India
- hkitchstewart
- Jun 25, 2019
- 15 min read
Updated: Oct 9, 2019
What a month it’s been. From visiting the majestic Taj Mahal, escaping aggressive red-butted monkeys, rafting on the Ganges, full 8 hour days of yoga, a 4 a.m. hospital visit, too many marsala chai’s, an unfortunate assault, and dodging large amounts of motorbikes, people and cows…. crammed onto tiny bridges and cobbled streets all with a consistent horn sound blaring… Whew...... India you were everything that everyone told me.
However, I am not regretful that I came, even though it wasn't the most ideal experience, not all experiences can be everything. I met wonderful people at my yoga school, spent an entire month in the Holy City of India, and achieved my license to teach yoga back in the states.
Trevor and I arrived in New Delhi on March 23rd, we spent the evening sipping pricy drinks in the Connaught area but enjoyed the 21st-century infrastructure after spending time in Kathmandu, Nepal.
Taj Mahal
The following day we went to Agra, to visit the Taj Mahal. We used Keeper Landwey Delhi, tour guide service. Highly recommend. This all-inclusive experience picked us up from our hotel, transferred us to a 1-hour train ride, then promptly met us as we stepped off our train. Trevor enjoyed the train ride, as they served us breakfast and international newspapers. Our tour guide had been in the business for over 23 years and was still excited to show us around for the day. It’s been on my bucket list to visit the Taj Mahal. As a child I remember drawing a photo from a National Geographic cover, several years later I drew this mausoleum in high school. I think once I get home, I will again attempt the architecture of the Taj Mahal.
Commissioned in 1632 by emperor Shah Jahan, as a tomb for his favorite wife Mumtaz Mahal, who died giving birth to their 14th child. It is known as “The Jewel of Muslim Art in India”. The exterior decorations consist of applied paint, stucco, stone inlays, and carvings. The Taj Mahal is a Muslim temple, therefore, there are no indications of animals, all decorative elements consist of decorative calligraphy, abstract plant-like motifs, geometric vines of fruit, and flowers.
We had to remove all the pens, pencils, food, and magazines from our bags before we began. Our tour guide, took us to the side and asked us to please deny the photographers, we were a bit confused, “where were they”? But then suddenly we were swarmed by people wanting to follow us around for the day to take photos of us with the Taj Mahal, our tour guide simply said “yes these are good prices”, we denied the photography service, our guide looked relieved. As our tour progressed he became the photographer, he walked around with my iPhone, as I had my DSLR in tow and began instructing Trevor and me to pose for photos. He kept saying “I want to capture all the precious memories” Trevor wasn’t as enthusiastic, about these photos, however, some of them are hilarious so I posted them for anyones enjoyment. Our tour also consisted of The Baby Taj and Fort Agra. The tour guide took over 200 photos of Trevor and I wondering around. Only when my phone died, did he return it to me. We enjoyed an affordable and delicious lunch, and then promptly back to the train station for our sunset train ride back to New Delhi. It was nice just paying the extra money to feel comfortable and taken care of for the entire day. As a Thailand friend told me before I left for India, “ plan everything….down to a T before you get there, don’t be at the mercy of someone for a price or rely on anyone that offers you a service, pre-book and make sure it is legitimate”. (Best advice ever, thanks Rithi!)
Rishikesh
The next morning, Trevor and I parted ways. I took a 6-hour cab ride up to Rishikesh, a northwestern part of India, in the foothills of the Himalayans. Trevor had a few more days in Delhi before he left for the USA. In Delhi, Trevor and I stayed in the Red Fox Hotel, which was located directly near the airport. Originally, I had planned to travel to India and Nepal alone. Then fly to Rishikesh from New Delhi. Therefore, I booked this hotel near the airport. However, I had massive flight complications with a company called Jet Airways. They canceled a fight that to Nepal, and also canceled another flight to Rishikesh. It took several days to get the flights adjusted while I was working at the homestead on Nepal. Once I got to India, I was not able to find a flight into Rishikesh on the 25th. I needed to be at the yoga school that day for orientation. Therefore I had to take the undesirable 6-hour drive by cab. My yoga school was very slack on responding to my emails, after several calls I booked a taxi service with them. The ride took about 7 hours and my driver was full on swerving around people, cars, cows, massive cow poop patty sculptures, (yes even the poop is scared). Also, my driver had three thumbs, two were on one hand! They both had fingernails, and he used it for honking. He honked at everything, we even drove around a massive pothole and he honked at it. The honking is different from southeast Asia, it's not “a courtesy honk”, it's a “get the F outta the way honk”. This drive was uneventful. But since I had been traveling with Trevor for the past two weeks I quickly realized that I needed to keep my guard up. Culture in India is different from anywhere I have traveled, the sexual violence I heard before coming to India is real. I was definitely stared at in unpleasing ways (much different from Thailand). People constantly ask for photos, you will catch men taking selfies of you without your permission. As the 2nd most populated country in the world, there is very little personal space, women aren’t respected, lots of things are overly sexualized. India is definitely making advances to change this culture. With that being said, trust your instincts, stand up for yourself, be loud, go in groups, get a SIM card and just don’t let your guard down. I got used to it but, the first few days without Trevor lurking around were an adjustment.
Vinyasa Yoga School— Rishikesh
The school I attended was called Vinyasa Yoga School, it was in a great location right off the Ganges river and only a 5-minute walk from the famous Rishikesh bridge. The school was divided into two different hotels with their Yoga studios on the top floors. The hotels were beside each other and you could access them through a small alleyway, that was constantly filled will cows. Surrounding the yoga school was construction. There was a new building construction and they are renovating a portion of the existing yoga school building. This made for loud and constant construction noises throughout the day, several people could not sleep because of this. Luckily, I lived next to a bar in Thailand, I was ready for any kind of noise.
Students stayed within both hotels, I learned later that the opposite hotel had nicer rooms, which were featured on the website. When I arrived I was given my room, which was basic, small, a bit dirty, a massive mattress with stained sheets (this is typical when traveling), however after a week in the homestay, I thought well this is enough for the month, the bed was soft. I eventually figured out there was hot water, they had reversed the faucet markings so the cold was hot and the hot was cold. I took three days of cold showers before I realized this.
It became clear after several days and listening to several of my classmates complain that the website inaccurately represented the accommodations and the amenities of the yoga school. There was no sauna or yoga therapy. The rooms looked nothing like the website. And the classroom experience wasn’t fully encompassing our expectations. I wouldn’t recommend this school to anyone, because it is inaccurately represented on its website. I would recommend one teacher Tilissa Patterson, as she was the most influential part of this program, and really worked with each of us individually to help us become yoga instructors. I learned the most from her and gained confidence in leading a class, however, her class was only 1 hour every day. Maybe this is because she is Australian, but I really appreciated getting a direct answer from her. I even went up to her one day and said: “I don’t know who to ask about this, but can I flush the toilet paper in Indian toilets” (a huge no-no in Thailand). She laughed and said yes. If I had asked an Indian, 80% chance I would have gotten the Indian head-roll. Google it. It consists of just a dead-eye stare and a rolling of the neck that doesn’t indicate yes or no. You will continue to ask, only to received maybe a faster version of the Indian head-roll, it’s complicated.
Majority of Vinyasa Yoga School 200 YTT was based on yoga theory, philosophy, and meditation. There were several teachers that were good at their jobs and clearly enjoyed working there. There were also teachers who were clearly checked out, several of them, including the hotel staff, slept with students, which felt predatory and unprofessional to me, even if it was consensual. The food was advertised as nourishing, which is definitely subjective, it should be advertised as basic Indian food. Most of the fruit was rotten, the vegetables were cooked to a watery mush. I found hair in my food more than once. After a week I became violently sick. So sick that I spent the entire night throwing up to the point of bile, I also had extreme diarrhea. I couldn’t even keep down a sip of water, I went downstairs at around 4:30 a.m and begged a hotel clerk to take me to the emergency room, it was all very scary. He agreed to take me to the emergency room and we zoomed off on a 25-minute bike ride to the hospital, I got IV fluids and blood work is done, (which was $25 USD, so the health care is affordable) I spent the next 2 days in bed, sick on my stomach. When my results came back, I was all normal. It was chalked it up to gastroenteritis, which is a highly infectious disease, commonly caused by the lack of hand washing. I also think it was a combination of dairy, as the pasteurization is different. After the hospital visit, I stopped eating any dairy, I began eating my meals outside of the school. (Even though I had paid for 3 meals a day with the school). I managed to not get sick again, but the gastroenteritis spread like wildfire throughout the school, several more hospital visits were made by my classmates. I felt bad because I was patient zero. I am in the process of writing a concise review for the program, this includes accurate advertisement, and if they are not going to change their advertisement the price should be severely reduced. Expectations should be managed before students arrive. It was all clearly a scheme for the school to make money and I felt very taken advantage of. Which was, unfortunately, my typical experience in India, I always felt like someone had up-sold me on the price but without the quality. I wondered how after a year of traveling and planning these solo adventures I could have messed up so badly, didn’t I read the trip advisor? I went back and saw that there are two schools named Vinyasa Yoga School, both are located in Rishikesh, and that was my mix up. A friend at the school helped me locate the actual trip advisor, for this school. The descriptions were accurate to my experience, and clearly, this has been going on for years. I contacted the other school, and let them know about this mix-up, I also posted on their trip advisor warning any potential students about this mix-up.
The positive sides of this program are that it is much more affordable than obtaining a 200 YTT certification in the U.S.A by thousands of dollars, but it was much more expensive than other yoga programs in surrounding Rishikesh.
Assault
I woke up every day at 5:30 am, except for Sundays. Our classes began at 6 am and went on till 1 pm. Midday we would have a 3-4 hour self-study block. Then in the evening we would pick back up around 5 and carry on till about 8:30. Because I didn’t find the yoga as challenging as I preferred. I began taking long walks around the town and surrounding countryside to get some exercise during this time. I kept seeing another girl from my school out walking on the mountain, Jasmine, she was in another advanced course but from California and the first person, I met when I arrived at school.
About two weeks into the program, I left to go on one of these midday walks. I put in a podcast (one earphone only) and began. Typically, on these walks, I see very few people. The views are gorgeous and look down into the valley of Rishikesh, there was always a slur of cars driving by, and several people would stop and ask for pictures, I even had a woman with a baby get out of her a car and ask for a photo. The reply to all of them was a firm “no”.
One particular day, I was 30 minutes out in the countryside, and I saw a tall skinny Indian man walking towards me, he pulled out his phone and promptly asked for a selfie, I didn’t respond and kept walking, then he asked again, I gave a firm “no” and continued to walk past him. About 5-6 minutes later I realized out of the corner of my eye that he was following me. Before we had met because we were both going in opposite directions. I then instinctively reached into my bag for my pepper spray, by the time I looked up he was right in front of me. He asked me for the time, I looked at my watch and replied 2:17, he looked confused and I showed him my watch. Then I proceed to walk off, he then tried to reach his hand up my shorts grab my left butt-cheek as my back was turned away from him, I grabbed his hand as I turned and tried to spray him directly in the eyes. Everything happened really fast, looking back on it I am surprised I was able to react as quickly. I don’t know if it went into his eyes. I saw the stream go near, but it was nothing like the movies, where he falls to the ground in agony. He turned and ran, stopped, he looked backed and walked. Then continued to walk/run away, while turning every few minutes to see if I was chasing him. I considered, chasing him, but then I remembered I was alone on a mountain in a foreign country, he had a backpack and I didn’t know what was in it. I was glad he was gone and there was some distance between us. I took a few photos of him as he ran off but there was no way to identify him. Then reality came rushing back, I didn’t know what to do at that moment, I was frozen in fear. Mainly, because I was in a remote location. I managed to text Jasmine because I knew she would know where I was. I also texted my friend Bianca, and both of them came to my rescue. I told the yoga school what happened, and they didn’t have much to offer. Except, Telissa my favorite professor, offered me some solid advice. I just wanted to move forward with my time there so I never reported the incident. I also know it would only give me much more stress and anxiety about the situation, and I assumed that nothing would be done because of previous experiences. However, after this incident I was uncomfortable with walking alone, I still continued to walk most days but always with a friend. Jasmine and I began teaming up for our walks, which definitely lead to great conversations.
Surrounding Rishikesh
Since obtaining a 200 yoga teacher certificate is a full-time job, the majority of my time was spent in a classroom, mostly listening to lectures and trying not to fall asleep. Those 5:30 am wake ups began to wear on everyone, coupled with the odd schedule where we ate breakfast at 9:30. Which were 4 hours after we woke up, this leads everyone to gorge themselves, then remain in a food coma in a hot room for another 2 hours. India and Nepal operate on a 1 day weekend. Saturdays are still considered work days and Sundays are the only days off. The yoga course advertised excursions, however, I didn’t attend half of these day trips due to the fact that one included meditating in a cave (I loathe mediating) the other was a 3:30 am wake up for a mountain sunrise, which after waking up at 5:30 for the past 6 days, did sound fun to me. Also, there was no way for me to nap in the afternoon due to the construction noise that surrounded the building. One excursion was rafting on the Ganges, which I did attend. The Ganges or Ganga is a trans-boundary river which flows through India and Bangladesh. It is one of the most sacred rivers to the Hindus and is the lifeline for millions of Indians. This river flowed out of the Himalayan mountains and directly through Rishikesh, people would go and bathe in the river, there were also several extreme rapids, and several established river rafting industries. Looking down into the Ganges you could always see rafts barreling down the river. So many people on my course were excited to go rafting. However, once we got to the river, they wanted to sit in a safer part of the boat, myself and the only guy on our course ended up sitting in the front. Which required us to basically lead the expedition, the air that we caught on some of the rapids was scary! We flew over 10 ft. rapids swerved around rocks and whipped down the raging river. Towards the end of our expedition, our raft crew became a rescue team. A boat behind us completely flipped over, scattering 20 Indian men into the water, the rapids quickly dispersed them away from the boat. These men were helpless and it was clear that some of them could not swim, they relied on their life-vests to float. We rescued about three men onto our boat and about 10 pairs of flip flops, I have no idea why people wear flip flops to go rafting. The Ganges water was ice cold but refreshing. Our guide was into the synchronized team chanting, every one of us was soaking wet after, but it was a fun experience.
My closest friend in India became Bianca, a fellow American from New Mexico, it took us a few days to find each other on the course. We were placed in the same 9 people team. Bianca is already an alternative dance and Reiki teacher. She has been practicing yoga for years and extremely flexible, and very spiritual. She wasn’t impressed at all with the program, and we found a lot of support through each other to make it through the course. We also checked out almost every possible restaurant option in Rishikesh, because she also became very sick-off the food. I know I found a lifelong friend in her, and hopeful to visit her in the future in New Mexico. As they have the biggest hot air balloon festival in the world! Bianca and I spent a lot of time together walking the streets of Rishikesh, we even visited The Beatles Ashram. Which was where the famous Beatles band came in the late 1960s to discover transcendental meditation. While they were only in India for a few weeks, this ashram became very popular after they left. However, fell out of popularity after the guru was denounced by the Beatles for sexual misconduct. The ashram set in ruins for 30 years. In 2014, it was cleaned up and reopened. It is still mostly dilapidated buildings. The Beatles made a statement years later that the Guru was discharged with sexual misconduct. It's all a big mystery, but it was still cool to see a ramshackle bathtub where John Lennon bathed in the ’60s.
Fire Ceremony
The bulk of my course work in yoga school was designing a 1-hour class lead by me at the end of the course. My class was to be taught at 6 am, and I was lucky because my favorite teacher Telissa was the reviewer. Even after teaching for the past year to hundreds of kids in large halls, at camps, and in classrooms, for some reason, I became extremely nervous. I kept thinking I was going to forget something, I spent the entire night before tossing and turning. Teaching yoga is different from English teaching because there is a strong need to memorize everything. Luckily, the style of vinyasa, each position flows from one another. My class went well, and because it was so early I think most people were asleep. There are so many different styles and ways to teach yoga, my preferred method seems and feel like gym yoga, and is all about strength and feeling the burn, instead of slow and meditative spiritual yoga. The course ended on April 24th, the following day we had a Hindi themed fire graduation ceremony. Prior to the ceremony beginning the leader had tied, what looked like a rock, on a long string. During the ceremony he swung this rock around the fire then placed it in the center, the burning wood was uneven, about 5 minutes later the burning rock, which turned out to be some type of gourd, tumbled from the fire and almost ignited a nearby yoga mat. The spiritual leader scrambled to place the fire gourd back on the fire, myself and Bianca could not control our laughter.
Leaving India
India was my final destination over my year of traveling. I ended up taking the 6-hour cab ride back with two wonderful classmates. Bianca and I holed ourselves up in an Airbnb for 2 days in New Delhi, and ate terrible junk food, because finding food was difficult in that area. Bianca’s flight out of India left at 3 am but was delayed until almost 6 in the morning. My flight was at 12:30 pm the following day and delayed for an hour. I flew from New Delhi to London and was fortunate enough to meet an old friend Shelly Bittler. I stayed with her, in her London flat for the night and enjoyed far to much wine and pizza. I wished I had more time with her. The following day I explored the city, trekking to Big Ben, which was covered in scaffolding but the London eye was fabulous. My journey home was long, and my arrival back at JFK was stressful, which included a 2-hour wait in the TSA line. Then it was onward to RDU where Blake met me and took me out to tacos and margaritas.
So what's next?! I am currently sorting through all of my stuff which has been stored by my family in an old farmhouse. My family was kind enough to restore the bathroom in the farmhouse and I plan on living here for the summer. I am 2 courses away from finishing graduate school, and I will be doing an internship with the education department at the NCMA this summer! Trevor is moving back to Fayetteville next week, we are looking forward to an exciting summer. I just met my new niece yesterday! As for my pets, Pongo is the size of a basketball, Dora looks the same. They both remember me and have been following me around the house.
More later on website updates, photos, and sketches. And of course visits in the flesh!
Xo Felicia.
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