I am in Montreal. Finally back home after four months on the road, six countries, five weeks of yoga, too many memories to count and about a thousand photos. Well, it was definitely a slice. Probably the best thing I've ever done, definitely. It's strange to be back home and to be unclear about what my next step will be. Up until now, my path has always been clear: school, school and more school, and now that I'm taking a year off before going back to do my Masters, I can choose to do anything, live anywhere, and that freedom, well welcome and appreciated is nonetheless daunting. I'm sure though that everything will fall into place with time, and anyway, nothing is ever set in stone.
It's great to be home, to be able to wander around my neighbourhood, buy lilacs and tulips and cambazola cheese. My family will be arriving on Tuesday for my graduation and I am excited beyond belief. Right now I should be sleeping, but the jetlag is definitely affecting me, it's about 2 in the afternoon for me right now (Bangkok time). So for now, I'm sitting in my bed, typing, listening to the radio (how I've missed CBC Radio One) and thinking about how I really should be going to sleep, because I want to make it to Darby's 2/3 in the morning. I'll be up early anyhow I'm sure.
I had the most fantastic time travelling, I met some wonderful people, experienced a lot more than I ever could have staying here in North America and I have definitely come to appreciate what I have here more than I ever could before. I have so much to say about the trip, but I think I need a little while longer to process everything and make cohesive sense of all the somehow connected thoughts and discoveries that are floating around in my brain. For now I'm just keeping busy graduating, readjusting to life here in Canada, looking forward to going back home to Ontario next week and eating lots of fresh asparagus. My whole room smells like lilacs and my sari-duvet cover looks divine on my bed, it's good to be home.
- posted by Andrea @ 1:42 a.m. (1) comments

 
Yay! Quick note from the paradise of southern Cambodia to say that I have a comments option on my page now. This excites me immensely. To my great surprise, Sihanoukville, here on the Gulf of Thailand, is gorgeous with cheap accomodations, great food and even an ocean view: pure white sand, turquoise sea and beautiful children making fresh fruit salads on the beach. Heaven.
- posted by Andrea @ 2:43 a.m. (1) comments

 
I miss India. I miss India so much that I find myself looking up airfares to Bangalore from Canada and fantasizing about going back as soon as is remotely, slightly possible. The further I get away from it, the more I realise how fantastic my time in Mysore was. There's nothing wrong with being back in Bangkok (going to Cambodia tomorrow), but it's not quite the same. Relative to India, Thailand seems so clean, almost sterile, it seems like the West. It's so strange how perspective can change so quickly. When I first got to Bangkok in January I thought it was so bustling, crazy and even a tiny bit dirty, but now, now it is a haven of cleanliness and westerization. It is sparkling and peaceful. I miss India's stench, grime and character. When can I go back there? Take me back there. I miss the routine of my day centering around practice. And try as I might, there are no fenugreek rotis or badam milk to be found in Thailand. For a place that I was so hesitant to visit, India shocked and surprised me and left me wanting more. And I still don't know what it is about that place. It's bustling, noisy, colourful, ever-spinning and chaotic, a cacophony of sounds, people, languages, cultures.
Time to go grab some lunch here in Bangkok (well, in my case breakfast), maybe get a massage today, hang out a bit at the hostel, write in my journal and try to sort out all my thoughts about India, this trip and the future. One things remains certain though: I will return.
- posted by Andrea @ 1:12 a.m. (0) comments

 
I am a horrible blogger, I know. I'm afraid that I got a little too caught up in my social activities during my last days in Mysore and I was a little too lazy to record all my memories, thoughts and sentiments here, because I was too busy living it.
Here I am, back in Bangkok where this whole crazy adventure started, and where it will all come to a grinding halt in two weeks. I have so much to say about my time in India, but I feel like I need to get a little distance from it to be more objective and clear about my experiences there. Suffice it to say for now, that India was an incredible experience that jolted me in innumberable ways.
My time in Mysore was wonderful, and I hope to return there as soon as money and commitments permit. My practice came a long way, both physically and mentally, and I learned how inextricably linked the physical and mental aspects of the practice are. By the end of my fifth week of practice with Sharath my backbending had improved immensely (after a couple weeks of full series practice), and aside from the hamstring that when 'snap' (and is still hurting, a week later) in upavishta konasana, all's well that ends well.
So my trip is winding down, but I can say very confidently at this point that it has been quite probably the best experience of my life. I've learned a lot, laughed a lot and twisted my body into many strange and unnatural positions, and I'm all the more mature, content and bendy for it. This trip has reaffirmed so much while it has simultaneously changed everything. But for now, for these last two weeks of free-roaming and backpack-toting I am happy to just take it all in, thankful for every last drop of sunshine and sweetened condensed milk atop my banana pancakes, wind at my back, enjoying the ride.
- posted by Andrea @ 7:51 a.m. (0) comments