A Vedic Journey to the East: an Enchanting Tour of India

February 26 to March 15, 2003

Presented by the Lancaster Ayurveda Medical Centers:

Central MA /Greenwich, CT / Montreal / Boston-North Shore

Headquarters:

153 Clinton Road, Sterling, MA 01564

978-422-5044 (phone) 978-422-8377 (fax)

E-mail: indiatour@AyurvedaMed.com

Please see us online at www.AyurvedaMed.com

The Background Behind our Voyage

I have the world's best patients. They are willing to do anything to improve their health, undertaking lifestyles and diets to maximize their longevity, promote rejuvenation and maximize well-being. They amaze me by their love of healthy living. Once I commented to my wife, "Sometimes I think my patients would follow me to the ends of the earth. Well, now they are having their chance. About eighteen months ago, offering a course on Ayurveda in Ecuador called "Hacienda, Hot Springs and Health", Danielle and I conceived the idea of taking a group to India to study Ayurvedic medicine and Vedic science. Here we are.We will meet Vedic scholars and Ayurvedic physicians, visit forests and plantations where herbs are grown and prepared, and even get a chance to have several days of Ayurvedic treatments ourselves. We will be sharing our knowledge and photographs with you

Jay Glaser, MD

Our Journal

Take a last look at these adventurers in western clothes.

Day 1, Feb. 27th: We all knew we had a special group of twenty adventurers when the bus driver took us to the wrong hotel at 3 a.m. because everyone laughed at their first encounter with the land of the Veda as they reloaded their bags, even though they were aching for a good rest after traveling eleven time zones. Danielle and I had kept a secret from the group: their first adventurer would be a foray into the back streets of Delhi to meet Dr. Brihaspati Dev Triguna, a foremost authority on pulse diagnosis and recent President of the All India Ayurveda Congress. Only a few hours off the plane, the group ducked under railway barricades, climbed over stalled rickshaws, jumped over sleeping dogs and squeezed through broken fences as the street turned into a path. Visiting Dr. Triguna is always an adventure because his clinic is located in Nizamuddin, one of the most culturally interesting parts of town. Dr. Triguna had already seen hundreds of patients when we arrived at noon, and would see a hundred more once we left. He took everyone's pulse, telling them their imbalances in Ayurvedic terms and entertaining their questions. He prescribed everyone an Ayurvedic herbal program and his son, Virendra, prepared for everyone a dietary and lifestyle program. By the time we negotiated our way back to the bus we felt pretty much integrated into India. We opted for a South Indian lunch, huge, paper-thin crispy crepes that we dipped in pea curry, washed down with chai. We went to a government shop where hand-woven clothes are sold and the profits returned to the craftsmen. The women wiped out their inventory of punjabi tunics while the men looked looked the part in kurtas and white cotton pants.

Day 2, Feb. 28th: A four hour train ride brought us to Haridwar and from their a bus took us to Rishikesh. We were received at our hotel by a pandit chanting Vedic hymns, who applied vermilion to the forehead as the owner garlanded every arriving guest, with cold drinks all around. No one had ever been received so warmly. Every room gives a view of the Ganges with the foothills of the Himalayas rising on the other side. The call of the forest looked so tempting that we decided to approach town from the wild side, the back way through the jungle. On the way, we met a family of nomads, a Semitic tribe that kept their animals in the highlands in summer and in the jungle near the river in this season. They invited us into their hut and told us that the damage all around was due to an unannounced visit of elephants the night before. Tomorrow is Shivaratri, celebrating the marriage of Shiva and his consort, and we encountered thousands of pilgrims undertaking a five mile trek up the steep mountain to a shrine. We wandered the river banks, passing through the ashram of Maharishi Mahesh Yogi, where the elephants had also wreaked havoc. The group met a learned yet humble sannyasin living a life of utter simplicity, Swami Narananda Saraswati, who invited us to sit outside his stone hut and ask him any questions. Sumeet, our guide translated. The group engaged him in an intelligent discussion about his reclusive lifestyle and the issue of detachment in the quest of higher states of consciousness. We finished our day with the aarti at sunset on the steps to the Ganga, with 100 Brahmin boys studying to becoming pandits, who led worshippers from the village in traditional devotional hymns to Shiva.

Day 3, March 1. Today is all about water. We awoke to a thunderstorm and took a bus upriver along a switchback road cut impossibly into the steep hillside 500 feet above the river and sprinkled with signs saying things like, "Better late than never," and "Life is already short enough, don't make it shorter." Cars honked politely and zipped by us on the hairpins. We walked down to a small ashram near the water thinking we would be alone to meditate in Vashishta's cave. Shiva had other ideas. It was his wedding day, and the village people came to make offerings of Ganga water and leaves over the Shiva lingam in the cave. As we poured, one devotee said, "We pour water on Shiva and he pours water on us." From Shiva's forehead comes a waterfall, giving life. A few miles downriver we donned raingear, helmets and lifejackets and ran the rapids of Mother Ganga for about 6 miles. We learned that those in the bow get soaked in Level III and IV whitewater, but have a more exhilarating ride. No one fell overboard. A day of water.

Joining 100,000 pilgrims in a sunset fire aarti on the Ganges river bank in Haridwar.

Day 4. March 2. Our day yesterday was one of water, and last night was wind and fire, a gale coming down the Ganges Valley that rearranged around the rooftops that were poorly nailed down, coupled with a lightning display that overshadowed the fireworks that were lit in every town across the land after India beat Pakistan in the Cricket World Cup. With wind, fire and water under our belts, we felt ready to tackle Ayurveda. We planned to ride to near the top of the highest local hill and walk the rest of the way for the view of the snow-capped Himalayas. 2/3 of the way up it became obvious the haze from the rain was going to spoil the view. We stopped to turn around at the summer palace of the Raja of Garhwal, which he is leasing as an upscale Ayurvedic spa and got ourselves invited in for a tour and tea. The magnificent buildings and grounds together with the view of the Ganges valley below put the group in a mood not to leave. Fred offered lunch at their dining room and everyone felt like Rajas and Ranis for an hour more. We arrived in Haridwar, the holy city on the Ganges 20 miles downriver with an hour to spare before the evening fire aarti on the steps to the river, together with 700,000 pilgrims from around India. Sumeet, our guide, nevertheless got us front row seats perched on columns and pooja stands. The bells, fires and Vedic recitation made a powerful impression of the devotion of the people to the Ganga and what its bounty represents.

Learning about herbs at an Ayurvedic herb factory in Haridwar

In the Ayurvedic surgical theatre

Day 5, March 3. We met Drs. Arun Chaudhury and Sanjeev Goel at our hotel in Haridwar and took us on a tour of the Premnagar Ayuvedic factory where we saw how herbs are selected and cleaned, powdered, blended and pressed. We spent an hour in the storage room where the group ran back from the various bins asking, "What's this root, Vaidyaji?" Dr. Chaudhury showed the important herbs used in vajikarana, the science of rejuvenation and potency. We proceeded to Gurukul University. Dr. Joshi is one of the few experts in Ayurvedic surgery and postponed his train to speak with the group. He explained the concept of "parasurgery" and its practical value for the west, including techniques for treating herniated discs without surgery. We toured the Ayurvedic operating theater before receiving a demonstration and explanation of Ayurvedic pulse diagnosis using willing volunteers from the group as the subjects. We had time to linger and rest in a quiet sanctuary where the modern saint Anandamoyi Ma is interred before catching the train to Delhi.

Contemplating the throne at Agra Fort

Day 6, March 4. We headed south by bus toward Agra, stopping in Vrindavan, the childhood home of the warrior, Krishna, who was Arjuna's charioteer in the Mahabharata war, and whose advice to him on the battlefield played a decisive role in the war's outcome. We went, for our experience of this place, to a site revered by Indian classical musicians and which is rarely visited. Here the musician Hari Das played ragas on the banks of the river inspired by the love between Krishna and his lover, Radha. The ascetics were surprised by our arrival but let us linger in the tender softness of the courtyard. We took in the Agra Fort during sundown, the redness of the light playing off the red stone and white marble walls made it look warm, even though most of us were unprepared for just how cold it would get when the sun went down. We were inspired to learn that Akbar, the builder, incorporated elements of Hinduism, Judaism, Buddhism, Jainism and Chrisianity into his design in an attempt to create religious tolerance in his empire, an idea that worked until the day he died. From Shah Jahan's quarters where he was imprisoned by his son, we looked down the river and saw his view, from his prison quarters, of the Taj he had built to his beloved queen. It had been a long day; the group basked in the luxury of our 5 star hotel, after roughing it in the Himalayas.

Day 7, March 5. We were the first to arrive at the gate of the Taj Mahal with Mr. Khan, our guide from the previous evening, who has a gift of singing Arabic verses of the Qur'an under the dome of the Taj to create haunting harmonies. After passing the tight security, the group was astounded to step through the arch and see the building without a soul in the landscape, with the orange of the rising sun gleaming off its pearly fa?ade. Khan's song was haunting. After a lazy morning in the royal surroundings of the hotel, we returned to Delhi.

Day 8, March 6. Approaching Khajuraho by air we could see small hills, but nothing resembling a city. As we landed, we flew along side both our hotel, located right next to the runway, as well as a superb temple. In fact, temples like that one are responsible for both the hotel and the airfield in this sleepy town of a few thousand souls. The spirit of the unsung gnenerations of sculptors and architects is present throughout the town. A series of kings built these incredible structures in honor of their military victories and other auspicious moments. They were almost perfectly preserved by the jungle. First, the Moghuls could not penetrate the dense forests to plunder Khajuraho, and when the town was eventually abandoned, the jungle vines covered the temples so they were invisible. We attended a sound and light show in a cluster of fabulous structures in the evening under a clear, starry sky with a setting thin crescent moon.

Day 9, March 7. This morning we took a tour with a local scholar, Pandit RK Sharma, who was particularly capable in interpreting the sculptures of special beauty in the Western Cluster of Temples. This is no easy job, because each temple had literally thousands of sculptures, depicting every aspect of earthly life. A small percentage of these laboriously worked sculptures dealt with seduction, pleasure and love in an erotic yet intimate and subtle way. Each figure was a person come alive with a personality, desires and weaknesses.

Arriving in Varanasi by plane, we had a lesson in yoga with Pandit Yogiraj Rakesh Yogi. This scholarly Brahmin is an expert in the Yoga Sutras of Patanjali, but has also mastered hatha yoga and the six kriyas (yogic procedures for purifying and cleansing the body). He gave a demonstration of hatha yoga asanas that most experts could only dream about and showed us more esoteric techniques used for cleansing. At the end of the session he gave a demonstration of stopping the pulse. Dr. Glaser felt his pulse which went from 84 beats per minute to over 120 beats as he performed a specific forceful pranayama (respiratory exercise), become faster and fainter until it was imperceptible. This lasted about ten to fifteen seconds, and then the pulse returned slowly and forcefully. Yogiraj Rakesh Yogi repeated this three times.

A Private Indian Classical Music Concert in Varanasi

Day 10, March 8. Benares Hindu University is the foremost university in India for research in Ayurvedic medicine. The vestibule has samples of thousands of medicinal herbs. We received a tour of the Ayurvedic Garden from Dr. Mandal, the chief resident, pointed out the most commonly used herbs and the ones of greatest importance in the west. Sarpagandha (rauwolfia serpentine), from which the modern antihypertensive drug reserpine is synthesized, brought up the issue of whether one should be extracting the active ingredients or using the whole plant. We were received by the Chief of the Department of Ayurveda, Dr. Dwivedi, who used this controversy as a launching point for explaining the holistic value of herbs and the purpose of the University in documenting the benefits and actions of herbs. He admitted that in their clinic the doctors used the whole plant in an unrefined form. In the late afternoon, we went upriver in a boat, giving us the first glimpse of the cities ghats, the three mile string of steps going down to the river, and the essence of Varanasi's life. A concert of Indian classical music was held for us in a tiny intimate temple overlooking the water. After the tabla/sitar ragas, the whole town erupted in a cacophony of bells, conches and cymbals as Varanasi celebrated the evening rites. Two young ladies arrived and sang beautifully with tambura, tabla and harmonium. We left in a huge rowboat, drifting a mile back down the river in the darkness. In our wake we each lit a candle in a small raft of flowers, and set them afloat on the river. Twenty-five lights bobbed on the still dark water behind us like stars in the sky. No one could say a word as we savored the silence of one of the most moving moments of our trip.

Tom and Gregg man the oars

Day 11, March 9. A half hour before dawn found us on a rowboat watching the world's oldest living city come alive at the main ghat where pilgrims from around India come to bathe and perform their prayers. At sunrise the steps were alive with activity. We floated a mile down and back, admiring the thousands of temples and other buildings of Varanasi's "skyline" while on the other side of the river where the sun is rising not a structure is found. One of us dove in at sunrise in the middle of the river where the current is swifter (and cleaner). We wandered through the back streets of the city where barely two people can pass, to the entrance to the Golden Temple of Vishwanath (Shiva), giving us a flavor of the essence of this city. The temple was under heavy guard, since a mosque is next door and each seems to dispute the presence of one the other. The dean of Sanskrit College, former director of Maharashi Ved Vishvalaya in Jabalpur, gave a discourse on the structure of Veda and the Brahmanas and their role in spiritual development. The morning was still young, so we toured the Sarnath, the site holy to Buddhists where Buddha gave his first sermon. The afternoon found everyone shopping. In the late afternoon we went to Sanskrit College where young Brahmin pandits recited the Vedas, including the Purusha sukta and the Gayatri mantra from Yajur Veda, under the tutelage of their master, Pandit Dwivedi. Their voices were strong and sure. The dusk was soft and gentle. The neighborhood people gathered around us seated in the courtyard of their teacher as the Vedic hymns floated in the air.

Day 12, March 10. Today was a day of intensive cleansing. In response to the description by Yogiraj Rakesh Yogi several days earlier of a yogic technique for elimination, a majority of the group wanted to experience its benefits. The technique is called sankhaprakshalana. Sankha is a conch shell, and prakshalana means clean and pure. The nature of a conch shell is white and labyrinthine, so this technique makes the entire labyrinth of the esophagus, stomach, small intestine and colon as white and pure as a conch. It consists of drinking rapidly, under Yogiraj's careful supervision, large volumes of salt water, followed by 25 yoga asanas designed to squeeze and press the water through the gut without it being absorbed. The cycle is then repeated. Most of us did 6-8 cycles with Yogiraj monitoring our progress and telling us when to stop. The twelve people who participated went through 60 liters of water! Everyone was satisfied with their result. We took a light snack to break our fast on the plane back to Delhi. It was Sunny's birthday, which was celebrated in style. After some discussion of the passages in the ancient Ayurvedic texts about the effects and benefits of alcohol, Dale ordered champagne.

Day 13, March 11. We hopped an early plane to Kerala in south India, feeling the humid warm air as we debarked, and immediately noticing the change in flora, dress, language, script, cuisine and nature of the people. Another country. Our resort is barely a year old and is a true paradise, situated on a cliff overlooking a long, wide sandy beach. Our beach is used by the local village of fisherman, and we enjoy watching as the entire village shows up to participate in pulling in the nets, aided by a few of the group. Every cottage is a reassembled (air-conditioned!) 120 year old, intricately carved wooden home and the main building is a reassembled palace, beautifully appointed. Even the bathrooms are special, elegantly crafted and open to the air via a courtyard in which are growing bushes and flowers, so even a trip to the loo is an excursion to nature. On our arrival the extremely competent Ayurvedic physician, Vaidya Vinod, gave the group an orientation regarding the extensive menu of panchakarma (physiotherapeutic purification) treatments that are available, then consulted with each person in the presence of Dr. Glaser, prescribing a treatment program. Massage treatments are traditional and based on techniques from ancient Kerala forms of martial arts for healing muscle trauma. We started that very day. The oil massages, called uzhichil (pronounced urichil) were firm and enjoyable, and are performed by the technician using either the hands, or with the technician balancing with a cord hung from the ceiling, and using the foot. The center also specializes in techniques of massage using hot, oiled boluses made from either medicinal leaves, pastes of powdered herbs or a special variety of rice. Everyone is healthy and in heaven.

Group members in Kerala Ayurvedic spa show they are adept at skills that don't involve roughing it

Day 14, March 12. Our group is preoccupied today: Ayurvedic treatments and the beach. It lets me meet people, such as the yoga master. Rajesh had a special relationship with his grandfather. He taught him to fight. He comes from a lineage of warriors, the Niyers so he is a master of Kalari. A demonstration of this ancient system of hand-to-hand combat that developed in southern India is all flash and fire and looks as much like dance as combat. There is a lot of kicking, slashing and flying through the air, and unless you knew that Kalari is actually older than martial arts from the far east, you? actually believe the fighters had been inspired by the latest martial arts movies and professional wrestling. Kalari, however, is also a spiritual science and Rajesh's grandfather taught it to him together with yoga and bits of Ayurveda. Rajesh is now a yoga master and prefers that to Kalari. He tells me that many of the techniques of Ayurvedic physiotherapy coming from Kerala, the ones we are currently experiencing here at Travancore, were actually derived from techniques used to heal injuries incurred in combat training and that yoga was used by the warriors for suppleness and presence of mind. The three sciences became one. Rajesh and the vaidya both tell me that many of the treatments used in Ayurvedic panchakarma were initially martial arts. He could well be right: the treatments he is referring to are not described in the oldest Sanskrit texts.

Sean, adopted by the village fishermen, leans into the nets

Day 15, March 13th. Yatra in Sanskrit means a pilgrimage, and we have seen pilgrims all over India, sometimes undergoing arduous treks by the thousands. Our pilgrimage was the temple to Mother Divine at the southernmost tip of India a few hours away. It helps to have an ardent desire or be a little restless to undertake a taxing pilgrimage. As it turns out, more than half of the group are already in paradise at our Ayurvedic spa on the beach, glowing in the luxurious treatments with competent technicians, enjoying tasty food and the slow pace. So thirteen opted to stay behind and continue serious Ayurvedic treatment. Eight of us left after morning panchakarma treatments, stopping on the way at a magnificent palace carved of teak wood for the Raja centuries ago. School children crowded into our photos to be memorialized with the first white faces they had ever seen.
The Kanniya Kumari temple to Mother Divine is unassuming. It is below ground level: you even walk down to stand on the roof. At its southern wall, the Indian Ocean meets the Arabian Sea and Bay of Bengal. Its thick interior gray walls with doorway heights at chest level and thick air could hardly be called feminine. The singular factor making this site of interest for those with a passion for Vedic medicine is its concentrated presence of the qualities of nurturing, tranquility, and protective ferocity, the laws of nature giving rise to self-repair, growth and immune strength. The brahmins seated us in the inner sanctum to meditate. The ladies' sarees and punjabis were drenched. The men, fortunately, are not allowed to wear shirts in south Indian temples. For some of us the experience was simply intense, for others emotional. We emerged from the bowels of the temple just after sunset to a moonlit, star-studded sky with heat lightning all around.

Day 16, March 14th. Danielle and Dr. Glaser had commanded a Vedic procedure known as abhishekham for the following morning. The brahmins were already waiting for us at 4:30 together with a few dozen devotees. Before proceeding, they asked us to state our names and sankalpa, the intended result of the performance. We were calling upon Mother Nature to create health for our patients and ourselves. Two hours later we emerged to a glorious dawn and joined several hundred people assembled to witness it. As the red globe appeared, they became silent and reverential. There was an absence of the ooh's and aah's heard in the West; they bowed, hands together, toward the rising sun.

The tip of India over our heads from Vivekananda Rock Memorial

We took a ferry to the Vivekananda Rock Memorial a few hundred yards offshore from the temple with hundreds of devotees and children before returning to the rest of the group and our afternoon panchakarma treatments. In the late afternoon, we took a gondola ride in the backwater canals where the village people live. It was cool and serene, with eagles, egrets, and iridescent kingfishers making their living beside the fishermen.

A last moment of tranquility before our trip

Day 17, March 15th. After panchakarma treatments this morning we headed back to Delhi and then home. Everyone has remained healthy. Lost in our Vedic lifestyle, no one had even thought about conflict and war; we felt safer than people in North America. We had gained insight during our Vedic Journey to the East about the deepest basis of peace in society: peace within. We enjoyed a sumptous farewell party at our previous hotel in Delhi, that kindly provided rooms for us to rest, shower and change. Tom provided the poetry and Dr. Glaser the blues harp. The group was unanimous in their appreciation to Sumeet Bali, our agent and guide, for making the voyage smooth as well as rich with experiences and knowledge. Danielle and Dr. Glaser announced that they had enjoyed being with the group so much, with their coherence and sense of humor, that they would plan something even better for next year.

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