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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.