Shalom Kasol!

So, the Olympics was over, what to do? First thing, we have to loot the remains of the stock! In old pirate manner, tracksuits, shorts, singlets, drinking bottles, everything was for grabs.. the rest is being sold on eBay, so check it out! Now when I had so much free time, it was nice to relax and what better way then letting my friend Aina, a yoga, Reiki and massage therapist, having me as a practice dummy!? So, now I'm massaged up and I have a nice morning yoga routine to start the days. Big thanks to you and good luck with your new center!

It was time to move on, I've spent over 6 weeks in McLeod and I needed to see something else. Next stop was to be the little town of Mandi, on my way up north to Manali. Mandi is a nice stop 6 hours midway from Daramsala and Manali. It has a sacred lake nearby and it's a quite an interesting place with lot's and lot's of small Shiva temples. Something that is really nice in India is all the colorful women in their beautiful Sari's. They are very photogenic with lots of different jewelry and piercings, unfortunately most are not willing to let you take photographs of them. In the parts up here, you won't find Indian women in jeans and t-shirts, no no, it's all very traditional. Something that Indian men usually tend to remark, when wanting to start chatting with me, is that they like 'women from my country'. I don't know how many these people had met, but with big grins they say "They are very naughty, no? They like sex. Indian women don't like sex...". Well, what can I say to that? Like in Egypt, Indian men seem to have this idea of wanting to 'practice' with these 'western, sex craving women', before marrying a decent Indian girl. And she has to be virgin of course... Arranged marriages are still very common here and very much according to cast and family reputation. It's interesting watching the contact sections in the news papers, they are divided into different sub sections for casts and everybody sticks to theirs.

After a night in Mandi, I wanted to have another stop over in Kasol before continuing to Manali. Kasol is a small village next to a river, beautifully tucked in between two narrow mountain ridges, making it feel like you are in a canyon. There is lot's of forest here, mainly very tall pine trees and also a huge number of Israelis, easily 90% of the travelers here. There is so many signs in Hebrew that I feel illiterate and they even have a Chabad here (a Jewish religious place to take care of traveling Jews). Finally, some good food in the restaurants and I found Labane again! As you sit to eat, your head and feet tend to move rhythmically to the constant psychedelic trans music that is being played everywhere. Weed grows here and there and the light scent of the herb is in the air. In the restaurants most people are smoking pot openly, very naturally and carefree. Some Israelis I met in the restaurant lit up a chillum and told me that all the restaurants pay off the cops and they turn a blind eye for quite some big money by Indian standards. I have to say that even though they tend to have a bad reputation, I do like most Israelis, they are nice people, easy to get along with, always up for good parties and they do keep the prices down!

Next day I walked a bit further up the river to a village called Manikaran. This village is built over natural hot springs and the villagers even cook their rice in small bags that they in a 'fishing' manner dip into the pools. Most houses have hot water and in a few guest houses here, you can have your own hot spring pool! The way in to the village is through a bridge straight in to a big Gurdwara, a Sikh temple. This has also a nice Hindu shrine and the place is holy for both Hindus and Sikhs, that make their was here in masses. Inside they have bigger hot pools, separating women and men. The water has to be diluted with cold water not to cook people, but even so i had to tip toe in very slowly cause it was so hot. It was very nice and I came to think that I probably want to live in Budapest when I grow up. And for the ones that say "there's no free lunches!", I beg to differ and ask them to go to nearest Gurdwara. Here anybody from anywhere get free accommodation for 3 nights maximum (donations are appreciated) and free meals, langar, (just cover your head). In a big hall people sit in rows and volunteers comes with buckets of food and spoon it up on you tray. Sikhism began partly as a reaction against the cast system and the Sikhs regard them selves as Khalsa, chosen soldier saints, fighting for morals and righteousnesses. They don't cut their hair and they run around with knifes that should be used for self defense or protecting the weak. In the shops outside the Gurdwara they sell these religious knifes, but the vendor warned me that I can only bring the small ones on the plane... He had been stopped trying to bring on a bigger model with knuckleduster on a local flight! The whole area around the temple and the village was very intriguing and with the hot water steaming up here and there, laid a mystic, ambient mist over the whole place. There is lot's of Indian tourists right now (holiday time), but I saw hardly any other travelers.

In many places you travel, you can feel change in the air and you see so much new development and construction. In these places here, big change feels very far away. 'Things in rural India change slowly' I think to my self, as I update this blog through my iTouch.