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Ashram life may be the cheapest yoga vacation in India but it’s not for everyone.

A Sivananda yoga students sits by the nearby lake. By Sonja Bjelland

Four hours of asana practice a day did manage to relieve the tightness in my neck from my pack, OK and the duffle for my purchases.

But poses or asanas only make up a small part of yoga in India. All those body contortions help people sit longer cross-legged in mediation. The physical poses have equal importance to meditation and chanting for a well-rounded yoga practice.

Even more than complaining about the food and the mildew, I’ve heard visitors say they just wanted “yoga.” They didn’t mind the meditation but really couldn’t get into the chanting. It’s that religious side of yoga that makes Westerners squirm.

If Hinduism or yoga came first I won’t debate. Both started several thousand years ago so by now they are pretty integrated in India, regardless of the ongoing debate surfacing in American media as seen in this recent New York Times article. And religion, any of them, is part of everything in India. It’s just the culture.

A man at a Hindu ceremony in Kanyakumari, India By Sonja Bjelland

In one cab the car’s owner had a Ganesh doll and the driver put up a Christian rosary. People show their religion outwardly. The many Hindus who attended a morning service will have a red dot on their forehead. Muslim women cover their heads and many men wear a skullcap. Christians frequently don a gold necklace with a cross or post “Jesus loves you” stickers on their rickshaws. And this is only the more popular religions in India. The religious landscape is as diverse as the topography from the thick jungle and rocky beaches to vast deserts and snowy Himalayas.

Being in an ashram allows visitors to focus on their own spirituality. But time there can prove difficult to bear for those who are not at all spiritual or disagree with what the ashrams teach.

Most ashrams associate themselves with a temple and Hindu spiritual leaders. Devout Hindus pray twice a day – morning and evening. Seven days a week. Ashrams serve as sort of combined

A hilltop cross in Kumily, India By Sonja Bjelland

monasteries and convents so visitors are expected to participate as well.

But that doesn’t mean becoming Hindu. That’s only by birth anyway. It’s about pondering your relationship with the world and whatever you believe. Teachings will be heavy on believing something – but not usually one religion over another. At the Sivananda ashram in Kerala, the chants included paying homage to Jesus, Buddha, Mohammed, Moses and on and on. To keep it all the more inclusive, and highlight the internationality of the ashram, the morning universal prayer would be given in a different language almost every day – Farsi, Russian, Spanish.

I couldn’t believe it when I made it to India and now I can’t believe I’m gone.

Kerala backwaters, India By Sonja Bjelland

I have many more yoga adventures I’m looking forward to but the first leg is done.

But I don’t feel finished with India. So much more I want to see and do.

For now, it’s been a little tough adjusting to Western life. I have so many choices in everything it’s a bit overwhelming.

That’s reinforcing how India provides many more experiences to develop a yogic sense beyond yoga classes. The patience of waiting – for everything. The balance of having an idea, but not a real plan. The realization that humans actually need very little to survive. And the fact that it’s up to us what constitutes enough in our lives.

Seeing women carrying baskets of everything on their heads and washing clothes on riverbanks reveals these nuggets of life lessons for those open to learning. And it’s those experiences that provide a true India yoga experience. The photos can show the beauty of India, but it’s more difficult to detail the lack of sidewalks and pockmarked roads. The trash piled high by the train tracks and cow dung in the streets.

Kanyakumari, India By Sonja Bjelland

Many people journey to India believing great yoga teachers are as common as cows on the street.

Unfortunately, they leave disappointed.

I did find a few good teachers in my nine weeks of travel but that also left a lot of the yoga landscaped untouched. I did not visit the towns of Mysore and Pune known for teaching specific types of yoga. Those are more geared for yogis doing teacher classes or further training who have already studied the Iyengar or Ashtanga systems.

I also had to get over caring about teachers causing injuries by looking out for myself and to stop wishing for more variety in poses.

Most classes follow more or less the same 12 postures. Some variety that includes shoulder stand, fish, triangle pose, butterfly and such after a round of sun salutations.

I’ve rarely done any variations of warrior poses, a standard in U.S. classes. And there’s numerous names for the asanas in English. I’ve heard downward dog referred to as triangle, mountain and inverted rooster. So it helps to know the Sanskrit names because the teachers do not provide much instruction and expect the students to know how to do the pose already.

I’ve also learned a few new poses that give a good stretch and I keep trying to improve my headstand. But no, I still can’t touch my toes.

Classes also take several mini-sivansanas, which was hard to get used to, and range from power-yoga intense to barely breaking a sweat. And all may be considered beginner.

It’s very possible to find a great teacher. Even so, the experience may not deliver the yoga heaven and spiritual bliss some people seek here.

But the experience of India is worth having regardless of the yoga.

Man in Kanyakumari, India By Sonja Bjelland

I’m filing this tonight from inside a neon pink mosquito net during one of the many power outages today. Hence today’s post sans photos as I race against a dying battery.

I’m also trying to do this as surreptitiously as possible. Cell phones are not allowed here and can be confiscated. Not sure what they’d think about a laptop with Internet access.

I’m at the Sivananda Ashram in Kerala for a four-day yoga vacation.

Not exactly a holiday, but for those who are really into yoga, it can be a blessing.

My body’s tired from doing four hours of yoga everyday and waking up at 5:30 a.m. for meditation and chanting. But it’s a good way to wrap up India.

Slightly different from some other ashrams, no guru remains on site here and the teaching is the same as their yoga training centers around the world. While it is Hindu based, I spotted a Christmas wreath already up outside the dining hall entrance and Amazing Grace is included in the chant book.

Visitors can take a yoga vacation from 3 days to two weeks in length and, unlike some ashrams, it includes twice daily posture practice and twice daily meditation. It’s even more summer camp-esque here than at some other ashrams because not many people live here full time. In addition to the hundred or so of us on “yoga vacation,” about 150 teacher-training students walk around in matching yellow tops and white pants. Each is referred to by their number. As in, No. 66 you have three phone messages. And some are Indian. That might seem logical being that I am in India. But I’ve seen very few Indians in my yoga classes or in the training programs.

The food here is known for being the best for ashrams and I can’t disagree. I’m guessing Westerners say that because it’s not super spicy to make up for the lack of taste. They even serve beans and veggies so it’s healthy as well. However, it is eaten traditional Kerala-style sitting on the floor and eaten with your hands. And meals are served only twice a day. At least at the “Health Hut” I can buy a fruit salad and toast with honey.

Otherwise, life is much the same as other ashrams. The pre-dawn clanging wake-up bells, thin mattresses and what from an American perspective can feel like summer-camp accommodations. Fortunately, one of my dorm mates is also of Midwestern stock so the bathrooms in our block are likely the cleanest in the ashram.

Aside from cleaning and eating, I’ve taken both the beginner and intermediate/advanced classes. Beginner is just a slower version with a few less complicated postures than the upper level but still includes shoulder stands.

Throughout my 9 weeks in India, the poses have been about the same. In the classes I’ve taken, I have rarely done a warrior pose or others that I would find typical in the U.S. The intermediate/advanced class here starts asanas with headstands and ends with forward bends. It just feels the opposite of home. And this style of yoga does not use blocks or straps. I prefer having them available because, despite my attempts, I’m not so flexible.

Geared toward those coming here to study or otherwise vacate, the staff brings in some traditional entertainment and arranges excursions to the backwaters or Kanyakumari, the city at India’s tip. On Thursday night, dancers and musicians from the nearby city of Trivandrum performed.

On the Friday’s off, visitors can walk to the nearby zoo/wildlife reserve where they keep Asiatic lions on a caged island. It’s not exactly the wild and it’s geared for Indian tourists but it was interesting to see the lions audible from the ashram.

Sunset in Varkala, India By Sonja Bjelland

Finding a good yoga class while on vacation

Ask to see the yoga room. These can range from air conditioned and clean to beach mats in a concrete den.

People walk up and down the main corridor toting yoga mats. Ask which classes they like and always ask more than one person.

Understand this is not YogaWorks. There will not be bamboo floors and a special iTunes playlist. Some do have blankets, blocks and straps though.

Varkala, India – Sunburn is the latest fashion trend here.

Between 8 and 9 degrees north of the equator, the sun is fierce and the beach is always calling. White women trying to be a little appropriate wrap their shoulders in a shawl purchased at one of the many shops that line the well-worn path on the cliffs above the Arabian Sea.

But those come off at the beach where Indian men sit, cell phone cameras in hand, to collect the images of bikini-clad women. That aside, Varkala is an easy place to visit. Plenty of restaurants and fellow tourists to make friends with. It’s even possible to venture out after dark for a dinner of banana leaf steamed barracuda with a lemon and garlic sauce.

This relaxed, beach vibe made me not want to do anything but play in the waves and read my book. But I managed to get myself off the beach and out of the shops long enough to take in some yoga classes.

Finding a good class, though, took a bit of research, kinda like picking the restaurant with the freshest seafood.

Like most seasonal beach towns in India, Varkala businesses open in November and remain open until March. Some teachers work in Europe or other locales until the season hits so out of season might leave you out of luck. This can also lead to constant turnover so advertisements about certain hotels having yoga and such may not be true.

I didn’t have time to attend every yoga class in Varkala (that would take awhile) but I did hit a few and enjoyed where I went.

Ullas began the morning class at Progressive Yoga with several rounds of pranayam or breathing techniques.  The hour and a half class included beginner-level standards of sun salutations and triangle pose but also incorporated a few more advanced poses such as crow.

Varkala, India By Sonja Bjelland

Coming from a line of yogic and ayurvedic professionals, he said he has been teaching yoga in Varkala for 15 years and trained at Sivananda, an international yoga school that has an ashram a few hours away.

The class was well paced for vacationers and was a good way to start the day, though occasionally interrupted by the clang of the kitchen next door. His classes run from 8:30 to 10 a.m. and 4:30 to 6 p.m. and costs 250 rupees ($5.55 USDs).

Similarly along the tourist path at the Green Palace Hotel, Harinarayanadas teaches morning and afternoon classes. The small, clean room in the lower area to the right of the entrance to the hotel has a ceiling fan and an air conditioner.

He changes the speed of the class depending on the level of the students and makes quick work of adjusting each student into the correct posture. Despite having some beginners in class, he helped everyone safely manage poses such as a headstand that they might not have thought possible.

The hour and a half classes start at 8 a.m. and 4:30 p.m. and cost 200 rupees (about $4 USDs)

Outside the main tourist hub is one class I heard good things about but didn’t get to try.

It starts at 7 a.m. at the Oasis Hotel north of the Black Beach area.

The walk leads out past clothes shops to where fisherman outnumber tourists and one can feel a little closer to India.

The key to finding the Oasis Hotel, is to walk about 10 minutes past where the sidewalk turns to sand north of Black Beach. Go through the first stream and fishing village and keep following the shoreline through the second stream. Up and to your right you’ll see the yellow Oasis Hotel. Continue on the path hugging the beach and go past the Blue Water Ayurvedic Center and turn right. That rocky, dirt path leads up and around the hotels such as Oasis that are perched on a small hill. Keep going right until the path stops at a “T” and turn left. Oasis will be a couple doors down on the right.

It’s sounds a bit “over the river and through the woods” but it’s really quite simple and supposed to be worth the effort.

It’s not an emotional attachment to food, the woman argued. She just wanted something she could taste.

I couldn’t agree more and my first meal out of the ashram was a spinach and tuna steak dish to help replenish my iron and protein. And it was covered with cheese and garlic and tasted amazing.

The concept of attachments, as I’ve written before, is a major component of Eastern philosophy. The less attached we are to the physical world around us, the less emotional we will be and more connected to a spiritual being. That’s the aim for those on the level of monks or nuns.

For the rest of us though, I think it’s more about being aware that we have such attachments. That clothes and food do give us a certain emotional response, as do certain activities and people.

Ashram life can force one to think about some of this. Residents wear only white and have limited options for eating.

But is it to make you think, or not think.

I got into this discussion today I see it as a little of both. It’s a time to attempt to quiet the mind from daily concerns of work or family. But it’s also a time for personal reflection and confronting issues I know I have but otherwise avoid thinking about. Looking at patterns in our lives by breaking the normal habits.

It can take a few days for the mind to want to be there. In the mean time, I passed the days managing only to wash clothes check e-mail. It’s easy to loose sense of time and place and not worry about anything beyond that day. In an ashram, I have trouble remembering appointments or getting anything done. My brain just takes a break.

Lately though, I’ve been in my head a lot. That’s what traveling solo does. I can’t escape myself. It’s all I’ve got.

But I think doing that all the time is it’s own pattern. Now, I want to see how these lessons have affected my life in the real world again. It’s not that I’m free of issues. I’m not sure any of us ever really are. But I’ve learned some methods for scrubbing out the mind and can always pick that brush up again.

Within the walls of an ashram, resides a small community that is not totally different from the world outside those walls.

Amma's Ashram on the Kerala backwaters By Sonja Bjelland

The one I’m in now is actually larger than the town I grew up closest to.

Some 2,000 people live here at times in dorms towering up to 17 stories – thankfully with elevators.

It has a bank, laundry, stores, juice stand, etc.

But all the work is done by volunteers.

My jobs include serving one of the breakfast options and washing up dinner dishes from the Western kitchen. I’ll explain more on that later.

This is life in Amma’s ashram. Known as the “Hugging Mother” she is worshiped here as a saint. People pray to her and follow her advice.

In the last 30 years, she has built a following of volunteers who have donated millions, constructed thousands of houses and treated innumerable patients at hospitals and clinics.

On the coast of the Arabian Sea, the balconies look out on a blanket of palm trees and water. The 2004 tsunami devastated portions of this area and the evacuated ashram residents were serving food and providing aid within 24 hours.

Her point is that everyone should be loved equally. People wait for hours to be hugged by her and have told me it changed their life. I’ve met more Americans here than in the rest of my time in India combined. Many have lived in her ashram in San Ramon, Calif., as well. She actually only spends a few months a year here and the rest of the time is on the road, hugging the world.

This isn’t a yoga ashram, but it was on the way to my next yoga experience at the Sivananda ashram, south of where I am now but also in Kerala state. However, it does currently have a good yoga class but it’s for women only. The teacher pays a lot of attention to form and making sure we’re doing each pose correctly, which I appreciate. In the coming months, they are hosting four-day and two-week intensive yoga programs.

But yoga isn’t the only activity divided on gender lines.

Keeping with the conservative roots of this area, women and men do not swim together either and one must purchase a “swim dress” before entering the pool.

In the Indian side of the mess hall, men and women sit in separate groups. Yes, there are enough Westerners here we have our own restaurant. Of course, everyone crosses both sides. And the Western food is not included in the 150 rupee daily cost for room and board. That’s $3.33. But it’s nice to be able to get a pesto pizza for about a $1.25 when you really want one.

The Indian side is also not particularly nutritious. The veggies are cooked beyond retaining their vitamins and served with white rice so you get hardly any nutrients or fiber. The ashram’s website even recommends bringing multi-vitamins with you. I could practically eat a head of broccoli right now. Funny what you do and don’t miss when it’s gone.

And while every bit of life is about helping others selflessly, that doesn’t mean this place is immune to the human condition.

While I was serving breakfast, people complained about how full the cup was for the yogurt I poured. I’ve heard other Westerners complain about spats with co-workers and “oh, who will take over my job when I leave.” It’s the same personalities as in an office. The drama queen, the martyr, the workaholic. It’s just a different setting and an overriding tone of love.

Wild orchid at Periyar Tiger Reserve By Sonja Bjelland

In a traditional Indian yoga practices, you bow after chanting.

The act shows your humility.

India humbles me with its natural beauty and extreme poverty.

The photogenic spice and tea plantations in India’s southern state of Kerala blanket the hills with varying shades of green. In the Periyar Tiger Reserve, jungle cardamom carpets the floor making safe cover for the few tigers that still call it home.

Vines pour off of trees. Birds and monkey coo and caw from above.

Spotting elephants eating in the morning mist gave me pause.

Elephants in the mist at Periyar Tiger Reserve, India By Sonja Bjelland

Having them charge me and my group a few hours later made my heart race. Unbelievable creatures, they mosey around the jungle eating all day and walking in the hills. I had to keep reminding myself this wasn’t some Disney concoction. This is their real home. I am the guest here.

But humility goes beyond awe.

India has a way of making you rethink what you really need and at the same time grateful for what you have.

Forks, shoes and toilet paper do not qualify as necessities here. But apparently a cell phone does, according to a U.N. report.

Even so, people survive everyday in so many different ways. Each culture has its own method for getting by and its own customs for celebrating doing so. The old adage that everyone puts their pants on one leg at a time may be true, but here men and women wear skirts. Road gates are moved with ropes, pulleys and rocks for weights. Postal packages are wrapped in cloth and sewn shut.

Finding a good yoga experience can be tricky. Many yoga teachers in India do not have the same teaching style that Western yogis are accustomed and some may not be professionally trained.

Some of the people I’ve met who are studying yoga here are studying with Americans who are living here. One piece of advice I was given was to only study with Western teachers, but I’ve had good Indian teachers as well.

Sorting out the good from the bad is not easy. Finding a place to stay while studying is another difficult task.

I started this site to build a community of people traveling for yoga and allow discussions on these places. While the site is growing however, there’s some keen advice to be had.

1. Always ask your yoga teacher if they had someone they studied with. If you like their teaching style it’s probable you’ll like who they learned from.

2. TripAdvisor.in Yes it’s the go-to site for hotels. In India it’s a must because frequently what’s advertised is not reality. The site also includes ashrams and other yoga spas and resorts among its reviewed.

3. Facebook Several ashrams have Facebook pages and it can be a good place to find people who have stayed there. Granted if they liked it on Facebook they will probably give it a positive review, but you can find someone who can give the real scoop on if towels are provided and how strict a place is.

4. Twitter Not always trending but during the massive floods this year in Rishikesh that’s where I got the first news that the giant Shiva statue was floating down the Ganges and confirmed my decision to wait a couple weeks before heading there. It’s worth searching to find people who have been there for more brains to pick.

5. YogaJournal.com A good mass of stories where you can search their site on such words as “ashrams” “India” or even “Rishikesh.”

Most importantly: Be patient. If the first teacher or location isn’t a good fit – move on.

And for a little update from my travels.

I left Goa and headed south to the port city of Fort Cochin. European and laid back, I toured around on a bicycle and ate fruit and cinnamon bread. It rarely felt like India and has made me crave a long list from waffles to goat cheese.

I saw a few signs posted for yoga, including one at the Killian’s Hotel across from the Chinese fishing nets but I couldn’t make it at the times offered.

Wanting to see the roots of all this tea I’ve been drinking I headed into the mountains. Clouds wrapped around the towering hills coated with tea bushes.

Calm and serene, I spent a few days wandering around and tracking an elephant in a nearby wildlife sanctuary. I never found that elephant but I did spot mother and her kin on the riverbank today.

Tomorrow, I am doing a jungle safari in a preserve south of the tea plantations in a region known for its spices. They sell cardamom by the kilo. I may be going back to the post office.