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A Day Retreat In Bylakuppe, India

By Karuna DiLibero

Republish: EasyPublish™
Published: 02Feb2012
Word count: 1398
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Bylakuppe is a Tibetan refugee settlement about 29km to the west of Mysore in southern India. When I was living in India I went into the hills as a retreat from the intense heat for holiday. I took a bus from the station by Gandhi Square in Mysore, where I was living at the time. The bus pulled out of the station at 1:45pm arriving in Bylakuppe about 4:30pm. My bus ticket cost me 35 rupees, less than a single dollar. I was dropped off at a stop where the scene had suddenly changed from Indian to Tibetan. Everything looked and smelled different, the people, their clothes, the foods they ate and the language they spoke, even the temperature and foliage differed. I was looking for a place to find some quiet refudge. I believe I found it.

I hired a rickshaw driver for 50 rupees, more expensive than my bus ticket which I found amusing to take me to the Tibetan hill station. The ride was only about 10 minutes, compared to the 2 hour plus bus ride. As I sat comfortably back in the open air of the motorized rickshaw, I watched the varied landscape pass me by as we drove up the hillside along a very narrow, curved road. We passed empty fields the lush color of green grass. Across the landscape cows were scattered here and there, grazing lazily. We passed some marshland where the water buffalos hunkered down. The air smelled musky, fresh and clean and it smelled like it was about to rain. The scene changed quickly to a palm forest just as the rickshaw driver let me off in the Sera Jhe Settlement district, my destination. Sera Jhe is just one Tibetan village in a settlement of 20 in the surrounding area. Soon after I got out, it started to rain. It was a welcomed event since it hadn't rained much in the last few months in the lower lands where I was living. Thunder rumbled in the distance and threatening dark clouds lumbered in the distance threatening heavier rains to come.

I found a guest house and checked into a small humble, yet very clean room with a single bed, a table and chair and a bathroom with a Western style toilet. It felt like a luxurious change from the squat toilets almost everywhere else. As I settled into the comforts of my room for the night, the rain really started to come down. It was loud and heavy, flushing out any other background sound. After I relaxed a bit from my travels, I wrapped a pashmina around me and explored the village, getting quite wet from the rain. Walking in the rain refreshed me like a wilted flower coming back into bloom, after the oppressive heat I had been living with in Mysore.

All the buildings were built in the Tibetan style and they all looked holy and special. they wer all well care for wand freshly painted. I was used to being the minority while living in India but as I walked around I noticed I was only one in a handful of women here. I was visiting the male village where boys and men were studying to become Tibetan monks. The men that I walked by kept their eyes to the ground and all were chanting mantras as their fingers passed over their mala beads.

I heard instruments, their sounds foreign to my ears and chanting far off. I followed the sacred sounds until I was in front of an immense prayer hall. Many sandals were lined up neatly outside the door. I found some empty wall space and sat down, closed my eyes and let the chanting consume me on every level I could absorb. A very old monk approached me slowly and he offered me a pillow to sit on. How very kind I thought as we smiled at each other briefly in silence before he turned and walked just as slowly away. Other monks sat by me and as I listened, they joined in the chanting. The same gentle old man that gave me the pillow, came back with a stainless steel cup and placed that in front of me. He said nothing and walked away again.

A little while later, two extremely happy young boys ran by with buckets of rice and filled the bowls that sat in front of the monks who I was sitting with. It was like these boys were having a contest with each other to see who could fill the most bowls. Not a grain of rice was spilled, I noticed. They were gone as fast as they had arrived, like the lightening flashing in the sky quite the opposite of the old monk that offered me the pillow and cup. The boys returned with another bucket full of warm buttermilk. They did not pass my cup by as they filled those before the monks. It was rich and thick and warmed me as I drank.

The winds had picked up as the storm persisted like a background symphony to the chanting and music within. Once the chanting stopped, there was a long period of silence, something of an unusual phenomena in India-complete silence except for the sounds of nature; the wind the rain and thunder. I was immersed in deep meditation and the beauty of it all. Later I felt hundreds of monks silently walk by me to put on their sandals and go about the rest of their day. I sat for a long while until I felt like I was quite alone, and the rain had ceased, before I got up to leave myself.

I walked along the roads and through fields for about 3km toward the Golden Temple. As I walked, I passed a sign that said, "It is better to be 10 minutes late in this life than 10 minutes early for the next." Quite true. Tibetan humor! I could see the temple in the distance, glimmering in the sunlight that was breaking through the storm clouds. All seemed especially quiet as I approached the temple, as if even the birds knew to honor this area with silence. The greatness of the temple was felt the closer I got to it.

Before entering, I walked clockwise around the temple, spinning all the stainless steel prayer wheels with thousands of mantras hammered into them to send these prayers merged with my own into the wind. While I was focused on my prayers, I almost ran into four young monks who were playing with toy guns, pretending to shoot me. Ironic, I thought! I passed a row of stupas, altars and then walked into the temple when my breath was pulled from lungs in awe! I gazed upon three of the largest buddha statues I have ever seen. What made them breath-taking was they were all gold plated and about 30-40 feet high! The walls were covered in hand painted Tibetan gods and goddesses. It is beyond my words to describe this beauty. I was ensconsed in golden light that reflected the thousand shades of colors in the paintings onthe walls.

After sitting in the temple in meditation for a while, I returned to my room and slept. I felt tired from a day of travels, fasting and meditation. the next day, I begin my journey back home to Mysore. The long, bumpy, loud, stinky, hot bus ride home is like a dream as I still felt the meditative state of being in Bylakuppe. When we pulled into the bus station back in Mysore, it's like I came out of my trance and returned to the world. Indian music crackles blaringly through blown out speakers, horns, voices, vehicles and animal sounds raid the airwaves as I left the silence of Bylakuppe behind. The chaos of India surrounds me again. Strange scenes, like people falling out of buses at intersections, a family of five riding on a single motorcycle, decorated cows and camels with bells tied to their knees, mostly naked sadhus meditating in stillness in the bustling streets, beggars with boils or burns or sawed off limbs asking for rupees, scrambling chickens and children pass me by and yet I feel like I've returned home again as I carry the meditation with me.

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