higher education

amritsar--> katra (vaishno devi and shiv kori yatras)--> sanasar--> kishtwar--> gulabgarh--> kilar--> keylong--> leh

from over here, far and away, i am noticing a general cry amongst my compatriots back home: everyone is going back to school. i understand the urge very greatly, as undergrad was in so many ways unsatisfying. it seemed most of us got thrown into the rigours (or lack thereof) of university life without a moment to really think what we were doing. decisions were forced by beaurocratic deadlines leading many of us strange paths. latin? art history? theatre? hilarious. as for myself, i thank university only for the following three things:

1. the chance to live on the beautiful west coast of canada

2. the people who taught me, and most of them weren't professors

3. samuel beckett

these were things that started picking at the walls around my heart. they made cracks so that i could see that light was on the other side. india then proceeded to take a sledgehammer to those walls.

and what of india? another trip almost under my belt. i'm seeing more and more that actually being in india is not the journey; the journey is internal. i've been hard-travelling through the mountains looking for peace and only rarely finding it. between hyperactive hindoos, physical malfunctions, landslides and (worst of all) my own wretched mind, i have been feeling that pilgrimage must be an action of the soul, not the body. i hope that all of my dears going back into the education system are feeling the same way about their programs. the real lessons we are trying to learn are not contained in countries or classrooms. they are free and available to anyone willing to seek them. these are just the means we go by.

i'm above 3500 masl and for the moment that's the only higher education i can imagine for myself. maybe this is all just the AMS talking. i'm not going to get any letters after my name or a good job for my efforts. i just have to rest on the faith that there's something else for me.

om hari om hari om