How strange it is to be halfway between two homes. Down under, my son and his girl are out of work - it is a bad time to be in the hospitality industry. Cafes are shutting, bars are closed, and concerts cancelled. In Tasmania, my best friend has just done a bit of what we dubbed toilet paper tourism, just to see if it was true that the shelves were clear. My sister jokes she has started a spreadsheet of rations. But everyone is okay and joking about. They have each other. I don't feel worried. I am more worried about my mother in law who only recently was widowed. She is anxious and on her own. We have to leave this stunning, warm, colourful and extraordinary country begore more borders are shut, and have fingers and toes crossed that we can get on the Air India flight that leaves Tuesday.
Oddly, we spent one day at the dentist. I got 7 cavities fixed and a clean and scrape (two cavities were an amalgum fillings from when I was a kid) and it costs me a grand total of 290 bucks. At home, it would cost me thousands. Every one is shocked I had no anaesthetic. I didn't need it. It was uncomfortable, but not painful. Jamie is ecstatic - he had desperately wanted his 6 amalgum fillings out for years as the mercury in them is known to cause ill health. His treatment will cost 400 AUD. I love her dental after care recommendations - a herbal, ayurvedic gum gel, warm salt water, and coconut oil. Back to oil swilling it is!
Rishikesh is a fairly sheltered place to be in this crisis. The food is extraordinary - try a salad at Little Buddha cafe, a uttpam or dosa at one of the busy local cafes on the Tapovan side of Laxman Jhula, or a vegan burger at The Beatles Cafe. There is an amazing samosa guy on Laxmam Jula Road we think can read minds, but that's another story. There's also plenty of good cafe to be had, and I am slightly addicted to the strudel from any of the German Bakehouses in town.
I am in love with Ganga-ji, holiest of the holy rivers. I don't need a guru or a yoga class, just a medicinal dip in the waters and hours watching her swirl her blue skirts over rocks and ghats, and the garlands of marigolds fall apart as they drift toward Varanasi where the waters get murkier and more full of the discarded spoils of human beings. Besides, being in a crowded yoga room on a festering public mat grosses me out. At home in Australia, many studios are closing their doors. I don't need any of it, just my breath and my heart and the river. I am struck by all the people searching for things here.
I am in love with the cows. It is an excellent place to be a cow, amongst vegetarians. I am struck between the relationship between om and moo. Even the dogs are God. Nature is goddess. I buy a small statue of Kali - she is the mother of all, the dark blue goddess of time, a reminder of impermanence but also nature and all that is. Moos are all there is. Hare Oooooom.
I bought more ayurvedic herbs today, just in case. In England we will have to quarantine ourselves, and if we get sick, I will turn to what I have. But I have a healthy travel glow happening. I feel relaxed, so long as I stay away from the media and the dirtiness of mankind's thin veneer where they fight and scrap over what they have or believe they lack. If I go online, it's easy to believe it is Armageddon.
But life is so beautiful still. Grey hornbills dart amongst the trees and blue kingfishers sparkle like colourful saris worn by the woman taking selfies on the bridge. Yesterday we walked to a waterfall.
I met an Indian musician this morning who tells me God is punishing us. I think of om, and cows. He says his father taught him trees are his brothers. Every year he plants trees, this year mangoes and blackberries. He tells me ayurveda had the Namaste hands right - held at heart centre, they are an expression of love whereas the handshake spreads disease. It cheers me up at a time I long to touch, to hug, to close the distances between us in this time of face masks and enforced social isolation. Love still exists, and nature, and hope.
It's Spring in England, and we will go a walking when we arrive, and pick nettles beside chalk streams and commune with oaks and ashes, and I will see West Country cows and think of the cows of Northern India, and the waters of Ma Ganga and her tributaries, and long to return.
@naturalmedicine II Discord Invite II #naturalmedicine
