It has been a while since I've updated my blog. I fell ill to a serious case of Laziness :P. A lot has happened in the meanwhile, and I will update my blog with a big summary. To give you a teaser:

- The mysterious case of the alcohol curse
- The return of my meat karma
- Meeting a Living Buddha
- The auspicious return of my mother back to the Sangha
- Back to India?! Again?

Stay tuned!

Finally back from Mount Athos and have some time to settle down and write.

The whole trip was one big comedy, but with the necessary life lesson in it. To be honest, it was my first real experience in Christianity, and in particular Orthodox Christianity. Before continuing let me sketch the scene for you first.

Mount Athos is considered the Holy Mountain of the Orthodox Christians for people to retreat as monks and/or hermits and dedicate their life to God. It is open for pilgrims to spend some days there to strengthen their faith. Interestingly, no women are allowed on the island, and it can only be accessed by boat through 2 ports only. I think you have to be even Orthodox Christian to access Mount Athos, luckily through a friend of Photis we were able to enter without any problem and stay longer than the average 3 days.

We basically embarked the journey with the 5 of us, David, Photis, Yoryos, Marcus and yours truly. To enter Mount Athos you need a special permit. When we received our permits, the religion of the person is stated on the paper; for me it was "nothing", for David "Catholic", assuming he was Italian, and for Marcus it said "Protestant". Photis and Marcus went last year, and Marcus got into some trouble because he was Protestant. So, we went back to immediately change our religions haha. Unfortunately for Marcus, due to previous records we were not able to change his permit, but for David and me, we now have an official paper from Mount Athos stating that we are Orthodox Christian :)

In truth, nobody would check you, unless there is a huge doubt. 

We basically had a scheduled planned out, which was prearranged. But due to Marcus arriving already sick and then David, we eventually stayed in the first monastery 4 nights instead of 1. The first monastery was well off, but had so many rules, and was filled with angry monks and if it wasn't for Photis' friend we would have probably been kicked out after the first night. You have to see it as going on school camp with the Fathers being the teachers. 
It was interesting to see, how much rules one has, not wearing socks into the monastery is a sin, not fasting is a sin, breaking rules is a sin, having sex with an unmarried woman is a sin, masturbating is a sin and so on. Hahaha, it was at a point ridiculous. Of course this is from our perspective, these are people who are still following ancient rules and live by this. So, when the 5 stooges arrived, they were tested by God and so were we :P.

Also we were stealing wine from the refrigerator, drinking wine late at night, smuggled beer inside the rooms, eating diary during fasting and so on. Like a school camp. 

One night we were planning to do confession, and it was very interesting to see, Yoryos was fully interrogated in how he had sex with his wife. If they had oral sex, anal sex, did he masturbate, and so on. Unbelievable, and literally they were fishing for this stuff, to seek your sins. Luckily, I was last and when David came out of the confession room he said: "Keep it short, the guy talks a lot" hahaha. So, I diverted all the questions and pretended to be the perfect Christian, which the Father was stroking awkwardly my face and saying "Good boy Anthony, Good boy"... seriously weird. Haha. I felt sexually harassed haha.

Ow yes, before I forget, the name Anthony, or Antoon, Antoinne, derived from Saint Anthony the Great, was given to me by David. You could say my Christian Spiritual that arrived out of need. We were visiting several places and of course looking like not your typical Orthodox Christian, basically looking Asian, I was asked many times how I became Orthodox Christian, and when I was baptized. Well coming up with that story and an imaginary Russian family friends was the easy part, then one day one Father asked me what my Christian name was...well eeh..well and David came to the rescue, his name is Antoon... And so Antoon was born. And I embarked my journey through Mount Athos as Antoon. Funny thing was that the whole group had to adjust to calling me Antoon instead of KJ, and it took sometimes a long time before I reacted.."Ow yes, that is me".

Despite the awkward experiences, I must say I had some interesting experiences there as well. The first day I arrived to attend the Divine Liturgy in church, I was in a normal state and not understanding what the monks were doing and saying. When the monks started to chant, for no reason, my heart start to pour out and I started to cry, non-stop for an hour. In this moment I understood the Heart prayer, Lord have mercy. As I finished crying, all the people that were standing around me left, and the corner I was standing was empty, except for one Russian guy, that came to check on me. 

From this monastery we went looking for a hermit who apparently has the gift of the Holy Spirit (whatever that means) to receive blessing and to get Marcus and me baptized. When we found the hermit, who was residing in a brotherhood, we were not allowed to see him. Of course these people they became hermits for a reason, to be away even from the consensus of the monasteries, and it is only natural that they don't want to see anyone, especially the 5 stooges :P. Also, this hermit has stopped seeing people for the past 2 years. 
We tried to press the brother monks to see him, but eventually they were very distant and rather had us go. Instead, we made a small prayer in their chapel and give thanks to the hermit (his presence was definitely there). From their I entered in the Heart and asked the hermit to give us a baptism, and from the Heart, the hermit answered "Lord Jesus Christ is already in your heart, why do you need to be baptized?". I took this as my baptism.  David told us about the famous Saint Kabir, who was born in the low cast, was once waiting for the Guru to come down the stairs to take a bath in the holy Ganges. Kabir laid there on the steps and waited for the Guru to step on him, and when it happened the Guru yelled God. Kabir took this as his initiation, and from that his journey began and became the famous Saint Kabir.
We left a bit disappointed, but David reiterated that the Guru can come in different forms, not necessarily to be in physical form, as his presence was clear. In the end the Heart is but one.

When everyone recovered, we continued our journey to stay at a brotherhood of 3 people. Along the way we visited 2 monasteries. The first one, we bumped into this friendly old monk, who started to make comparison with Buddhism and Hinduism. The monastery itself, had a very uplifting feel, and as the old monk said, it was a more free monastery than others. One of the interesting things the old monk said, was that we did not inherit guilt from Adam as many believe to be, but we inherited the blindness not to see God. Which was a beautiful way of looking at things. 

So we continued and bumped into this Greek guy.. that immediately asked me if I was from Hong Kong, and I asked him how he knew... he said when he was on holidays he would play with the kids of Hong Kong families... and he loves the chinky eyes.. dirty old pervert. Hahaha. We moved on and arrived in a Romanian monastery, again the feeling was different, we met this young monk, very friendly guy and he was telling about the miracle icons they have. One of them is about the Virgin Mary holding Jesus, and that the painter one day could not finish the painting, he suddenly forgot how to paint the faces, and he became very upset, believing he had lost his skills. In the evening, miraculously the painting was finished, and the faces are portrayed very differently, more human like, rather than iconic. It is also said that it is the closest to the real face of Virgin Mary. Another is about the Painting of Saint John with the angry face, when the Turks tried to invade Mount Athos and take over the Icons and Relics, the face turned angry and when they tried to shoot the painting, the bullets fell on the ground. And so each, monastery or brotherhood holds icons, and or relics.

The father, liked us so much that he gave us a Divine Liturgy in English and in mine there was written "To my first friend from Hong Kong/Holland, KJ (Antoon)".

From there we moved on to the brotherhood and stayed there overnight, it was absolutely a beautiful place, hanging over a cliff near the sea.  We did the mass with the Fathers and Marcus got kicked out, because he was Protestant. After that we decided to tell to everyone that he was Orthodox as well, just like me :P. 

The next day we had to travel by foot, and according to many people it was only a 3-3.5 hours walk...great, me with 12 kg on my back and Marcus with 20 kg on his back we were walking 7.5 hours to reach our destination... meeting the most interesting bunch of them all.. a Russian Father that in the end got banned from Russia, and is now residing in Mount Athos almost like a hermit, but with a live blog, haha. When we asked him for showers.. it was a bit of an awkward question, because they did not shower.."Everything is blessed by Virgin Mary no need for showers"...yeah great.. luckily he suggested us to take a dip in the sea for the shower.

The next day we were so afraid to climb up the mountain again to visit the last brotherhood, luckily the boat would go to the other side of the cliff, that saved a lot of time and only a steep 1 hour climb up the mountain. Luckily we got a donkey to carry our bags. It was a jolly brotherhood with their own perks and rules, such as the bell of hell, run by Dumbledore. When we were taking an afternoon nap, they rang the bell of hell, TING TING TING TING, to ask us how we would like our coffee. At 4am the bell of hell rang again, TING TING TING TING, to wake us up, which left me in shock for 45 minutes.

After the whole journey we decided to leave the next day, we basically all felt we finished our journey, and it was time to leave Mount Athos. When buying tickets at Dafni back to Ouranapolis, these 2 Greeks asked me if I was Orthodox. Yes I am. Where are you from? I am from Holland. Where were you born? I was born in Holland. Where are your parents from? Hong Kong, China. And the guys made a cross and one wanted to touch my feet haha. I've been this crazy miracle in Mount Athos, the Chinese Orthodox convert.
Oooh how good it was when we arrived in Ouranapolis, sweet sweet civilization. God have mercy on us!

Looking back, the journey was beautiful, tiring and fruitful. As for my view on Christianity, it did not change that much, it confirmed what I already knew. As a designer we try to achieve simplicity, we discard the unnecessary, and what is left is most important, the essence. For Christianity all that remains then is God is Love. Of course like many people in design, people add things, what they believe is important :P, so it is with religion, people like marketing, or bosses, chair-mans and so, we all have our own view and from that we lose sight of what is important. And hold on stronger to that view than the essence. It is the same for all beliefs, whether religion, or your own view it doesn't matter.

I must say, I have much more respect now for the hermits and the monks that choose this life, it is a 24 hours job with the same baggage in office life, politics, rules, and much more. A life only suitable for a few. Despite the many dogmas and rules, they deserve as much love and compassion as anyone.

After India, I had enough of the dogma in  Buddhism. And now after this long week, I've had enough of the dogma within Christianity. No disrespect to any religion, it is just that my experience so far is that they all point to the same thing, the Heart, most importantly as His Holiness the Dalai Lama says is to develop a loving and caring heart. As John the Baptist said: God is Love. 

Kabir sums it up beautifully:

Where do you search me?
I am with you
Not in pilgrimage, nor in icons
Neither in solitudes
Not in temples, nor in mosques
Neither in Kaba nor in Kailash
I am with you O man
I am with you
Not in prayers, nor in meditation
Neither in fasting
Not in yogic exercises
Neither in renunciation
Neither in the vital force nor in the body 
Not even in the ethereal space 
Neither in the womb of Nature 
Not in the breath of the breath
Seek earnestly and discover
In but a moment of search
Says Kabir, Listen with care
Where your faith is, I am there.

Well not really... Ok let me explain. At first, I had this amazing belief that I should go to India, and go in retreat and deepen my practice, visit all these holy places haha. After three days in India, both Marcus and I realized our journey finished, we actually became depressed haha, how can it be that our intention of 6 months, just ended in three days. And it is not because it is so dirty or not to my liking, it is none of that, I enjoyed my journey so far. It has been fulfilling, yet for me I understand that it was something I created, which I had to dissolve. An idea, that was implemented in my head, by reading stuff and so. Never could imagine it would dissolve in three days.

Anyways, we stayed longer in spite of that realization and were able to receive the blessing of His Holiness. So all is well. Being here in Sringar, for me looking at the European landscapes, made me realize that I my desires to be India completely burned out, and I  will continue my journey in Europe, so I've booked my ticket to Frankfurt, and will be heading back to Holland on Monday. Here, I will rest for a week or so, and continue my journey to Mount Athos in Greece, the Holy Mountain, to develop and see more of the Christian Heart, and from there on I will see where I will go. 

So the journey has not really ended, just not in India anymore :)

As for Marcus, there is still karma here, and he will be off to Rajasthan, to meet his friend and Saint, Baba Shri, and he will continue his journey until he burns away that karma ;)

First of all, yesterday when I was checking the internet, all the news was bombarded with the Malaysia airplane incident. At first I thought they found the other plane, but then I realized the unfortunate news. I wish all those who are directly affected by the incident a lot of Love and strength during this difficult time. For those who know anyone who have been affected, hope you can be a shoulder to cry on. May God have mercy on those who have fallen...Om Mani Padme Hum _/\_

To change the subject in a sudden matter..
Let me recap how we ended up in Srinigar. Marcus and I, were discussing on how to get to Dharamshala. After the very bumpy road and more than 15 hours of bus drive, we almost decided to fly back to Delhi and take the bus from there to Dharamshala. Then we met Altaf Kotroo, from "Same, same but different" shop in Leh, and his friend Marc from Holland (currently living in Germany) who actually suggested to go through Srinigar, as the roads are more comfortable, and everybody keeps on telling us how beautiful Srinigar is. 

So Altaf, arranged everything for us, he arranged a taxi driver, called his brother to have rooms ready, and called his cousin for us to chill at his house boat. Altaf even went so far to let us stay for free at his guesthouse. 

When we arrived, Mumbarak his younger brother told us to let him know if there is anything, you are like family now. It is actually amazing, the guy really gets upset if we want to do something ourselves, if we want to pay for something, haha. And his wife is even cooking every evening something else. And let me tell you, it is home cooked and excellent food. Apparently, Mumbarak's father was the best chef in Kashmir and passed on his skills to Mumbarak's wife. 

It is a bit weird at the same time, because Ramadan is going on, so all the Muslims are fasting until sunset and we are just eating, drinking coffee, drinking beer and so. We even had to go to Mumbarak's cousin to get new beer, because he knows a guy with a secret stash haha. 

Srinigar so far is good, Kotroo family is taking care of us, going on the boat, visiting factories, temples, aah I feel like a tourist. Today, we are resting and taking it easy. 

There is only one odd/interesting thing, the mosque at 2-3am in the morning starts to call everyone through loudspeakers to come to pray hahaha. And then through the speakers they have the whole prayer going through the city. Great...at 3am haha. But all is well, it gives me a peak inside the world of the Muslims. 

You know, my biggest lesson learned so far, it is not about having religion or having no religion defines us or so.. it all comes down to basic human nature, care and love. Now I've seen people from different religions some people are good, and some not so good. It doesn't matter, to categorize yourself to be or not to be of that group doesn't make you a better person, it is as His Holiness the Dalai Lama says, first and foremost I am a human being. It is not religion or non-religion that makes you a good person, it is being human, knowing Love and Care, and that is inherent in all of us, if we are missing that we can't even fulfill our basic nature.. instead we move away, and instead chase around our dreams, our money, our projections, our anger and so on. Interesting.

We Just arrived this morning in Srinigar after a 11.5 hours drive, at Altaf's Kotroo Palace. We were welcomed by his younger brother Mumbarik and we are treated like family. Mumbarik forbid us to lift a finger, and he is taking care of everything. 

Also he was telling that his father is the number one chef in Kashmir, and he will be cooking for us :D

Looking forward to relax these few days here. Srinigar, really has this European feel. Will upload some pictures as we move on. 

Yesterday, finally was the last day of Kalachakra. Actually, the initiation ended on Saturday, but yesterday was a special White Tara long life empowerment for the public and His Holiness. Basically a blessing that helps purify karmic obstructions.

We had to arrive at around 6am. When the empowerment started nothing special..the usual things happening, monks chanting and His Holiness explaining some things. When finished the White Tara empowerment, Marcus eagerly wanted to leave, but I wanted to stay through the Long Life blessing for His Holiness, at least as a thanks. 
Now the interesting part happened, they were ready to invoke some spirits and when the monks started to chant again, a strong emotion arose from my heart and I started to cry, the crying was that strong that I was brought to my knees and I could not get myself up, throughout it I noticed Marcus was also crying...So, imagine the two of us crying in the middle of 5000 foreigners. I cried for an hour and was unable to pick myself up.. the only thing I can say is what a tremendous power of His Holiness, and such compassion.
At the same time, there was a lot of commotion from the public, apparently many people fell into trance and these deities came to pay respect to His Holiness. People were dragged by the police to see His Holiness. Unfortunately, I missed that part :P

As for those who are skeptical about it, His Holiness was explaining, sentient beings are everywhere, some we can see, some we cannot. He said that it must have been an entertaining show for the foreigners. For the locals, it is like anything else, it is part of their culture.

It was an interesting thing that happened. After reflecting I noticed that, while I was crying, only one Tibetan guy sitting in front of me asked me if I was ok.  When I was able to grab myself together, only one Tibetan mother sitting behind me asked me if I was ok. She thought there was something with my stomach, but I explained her it was His Holiness blessing, oddly enough she actually understood. As for Marcus, nobody asked him anything. Yes, we were handed a lot of tissues, but the people just disappeared. Amazing.. surrounded by so many Buddhist foreigners that practice Love and Compassion, missing the basic human nature of care and love for another human being, of course I am generalizing here.
But then again afterwards, Marcus and I had a good laugh of how many people we must have freaked out.

These few weeks, I have seen the other side of the Buddhist community, remove the so-called values they should practice, in the end they are just human beings who dress up like red strawberry (excellent analogy from Marcus :)).
Actually, the monks are maybe even worse..when we left the venue, the area where the monks were sitting was so dirty, like they don't know how to clean up. One of the volunteers we talked to, actually said that the monks even abused their status, and the volunteers often had to bring the police to settle the matter.
Then again, they maybe are the ones in most need for His Holiness' blessing.

As we left the venue, I was unable to move, and my body felt like 90 years old, people were bumping into me and I was continuously almost fainting or falling. Marcus had to walk behind me to deflect the crowd from hitting me. Was good to see the other side, if you don't look old the care and compassion is also lacking haha. Next time, need to dress up like an old man.

In conclusion, this has been the most interesting and heaviest experience so far, and I bow to His Holiness, the rain of compassion that arose yesterday cannot be described... so much power, to benefit all sentient beings. It touched my Heart directly. Respect.
If one ever has the urge to see him, I suggest to go and meet him, no need to meet him in person, as long as you are in his presence is a blessing by itself, and you don't need to be a Buddhist, Christian or whatever religion to know about Love and Compassion, you just need to be Human.

Well, we have had enough of Leh, too dry and hot here. Tomorrow, we are off to Srinigar, Kashmir, to relax and have some beer :) Will upload the pictures of this week when I am in Srinigar, Internet has been so sucky lately.

Yesterday, we celebrated His Holiness' birthday, which was very interesting, about 120.000 people arriving haha, with speeches of Richard Gere, and even the arrival of two deities.

Palden Lhamo
Out of nowhere a woman started to scream, and nobody knew what was happening. The Dalai Lama was perfectly calm and even let the woman come near him, and then she fell unconscious.

Then as the Dalai Lama gave his speech, he saw another man yelling and called him forth. The translator explained, that the woman screaming before, identified herself as the powerful deity Palden Lhamo, which the Dalai Lama saw immediately, and let her pay respect. Later we heard the woman was actually muslim. Interesting.

As for the man, he was the dharma protector of Tibet. As soon as he paid respect to His Holiness, he fell unconscious as well, and then Richard Gere came to give the speech and continued as if it was the most normal thing in the world.

One thing I noticed, is that The Dalai Lama was giving his own blessing to the crowd, I felt very emotional the whole time, and had tears coming out of me. It was very strange because, people were praising him and wishing him happy birthday, the speeches were very boring, nothing to be emotional about. After talking to many people they had similar experiences. 

Yeshe's birthday
So after the prayer we went to Yeshe's birthday party. We arrived at late afternoon to her house and Marcus and I were so tired we took a nap first in her house.

Ladakhis are very friendly, Lhado, Yeshe's sister kept on asking me if I was comfortable and if not I should tell them. They also make sure we eat first, before they eat.

Marcus wasn't feeling very well so he had been lying down and we were all dancing in the other room and enjoying and met Thupten a Tibetan and Simone the Italian guy, they are staying at Yeshe's house. Can't remember how long it has been that I had so much fun and without a care in the world.

Besides dancing, I was also paying attention in the kitchen and Dorji taught me how to make the steamed Ladakhi buns, which I failed badly. Something, I noticed was that the Ladakhis eat very late, at 9pm they start to eat, I was starving haha.

I enjoyed the day a lot. Also, I felt way over age haha, but Simone beat me in that haha. I was reflecting with Marcus today on it and it felt we were part of their family. Very nice.

Today, I've been mostly sleeping at the Kalachakra very nice, doing this now every day. Met up with Simone and Thupten and we bumped in to LiLi a Hong Kong girl who had great plans to go to dance for a year in India, but divine interaction changed things haha.

The Ride to Likir
This morning we woke up at 5am to take a 2 hours drive on the motorbike to see the Dalai Lama. It was a good, but long ride. The roads were great.

The Dalai Lama and attending lecture
When we arrived, I think we never seen so many people flocking from all the villages in Ladakh to see His Holiness the Dalai Lama. It is quite amazing, today I saw on facebook how someone posted a picture of a huge crowd of people demonstrating. Yet here we all came together to receive blessing for peace and love.

I must say being in his presence I did feel this very nice, gentle soothing caring love, it literally moved your heart, in Marcus' words: "It's amazing". But then to sit on the ground for 3 hours, really hurt my ass, and it was like university all over again. Attending a lecture in general is boring, of course to be in His Holiness presence is great and special, but still is a lecture, and the worse was that the translator was really slow haha. After 1.5 hours, the translator decided to translate simultaneously, being silent for more than an hour…great.

Interesting to see how basically everybody was falling asleep after a while, similar in lectures. But then when you ask the people how it was, it was amazing haha. People are funny.

It was also tiring and painful to sit on the ground for so long, it did motivate us to get a big ass pillow for the Kalachakra, or even a chair haha.

But then again, I think it was interesting to see the Dalai Lama in real, rather than from Youtube.

Stop! In name of His Holiness
During our ride back, police were chasing us, or so it seemed. At first they forced us to drive faster; we tried, but our bike couldn’t go faster. After a while, the police who was driving in front of us, forced us to pull over (they themselves kept on driving). As we pulled over and got off the bike, the Dalai Lama passed us and was waving at us haha. Apparently, the police was clearing the road for the Dalai Lama, and we were obstructing the road :P

So another day of rest and then hardcore Kalachakra for 10 days straight on. Pillow hunting tomorrow!

Busy Leh
With the Kalachakra coming, Leh has suddenly been overcrowded in the past few days. I was talking to a local and he actually didn't like it at all. It was interesting to see, how to one extent, the arrival of the Dalai Lam is one of the greatest blessings, became also one  of the great frustration for locals.

We will come tomorrow!
Yesterday evening we met up with Jun and her Israeli friend Raz (not sure if spelled correctly). We finally ate at the Penguin Garden restaurant, which is on our way to city centre. The guy has been bugging us for a week to come and eat at his place, and we kept on promising to come, so we finally did… well… haha the food was good and so, and when we left the restaurant, I saw the guy and enthusiastically told him we had dinner at his place and that the food was great… he gave a surprised and spaced out impression and then said "Will you come to my shop upstairs?"... And this was the confusion of the day… the guy that kept bugging us, did not own the restaurant, he owned a shop that sells goods upstairs hahaha. So, we had to promise him again that we would visit his shop tomorrow.

Holland vs Mexico
So after dinner Raz heard about this bar that we wanted to check out. When we finally arrived, to my surprise Holland was playing against Mexico… the first 80 minutes were really boring, and then when Sneijder finally scored, I was the only one yelling haha, and when Huntelaar made the penalty, I was like "hup holland hup" haha..in an awkward lonely moment haha. Or people must have thought "Why is this bald Japanese guy cheering for Holland?" Strangest mood ever watching a football match haha, but I was imagining how it was in Holland, where everybody is tensing up, and releasing the tension when the goals went in haha.

Lessons learned
Next time when someone asks to come visit his/her place, ask which one it is :p