Pondicherry

When it was time to leave the yoga ashram, I felt sad that this chapter of the trip was ending, knowing that we were leaving the tranquility of mountains. I was not looking forward to the hustle and bustle of India – the rickshaws, and their endless horns. But after a few bus rides, we arrived in Tamil Nadu to find that the rickshaws are not electric but squish operated. Like the old school horns, these are no where near as annoying as they are so much quieter. We arrived in Madurai and headed to the train station to see if we could head out that same night. The station attendant initially said that it was impossible to leave that same night, sticking to her guns, she repeater herself 5 times. But then decided to call someone, as it turned out we were very lucky, as there was a train going close to Pondicherry. (kind of odd, as ALL trains were passing by…) Yup, this is defiantly India, no intentional deception, just the way things go.

We headed off to check grab a bite to eat and check out the Sri Meenakshi Temple – Madurai’s main attraction. As with most time limiting sight seeing expeditions, the temple was far too much to absorb in only 2 hours.

We had decided to go to Pondicherry as a friend of ours had been here and gone to “The School for Perfect Eye Sight.” So we were here to check it out and see if we could improve our vision. The school walks you through about 2 hours of exercises, both in the morning and afternoon. But the most important thing is to curb the use of your glasses and eliminate using contacts. But I found that walking around a strange town in a different country lead to some interesting conversations: ”is that an elephant? I don’t know I can’t see….” Or ”is that a cow? Oh yeah, sure is.”

By the end of 5 days my prescription was reduced, and I was reading two and a half more lines on an eye chart from a distance of one meter. The spherical and axis portions of my prescription have now been completely eliminated, and the overall prescription was reduced by 0.75 in my right eye. Not too shabby for 5 days. I also had a pair of reduced lenses made for my glasses. All this makes me want to confront my optometrist; “why create a dependence? As opposed to encouraging the eye to see better?” I so distinctively remember being told as a 12 year old to wear my glasses when in the class room and when watching TV and movies…

Pondicherry is a former French colony and the influence that the French have left here is very predominant. There are loads of pseudo French restaurants and tons of colonial French architecture – if you are into that kind of stuff :) Much of the appeal was the tranquility of the town. As a large portion of the city resembles a small European town, this is where the Sri Aurobindo Ashram is dispersed (actually the Ashram is not very prominent in the town at all). But crossing the Canal road, would instantaneously through you back into India.

We wanted to check out Auroville, and so decided to take some scooters and check it out. The super friendly receptionist from our guest house offered to lead us there on his bike. We had also picked up a straggler that particular morning, a strange character who claimed that is was his birthday and he was visiting friends, he turned out to be harmless but gave us all an uneasy feeling. Oh well, no harm, no foul. So we were on our way and took in the sight of a couple of banyan trees, and the famous golden meditation hall (golf ball). We were about to leave, slightly dissatisfied, but we found some friends, and checked out the Tibetan pavilion, saw some art and checked out the awesome architecture of Auroville.

The Mother and the philosophy of the Sri Aurobindo Ashram. Enlightenment and the a new consciousness. Yeah its kinda scarry to write about these types of things as they seem so far out there, but there might be something to it, as it seems that Pondicherry was 'spared' from the effects of the Tsunami... Things that make you go hmmmm.