Email home #14

Hey all y'all!

Greetings from beautiful McLeod Ganj. I am currently residing in this enchanting Tibetan settlement/touristy backpackers' paradise in the foothills of the Himalayan mountains and I love it. The air is cool, the mountains majestic, the food delicious and the people are fabulous. Between the mountains, temperature and pines, I find myself forgetting that I am a student and thinking that I am on vacation up at the cabin. Or in other words, I love it here.

I am amazed at how quickly the time in India is flying by. Amritsar came and went in a blink of an eye, it seems. It was a wonderful stop on a world religion tour. I was able to learn quite a bit about Sikhism. Almost everyday I spent time at the Golden Temple complex. I was always sure to circumambulate (walk around in a clockwise direction) the temple. Twice I visited inside the temple, once I visited the museum in the clock tower, and I was always sure to visit the langar, the free kitchen which serves chapatti and lentil meals to roughly 13,000 people on an average day. My favorite spot in Amritsar was sitting atop the temple. The view was beautiful, there were fewer people, and I was able to meet pilgrims from Delhi, Hyderbad and other regions of India.

I really enjoyed my evenings in Amritsar. In addition to ideal weather, there was always something exciting happening. On Monday we had a group Family Home Evening, on Tuesday several of our group went and saw Om Shanti Om, a popular bollywood film out in theatres, on Wednesday we visited the India-Pakistan border to watch the evening ceremony, and on Thursday I went to the temple and watched their holy book, Sri Guru Granth Sahib, taken to its bed for the night.

In Sikh history there were originally 10 successive Gurus who were leaders and teachers to Sikhs. The 10th Guru, Gobind Singh, prior to his death, declared that from them on their book of scripture would be their living guru. So, the Guru Granth Sahib is seen as their living word, is highly respected, is believed to have answers to all problems and each evening at 9:30 it is retired to a cushioned bed in a gold trimmed room in a neighboring temple. I observed this with two other students and had a kind Sikh yoga teacher from Canada, Dave Singh, explain what was happening and answer any and all questions.

Thanksgiving was spent in Amritsar. The group decided that it would be appropriate to splurge by going to one of the town's alleged nicer restaurants and order something non-veg. We took a rickshaw to The Crystal where the ambiance was nice, with the exception of the cockroaches and the food was mediocre and left most of our group feeling ill. So, when it comes to Thanksgiving, there is no place like home. But it was still a wonderful day and there was plenty found to be thankful for. I ate dinner at the free kitchen and enjoyed that experience a great deal. I love langar. It is run completely by volunteers and donations, and everyone sits on the floor together. A major theme in Sikhism is of equality. There is no caste. Women are esteemed as equals. There is a picture in the museum of a visiting emperor sitting cross-legged on the floor and eating the same food as the common people he ate along side. Be you Hindu, Muslim, Sikh, American, Indian, rich or poor, all are treated as equals. I love it.

Other highlights of Amritsar included shopping for punjabi shoes, discovering a delicious breakfast of hot milk, sugar, cream and something resembling shredded wheat. I also loved visiting a nearby park which commemorated the martyrdom of hundreds of Indians in the early 1900s. It was a beautiful place. Originally I'd planned to do homework there daily, but it was too distracting since I would be approached regularly by people wanting to shake my hand or take my picture. Half the time I feel like a celebrity, and the other half a caged "zoo animal", as Melanie not-so-tactfully phrased it for some young men snapping pictures on their camera phones. For some reason people are enchanted by white people and aren't shy about expressing it.

We don't have the same problem here in McLeod. This place is swarming with white people, most of whom speak with Australian accents. And I must confess, I'm not a huge fan of being just another white backpacker passing through. In all my travels I have been sad to see how much certain parts of society have had to evolve to accommodate and take advantage of visiting tourists. But it is still a beautiful place and I am excited to learn what I can during my stay in this wonderful place. McLeod Ganj is home of the residency of His Holiness the Dalai Llama and many temples and places of cultural significance to Tibetan exiles.

Well, I'm going to go work on some homework and then go out in search of adventure. I hope that all is well on the homefront. See you in a few weeks!

Love,
Allison