The One Where It All Comes Together...

So this last leg of my trip has been nothing short of miraculous. It’s the one time I'd not filled every available second with anything spiritually or physically challenging. So it's with some incredulity that I have to report that it’s here in Anjuna, this out of season beach resort, that I’ve begun to find some of the peace and closure that I’ve been searching for for a very long time. For the sake of convenience I kinda pin-point to when my Dad and Jason both died last year, but the truth is that the unhappiness has been around for way, way longer than that. It's just that in the past I’ve just found all kinds of ways to distract myself from it all.

The whole purpose of my trip to OshoWorld was to learn how to counter the negative voices in my head and heart that have plagued me for years. Sadly, for an assortment of previously documented reasons, it didn’t happen there at all. That’s not to say I didn’t get something out of the experience, just that I didn’t get what I went there for. The haircut and tattoos are things I don’t regret about my time in Pune! I also used the time to kick-start my exercise routine and that is fabulous too.

After that I went to the home of His Holiness the Dalai Lama to do what I thought would just be a good re-introduction to the world of Iyengar yoga up in Dharamsala. On my first day on the course, the instructor went through all of our registration forms and asked us all about what we’d listed as our illnesses. When it came to me and the Lupus - he simply said ‘Maybe if you loved yourself a bit more, your body wouldn’t be attacking itself’. There was an audible gasp from the entire class at his bluntness but I couldn’t disagree with his summation. He told me to buy Louise Hay’s “You Can Heal Your Life” and read it while I was doing his course.

That afternoon I tracked it down in McLeodganj and turned to the bit where she gives the mental causes for physical problems. The diagnosis for Lupus totally summed me up! I know she was on the button because I got really bloody angry with her, her stupid book and the stupid yoga teacher!

As the week went on and as I pushed myself harder and harder in the class, I was also pushing through my mental resistance to facing up to my own responsibilities as I read through the book. The more I read the more I saw through some of the airy fairy stuff and got to the common-sense that lies beneath. The book was affecting the effects of the yoga too, as I did backbends I found myself in floods of tears. I was told later that when you do those moves they have they effect of opening up the chest, and as mad as it sounds I know that I felt the thick brick walls I’ve built around my heart in recent years begin to crack as I opened up.

As the second week of yoga continued I lost a bit of faith in the teacher to be honest, by day two it became a philosophy class, and it was the world according to him - God spare us from small men with huge egos! - so when the cramping and the shits that are automatic by-products of the majority of Dharamsala cuisine got beyond bearable I gave up on the classes. I spent my last few days in the Temple doing a bit of chanting, and attending English conversation classes with the Monks. I found time to finish the quick read-through of the book as Ms Hay instructs, and with Goa coming up I planned to go through it all again, this time in far greater detail.

Well guess what folks, that’s exactly what I did. My first nine days were spent on the beach making copious notes, reading and re-reading and doing a whole lot of thinking about how I treat myself.

You know, when I was here in Goa at the beginning of this trip, a girl at the Saturday Night Market said to me “Forget Osho, spend three months here, it’ll do you more good”. I’m starting to think she may well have had a point. Having said that, I feel I needed to go on the external journey in order to be able to begin the inner one.

About seven days in I noticed small changes, the work I’d done began to show results. Yes, it has happened that quickly! I guess it comes quickly when you're ready for it eh? I’m working really hard to silence my inner critic - or at least being mindful enough to notice when I’m being hard on myself for no reason. As hippyish as they appear, I've been doing the affirmations and using a lot of energy to be kind to myself.

It hasn't all been navel-gazing though, I’ve been pro-active too. I’ve been allowing myself to dream and plan for my future, and reaching out to people I’d kinda lost contact with for one reason or another over the years. It feels good to take chances again, I feel alive!

I came here wanting to lose the sad, sick me that I’d become and find the old me, the one who got excited about the daftest things, who trusted people enough to give them at least a couple of chances, who was happy to wake up in the morning. Until 15 days ago I feared that I’d been expecting the impossible, but then bugger me, it’s happened!

Goa, Goa, Gone!!!!!

Due to the change of plan at OshoWorld I ended up with two extra weeks here in India. Now I could’ve gone to Rishikesh or Amritsar or even deeper into the Himalayas, but the reality was I felt like just chilling out. And where better to chill than back in Goa?

When I told people I was planning to spend my last two weeks here all I heard was “ooooh it’ll be too hot”, “OMG you’ll fry!” “it’s all shut down, you’ll be bored”, yada yada yada. Well all of those doom merchants were wrong. It is hot - the average temperature is 32C, but then it was about that in January - and yes there’s not that many people here and as a result a lot of bars and shops have shut, but in my book those are positives!

The legendary Shore Bar where I got my freak on 20 years ago.

Out of season Anjuna is paradise. Well it’s paradise as long as you don’t look down and see all the garbage that’s strewn everywhere, along with the buildings that you can’t tell if they are going up or falling down - and there’s a silence everywhere that’s enabled me to really explore my own inner-workings, the results of which are in a whole other blog post!


The hotel I stayed at is called the Spazio Leisure Resort - a rather grand name for what is essentially a 3* hotel with a pool - and while the Taj doesn’t have anything to worry about, it’s been ideal for this last couple of weeks. The rooms are clean and really comfy with a big old bed, cable tv, a brilliant shower and no power cuts! The pool isn’t massive but it’s ideal for cooling off when you’re sunbathing, and the staff are really on the ball.

Not sure this is the best name for a bar really

Most nights I ate dinner at a place called the Sea Queen it’s the most popular place around cos they show a different couple of movies every night to pull in the punters and flog the food and drink. It works and it means that everything here is fresh and tasty. It’s been great for me as I’ve worked my way through the menu almost, and caught up on a ton of films I’d not seen. Twenty years ago I’d have been looking for the Full-Moon parties, but now dinner and a dvd suits me just fine.

When I first arrived that I did consider doing a bit more travelling, I thought I might get bored, but it’s turned out to be the best thing I could have done, to do that last bit of unwinding and reflection before I head home.

Thank you Anjuna.

Two Weeks in Dharamsala

My time here in India is truly flying by now. I’ve been here almost four months but in many ways I feel like I’ve just arrived. Of course in other ways it feels like I’ve been away from London forever.

My fortnight here in McLeodganj is almost up and I have to say that two weeks is plenty of time here for me. I guess if you are one of those super-fit, love the countryside, hill-climbing, paragliding, trekking kinda people then you could stay here a lot longer, but I am none of those, at all!

The hotel I’d originally booked up the hill in Dharamkot- mainly because it was right next door to the Himalayan Iyengar Yoga Centre where I was going to be doing a couple of yoga courses - lasted a week. It was too isolated and the lack of lighting and safe footpaths meant that once it went dark outside I was trapped inside. After a couple of days I was starting to feel like Jack Nicholson in The Shining!

So I moved down into McLeodganj, the swinging metropolis, and into the only hotel in town that looks like a hotel and not a refugee camp. It even has neon signs outside! The signs inform you that it is a “luxury hotel” and I have to say that in my experience if a place has to tell you it’s luxury, it probably isn’t. And this place really isn’t, luxurious I mean. But it is safe, and the location is perfect for me and the added bonus is that it even has wi-fi in the rooms … sometimes.

Up in the foothills the main pest problem was mahoooosive spiders that looked like they would give tarantulas a run for their money, down here it’s moths! I have never seen so many moths! Not since ___________ opened his/her wallet (Insert generic skinflint stereotype here).

In addition to the moths, every morning I watch as a troop of monkeys make their way across town right by my balcony in search of breakfast. This morning it was thundering and raining and I was slightly tempted to open my door and let the little babies shelter in my room till it stopped, they were looking pretty scared. I didn’t of course because I am not totally insane.

Living down here means that every day I have been able to go and spend a good amount of time at the Temple, and on Sunday I was thrilled to be able to sit and listen to the monks chanting - it’s such an incredible sound. Even though His Holiness The Dalai Lama is not here, the whole temple complex is filled with such positivity and energy that it actually doesn’t matter that he’s over in the US.

I’ve done a bit of voluntary work here since I moved to town too, attending English conversation classes at the LHA centre. I had no idea what to expect on my first day. I went along thinking I would maybe do some good, impart some knowledge, etc. What a humbling experience! I sat down with three monks, who somewhat shockingly shook my hand, in Thailand the monks won’t even touch your camera if you are holding it (if you’re a woman that is) but with the Tibetan monks there’s none of that. I mean let’s face it, shaking my hand is hardly likely to turn into a Tibetan Thorn Birds is it?


We sat down in a room filled with Tibetans and westerners, and the three of them told me so much about their lives and the lives of the Tibetan refugees. Some of it was heartbreaking, some of it life-enhancing and I came away from my time there with just the warmest feeling inside my bitter old heart! Wonderful stuff.

One of the positive things about having such a long time to spend here is that you get to know the people. The other day I found myself chatting with one of the jewellery stallholders as she very kindly polished up all of my silver jewellery for me. There was nothing in it for her except a chance to practice her English and share experiences with another human being, beautiful.

So what of the main reason I came to Dharamsala, the yoga course? Well, I’ll start by saying it was easily as challenging as my entire 10 weeks in OshoWorld. I learned that yoga is so much more than just stretching your muscles and enhancing your balance. When you do it for upwards of three hours a day, you see the connection between body and mind. Some of the things I did with my body unleashed all kinds of emotions in my mind. None of them were very pleasant, but now I am glad that they occurred. I stretched myself in every way possible.

The ‘Delhi-Belly’ that began over a month ago in Pune, returned here with a vengeance! And nothing, not even a trip to HH the Dalai Lama’s Tibetan Clinic has cured it to be honest. The doctor I saw there told me it was food poisoning, but as I’ve not been vomiting I’m not so sure it is. It’s not like a big old dramatic case of the shits even, it’s just that for the last four weeks I’ve either been constipated or had the runs - no happy medium - and the only time I am constipated is when I have taken twice the dose of the local diarrhea pills I got in Pune. Rather than wiping me out totally, I’ve just been feeling weaker and weaker really. The food here is pretty bad anyway, and the lack of fresh fruit and veg is definitely taking it’s toll.
The Richard Gere Memorial Toilet outside the Temple

Thankfully, tomorrow I’ll be in Goa again, and there I’ll have no end of fresh fish, fruit and veggies - by the time I come home I’ll be fighting fit once again!

Blimey!

Sooooo my website has been offline in one way or another for aaaaages and as a result I’ve not blogged for over a month. I’ll spare you the minutiae, but here’s an overview.

In the last blog I got a haircut, India won the cricket and I saw a cock. Since then I finished up my time at OshoWorld, had some of my plans thrown into disarray as a result of relying taking people at their word, but made a couple of good friends in the last week or so that I really wasn’t expecting to.

The heat in Pune was climbing on an hourly basis it appeared. I spent the last 10 days constantly drenched in sweat, to the point where if it wasn’t for the dark patches on my maroon robes I wouldn’t have even noticed I was sweating. I just surrendered to the heat.

My constitution finally caved in, having had no real stomach issues for the first three months here, it all started to go wrong in a big way around mid-April and to be really honest it’s been dodgy ever since! Not death’s door dodgy, but a ‘don’t risk a fart’ dodgy.

My time at OshoWorld needs a bit more reflection before I can truly say what I did and didn’t get out of it. I know it didn’t meet any of the expectations I had of it - but that is just a lesson for me not to expect too much of the unknown - how can I know/expect?

A few basic observations from the “World According to JoJo @ Osho”

It’s extremely popular with the recently divorced.

Despite everyone calling it so, it is most definitely NOT a commune.

Despite the sign on the front gate, it’s not a full-on “Resort” either. It has the appearance of a Club Med enterprise, but the facilities and service remind me more of Butlin’s.

The organisation is very ‘nickle and dime’. Charging people Rs850 to come in for the day then charging them another Rs150 to use the pool is cheap and nasty and leaves a bad taste in the mouth. Charge Rs1000 and tell ‘em everything is free - simple psychology innit?

The maroon and white robes, the maroon swimwear etc., needs to be dumped. Does nobody see the irony of listening to Osho negatively describe China’s old policy of making its people all dress alike as a way of ‘suppressing the individual’? Again, it comes across as another way of making a few bucks on the side.

Having said all of the above, I have no regrets about my visit, and I would recommend anyone who is interested in seeing humankind stipped bare and really close up to take a look. It’s fascinating!

Where its future lies will be interesting. I heard that a lot of the old timers were very unhappy with the direction OshoWorld is taking, I wonder if they will continue to desert the place or whether they will fight back and help to get it back on track. The place has such potential for both good and bad - it just depends who’s steering I guess.