Dehra Dun

Visiting the Sakya Buddhist monastery at Dehra Dun.


A few days ago we went to visit Dr Singh in Rishikesh who treated me for rabies 2 years ago after I was bitten on the back of the leg by a dog - it must have worked! Rabies is 100% fatal if the virus get into the bloodstream and 20,000 die from it in India ever year. Anyway, Dr Singh is genial company and not only highly respected in the medical community, but also in the indigenous Ayurvedic medicine system. (We also have some of his delicious Himalayan herbal tea on our shelf at home.) The unexpected upshot of the visit is that Cathy will be doing some classes in traditional ayurvedic massage techniques before she flies to Thailand, probably for a week.
Although the weather hs been over 40 every day, we have been having a swim in the great river Ganga every afternoon - there is nothing more refreshing. We go upstream a little to a small sandy beach surrounded by large rocks. Dotted around the rocks are huts occupied by sadhus - we saw one fellow with his matted dreadlocks (Sanskrit name is Jhata) about 2 metres long. He was sitting at a high spot with his hair tumbling down over the edge. We took the camera the following day but he wasn't there. The water is so cold it is not possible to stay in for long, so we take brief dips.
We temporarily left Rishikesh (and left most of our albeit light luggage there) for a short journey. Nearby Hardwar is one of the Hindu holy cities (and thus a vegetarian town) and marks the point where the Ganga leaves the mountains and reaches the Plains of India. At that spot there is a spectacular ceremony of lights every evening at dusk. Imagine a huge stadium full of people supporting the same team, making lots of noise, putting little leaf boats full of flowers and a burning oil lamp into the water to float down the river, banging gongs, chanting...except there were a lot more people than any stadium would hold. Hardwar is also one of those magnets for sadhus; hundreds if not thousands of wild looking men with matted hair carrying all they own, particularly a brass water pot and a staff.
From Hardwar we have come to Dehra Dun, the provincial capital of this newly formed state of Uttaranchal (which goes from here up to the border with Tibet). My initial interest in coming here was to visit a yogi whose late Guru I met years ago in Bangalore. He had meditated for 23 and a half hours a day for 12 years to the day - his successor did likewise for 7 years; but just before we set off we discovered he is in Australia! This place is also the headquarters of the Sakya branch of Tibetan Buddhism, so a visit there is proposed for tomorrow. We checked the weather up in the mountains from here and it is supposed to be minus 5 at night with possible snow and sleet. Hmmmm.