Bodgaya - on the tracks of Buddha

Our guidebook and some people I met on the way recommended to visit Bodgaya and dive into the Buddhist and Tibetan culture. By pure coincidence we arrived right at the beginning of a big Buddhist festival called "Karmapa". The streets and of course the main temple with the "Body tree" --- the tree, under which Sidharta reached enlightenment and became Buddha -- were packed with monks and pilgrims. Patricia, Agus and I inhaled the special atmosphere of thousands of believing people praying and listening to the lectures held by big spiritual masters, the so called "Rimpoche". After two days of exploring temples of many different nationalities our journey together has come to an end. Pat and Agus moved on to Kolkatta, while I decided to stay some more days and dedicate my time to Yoga and meditation. I miss their company, but on the other hand now a new part of my trip has started and I am looking forward to other experiences.

Luckily I met an interesting guy at the Tibetan monastery -- he was from Graz, Austria, Buddhist for 25 years and just preparing for a 3 month retreat -- who recommended me an institution where meditation-classes are held twos a day. I would have to write a book trying to explain you what meditation is and what it isn´t, but I can tell you that it is very difficult to slow down the continuous stream of thoughts and manage to consciously live the present moment without the mind interrupting and fading away into the past or future…

It seems that the internal part of my trip has started... ;) From the 23rd of December to the 1st of January I will be on some kind of retreat, so I will disappear from the map during X-mas and Silvester which is kind of an appealing perspective for me as I ultimately tend to feel more stressed by these occasions than I am actually enjoying them ;) Of course I hope that I am one of the few persons feeling like this and that you enjoy X-mas and new year!!! All the best to you, big hug ;)