to the boat.

Pictures below. As with the pictures from Turku, these aren't mine (except, of course the ones of Mikko - I took those ;), I'm piggybacking on Mikko's talent again. Enjoy.

Ferry traffic



Taking pictures in Stockholm


Me & Christofer, coffee by the harbour


Christofer and Mikko on the way to Christofer's gallery



Watching the sunset


Sunset from top deck


Arriving in Helsinki, Sunday morning

another hard day as a tourist

Saturday was a day of sightseeing. We began in Naantali which I knew only as home to the President's summerhouse and Moominworld. Moomins are deserving of their own post altogether but, for those reading in the west, they're the equivalent to our Smurfs only infinately better; strangely melancholic but strong and optimistic at the same time. People often have 'their' character, the one they identify most strongly. Growing up with the Smurfs, I had a choice of Smurfette or uh...Smurfette (the only female character whose distinguishing characteristics were limited to her long blond hair, her love for strong smurf, and her disdain for brainy smurf) the Moomins have a far richer cast of characters and they're just amazing, click here if you're curious.

I expected Naantali to be like our Canada's Wonderland/Vaughan area where the amusement park came first and the suburbs built up around it. Instead, Naantali was a gorgeous seaside town with weathered wooden homes, cafes and artisian shops. Moominworld, along with the exasperated parents and overexcited kids that I'm sure accompany it, is relegated to an island slightly offshore from the town.



After Naantali we returned to Turku to visit the castle, old town and have dinner. Unfortunately, the sightseeing was kind of limited to this ferryride across the river. Due to the demands of the increasingly hungry tourist, the castle was closed by the time we got there.



After dinner we headed to the park to say hello to the ocean, play along the shoreline, and bask in the evening sun. It was a very good way to end the day.

a dog show of another nature

My tendancy to judge a city by its dogs was questioned this weekend while visiting Finland’s oldest city, Turku, where I was exposed to another kind of dog show altogether.

The Finnish saying “ulkoiluttaa mäyräkoiraa”, which loosely translates as “taking the dachshund out”, refers to picking up a 12 pack of beer typically called a dachshund because of its shape. As the weekend approaches and the weather holds there is a noticeable increase in the number of dachshunds making the rounds. Last weekend’s visit to Turku coincided with an annual music festival ‘Down the by the laituri (pier)’ held by the river running through the city and, let me tell you, it was a veritable dog exhibition.

I’m beginning to think that it’s just my city that holds an intense dislike for pesky people cluttering up the sidewalks because Turku, like many cities I’ve visited, seems to understand that cities are meant to be lived in as opposed to moved through. Accordingly, those attending the festival weren’t simply allowed to enjoy the public spaces, they were encouraged to. Roads were closed for pedestrian traffic, people lined the riverbank (dachshunds close by), and long lineups for riverboat restaurants were made more bearable by restaurant service while they waited.

Questions about people being ‘allowed’ so close to the river’s edge (what if someone fell in?), public drinking and, my god - is it always so easy to find parking here? were met with patience and a furrowed brow as if to say “What else would you expect?” and I began to feel like a gauche North American. I would expect to park at least 1/2 an hour away, that the areas where we were allowed to have fun to be clearly marked and cordoned off, and a very heavy police presence lest someone lose themself and try to drink in public - in the daytime no less.

In one of those stupid tourist moments, I was thrilled when a woman (who had clearly spent several hours ‘taking out the dog’) bumped into us and was moved to yell “VOI VITTU”. Voi vittu just so happens to be my only Finnish swearword and, although I don't have an exact translation, I know that it is very, VERY bad. Probably the kind of phrase that I would never actually use if I knew what I was saying but damned exciting to hear it in real, live action from the mouth of a real, live Finn and actually know what the heck they were saying because, believe me, THAT doesn't happen very often.

who needs dr. spock?

In my postings from India I referred a couple of times to the 'whirlywhirl bird', my favourite bird whose crazy (and non-stop) call puts me immediately in an India state of mind; well, it turns out that 'whirlywhirl' is less its actual official name and more the completely bogus name that I made up. In a conversation with the lovely Anu (of Anu's Internet Cafe) shortly before I left I learned that its real name is Koel, it looks like a crow, and it parents by sneaking into another birds nest, laying its egg and then leaving. Forever.

As someone who plans to be a mother someday, is it wrong that I think that last bit is absolutely freaking brilliant?

One website had this to say about the Koel's parenting style:
"The Common Koel is a brood parasite, that is, it lays its eggs in the nests of other bird species. A single egg is laid in the host's nest and once hatched the chick forces the other eggs and hatchlings out of the nest. When the chick leaves the nest it roosts in the outer branches of a tree, cheeping incessantly while the significantly smaller parents desperately search for sufficient food to satisfy the nagging youngster. This is a full-time job, as the young Koel will grow to nearly twice their size over the next four to six weeks."

'Brood parasite'? I think that's a bit harsh. Forget Dr. Spock, someone give this bird an award. Nipping sibling rivarly in the bud, nagging parents to provide food, refusing to leave the nest? Seems pretty ingenious to me. In fact, I'm quite sure I know a couple of human incarnations of the Koel ;)

www.amonline.net.au/factsheets/common_koel.htm

judging a city by its dogs

As I was telling some friends about my travels of the last few weeks, my recollections of each city visited invariably included an observation about the dogs: Prague, crowded, hot, all dogs met some unspoken prerequisite that they be a daschund (or some kind of mix thereof); Barcelona, really hot, fun, ‘real’ sized dogs; Salzburg, gorgeous, clean, dogs paraded as status symbols; and Mysore wonderful yoga, dogs that provide protection but rarely get walked.

I like dogs. They’re straightforward, honest, and genuine, whats not to love? I’m one of those idiots on the sidewalk who thinks its ‘nice’ to greet dogs as they pass so it’s not really a surprise that they factor so high on the list of things I’d notice about a city, I tend to interact more with them than with people.

After ten days of whirlwind travel with my mother and aunt, I’m back in Helsinki where the dogs have very long tails and the promises of April have been fulfilled: Helsinki is a gorgous place to be in the summertime. The transition from my very silent, hermit like existence in Gokulam to non-stop travel and the company of others in Europe was a bit rocky but they had the patience of saints in ignoring the fact that my every sentence began with the phrase “In India...”.

There is so much happening inside this head of mine. I’m striving to stay centered, to be where I am, and not let myself ricochet with sadness, anxiety, worry between past and future events without stopping where I am because right now, this moment, this is a good place to be. It is literally a second-by-second endeavour to remind myself to be where I am but so far, so good.

After 29 hours of travel and 40 hours without sleep I arrived in Munich, Germany to meet my Mother & Aunt. Air India decided to hel me overcome my sadness at leaving India by turning my departure into the most horrendous travel experience ever. I truly thought nothing could trump 12 hours as the only passenger on a pig barge riding downwind in a sweltering Laotian summer while fighting off the advances of the crew who, until I joined them, counted the pigs as their only company. I was mistaken. Congratulations Air India, not only did you make me desperate to get on with my journey but you've topped the pigs.

I've been in Europe for three days and have visited three different countries in as many days, pretty much the polar opposite of my two months rooted in sleepy little Gokulam. This, perhaps, is a blessing; I'm tired, my head is spinning and we're moving so fast that I can barely register which country I'm in let alone what I've left behind.

I'm a very bad tourist in that I consistently miss the biggest tourist attractions in favour of drifting through a city, sitting in parks, and returning to my hotel room to nap instead of making the most of my time there. After three days of travelling with my mother and aunt I now understand, I've been travelling Deeley-style. It's so nice to travel with others with as little inclination to visit the torture tower or whatever the 'big sight' is as I have.

My mother has surprised me with her penchant for window shopping and I've discovered that she's only escaped the teasing we heap on our father for his determination to conquer airports because none of us had ever travelled with her through a European train station. Until now. Yikes.

I'd been worried about how I would practice while sharing a room with others but mornings have emerged as one of my favourite times. When the alarm goes off at five, my aunt is usually already awake and leaves to explore the waking city while I practice (in the hall) and mom sleeps. After practice I return to bed to read and drowse for a few hours before breakfast. Today Gwyn returned from her walk with an apple torte and coffee enjoyed from a pile of thick down pillows and rich cotton duvets. Absolutely lovely.

It's the mornings I know I'll remember best in the years to come. That and the sound of the 'Deeley-cackle', the combined sound of my mother and aunt on a laughing jag, floating around European hotel rooms with dark wooden panelling and strange furnishings.

last day

Every night before bed I head to my roof where I lay and look up at the evening sky peeking through the palm trees; it’s one of my favourite times of the day and something I’ll miss most when I leave, this is my last day in Mysore. Last night as I lay listening to the unique Indian cacophony of barking dogs, tv’s, horns, neighbours’ voices and the rustle of palm fronds, a wave of anxiety washed over me as I asked myself whether I’ve accomplished what I came here to accomplish. And the answer is, I don’t know.

It's both a difficult question, I don’t really know what I hoped to accomplish while I was here, and an irrelevant one, I didn’t arrive with any expectations I just wanted to sit somewhere, practice, and see what came up. I did that, so, I guess the answer is yes, I accomplished what I hoped to accomplish ;)

It’s been a wonderful, wonderful trip. Yesterday during my last practice I stretched into upward dog, face turned up, shoulders pressing back, chest open to the room and felt such intense gratitude for this thing: this yoga. It truly is my teacher, my therapist, my religion and my well. Nothing has been the same since my last trip in December and, while I have no idea what will come in the aftermath of this one, I expect that it too will reveal itself slowly in the space of the months to come.

I leave for Frankfurt at 3am tonight to meet my Mother & Aunt for an impromptu (and whirlwind) tour of Salzburg, Prague and Barcelona before returning to Helsinki to see if the rumours are true; that Finland really does allow summer weather to grace it’s shores.

hey, you, step away from that counter!

This is me at Bombay Tiffany's, Mysore's best sweet shop:




See how I'm looking away from the counter all innocent like? That's because I'm not supposed to be there. Whatever you may have heard about travelling in India, dodgy food/water and and travellers who return home poor little skeletons - that doesn't apply to me. Maybe its the immense amounts of sweets, thick, rich dairy, and carb overload that comprises just about every meal; but each time I come to India I return home several pounds heavier.

This time I was determined not to let that happen and the first critical step in this plan was to avoid Bombay Tiffany's, home of Mysore Pak (or, in my case, better known as Mysore Crack). Mysore Pak is a sweet made from ghee (butter) and jaggery (sugar) with a bit of flour thrown in for substance - what more could I ask for in a food?

I did pretty well for a while, managed to delay the inevitable resumption of my addiction for about a week into my visit before succumbing, but all it took was one visit, one taste, and I was a gonner. All I can say about my complete lack of restraint is that its been sweet, very sweet :)

texts from the last few days

I've mentioned before the huge difference I've noticed in having a mobile with me this time around. The biggest difference being that there is no shortage of things to do here in Gokulam and, this time, I actually get to hear about them! Due to fatigue and in lieu of an actual posting (that would require actual energy), I present a sample of text messages received over the last few days:

"Mistress of Spices - english film - starring Ash. Rai sun @ 11 skyline talkies. meet there or @ kaveri lodge by 10.30"

"Samba & Dance party is on! SriVara Manor frm 19.00. Numbers r. tite"

"B-fast @ 9 @ s.star. Posso trip to Brind Gardens @11"

"Gokulam outdoor theatre presents 'dude, who stole my car' tonite, 19.15 at our place"

In other news, I've only 5 days left in Gokulam and have been blessed with the most gorgeous of weather for my last week - blue skies, hot sun and fluffy clouds. When not sitting on my roof soaking in the sun, sights, smells and sounds of India I've been busy stuffing myself with chikoo and mango which I will miss so very much when I leave. Otherwise, I'm still in no rush to leave and am very happily enjoying my remaining time in the Shala, in my flat and in Gokulam overall.

it's time to disco

Last night I rented Kal Ho Na Ho, a bollywood movie that spawned last years big hit "It's Time to Disco". Throughout the entire movie something was bothering me, niggling at the back of my mind, but it took me ages to put my finger on it. Then I began to piece it together: the CN Tower looming in the background, a sign for the St. Lawrence Market, the BCE Place posing as the leading man's very important workplace - the movie (set in NYC) was filmed in Toronto. So strange to be sitting in India watching a Bollywood movie, a genre so unique to India itself, only to be looking at the streets of my hometown.

When I was packing for my trip I included a couple of boxes of Ryvita bread and a bag of Fazer chocolates as a treat figuring that, with careful rationing, they would last me the duration of my visit. I'm just about done the last box of Ryvita, I've only a few chocolates left, and my remaining days can now be measured in single digets; however, I feel nowhere near ready to go. I suspect that this sentiment will be repeated fairly often in the days to come but promise not to harp on it, the weather has turned gorgeous, there's more to do than days to do it in, and I'm enjoying the time I have left here.

Notes from 10 years ago

Before I left for India I copied some of my journal entries from years past with the thought of turning them into something else while I was here. I haven’t quite gotten around to that yet but I have been browsing through them as I wait for the rain to stop and the series below made me smile. They’re from 1996, written during that very confusing year after I’d graduated from university and was trying to figure out just what I was to do with myself.

April 10, 1996
I got a job as an Assistant in a computer personnel company. Every time I tell someone about it I feel like crying. The part of me that dreams of saving the world, backpacking across Europe, living in another country, being a rehabilitation counsellor feels like it's being crushed by this permanent, full time, Assistant job. I’m afraid I’ll look back in 10 years and I’ll still be someone’s Assistant in some business. I was dressed for my interview this morning and I looked at myself in the mirror - this yuppie, efficient-looking assistant thing - and I felt such despair. I turned to my sister and said ‘I don’t want to be this person’. And I still don’t but, as of April 15, I will be.

April 16, 1996
I started my new job yesterday. I get up at 6am to catch the train in and wait until 7.05pm to catch the train home. Yesterday I got home at 8pm, ate two peices of cold pizza, went to the gym and was in bed by 10.30. I’m too young for this life.

April 24, 1996
I’m on the train on the way into work. Two girls who can’t be any more than a year older than me are are sitting beside me talking about their lawns and what fertilizers are best. A very detailed discussion about the dramatic difference noted when fertilizer X was replaced by fertilizer Y. Lord, if I ever reach the point where fertilizer becomes the most interesting thing to talk about at 6am in the morning please just do the merciful thing and strike me dead on the spot. Thanks, b.

Yesterday I was wishing I could skip ahead in my story right now to make sure things turned out ok. Obviously, can’t do that. But I can provide an epilogue to the entries above these 10 years later:

Quit the Assistant’s job within the year to backpack around Europe and never really stopped travelling, haven’t worked as anyone’s Assistant again (or in the for-profit world for that matter), did work as a Rehabilitation Counsellor and liked it, have never had a conversation about fertilizer - but the desire to own my own house with an actual lawn that I would actually have to fertilize is building.

well....

One of the things I love most about being here is that any line of questioning about what someone does at home is very often met with the kind of drawn out “Well....” that indicates there’s a long story behind the answer. Last visit I responded to questions about what I do with a firm answer, this visit I’m part of the “Well...” group. Mysore is the perfect place for transition, or rather, resting place for those in transition and this time, I’m no exception.

I leave Mysore in less than two weeks and I’m beginning to think about what comes next. Last night I dreamt that I stepped off the plane in Germany and started to cry because I realised that I was one step closer to returning home to a life that I haven’t missed once. Of course, there’s my family and friends but, perversely, I tend to be in better contact with them when I’m away than when I’m at home so, although I may miss their physical presence, they’re very much a part of my daily life.

I really don’t know anymore where I belong. Where I should be. What I should do. That’s more of a surprised observation than a complaint; I don’t really mind it all that much but I am a bit bewildered by it. Where do you go when you don’t know where you belong? What do you do when you no longer no what you’re supposed to do? How do you dream, plan and move forward when you don’t know where you’re going anymore?

I know. You just begin where you are and you pay attention. It’s just that when the ‘you’ I speak of is actually me, it’s that much more striking how disorienting change is. I have ideas of what form I’d like life to take and I know I'll end up somewhere different from where I started so my bewilderment is accompanied by excitement and, of course, an edge of uncertainty. No one can say what lies ahead. If this were a book I’d be sorely tempted to jump ahead to the ending to see how things turned out but, it’s not a book, it’s my life so I’ll just begin where I am and take it from there.

news from mysore

A few random updates:

The monsoon has settled upon us and our days are grey, rainy and cold. There's more than enough to occupy my attention so life carries on as always with the addition of careful laundry strategizing, an acceptance that I'll be wearing the same set of warm clothes for the next two weeks and a slight regret that I didn't take advantage of the sweltering weather with an afternoon at the pool when I had the chance.

I copied the following headline from the newspaper this morning: "Fraudulent Manure Seized". Someone was selling 240 bags of fake manure to agriculturalists. Given the contributions of cows, goats, dogs, pigs, and the occasional human to the cause, I'm stunned that someone actually thought it necessary to create fake manure. How lazy do you have to be?

The woolen blanket count on my bed has risen to four, it would have risen to five but I'm out of blankets. As it is, the combined weight of those already there makes it difficult to move once I've slid under the covers. Last night a very, very, very large coackroach sauntered across my chest and I couldn't get my hands free quickly enough to panic appropriately. The extra time served me well by giving me a chance to think about just how important it was to expend the energy to free myself, move the blankets, and try to find the bug. Turns out, not very, I turned over and went to sleep instead.

humpty-rebecca-dumpty

Last summer, at about this time, I was sitting in my overly-airconditioned office reading the blog of a woman who had come to Mysore to practice yoga for three months. I was envious and wanted that experience for myself. When I was trying to decide what to do this summer I couldn’t get that memory out of my mind: sitting at my desk, daydreaming through others’ blogged experiences, wishing I too had a flat in India and could bury myself in yoga-land. And so I came.

The writer of this same blog talked about the value of being here for three months because the first month you settle into your practice, the second month you fall apart, the third month Guruji puts you together again. Halfway through my second month, I can definitely identify with that.

The last two weeks were difficult and I really wanted to leave. Like any other community, the yoga scene can be tiresome at times with gossip, judging, and complaining but then added to that is the very gorgeous tendency yoga has to stir stuff up and bring it to the surface. These lessons truly are the reason I keep coming back to my mat but it can be a bit much when you’re trying to deal not only with your stuff but others’ as well. The energy around here can get a bit wonky at times.

My first month I was just glad to be here. Getting settled, rediscovering Mysore, and diving deeper into my practice. My second month, well, it’s been work. I’ve felt irritated, agitated, bored, and frustrated. Not with the practice, I love practicing here and wouldn’t change it for anything; but the hours the follow (you know, the rest of the day) have been trying. This week I gave up fighting it, gave up counting the number of days until I leave, gave up dreaming of leaving early, and gave in to the struggle because I had an epiphany: this is exactly what I came here for.

I could have travelled, moved around, explored new countries but I came to Mysore specifically to dive into my practice and stir shit up. That’s why I’m here, I can’t run away just because it’s getting hard. It’s amazing what a difference this insight has made. I’m happy to be here again because instead of getting stuck on the frustrations, irritations and agitation, my focus moves a step beyond to think about why, what’s happening here and what lies beneath?

Far from counting the days until I leave, I’m startled to realize that I only have two weeks left. I’m going to miss that third month, the one where Guruji puts me back together, but I’m back to feeling greatful that I’m here and I’m pretty confident that I can put the pieces back together on myself without the help of all the kings horses and all the kings men ;)

camping in mysore

My family and I spent the better part of our summers camping. To this day my daydreams lead me down dirt paths marred by tree roots, through northern Ontario forests, and along sparkling pink granite rock when I’m in need of a mental escape. Like every family, we had our traditions and when it came to camping, our tradition was rain. We camped, it rained. That’s just the way it was.

We learned to cope, stringing tarps up across every square inch our campsite was as natural a part of setting up camp as putting up the tent was. Even now, whether I’m car camping or tripping, a ridiculous portion of my gear is dedicated to army green, blue and orange plastic tarps because, hey, you never know when they might come in handy. My affinity for doing absolutely nothing, in its own way, helped cope as well. Memories of camping include the usual swimming and campfire scenarios but also the sound of the wind in the trees, sight of grey skies, and feeling of cold feet tangled in my sleeping bag as we whiled away the rain; spending hours in our tent reading, writing and irritating each other.

Today is a camping day in Mysore. Warmth has given way to cold weather, the wind blows strongly shifting rain clouds across grey skies, and my jeans have that clammy feeling that comes when a cold body is poured into clothes that feel permanently damp. So I’ve spent the day hibernating. Whiled away the miserable weather from the comfort of my bed buried beneath a tangle of blankets, under the makeshift tent of my mosquito net and reading trashy books. It’s been a strangely familiar, at times the sound of the wind in the trees has tricked me into forgetting where I am, and an entirely lovely way to spend this day.

pictures

Last time I was here I was able to link to the pictures of Mikko, photographer exraordinaire, instead of inflicting my crappy-400-speed-for-all-occasions-take-the-picture-quick-before-someone-sees-you pictures on you.

This time, you're not so lucky. But don't worry, the camera I've borrowed uses a lithium battery which has since died, all requests this far for 'a lithium battery' have been met with the infamous wobble sans replacement battery so I suspect my crappy-picture taking days are over. Have fun. r.

crappy-400-speed-for-all-occasions-take-the-picture-quick-pictures

the love affair resumes

Just a quick update: our spat is over, India and I are in love again. With the grace of a few days distance, I can admit it, I may have been in the wrong. I should have known better than to write anything for public consumption after a sleepless night, nothing good can come from zero sleep. Which reminds me, although the love affair between India and I is alive and well, no such love exists between me and my 'begin socializing at 10pm' neighbours. They can go.

overheard in the shala this morning...

Guruji has a fondness for children. Parents practicing here often usher their kids into Guruji’s office to say hello and the kids come willingly because Guruji’s got something fabulous in that office: he has chocolate.

Today during a particularly exhausting practice I could hear Guruji teasing the two children in his office bellowing “Yes? What you want?” and the kids replying “Chocolate, we want chocolate”. I was distracted by an all consuming yearning for chocolate. Forget driste (focusing the gaze), breath and my bandhas, all I could think was “Oh God, me too. I beg of you, some chocolate”. Alas, none came my way.

when can i leave?

I spend more money on India tourist visas than I do on rent so, please don’t take this entry the wrong way, but, right now, I really can’t wait to leave. Yesterday was one of those days. It’s hard to put just how horrible a day it was into words as the nature of its crappiness exceeds any crappity-crap scale I’ve ever seen. It was that freaking crappy.

Given the runaround by the same rickshaw drivers I use every day; isn’t there a point where they match the smiles on their faces and happy greetings with the inclination not to jerk me around? Conflicting fees at the Southern Star until the final price quoted was far higher than either of the first two quotes, the employees feeding off of each other’s ridiculous estimates and combining forces leaving me with little bargaining power. Returning to pick up clothes left a week ago at not one but two separate tailors to find that neither had been started yet, come back next week. Cat calls, kissing noises, swerving rickshaws, hit by a turning scooter; all seemed more prominent than usual, although it’s more likely that my foul mood just lent itself to noticing these things more than I would normally - frustrating, all of it.

And then the final denouement to my crappity-crap-when-can-I-get-out-of-this-country day: the neighbours. The same ones who let me blissfully fall asleep each night thinking ‘this will be the night, tonight, I sleep’ only to wake me up at 10-10:30 for several hours of entertainment courtesy of them, their guests, their guests children etc. I’ve been informed by my landlords that this is to be expected, they’re not from this area but I really don’t care where they’re from, I need to sleep. Last night they didn’t let me get a moments sleep. At 12:30 one of the kids had a temper tantrum which, instead of being met with, oh, you know, bed, was the source of great mirth for the adult section of the party. By 2:30am I started crying myself, big, self-pitying alligator tears. At 3:00am the guests departed leaving the hosts free to have a viscous (and loud) fight which ended with the woman growling and snapping at the man who retreated to the rooftop to sob (also loudly) to himself. By 4:00am I turned on my light, pulled out my book, and started reading. The alarm was set for 4:30am anyway.

Although I’m currently wondering how I’ll possibly last the 23 days I have left in this country, rest assured that by the time you read this I’ll have swung to the opposite end of the spectrum and will be exploring options to extend my ticket because I can’t imagine not being here. It’s just one of those days.

an apple playground

My last visit to Mysore served to teach me what a techno idiot I was. A stranger to my mobile and ancient PC user at home, I arrived in Gokulam to the land of the hooked up and was very much out of my league. I met requests for my mobile number with instructions to "Just stand at the gate of the yellow house on the road parallel to the shala & yell, I'll come out". Understandably, no one took me up on this.

This visit, I've arrived armed with a borrowed mobile (that actually works) and my apple ibook purchased because I got hooked on the little suckers after borrowing one through my last visit. I'm in good company. Apple seems to have a stronghold among the yogi population here, each time I visit Anu's internet cafe I'm met by several other little apples glowing in the evening light. File swapping, networking, music sharing, you name it, I've been doing all kinds of fabulous things that, while very cool, I'm completely unable to reproduce myself.

Below is a picture of lovely Abby and myself taken & networked to me courtesy of Les' iBook.

overheard in the shala this morning...

Guruji gently scolding someone "Head down ALWAYS. Why you lift your head?". This last part spoken with genuine bewilderment, as in, 'What could you be thinking?'.

Also overheard, Sharath saying "You stand up from backbend". This was directed at me and I responded by stopping what I was doing and laughing, expecting Sharath to join in at any moment, yeah...stand up...good one Sharath. Turns out, he wasn't joking. Instead he repeated "You stand up from backbend" and added "It is possible". Yes, it is possible (and getting closer) just not quite yet.

Mysore, strangely, has been feeling a bit like Club Med as of late with so much talking, planning, scheduling, doing, moving etc. but when I think about moments like these, those silly, random impressions that leave their mark, I know that I love being here and love practicing here.

hey look - a cow!

You know, this is my fifth trip to India. You'd think I'd be over the excitement of cows by now but, no, I like cows. I also like pigs, dogs, horses, and geese. I know this because I just got my first roll of film developed and that's pretty much all I've taken pictures of so far. Just like my first four trips.

Below, the prerequisite cow picture but also a few others. I wish I could blame the poor quality of the pictures on the developing, a poor choice of film speed, etc, but the blame lies pretty squarely on me. I take a bad picture, usually mid-stride which makes for things like composition, framing, and whatever else I should be considering pretty difficult.

bovine friend at the top of my street


my lovely flat (the door on the left), the pink palace


Waiting around the Bangalore railstation


this movie poster is everywhere. Inexplicably, the catchphrase (in white) "When God is silent, he is violent" makes me wince everytime...


Finland, Estonia, Latvia & hopefully better India pictures are being developed. Maybe I'll have something more impressive to post shortly.

sleepless in mysore

When I secured my flat, I was excited about two things: that I was on the same street as my last visit just two houses down from my old flat and that I had escaped the neigbours with the three dogs that barked allll night, every night.

Yeah. Have you already picked up on the idiocy of my reasoning? Given that my lovely, pink flat is just two doors down from my last visit, the irritating neighbours with the yappy f’ing dogs are still my irritating neighbours with the yappy f’ing dogs. I’ve just changed sides.

I remain yours, sleepless in Mysore - r.

being 'the new guy'

I’m not sure what it is about being ‘new’ that’s so bothersome, particularly as a lot of us travel to escape the same old, same old of home, but it seems like no one likes to be ‘the new guy’. In Mysore, you can separate the new arrivals from the ‘old timers’ by practice time, those who have been here for a while begin at 5:00am and the newcomers begin whenever a spot from the 5:00am group opens up. It’s not uncommon for the question “What time do you practice?” to be included in the usual “Where are you from?”, “What do you do?” list of introductory questions and the desire to be included in the 5:00am start group is even more common. This I don’t understand.

Most of the people who arrived around the same time I did have had their start time moved to 5:00am while I’ve selectively ‘not heard’ Sharath’s suggestions to ‘come earlier’ and continue to arrive just before 6:00am to wait for a spot to open up. I don’t care about being in the first group, about practising in the same spot every day, about not being ‘disturbed’ by new arrivals; I do care about that precious extra hour of sleep. As it is, the alarm goes off at 5:20 so I can press snooze for 20 minutes before getting up at the last possible minute to arrive on my mat with sleep lines still visible down my face. I can’t imagine the mess I’d be after waking at 4:30am and, with luck, I won’t have to find out. All I need to do is maintain my status as one of the ‘new guys’ for the remainder of my visit.

philosophy class

I’m taking a philosophy class with B.N.S. Iyengar. Right from the start, I've been a bit jaded about the class; he had us wait on a dilapidated balcony for an hour before talking with us, berated us because our teachers charge so much for yoga instruction, and spent the rest of the hour assuring us that after his class we would be ‘able to talk about these things with any scholar in the world. Then, of course, there's his name. Just as it’s common for products to be given familiar names with slightly different spelling (Lyzol cleanser or Reebock trainers) to encourage patronage, I find B.N.S. Iyengar to be strangely close to the name B.K.S. Iyengar, one of the most learned and advanced yogis alive today.

The class itself is difficult. Sometimes I can find the humour, like when he glosses over complicated sanskrit words only to stop and spell out the English ones, but mostly, its just frustrating and I dread going. But I go. No matter how jaded and cynical I may be, he is very, very learned and he knows miles more than I do. Despite my own best efforts, I'm learning. I've revisited the Yoga Sutras since beginning the class and noticed that the pieces are falling into place much more easily than they would if I had'’t had his instruction first.

Recently, an Indian gentleman has joined our class and I've gained insight into just how frustrating we must be for our teacher. Where I meet his constant inquiries as to whether 'You understand these examples?' with a puzzled look and a “Yeah", the Indian student responds with comments like “Very convincing argument Teacher” or "You have explained this very well Teacher, I've never heard an example like this before”. I know that, in India, the Teacher/Student relationship is one of respect but really didn'’t have the framework to understand what that means in a practical setting. How strange we must be, these four foreigners, with our blank looks, one word answers and hurried departures. I'm greatful the new student has joined us, first, because I've gained a sense of compassion for our teacher and, second, because he takes the heat off of us.

why you no write?

Given that English is my first language, there’s really no reason why I should talk any differently in India than I would in Canada but I’ve noticed that my inner voice tends to adopt the speech patterns of whatever country I’m visiting. I’ve been thinking about how little writing I’ve done since arriving in India and asking myself, as Guruji would put it, why you no write?

Before I came to India I had visions of myself sitting in front of my window, candles glowing, writing madly away. I do spend hours with my feet propped up against the window and a book ignored by my side as I watch life go by, but there’s been very little writing. I came here because I was craving space to stay put, practice, and see what bubbled to the surface but I forgot how seductive the social scene here can be. I’ve been having a lot of fun these last few weeks. Even still, as easy as it’s been to fill my time with social activities and leave the pesky task of introspection for later, I don’t think my social life is to blame.

I’m not writing because I really don’t know what to say. Being here is, at the same time, the most perfect place in the world to be and the most difficult - with strong emphasis on the former. Giving credence to the phrase ‘wherever you go, there you are’, no amount of socializing can distract me from what I came here to learn. And I’m learning a lot. So much that I think I’ve been silenced, for once, I don’t yet have words to put what I’m experiencing to paper. It’s good though, so good to be here.

overheard in the shala today...

A couple brings their daughter, only a few months old, into the shala each morning for the trade off between father, just finishing his practice, and mother, waiting to begin. Today as the baby lay on the platform waiting for her father, Guruji approached and stood over her bellowing "Why you here? Why you here already?" as the shala dissolved into laughter.

So. Very. Cute.

blessings

A mother and daughter approach me on my evening walk, pulling me aside to whisper about prepared meals for yoga students, tell my friends. Manu, the rickshaw driver, offers repeatedly to drive me home for free, but nothing is free. As my refusals mount so do the details of his story until I eventually learn about his friend’s shop, very close by, we could stop on the way. The mango vendor humours me as I select my fruit only to replace my carefully selected mangoes with rotting ones when I look down for change. Children chase me down, small flipflops flapping quickly from behind, to ask for donations for school, for new books, for children in Bangalore. At times, it seems like everyone wants something from me. But why wouldn’t they? When it comes to requests like these, I have it to give.

The road in front of the shala this morning was filled with sleeping dogs. Small doggy-sized bumps waiting until practice is finished and they can count on an outpouring of affection from yogis homesick for their own pets. Funny how it’s so easy to give to dogs what it’s so hard to give to people, the requests are essentially the same; acknowledgement, attention, maybe something to eat. There’s something there, I can’t quite put words to it yet. Maybe it’s that I’ll never be a dog (at least in this lifetime) but it’s possible that I could be the mother with the beseeching eyes asking for food. It’s too close. Too overwhelming. I feel at once grateful, sad, embarrassed, irritated, ashamed, and afraid - life is just so tenuous. So little separates me from them and, blessed by the grace of where I was born and the hard work of my parents, I'm aware of how little I've done myself to deserve the blessings I have.

overheard in the shala this morning...

...my teacher and a recently arrived yoga student discussing the price of gold on the various stock markets; American, Japanese, Indian. It was strange. But, if you go in for that kind of stuff - gold is on the rise.

walking in gokulam

I walk to practice in the pre-dawn light kept company by the street dogs who leave periodically to wage war with pampered house dogs made fierce by the protection of their front gates. Practice begins with a giggle as Guruji makes a joke and finishes in what feels like a heartbeat. Walking home, I notice again how the trees bend to meet over the street, their green canopy interrupted only by bursts of orange, yellow, purple, pink, and white flowers. It’s lovely.

My favourite vegetable stand is outside of Gokulam, close to the Green Leaf restaurant. The owner offers tastes of new fruits to tempt me into buying more, usually he’s successful, and I welcome the excuse to walk, always taking a different route there and back. One route brings me past a row of driving schools, another past construction sites for very posh apartments, another past road construction and downed power lines, a result of last Thursday’s storm, and still another through a public garden.

Today’s walk brought me through the shanty-town just outside of main Gokulam where I averted my eyes from the patchwork shacks, embarassed by my western clothes and heavy bags of groceries. No one pays me any mind, the embarassment is mine alone. A cow studiously ignores me as she works her way through a garbage patch while the crow sitting on her back yells, irritated, at me. A dog bursts out of it’s front gate to chase away the young cow who mistook the front garden for dinner, a man passes wearing a “Las Vegas” shirt, and a mother encourages her daugher to call out “Hi Auntie”. This interrupts me from my reverie and I wonder, is there really any other way to live?

After dinner, I join the power walkers excercising in the public garden on the way to Tina’s. A red dirt path forms a large square around gardens transformed from their struggling daytime appearance to lush, green gardens by the magic of carefully arranged lighting. I walk slowly, lost in thought, enjoying the greenery, the opportunity to walk, the feeling of being anonymous, and the evening breeze while the locals power past me, saris waving in their wake.

and on the fourth day

I discovered peanut butter. And it was good.

Now that I'm safely out of the country, I can talk freely about this. The Finns have something against peanut butter. Five weeks in Finland without peanut butter, it was an exquisite form of torture. I searched the shelves of every grocery store I entered and always found the same sketchy brand, usually just one lone and dusty jar, sitting ignored on the bottom shelf of the jam section. After a while, I looked just for sport, just to see if I could find that one grocery store that understood the importance of the almighty peanut spread.

Coming from a country that dines almost exclusively on breads, you think they'd be open to a bit of variety but every time I lamented the loss of my beloved PB I received looks similar to what I you'd expect had I suggested something really gross like, oh, I don't know, adding rye to everything (oh, but wait...;). When I booked my ticket to India, one of the first things I thought about was the dealer outside the shala; the guy who sells tofu, banana bread and peanut butter out of his blue duffle bag each morning.

It's taken me a few days to catch him but yesterday I wandered outside after practice and the heavens sang - the blue duffle bag was there in its rightful place sitting on the wall. Within minutes I was the proud owner of my own jar of peanut butter and I rushed home where, with a tear in my eye, I enjoyed it with a piece of flatbread I'd brought with me from Finland. And, yes, if you must know, it was rye. After five weeks, some things grow on you.

laundry

How is it possible to slip so easily from one life to another? To adjust to the 8 roads that comprise my daily stomping grounds. To settle so comfortably in a flat that required only incense, candles and a brightly coloured mat to become more home than home. To slide into a rhythm operating at a quarter of the pace of my normal life? After three days I’m amazed at how completely, happily at home I am.

I sit by my window reading and prepare meals which I take to my roof to watch life on the street move through rhythms of it’s own - that’s enough. Days move slowly when practice is finished by 7:30am but they seem to fill. My list of ‘things to do’ is rationed slowly, saved to distract me from those idle times that I know will come: first coffee at Coffee Day, not yet; Fab India, maybe on Saturday; brunch at the Metropole, some other time. This happened my last visit as well and I left without actually getting to any of those things. That’s what happens here, at least for me. How is it so easy?

I wonder what my landlords think of me, the mother up at 5am to brush the front walk, the MBA student busy studying for her finals; what do they think of me always here in front of my window, doing nothing? I wonder what they would think if they knew how hard this doing nothing can sometimes be? How I slowly ration my list of things to do so that I don’t get fitfull - all this time and nothing to fill it. And I feel silly, spoiled and pampered.

The servant comes, my mind naturally jumps to replace the term ‘servant’ with it’s Western connotations, to ‘cleaning lady’ and I don’t know what to do with myself. Where to stand, what to say, what to do. I sit outside in my chair,dissociating myself from the situation while my landlady supervises the cleaning and I’m uncomfortable; sitting here typing isn’t right either. I don’t understand that my garbage should have been placed beside me, outside the front door, for the garbage collecter to pick up, even though we were all standing there talking when he arrived. Instead, I walked to meet him, garbage bag extended, smiling my thanks. This was wrong, my discomfort grows. The cleaning lady takes my clothes to the side of the house to launder and I cringe, afraid that including my underwear in the pile was also wrong, that I’ve added to the list of social norms I’ve transgressed already.

My job means nothing here, even when simplified to ‘Counsellor’. Because I work at a university people usually grasp at that to mask their confusion and assume I’m a teacher, I teach psychology. I’m uncomfortable lying but even more uncomfortable trying to explain what I really do, most can’t comprehend the need for a role like mine. India gives me time to question myself: What do I do? Cleaning lady or servant, its just semantics, what am I really uncomfortable about? Why ration my list of ‘things to do’, what’s to fear from the void of truly having nothing to do?

In the time it’s taken me to write this, my laundry is done and my underwear, bright scraps of cotton, strung carefully across the line running the length of the front yard. This embarrasses me more than anything else that’s passed this morning and I calculate just how long I must wait until I can pretend they’re dry and bring them inside to finish drying here.

getting settled

Kind of feel like I should add something to bump the entry from earlier this morning down, I know people will be worried.

After a good night's sleep, practice and the move from my hotel to my flat, I've had a lovely day. I spent the morning unpacking and the afternoon fluttering around from room to room just being happy - I'm in love with my flat. Everything from the pink walls to the granddaughter who keeps popping in to yell 'Auntie' at me before running away to the mosquito net I've suspended over my bed; it's perfect. That last bit, the mosquito net, I don't actually need but it reminds me of the princess beds I coveted when I was little and I like it.

I took a walk to the only bank machine in Mysore that accepts my bank card. Thankfully, that hasn't changed, but there have been other changes. The construction across from the Stand Up Chai is done and what I thought was going to be a jewellers is actually a pharmacy. It's quite nice so I'm trying to think of something I need so I can drop by. Several flash new restaurants have opened up in the same area as the Green Leaf and there's a new cafe in town to give Coffee Day a run for its money. But not an air conditioned run for it's money so I'll be sticking with Coffee Day for the next few weeks.

Last stops were the Himalaya shop to buy the ayervedic shampoo, lotion, and vitamins I can't buy at home and Loyal World for groceries before returning home to nest some more. So. It's been a good day. Maybe the lesson I'm to learn while I'm here is how not to get caught up in the Maelstrom of my emotions, to remember how quickly things change, because I sense that this is going to be a very solitary visit and there will be times again where I'm feeling sad just as there will be wonderfully content and happy afternoons like this one.