Calve Heritage Hotel Pondicherry

... Ironically enough, the teachers spoke very little English so we had a hard time communicating with them. We each ended up taking a group and just threw ourselves in with the children. The kids were great. It was such an awesome time. I started counting and they quickly joined along and screamed their way to thirty. They were so excited and proud to say all of the English words they know. They were excited just to hear us speak English ...

This town is quite affluent with lots of French culture and architecture as it used to be a french colony...so there are a lot of French peeps living here. Pondicherry has a seafront promenade, wide boulevards (with curbs, wow), lots of trees, a lovely park (for India standards), a well-known ashram, Sri Aurobindo. It is unlike anywhere else (apparently) in southern India so i figured it was a great place to ease myself into South India. <br><br>I say ...

... was that time really doesn&#8217;t mean anything here. Someone might tell you they will meet you at 9 but not show up until 10, maybe 9:30 if you&#8217;re lucky. That&#8217;s by far been the most frustrating thing that is teaching us all to take a few steps back and just relax. My professor made it pretty clear yesterday when saying that relationships here are far more important than time. Eight of the Americans arrived around the same time and Air India lost five ...

... of all countries are able to live in peace and progressive harmony, above all creeds, all politics and all nationalities. The purpose of Auroville is to realize human unity.&#8221;<br><br>Here is the Charter of Auroville given to me at the visitor center:<br><br><br><br> <ol><br><br> <li>Auroville belongs to nobody in particular. Auroville belongs to humanity as a whole. But to live in Auroville one must be the willing servitor of the Divine Consciousness. <br><br> <li ...

... culture. It&#8217;s a sign of trust and deep friendship between them. <br><br>At some point I urgently needed to go to the bathroom. Well, it&#8217;s quite difficult to find a town where to stop. There is no public bathroom anywhere as people simply do what they have to do on the road and don&#8217;t seem to be bothered about being seen. I waited for an hour hoping we would find a place and finally had to ask Madhan to pull over. I tried to hide behind bushes but ...

... and baby Indu waved me good-bye at the gate and a taxi drove me to Pondicherry (Pondy) where i was to spend a rather interesting day out in the other 'real' world away from the bubble of Auroville. Straight away i was missing the community. Surprisingly, my senses were heightened and it was as though i were seeing India for the first time so it was refreshing to feel aware and i was able to enjoy doing a little trek around town without the blindness that comes from being ...

... the call goes out for volunteers to take on jobs around the farm in addition to their regular daily work. They rotate the chef job every week. My job was to water the gardens which was quite a good one because you were outside wandering amongst the aubergines, pumpkins, bananas, papaya, oranges and pineapples and making friends with all the grubs and insects. Other times i helped with the cooking, in the nursery or worked with Swami, an Indian guy. There are two ...

... water to tobacco juice and sprayed the mixture over the garden veggies to help keep off pests and fungus. Yet another shift I took dried leaves and sticks and covered newly planted seedlings to help lock in moisture and keep the topsoil from running off. Our last day we filled baskets up with mud created from the rain a few days earlier and created a barrier around young trees to help prevent soil run off and lock in nutrients for the tree to grow. Solar Panels ...

... enjoying their company immensely. The are a great couple, full of energy, a real pleasure to be around. Our friendship was cemented one night when we all found ourselves drinking in a hotel room that had been set up as a "secret bar", as alcohol wasn't be served anywhere in the city on this particular day. We chatted for hours and realized that we all had much in common, sharing many of the same passions and interests. We all had a really good ...

... love with this place. For all its faults, it has an authenticity and a sort of "divine chaos" that I find weirdly alluring. This entry is my effective retirement; but not from ALL entries, just the more daily sort. Now that I'm attending class full time I think it would be considered cruel and unusual punishment if I were to post thoughts of y daily life (Got up, ate, went to class...) for everyone to read. NOT good reading ...