I DID IT !!!

After having declared and promised and talked about arranging things so that I could return to India and stay for as long as I like - here I am, back in the land where toilet-paper and hot showers are considered unnecessary luxuries (or just plain unnecessary) by most of the population. I landed yesterday morning at Trivandrum (Thiruvananthapuram for the purists among you), and spent most of the day congratulating myself on carrying through and actually doing what I set out to do - and the rest of the time just feeling good about being where I want to be and doing what I want to do. In the words of the unforgettable Paul Simon:

        Yesterday it was my birthday-
        I hung one more year on the line.
        I should be depressed, my life's a mess-
        But I'm havin' a good time!

I'm starting my trip in the same place as last time: the Sivananda Yoga Vedanta Dhanwantari Ashram, P.O. Neyyar Dam; Thiruvananthapuram Dt., Kerala. (There's a mouthful, huh?) From the moment I arrived, I feel like I was always here, like it's just a continuation of my previous trip. I feel perfectly at home, as if I belong here, as if I never left. Which is not to say that everything is perfect!! We got into the swing of things with our daily power failure yesterday evening (thoughtfully timed to when I wanted to go to sleep anyway, after having one hour of sleep the night before, on the plane); and I had my own private heart-break when the tiny little pocket-computer that I bought (expressly in order to be able to compose letters without depending on anyone else) - broke down (yet again).

But the food is every bit as wonderful as I remember it (and I don't have to cook!!), and I'm finally moving my creaky old bones again. I have been painfully reminded by my aching muscles that it has been at least four (I'm so ashamed!!) months since I practiced yoga (or any other physical exercise, for that matter), and you wouldn't believe how quickly an old body like mine deteriorates!! But there is good cause to expect a fairly quick recovery - I've seen it happen before. And then I will need to find a way to develop some self-discipline, so that I won't be so dependent on a framework to keep practicing.

So, for the mean time: Ommmmmmm to one and all