Our 1st ashram experience & our 1st ever encounter with a 1000 year old man ! He was in amazingly good health, particularly for a man that doesn't eat, & he proved to be very charismatic, not to mention well travelled. He told us about his encounters with the Big Dipper & chorus girls in Blackpool & did a great mime of playing the bagpipes. He comes from Kashmir, as did his yoga master, who was apparently alive at the time of Jesus. According to the story we were told, Jesus spent his young "missing" years in Kashmir being taught by this very same yoga master.
The yogi obviously has some wealthy followers willing to lavish money on the Kandbadi Mahaarter Babag Ashram. The buildings were new & beautifully fitted out while the construction was underway in the grounds of a spacious library & new guest houses. We can understand why people would choose to support the place. The ashram is in a beautiful location, while the yogi & the worshippers that we met were charming, welcoming & hospitable. It was an enchanting place to spend an evening, a day, a month, a year, a lifetime or two.............
3 comments:
Little pearl from Howard - "I don't believe in reincarnation & I didn't believe it last time either...."
Matt Lauer, graduate of Greenwich High School in Connecticut was in Bhutan the other day as part of NBC's "Today Show" before Dubai. I have enjoyed your amazing journey since you've started this blog. I once attended Stony Brook University and the Anthropology chairperson, an economic anthropologist, had to flee Tibet studying markets there and we had a grad student Yugen Gombo, a Tibetan scholar from Darjeeling. Rex and Shirley Jones had published their fieldwork in "Himalayan Woman" about the Limbu people in eastern Nepal. You have made this once third grader listening to New Zealand's Edmund Hillary who'd come to his class in 1960 very happy. He said we were very lucky to even have a school, where he helps build them. An interesting cave full of murals of the Buddha were announced found the other day from at least the 12th century or earlier Common Era, on the road between Nepal and Tibet. Very interesting. Similar bodhisattva depictions I recall have been found in China.
Part of the joy of our travels has been all the interesting people we've made connections with along the way! Great to hear that you've been following (& enjoying!)our progress. Must say we're envious that you got to see Sir Edmund Hillary in person..
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