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| in the archaeology museum |
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| Blue Mosque by Night |
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| marble slab in the hamam |
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| From the ferry across the Bosphorus |
Showing posts with label culture. Show all posts
Showing posts with label culture. Show all posts
Monday, December 20, 2010
Rain in Istanbul
Monday, December 13, 2010
SE Turkey - Off the Tourist Trail
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| Our "tour guides" in Diyarbakır |
We wandered into the old city which is a maze of small alleys. Within 15 minutes, 3 older schoolkids came up to us and was trying to help us get to where we were going. Only slight issue here, was that they spoke almost no English, and we speak no Turkish. Amazingly though that was not too much of a hindrance, for us to spend the next few hours together walking around the city and drinking tea. We would try to communicate using the few words we knew, hand signals, and other such grunts and gestures. It was actually quite funny and interesting. What was also truly amazing is that they were not at all trying to sell us anything or get any money from us. They were just genuinely interested in us as people and wanted to spend some time with us.
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| Looking through some ruins at the Tigris River |
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| Fish Ponds in Şanlıurfa |
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| Having tea with Adam |
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| Entrance to Abraham's birthplace |
It was really great and refreshing to finally get away from the tourist trail in order to have the opportunity to have some genuine experiences with the local culture and people. It seems one thing that had been really unsatisfying about our travels all through SE Asia and Nepal for the past 5 months was being in really touristy places. Unfortunately in these countries, the grooves are worn so deeply that it is nearly impossible to break out unless you have a lot of time, money, and previous knowledge of the language and culture. When people deal with thousands of foreigners a year, you are just another chance for them to make some money. These are mostly poor countries, so you cant blame them for trying to feed their family, but it does prevent any genuine encounters with people. The culture also begins to revolve around tourism and whatever festivals and local ways of life are adjusted so that tourists can watch and take pictures, and of course pay some money. Now that we managed to get away from all that for a little while, it really opened up the possibility to meet "real" people and genuinely enjoy each others company.
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| Şanlıurfa by night |
Sunday, December 5, 2010
On Nepal
After spending 10 weeks in this country, less than twice the size of Pennsylvania, I am more than ready to move on. In fact I even have the rest of this international trip planned out. Here's the quick rundown:
Dec 6 - fly to Istanbul and wander around Turkey
Dec 19 - Fly to Israel and visit some friends and family and the sites
Dec 31 - Fly to Kiev, Ukraine (only for new years - gotta love the randomness)
Jan 1 - Fly back to NY
Anyway, this post is supposed to be about Nepal. I've spent the past week hanging out in Pokhara doing next to nothing except relaxing, reading, catching up on stuff, and planning this next month. It has given me some time to think about the past 10 weeks here and reflect.
When I first imagined Nepal, I thought about quaint little Buddhist Sherpa villages among giant Himalayan mountains. Now this does exist, but for maybe 1% of the country. Having Kathmandu be my introduction to Nepal was certainly a shock. As you fly in, there is a thick brown haze that covers the entire valley. Then the taxi ride from the airport was insane, seemingly no roadrules, and people cars livestock and trash equally scattered all about the streets which wander confusingly all around the city. This is way more like what I have thought of for India, not Nepal. This was also reinforced once we wandered around a bit, and found that most of the food here is Indian and everyone is Hindu.
Luckily the beginning of our first trek was a great experience (other than Nico being sick for 6 days). We were doing a section of the Everest Trek that very few people do nowadays. Because of this the people were all very friendly and genuine, prices were reasonable, and the other trekkers were good company. When you order muelsi with milk the lodge owner goes out back and milks the water buffalo, and sometimes we be joined on the trail by someone who just wants to talk for a little while as they go about their day. Little did I know at the time that this would be among the best and most genuine of my experiences in Nepal. Once we met up with the main trail everything changed. We encountered mostly large tour groups with no respect for the environment, prices suddenly triple, and the locals are now way more interested in your money than they are in you.
I understand that this is among the least developed countries in the world. Hence it can sometimes take 11 hours on a bus to go a measly 110 miles, with people luggage and goats all over the bus and even on the roof. This is fine with me. One thing that I don't totally understand is the lack of hygiene. Certainly these people know what soap is, but i doubt many use it. Staying healthy has been a constant struggle. I rarely get sick, but I have probably gotten sick from the food here more in the past 10 weeks than I have at all in the past 3 years. And on most of the treks it is rare to find a group of more than 1 that has not been held up due to someone getting food poisoning or some other illness.
Even with dealing with so much crap in this country, the Himalayas are as amazing as I could have ever imagined. I still think that one of the highlights of this entire year of traveling is that day that we made it up to Kala Patthar and had the amazing views of Everest, the highest point on Earth. And on the Annapurna trek with Jay we saw constant amazing yet different scenery every day for almost 2 weeks. I feel an amazing peace with everything when I am just relaxing up high at some amazing viewpoint.
The people here have certainly taken a little while to figure out and get used to. One of the strangest things is that for them, a shrug of the shoulders and tilt of the head means yes. Even knowing that it is hard to get used to when you ask if something is okay and it looks like they are shrugging as if they'll do it, but unhappily. When in fact they are actually saying, "sure, no problem". Also people here cannot give "I don't know", or "I cannot do that" as an answer. This very quickly gets frustrating, when you ask some people for information they will tell you something even if they are making it up on the spot. When trying to see if we could get Nico a flight out from the Annapurna trek, we got 5 different answers about how many planes there are per day and how to even go about getting a ticket. So when people tell you something, you have no idea if it is true or not. What also comes from being a major tourist destination is that you never know if someone is trying to genuinely talk to you, or if they just want your money. Everyone here knows some basic English, which is extremely helpful considering that is the only language I'm comfortable with. If you are talking about tourist activities, then they are fine, but as soon as you ask something different most people are clueless, but they will respond with an answer to some question even if it is not the question that you asked.
I mentioned earlier about how very few people do the Jiri section of the Everest trek (the first part). This is because for about the past 10 years, people would be asked for a "donation" at gunpoint to the Maoist party. You would at least get a receipt so you'd be off the hook the next time another Maoist asks for a donation. As of two years ago the Maoist party was recognized to most of the world as a terrorist organization. Although recently they have managed to gain control of the government and is now running the place. There were elections and the people voted them in on their promise to make things better. But of course after a couple years no one likes them because it was all empty promises and corruption.
One thing that I despise is TIMS - Trekker Information Management System. Sounds nice as they have tons of trekkers who come through here and it would be good to make sure that they all make it out of the mountains alive. But in fact it is a croc of shit, where you have to pay US$20 (plus another $15 to $30 on park fees, plus more ridiculous prices on food and accommodation) to just go on a hike. It might be checked once, your info gets written down, and then nothing ever happens with it again. They don't even pretend to notice if you've made it out alive or not.
Anyway, so overall, Nepal has not turned out to the hiker paradise that I had imagined before I came here. It was actually a tough country to be in for so long, and I actually feel a sense of accomplishment for making it this far alive. Although even with all the shit that you need to go through to get there, small parts of the country do come close to that mountain paradise. Unfortunately to get to some of it you need a budget about 1000 times what you'd expect in a poorly developed country (one region requires a US$500 entrance permit which lasts only 10 days). I am really happy that I made it to this country, saw some truly amazing scenery, even learned a new alphabet. 10 weeks might have been just a little bit too much time. Moving on though, I am very excited about what is coming up in the next month.
Dec 6 - fly to Istanbul and wander around Turkey
Dec 19 - Fly to Israel and visit some friends and family and the sites
Dec 31 - Fly to Kiev, Ukraine (only for new years - gotta love the randomness)
Jan 1 - Fly back to NY
Anyway, this post is supposed to be about Nepal. I've spent the past week hanging out in Pokhara doing next to nothing except relaxing, reading, catching up on stuff, and planning this next month. It has given me some time to think about the past 10 weeks here and reflect.
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| Smog in the Kathmandu Valley |
Luckily the beginning of our first trek was a great experience (other than Nico being sick for 6 days). We were doing a section of the Everest Trek that very few people do nowadays. Because of this the people were all very friendly and genuine, prices were reasonable, and the other trekkers were good company. When you order muelsi with milk the lodge owner goes out back and milks the water buffalo, and sometimes we be joined on the trail by someone who just wants to talk for a little while as they go about their day. Little did I know at the time that this would be among the best and most genuine of my experiences in Nepal. Once we met up with the main trail everything changed. We encountered mostly large tour groups with no respect for the environment, prices suddenly triple, and the locals are now way more interested in your money than they are in you.
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| Quaint little village.... before joining the main trail on the Everest Trek |
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| On top of Kala Patthar with the top of the world behind me |
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| One of the places on the Annapurna trek where I was more at peace than I'd been in a long time... just soaking it all in. |
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| Kids on the trail - they love getting their picture taken |
One thing that I despise is TIMS - Trekker Information Management System. Sounds nice as they have tons of trekkers who come through here and it would be good to make sure that they all make it out of the mountains alive. But in fact it is a croc of shit, where you have to pay US$20 (plus another $15 to $30 on park fees, plus more ridiculous prices on food and accommodation) to just go on a hike. It might be checked once, your info gets written down, and then nothing ever happens with it again. They don't even pretend to notice if you've made it out alive or not.
Anyway, so overall, Nepal has not turned out to the hiker paradise that I had imagined before I came here. It was actually a tough country to be in for so long, and I actually feel a sense of accomplishment for making it this far alive. Although even with all the shit that you need to go through to get there, small parts of the country do come close to that mountain paradise. Unfortunately to get to some of it you need a budget about 1000 times what you'd expect in a poorly developed country (one region requires a US$500 entrance permit which lasts only 10 days). I am really happy that I made it to this country, saw some truly amazing scenery, even learned a new alphabet. 10 weeks might have been just a little bit too much time. Moving on though, I am very excited about what is coming up in the next month.
Tuesday, September 14, 2010
The Greatest Insight to Lead Me Nowhere
I have recently spent 10 days in a Theravada Buddhist meditation retreat in southern Thailand. This has been quite the interesting learning experience and finally there is some understanding of all that went through my head in 10 days of silence. This is a long one and I have chosen to not add pictures, cause that is not what this all is about. But I will post some soon at my picasa site so check there in a day or two. First of all let me talk about the retreat in general.
About the Retreat
It is a 10 day silent meditation retreat. Basically that means 10 days to meditate without distractions of any sort other than nature and yourself. It is silent, so no talking or really interacting at all with anyone. That is how it was for the men anyway, it seems that women become pretty good at communicating even if no talking is allowed. But men and women are separated in dorms, meals, and even meditate on different sides of the meditation halls. On day 0 when you register, you get rid of any external items that can stimulate you, such as iPods, cameras, books, cards, or writing. This afternoon there was also a weird saying goodbye to Nico, because even though we were going to be in the same place we were not even going look at each other or anything for the next 10 days. Our schedule went something like this:
4:00 – wakeup
4:30 – morning reading (by a participant)
4:45 – group sitting meditation
5:15 – mindfulness through movement (Yoga)
7:00 – Ajahn Poe’s (head monk) morning talk, group sitting meditation
8:00 – breakfast and chores and free time
10:00 – Dhamma talk, group sitting meditation
11:00 – walking meditation
11:45 – group sitting meditation
12:30 – lunch and free time (nap)
2:30 – Dhamma talk, group sitting meditation
3:30 – walking meditation
4:15 – group sitting meditation
5:00 – chanting
6:00 – tea and hot spring
7:30 – group sitting meditation
8:00 – group walking meditation
8:30 – group sitting meditation
9:00 – head back to dorms
9:30 – lights out
Surprisingly you get used to the whole getting up at 4am thing and eating only two meals a day. (The food was so good though that I think in those two meals I took in way more calories than I had been with three meals). Each dorm room was about an 8’x8’ concrete cell, with a concrete platform and straw mat to sleep on and a wooden pillow is provided. They made a joke about sleeping with the wooden pillow because that is what the Buddha did, but it really was not all that bad. Although, I think I might have been the only one to use it. I also did have some roommates. The first night I walk into my room to find two very large spiders on the floor that I gently escorted out. Then I look up to see a foot long gecko hanging out in the upper corner looking at me. He didn’t move at all, so I left him alone. Of course the next day the spiders were back, along with the gecko’s two female friends and there was even a wasp that was making a home in the other corner of the room. It was actually nice to have some friends there and during the 10 days I even began to see some of their daily habits.
Originally I came into this without many expectations other than that it was going to be physically and mentally a challenge. Luckily the physical part was not too much of a problem. They introduced us to all sorts of sitting positions and even if you were too uncomfortable you could do standing meditation. Mixed with the walking meditation, I certainly had muscle aches and pains, but at least they rotated around my body and never got too bad.
Mentally, it was tough in a different way than I originally thought. I actually did not get too bored, even though you don’t really do anything all day other than sit there and concentrate. Some people do get very bored, or listless, or angry, or frustrated, but I ended up just kinda going with it cause it is what I was there to do. I did found it really daunting though. After a couple days I had a hard time imagining doing this for another 8 days. Your brain just gets tired and you want to relax it and let it think about whatever, but you really need to stay focused. I took it one day at a time (or even one meal at a time) and made my way through the 10 days.
We started out with 42 participants (a small group for there) and ended up with 33 by the last day. So it is a very difficult thing for some people that they just cant stand being there any longer and have to leave. I found it interesting that they said around day 3 or so is the hardest. That is when people get through the basic emotions and really have to face themselves and their problems that they have always run away from by occupying themselves with something else (such as TV, music, shopping, or friends) when it comes up. I guess I am lucky that I am mentally in a good place and seem to take things head on. Cause I never felt anything like some of the others that many days led them to tears.
I mentioned in the schedule above that a couple times a day there were talks. These were on things like meditation instruction in the beginning and then on Dhamma in general. Basically they were about the different parts of Buddhism and how it says you should live your life. They were really interesting… when I could understand them. Thankfully everything was in English, but some of the Thai monks have such a strong accent that I could not understand half of what they were saying.
It was really interesting having Nico there with me. We talked beforehand about how we agree that we are not going to look at each other or try to contact each other and also what to do if one of us leaves. That first afternoon was very strange as if we were dragging out a goodbye, when we still had a few hours before the silence but we decided to have our last hugs and get it over with. But on day 3 I guess I looked miserable (even though I felt fine) and Nico was worried. I was able to sense that she wanted to contact me in some way. After tea that evening she came up to me with a note she had written. It said something about asking how I was and then something else. I just gave a big thumbs up and continued on my way really trying to not have any contact with anyone. Then of course all the next day I was worried about her and was thinking about that interaction constantly. What else did she have written there, was she alright? I would have been way better off just taking the time to see what she wanted and gotten over it. This was a bit of a lesson in the “middle way” and maybe I was being too strict with my practice. After that I would at least look up and smile at her and she would do the same. It was not until the following morning that I saw her doing the morning reading that I knew for sure things were good and I could stop thinking about it.
So what is meditation? Basically all you do is follow your breath and keep your focus there without letting your mind wander. Feel how it feels on nose and in the navel to breathe in and out and mentally follow it between the two. I had started to do a little bit of meditation with Nico in New Zealand and then I could barely get one breath before my mind was somewhere else. It is especially difficult to concentrate when you have everything in the world going on around you. But during this retreat there were times that I could actually have my mind clear and think only about my breathing for even a couple minutes at a time. Later on I realized that I should also be doing some insight meditation (contemplating things) as well as the concentration meditation. The concentration that I had so far developed was really neat in that it led me to have such clear thinking. We learned about Anapanasati, which is 16 steps to attain on the path to Nibbana (nirvana). Unfortunately without being able to speak and get further input, I am not sure if I was still on step 1, or if I was up to step 9 by the time the retreat ended. Once Nico told me that people spend their entire lives trying to attain Nirvana, I figured that I was probably on step 1.
One of the other rules in this place that they ask you to keep is to “not take away any breath”. This means don’t kill anything… even mosquitoes. I would actually blow away mosquitoes that were biting me. This definitely was a bit of a hindrance while meditating though. Sometimes I was good and just let them bite, but man I don’t think I will ever get used to that.
On the last night we all had a chance to get up in front of everyone to share any insights that we had. I am really nervous about speaking in front of people and so after thinking about it a whole bunch that day, I made myself go first. This way I could get it over with and then actually listen to what other people had to say. Of course once I get up there, my mind goes blank and only about half of what I planned to say came out, but according to Nico I still made some sense. What I said up there is a small portion of what I will write about below.
Then finally on day 11, after the morning reading and meditation, the silence was broken. We had some time to finally meet all the people that we had been going through this with and seeing for the past 10 days. It was really interesting to feel like you know someone without ever having spoken to them before. Another funny thing is hearing them talk. You make assumptions about where people are from based on their looks and mannerisms. The biggest discrepancy was from this guy who had very brown skin, looked Indian, and could sit for hours. When he spoke, though, Jon had the most American accent you can imagine complete with the volume of an American. Apparently he grew up in the US, but his whole family is Indian and he’s been meditating his whole life. Anyway, we also took a tour of the Suan Mokkh main monastery before parting our ways and continuing on our journeys.
About My Insight
A very good question now, and what I have been thinking about since the retreat, is what have I gotten from this experience? There is also the greatest insight that I realized, at least its how I feel at the moment, which is all about the “middle way”.
Let me explain a few things first:
The middle way – You are not meant to be too strict and also not too loose in your meditation practice. One monk told us of a time when he meditated for about 20 days straight with no sleep. And another that drank only coconut milk for 18 days until he almost died. This is not the middle way. And in general, by the nature of trying to get yourself to attain Nirvana you will never get there because you are hanging onto your ego.
Dependant Origination – “Contact” is when one of your senses or mind notices something which then causes a feeling.
Ignorance gives rise to contact
Contact gives rise to feeling
Feeling gives rise to craving
Craving gives rise to attachment
Attachment gives rise to becoming
Becoming gives rise to birth
Birth gives rise to suffering
Suffering gives rise to ignorance
It is ignorant contact that leads us through this endless cycle of suffering. Wisdom in contact will still give rise to feeling, but there will be no craving and thus no suffering.
Knowledge – there are three levels of knowledge and all are needed to truly understand something. The first is learning, like when you read books or hear talks on something. The second is reasoning. This is when you know all about it and can philosophize. The third is experience. A good example of this is sugar. If you’ve never had sugar before, people can tell you what it tastes like, but you can never truly understand until you taste some and experience it for yourself. As an aside, I think that all school teachers and professors should understand this concept, I bet it would revolutionize how we are taught in school.
Selfishness – All things are impermanent, unsatisfying, and not self (there is no “me” and no “my”). This not self concept is very difficult to swallow, and I have done some learning and reasoning about it, but you only truly experience it once you reach Nirvana.
Buddhism recognizes that there are four noble truths. A noble truth is something that is universally true irregardless of the time or the place or who it applies to. These are:
1. There exists Dukka (suffering)
2. The cause of Dukka is Selfishness
3. Nirvana is the end of Dukka
4. To get to Nirvana follow the 8 fold path.
Basically Buddhism says that everyone suffers and that no happiness that we know it is true happiness. The only way to be truly happy is to follow the teachings of Buddhism to the extreme – Nirvana. Buddhism as a religion is really the only one that claims to end all suffering in this lifetime. All other religions are also moral codes, but they seem to more deal with those unanswerable questions that humans have pondered forever like why are we here, and what happens when you die? On that subject, Buddhism simply explains that everything is a flow of events, and it all depends on previous conditions.
It seems that in Theravada Buddhism we all suffer. We all want to be truly happy, which means we all should strive for Nirvana. Since you need to do a whole lot of meditation with a clear mind, the only way to actually reach Nirvana is to free yourself from worldly attachments and devote your life to meditation. You can do this by becoming a monk. The monks in Thailand all live in monasteries. They rely on the goodwill of the population to provide food and in return they run some community events as well as being the spiritual leaders of the community. In being a monk, you can devote your life to meditation and spiritual development. Now let me briefly list the 8 trainings that all monks (and us for 10 days) live by:
1. Intend not to take away any breath.
2. Intend not to take away what is not given.
3. Intend to keep my mind and body free from sexual activity.
4. Intend not to harm others by speech.
5. Intend not to harm my consciousness with substances that intoxicate and lead to carelessness.
6. Intend not to eat before dawn and after noon each day.
7. Intend not to sing, dance, play, listen to music, watch shows, wear garlands, ornaments or beautify myself.
8. Intend not to sleep or sit on luxurious beds and seats.
So far, I’ve determined that I suffer and should work on my meditation to get to Nirvana to reach true happiness and release myself from this suffering. When I thought about what it means to be a monk and to reach Nirvana, I began to question if that is what I really wanted. Be free from attachments… does that mean that I wont ever play ultimate again? Then I wont be attached to trying to win, and winning is impermanent and unsatisfying, so why should I want that in the first place. Also to be free from attachments means no girlfriend or starting a family – sorry Nico. Once you reach Nirvana, you will be truly happy and fundamentally not interested with these impermanent worldly pleasures. You come to see music for what it is, an unharmonious conglomerate of sounds. I clearly will not want to listen to music or play the piano anymore.
A metaphor that I came up with about Nirvana is this: Imagine a garden of Eden plopped down next to your house. If you choose to enter it, you can never leave. While in there, everything is perfect, you have no worries or obligations or anything like that for the rest of your life. But in entering the garden you leave everything behind. No music, sports, family, or friends, even though all of that still exists all around you.
Really, why do I want this again? Is being truly happy and at peace with myself and the world worth giving up all that I currently hold dear? Maybe some people would say yes, but I don’t see it. I am not trying to say that Buddhism is incorrect, and maybe if I did give it all up to reach Nirvana I’d be happy about it later. But I don’t think that is a personal experiment I care to take up. And then I also wonder how things would work if everyone decided to become monks and nuns. Who would comprise the community that donates food, who would study medicine to take care of the sick?
This was around day 7 when I was truly beginning to doubt this whole meditation thing and was about to totally lose interest in being there. I felt that Buddhism itself is quite egotistical to say that no one experiences true happiness, and also that it would be a very selfish thing to do to remove yourself from those that rely and depend on you to seek your own happiness. Where is the “not self” which is such a crucial part of the teachings?
Luckily very soon after in the next meditation session something occurred to me. The “middle way” does not just apply to how strict or not you are with meditation, but also for how you should live your life. Nirvana is not something that I should strive for. Maybe I should just try to be a good person. If you don’t take all those teachings and trainings too seriously, Buddhism has a really great moral code to live your life by. Not only that but I had recognized that I do have much better concentration and mindfulness through all the meditation. I cannot control what sorts of things happen to me in my life, and I cannot control my immediate feelings, but I can approach them as best I can with a mindfulness that will prevent me to give rise to suffering. And I do realize that I will never be perfect at it.
Now I think that I am already pretty in control of my emotions and reactions to whatever life brings me. I am also usually aware when my sense of “self” becomes quite strong and leads to ignorant contact and suffering. So basically all of this has just gone to reinforce how I already live my life and the morals that I have. Hence, how this great insight has left me right where I started.
The retreat was definitely not a waste of time though. It was a great learning experience to first hand experience meditation and Buddhism. In the few days since the retreat I have continued to meditate at least daily. I also do have greater concentration and clearer thinking than I can ever remember having. Who knows how long this will last, but such is life.
I would also like to say that all of the teachings about Buddhism that I have talked about here are identified with Theravada Buddhism, as opposed to Mahayana Buddhism which is more widely practiced in the west. I learned from Nico after the retreat that Mahayana is much more focused on the general people, rather than the monastic life like Theravada. Also not to say that Theravada is all bad, because in all practicality, almost all of Thailand is Theravada Buddhist and it is a great country filled with nice and practical citizens who comprise a thriving country and society.
I did though realize something about myself through all this, even if it is unrelated to this big insight I have gained. I had kinda noticed this before, but never really thought it through. I guess if you’ve managed to read through this whole blog post, I can let you in on what this is. It is that I am in fact a proud person. I don’t have pride in the “normal” sorts of things such as material possessions or how good of a job I have. But it is more a pride in my own ways, especially because they are different than most people. I do care what people think of me. For example, way back in NZ there were thoughts of not continuing the trip and just coming home. Everyone expected me to do this whole world trip for 18 months, and would they all think that I failed and couldn’t take it? I guess sometimes I feel like I do things cause I think people would think less of me if I didn’t. There was much more reason than that as to why I continued traveling, but the thought did cross my mind. And all the talk about “I” and “me”, I clearly have an ego, and I understand that I am not going to get rid of that one. I really liked to have Nico tell me later that I did well with talking when I shared my insight at the meditation retreat (cause I thought everyone was going to think I was mentally slow with how ridiculously slowly I felt I spoke). Well, if you feel like fueling this ego, feel free to let me know what you think about all of this.
These sorts of meditation retreats exist all over the world, and even all over the US. I certainly would recommend anyone to go to one and experience it for themselves. One thing I do know is that what I have talked about is just my own experience which was quite different from everyone else's experience at the retreat. Everyone got something out of it in their own way.
About the Retreat
It is a 10 day silent meditation retreat. Basically that means 10 days to meditate without distractions of any sort other than nature and yourself. It is silent, so no talking or really interacting at all with anyone. That is how it was for the men anyway, it seems that women become pretty good at communicating even if no talking is allowed. But men and women are separated in dorms, meals, and even meditate on different sides of the meditation halls. On day 0 when you register, you get rid of any external items that can stimulate you, such as iPods, cameras, books, cards, or writing. This afternoon there was also a weird saying goodbye to Nico, because even though we were going to be in the same place we were not even going look at each other or anything for the next 10 days. Our schedule went something like this:
4:00 – wakeup
4:30 – morning reading (by a participant)
4:45 – group sitting meditation
5:15 – mindfulness through movement (Yoga)
7:00 – Ajahn Poe’s (head monk) morning talk, group sitting meditation
8:00 – breakfast and chores and free time
10:00 – Dhamma talk, group sitting meditation
11:00 – walking meditation
11:45 – group sitting meditation
12:30 – lunch and free time (nap)
2:30 – Dhamma talk, group sitting meditation
3:30 – walking meditation
4:15 – group sitting meditation
5:00 – chanting
6:00 – tea and hot spring
7:30 – group sitting meditation
8:00 – group walking meditation
8:30 – group sitting meditation
9:00 – head back to dorms
9:30 – lights out
Surprisingly you get used to the whole getting up at 4am thing and eating only two meals a day. (The food was so good though that I think in those two meals I took in way more calories than I had been with three meals). Each dorm room was about an 8’x8’ concrete cell, with a concrete platform and straw mat to sleep on and a wooden pillow is provided. They made a joke about sleeping with the wooden pillow because that is what the Buddha did, but it really was not all that bad. Although, I think I might have been the only one to use it. I also did have some roommates. The first night I walk into my room to find two very large spiders on the floor that I gently escorted out. Then I look up to see a foot long gecko hanging out in the upper corner looking at me. He didn’t move at all, so I left him alone. Of course the next day the spiders were back, along with the gecko’s two female friends and there was even a wasp that was making a home in the other corner of the room. It was actually nice to have some friends there and during the 10 days I even began to see some of their daily habits.
Originally I came into this without many expectations other than that it was going to be physically and mentally a challenge. Luckily the physical part was not too much of a problem. They introduced us to all sorts of sitting positions and even if you were too uncomfortable you could do standing meditation. Mixed with the walking meditation, I certainly had muscle aches and pains, but at least they rotated around my body and never got too bad.
Mentally, it was tough in a different way than I originally thought. I actually did not get too bored, even though you don’t really do anything all day other than sit there and concentrate. Some people do get very bored, or listless, or angry, or frustrated, but I ended up just kinda going with it cause it is what I was there to do. I did found it really daunting though. After a couple days I had a hard time imagining doing this for another 8 days. Your brain just gets tired and you want to relax it and let it think about whatever, but you really need to stay focused. I took it one day at a time (or even one meal at a time) and made my way through the 10 days.
We started out with 42 participants (a small group for there) and ended up with 33 by the last day. So it is a very difficult thing for some people that they just cant stand being there any longer and have to leave. I found it interesting that they said around day 3 or so is the hardest. That is when people get through the basic emotions and really have to face themselves and their problems that they have always run away from by occupying themselves with something else (such as TV, music, shopping, or friends) when it comes up. I guess I am lucky that I am mentally in a good place and seem to take things head on. Cause I never felt anything like some of the others that many days led them to tears.
I mentioned in the schedule above that a couple times a day there were talks. These were on things like meditation instruction in the beginning and then on Dhamma in general. Basically they were about the different parts of Buddhism and how it says you should live your life. They were really interesting… when I could understand them. Thankfully everything was in English, but some of the Thai monks have such a strong accent that I could not understand half of what they were saying.
It was really interesting having Nico there with me. We talked beforehand about how we agree that we are not going to look at each other or try to contact each other and also what to do if one of us leaves. That first afternoon was very strange as if we were dragging out a goodbye, when we still had a few hours before the silence but we decided to have our last hugs and get it over with. But on day 3 I guess I looked miserable (even though I felt fine) and Nico was worried. I was able to sense that she wanted to contact me in some way. After tea that evening she came up to me with a note she had written. It said something about asking how I was and then something else. I just gave a big thumbs up and continued on my way really trying to not have any contact with anyone. Then of course all the next day I was worried about her and was thinking about that interaction constantly. What else did she have written there, was she alright? I would have been way better off just taking the time to see what she wanted and gotten over it. This was a bit of a lesson in the “middle way” and maybe I was being too strict with my practice. After that I would at least look up and smile at her and she would do the same. It was not until the following morning that I saw her doing the morning reading that I knew for sure things were good and I could stop thinking about it.
So what is meditation? Basically all you do is follow your breath and keep your focus there without letting your mind wander. Feel how it feels on nose and in the navel to breathe in and out and mentally follow it between the two. I had started to do a little bit of meditation with Nico in New Zealand and then I could barely get one breath before my mind was somewhere else. It is especially difficult to concentrate when you have everything in the world going on around you. But during this retreat there were times that I could actually have my mind clear and think only about my breathing for even a couple minutes at a time. Later on I realized that I should also be doing some insight meditation (contemplating things) as well as the concentration meditation. The concentration that I had so far developed was really neat in that it led me to have such clear thinking. We learned about Anapanasati, which is 16 steps to attain on the path to Nibbana (nirvana). Unfortunately without being able to speak and get further input, I am not sure if I was still on step 1, or if I was up to step 9 by the time the retreat ended. Once Nico told me that people spend their entire lives trying to attain Nirvana, I figured that I was probably on step 1.
One of the other rules in this place that they ask you to keep is to “not take away any breath”. This means don’t kill anything… even mosquitoes. I would actually blow away mosquitoes that were biting me. This definitely was a bit of a hindrance while meditating though. Sometimes I was good and just let them bite, but man I don’t think I will ever get used to that.
On the last night we all had a chance to get up in front of everyone to share any insights that we had. I am really nervous about speaking in front of people and so after thinking about it a whole bunch that day, I made myself go first. This way I could get it over with and then actually listen to what other people had to say. Of course once I get up there, my mind goes blank and only about half of what I planned to say came out, but according to Nico I still made some sense. What I said up there is a small portion of what I will write about below.
Then finally on day 11, after the morning reading and meditation, the silence was broken. We had some time to finally meet all the people that we had been going through this with and seeing for the past 10 days. It was really interesting to feel like you know someone without ever having spoken to them before. Another funny thing is hearing them talk. You make assumptions about where people are from based on their looks and mannerisms. The biggest discrepancy was from this guy who had very brown skin, looked Indian, and could sit for hours. When he spoke, though, Jon had the most American accent you can imagine complete with the volume of an American. Apparently he grew up in the US, but his whole family is Indian and he’s been meditating his whole life. Anyway, we also took a tour of the Suan Mokkh main monastery before parting our ways and continuing on our journeys.
About My Insight
A very good question now, and what I have been thinking about since the retreat, is what have I gotten from this experience? There is also the greatest insight that I realized, at least its how I feel at the moment, which is all about the “middle way”.
Let me explain a few things first:
The middle way – You are not meant to be too strict and also not too loose in your meditation practice. One monk told us of a time when he meditated for about 20 days straight with no sleep. And another that drank only coconut milk for 18 days until he almost died. This is not the middle way. And in general, by the nature of trying to get yourself to attain Nirvana you will never get there because you are hanging onto your ego.
Dependant Origination – “Contact” is when one of your senses or mind notices something which then causes a feeling.
Ignorance gives rise to contact
Contact gives rise to feeling
Feeling gives rise to craving
Craving gives rise to attachment
Attachment gives rise to becoming
Becoming gives rise to birth
Birth gives rise to suffering
Suffering gives rise to ignorance
It is ignorant contact that leads us through this endless cycle of suffering. Wisdom in contact will still give rise to feeling, but there will be no craving and thus no suffering.
Knowledge – there are three levels of knowledge and all are needed to truly understand something. The first is learning, like when you read books or hear talks on something. The second is reasoning. This is when you know all about it and can philosophize. The third is experience. A good example of this is sugar. If you’ve never had sugar before, people can tell you what it tastes like, but you can never truly understand until you taste some and experience it for yourself. As an aside, I think that all school teachers and professors should understand this concept, I bet it would revolutionize how we are taught in school.
Selfishness – All things are impermanent, unsatisfying, and not self (there is no “me” and no “my”). This not self concept is very difficult to swallow, and I have done some learning and reasoning about it, but you only truly experience it once you reach Nirvana.
Buddhism recognizes that there are four noble truths. A noble truth is something that is universally true irregardless of the time or the place or who it applies to. These are:
1. There exists Dukka (suffering)
2. The cause of Dukka is Selfishness
3. Nirvana is the end of Dukka
4. To get to Nirvana follow the 8 fold path.
Basically Buddhism says that everyone suffers and that no happiness that we know it is true happiness. The only way to be truly happy is to follow the teachings of Buddhism to the extreme – Nirvana. Buddhism as a religion is really the only one that claims to end all suffering in this lifetime. All other religions are also moral codes, but they seem to more deal with those unanswerable questions that humans have pondered forever like why are we here, and what happens when you die? On that subject, Buddhism simply explains that everything is a flow of events, and it all depends on previous conditions.
It seems that in Theravada Buddhism we all suffer. We all want to be truly happy, which means we all should strive for Nirvana. Since you need to do a whole lot of meditation with a clear mind, the only way to actually reach Nirvana is to free yourself from worldly attachments and devote your life to meditation. You can do this by becoming a monk. The monks in Thailand all live in monasteries. They rely on the goodwill of the population to provide food and in return they run some community events as well as being the spiritual leaders of the community. In being a monk, you can devote your life to meditation and spiritual development. Now let me briefly list the 8 trainings that all monks (and us for 10 days) live by:
1. Intend not to take away any breath.
2. Intend not to take away what is not given.
3. Intend to keep my mind and body free from sexual activity.
4. Intend not to harm others by speech.
5. Intend not to harm my consciousness with substances that intoxicate and lead to carelessness.
6. Intend not to eat before dawn and after noon each day.
7. Intend not to sing, dance, play, listen to music, watch shows, wear garlands, ornaments or beautify myself.
8. Intend not to sleep or sit on luxurious beds and seats.
So far, I’ve determined that I suffer and should work on my meditation to get to Nirvana to reach true happiness and release myself from this suffering. When I thought about what it means to be a monk and to reach Nirvana, I began to question if that is what I really wanted. Be free from attachments… does that mean that I wont ever play ultimate again? Then I wont be attached to trying to win, and winning is impermanent and unsatisfying, so why should I want that in the first place. Also to be free from attachments means no girlfriend or starting a family – sorry Nico. Once you reach Nirvana, you will be truly happy and fundamentally not interested with these impermanent worldly pleasures. You come to see music for what it is, an unharmonious conglomerate of sounds. I clearly will not want to listen to music or play the piano anymore.
A metaphor that I came up with about Nirvana is this: Imagine a garden of Eden plopped down next to your house. If you choose to enter it, you can never leave. While in there, everything is perfect, you have no worries or obligations or anything like that for the rest of your life. But in entering the garden you leave everything behind. No music, sports, family, or friends, even though all of that still exists all around you.
Really, why do I want this again? Is being truly happy and at peace with myself and the world worth giving up all that I currently hold dear? Maybe some people would say yes, but I don’t see it. I am not trying to say that Buddhism is incorrect, and maybe if I did give it all up to reach Nirvana I’d be happy about it later. But I don’t think that is a personal experiment I care to take up. And then I also wonder how things would work if everyone decided to become monks and nuns. Who would comprise the community that donates food, who would study medicine to take care of the sick?
This was around day 7 when I was truly beginning to doubt this whole meditation thing and was about to totally lose interest in being there. I felt that Buddhism itself is quite egotistical to say that no one experiences true happiness, and also that it would be a very selfish thing to do to remove yourself from those that rely and depend on you to seek your own happiness. Where is the “not self” which is such a crucial part of the teachings?
Luckily very soon after in the next meditation session something occurred to me. The “middle way” does not just apply to how strict or not you are with meditation, but also for how you should live your life. Nirvana is not something that I should strive for. Maybe I should just try to be a good person. If you don’t take all those teachings and trainings too seriously, Buddhism has a really great moral code to live your life by. Not only that but I had recognized that I do have much better concentration and mindfulness through all the meditation. I cannot control what sorts of things happen to me in my life, and I cannot control my immediate feelings, but I can approach them as best I can with a mindfulness that will prevent me to give rise to suffering. And I do realize that I will never be perfect at it.
Now I think that I am already pretty in control of my emotions and reactions to whatever life brings me. I am also usually aware when my sense of “self” becomes quite strong and leads to ignorant contact and suffering. So basically all of this has just gone to reinforce how I already live my life and the morals that I have. Hence, how this great insight has left me right where I started.
The retreat was definitely not a waste of time though. It was a great learning experience to first hand experience meditation and Buddhism. In the few days since the retreat I have continued to meditate at least daily. I also do have greater concentration and clearer thinking than I can ever remember having. Who knows how long this will last, but such is life.
I would also like to say that all of the teachings about Buddhism that I have talked about here are identified with Theravada Buddhism, as opposed to Mahayana Buddhism which is more widely practiced in the west. I learned from Nico after the retreat that Mahayana is much more focused on the general people, rather than the monastic life like Theravada. Also not to say that Theravada is all bad, because in all practicality, almost all of Thailand is Theravada Buddhist and it is a great country filled with nice and practical citizens who comprise a thriving country and society.
I did though realize something about myself through all this, even if it is unrelated to this big insight I have gained. I had kinda noticed this before, but never really thought it through. I guess if you’ve managed to read through this whole blog post, I can let you in on what this is. It is that I am in fact a proud person. I don’t have pride in the “normal” sorts of things such as material possessions or how good of a job I have. But it is more a pride in my own ways, especially because they are different than most people. I do care what people think of me. For example, way back in NZ there were thoughts of not continuing the trip and just coming home. Everyone expected me to do this whole world trip for 18 months, and would they all think that I failed and couldn’t take it? I guess sometimes I feel like I do things cause I think people would think less of me if I didn’t. There was much more reason than that as to why I continued traveling, but the thought did cross my mind. And all the talk about “I” and “me”, I clearly have an ego, and I understand that I am not going to get rid of that one. I really liked to have Nico tell me later that I did well with talking when I shared my insight at the meditation retreat (cause I thought everyone was going to think I was mentally slow with how ridiculously slowly I felt I spoke). Well, if you feel like fueling this ego, feel free to let me know what you think about all of this.
These sorts of meditation retreats exist all over the world, and even all over the US. I certainly would recommend anyone to go to one and experience it for themselves. One thing I do know is that what I have talked about is just my own experience which was quite different from everyone else's experience at the retreat. Everyone got something out of it in their own way.
Friday, August 13, 2010
Cameron Highlands
Hi from Malaysia!
We have so far spent our first night in Kuala Lumpur (the capital), and then the next day took a bus to the Cameron Highlands. Here we are about 5000ft. above sea level, so even though we are so close to the equator, it is nice and cool - a welcome relief from KL and Indonesia. This is a nice place to chill out a bit and also do some hiking.
The scenery here kinda reminds me of the Catskills. Rolling green hills with some decent views. Nothing amazing and defo not worth travelling completely across the globe to go see, but since we are here it is great to do some hiking. We've barely done any physical activity in a while, so getting out for 4 days in a row and doing some hiking has been great.
Something that is neat about hiking here though, is that the jungle sounds (birds and insects) are totally different from anything I have ever experienced and also there are loads of new plants. Like this pitcher plant (picture below). It is one of those carnivorous plants that lure bugs into the plant and trap it there to suck out the nutrients! One day while hiking, I came across one dead one that was lying on the ground. I brought it back and later started dissecting it. Even though it was separated from the main part of the plant I think it was still alive. On the inside, there were these little white tentacles that were actually moving and grabbed a nearby piece of fly when I opened it up! It totally looked like some little alien thing.
Another exciting thing happened on the last hiking day. We hiked up Gunung Brinchang (highest mountain in the area at 6666ft), which is also possible to drive up. Then at the top it started to rain, so instead of hiking back down the trail we thought we'd go via the road and then stop at the tea plantation for a cup of tea. But a little ways down we got lazy and hitchhiked. A pickup truck came by with 3 kids in the back and they offered us a ride! It was a Malaysian family who was getting a tour of this huge vegetable farm. We joined in and got to ride through it all and chat with the kids in the bed of the pickup all the way down the mountain. They were super nice and even offered to have us come out to lunch with them. Too bad we had just eaten! But anyway, here we are with them with some veggies behind us on the side of the mountain.
So thoughts on Malaysia so far:
-It is way more developed than Indonesia, but in a good way. There is a such thing as public transportation and garbage pickup. Also because people are a little better off, you may be offered a taxi but if you decline they don't follow you pestering.
-It is way more diverse. There are of course Malaysians, but also lots of Indians and Chinese live here too. We have had way more Indian food here so far than local food. The guys in the Indian place even recognize us by now!
-Part of it being more diverse, and probably more developed, means that people are way better at English. I know that I should not expect everyone else to speak English everywhere, but it is nice when they do. We can actually have a conversation with people and talk about something more than the weather or the fact that we can speak only a tiny bit of Indonesian!
So it's good so far, and tomorrow we head off to Taman Negara. This is going to be some hot steamy jungle, where maybe we'll get lucky and see wild elephants, monkeys, tigers, pumas or leeches.
We have so far spent our first night in Kuala Lumpur (the capital), and then the next day took a bus to the Cameron Highlands. Here we are about 5000ft. above sea level, so even though we are so close to the equator, it is nice and cool - a welcome relief from KL and Indonesia. This is a nice place to chill out a bit and also do some hiking.
Something that is neat about hiking here though, is that the jungle sounds (birds and insects) are totally different from anything I have ever experienced and also there are loads of new plants. Like this pitcher plant (picture below). It is one of those carnivorous plants that lure bugs into the plant and trap it there to suck out the nutrients! One day while hiking, I came across one dead one that was lying on the ground. I brought it back and later started dissecting it. Even though it was separated from the main part of the plant I think it was still alive. On the inside, there were these little white tentacles that were actually moving and grabbed a nearby piece of fly when I opened it up! It totally looked like some little alien thing.
-It is way more diverse. There are of course Malaysians, but also lots of Indians and Chinese live here too. We have had way more Indian food here so far than local food. The guys in the Indian place even recognize us by now!
-Part of it being more diverse, and probably more developed, means that people are way better at English. I know that I should not expect everyone else to speak English everywhere, but it is nice when they do. We can actually have a conversation with people and talk about something more than the weather or the fact that we can speak only a tiny bit of Indonesian!
So it's good so far, and tomorrow we head off to Taman Negara. This is going to be some hot steamy jungle, where maybe we'll get lucky and see wild elephants, monkeys, tigers, pumas or leeches.
Monday, July 26, 2010
Hanging out in Ubud
Yea, that's about what we've been going for the past 5 days or so. We are staying in a homestay which is sweet, cause it is in a nice area off the roads where a few families live. There are the just a couple rooms for travellers and basically is just a normal living space. The homes here are really neat to see to as there are intricate carvings everywhere, and it is just a different style of living than we americans are used to. Check it out, this is where we are staying:
The first full day here we wandered around a bit and went to the sacred monkey forest. There are tons of monkeys! Here's me hanging out with my power animal, or should I say "I've got a monkey on my back!"
Next day we went for a walk around Ubud to see some of the surrounding areas. It is really nice to get away for a bit after spending so much time in cities since we've been in Indonesia. Around Ubud are all rice patties and small villages and there are actually some trails that you can kinda figure out where you are going on your own. One frustrating thing about here so far is that to do any hiking you really need a guide. It's not like the US or NZ where there are trail signs and well worn trails.
Then yesterday we went to explore a little further away by renting some bicycles for the day. About US$2 each for the day, not bad. We first head toward this place called Elephant cave. Kinda disappointing as there were no elephants there and the cave was really small. But it was neat in that there is a Hindu temple and a Buddhist temple right next to each other. We hung out with an old lady at the Buddhist place and Nico made an offering and we stayed to meditate for a little while. Then after that we just found some small side roads (good to get away from the craziness that is Indonesian driving) and explored. I really enjoyed getting to do some physical activity even if it is 100% humidity.
Ok, now some planning is in action, and also tomorrow we are going to rent a car and wander around the island for a couple days seeing what we happen to come upon. Oh, and I suppose we should hit up a beach or two.
Ok, now if you've made it this far in the post, than you might care about how everything is going and what I've got to say. Nico is discouraged with the whole blogging thing, so now mine might be the only one with updates. We both have been feeling like this wandering around and finding the good things to see is actually not all that fulfilling. We've spent about 4 hours a night for the past 3 nights trying to figure out what to do from here (Bali) as our visa is up in two weeks and we have no onward plans at the moment.
I have been trying to figure out what I am really doing here on the other side of the world from the people and things that I hold dear in my life. Seeing some ruins is kinda cool, but am I really getting anything out of it? I think I need to be travelling with more of a purpose. A couple things that I am really excited about and have wanted to do for some time is trek in Nepal and work on a kibbutz in Israel. Another thing that is important to me for this trip is to experience other cultures and people, and learn about sustainable living. It seems like couchsurfing and volunteering are a couple things that I want to do more of here in SE asia before getting to Nepal in mid sept to oct when the trekking season starts. Another thing important for Nico is Buddhism, which is something that I am also interested in. So we'll see what happens from here on out.
The first full day here we wandered around a bit and went to the sacred monkey forest. There are tons of monkeys! Here's me hanging out with my power animal, or should I say "I've got a monkey on my back!"
Next day we went for a walk around Ubud to see some of the surrounding areas. It is really nice to get away for a bit after spending so much time in cities since we've been in Indonesia. Around Ubud are all rice patties and small villages and there are actually some trails that you can kinda figure out where you are going on your own. One frustrating thing about here so far is that to do any hiking you really need a guide. It's not like the US or NZ where there are trail signs and well worn trails.
Ok, now if you've made it this far in the post, than you might care about how everything is going and what I've got to say. Nico is discouraged with the whole blogging thing, so now mine might be the only one with updates. We both have been feeling like this wandering around and finding the good things to see is actually not all that fulfilling. We've spent about 4 hours a night for the past 3 nights trying to figure out what to do from here (Bali) as our visa is up in two weeks and we have no onward plans at the moment.
I have been trying to figure out what I am really doing here on the other side of the world from the people and things that I hold dear in my life. Seeing some ruins is kinda cool, but am I really getting anything out of it? I think I need to be travelling with more of a purpose. A couple things that I am really excited about and have wanted to do for some time is trek in Nepal and work on a kibbutz in Israel. Another thing that is important to me for this trip is to experience other cultures and people, and learn about sustainable living. It seems like couchsurfing and volunteering are a couple things that I want to do more of here in SE asia before getting to Nepal in mid sept to oct when the trekking season starts. Another thing important for Nico is Buddhism, which is something that I am also interested in. So we'll see what happens from here on out.
Friday, July 23, 2010
More Adventures in Indonesia
Anyway we took a day to chill out there, went to a shadow puppet show and also saw some Gamelan music in the Kraton (royal family's palace). The puppet show was cool, and there is one guy who moves the puppets, tells the story, makes some other banging noises and also directs the gamelan music band. It was all in bahasa indonesia (Indonesian) so I had no idea what was going on, but it was cool nonetheless.
Then the next day the plan was to take some public transport to Borobudur (a huge Buddhist temple). We set out at 2pm and the plan was to get to the nearby town and spend the night, assuming that was enough time to get there. We go find where we are supposed to wait for the bus, and some guy tells us it is where we are standing, even though there is no obvious bus stop there. So we sit and wait, ... and wait ... and wait some more, until it was about 3:15 and we realized that the bus we needed to change onto stops running at 4. The bus never came. Many busses here just wait in one spot until they are full, and then they go on their route. I guess bus 5 never got full....
Later we decided that maybe we should do some organized transport, and booked a day trip to Borobudur and also a 2 day thing to get us to Mt. Bromo, and then on to Bali. First off, Borobudur is pretty cool. I have been meaning to look up some more info about it, but just havent gotten there yet. I just know that it is a big ol' Buddhist temple and you are supposed to walk around each level 3 times before going up. I'll let the pictures do the talking about how much work had gone into this thing. To see more picts go to my picasa site: picasaweb.google.com/dave.dayan
Carvings like those above were everywhere!
After wondering around the temple, we thought it would be nice to walk to a nearby hill to get a different view of it. Turned out to be really nice and there were all these trails and walks around, but they were not advertized at all. Funny how when something is awesome, but not in lonely planet, no one goes there. Obviously Borobudur is in there and there were tons of tourists, but once we went for a little walk the only person we saw was a guy climbing a tree to get some coconuts.
The next morning we head off to Mt. Bromo. One breakdown and 3 hours late, we make it to the hotel to get about 5 hours of sleep. We are woken up at 3:30 shoved into a jeep and taken to a nearby mountain to get some wonderful views of Bromo and the sunrise. Apparently sunrise tours here are hugely popular. It was kinda weird for me to get way up on a mountain (2700m or about 9000ft) and have just been driven there. It was too easy. But it was sweet.
Bromo is the one smoking in the middle
Unfortunately it is so easy that probably about 400 other people were there that morning too! I of course had to climb down off the viewing platform and then into a tree to get away from them all. We were then shuttled down to the base of Bromo to go walk up it. It was quite easy, and then there was a staircase up the steep part! It just did not seem right to actually have to wait in line to walk up stairs to get to the top of the volcano. At least no one was adventurous enough to do the 45 min walk around the crater rim, and I at least got to do a bit of walking in peace.
Overall it turned out to be cheaper and easier to do the tour thing to see Bromo and get to Bali, but at the same time it was way less fulfilling. It was the first time we were with lots of white people since we got to Indonesia, and it was also quite chaotic. We never really knew what was going on, or where we were headed or where we were staying, yet somehow it all worked out. We made it to where we were going; although there was one other girl supposedly coming to Denpasar (Bali) who we met and I never saw her after leaving Bromo....
So anyway, now here we are in Ubud which is kinda in the middle of Bali. There is lots of art and dance and my favorite - trails with monkeys. We will probably spend at least a few more days here and also figure out where we are going from here. Our visa is only good for 30 days, so I suppose sometime soon we'll need to buy another plane ticket somewhere. Till next time...
Sunday, July 18, 2010
Jakarta: a life Experience
Holy Crap. I have never experienced such a dramatic change in culture and basically everything (except climate) in just a 90 minute flight. First of all, couchsurfing is amazing. Nico and I are so lucky to have had the change to really experience how people live in Jakarta and learn so much about it. We stayed with a 24 year old math teacher named Rheden, who lives with his family in a modest little house in South Jakarta. His whole family were amazing hosts as they were so happy to see us and talk to us and constantly feed us new Indonesian foods. About the only thing that was normal to me was rice. For them it is not a meal unless it includes rice (breakfast, lunch and dinner). But everything that goes with it and how it was prepared was different and equally new and delicious every time. They believe that when they have guests they really take care of them. They made every meal (and lots of snacks) for us when we were around and would not let us clean up at all even though we tried every single time.
Jakarta is not much of a tourist city. This has made for some totally unique experiences here, especially having locals as hosts. First off, when we first took a bus into the middle of town, we were constantly surprised by the people. It seemed that they all wanted to sell us stuff cause we were foreigners. But once we actually listened to what they were saying, the ones that have some broken english are all trying to help us get to where we need to go by pointing out directions. And everyone else just wants to say “Hi Mister!” That's it... not begging, or selling crap, they just want to say hi.
The second day that we were here, Nico and I went with Rheden's Mom and Sister to go pick up his 6 yr old nephew from school. Now in this small school, most of the kids had never seen a white person before, but it is part of their curriculum to learn some english. We kinda walk in and all the kids are just looking at us, and following with some distance. Apparently they all love photos... I take out my camera and say “foto!” and they all get super excited and pose, and then I get in there with them. Then they all want to talk in English with us. Next thing we know, a path is cleared and the teachers are ushering us to the front of a classroom with 40 super excited 9 year olds. So here we are trying to teach some english words. We'd say something and then they would all repeat it. I have never seen so much excitement in a classroom. Then after a few minutes we tried to leave, but then every single kid wanted to shake our hands. They also do this thing where they bring your hand to their forehead and sometimes kiss it to show respect to elders. I felt like some celebrity being there with everyone doing this to us. Crazy that it is all just because of the color of my skin. Then we were ushered into the headmasters office to meet with the people running the school and sign their visitors book. This morning was an experience that I will remember for the rest of my life for sure.
Later that day Nico went into the middle of the city and went to the national monument (Monas) and to Masjid Istiqlal which is the third largest mosque in the world. This city is something different. To continue with the craziness of being white from before... Wherever we went people would want to take their picture with us. About 10 times that day we took photos with strangers, probably so many times cause I have a really hard time ignoring people. I am constantly saying “halo” to people on the side of the road. The bus system here is also very different. The buses have no set stops. You just wave one down as it goes by and then tap the ceiling when you want to get off. The driver will stop (or just roll slowly) in the middle of the road; not even necessarily on the side of the road – so you wander through traffic to the relative safety of the sidewalk. The doors are always open and there is a guy who hangs out the door hustling people to get on the bus and collecting money. Then when we stop at a traffic light people with guitars get on and play a song or two, collect some money and then hop off and wait for the next bus.
It is a really good thing that Nico and I studied a little bit of bahasa indonesia before we came here. Unless they deal with tourists, which is not many people, very few people speak any english. Our broken Indonesian has saved our butts a couple times especially when we first got to where we were to meet Rheden for the first time and we borrowed someone's phone to send him a text saying we made it.
Now we are on a train (this will probably be posted sometime later...) to Jogja. It was an amazing experience being in Jakarta, but also very tiring. You always need to be “on” and paying attention. Also Jakarta has awful air quality. There is smog from the tons of cars and motorbikes and traffic that does not end even in the middle of the day. And everyone smokes all the time. So I am happy to be moving on, although I am not sure what we are moving on to. We hear that it is kind of the cultural center of Java, and there is a big Buddhist temple nearby. We might have to actually spend the $30 for a lonely planet travel guide, cause there is so much in this country and we are only allowed 30 days here.
I think that is it for now, I feel like I could write pages about all we've seen in just these past few days, but maybe I'll save some for later. Phew.
This is Rheden's family at 6am on the day we left. Rheden is in the picture below.
Jakarta is not much of a tourist city. This has made for some totally unique experiences here, especially having locals as hosts. First off, when we first took a bus into the middle of town, we were constantly surprised by the people. It seemed that they all wanted to sell us stuff cause we were foreigners. But once we actually listened to what they were saying, the ones that have some broken english are all trying to help us get to where we need to go by pointing out directions. And everyone else just wants to say “Hi Mister!” That's it... not begging, or selling crap, they just want to say hi.
It is a really good thing that Nico and I studied a little bit of bahasa indonesia before we came here. Unless they deal with tourists, which is not many people, very few people speak any english. Our broken Indonesian has saved our butts a couple times especially when we first got to where we were to meet Rheden for the first time and we borrowed someone's phone to send him a text saying we made it.
Now we are on a train (this will probably be posted sometime later...) to Jogja. It was an amazing experience being in Jakarta, but also very tiring. You always need to be “on” and paying attention. Also Jakarta has awful air quality. There is smog from the tons of cars and motorbikes and traffic that does not end even in the middle of the day. And everyone smokes all the time. So I am happy to be moving on, although I am not sure what we are moving on to. We hear that it is kind of the cultural center of Java, and there is a big Buddhist temple nearby. We might have to actually spend the $30 for a lonely planet travel guide, cause there is so much in this country and we are only allowed 30 days here.
getting a tour in Istiqlal
I think that is it for now, I feel like I could write pages about all we've seen in just these past few days, but maybe I'll save some for later. Phew.
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