Back to School.. (Nov 13 - 18)

We spent the rest of our week in Dharmasala pretty much the same. I was doing yoga with Sivadas in the morning from 10 to 12 and then massage class in the afternoon from 2 to 5.

Brad took a morning Astanga class with Vijay one dayu for 2 1/2 hours! He ran through the full primary series and those who knew how, were to use ujai breath and the bandas. He looked pretty tired when I saw him afterward.



After 6 days of yoga with Sivadas my headstand is getting pretty darn good! I still need the initial help getting up but once up, I can balance quite nicely for several breaths. I even managed a hand balance in crow for a few breaths and, on the last day, my toes reached the ground in plough. I kind of surprised myself with that one. It's a pretty tough class - we are doing 3 types of sun salutations (classic, A and B) 6 to 8 times each. Thankfully, we get to do a small relaxation right afterward before we dive into the asanas. The ayurvedic massage is really interesting. I'm learning the Kerala method that ws apparantly developed as part of a martial art system to relax the body and stretch out after a workout. The essential oils all have a different use depending on the weather and the person's constitution. It's so cool and Brad hasn't been complaining about my need to practice on him each evening!

Brad spent three days in an Indian cooking class with Mrs Nishi. She has a restaurant in town called Taste of India and the food is excellent. She's had the restaurant for eight years and is written up in the Lonely Planet guide. One of her key instructions - only use fresh ingredients!! Nothing canned or frozen allowed. She even makes her own cheese for paneer! I can't wait until Brad can test out his new skills on me. He learned to make my favourites - channa masala, dahl makhani and samosas, among other things. It looks like we're going to have to get ourselves a pressure cooker to do things up right.

The power grid here had been pretty stable up until Thursday night. We'd been so long without a power failure, we were almost shocked when it happened! All the restaurants cook with gas so it doesn't really slow business down any (I guess we'll have to get a gas stove as well).

Some random thoughts and observations on Dharmasala :

The use ketchup on everything. Or maybe they just assume that tourists use ketchup on everything. What I wouldn't give for a good tamarind sauce or coriander chutney!

We had some of the best chocolate cheesecake I've ever tasted at the Green Cafe. It was like a really dense, rich brownie.

Dharmasala seems to get a really high number of Isreali tourists (Mrs Nishi was even fluent in Hebrew). We're not sure why this is.

Dharmasala is quite a spiritual place with a large number of temples and shrines (and the residence of the Dalai Lama). There are monks everywhere yet, at the same time, it's quite touristy with every second shop hustling souvenirs. Even so, they shopkeepers and monks seem to coexist quite happily.

One afternoon we walked around the main temple and stood outside the gats of the Dalai's pad. We are a bit curious about something the monds were doing. One would be standing and talking to another monk (or small group of monks) and would puntuate what he was saying by, what I can only describe as an exaggerated clapping of the hands. I had read somewhere that they often have afternoon debates so maybe that's what was going on - we'll just have to investigate further.



Even as quiet and peaceful as this place is, one morning while in yoga, I heard a very heated domestic argurement going on next door - I guess people are people, no matter where you are.