Traveling Within at Nepal 10 Ten Day Silent Retreat

Hey Everyone! We’re in for a treat this week – Raji is back with another article to share with us. If you recall, Raji is our friend we met while we spent some blissful time on Gili Island in Indonesia. She wrote about her family road trip in Nepal. We visited Raji’s home country of Nepal and had an absolutely fabulous time. We went on a wildlife safari (yes – Nepal has some amazing wildlife) and hiked the stunning Poon Hill. Raji has completed a ten day silent retreat and found the experience impactful and wanted to share that with everyone.

I just want to take a moment to give an extra shout out to Raji’s work and her passions. She was recently asked to give a talk at Stanford in their Summer Human Rights Series. She will be talking about care giving work. (omg – amazing Raji! Check out the event here.) Most recently, she has been working with teachers on the notion Safe Schools focusing on anti-bullying using a Narrative Approach.  Travel has connected us and I am so glad we crossed paths. I hope you enjoy reading this piece and thank you so much Raji. 

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Travelling Within

When thinking about traveling the mind goes to making reservations, booking buses, trains and planes and making a list of what to carry, measuring the weight of ones bag and so forth. And of course the excitement of seeing a new place.

I was really excited as well, but this trip was different. I was only going a few kilometers north of my home town to the Dhamma Center for a ten day silent retreat. If you are not familiar I was going for Vipassana, an ancient form of meditation that was taken to Burma by disciple of Buddha. Its knowledge was lost in other parts of the world but Burmese monks preserved it in its true essence. In the mid ’70s Goyanka, a Burmese of Indian descent hailing from a rich business family stumble upon it while he was trying to find a cure for terrible migraine headaches. He started the practice and never looked back and since then centers have opened all over the world.

My parents had done the silent retreat several years back and I had been planning to do it for many years but things hadn’t aligned. I was a bit afraid and nervous at the prospect of having to sit for more than eight hours a day and maintain a vow of silence including no writing and reading. So in December of 2017 I signed up for a mid-January 2018 session. “It will be tough but you will be fine” and “I am so excited for you!” were the two sentences friends who had done it before uttered in succession. I looked at them perplexed but it all made sense when I came out of there.

Now I know this blog is about travelling. Although at first I didn’t think about this trip as having anything to do with travelling, the more I thought about it the more it made sense to me. I have been travelling on and off keeping Kathmandu, my home-town as my base, but I was feeling the urge that I needed to go somewhere for a while but also be really still.

And most importantly tackle my fearing of just sitting with myself.

I am one of those travellers who can check out and look for distraction instead of being present. And was starting to notice that in last trip I made in 2017. I am a person who likes to be in motion and I do my best thinking when I am doing something. I have a degree in Social Work which is basically like saying I have a degree in problem solving. I like to fix problems and manage crises. Sitting still for me is opposite to those things. But the world is full of problems and distractions. Something inside me felt ready. I wanted to challenge myself and wanted to see if I could sit still for once instead of always telling myself that I am not someone who can do that. I wanted to change this narrative about myself.

Also, I realized if I really wanted to enjoy travelling I also need to cliche alert…travel within and be with myself.

So how did I do that?

First I made a reservation to be part of a retreat which happens twice every month unless indicated otherwise in the online schedule. The website itself provides a lot of information on the registration process. You are asked to read the philosophy behind the meditation technique and also the “what you are in for” disclaimer.

The center is a bus ride away from its city office.
The center is run by volunteers and while you are there you are living there for free in the kindness of strangers who like you attended the retreat and donated whatever they felt like donating at the end of their stay.

The environment surrounding the Center is peaceful and is perfect for respite. But part of the disclaimer you will hear time and again before you take the vow of silence is that the 10 days are not to be treated as vacation. Sure you won’t be doing much if someone were watching you but you will be sitting with yourself, with your thoughts and may be even meditating.

Depending on the weather, you will be advised what to bring with you. I went in the winter and yes it was cold however we were given enough blankets and enough hot water to last for days. There are set times for meals but you can drink plenty of water. They also have assortment of ginger water, cumin water. I brought a hot water bag with me and I was very glad I did because it kept me warm at night especially as my feet tend to get icy cold and prevent me from falling asleep.

If you are travelling through Kathmandu, the center will also assist you to store your luggage while you are at the center. They will safe keep your phone and your passport so you do not have to worry about them whilst there.
I really enjoyed the almost 2 hour long lunch breaks and I remember taking naps in the sun.
The thing I struggled the most was sitting still for all those hours. It will be tough. I really got the sense of how long a minute can be when you have to meditate and how short an hour feels when you are napping in-between mediation sessions! The mind does play those games with us and those games become more apparent when distractions have been minimized to the lowest e.g. no phones, no emails to check, no books to read and no one to talk to.

The vow of silence was not that difficult for me which I found surprising. It was made easier also because we were asked not to make eye contact with anyone. One of the philosophies of the program is that we also present ourselves in such a way that we are the least bit distracting to others. So we let others be present in keeping with the vows as well. This is not to say that you cannot talk if you absolutely need to. There are volunteers who are assigned for just that and also teachers who you will meet everyday and who will ask you if you are doing okay. You also have the option of going to the teacher if you need some guidance eg. if you are feeling anxious, have questions about a technique, need clarification about it etc. etc. On my third day I woke up with a huge pimple on my eyelid and freaked out only to be calmed down by the volunteers and given appropriate medication.

I am not a religious person and I liked most aspect of the meditation technique mainly because there was no religious posturing. There is no idol worship or elaborate pujas. The philosophy is basically you can take it or leave it but give the practice a fair chance while you are at it!

It is a lot of time to be spending “doing nothing.” Although it may look like that and it is that, the doing nothing really does add value to the times when we are doing something, be it travelling to a known land or exploring a new place.

I would say that this meditation is not for everyone and people react to it differently. My reaction was that of surprise that I liked it and relief that it was over but I know I want to do it again because learning about myself and travelling within is still a place less travelled for me and I want to change that.

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Raji Manjari is currently based in her home town of Kathmandu. After 11 years she is back and loves to explore the city with plans to travel more extensively around Nepal and the surrounding regions in the coming years. She is passionate about mental health awareness.

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