Laughing Yoga

My friend Kevin Rodin (also known as Huyen's new swim teacher) told me that he and his wife Beth tried to go to laughing yoga in Kolkata. I was intrigued by the idea of laughing yoga and asked someone in Kolkata about it. This one guy told me how it was very healthy to laugh and that since Indian people don't laugh much, it was good to make oneself laugh in yoga class. When he told us this, my first thought was, "Indian people don't laugh a lot?". After he said that I started to notice that indeed, people didn't seem to laugh as much in India as in other places I've been. For example in Vietnam, everyone always seems to be laughing (except when they're stone faced on their motorbikes).

In Kolkata, we tried to find the laughing yoga and failed miserably for two hours. Perhaps the laughing yogis were watching us search for them and this inspired their laughing. Well, in Varanasi we signed up for regular yoga and it turned out to be a laughing yoga class. The guru was the weirdest dude I've met in a long time. Besides his dyed purple hair, he just had this comical look to match his big belly. I found myself giggling because all around his yoga studio were pictures of him featured in newspapers around the world. The pictures were clearly from a few years earlier when he was a tad bit trimmer. Anyway, he started to lead us in laughing yoga which was actually a lot of fun. We did thing like making funny faces and forcing ourselves to laugh. It wasn't too hard to make ourselves laugh though because everyone looked utterly ridiculous, especially the guru.

Just as we started to feel good and relaxed, a joke was played on us -- the guru said he had to go and had his assistant take over the class. His assistant, a girl, looked like she hadn't laughed since, well ever. She had the most serious look on her face and started to instruct us like a drill sergeant. Needless to say, there were no more laughs the rest of the class.

Our Cyclo Driver

If you ever go to Khajuraho, keep your eye out for this guy. Without a doubt, he was the most honest driver (taxi/cyclo/rickshaw) we had in India. On our way into Khajuraho he rode us around through the town and showed us about ten different hotels. On our way out of Khajuraho, he picked us up at our hotel (on time) and took us to the bus station. He then proceeded to just hang out with us for forty five minutes as we waited for the bus.

The guy was very open about his life and told us how it was a "miracle" how tourists came to his city in the middle of nowhere. I liked his attitude because he treated tourists as people to be respected and thankful for. Frankly, this is how I think people should always treat tourists who come from far away to see another land and culture. Personally, whenever I meet a tourist (which has happened a few times since returning to the states) I try and be as friendly to them as possible as I think it is pretty cool that they chose to come to our country and spend their money and time here.

Anyway, the point of this blog is that this guy was pretty cool and if you go to Khajuraho you should hire him. I can pretty much guarantee he'll be waiting by the bus stand.

Walk like an Egyptian...

One of our more bizarre interactions in Khajuraho was when we visited the most famous temple. Standing guard at the doorway of the temple was this guy:


(PICTURE: Me with the security guard.)

While Huyen and I were inspecting the carvings, the security guard came over to us with a huge smile and started to explain what everything meant. The guy was trying so hard to summarize thousands of years of Hinduism into just a few minutes which is obviously not an easy task. To make matters worse, his English was quite poor. However, what he lacked in communication skills he made up with gusto.

While he was telling us about Shiva and the other Hindu gods, he kept looking over his shoulder to see if anyone was stealing the relics he was supposed to be protecting. After he finished giving us his mini tour, he insisted that Huyen and I take pictures with the same poses as in many of the sculptures. Heck, we're always down for some funny pictures so we took these:


The area we are standing on is the same place that dancers and performers would entertain the king hundreds of years ago. On this day though, the only person really being entertained was the security guard.

Biking

(PICTURE: Ride like the wind, Huyen. Ride like the wind.)

Let me tell you one of my secrets for traveling: no matter where you are, it's always more fun to have your own two wheels. Huyen and I have rented bikes in Thailand, Myanmar and India. Whenever we do, it always ends up being one of our favorite experiences. In Khajuraho, we would wake up at about 5AM and bike around so that we could avoid the heat. Having your own wheels allows you to:
1. Avoid all the rickshaws and cyclos who harass you for your business.
2. Gets you off the beaten path.

With our bikes, Huyen and I went to some of the furthest temples in Khajuraho where nobody else was out. We were also able to bike into an old village and meander through alleys and back roads.

I was especially happy with my bike in Khajuraho because it was basically personalized:


*They had no helmets in this city. Thankfully there was very little traffic and decent roads so we didn't have any issues. When we asked for helmets we basically got laughed at since it was like 118 degrees.

Yoga

(PICTURE: My wife, the yoga guru.)

Take a deep breath everyone as I'm about to write something that might offend. Here goes: Yoga, as we know it, is a scam. Don't believe anyone who tells you that yoga is an Indian thing. No, yoga is a western invention, no ifs ands or buts. Sure it might have started in India but the yoga we know (and pay lots of money for) is completely westernized. I'm not saying there's anything wrong with yoga. I thin it's a great form of exercise that really shapes your body. However, for those who go to India to practice, save your cash. What you'll find in India are:
1. Gurus who are no better than your average white chic with an "om" tattoo on her back.
2. Generally gurus who come from the west. We went to one of the most famous ashrams in India and not only was everyone in the class a westerner, but the guru was from NJ.

Huyen and I rarely ever saw any Indian people actually doing yoga. One morning we went to a park where we heard there was "laughing yoga." We walked the whole park and didn't see anyone doing anything more than some neck rolls. By far our worst experience though was in Khajuraho. We had specifically stayed at the Yogi Lodge because it included free yoga every morning. Well on the first morning we asked about the yoga and the owner seemed a little bit caught off guard. He told us we could do it at his other guest house which was a ten minute bike ride away. When we showed up, we were taken upstairs and proceeded to do yoga on a concrete floor. Actually, technically we didn't do it on the floor; we did it on a FILTHY thin carpet that the yoga "instructor" rolled out. This carpet was out of a movie. If you stomped on it, dust flew up. The worst part though was the instructor. We told him right off that we were beginners, yet within five minutes he was asking us to do pretzels. We literally looked at him and laughed. He would then put his legs behind his head and tell us to do what he was doing. We then laughed again. He then would ask how much yoga instructors get paid in America. After digesting this, he asked us for a donation. A donation? For what? Clearly, for him. We told him that the yoga was included with the guest house and he said he knew that but that we should give him "a present." This time we awkwardly laughed and then got the hell out of there.

Khajuraho

(PICTURE: Huyen in front of a temple.)

I've been getting a lot of slack from people for my lack of blogging. And well, I deserve it. I'm gonna try and get back on pace and finish up the India blogs and then put a nice pink bow around Ahoy Hanoi. After that, you can all get your daily fix from the blog Huyen is going to start up.

I think the lack of blogging has been twofold: 1. I'm home now and spending a lot of time with family and friends. 2. I'm honestly just not that excited to write about India. Sometimes trips take a little while to digest and process (the opposite of Indian food) and this was one of them. So, I'm gonna attempt to breeze through India with some more general blog posts.

After going to Varanasi, we headed to Khajuraho. Getting there, as always, was an adventure. We had to take a long train, stay overnight in a very sketchy town where everyone and their mother offered to drive us to Khajuraho for about 10x's the bus fare, and then take an early morning direct bus which stopped 3,974 times including an hour along a mountain pass which wasn't wide enough for two buses/trucks to go through.

We finally got to Khajuraho which was the HOTTEST place we visited in India. I mean, it was freaking HOT! It was the off season and we had the pick of whichever hotel we wanted. We had a bicycle cyclo guy drive us from place to place to get different rates. We finally ended up going to the one we thought we'd go to since it had free yoga in the morning. It wasn't the nicest place but for $4 a night you can't really complain.

The next day we rented bicycles and rode around all of the temples with the famous karma sutra carvings:

Looking at the carvings one can't help but be impressed. I mean, how flexible are Indians?

Seriously though, doesn't this explain why the population is the fastest growing in the world?

Photos of People

(PICTURE: One of my favorite shots I took in India.)

In Varanasi, I took a lot of interesting photos of people. Here's some of my favorites that I haven't posted on other entries: