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Thank you, India
From sadhus in dreadlocks mediating on mountains to food that taught them to tolerate pain, India’s clichéd portrayal has, however, changed the lives of many - who have in turn, changed the world
Malaysia may be truly Asia, but India's got an edge when it comes to attracting Western tourists seeking enlightenment.
Lonely Planet recently carried out a survey among its Facebook and Twitter followers on destinations that had most altered their lives.
Over 1,000 people responded and India was voted the favourite destination for life-changing experiences.
Cambodia was at number two. Almost tied for third place were Australia and Thailand. So globe-trotters don’t come to our country looking for fakirs on beds of nails any more. But they don’t mind a few epiphanies while here. Here are a few people who returned altered because of their Indian experiences.
Steve Jobs
When 18-year-old college dropout Jobs came to India in 1974, he walked seven miles to get a free meal at the Hare Krishna temple and take a crowded bus from Delhi to UP and back. Having chucked away his jeans and tees for lungis and dhotis, Jobs left Delhi for the Himalayas, slept in deserted buildings and survived on mangoes with dahi and chapati in a quest to find his inner self. From battling dysentery and scabies to getting fleeced and surviving a thunderstorm, his India experience was not pleasant.
But it changed Jobs’ thinking: he returned home a tonsured Buddhist. His faith in human intelligence and technology was strengthened during visits to mystics. Dan Kottke said Jobs appreciated India’s spiritual culture that ‘helps many live fulfilling lives in the midst of material poverty’. Asserting his practical approach to life, Jobs later said, “Maybe Thomas Edison did a lot more to improve the world than Karl Marx and Neem Karoli Baba (a mystic) put together.”
The Beatles
The ashram of Maharishi Mahesh Yogi at Rishikesh was the reason behind The Beatles’ famed three-month stay in India in 1968, along with their wives, girlfriends and a mega entourage. What started with a meditation session at the foothills of the Himalayas turned out to be one of the most musically productive periods for the iconic band.
The foursome wrote around 30 songs, of which 18 with noticeable Eastern musical influences, were later recorded for the White Album, Abbey Road and as solos. Their controversial fallout with the Maharishi was public and John Lennon later said, “We believe in meditation, but not the Maharishi and his scene. We made a mistake. He’s human like the rest of us.”
George Harrison, who introduced his bandmates to Indian culture and yoga, learnt sitar from Pandit Ravi Shankar, converted to Hinduism and started signing off as ‘Hari Bol’. Their legendary song Norwegian Wood has sitar strains enhancing guitar sounds.
Elizabeth Gilbert
In Elizabeth Gilbert’s blockbuster on selfdiscovery Eat, Pray, Love, the ‘pray’ section pans out in an Indian ashram.
The 2006 book, which sold 10 million copies, is a memoir based on her year-long journey to Rome, India and Indonesia after her marriage broke down.
Julia Roberts essayed her role in the film in the part where she meditates to get to the ‘elusive fourth level of human consciousness’ while fighting off thoughts about the New York property market.
She said in an interview later that it was during meditation - based on the japa mala with 108 sections, divided into three groups of 36 - that the structure of the book became clear to her. “In one glorious instant I was shown a complete vision of how the book would be organized,” she said.
Allen Ginsberg
Beat poet Allen Ginsberg’s 1961 trip to India is believed to have not only changed his life but helped spawn generations of hippies, writers, artists, rock stars and mental cases who traveled here.
He stayed in a tenement apartment on the banks of Ganga at Varanasi. Deborah Baker, who has documented his time here in the book A Blue Hand, says the journey had a tremendous impact on Ginsberg and India remained with him until his death in 1997. His activism was influenced by Gandhian principles.
He continued to chant and use the harmonium while singing hymns after his return. While he came here looking for the sacred, Gary Snyder who came along with him has suggested he was also looking for ‘drugs and boys’.
Gregory David Roberts
On being convicted for bank robbery 30 years ago, Australian Gregory David Roberts managed a prison break, fled to India and lived here for a decade. Destiny had it that Roberts stayed in Mumbai, learned near-flawless Marathi and started a free clinic for slumdwellers.
The underworld found him useful for smuggling passports and foreign currency. Roberts also worked as an extra in a handful of Bollywood movies. At home, a studied introspection of his misadventures led to Shantaram - a fictionalised account of his on-the-edge life in Mumbai.
Roberts, who doesn’t miss Leopold’s when here, maintains that he found a lot of love in India and how the city helped him heal. “I fell into Mumbai as a wounded man might fall into the arms of a stranger - a woman who cares for him and heals him for no other reason than that she should.”
Link : http://www.mumbaimirror.com/article/2/20111118201111180202174999f9ca924/Thank-you-India.html
From sadhus in dreadlocks mediating on mountains to food that taught them to tolerate pain, India’s clichéd portrayal has, however, changed the lives of many - who have in turn, changed the world
Malaysia may be truly Asia, but India's got an edge when it comes to attracting Western tourists seeking enlightenment.
Lonely Planet recently carried out a survey among its Facebook and Twitter followers on destinations that had most altered their lives.
Over 1,000 people responded and India was voted the favourite destination for life-changing experiences.
Cambodia was at number two. Almost tied for third place were Australia and Thailand. So globe-trotters don’t come to our country looking for fakirs on beds of nails any more. But they don’t mind a few epiphanies while here. Here are a few people who returned altered because of their Indian experiences.
Steve Jobs
When 18-year-old college dropout Jobs came to India in 1974, he walked seven miles to get a free meal at the Hare Krishna temple and take a crowded bus from Delhi to UP and back. Having chucked away his jeans and tees for lungis and dhotis, Jobs left Delhi for the Himalayas, slept in deserted buildings and survived on mangoes with dahi and chapati in a quest to find his inner self. From battling dysentery and scabies to getting fleeced and surviving a thunderstorm, his India experience was not pleasant.
But it changed Jobs’ thinking: he returned home a tonsured Buddhist. His faith in human intelligence and technology was strengthened during visits to mystics. Dan Kottke said Jobs appreciated India’s spiritual culture that ‘helps many live fulfilling lives in the midst of material poverty’. Asserting his practical approach to life, Jobs later said, “Maybe Thomas Edison did a lot more to improve the world than Karl Marx and Neem Karoli Baba (a mystic) put together.”
The Beatles
The ashram of Maharishi Mahesh Yogi at Rishikesh was the reason behind The Beatles’ famed three-month stay in India in 1968, along with their wives, girlfriends and a mega entourage. What started with a meditation session at the foothills of the Himalayas turned out to be one of the most musically productive periods for the iconic band.
The foursome wrote around 30 songs, of which 18 with noticeable Eastern musical influences, were later recorded for the White Album, Abbey Road and as solos. Their controversial fallout with the Maharishi was public and John Lennon later said, “We believe in meditation, but not the Maharishi and his scene. We made a mistake. He’s human like the rest of us.”
George Harrison, who introduced his bandmates to Indian culture and yoga, learnt sitar from Pandit Ravi Shankar, converted to Hinduism and started signing off as ‘Hari Bol’. Their legendary song Norwegian Wood has sitar strains enhancing guitar sounds.
Elizabeth Gilbert
In Elizabeth Gilbert’s blockbuster on selfdiscovery Eat, Pray, Love, the ‘pray’ section pans out in an Indian ashram.
The 2006 book, which sold 10 million copies, is a memoir based on her year-long journey to Rome, India and Indonesia after her marriage broke down.
Julia Roberts essayed her role in the film in the part where she meditates to get to the ‘elusive fourth level of human consciousness’ while fighting off thoughts about the New York property market.
She said in an interview later that it was during meditation - based on the japa mala with 108 sections, divided into three groups of 36 - that the structure of the book became clear to her. “In one glorious instant I was shown a complete vision of how the book would be organized,” she said.
Allen Ginsberg
Beat poet Allen Ginsberg’s 1961 trip to India is believed to have not only changed his life but helped spawn generations of hippies, writers, artists, rock stars and mental cases who traveled here.
He stayed in a tenement apartment on the banks of Ganga at Varanasi. Deborah Baker, who has documented his time here in the book A Blue Hand, says the journey had a tremendous impact on Ginsberg and India remained with him until his death in 1997. His activism was influenced by Gandhian principles.
He continued to chant and use the harmonium while singing hymns after his return. While he came here looking for the sacred, Gary Snyder who came along with him has suggested he was also looking for ‘drugs and boys’.
Gregory David Roberts
On being convicted for bank robbery 30 years ago, Australian Gregory David Roberts managed a prison break, fled to India and lived here for a decade. Destiny had it that Roberts stayed in Mumbai, learned near-flawless Marathi and started a free clinic for slumdwellers.
The underworld found him useful for smuggling passports and foreign currency. Roberts also worked as an extra in a handful of Bollywood movies. At home, a studied introspection of his misadventures led to Shantaram - a fictionalised account of his on-the-edge life in Mumbai.
Roberts, who doesn’t miss Leopold’s when here, maintains that he found a lot of love in India and how the city helped him heal. “I fell into Mumbai as a wounded man might fall into the arms of a stranger - a woman who cares for him and heals him for no other reason than that she should.”
Link : http://www.mumbaimirror.com/article/2/20111118201111180202174999f9ca924/Thank-you-India.html
