We travelled back from Lumbini, and spent a night in Varanasi at Surya Hotel which we again enjoyed. We indulged in their delicious restaurant for both dinner and breakfast. Here's a picture of our tasty savory dish of spinach with yogurt sauce and a mug of Kingfisher beer which was complemented by curried lamb, chicken biriyani and of course of favorite Indian breads, stuffed naan and paratha, for dinner.
While at the hotel we saw two more weddings. Both were very elaborate events with DJs, marching bands carrying lights, fireworks, food and drinks, and fancily dressed guests. It seemed that only the boys danced, but they had a great time showing their moves.
At one wedding the bride arrived on horseback. At the other, the groom was carried up to a stage for the wedding ceremony.
The ceremony included first the bride lassoing the groom with a necklace of flowers while he was picked up, making it a challenge to get the flower garland around his neck. Then the groom had to catch her with a flower necklace too. After the ceremony, the newlyweds were photographed with what seemed like each family at the wedding, which took a really long time; We don't know for sure, but it seems to be good luck to touch the heads of the new couple on their wedding day, so they sat on a couch while the families stood behind them with their hands on the groom's turban and the bride's head.
We had a pretty easy time getting back from Lumbini to Bodhgaya because we took three days to make the trip and neither of our trains were very late. While we were at a station we witnessed the boarding of a train headed to Allahabad for Kumbh Mela, which is an enormous Hindu festival held on the Ganges every three years. This picture doesn't fully capture the intensity of the people who wanted to get on the train, but since we don't like crowds, it was about as close to Kumbh Mela that we wanted to get!
We have seen a lot of poverty while we've been in India. Perhaps the saddest sight is to see children begging on the street. We talked with Raju, an Indian shopkeeper we met in Varanasi about it; His advice to us was to NOT give money to the children because it results in them earning money for their family but at the cost of them not going to school. While in Kushinagar we heard from others that the begging children had been "dirtied up" by their parents to make them seem destitute, but in fact they had homes. We wanted to do something to help, so we found a local charity in Bodhgaya called Shanti India, and made a donation to them. We visited their tutorial school for 250 kids from nursery school age through high school. There are 7 classes of students. These are the 1st through 3rd graders, and they are meditating; All the classes do this for a few minutes at the start of class.
The school runs from 2:30 pm to 6 on school days, with most of the kids attending regular school in the morning/early afternoon before coming to Shanti India school. We were told that the public schools teach with both corporeal punishment and learning by rote, with English language introduced only at age 14; Shanti India's program is completely different to encourage the children's curiosity and development of English language skills. These are high school students preparing for a mathematics exam at the end of the month.
If you are interested in learning more about their programs (which include micro-lending and healthcare too), check out their website www.shantindia.org The students gave us marigold necklaces to thank us for our support.
It is really nice to be back in Bodhgaya, because this is a place of deep spiritual connection for us. And we've always enjoyed returning to a place that is familiar as it's easier to navigate. We took the flower necklaces from Shanti India to the Mahabodhi temple and put them on some Buddha statues after meditating under the Bodhi tree. As before there was a lot of chanting at Mahabodhi and the birds were singing - it's a lively place! As a leaf fell off the tree we watched several people who wanted to have it, but the first person to pick it up was a boy and he got to keep it. Here's a picture of Kristina near the Bodhi tree - take a look at the flags in the photo.
This is the Buddhist flag. We first noticed it while we were in Sarnath at the Mahabodhi Society and we assumed it was the Sri Lankan flag. Then we saw Cambodian monks with this flag on their bags and we got confused. So we asked Professor Google, and learned that the Buddhist flag was created about 100 years ago as part of Angarika Dharmapala's efforts to revitalize Buddhism (he was the Sri Lankan who restored Sarnath and Bodhgaya).
Coincidentally there is a big Sri Lankan festival going on in Bodhgaya and their president, Mahinda Rajakapsa, was here for the ceremony (which shows how important Buddhism is to Sri Lanka). Security has been very tight as a result, since Tamil militants (who assassinated the previous Sri Lankan president and Rajiv Gandhi) have threatened to kill President Rajakapsa. This is a picture of the Mahabodhi Society building which was covered in fresh flowers for his visit.
Now that we're back in Bodhgaya we've been helping out with retreat preparations at the Thai temple. We will be on a silent meditation retreat led by Christopher Titmuss for 10 days, Feb 10th through 20th. This is the 39th annual Bodhgaya Vipassana retreat with about 45 retreat participants. We've been helping to get everything ready, along with 8 other retreatants, who hail from Serbia, Berlin, southern France, southern Russia and Australia. Pete will be staying in a tent, and Kristina in the dorm because it appears to have room for yoga. We are looking forward to the retreat!
