To be here, in Mcleod Ganj (which lies just above Dharamsala, on the mountainside- this is where we are actually staying), is like escaping. All the craziness, the noise and the dirt and the crowds of Delhi and Agra, is gone. The beauty here is the beauty of mountain views and of peaceful energy. It's like a haven from the India we arrived in.
The trip to Dharamsala was, unfortunately, miserable. The majority of the group became violently ill during our 3pm-3am journey in 3-tiered sleeper cars on a shaky train, and continued to be ill for the three hour taxi ride here and the first days in town. I spent my first day in bed, but proved one of the lucky ones, who recovered quickly, and my time here has been magical. Mcleod Ganj is small and made for tourists- small shops, cafes, yoga studios, healing centers, book stores, and vendors line the streets. There are many travelers, more westerners than I expected, but the local community is also quite international, made up of Indians, Kashmiris, and many, many Tibetans. The Dalai Lama's home is in Dharamsala and he has a temple up here on the mountainside. There is a prayer and meditation walk, called the kora, that surrounds the temple. The flags, the prayer wheels, and the ancient Tibetans always lining the walk, chanting and clicking their prayer beads, make it a mystical sort of experience to do the walk. It is nice to be in a place where simply walking is possible (though the streets are terribly steep), where I can breathe and feel real sunshine and think my own thoughts. After the crowded streets of Delhi, it just seems that there is room here. There is time and there is room to experience and also to process, to make sense of the things around me.
Today we had a lecture from Dr. Gotam, who is apparently known as the "encyclopedia" of folk culture in Himachal Pradesh (the state we are in). He catches my heart when he says:
The trip to Dharamsala was, unfortunately, miserable. The majority of the group became violently ill during our 3pm-3am journey in 3-tiered sleeper cars on a shaky train, and continued to be ill for the three hour taxi ride here and the first days in town. I spent my first day in bed, but proved one of the lucky ones, who recovered quickly, and my time here has been magical. Mcleod Ganj is small and made for tourists- small shops, cafes, yoga studios, healing centers, book stores, and vendors line the streets. There are many travelers, more westerners than I expected, but the local community is also quite international, made up of Indians, Kashmiris, and many, many Tibetans. The Dalai Lama's home is in Dharamsala and he has a temple up here on the mountainside. There is a prayer and meditation walk, called the kora, that surrounds the temple. The flags, the prayer wheels, and the ancient Tibetans always lining the walk, chanting and clicking their prayer beads, make it a mystical sort of experience to do the walk. It is nice to be in a place where simply walking is possible (though the streets are terribly steep), where I can breathe and feel real sunshine and think my own thoughts. After the crowded streets of Delhi, it just seems that there is room here. There is time and there is room to experience and also to process, to make sense of the things around me.
Today we had a lecture from Dr. Gotam, who is apparently known as the "encyclopedia" of folk culture in Himachal Pradesh (the state we are in). He catches my heart when he says:
"Himachal Pradesh is not having only it's scenic beauty... the temples speak something. The people speak something. The places speak something."He encourages us, during our stay here, to listen.
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