rishikesh.

rishikesh is another part of india that had a particular special meaning for the female counterpart of bryndia. it is the town where her parents met. the moment that india stepped out of the rickshaw and stood on the steep hill overlooking the rushing ganges, she felt it: the romance. the reason. the meaning behind her parents falling in love with each other, with this place, over thirty years previously. the feeling overwhelmed her.

but sometimes, one has to take some hard hits before they can full appreciate the wonders of the world. sometimes, one must learn a lesson the hardest of hard ways to understand the meaning of this kind of romance, this kind of reason.

five minutes after exiting said rickshaw, india discovered that she had misplaced her wallet. in which was her drivers license, her debit card, her credit card. and her passport.

after the initial panic had worn off, the search party for the rickshaw given up as a lost cause, the worthless police report filed with the unhelpful police, india made a call to the american embassy in delhi who assured her that it would be taken care of quickly and easily, but a visit to that embassy was required. 'but don't rush here,' the man on the line said. 'spend your time in rishikesh, enjoy it, relax. and come here after you're done, and we will help you.' god bless the united states.

bryn & india walked down towards the water as the morning turned to afternoon. the two crossed a modern suspension footbridge packed with indian tourists and painted cows, who all stopped to stare at the family of monkeys dangling from the wires, screeching for attention. in lakshman jhula, the east side of rishikesh, the chants from the ashrams could be heard from blocks away. incense and charras mixed in smoky clouds over their heads. babas, or holy men, all thin as pins, their loose orange robes hanging from their shoulders in giant loops, twirled their fingers around their grey dreadlocks and smiled at bryn & india toothily, bobbing their heads slowly, side to side. the bathing ghats along the river were never empty. men stripped down to their underwear, women remained fully clothed, and they all submerged themselves in the holy river, whooping and laughing, splashing the cold water over their shoulders, onto their faces.

bryn & india walked and walked until they couldn't walk anymore. the paved road that followed the river disappeared into a maze of rocky paths and barren fields. the two followed their feet until they hit a tall iron gate extending from the river bank up into the surounding mountains. the white paint was chipped, with an intimidating sign posted in big red letters: do not trespass. shrugging their shoulders, about to turn around, a tiny but clear voice was heard from behind the gate. would you like to come in? bryn & india turned to find a small, straight backed sadu with a short grey beard and big eyes staring at them through the bars. smiling and twirling the whispy hair surrounding his left ear, the sadu swung the gate open, and bryn & india stepped into the maharishi ashram.

in the 1960s, the notorious meditation guru maharishi built up the largest meditation ashram that had yet to exhist on the ganges. a place where one could enter with an intent to gain complete enlightment through emptiness. to remove yourself from the outside world and focus all your energy on becoming a trancendental meditator. a compound big enough to hold hundreds of people studying, and hundreds more to teach and serve those students. it was, in fact, a city within a city. cafeterias. lecture halls. apartment buildings. private houses. post offices. all connected through a weaving paved path surrounded by colorful flower beds, mosaic sculpture, and wrought iron lamposts. but. in the late 1990s, when the guru lost a lot of face for various public scandals, including some tricky tax evasion, the ashram was siezed by the government, shut down, and left for ten years to become overgrown with ripe indian vegetation.

for bryn & india, stepping into the ashram was like stepping into a scene from the jungle book. a famed city made ancient and mysteriously romantic by the thousands of vines, flowers, and brush that had overtaken the area.

bryn & india's sadu shuffled along beside them, barefoot, finger constantly twirling, spitting off every fact about the ashram, the celebrities who had studied there, and the maharishi himself. the sadu had lived in the ashram since the mid 1970s, and when the government had shut it down, had deemed himself the unofficial and illegal tourguide. he took them throughout the maharishi's private home, showed them the turquoise tiled bathtub where the guru had washed. he took them down into a windowless basement, pitch black and cool, where he struck a match and pointed to a corner and breathed that this was the corner where the guru had done his private meditation. and he walked them to the highest point in the compound, up six flights of decaying stairs, out onto a flat roof decorated with large egg shaped meditation huts, and told them to breath in the energy of the ganges. don't you feel, he said, that you are truly on the lap of nature here? they did.

and just like that, it went from the worst day ever, to the best day ever.

the next morning, bryn & india sat in a crowded german bakery overlooking the ganges, drinking hot coffee, eating toasted bread with thick slices of yaks cheese, when they were asked to share their table by two nice looking jewish boys from toronto. since bryn & india love everything jewish, and most things canadian, they obliged. thus began the start of a fantastic foursome.

randy and avi had been traveling india for a month. the four shared stories of their respective times in israel and their shared appreciation for all kinds of thali. they seperated after their meal with a promise to meet up that afternoon so bryn & india could guide them to the overgrown ashram. throughout the day, the group grew larger, and as the sun began to sink into the river, bryn, india, randy, avi, two brits from london, two girls from new york, and a hippie from north california, all sat in a circle on the highest roof in the hidden ashram and watched the sun set.

the next day, bryn & india decided to explore outside of the city, and the two headed five kilometers up river to find some waterfalls. after walking in heavy heat for an hour, the two were about to give up, when a car with two boys pulled up, gesturing for the two travlers to get in. though they didn't speak a word of english, bryn managed to communicate their want of a waterfall, and the two boys not only delivered them to the start of the hike but (what could be assumed as) spontaneously decided to join them. the four walked up a damp, steep ledge, the path growing more obscure with each climbing foot, until the two boys led bryn & india completely off the path and into the dense forest. just as the pair was starting to get apprehensive, the thick brush gave way to a gigantic jutting cliff where a thin mist of water poured out over a series of dozens of small caves carved into the wall. staring up, gasping, bryn & india dipped their feet in the pool and, again, felt to be on nature's lap.

that night, bryn & india shared oven baked pizza with randy and avi in a treehouse restaurant, little buddha cafe, and strained to stay up for a midnight world cup game.

bright and early the next morning, bryn was up to watch the nba finals at the only coffee shop in rishikesh. and, a few hours later, despite india's aching stomach, bryn followed their plan to do a morning yoga class, and returned in the early afternoon with water, and soup, and stories of hard breathing and big stretches at sai yoga. determined to feel better, india slept off her stomach ache all afternoon, and bryn joined randy for a third visit back to the jungle ashram. that night, feeling better, india joined the group back at little buddha cafe, and shared a chillum and stories of home.

the rest of bryn & india's week in rishikesh passed in an easy routine. the two would awake for morning classes at sai, where they practiced their sun salutations and standing on their head. randy and avi would join them for lunch, and then again the group would seperate, and bryn & india would take the kilometer walk upriver to goa beach, where the two would swim in the cold ganges, read their novels, build sand castles, invent improvised beach games, and share himalayan cream with other beach bathers.

after basking in the good energy of the holy river for a week, bryn & india reluctantly booked their bus tickets to delhi, where they would face the daunting task of replacing india's passport and indian exit visa.

on their last night in rishikesh, the two were invited over to a uniquely bizarre iranian's hotel room to watch a world cup game. the long bearded balding student, who had entertained bryn & india that afternoon at the river by frolicking in playboy printed underwear and relaying stories of his alien encounters, was earnest in his attempts to convince the pair to come visit him in iran, which, he assured, was the safest country in the world. two spaniards, who he had also picked up on the river that afternoon, joined the three in the small hotel room to cheer on their home country in the football match. whenever a silence took over the group, their iranian host would begin to laugh obsessively. cracking up with him, bryn & india made their exit with awkward goodbyes and headed towards their night bus.

waving goodbye to the village in the valley, bryn & india's love for the subcontinent was confirmed.