Of Lice And Ben

A Worrying Discovery

Three nights ago I had an itchy scalp, which was conspiring with my unhappy stomach to stop me from sleeping. No worries, this happens with dreadlocks, particularly if I have been sweating away in yoga practice. I got up and washed my hair (this involved asking my neighbour for a bucket of water, remember that I don't mention the steps involved in what should be simple exercises), which always fixes the problem.

But I woke up in the early hours with the itching as strong as ever, and was that the sensation of something crawling in my hair? Just ignore it until the morning, and pray it isn't you know what... In the morning I captured a bug in my hair. And unfortunately it wasn't a flea (fleas are easy to get rid of, and don't like human hair that much anyway, just hide a flea collar in your headband for a day and they are gone).

Wikipedia confirmed that the critter in my hair was a louse. Lice, nits, whatever you call them, I cannot remember having to think about them since I was a little kid. They are the worst thing to get in your dreads, because one cannot comb out the eggs, so stopping an infestation from reoccuring can be very difficult, and most people cut their dreads off.

A bit more hunting around on the web and it became clear that one has to work hard to get them out of dreadlocks, and go to fairly extreme measures. I found one particular recipe for lice elimination from dreads in several places, so I set out to perform it. Vinegar and hot chilli powder were purchased and mixed into a vile mixture, which was applied liberaly to my hair, then my hair was covered tightly with a black plastic bag and I waited an hour. Goddamn, that stuff stings when it gets in your eyes. I then washed my hair and put lots of coconut oil to drive any survivors away.

This didn't really work, with the itching starting up again a couple of hours after the washing. Luckily for me I met an Israeli guy who had dreadlocks, and having travelled through India for many years and being a bit of a bum he had lice stories to tell. He said "vinegar? You will have to wash your hair with it every day for 2 or 3 weeks to get rid of them all.". Instead he suggested using medicinal alcohol, and using neem oil in my hair to drive out any stragglers and new ticks that hatch from eggs. As it happened, he had a spare bottle of the vile substance that is neem oil that I could have.

Not Big Enough For Ticks and Dreads

That night the itching was worse than the previous night, and I decided that if I could not improve my condition by the next night I would shave my head. So, the next day I went on an adventure to get some rubbing alcohol. After visiting 6 chemists I found out that they call it spirits, and if you ask for alcohol you get blank stares, this is because to run a pharmacy in India you don't need to know anything about the products you sell. After I had convinced the man at the pharmacy that I did not intend to drink the spirits, I went home and made a spirits-vinegar-chilli cocktail for my hair. If you ever do this, make sure you are in a well ventilated room, and whatever you do, keep the mixture out of your eyes!

This time the mixture stayed in for two hours, and it was so powerful that I decided that any lice that survived would get certificates. I made a special oil, comprised of coconut, neem and some DEET. No living creature, let alone lice, would want to live in hair full of that stuff.

Ben 1 - Lice 1

To my relief I woke up this morning after a fantastic sleep, and there is only the odd itch here or there. For the second half, one more application of the cocktail in 4 days time, and daily application of my repelant for the next couple of weeks should defeat them. They have a short 7-10 day reproductive cycle which I have to interrupt. Now begins the laborious task of quarenteening and de lousing my clothes, bedding, yoga mat, and other infected things in my room.

A Few Smiles

I had just recovered from a cold, when I came down with a stomach problem on Christmas Eve. This combined with the lice put me into a poor mood, and I was not inclined to shower as much attention on the locals as they usually like. But when the Israeli guy gave me the neem oil, and let me know that it was possible to keep my dreads I was in a slightly improved mood. I went to get some dinner, stopping at the little store where I buy my paper each day to get my copy of The Hindu (local English language paper). I normally get it from him each morning, and he hands me a copy straight away without me having to ask now. I hadn't been to collect it that morning, so he broke out into a smile and looked my in the eye when I turned up at 7:30 in the evening. This was a development, as he, like most other Indian shopkeepers, usually avoided eye contact during the transaction.

I then crossed the road to the little Indian place where I go for meals about once a day, and the guy who usually serves me impassively smiled when he saw me. I also got a smile when I payed, where usually I met a pair of eyes that had found something interesting in the middle distance over my shoulder. On the way home the kids on my street, and there are a lot of them, were certainly friendlier and only one of them had the cheek to ask me for a pen or Australian coin. I had a good chat with one little boy about the sheep that were tied out the front of his house (they were being fattened up for eating on New Year's Day).

This new trend in my relationship with the locals was probably due to a combination of my good mood and becoming a bit of a local myself. Now that I have been in the same spot for a fortnight, and I am getting some regularity in my dealings with the locals they have started to cut out some of the crap that they deal out to foreigners. Indeed, life is starting to settle down. I have some good friends among the other foreigners and I have found the shops and restaraunts that are staffed by pleasant people.

Chai Dog

Well, the chai dog hasn't settled down, but I don't think that she ever will. Chai dog lives on my street, and seems to take an exception to me. Initially our relationship got off to a smooth start, but that changed when she saw me with Sean. Sean and I were going for our daily chai after yoga, and we were discussing the local dogs. Sean is not a dog person, and dogs pick up on it and love to bark at him. He informed me that there was one dog that went particularly mental when it saw him. As we were having chai a female dog, with drooping teets walked past, and Sean whispered "Here she is, just wait till she sees me"... and the moment she saw him she jumped back 3 steps, began wagging her tail and barking like her life depended on it. She backed off around the corner and barked half way up the street, leaving Sean and I laughing. Since then I have been tarred with the same brush.

Chai dog is harmless, she barks a lot, but her body language, in particular the wagging tail, tells us that she doesn't really mean it. Every morning she walks past the chai stand oblivious to our presence, before we greet here with a "hello darling", or a "good morning sunshine", and she delights in barking at us, which amuses the locals no end.

Charming Old Bloke

"Mayurasana is the peacock posture, but that looks more like a chamelion!"
"perfection is important, there are 400 asanas, but if I show you them all today you will not have perfection and you sill stay in bed tomorrow"
"hey, right foot first, whose side are you on, the devil or God's? I am watching you always"
"try as much as you can. Perfection!"

Being in class with Mr Iyengar each morning is a lot of fun. Unlike other teachers in Mysore, who by all accounts take a lot of fun out of practice, he is always coming up with funny things to say and is very friendly. Of course, he is very serious, but doesn't take himself too seriously, and he also has the habit of punctuating practice with little lectures on the philosophy behind what we are doing. Yesterday Sean told me after class, "when he looked at me and said 'slow breathing, try as much as you can', and started walking over I started breathing quickly!" Sean isn't so flexible as the others in class, and as a result he gets some more "assistance" from Mr Iyengar. I have learnt not to make any complaining noises when he is adjusting me, because he just makes fun of them. This might sound a bit rough, but in reality he has an awful lot of experience, and knows what he is doing.

It is amazing that very few people come to learn from him. We have always got 4-7 people in the morning for each asana class, and in the afternoon my Polish freind and I have him to ourselves for 2 hours when he teaches us philosophy and mudras. One simply does not get the same level of intimacy with other teachers in Mysore (there are 200 people at one of the other schools), and no other teachers are willing or able to teach yoga, pranayama and mudras like he does. The stories that I have heard about dodgy things that happen different yoga schools, particularly that of Patabi Jois who is considered by many to be the grand old master, will have to wait for another post. One guy who has been here a long time told me that he would go to Iyengar if he wanted to learn yoga, because he is the only teacher that he hasn't heard a bad story about. I am glad that he doesn't advertise at all, and deliberately makes himself hard to contact so that only a small number of interested students make the effort to come and learn from him.

D-Day

My practice is coming along very well, and I am now doing the whole of the primary series. It was only three days ago that I got myself into Marichyasana D on both sides (harder than it looks!), which is quite an acheivement for me. In traditional teaching of Astanga yoga, the student only learns a new asana in the series after they can do each of the asanas they have been shown. Marichyasana D requires flexiblity in both ankles, knees and hips, along with a good spinal twist so many people get stuck trying to complete it due to problems in one of those areas.Of course, some of my attempts at the asanas need a lot of work, but over the next few months I will get a lot stronger.

I am also doing classes in teacher training (yoga philosophy) and in mudras (muscle contractions with particular breathing patterns, and nothing to do with hand positions). Mr Iyengar is a real mine of information, and his philosophy lectures in particular are a lot of fun, though it can be quite frustrating to try and get a straight answere out of him when I want to clarify a point that he has made. By the time I have left Mysore I will have plenty to practice and work on before I visit him again to learn the second series... maybe!

Indian Moments

India has a habit of surprising and providing moments of hilarity.

Indglish

The Hindu, a national English speaking newspaper in India, recently had an obituary for a journalist on the front page. After briefly outlining the details of his early and working life, the last paragraph began

At the fag-end of his life he worked as an editor for the...

What part of his life? Indians like to tell you that their middle and upper classes speak the best English in the world, but reading their newspapers one is always delighted by such turns of phrase, thesaurus-inspired vocab and editorial slip-ups.

Got Change?

Getting change when making purchases, particulary off small vendors, can be a problem. But everybody works together to solve the problem. At a bus station recently I was purchasing an iceblock for 2 rupees from a guy carrying an esky (chilly-bin for you Kiwis) while a begger was trying to get some money off me. The seller had no change for my 5 rupee coin (about 15 cents), and without any apparent communication the begger extracted the correct change from his takings for the day. I don't give to beggers usually, but I left this one a couple of rupees.

For Your Own Safety

Recently a law was passed in Mysore making it illegal to ride motorbikes and scooters without helmets. In the leadup to the law coming into effect the police were running around town with loudspeakers reminding motorists of the looming deadline. The law only applied to the person driving the vehicle, not to any passengers. It is not uncommon to see an entire Indian family, Mum Dad and two kids, on one bike. Of course Dad drives, and of course only Dad wore a helmet, with the wife and kids getting the wind in their hair. Tourist passengers who wore helmets were openly laughed at as they rode along.

You might notice that I talk about the wearing of helmets in the past tense, because three days after the implementation of the law everybody stopped wearing helmets and that was that.

Don't Feed The Animals

Out the front of the zoo in Mysore there was a street vendor selling peanuts, with the sales cry, "buy some peanuts for the monkeys". I remembered thinking that was odd, because normally a zoo would not allow the visitors to feed the animals. As it turned out there were plenty of signs inside warning visitors not the feed animals, for their own safety, for the animals' sake and to avoid paying a fine. Nobody seemed to be making any efforts to stop the vendor out the front from encouraging this sort of behavior, though he was standing next to the ticket counter and secturity guards.

What a Difference a Day Makes

The last post was written at the end of a few days of Indian silliness. Of course I don't feel that way all of the time, but India has a habit of amplifying one's emotions! I can be having a good day, when all of a sudden something quite unexpected will throw me off-balance. And Indians seem to sense an off-balance foreigner like dogs smell fear, and they seem to all start playing up at once. Of course nothing has changed, I have just allowed their usual behavior get to me.

It is like doing a tricky balancing posture in yoga. You will be calmly balancing, when you think, "Hey, I am doing well on this asana today", and all of a sudden you start to wobble and fall over. You only start to wobble and fall over with the Indians when you start thinking too much about it... it is like some days I go looking for trouble.

Today was a much better day. I woke before my 5am alarm to go to yoga. My head was clear from my cold for the first time in a few days. The over-enthusiastic dogs that have been chasing me on the way to the shala decided that I wasn't worth the effort, due in part to some well aimed rocks at their leader yesterday.

I enjoyed the practice, with the postures coming a lot easier this morning as I didn't have to struggle for breath and I had enough energy to keep the vinyasa going between postures. I am starting to take a real liking to Mr Iyengar, he is a strict, but funny and understanding. When he was putting me into a tricky posture the other day I let out an unnecesary groan, and he mockingly groaned in return. This might offend some, but it was clear that there was no need for me to moan like that. His adjustments are strong, but he seems to know what my limits are, which is the result of knowing what he is doing and 50-odd years of teaching. His catch-cry is "all will be revealed!", and if you ask him a question about anything a torrent of information and funny stories is unleased.

My usual after-class, chai-drinking buddy Sean was not in class today, so I walked to the chai stall on my own. The guy who runs the chai stall is one of the good Indians, always ready with a smile and a well made chai. For 6 cents one gets a couple of short, sweet chais to start the day.

On the walk down my street to home, the kids were well mannered and in high spirits. They were happy to play and chat, without asking for pens or coins... and the little rascal who threw fruit at me when I didn't give him anything was absent.

For breakfast I made myself cardamom coffee arabic style, and banana porridge with cloves, cardamom and cinamon. It is full power cooking with my new stove.

Then the guy who lives in the flat next to mine, a nice-enough Malaysian bloke who is also studying yoga, and I went to the Mysore Zoo. The zoo was well kept and organised by Indian standards, with lots of different animals (including my fave, the hippo). That said, some of the animals' enclosures were not that well kept, and a lot of the mammals were showing signs of stress. The big cats and bears in particular looked very agitated.

It cost one dollar to get in with my camera. I took a few photos for the first time in a while. I only took one shot of the animals, instead I took photos of Indian tourists taking photos of animals, Indian tourists taking photos of one-another (which is funnier than it sounds), the tacky signs, some well-designed rubbish bins and other little things that make an Indian zoo a unique experience. This Martin-Parr style of photography is a lot of fun in India. And if you don't know who Martin Parr is, I recommend doing a google search for him.

Then a vegetarian fixed meal, called a thali in these parts, was had for 50 cents. That entails rice, some fried breads, 2 types of curry, 2 types of spicy soup, set yoghurt and a dessert. And free top-ups on the curry and soup. Delish, healthy and affordable.

So, not a bad day. Now that I am over my cold and feeling well it is harder for the locals to rock my boat, and easier for me to get along with them. I might not end up "enjoying" many of my Indian experiences, but I certainly am learning a lot from them.

The Natives

Today I am a bit annoyed. It might have something to do with the cold I came down with a couple of days ago, which is making my yoga practice each morning very tiring. It might be the natives. It might be a combination of the two. Whatever the cause, I am going to indulge in a little bit of Indian bashing in this post...

The Landlord

I have never had a dodgy landlord. Sure, I have come in contact with some overzealous real estate agents in my days as a renter, but they only have to be dealt with every 3-6 months during inspections. However, the flat that I am renting now is attached to the house of the owner, aka the landlord. I am developing a dislike for my landlord.

He is an old man who spends all day at home, sharing his wisdom with everybody who comes within earshot. Men have been digging a trench out the front of the property the last couple of days, and he has spent all that time out there telling them how to dig said trench. When I knocked on my neighbour's door yesterday, he hurried over and showed me how to knock properly. He almost tripped me over this afternoon as I left the front gate, "helping" me to avoid a puddle left by the trench diggers.

Yesterday he was hosing down the concrete in front of my room, and started hosing down my new leather sandles. I jumped out of my room and grabbed them before they got to wet. "Hey, it is ok, no problem" he yelled. I quickly shut my door so that he would not see the look on my face that said "I don't care what you do to your leather shoes, but show some respect for my things please, you silly old man". That would have been taking it personally, and one should not do that at any costs.

The Gas Stove

When I first moved in the landlord was showing me around the flat, showing me how to use the light switches, operate the taps, use a key etc etc. We got to the stove, a simple contraption : a screw on burner on top of a gas bottle. We turned it on and a small blue flame was seen,
"Look, fire for cooking"
"very good, how high does it go?"
"this is max-i-mum"
"ah, it is not very strong, are you sure?"
"yes yes, look"
"this is not very strong, maybe the bottle is empty", I pick up the bottle and shake it, is indeed empty.
"No bos, full full"
"then the burner must be broken, I cannot cook with such a small flame, look I can put my hand in it", I wave my hand in the flame,
"NO BOSS, you burn yourself, very hot flame!"
"but look, no burning!"
"look boss, good stove, you cook fine"

The next morning I went to make some porridge, and the flame spluttered and died... the bottle was indeed empty. I point this out to the landlord and he says "yes, it is empty, I will fill today". The next day I get the full bottle back. He then tried to charge me for filling the bottle, but I informed him that gas and electricity were included in the rent. He protested that both were seperate bills, and that I should take the matter up with the Yoga Mandala through whom I had organised the flat. The Mandala confirmed that he was, indeed, being cheeky, and promised to have a word with him.

As he was leaving he said "I am old man, and now I am full tired from making table for you yesterday and filling the gas bottle." He waited for my reply, expecting some baksheesh for doing something he should have done before I moved in. I reply, "Then I won't bother you any more, go and take some rest". They never stop trying!

The kitchen table is another story, I had asked for a table in the kitchen, and he had hired a carpenter to remove the table from my bedroom (which I had told him to leave where it was) and put a new top on it. His involvment in fixing the table had been to stand next to the carpenter all day instructing him on the proper use of a hammer.

Be that as it may, that was all water under the bridge, because I had a stove now! Great, I put a couple of centimeters of water in the bottom of a pan, added some fresh spices and put it on to boil so that I could make some chai. Twenty minutes later the two centimeters of water had not boiled, and my fears about the stove not working "full power" were confirmed. I asked the landlord, and he told me that it was not his problem. Well, it was his problem, but I figured that I would have more success dealing with the Mandala.

Half an hour later I found myself at the establishment of a man who repairs stoves, electric mixers and other such kitchen appliances. He informed the helpful yound man from the Mandala and I that he did not have the proper spare part, but it would be ready by midday the next day.

When I returned the next day he smiled and handed me the stove... "It is fixed?"
"yes, new jet installed"
"good, can I see it working please?"
"ok ok"
The repair man then got out a spanner and began dismantling the burner and trying to clean the jet, which clearly had not be replaced. He put it back together, attached it to a cylinder and managed to extract a puny flame from the burner.
"my friend, you have not fixed anything!"
"problem with the jet boss"
"I know, you told me that you were going to replace it yesterday"
"but I need to replace it, look it is broken"
"I can see that it is broken, why did you try and give it back to me without fixing it?"
"Look, this is a new burner, you have for 160 rupees?"
"what about fixing my old burner?"
"but I need to get a new part"
"My friend, you are behaving very badly, I shall be back"

Far out. I returned to the Mandala and informed them of this new develpment, and that I was not happy at all to have a kitchen full of fresh ingredients and having to keep buying my meals. They promised to look into it, and that I would have it by the next morning. That was yesterday and I still haven't got my burner, even after another visit to the Mandala. But Ben, don't get upset, don't get impatient, this is how Indians are. Well OK, I will not get overly excited by these events, but I won't pretend to enjoy them either.

Nothing Personal

As I have said before, Indians also treat one another in a similar way, and one should not take things personally. You are allowed to raise your voice, shake your fist and make a scene, the Indian whom you are abusing will not take it personally. Thirty seconds later he is you best friend. Likewise you should not take any of his actions personally.

So I don't take it personally. I ignore the kids on my street, because every time I lower my guard and start chatting with them they stick their hands out and ask for "school pens" and "coins". Every time I make friends with someone my age, they end up asking for money directly or indirectly. I don't get upset when every time I buy a handicraft, or appliance from an Indian it breaks and they pretend to be surprised. Every time you give an Indian a chance they dissapoint, and this makes one suspect every friendly advance.

And there are people everywhere, one billion of them stuffed into a relatively small area. Everywhere one goes they will be approached by an Indian, so they are an integral part of the landscape, they are an unescapable aspect of the "Indian experience".

For this reason, if it wasn't for the yoga in Mysore and the friendly Westeners I am meeting, I would leave this country as soon as possible, and probably not return. I am capable of tolerating the Indians, not acknowleging them when they approach me on the street, staying detached from them, but I do not enjoy it. The vast majority of Indians one meets end up doing something that can offend and upset. I don't want to stop being open with people, I don't want to expect the worst from them in case they dissapoint me.

Happy Homemaking

Thanks for your comments folks, it would appear that my Mum isn't the only reader. I will keep posting, though I now have a new challenge -- writing interesting posts when I spend a long period of time in the one place.

I arrived in Mysore on Sunday, after a very-pleasant-by-Indian-standards bus journey. That is to say, I had a seat to myself the whole way, I was able to stash my bag under a seat where I did not have to worry about it and the climate inside the bus was tolerable. The climate outside wasn't so flash at times, I had my elbow hanging out the window for around an hour, until I noticed that all the surfaces of my arm that faced the wind were coloured black from the smog in the air.

A New Home

"Hey Rasta, how you going?"
no reply
"Hey man, why you no wanna talk?"
"because you are going to try and sell me some marijuana"
"you don't want marijuana? OK, you want opium?"
smile and keep walking.

Mysore sees more than its fair shair of tourists, this type of conversation only happens in tourist towns.

I was a bit nervous entering Mysore, because I was worried that the city in which I wanted to spend some months might be too noisy, dirty and hot (these things are relative, it is an Indian city so I was expecting it to be noisy, dirty and hot). To my releif it is the most pleasant Indian city that I have visited so far.

The city is centred around the Maharaja's Palace, which is one hell of an impressive complex. I haven't visited it yet, but it looks amazing from the outside. The streets are clean by Indian standards, with raised gutters (impressive) and police making sure that pedestrians and vehicles get along at the major intersections (appreciated). The climate is tolerable too, being far cooler than the coastal areas that I have just left. The winter here is cooler than the summer in Brisbane (one has to remember that we are close to the equator here), so no great discomfort there.

The people are also far less intrusive than those in the North. There are a few young guys who try to sell you drugs at Ghandi Square, but otherwise people keep their distance. Rickshaw drivers rarely hassle the pedestrian foreigner (in the North they don't beleive that we should be allowed to walk more than a block), and they use the meter, though I did have demonstrate with one driver who tried to take me the long way (I always have a compass and a map for the first couple of days, after which I can find my way around easily).

It was very easy to get myself established in Mysore, with only one day needed to find myself some long term accomodation and organise to start yoga classes. I have an appartment, with bedroom, bathroom and kitchen in a quiet part of the suburb Laxmipuram. Today I am going to do some shopping for a few cooking items, and then get some raw ingredients. It has been driving me mad walking through the amazing produce markets and spice stalls without being able to take some goodies home and have a cook-up.

Yoga Classes

Yesterday I went to pay BNS Iyengar a visit at his yoga shala. This is certainly not a fancy yoga studio with wood floors, natural light and inspirational posters on the wall. The concrete floor is covered with large rugs, on which one places their yoga mat to practice. The ceiling is high, and the rooms are dark, with the Indian men practicing in the main room, and the foreigners and Indian women tucked away in small, dark, stuffy rooms.

Mr Iyengar himself is a very likeable character. After waiting a couple of minutes he entered the room and yelled, "what information do you want?". I explained my interest in studying yoga, and he asked "how long do you want to study for?", I told him 3 months, he smiled and said "then I can help you". He explained the routine, "this is an institution, you practice every day except for days of the new and full moon".

Unlike other teachers in Mysore, he believes in teaching students philosophy from the beginning. So the first part of the course was an hour long talk on the basic philosphy behind Ashtanga Vinyasa Yoga (The yoga practice taught by Iyengar). "Hey, are you taking notes point-by-point? OK, good. Because you won't get told this anywhere else." He need not have worried, I took my notes home and wrote out a full description of everything he had told me and hilighted the points that needed clarification.

He then showed me the first postures, the suriya namaskar or sun salutes that are performed at the beginning of each practice. I found it very different from my practice in Brisbane, with BNS counting out the breaths very quickly, forcing me concentrate hard on smooth fast movement. After they were finished he smiled and told me to sit
"now stretch your legs, NO NO not that way, full lotus!"
I begin to fold my left leg into lotus
"NO NO, always right foot first"
oh shit, my bad side. It is much more difficult for me to get into full lotus with my right leg first, but I oblige him. He smiles again.
"now 20 Ujaiyi breaths, make them strong"
he leaves the room and comes back 20 seconds later
"ok, you finished?"
I shake my head
"ok, now hands above head. NO NO, palms up, now bend forward, 10 breaths"
my right leg is hurting like hell.... then I relax it and find that I am very comfortable.
"ok, finished, come tomorrow at 6:30"
and off he walks, with me saying thankyou to his back. He doesn't stand on ceremony at all.

This morning I turned up and met a Polish couple who have been studying with Iyengar for 3 weeks. They gave me a quick run-down on what to expect before he arrived and started the class. He started with the opening chant, which nobody tried to follow. I had spent some time last night remembering it because it was different from the one that I am used to... so I just lip synched... until he skipped the last few lines and started counting us straight through our sun salutes.

Then we started with teaching me the standing sequence. I was familiar with all of the postures except for one. The main difference was that he expected full postures with no adjustments. This caused problems for me in some spots, for example I lose my form completely if I have to grab my toe in the triangle posture (U.trikonasana A). The pace is fast and, the postures strong and the sweat flows. He stopped me when the rest of the class moved on to the primary series, "we introduce other assanas each day", and got me to lie down and rest. I heard one funny comment "Hey, try to do the B position, yes try, you can do it..."
a couple of seconds pass then Iyengar laughs
"Oh, you cannot do it!"
and everyone laughs, but in a good natured way.

I promise not to talk too much about the specifics of my yoga practice here. There are plenty of other blogs out there with people writing daily commentries on their physical exploits in Mysore, and they are about as interesting as watching paint dry.

Now, it is time for me to go get some lunch then do some happy homemaking. I had some funny things that I had found in the local paper that I was going to write about, but they can wait until next time.

Mangalore

Mangalore is a cool name for a city. Last night I was making a list of cool sounding places that I have visited, and it was up there with Chichicastinango, Kathmandu and Managua.

I would call it sunny Mangalore, if only the smog would part and let some rays in. The first indication that I was entering a city on the bus yesterday was the sharp increase in dust and smog levels. According to the Lonely Planet this is a university city, as well as one of India's technology hubs. Well, there certainly are lots of "student types" running around, along with an increase in the number of jeans being worn. Every third shop here is selling mobile phones and computers, and at damn low prices too.

Is Anybody Out There?

One little point of administration before the post proper. I have a sneaking suspicion that my mother might be the only person who reads my blog (G'day Mum!). So, is there anybody else reading this? Feel free to comment on this post, or write me an email letting me know if it is worth my while continuing to write these posts. I like writing them, but they are time consuming.

A New Pair of Jeans

As I left the changing room the salesman asked "Hey Boss, they fit you?".
"Have you got any real Levis?" I ask. He thinks about lying, then decides not to.
"No boss. They no good, here, maybe some Wranglers, here try these"
"But these are boot cut, remember I want flair"
"oh boss, same same"
"but different, eh?"
"yes, different, but same, you try?"
"ok"
... I try the jeans and they are not too bad...
"you like boss?"
"hmmmm, not bad, but 1300 rupees is very expensive, no?"
"yes, try these, only 400 rupees"
I smile, and play along, "but they are a different brand, not same same."
"look boss, made by same company, look at labels."
"I see, maybe I come back, see you later"
A look of dissapointment, then a smile, "ok boss".

My old pair of Levis had a blow out on the bum; it was time to get some new jeans. Mangalore seems like a good place for this kind of thing. One has to be careful buying clothes over here, little things like using quality zips, buttons that don't break and dyes that don't run in the wash can ruin your day. I had decided to bight the bullet and get a genuine pair of Levis, to save me having to buy a replacement pair in one months time. Now the challenge was to find a "genuine" pair of Levis.

I had already tried on something that looked like a good approximation to a real pair of Levis. All good until I tried them on and the zip didn't line up. I had then gone to another "emporium" where the exchange went something like
"Hello, have you got Levis?"
"No, but we have Diesil"
"OK, well, I want a 32 waist in dark blue, no bleaching, and flair cut"
"Here try these"
"These are boot cut"
"same same, very good jeans"
"ok. I try."
... I go to the change room, trying to figure out where they have put the spy hole (it is almost guarenteed that they have one), and I emerge 30 senconds later...
"hey boss, you like?"
"The button is not very good quality"
"buttons is first class"
"but look, it fell off when I was putting them on"
"oh, must be a bad pair"
"yeah, must be, goodbye"

Normally I hate shopping for clothes, but I was starting to enjoy my exchanges with the salesmen. Finally I went into a shop and asked to see their Levis. These looked like the real thing, I tried a pair on, and they fit. The perfect size 32, the denim is that flash stuff that is a bit stretchy, and the fly sits straight up and down with no wrinkles. These might just be the real thing. It is also a good sign that there is to be no negotiation over the price (fake stuff is sold at a higher profit margin, and hence one can always find some wriggle room on the price). So now I have some new jeans. Nice.

Paradise Lost

My last post was from Pardise Beach, south of Gokarna. I only stayed for a week, for a few different reasons.

First was the swelling number of Israelis. Now I have to be careful what I say here. All of the Israelis were easy going and good types. But on the last night the little private beach in front of my hut was covered with 12 Israelis and one Belgian. All the other huts in my "hotel" were filled with very stoned Israelis. You have to hand it to them, for a country of 7 million people (when I mentioned this to an Israeli I was corrected... 6 million jews and 1 million arabs, I am sure there is a reason for pointing that out) they manage to get a lot of their young folk out and travelling. They are good types, but they tend to turn the places that they visit into monocultures of smoking pot, drinking and bashing on drums/strumming guitars.

The second reason was the Aaron the Israeli yogi, who was the first person I met on the beach. Aaron is a special guy, that is for sure. He is 50 years old, and when I turned up he proudly declared that he had been a yogi for 30 years. He then did some postures that would impress a layman, but he didn't look that comfortable to me. He smoked a lot of cigarettes, and had the annoying habit of muttering "Om Shiva something-or-other" every time he walked into a room, saw anybody eating, saw a fire alight, and whenever somebody rolled a joint he would grab it off them and bless it. This seemed to be the only continuous form of yoga practice in his life. He then explained that Amelie, the pretty 24 year old French girl sitting next to him was his student. She smiled innocently. Oh dear. I wondered if there were any better huts somewhere else on the beach.

As it turned out there weren't, so I took the hut next to them. The next morning I woke up to find Aaron giving a yoga lesson in front of our huts. I did my own practice, then went to have breakfast and write a diary entry. When I returned he had them in very awkward looking headstands. Some were complete beginners, and he had them practicing for well over 3 hours. He had one girl in a headstand, with her neck and shoulders well out of position, while he stared absent-mindedly out to sea. When he let her down I said that it would be better if she tucked her chin in, or better still did a preparation posture. "Come on Ben, I am just trying to give them confindence". Indeed, and scare her away from doing yoga ever again. I saw the looks on the girls faces, and they were more than exhausted from having to try some very difficult postures without proper technique.

It all went pear shaped for Aaron when he made unwelcome sexual advances on Amelie, and informed everybody that they were not good students, in fact "they were not in his league". This was good, all his "students" stopped practicing with him and Amelie came to her senses and left the beach. But, the next moring he had another couple of girls (always female students) practicing in front of my hut, and later that day I saw that he had one of them drawn to the side all the time and he was talking and working on her. I decided that I didn't want to be around this sort of behavior.

It is ironic that yoga tries to free one from ego, but so many people seem to find their ego swell out of control in the yoga world. It reminds me how lucky I was to get honest and genuine teachers in Brisbane.

Still, paradise beach was an ideal beach, and Danesh, the Indian guy who owned our huts and ran the chai shop next door was super friendly, honest and a good cook. I went swimming all through the day, practiced lots of yoga and drank far too much chai.

Speaking of Yoga

I have been slowly working my way south with Mysore as my target, and tomorrow I will get a bus there. I plan to study yoga with BNS Iyengar (the little Iyengar, that is, not the famous IKS Iyengar who teaches in Pune), although there are no plans fixed in stone. I haven't really mentioned yoga in my blog, but I have kept up a regular practice, though not quite daily. When we were hiking in Nepal I practiced twice a day, before and after each days walk and got amazing results. Since then I have practiced at least once every two days. Now that I am not sitting at a computer all day the improvement in my practice is tremendous, both in terms of flexibility, strength and intensity. It is exciting to wonder what a few months of practice in one place with a master like Iyengar will do for me.

Paradise Beach

Pretty tacky name for a post eh? Well, it is a tacky name for a beach, but that is the name of the beach that I have found for mystelf, just south of Gokarna in Karnataka state. The beach is the fourth in a series south of Gokarna, and takes about one and a half hours of walking to reach. It is small and perfect. Clear water, clean sand and hardly anybody on the beach. These are all vast improvements over Goa, which was overcrowded, dirty and full of hassle.

I have myself a little beach hut. There are some simple places to eat, and a village 10 minutes walk away where fruit and veg can be purchased. So now is a time to relax; swimming, yoga and simple life are the orders of the day. And yeah, it has overpriced internet!

I am no longer travelling with my German travel budy Marco. He got an application for an Australian working visa accepted, and is on his way to Mumbai to get a flight. Some of you back home might be meeting him sometime soon...

Arambol was nice enough. I lived a lazy life, read a lot of books and started my skin started from its usual white to a yellow/pink combo (my days of getting red trying to get a tan are behind me, now I just hide in the shade). But the beach was nothing special, and one could not walk around without getting the usual hassle from the locals. The party scene was also beginning to heat up for Christmas and New Years. All of this is of little interest to me, so I have headed south for something a bit quieter.

The Natives

I often mention the local people in these posts, and the comments probably come over largely negative. Readers might think that I am being unfair, but Indians are really something else. I shall write a post on the subject another day, when my opinions are better formed.

But I shall say one thing. It is beleived that Indians are a spiritual people. This is horseshit.

At first sight, one sees only spirituality -- temples everywhere; shrines, statues and holy sites dot the streets; and people of all walks of life can be seen performing puja (prayers, offerings and other rituals) everywhere. Each door has a statue of picture of Ganesh (the elephant headed god of luck, among other things) above each door, and there is some kind of religious way of doing everything (only make love with your left hand, for example).

But after a while one realises that Indians are masters of blind faith. They perform their religious rituals by rote, and do not stop to consider the reasons why these rituals might be performed. As an example, They think that they are clean because they use the correct hand for unclean practices such as going to the toilet; if they thought about what they were doing they would not go to the toilet on the street in front of their house. It is for this reason that they believe westerners to be dirtier than they, because we do not follow the ritual (though we are very concious of hygene and sanitation).

But toilet practices are not a good reason to get upset about the local population. Indians are cheaters, scammers and liars of the highest order. It seems that for the vast majority, one's religious responsibilities end once one has finished performing puja. They will make a prayer for peace, understanding, honesty and make an offering. But they do not make the connection between their religious responsibilities and their day to day life. This ability to divorce spirituality (which I define as living properly) from day to day actions bu using ritual makes Indians a very tricky mob to deal with on good days, and when they get you on a bad day...

So, I have found that they greatest spiritual lesson that one can learn in India is not taught by the locals. It is learning to live happily and harmomoniously in the face of the sometimes very offensive, annoying and sculdugerous treatment that one gets from them.