Yoga, Culture and My Anti-Foreigner Perspective

Rikishesh
10-11-2005 National Coming Out Day

NCOD Act
First, I came out to someone for the first time today. Whether folks guessed it or not I don't know. But, it was NCOD and I thought I should do my part. I came out to Magda, an wonderful Chilean woman I met in the last day.

YOGA Capital of the World
Rikishesh is known as the Yoga Capital of the World. I am not sure why since they basically teach Iyengar everywhere. Now, yes, it's everywhere, but still. It should be Iyengar capital of the world. I am ok saying this because I am certain it was foreigner who dubbed it that. The city also has many, many ashrams where people live, stay for months, and learn about meditation and yoga and Buddhist things and Krishna. It's quite an interesting place, very spiritual, with lots of Sadhus (Indian Spiritual Seekers, many who have given up their lives as business men and drs. etc to seek enlightment). By 4am the town is awake with people doing their dutiful chores and by 8pm it's starts to slow down and by 10pm it's dead. It's quite wonderful in these ways. I was up at 6:30 today and watched the sunset in front of the Ganges with folks meditating.

Rikishesh's yoga and meditation has also attracted tourists here for ages. According to Lonely Planet the Beatles made this town the site that it is. They came here in 1968 and stayed at the Maharishi Mahesh Yogi ashram. Ringo did not like it, but everyone else did, for a while. Later they all left because the Maharishi was a ass to women. It is where they wrote Yellow Submarine and basically their double disc - White Album. From that point on Rikishesh has attracted foreigners from far and wide. Still, most of the tourists are actually Israelis who find it close and also, as I have been told, that if offers a liberation Israel does not. After that you have your Americans, Japanese, Europeans, and the last to arrive, the South Americans since SA is so far.

What does this mean? It means Rikishesh speaks English, tourist English. It means I see hundreds of travelers every day. It means I am pulling my hair out trying to balance cultural diversity (which I love) with cultural co-optation (which I hate). So, I went from the Himalayas and total immersion to here. Yes, I have felt cultural shock in India, but it has been the shock of how many NON-Indians can change the face of a place.

My CACA, My Life
So, let's be clear. We live in a world where I can't possibly call the kettle black. And, I live in a world where so much that comes up for me is my own caca. Am I this "type" of tourist? Am I the guy today who stood in front of a beautiful prayer ceremony having his moment with the Ganges or am I the 4 tourists that, like bees, swarmed around a woman and her daugther trying to do a prayer and put their prayer candle to float in the river? I had a zoom camera. So, what does that make me? What is culturally appropriate? 10 feet, 20 feet? I don't know, I really don't. I do know I had to leave the prayer ceremony because I got overwhelmed by the tourists and our collective digital media. I meditated and then came here to write to you - to breath it out so to speak.

I don't know if it's the women who wear low-rise pants in a country where that is just not ok, or the way that women wear halter type tops when it has been written everywhere that this is not ok. Maybe it's the men with the tatoos of "OM" or the fact that so many tourists have money and buy motorcycles in the pedestrian streets. Indians do it too, but it feels different. The bindi, the dot married Indian women wear. Foreigner women and men wear them - what the f***ing, f***? Or, maybe, it's all just like the pictures. You take them because you must have them, you must have a piece of this culture so that you can call it your own when in fact you only understand an ion of what it is all about.

Let me go back to the beginning. I arrived here 48 hours ago. Back then (and in travel time that is really long ago) I was in shock. I went to a hotel where I only saw white people (from all over the world), I went to eat at place where I saw 20% Indians, I went to a restaurant where there was no Indian food only granola, swandwiches and coffee. I was terrified. I ate with a fork and I hated it. I hated them all. Intensily.

Then I met Richard from England, and a guy from Canada and another guy from England, and a guy from Israel and a girl from Israel and we talked about the World Cup teams and I had a great time, while secretly thinking - since I hate everyone here I am glad Brazil is the best team in the world.

Richard told me about a hard yoga class. This new young guy - Prakesh - has combined new styles and has been attracting all the foreigners. I thought, yoga, ok. Let's go. Not ONE Indian in the class. There were 25 of us. Again, it was not about internationalism because the room had people from all over the world. It was the non-Indian piece. Well, of course, we had our Indian guru.

It just so happens that the class last night was changed from yoga to pranyama (sp) breathing. P. breathing is a type of exercise that uses breath work to get you to go "under" to experience intense feelings, often times from childhood or some pain you may have inside. It opens your chakras. Now, P. breathing only really works if you are totally connected to the people who are doing it around you. I did it once before at one of my yoga retreats in the US and it did nothing for me.

We started the exercises and I don't know if it was where I am in my life, this trip, the Himalayan air, the madness in my heart, but I breathed. I breathed like my little life depended on it for a good 1.5-2 hours. I breathed fast, slow, faster, faster, faster, and when I could not do it anymore I kept breathing to the rythms we were given. And suddenly it clicked, the girl next to me and I just went at it and I could feel the vibrations of her body near mine, I could feel the breaths of the people around me and yet I chose only me. I focused deeper than I ever have, and my lungs expanded, my diaphram contracted, my arms went up and down as directed and BAM - tears. They just rolled down my face, and I could feel them near my nose and they flew as I kept breathing. Near the end we slowed down, we lay down (the breathing was on our knees). I lay there and so much flashed through my heart and I focused and I cried.

The moment the lights went on the three women around me came over and hugged me and thanked me. I was a bit lost at first. Then, Ramina said - Thank you for you energy. I felt connected to you and carried at so many points during the breathing. I thanked them too because I too felt the connection. One of them suggested it was the Latin Energy (they are all Chileans). Maybe it was, I am not sure. I think it was more. I felt, as was suggested to me in the Himalayas, that beyond the skin, the bones, the nationalities was our energy inside. That energy is the essence that connects us all to each other, that makes us fall in love with each other, makes us help other without always knowing why, makes us feel hunger, cold, laugh and cry.

After class we all went to dinner together and laughed alot, shared travel stories and I have been spending time with them. It's complicated.

I am beginning to discover where I fall, or better, I am getting to practice where I have often felt I fall. Here are some of my ideas - TODAY.

I don't like cultural ownership.
People cannot convert to Hindu so let the Hindus be. Those that want to convert to other things should do a pilgrimage to learn. So, so many of the foreigners are here dopped out on drugs and finding enlightment. If people came to places like this for yoga, meditation, etc to learn from the best, etc then fine. Learn, go home or do, truly as the Sadhus do. I heard of several Canadian men who have been in the Himalayas for 15 years, in the forest, dedicated to enlightment. I respect them intensily. They are not picking the good and throwing away the bad.

I don't like people wearing things that are deeply cultural.
Fine, wear a shawl, wear, a hat, wear even a sari (I am not sure how culturally significant they are yet). But, a bindi, hindu paraphanelia, etc that rubbs me the wrong way. For instance, I am all for people wearing Israeli hats, the beautiful blouses from the region, but if folks started to make fashion statements with kippas I would not be happy.

Audre Lorde has a beautiful poem called WHITE SISTERS, RADICAL FRIENDS and it talks about white women who have lots and lots of pictures of themselves with their colored friends on their walls, and stuff from places like Africa. But, they do nothing to help the lives of the underrepresented. I say, come to Rikishesh, but also donate money don't just participate in this culture because it's cheap in the exchange market or because it's based on work and LIFETIME dedication and not currency. Don't pick and choose.

TODAY, and G-d knows I can change, I think am definitely participating in this madness and I don't know if my travels are helping or hurting this global process. I am one of the people I am talking about. I cannot deny it. In my heart I hope that my commitment to the work I have done and want to continue to do balances it all out in some way. G-d, I don't know. For now, I remind myself every moment of every day - be respectful, you are a guest in this beautifully complex country and as a guest there are things you should do and things you should not do. Take the lead from your hosts, start by asking, follow your gut, and lead with your heart.

Julio

"Into the Woods to Find the Giant..."
www.brazilbean.net