The Basic Essentials

There is something to be said about travel and simplifying life down to the essentials. When I left the USA I worried about finding the things I thought I could not live without. For example I brought a whole container of Trader Joe’s almond butter 🙂 and yet somehow I continue to live despite not finding a replacement jar. ha. I also brought various hair products and a fancy new flat iron just for the trip. Not that my hair will stay straight in this humidity and heat.

Delicious vegetarian meal of Sri Lankan food at the Krishnamurti Center in Colomobo

Now in my 3rd country, Sri Lanka, I still look for almond butter and soy or almond milk in the stores and even succeeded in finding soy milk in one store in India, but otherwise I have stopped worrying. Much to my relief and joy I find I can eat almost everything at any table or restaurant which is no small thing with all my food allergies including to wheat, yeast, corn, peanuts and shellfish. In fact eating is considerably easier than in the USA.

Ultimately I go with the flow more and don’t worry about the perfect-whatever. I use regular cow’s milk in my tea, eat steaming hot food out of plastic bags which leach chemicals into my food, wear less than squeaky clean clothing, drink sugared tea if the sugar has already been put in it or the person making it does not understand English, have learned to use but not mastered the bidet so I still carry toilet paper, sleep on old and I am sure dust mite filled pillows, eat my hands like the locals, and eat non organic fruit and don’t complain or even ask. In short the horrors never cease, lol!! No one after all is dropping dead here anymore than anywhere else, in fact many are noticeably healthier than my American counterparts. And anyway, who has the energy or desire to stress.

Banner outside the Aryuvedic Fair

Talking about stress. I went to an Ayurvedic Fair yesterday here in Colombo. It was held in two large exhibition spaces with so many fancy booths with people handing out glossy brochures and selling their products that it took me over an hour to make my way through while stopping only intermittently. I was psyched to find all natural mosquito repellant and bought two different brands for the mosquitoes that have plagued me throughout this trip. While there I decided to ask about remedies for stress and anxiety because the kava kava I brought is running low.

The response was “What? Stress??” Then they would stand there with a slightly lost look on their face. Others would simply shake their head or walk around the isles of bottles hoping a stress remedy would suddenly materialize. After this happened a number of times I began to laugh about it and finally gave up. People are in fact noticeably more relaxed here but there is something more, like the way they are really present and in that present-ness there is an ease and a peace, one feels fully seen by most Sri Lankans and Indians I have met.

The contrast was especially evident at the hostel where I landed on my first two nights here which only admitted foreigners. It was filled with white people, most from Europe and a few from China and Singapore and, outside of one warm Chinese young woman who gave me tea for my cough, I immediately felt a kind of chill. Not that the hostelers were unfriendly per se, but I sensed a distance as if they were in fear of connecting, of seeing and being seen. You have to work at getting to that place with westerners and it takes time.

Maybe this is the whole point of my trip. To live and let live. To notice. To be fully seen and see in return. And to hell with great straight hair, almond butter and dairy-free living.

Last week while responding to inquiries from friends and family about my arrival in Sri Lanka I wrote: “I had dinner and will have a shower and a bed to sleep on. That is good for now.” I did not write “Everything is great.” Because well, it was not perfect: I was in the hostel with no AC and bunk beds. And the heat was intense – worse that southern India– so much so I could barely think. But I realized that as long as I have food in my stomach, a shower to cool down with and clean myself, and a bed then another day will pass and I will be ok. Maybe tomorrow will be better or great or another day of basic essentials appreciation.

Krishnamurti Center

As I finish writing this piece I bask in the cooling breeze of a ceiling fan under which hangs a knotted baby blue colored mosquito net with no holes in it. I am taking a few days break from touring to get over a chest cold at the Krishnamurti Center in Colombo, an island of peace and forest in the middle of the city. The center is one of many around the world founded in honor of the late Indian spiritual teacher Jiddu Krishnamurti, who some say channeled the Buddha. I believe I am meant to be here to take in his teachings. I have a private room, can listen to DVDs of Krishnamurti’s talks, read any of his books in the library, and observe green parrots, cookoo birds, crows, jungle babblers, seven sisters, and tiny Jungle Squirrels come to feast in the bird feeder right outside my door. All that plus three meals a day of delicious Sri Lankan vegetarian fare for about $16/day. I don’t have everything but I have everything I need and more than I at one time dared to dream. This is perhaps the most essential essential.

Large Buddha outside the many Buddist temples in Sri Lanka

bananas served at the end of every meal at the center

the bird feeder at the center, parrots and a jungle squirrel sharing nicely

sharing tong ren at the center

the ayurvedic fair

ayurvedic fair

Fort Chochin, in Kochi India with friend and healer Puneeta 🙂

from the ferry to Fort Chochin

from Fort Chochin, chinese nets

Fort Chochin

Taking pics in Jew Town on Fort Cochin, its really called that proudly, interesting history… with Joseph

At the very old synagogue in Jew Town with Punetta

Punetta and I i Jew Town

Fort Cochin, fine pic by friend PJ Joseph