India

Dharamshala, India

Dharamshala is the home of Dalai Lama and, by extension, Tibetan Buddhism. It’s a small city perched along wooded hillsides about 300 miles north of Delhi. I engaged a taxi to drive me from the region’s tiny airport to my hotel in McLeodganj, but arrived on foot after what was, for me, a terrifying ride up the mountain — or in my case, part of the mountain. The city is lively but not chaotic like so much of India, and it feels different because the culture is predominantly Tibetan. And the cool climate of Dharamshala was a relief after spending several weeks in the intense heat of China and Sri Lanka.

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Khajuraho Oh Wow

Hindus believe that spiritual growth comes from a synchronization of the mind, heart, soul and body. Because Hindus believe the physical body and its functions aren’t separate from the other aspects of our being, it’s not surprising that there is a temple complex in India with carvings that are very explicitly sexual. Khajuraho in Central India is dozens of sandstone temples built in the 9th, 10th, and 11th centuries The temple walls depict scenes from the Kama Sutra, an ancient Hindu manual of sexual pleasure, desire, and love.

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Amritsar in the Punjab

The Golden Temple

Amritsar is a city near the northwestern part of India in the region called the Punjab. It’s the home of the Sikh religion and the Sikhs’ most important place of worship, Harmandir Sahib, also called the Golden Temple. This is not a normal temple. In addition to being a holy place of prayer and reflection, its kitchen and hundreds of volunteers serve more than 100,000 free meals every day. This work is part of the Sikh philosophy of “sewa” or service, and the reason I came to Amritsar.

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