I Quit

After my first day at Doon School volunteering... I Quit!

I Quit my worrying about scheduling.

I Quit my panic over planning.

I Quit running from place to place.

I Quit, well... I'd say I quit my job... but I already did that!

I LOVED my first day! Even with a cough and head cold and some very potent oral remedies (making me both dizzy and detatched in the afternoon) it was FANTASTIC. And I am not overexaggerating to sell issues of Lyndia's India either!

First - I had a nice breakfast at the Foote House table of C-form students (the younger grade). I was announced/introduced at the post-breakfast assembly and it was official. The students are all required to address the female teachers (now I am one too) as "ma'am" which feels very formal and I keep wanting to say "it's just Lyndia" but the rules are well established and well followed here so I won't ever say it outloud :)

Second - I went to the on-campus hospital for some medicine and can safely say from the vantage point of the next day that they were well worth it.

Met the enthusiastic, intelligent and supportive yoga teacher KPS and observed my first class, was introduced to the group (1 of 5) and then even got to teach for 5 minutes at the end. When will I teach again? Well... as of now (Friday) it's already done! The best-est part of all?? One of the students (a girl, one of very few - and only as she is a daughter of one of the teachers) beamed at the affirmative response to her question of "Will you be teaching us at our next class?" And then today (at said "next class") she came up to me and asked if I could meet with her some afternoon too! I. WOULD. LOVE. TO. (but now I am getting ahead of myself... I need to focus on why YESTERDAY was awesome, not today...)

Then I felt all my medicine kick in and compile side-effect on top of side-effect... I was exhausted, dizzy, and very unfocussed. So I did the only logical thing - after lunch I took a chai break, had a cookie and went to sleep. And MISSED my after-lunch scheduled Social Service class.  ....luckily I was napping at the home OF the Social Service teacher so she knew exactly where to find me! :)

I woke up JUST IN TIME and she took me over to where the Doon boys were... teaching at the Bindal project - where the children and youth living in the dried river bed a few blocks from the school come for tutoring, classes and EVEN YOGA! Six Doon boys were teaching two yoga classes and I came to and came in just as they were starting. I got to supervise these great young men instructing the eight young women at the Under-the-Bridge school in yoga. I also was instructed to take photos (so: done and done!)

Bindal Students I taught yoga to for 10 minutes ;)

Then the best part of the class was when the yoga teacher said that the Doon boys would assist and translate while I got to teach some asanas to these girls! YEEEE-HAW! It was SO FUN! I've never had such a great 14 minutes of yoga teaching before! I had them dancing and laughing a bit too and a few times my poor translators could only say "just please watch ma'am." At least we all had fun and apparently I will be able to do this two or three times a week (again, just found out today).

Girls at Sapera Basti (village) I was *supposed* to teach yoga to but they wanted to tour us around the village and show us their house and bedrooms and jewlery and posters of favourite Bollywood actresses.

That, all that... that was the cake. So the icing?

I missed my walking partner/roommate and was accompanied home by someone new (the librarian who lives in the main floor of the home I stay at)... someone who actually just took me back via SCOOTER (aka. Scootie).

SO AWESOME!

p.s. today I taught my first class in the yoga school and I will have about four per week.

First Day at Doon

I turned in my backpack for this first day of school. (Bought a handbag in the market yesterday and a new outfit just for it though...) I am here at Doon School ready to volunteer and looking forward to both the social/community project aspect and the yoga (and anything else they can possibly think of so task me with).

I have started really getting into the Hindi study (now that my brain has settled/pushed away a bit of the yoga-theory that was filling every possible space).

Dhanyavad (thank you... but I already kind of know this one)

Apne kya kaha?  (what did you say?)

Mera nam Lyndia hai. (I'll let you guess this one.)

achchha  (good)

are today's words/phrases... but first: khana!*

(*as soon as the breakfast bell rings and we can commense in the verb of food consumption.)

First Prize for being Early

...goes to: Lyndia!

But this time I've taken "being early" to a whole new, practically obscene level. I cannot believe it. I got so lost in Rishikesh (hours/days/weeks/month(s)) that I managed to break my own best record of timely-ness.

Sometimes I've had people comment on how I am "so punctual" and they ask what my trick is. Usually I tell them it's about planning ahead but that I've been planning like this for so long that "being early" is just habitual and "being ontime" is almost unacceptable as it almost feels late!

Luckily and thankfully the folks here in Dehradun that I've met are not only gracious and welcoming but totally able to overlook that my "punctuality" has crossed a line... so get ready for it. Guess how early I was?

I was approximately 27 hours early. TWENTY SEVEN HOURS! Compound this with the fact that the driver (I ended up hiring a car instead of taking the bus) was actually on NON-Indian time and apparently was ready to take me even three hours EARLIER. Good grief! The Universe is conspiring to make me terribly, unfashionably and very inconveniently early.

So I arrived a day before I said I would. How did this happen? I guess I counted 2011 as an un-leap year and took a day OFF February (sorry February) and simply counted yesterday March 2. Easy, I guess? Unfortunately this means I missed the camping trip BUT came on the day they DEPARTED not returned. Thus, my much anticipated meeting of Mrs. B will be delayed until the scheduled time. Oh poorly-timed, oxymoronic Lyndia, when will you ever learn?

Sunrise from the apartment accomodations

Good news? The patient front gate guards... the confused and immensely helpful staff... the slightly skeptical but supportive driver and then I even got to meet the school's headmaster.

But the best part? Well... that everything's worked out so far! Today (today = Tuesday, March 2nd 2011 - just reminding myself) is a holiday and things are certainly laid back and there's lots of time to see the new surroundings and take in the transition. The impressive, beautiful campus of the Doon School and my accommodations off-campus with... (you'll never guess) an ART TEACHER (Ceramics, Sculpture, Painting, Textiles) who is so awesome and helpful and lovely, named Banita! So I'm invading her studio apartment and she is an amazingly gracious hostess! First she took me for, shockingly, burgers at "Hot Spice" (a little fast food shop) which I was relieved to find out were vegetable patties because I was hoping I was not forcing any "non-veg" dietary options on anyone! But I think I will be able to keep on the bandwagon of the vegetarian diet while I am here :)

SpongeBob on the patio outside the studio apartment

I am really enjoying it so far (despite this silly cough I have assumed for the last couple days - which she tried to aid the relief of with a nice mint, raisin, cinnamon tea and gogul - a local sweetner of some kind that I doubt I've spelled correctly) and frankly, I am just so thankful that no one has even brought up my anti-tardiness again. In the upstairs studio with lime green curtains we shared stories and talked about art and I even got to see my hostess' art portfolio and it was all so lovely!

Toady? I've got the tour of the campus grounds (absolutely awe-inspiring and I DO have pictures... for another day). Now I am chillin' in the Ceramics Studio and wishing my art-inclined friends could see this place! (Kali, Katie, Janae, Heather, Cadence, Dad! others... this is a phenomenal set-up and any high school art teacher would be drooling at the space, materials and the required time teachers have for the own work!)

I look forward to learning how I will be able to be of service while I am here!

First I take Manhattan then I take Dehradun

I hope the title of this post was sung to the appropriate tune... my last (half) day in Rishikesh and my mini-road trip to Dehradun.

After much a bit of deliberation I am opting to take the "first class" method of trasport and feel like some kind of inauthentic glamour queen because of it.

Option 1: taxi to Rishikesh town/bus stop - public bus - taxi to Doon School (and likely getting ripped off for the first and last step. Slightly unclear on the scheduling - likely have to wait an hour or more beyond the travel time).
Required: carry over-sized, now TOTALLY FULL 40-some liter backpack.
Cost: about $12 Canadian Dollars

Option 2: hire a private car from the Ashram door to the school campus (set price & reasonably reliable timetable... i.e. when I order it (give or take aka. Indian time).
Required: carry backpack to door and... uhhh... no that's it.
Cost: about $25 Canadian Dollars.

I opted for the $13 peace-of-mind fee. Just call me a Hollywood Heiress... actually, please don't.

Next stop - Dehradun!

Bonus Days in Rishikesh

After some lovely sight-seeing (half of which has already landed on the blog!) I realized that instead of rushing off to a gracious offer of camping in India (Red Canyon) with teenage boys... I would be, instead, doing 3 or 4 yoga classes, having my meals cooked for me, reading, journal-ing/blogging, finishing some online tasks (looking into another "brand" of silence-meditation retreats), some in-town errands (finding some cds, and an atm etc.) - I decided to try and spend the extra two days here and practice integration: Life Yoga.

More than just the stretching and fitness yoga I need to build up some stamina in the meditation and mindfulness department - and what better way than to stay in Rishikesh and the Ashram. Part of me almost wishes I had another two weeks here but I am very much looking forward to the volunteering at the Doon School! For those of you who haven't googled that yet... here's their web site. And I plan to help out there for three weeks or so... but that's still "to come."

For now I will continue to rise at 4:45am, meditate, do yoga, eat breakfast in silence and enjoy the abundant sunlight and positive energy of the friends I've made from the Yoga Teacher training.

Already I have two new roommates (from the YTT program) and feel the reflection-time and relaxation as such a needed gift after the frenzy of tests, practicums, stress (real, imagined or other peoples') and then quite a few good byes. As such... I am hesitant to take any opportunity that DOESN'T involve both restfulness and personal reflection time. I am feeling pretty spoiled but refuse to feel guilty!

So the come-this-afternoon on an Indian public bus and then unload half your stuff and pack for fun-filled camping adventures for one evening... made me feel overwhelmed just thinking about it actually... but I was SO excited and drawn to the opportunity to DO something... I nearly forgot my goal of just BEing (more on that topic later).

Just as I had hoped when I started my blog and went on my trip... I am here not to finish a checklist of stops or amass a veritable contemporary art museum of photos (although I do have at least 200 already - burnt them on to a cd to help keep the memory card free)... no, this trip is about DOING as much as possible... I am abnormally capable of finding those opportunities ANY/EVERY WHERE. This trip is about learning how to BE as often as possible.  -- Intersting fact: today's morning yoga class theme: Be. (and) Be in the Moment. ... NOT the first time a random event has matched PERFECTLY with my mental intention or current inquiry while I've been here.

p.s. some how I keep forgetting to add this to my blog... my YTT nickname: from day one I was Miss India. Haha, there were actually some people who didn't know my real name until week three! But one day the nickname was expanded. After helping one of my Japanese Yoga Family friends with her paper and presentation her roommate said "good bye Miss India, home tutor!"

Good times in Rishikesh and now I've got an additional 48 hours to keep the vibes going.

a slightly famous Ashram

Here is a bit of a famous place - even if you don't know it you could guess why - play the game and follow the little journey we had this weekend.

Last Open to the public in 1988. Now? 50 Rupees at the Gate

Impromptu guide. What a Character! But not Maharishi Mahesh Yogi

Meditation Dome once home to some famous Bugs? 

There were hundreds and they had GREAT acoustics

Formerly the Main Yoga Hall... bit of a fixer-upper - but the ceiling tiles look like an inspiration for an Album of the same colour...

the LEVITATION Hall for Transcendental Meditation (we are all amazed!)

Old Water Towers on the Apartment complexes. I DID climb up but had my camera with me... (also great acoustics!)

Now do you know why this is a famous Ashram?

If you have no idea... click here - Wikipedia will explain it to you.

Sunrise Watching

Today for my Personal Practice I went up to the yoga hall to watch the sun rise...

 I tried to quietly go outside to see the night sky transition....

 and the sun's light starting to grow...

 and the colours of the sky playing chameleon... and then I went back to my mat and did some Sun Salutations (or Suryia Namaska'rasana)

 But came back to witness a bit more glowing warmth...

 and the light decorating the hills.

 from the rooftop patio of the yoga ashram.

but ended up witnessing something Divine

and went back inside to finish practicing asana (poses) and felt the sunny glory indoors too!

lots more pictures

Park near the Ganga

Concert of Traditional Music at the Ashram

Graduation Ceremony

delicious Ashram meal

Chai at the Jewelry Shop

Best Study Spot!

Swami Yogananda (aka Yogi 101 - his AGE!)

After a Dip in the Ganga

Mother Maya (Tiwari) speak at our graduation

Now I need a break from the Internet. I can't believe how much energy it takes to post pictures, I'm exhausted! I do have plans for three more blog posts.... and I managed to just save all my pictures (so far) on a C.D. so I can clean my camera off for the next leg of my journey! (Volunteering here I come.... but postponed by two days. It'll be Tuesday instead of tonight.)