India

My Healing with Vipassana (3): The Art of Simple Life

The Vipassana experience was magical for me as I could now sense the sensation of the surface of my whole body, from top of the head to toe. I could sense the interior of my body. My left brain, my right brain, my stomach and my intestines, my bones… all were producing never-ending subtle vibrations. I could even sense the parts of the body when I was sleeping. When I was dreaming, it was more like watching a movie rather than being involved in the actions of the fantasy. At this point, the meditation was not merely about sitting anymore. When we take breath, we meditate. When we walk, we meditate. When we eat and drink, we meditate. Even when we sleep, as long as the awareness is there, we also meditate. By Day 6, I started to notice small details I used to neglect. I started to see the movement of grass and leaves of the trees, appreciate the freshness of the air and the beauty of the occasional noise from the neighborhood, and be thankful to all my weaknesses and flaws, all [read more]

March 25, 2015 // 1 Comment

My Healing with Vipassana (2): Nothing is Permanent

Goenka the Teacher had reminded all the students that the Day 2 and Day 6 in our 10-day course of Vipassana would be the most difficult. At least, I can say, the Day 2 was really the biggest torture. I came to the Vipassana meditation course with an expectation of finding salvation from my depression. I thought I would see a magic aura of enlightenment, or beautiful visions, or a surreal experience of ecstasy. But what’s this? This was just a boring process of sitting in total silence, with nothing to do but to observe breath for ten hours per day. The more I craved for a divine vision, the more I got restless. While I closed my eyes and seemed calm, my mind was not unlike an untamed wild horse which brought me galloping over series of memories and fears. Once I saw blurred pictures of places I have visited, changing rapidly as flash: mountains of Himalaya, deserts of Pakistan, jungles of Papua. Suddenly after those happy moments of reiterating my traveling years on the road, my [read more]

March 24, 2015 // 0 Comments

My Healing with Vipassana (1): A Happiness Seeker and His Breath

Something was terribly wrong with me lately. I used to feel much “alive” when I travel on the road, but returning to days of monotony confined in Jakarta apartment always brought depression to me. It’s ironic to feel lonely amidst a busy and noisy apartment block inhabited by thousands of people. I was sure, my depression had something to do with my family problems. Since I lost my mother five years ago, sadness and fear slowly grew inside me. Three years after that, my father passed away. Year after year, I could not handle this loneliness anymore. I felt more and more insecure. Every quiet night I go to bed alone, I was bombarded by frustrating thoughts. Am I still needed in this world? For the sake of whom do I still need to continue my life? Even worse, I have depression and anxiety at the same time. As the negativity piled up, once in a while, I even contemplated of doing something very, very stupid to end my life. Until then, a friend suggested me to try Vipassana [read more]

March 23, 2015 // 1 Comment

Khorog – The Journey to GBAO

One of the two brothers, fellow passengers on the journey to Khorog, GBAO, Tajikistan GBAO, the Gorno Badakhshanskaya Avtonomnaya Oblast (Gorno Badakhshan Autonomous Oblast) is my main reason to come to Tajikistan. It is dominated by the minority Ismaili Badakhshani Tajiks and Sunni Kyrgyz. It has majestic mountain architectures. But the main reason I want to go to this restricted area was its history. The province was supporting rebel side in the civil war of Tajikistan. The province suffered a lot from the blockade of the central government. Going to Tajikistan is already something strange for my Indonesian friends in Kabul. “Why going to Tajikistan? It is a poor country.” Going to GBAO is another thing to be objected by my Tajik friends in Dushanbe. “Why going to GBAO? It is so far and poor…” Even the Tajik diplomat in Kabul raised his eyebrows when my embassy staff insisted to get a Tajik visa together with GBAO permit. “Is he really a tourist???” For the ‘GBAO’ [read more]

October 18, 2006 // 0 Comments

Lahore – I See India Again

April 25, 2006 Across the border Yes, this is a trip to the Indian border for the famous ridiculous border ceremony of the two enemous brothers: India and Pakistan. Few months ago I attended the ceremony from the Indian side, hardly saw anything due to the huge crowds. Seeing from the different sides of the border is always interesting. It’s just a thin line on the map, some inches of line de jure, but it made the two completely different sides on right and left side. Travelling to the border from Lahore, was passing through dusty areas of uninhabited lands. The area was completely empty since the Partition, and just recently when the relation between India and Pakistan getting better, people started to inhabit the dusty land between Lahore and the border. Equally the same case for Amritsar (Indian city next to the border), but less dusty. It was hot, and dusty. The sweat mixed with the dust to form special ingredients on my wrong-seasoned garment of clothes. The border is [read more]

April 25, 2006 // 0 Comments

Noraseri – The Doctor Shahab Family

April 2, 2006 Doctor Shahab with my Indonesian cap The NGO camp was emptied already today. The scars of the tents left another scars in people in neighborhood. It was Doctor Shahab, born as Khani Zaman, among those who used to come at least one time in a day to our camp area. He was an old man in his sixties, and everybody called him as Mister Doctor, or Doctor Shahab. I believed he was a doctor, until Hafizah told me that he never been a doctor. It turned out to be that he was a pharmacist, and used to be a driver of an ambulance of Edhi Foundation. His work was not that far from doctor anyway. The first time I knew Doctor Shahab was the same date when the Hajji Shahab passed away. The two occasions still made me confusing the two names many of the times. Doctor Shahab was there in the funeral day of Hajji Shahab, claiming that he was a friend of President Soekarno in school time, and asked me to send a dozen of Indonesian caps. He was humorous, he was optimistic, and he was [read more]

April 2, 2006 // 0 Comments

Karimabad – Indian Connection

Indian influence is obvious here India is just a bordering country, but the history of hostility between India and Pakistan makes the relation between the two countries interesting. As we all probably know, the language of both countries, Urdu and Hindi, are 90% similar. Urdu has more Persian and Arabic originated words, and Hindi from Sanskrit. But both languages are mutually intelligble. Though, the scripts are different. The influence of India is very huge in Pakistan, this is unquestioned. Everybody can sing the gigle of Aashiq Banaya, the new popular Bollywood movie, even though that this new film may not reach the villages of Pakistan. “Mujh se Saati Karogi? (Will you Marry Me?)”, Salman Khan’s newest movie, is a famous sentence anywhere here in Pakistan. And it became a laughter when we use this sentence to tease the others. The people in Karimabad, far away from anywhere, stuck their satellite dish to Indian channels. And guess what, a very plain TV drama, [read more]

January 9, 2006 // 3 Comments

Rawalpindi – Cantontment?

I never expected that it’s very difficult to find a place to stay in this city Imperial Hotel, Muree Road, Rawalpindi 400Rs/double bed room After the 5 hour bus journey from Lahore to Islamabad, and long taxi drive to Saddar Bazaar in Rawalpindi, I was really resent by the hotel owner who refused me to stay in his hotel. Saddar Bazaar is the place for the budget hotels in Rawalpindi, where 2 years ago I used to stay. Today, they refused to accept me as their guest, as there is a stamp ‘Visa not Valid for Cannt Area’ on my visa page. I didnt realize what the meaning of the small stamp on my visa before today. The feeling of being refused in a hotel was very bad. I can imagine the same feeling of people being refused to enter a certain country despite of possessing the valid visa. And I felt disappointed, badly treated, being looked as second class man, etc. Cantontment is military area, which sometimes also include residential and bazaar area, as in this example [read more]

December 17, 2005 // 0 Comments

Lahore – Welcome to Pakistan

Regale Internet Inn 150 Rs/dorm Indian border guard across the Pakistan borderline. Being sick for so many days has given me the chance to read lots of books recently. Just read Salman Rushdie’s “Shame” about the ridiculous stories of Pakistan history, from uprising and downing of its political leaders, from the ridiculous political manouvers, and also the stories about the founding of the “Land of Pure” and it failures. The other good book I got is VS Naipaul’s “Among the Believers”. This book is about Islam in Iran, Pakistan, Malaysia, and Indonesia. I have read the Indonesian part, and felt that the critics was quite well-said, even some parts I dont quite agree. The Pakistan part is quite interesting, how these Indian Muslims created this “Land of Pure” and how they tried to be the most purified Muslim on earth. But the struggle is full of failures, and Pakistan was a country of experiments. And today, I successfully [read more]

December 13, 2005 // 0 Comments