Tiara in Transit

The Sivanandra Ashram is just out of Trivandrum, high in the hills and right next to a forest. Walking in at 6pm at night, I’m amazed at how many foreigners there are and that the place, in the dim light looked more like a very basic resort / college (very basic)

Until I saw my room, which looked more like a jail cell, but the ‘country retreat’ version where the more well off prisoners spend their holidays.

6am at Satsang (Meditation & chanting)
This was my first introduction to both meditation and chanting, and always the optimist, I had a feeling I was going to be really good at it.

My girlfriend Daniela said over email a couple of months ago – ‘I can’t believe you’re going to stay in an Ashram! Your going to see an elephant come at you with 8 peckers.’

I sat still with everyone in an open air hall for over an hour until the sun came up, peeking my eyes open every now and then to check out what everyone else was doing, thinking ‘Am I meditating?’.

Then figured that since I hadn’t yet seen the elephant with 8 peckers, I hadn’t gotten it right yet.