Age of Aquarius

Since I have been having crazy awesome days almost every single day since arriving in India I feel like it would be cheating my faithful readers if I tried to describe just one or two stories in detail. So instead I have decided to give some short descriptions of highlights from a few key days I have been in India since arriving in Auroville, hope you enjoy :)

March 7: Liz and Stacy and I slid right into the commune way of living by playing the game "7 degrees of Morgan Freeman" with the amazing American couple Greg and Kerri, also our new buddy Nicholas from Belgium used a David Bowie reference AND the midget from the movie Willow to get to Star Wars. We also binged on as much chocolate, sugar, coffee, and cheese as humanly possible in town when we busted out illegal eating activities, this community is completely vegan so I have been having many drool infused dreams about cheese. We are staying in a palm leaved thatched hut with 6 people sleeping downstairs and 5 on the upstairs level. The main hut is the biggest building and also the only one with electricity. All the volunteers hang out in the afternoons and either play guitar, or drums or read and relax and just chill.


March 8: I just participated in a proactive non-violence workshop at the commune and learned the most effective way to block a bull dozer by laying in the street with 5 peoples arms linked in a star formation until police pull someone out of the star. Also if you are doing a sit-in just go limp, like a sac of potatoes so the police dragging your lifeless body out will have a harder time, if you struggle it will look bad when your picture is printed in the media. I also learned effective ways of jamming locks on any facility that goes against your beliefs by putting superglue in the locks to the main building or the supervisors office. I think this is illegal, but somehow it is still a non-violent protest method... When are they passing out the cool-aid? Im feeling kinda thirsty.

March 9: Monday morning, first time probably ever I have been excited to wake up at 6am. Today we worked on bunding dirt paths around the commune. I hate beets. We have had beet stew, beet salad, and even some form of beet dessert with sugar and nuts every day since I have come on the 5th. We were so sick of all the beet concoctions today that we motorbiked it into town and I ate my first real Indian meal with my hands. It was parotta which is kinda like a flaky pita bread dipped in spicy veggie curry and served on a banana leaf. It was so cool to eat only using my hands.


March 10: It is POURING down rain! Making this day energetic, thrilling, and terrifying all at the same time. It is reminding me of Oregon rain, but warmer. Since the whole place is powered by solar panels We had to jump on some work out bikes today that are attached to the generators and peddle our asses off to get enough power to run the blender in the kitchen, haha. I busted out my mini speakers and we hooked up Liz's Ipod and we had a jam sesh while biking for power. Kerri and I switched off between biking and leading the arm workouts which consisted of punching, push ups on the handlebars, and tricep dips. Unfortunately this means that all our dirt path building and bunding efforts have just been washed away, but after second work we had a huge mud slip and slide party, so it kinda made it a little bit better.

March 11: Today was Holi festival! Which is also called the Festival of Colours because it is celebrated by hundreds of people throwing coloured powder and coloured water at each other. The awesome American couple Keri and Greg and I went into town and got to throw around a little bit of pink powder and got our hands dyed bright fuchsia. It was awesome.


March 12: The Mud pools are still filled to the brim since it has been raining for the past 2 days. Kerri, my new American friend is a bad ass and proposed we play a little water polo game in the mud pools. I love this idea, and technically it isnt even going against the "no competitive games" rule since the mud pool is outside the Sadhana Forest fence. A new Frenchie just arrived yesterday and he is the smitten image of Johnny Depp in Pirates of the Caribbean, and to top it off he has a skull and cross bones tram stamp tattooed on his lower back. I am smitten!

March 13: I bonded with this Belgian guy named Nicholas tonight who works for Xerox in Ireland. He is hilarious because he has this obsession with chocolate and bakeries and has to have his sugar fix every day. This guy also has the most motorbike troubles out of anyone I have ever met...seriously, anyone ever. So far he has had 2 flat tires, his front light has gone out while driving at night, his back light has gone out in the day, he has run out of gas, and has just broken down completely. And due to this bad motobike luck he has been through about 5 different bikes. He never crashes though, which is very good for his passengers.

March 15: I have a goal for India which I seriously hope I can achieve. This goal is to NOT shit my pants in my entire stay here. There have definitely been some close calls I must admit, and Liz and Tony are thinking about starting a facebook group, haha. But just in case you were curious here is the oven our food is cooked in. Which I think is pretty rad!


Since I am running out of Internet time that is all I have time for right now, but I will wright more updates soon...

I have also decided to stay for another 3 weeks, so if you want to send me something wonderful via fed-ex I have an address where I will definitely receive it, and it goes a little something like this:

Juli Greenwald
Sadhana Forest
Auroville
Tamil Nadu
605101
India