My trip to India, most spiritual country?

(Wise Lessons) The Mysterious Life of Anandamayi Ma

• Anandamayi Ma?

(Nahana) India sucks!!! Don't ever come to this country

(Isha Branderhorst) I stayed in an ashram in Rishikesh, and it changed my life: honest experience

• (Mystics of India) Sadhguru on wild, wild country, Osho (Swami Bhagwan Rajneesh), and spiritual "cults"
• Where is Rishikesh, yoga capital of the world?
• Is an Ashram an intentional community?

Hunter discovers massive Buddhist civilization

Solly Wise, History All Day via MSN; Pat Macpherson, Dhr. Seven (eds.), Wisdom Quarterly

Officer was hunting a tiger in Mumbai but found an ancient civilization instead

John Smith’s wildest dreams came true in April 1819 when, while exploring the Indian jungle outside of Mumbai (Bombay), he stumbled upon a Buddhist discovery so fascinating it blew his mind. His chance encounter changed the history books and is surely one of the biggest achievements of his life. More

• New study discovers eight new prehistoric human groups

Tibetan sweater sellers, Bombay 2016 (video)

Dreamtime Productions (video); Dhr. Seven, CC Liu, Wisdom Quarterly

 

In Mumbai (Bombay, India), when the Tibetan sweater sellers set up their street stalls on the footpath, one knows that winter has arrived.Who are these people and where do they come from? This documentary gives a glimpse not only of their time in Mumbai but also their resilient and brave spirit that has them facing and laughing through trials and tribulations. The generous and lovable Tibetans share their hopes and dreams. When next walking by their stalls, perhaps will stop and say "Tashi Delek," share a chai (tea) with them, buy a sweater or two... These will be moments that will inspire with charming smiles and wishes that their dreams come true. Free Tibet.

Ask the Sexpert (audio)

Maya, CC Liu, Amber Larson, Wisdom Quarterly; Ameen Kader, Ashley Byrne (PRI.org)

Should I be touching my own breasts?

A retired doctor has become a popular figure in India after answering hundreds of questions a week about sex.

Dr. Mahinder Watsa, 90, gives males and females of all ages the chance to get answers to personal questions with his column in a popular Indian tabloid newspaper.
 
He practiced for many years as a gynaecologist and trained as a sex therapist in the United States. He first became an advice columnist for an Indian women’s magazine and then in 2005 began writing for Bombay's Mumbai Mirror.

 

Since then he’s answered tens of thousands of questions.

He doesn't need to know, and he'll still be happy

"People ask me, 'Are you making up the questions?' because some of them are really weird," says Dr. Watsa. "And I said, 'No, I don't. What comes in, I answer" [which is mostly about masturbation, rumors, naive ponderings, embarrassment, and unknown consequences].
 
The things people ask about range from questions around the practicalities of sex to issues around sexuality as well as relationships and physical looks.
 

Wait, Indians masturbate to my pornos?

It has caused some controversy in a country that still struggles with prudish attitudes towards sex, but Dr. Watsa’s no-nonsense approach and sense of humor have garnered him quite a following among readers of the paper and online.
 
"The column I think is popular because there are very few people who really attend to this area of their physiology or of their bodies," he adds.

He often finds himself dealing with myths and old wives tales about sex as well as questions relating specifically to the Indian way of life around things like arranged marriages [and the need for virginity or the appearance of it].
 
Dr. Watsa says people are becoming more open about sex, but the dissemination of information in India can be a barrier.

"Unfortunately, sex became a very political subject about four or five years ago, and suddenly there was a lot of hubbub about it, as a result of which sex education was banned in the schools, almost in all states in the country," says Dr. Watsa.

• AUDIO: LISTEN NOW (pri.org)

Don't think about sex, don't think about sex

At one time most of the questions that came in were from men, but more and more women are now writing to him.
 
"They talk about their breasts being small or big, or one recently thought her buttocks were very large," he says.
 
Many women get worried that their husband looking at porn means they’re not interested in sex with them.
 

Prefer the "good ol' days" of colonialism?

"The women are becoming more open and asking how to deal with these problems," he adds. India’s own "Dr. Ruth" answers questions that come in daily. And even though he’s just turned 90 he shows no sign of retiring.
 
"I tell people my head and feet are working and all the other parts are in order, so I suppose I will go on," he says. More

 

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Indian actress to pose for Playboy, ruin India

Huffington Post: Weird News; Wisdom Quarterly

India makes more movies than Hollywood

Sherlyn Chopra, a Bollywood film actor, will become the first woman from India to strip naked in Playboy. The 28-year-old knockout wrote to the magazine and suggested the idea herself, the BBC reported. They got back to her within a few days to accept. 

   

Fans will have to wait till the November issue circulates to get a glimpse of Chopra. A press conference earlier this week heralded the addition of a "Bollywood goddess" to the pantheon of beauties who've appeared on the pages of Hugh Hefner's magazine. 

 

India is socially conservative to a fault

But her decision to pose caused a controversy in her native India where the granddaddy of all adult magazines is banned. A critic cited by the Daily Mail wrote "one wonders if Sherlyn Chopra’s pictures wound a woman’s integrity."

  

Chopra, who has had small roles in a handful of Bollywood flicks, is unfazed by the criticism. "I have become the first Indian to pose naked for Playboy," she said to the BBC, "and nobody can take away that achievement from me," She uploaded snapshots from her tour of the famous Playboy mansions in Los Angeles to her Twitter account.

• PHOTOS: Sherlyn Chopra and Hugh Hefner
• Porn magnate Hugh Hefner reunited with girlfriend
• Bollywood hypocrisy: "The Dirty Picture"

 India tries to come to terms with its double standard in "The Dirty Picture"

as a Bollywood starlet is both made famous and condemned for being sexy.

Will gratuitous porn ruin India?

Wisdom Quarterly (COMMENTARY)

The specter of the bunny ears looms

Modern India is an amazingly conservative and sexist country. Although it creates far more movies than Hollywood, which are seen by far more people in India, there is no nudity in any of them. There is no sex, and for the longest time, there were no overt kisses, although both acts were implied. Dancing is celebrated and often serves as a substitute just as it has in many places around the world (including the US). And more and more violence is celebrated. But sex is taboo, which partially explains the massive population: With suppression comes a mystique with no legitimate outlet for experimentation, so illegitimate resources are exploited in secret. It is exactly because it is taboo that it remains titillating, fascinating, and an endless font of hypocrisy. Until now that titillation has been directed at foreigners (as well as children, the helpless, the most vulnerable, etc.), particularly Westerners, who constantly appear in what little porn is available in India. (It certainly exists but is very underground). Now rather than "liberating" anyone, Western-style exploitation can begin in earnest. Will it ruin India? It may. Other things like war, a war economy (thanks to a growing military-industrial complex), and infrastructure problems may seem more salient. But the day to day experience of living in sexist India is about to get worse.

Tibetans plan protests to "welcome" China

Tibetan groups plan protests to "welcome" Chinese premier

Hindustan Times (Dec. 15, 2010)
NEW DELHI, India - It's not just the Indian government that's gearing up to welcome Chinese Premier Wen Jiabao. Tibetan organizations in the city are drawing up their plans as well, albeit for a different reason. Students for a Free Tibet (SFT), Tibetan Youth Congress (TYC), Tibetan Women's Association, and Friends of Tibet India plan to stage protests across the city in the next three days, when the Chinese Premier will be in the Capital.

TYC members will hold a protest march starting from Rajghat at 11:00 am. It will wind up in central Delhi. "Around 500 of us will march under the banner: 'Free Tibet W(h)en, Free Tibet now,' " said Tenzin Norsang, TYC joint secretary.

Protests have also been planned for Dec. 16 and 17, but Norsang refused to give out further details. Tibetan poet and freedom activist Tenzing Tsundue will also join. In 2002, Tsundue climbed the scaffolding of a Mumbai [Bombay] building where then Chinese premier Zhu Rongji was staying. He carried a banner that read "Free Tibet"... More>>

India: Kashmir rally, Mumbai massacre

Serene Dal Lake in war torn Kashmir, made famous by a Led Zeppelin song residents have never heard, Kashmir Valley, India (AFP).

Kashmir, in the extreme north of India, is a state (J&K) with a wondrous valley, home of the remains of Jesus Christ, and the gateway to Buddhist-India (Ladakh). Its proximity to Tibet means constant foot traffic between world-famous Hemis Gompa, the Chinese line-of-control (de facto border), and Lhasa (in the Tibetan Autonomous Region).

Mumbai (formerly Bombay) is the banking and movie capital (Bollywood) of India. It is home to millions -- as made infamous by the Academy award-winning "Slumdog Millionaire" -- and recently suffered an appalling attack from Pakistan. It is home to a little-known religious minority (the Parsis) who practice Zorastrianism (Zoraster as in Zarathustra), which formed the foundation of the Christian tradition.

Suspected communist rebels kill 16 police in India
MUMBAI, India (AP) - Suspected communist rebels ambushed a police patrol in western India today, killing 16 officers, police said.

Thousands rally in Kashmir to mourn slain separatist leaders
SRINAGAR, India (AFP) - Tens of thousands of Kashmiris chanting pro-freedom slogans today held a rally to commemorate two top separatists slain on the same day a dozen years apart.

• Asia News

Another example of post-colonial civil strife thanks to the United Kingdom and its waning dreams of empire: Supporters of the moderate faction of Indian-administered Kashmir's main separatist alliance the All Parties Hurriyat Conference attend a rally in downtown Srinagar. Tens of thousands of Kashmiris chanting pro-freedom slogans today held a rally to commemorate two top separatists slain on the same day a dozen years apart (AFP/Tauseef Mustafa).

Bombay & "Slumdog Millionaire" follow-up

PLAY VIDEO

First, Rubina Ali and Azharuddin Mohammed Ismail, both nine-years old, starred in an Oscar winning motion picture. Now they are appearing in real-life soap operas.

• VIDEO: Pint-size stars arrive in Mumbai (Australia 7 News)
• VIDEO: Slumdog director: "Changing" child actors' lives (AP)

The paparazzi are everywhere, as are reporters who want to talk to the kid stars of "Slumdog Millionaire." Their lives are making the gossip columns and headlines in their native India -- and overseas.

• Tale of Two Cities: Life in Bombay (Mumbai) poverty and pride side by side

Azhar was reportedly slapped by his father when the boy, begging fatigue from traveling back from the Academy Awards in Hollywood, refused to give an interview his father had apparently promised. (Both were penitent afterwards: Azhar said he had been "naughty," according to the Times of India... More>>

Bombay: Biggest City on Earth

• VIDEO

The city of Mumbai, India, is home to nearly 14 million people. To put that number in perspective, it's like more than the total population of Illinois all packed into an area smaller than Chicago. And that's not counting the estimated 10 million more people that live in Mumbai's sprawling suburbs....

Slumdog Millionaire Celebration in India

Neighbors of actor Azharuddin Mohammed Ismail watch the a telecast of the 81st Annual Academy Awards near his home, in a slum in Bandra, suburban Mumbai, India, 2/23/09 (AP/Gautam Singh).

MUMBAI, India – Children broke into Bollywood dance numbers and crowds cheered in the narrow lanes of a teeming Mumbai [formerly Bombay] slum on Monday as their hometown heroes nabbed Hollywood's highest honors.

• LATE NEWS: Real life child actors pulled from poverty! (NYDN)
• Video: Mumbai slum dwellers take pride in "Slumdog" Oscars success (AFP)

Two of the child actors in "Slumdog Millionaire" were plucked from a desperately poor neighborhood on the outskirts of Mumbai to star in the rags-to-riches tale that stormed the Academy Awards.

The actors, Azharuddin Mohammed Ismail, 10, and Rubina Ali, 9, were flown to Los Angeles for the ceremony, leaving their friends back home to gawk, beam, shout and dance in celebration. More>>

• Video: "Slumdog" cast looks like a "Million" bucks (AP)

India's Holymen

Meanwhile, elsewhere on the subcontinent:

• India moves to revamp security after Mumbai siege
• Pakistan turns screw on charity linked to Mumbai attacks AFP
• Pakistan vows to comply with U.N. curbs after Mumbai Reuters
• Pakistan acts against one of India's most-wanted Reuters
  VIDEO:
• Video: 'No evidence' of Pakistan link BBC
  Video: 60th anniversary of Human Rights Reuters
  Video: Terrorists at Large FOX News

Great Global Pagoda: India

Great Global Pagoda

globalpagoda.org/Karuna Films

This short film offers a stunning look at the Global Pagoda being built on the outskirts of Bombay, India's most populous city. It is a modern wonder of engineering. Architecturally, this building will be by far the largest single-span stone dome in the world, twice as big as the Vatican's Basilica of St. Peter. Computer-guided stone saws are at work beside craftsmen using timeless chisel and hammer techniques.

Global Pagoda pays tribute to Burma for safeguarding the Dharma by reflecting the outer form of its famous Shwedagon Pagoda. However, this pagoda is being built as a hollow structure that will seat 9,000 for meditation. It featurese a gallery with educational panels and displays to inform visitors about the matchless contribution of the Buddha to human history. Thus it is intended to serve as a beacon of practice and education for multitudes, for centuries to come.

The placement of the keystone closing the dome (where the Buddha's relics will be kept) is scheduled for October 29, 2006.

• Insight (Vipassana) Meditation at www.Dhamma.org
• Buddhist books and audio resources at www.Pariyatti.com