Hitch-Hiker’s Travel Blog of India

On the day I left Puri I headed at first to Konark, a nearby tourist attraction with impressive ruins of an old sun temple - a temple with wall sculptures explicit enough to make a brahmacari lose good nights’ sleep :D. The sun temple had the usual Indian tourist site pricing - Indians pay 10 rupees, others 250 (!!). After an hour or so of touring the temple ruins I left and took some lunch, after wich I hit the road heading for Bhubaneswar. It was a surprisingly long way to Bhubaneshwar, and by the nightfall I had reached Cuttack on the other side of Bhubanershwar. The Lord mercifully arranged for a comfortable stay for the night as I was picked up by a mechanician apparently working at Cuttack, heading back to his home in a village nearby. He invited me to stay at his place for the night, an offer I happily accepted.

I spent a long while looking at the road map and trying to decide where to go next when I was leaving Puri. I ended up choosing to head next for Bodh Gaya, the place where Lord Buddha became enlightened. There was the easy way of sticking to the major roads, heading back towards Kolkata and then on the Kolkata - Mumbai highway to Gaya or a more challenging alternative of crossing the way on smaller roads through the states of Orissa and Jharkhand to Bihar, to Gaya. I didn’t feel like sitting in a truck for hours looking at the kilometers of highway I had alreaday seen so I decided to head for the smaller roads going through Jharkhand.

My next destination after Kolkata was Jagannath Puri. After staying put for almost a month (2 weeks at Mayapur, 1 day of moving, another 2 weeks at Kolkata), getting on the road felt nice. After one and a half days of hitchhiking, I reached Puri. Now I’ve been in Puri for a couple of days and will be moving on soon.

First when I came to Puri I found my way to the local Iskcon center. In here they’re a bit more jovial about providing lodging than in Kolkata - and probably they get more people in here too as it’s a major pilgrimage destination - so I ended up staying with Iskcon, the first time since I left Almviksgård in Sweden. I’ve liked it a lot staying with Iskcon, it’s not too long to the temple (two floors down) so I’ve had the chance of participating in the morning programs too. Of course in Mayapur it wasn’t that far either, about 5 minutes of walking, but somehow I found it rather difficult to drag myself up from the bed at 4 AM. Here it seems to be easier somehow, maybe because I got used to early rising at Kolkata (in order to do my morning sadhana before I went to Mother’s house).

I’ve seen some of the holy sites of Puri, but probably also missed quite a few. The main attraction, the temple of Lord Jagannath is off-limits for foreigners due to hardline conservative temple administration (only ethnic hindus allowed), but I had darshan of the birthplace of Bhaktisiddhanta, the founder of all Gaudya Maths and spiritual master of Srila Prabhupada. His father, Bhaktivinoda Thakur, has an important place in the Gaudya temples in Puri since he lived here and ’started the whole thing’ (and, obiously, his house is the birthplace of Bhaktisiddhanta). Another important place I visited was the samadhi of Haridas Thakur. Haridas Thakur was one of Lord Chaitanya’s associates, a muslim who converted to vaisnavism and spent ALL of his waking hours (22 hours per day!) chanting the holy names of the Lord, chanting around 3 lakh (300 000) mahamantras per day.

Other interesting places outside the Gaudya tradition included a temple founded by Sripada Sankaracarya - yet another temple out of bounds for non-ethnic hindus. At least I got to see the courtyard :). I also visited Karar Ashram, a yoga ashram founded by a great teacher of Kriya Yoga, Sri Yukteshwar Giri, who was also the spiritual master of Paramahamsa Yogananda (who, in turn, is the author of ‘Autobiography of a Yogi’). The ashram made a deep impression on me as did the prabhu who gave me audience to the ashram. I’ll definately have to find out more about Kriya Yoga sometime. Another interesting place, wich I’ll probably visit tomorrow, is the Konarak Sun Temple, a temple about 30km away from here along the coast.

One of the most impressive things here in Puri has been the ocean. This is the first time in a long time I’m on the seaside on this trip - I think the last time was in Germany when I spent the night sleeping under a container in the Rostock harbour :D. Also, this is the first time I’m on a proper ocean shore on this trip - the ocean is WAY different from the Baltic Sea at Rostock (and, of course, a sunny beach is quite different from the cold concrete jungle). Walking on the beach, seeing nothing but the beach and the ocean stretching out as far as I can see, I can appreciate infinity just a bit more and have a slight understanding of what infinite really means. In the Gita the Lord says ‘Among the resevoirs of water, I am the ocean’.
Now my days in India are getting to be numbered. There isn’t that long left in my visa - actually, after a quick count, there’s exactly 50 days left. In Kolkata I had the realisation that Kolkata is most likely the farthest-out place where I’ll go on this trip. Leaving Kolkata meant the beginning of my gradual return towards Europe.

Now I’ve been doing nothing for a couple of days, getting over the flu. Tomorrow or the day after tomorrow I’ll be leaving Kolkata, heading for Puri. I’m beginning to think of skipping south India on this trip, as I’ve only got around 50 more days in India and I think it won’t be enough for fully experiencing the holy dhams in the south. Instead I’m wishing to go for a couple of more dhams in the north and central India and finally heading for Kashmir, after wich I will - if the Lord is willing - cross to Pakistan and begin my journey back towards Europe.

My first day at Kali Ghat wasn’t as overwhelming as the day before, as I already had a rough idea of what the volunteers do and in Kali Ghat a couple of the senior volunteers kept me busy always telling me wich things I could help them with. Catching the ‘routines’ of the house took a day or two, after wich I would know what to do and when.

I really liked the company of the other volunteers, it was broadening for my mind to meet nice people outside the Hare Krishna devotee ‘frame’. I can fully understand why some devotees prefer not to associate with non-devotees as the majority of people are quite materialist and selfish and associating only with devotees is an easy way to try to find more spiritual people, but I’ve also found that only associating with devotees can narrow down your perspective of the world and that actually among devotees you can find just as petty, selfish, narrow-minded people as among non-devotees!

It’s a shame I still don’t know the language enough to talk with the patients. It would’ve been helpful in finding out what they want and also talking with them could’ve been a good learning experience. I heard the stories of some patients and had a few tries of communicating with some of them who spoke a bit of english. One of the patients was a school-book example of how you shouldn’t do drugs - he had gotten all of his arm badly infected because of a dirty injection needle (or dirty stuff he injected). He was lucky though, it hadn’t gotten to be very serious yet so his arm got fixed and he was eventually in good enough shape to leave. Another patient I remember was probably the youngest, a boy of only 17 years. He had had an accident with some sort of fireworks or a bomb wich exploded in his hand and burnt his fingers badly. In spite of the name of the house, not everybody there was in a terminal condition, but some were - I saw a few bodies being carried out (and once carried one myself for a part of the way, the closest I’ve ever come to death so far). Most common (visible) conditions of the patients were infections of wounds of different sorts - I guess the poor just can’t get their wounds fixed properly or can’t keep them clean and only end up at Kali Ghat when they wounds get really bad. Besides the wounds many of the patients also have tuberculosis and some other diseases.

I worked at Kali Ghat for a period of 10 days. Originally I planned for two weeks, but after 10 days I caught a flu (seems like there’s a flu epidemic here in Kolkata, everybody has it) and decided to not go anymore - for someone having HIV catching the flu from me might be fatal, and also the flu lowers my resistance to other diseases so I might be at a higher risk of catching something working there. It was a great learning experience, even though not exactly in the way that I expected. One of the great things I learned was on the last days, when I was helping the nurse to change the dressings of the wounds. The nurse, an italian lady named Teresa, taught me great deal of compassion. I learned that compassion isn’t always just being kind and soft and sweet - sometimes it can even be the contrary. Many times the patients were in great pain while she cleaned the wounds and they would be screaming and twitching in pain and my job was to hold the patient still while she cleaned the wound. I learned what she does is true compassion, doing what is necessary for the well-being of the patient no matter how much they scream and resist.

Another great lesson was delivered by Kito, a senior volunteer from Japan, who was basically in charge of the non-medical things done by the volunteers, such as the laundry and dishes. He showed me how to be as efficient as possible and not to waste time and how to give my full effort to my duties.

On monday morning I went to the house of Mother Theresa again to enlist as a volunteer. On the first day, I was assigned to Prem Dan, a hospital run by the Missionaries. The first day was a bit chaotic, as I didn’t know much anything of the routines of the place or duties of the volunteers and I ended up spending a lot of time just sitting down bewildered by everything around me. After the day I was supposed to share a cab with some other volunteers to return to Mother’s house, but we couldnt manage getting one (hmm, whenever you actually WANT a cab they’re not there and when you don’t theres always one so willing to give you a ride it’s annoying :D), so I decided to walk.

After a couple of hours of walking and getting a bit lost on the way I finally reached Mother’s house. The official registration of the volunteers would be in the afternoon and this time the sisters gave me a list of the different houses run by the missionaries and a short introduction of each and then asked me for any preference of where I’d like to work. My choice was clear, the “house of dying” at Kali Ghat, the place of wich was first told of when I heard of the operation of the Missionaries.

Later in the afternoon I invested a few rupees on a map of Kolkata to avoid getting as badly lost again (it’s NOT comfortable to walk long distances being lost in a big, very hot city). I found out that the trip from my hotel to Kali Ghat was pretty easy using the metro, just 15 minutes of walking to the station and another 15 minutes from the other station to the house itself.

I came to Kolkata a few days ago. It took me a few hours to hitchhike for the couple of hundred kilometers from Mayapur. I ended up at Barrackpore train station with the last ride with some instructions on how to locate Mother Theresa’s house at the next train stop in the direction of Kolkata. It turned out the place wasn’t Mother’s house, but a community of lepers run by Mother Theresa’s organisation, Missionaries of Charity. After a short tour of the community facilities, the brothers (Catholics seem to prefer ‘brother’ and ’sister’ whereas Hare Krishnas use ‘prabhu’ and ‘mataji’) gave me the address of Mother’s house in Kolkata and I went on to the city with another train.

My main motivation in coming to Kolkata was the House of Mother Theresa. I heard of it from someone in Rishikesh and right on hearing about it I resolved to volunteer for work in there. Mother Theresa, a devout Catholic nun, founded a hospital for poor in Kolkata. Now the operation is run by Missionaries of Charity, an organisation also founded by her. Actually the Missionaries have a couple of hospitals and some other institutions also, like one for street children.

The first day I reached Kolkata it was already too late for going to the Missionaries so I decided to try and find the Hare Krishna temple and ask them if they could provide me with lodging. After following some wrong directions I ended up nowhere near the temple, and after wandering around a bit more I found myself at Sudder Street, a tourist area similar to Kathmandu’s Thamel. Oh well, I decided to check into a hotel and find my way around Kolkata the next day.

The next day I finally made it to the Hare Krishna temple but they wouldn’t give me accomodation, so I ended up at another hotel on Sudder street. Later I managed to arrange for daily prasad at the Hare Krishna temple for the time I’m staying in Kolkata. I checked into another hotel at Sudder, populated mostly by volunteers working for the Missionaries.

The Missionaries told me I should register for volunteering on monday, so I spent a coule of days sightseeing. The most impressive sites I visited were Belur Math,
the headquarters of Ramakrishna Mission and Dakshineswar Kali temple. Sri Ramakrishna was a pujari of Dakshineswar temple who became a popular enlightened teacher of the monistic school of Indian spirituality. Belur Math was nice, but it didn’t deeply impress me like the temples of the Lord. At Belur Math temple there’s no deities, the samadhi of Ramakrishna is the main object of worship. In a way I can understand this, as Belur Math is very near to Dakshineswar, the temple where Ramakrishna used to practice spirituality.

After Belur Math I took a boat across the river to Dakshineshwar, and was just in time on the boat to see an amazing sunset over Kolkata on the river. After a boat trip wich was a bit longer than I expected we arrived on the other side of the river at Dakshineswar. When I came to the temple the evening puja was just about to begin and the temple was crowded with hundreds of people. I brought some offerings to Kali with me, but had to wait until after the puja (there was a LoNG queue for offering). The temple complex is quite big, with 12 smaller shrines for lord Shiva and one shrine for Radha-Krishna and the main shrine dedicated to Kali, the mother goddess.

When I was leaving Dakshineswar it was already getting late, and I was really far away from my hotel (having taken two boat rides and a long bus ride to get there), and was faced with the challenge of getting back cheaper than the taxi rates (a taxi driver told me something like 500 rupees for the trip!). After a bit of searching I found out there’s no direct buses from Dakshineswar to downtown, so I ended up taking two buses, hopping on an off of them according to people’s instructions, having personally absolutely no idea where I’m at :D. I finally reached my hotel at around eleven o’clock in the night.

I didn’t write much about Mayapur, as I was so totally absorbed experiening being there I didn’t feel too much like writing. I feel I should write at least something about Radhastami, the other major celebration I took part in. Radhastami is the birthday of Srimati Radharani, a celebration just about as big as Janmastami, and the main program also being the same - abishek (=bathing) of Radha-Krishna deities. This time I was much more observing what was happening instead of experiencing, as during Janmastami the guards didn’t allow me to enter the temple with a camera (theres no logic whatsoever to the camera policy for foreigners, sometimes you can bring it, sometimes not!) I couldn’t document the celebration so I was much more immersed in experiencing it. Having the camera at Radhastami and trying to get as good shots as possible of the celebration made me look at everything from a different angle, from the point of view of an ‘outsider’.

I’ve noticed this difference in my consiciousness “inside” and “outside” of things at other times too. Sometimes I’m even able to move from one to another at will. Being at “outside” feels as if “watching” all of my sensory perceptions from a “TV”, being somehow remote, detatched, “out of it”. Being “inside” feels like being totally immersed, in the moment, in my body, even sometimes like being the body. I don’t feel either one of these ‘modes’ of my consiciousness being any better, higher, holier or more transcendental than the other, just different. Sometimes though it’s practical to be able to go “outside”, for example if I’m sensing some pain or discomfort, it’s nice to (try and) detach myself from it, and look at everything as if it’s a movie - the movie of my life.

Oh, back to the Radhastami. I got some pretty nice photos, will post them later. After the abishek I didn’t feel like queueing for the birthday cake (wich was incredibly big, as was the queue), so I took a walk outside the temple planning to chant a round or two and then go back to see if there’s a bit of cake left for me. Instead I ended up chatting with a guy from Kolkata who had come to Mayapur for the celebration. After chatting for a while we noticed the temple is closing, so it seemed like I had missed the cake. By the mercy of Srimati Radharani some devotees coming out of the temple invited us to their room for an ‘afterparty’ of some tasty prasadam, including the bit of cake I had wished for! The Lord truly fulfills every wish of everyone.

I did a couple of parikramas (not in the strict sense of it as I didn’t encircle places) with a guide provided by Iskcon. One of the great things at the Iskcon campus is the dham seva office - with helpful devotees to give information about the most important holy sites nearby, and also ready to provide me a guide for visits to these places free of charge.

They also told me of Ekachakra, the birthplace of Lord Nityananda, wich is about 200km from Mayapur. I decided to visit, and took two days for the trip. Going there was a bit of a challenge as I didn’t have a map or much of an idea of the location, my only instructions were a list of town names on the way, given to me by the dham seva office. As the village is pretty small and indians on the countryside aren’t that aware of the local geography, sometimes I’d wonder if I’m still on the route as nobody whom I asked would know where the place is.

After a half day of hitchhiking, I eventually reached Ekachakra and had darshan of the birthplace. The birthplace itself is under one of the Gaudya Maths and Iskcon has a temple and guesthouse under construction nearby. The construction site already has a small shrine and a small accomodation facility ready, so I stayed there for the night.

The next morning, after the morning programs and a bit of chanting the maha-mantra, I got back on the road heading to Mayapur. On the way back I actually made it faster than by taking buses, mostly thanks to one truck, wich seemed to be a bit more modern and faster than average - usually I go around 40km/h, but this time I was moving at wild 60km/h :D.

Now I’ve been in Mayapur for a few days and every day in here is a party. The kirtans at the temple are great, much more lively and ecstatic than what I’ve gotten used to lately (the traditional Hindu style is a bit more peaceful and meditative) and I’ve also gotten to like the bhajans kutir of Srila Prabhupad a lot - in there devotees are singing the maha-mantra non-stop, so any time I feel like it or have some spare time I can go and join them. Another great thing has been the harinams - on two days we’ve gone on harinam, walking near the temple and singing the maha-mantra. The first harinam took us to Yogapith (I’m not sure of the spelling though), the birthplace of Lord Gouranga. The birthplace is administered by one of the Gaudya Maths, and has a few nice temples to it in addition to the tree marking the birthplace and the Goura-Kund, a small holy pond. We did a bit of kirtan at the temple and headed back, reaching the Iskcon temple just in time for the evening program to have hours of almost non-stop bhajans.

The other harinam headed across the river (actually not the whole river, much of this area is situated on small islands on Ganga) to a Jagannath temple. We stayed in the temple for a bit, singing bhajans and returning weree caught in the rain. As we started on our way back it was just a light rain, but it got really heavy on the way back and kept raining for the rest of the day.

I’ll be staying in Mayapur for about two weeks, until Radhastami (=the appearance day of Srimati Radharani), so I’ll have plenty of time to go around the holy sites of the dham.

I came to Mayapur one day early for the Janmastami, the appearance day celebration of Lord Krishna. I spent the day getting familiar with the Iskcon campus and the surroundings of my ashram. The Iskcon campus in Mayapur is huge, maybe a bit more than a kilometer across. In it there’s two very big temples, the samadhi temple of Srila Prabhupada (founder-acarya of Iskcon) and another temple with deities of Panca-tattva, Radha-Krishna and Lord Nrsimha. It’s clear wich of the Gaudya Maths has been the most successful - the samadhi if Srila Prabhupad is about three times the size of the next biggest samadhi (every Gaudya Math has built a samadhi for their founder) and the deities in the main temple are also by far the biggest and most decorated. I found the samadhi to be a nice, cool, peaceful place to do some mantra meditation in the daytime, if you just go in the right hours (sometimes it gets a bit crowded and noisy). The main temple, especially the Panca-tattva deities, made a great impression on me - maybe because Lord Gauranga and Lord Nityananda (two of the Panca-tattva) are my favorite forms of the Lord, due to being allways happy and dancing and endlessly merciful.

Janmastami was amazing. The main temple - and actually the whole campus - was full of people, mostly indians coming from Kolkata or some other places nearby. In the daytime there was a programme including a play of the Lord’s birth (in hindi or bengali, so I didn’t understand or follow much) and a fire sacrifice. At the night, the main programme included a dance performance and the most important part of the celebration, abishek (=bathing of deities) of Radha-Krishna. The abishek was very long, taking about an hour or two, and very ecstatic as people would sing the maha-mantra during the abishek. After the abishek I ended up chatting with Adam, a devotee from Australia, and sharing a big pot of subji (=veg stew) maha-prasad with him. As I was leaving the temple, someone gave me another big pot, with a bit of very sweet charanamrita left on the bottom - actually quite a bit, I couldn’t even finish it!

The next day after Janmastami was Srila Prabhupada’s Vyasa-Puja (appearance day celebration). The celebration was ecstatic, and the birthday cake the biggest I’ve ever seen. After the celebration I had the chance of performing a special service to Prabhupada - the devotees were carrying his form from the temple back to the bhajans kutir (on the other side of the campus, and asked me and Adam to help and assigned me to carry his shoes.