After day 2, I am starting to think this place is a dream come true. Basically, Auroville residents are a bunch of creative souls and spiritual thinkers who are all here for a specific purpose, contributing something to the society – either an alternative healing technique, eastern medicine practice, creative art form, café, homestay, eco-building, organic farm, etc. There is a town newspaper / bulletin FILLED with all of the different classes and workshops being offered by other community members: cooking classes, writing, drawing, yoga, meditation, singing, dancing, Ayruvedic treatments, therapies, massages, and more. As a guest, you can sign up for any of these classes that interest you for just a small fee – equivalent of $4 USD (and as a full-time resident, aka an Aurovillian, you can take most of the classes for free). So, my next 10 days will be filled with trying different yoga and meditation classes, getting massages and treatments, hopefully learning some new things, and signing up for whatever else peaks my interest. Dreamy!!!

The homestay is nice. I really like my little family – it is a mom, dad, one little boy and a puppy. The little boy is 8 – his name is Sagan. He has truly become my best friend here! Yesterday was Saturday and he had the day off of school. When I woke up, I drank coffee on the porch with him, his cousin, and their puppy, Jockie. We took the dog for a walk and he showed me the local café and grocery store right up the street. After that, I rode my bike to the visitor’s center to get a map and as I was walking in, I met this older man from Canada named Guy, probably about 60 years old or so. He had just arrived in Auroville and is staying until March to see if he wants to become a permanent resident. We ended up talking for a while and grabbed a coffee (at this time it was around 11am). He had been practicing qui gong, thai chi, kundalini yoga, many forms of meditation and different types of fasting for about 10 years now and was really into this alternative, conscious living space. This man was very “wise” and our conversation immediately got super deep and philosophical, so deep that I got out a pen and paper and started taking down notes on things he was saying. After coffee we got lunch and continued to talk… we talked until about 2 in the afternoon. It was so nice to have not one single plan for the day, to meet someone like this, and end up talking to them for 3 hours about deep, philosophical topics. Something like this would never happen in the States! Not only would you never be taking 3 hours out of your busy day to get to know a complete stranger. But if you started talking to someone that you had just met in a coffee shop about some of the subjects Guy and I were discussing, they would look at you like you were completely bat-shit crazy and walk out. It is nice to be staying in a place where you know everyone has the same interests and similar beliefs on spiritual and self-development.

That evening I went downstairs at the homestay to start cooking with Vijaya (the lady and owner of the homestay). She is letting me cook with her each night so I can learn more Indian meals. After we cooked, Vijaya asked me if I would help her with reading and writing in English. We sat down on the floor (per Indian culture) and went through her WhatsApp messages and emails. I helped her read and respond to a long letter (written in English) that Sagan’s school had sent to the parents. I had her read the whole thing out loud and then I helped her write the response. Afterward, she was so happy that she was rolling around on the floor laughing! She hugged me and thanked me about a million times. It was by far one of the cutest and most gratifying things. This is so interesting to see how truly different our ways of lives are.