Some interesting facts I learned since coming here

Everything has been happening so fast and I am really overwhelmed everyday. I feel like I was born just yesterday and have to learn even the most basic thing, like for example how to eat.
I have been blessed enough to have met someone like Omanand, a sadhu who has been living in India for the past 10 years and who speaks fluent Hindi.
He has been the main source of knowledge for me and has taught me everything---especially the Do and Don't of life in the Ashram.
First thing I learned was NOT to touch a Sadhu. As typical me, I patched a very friendly sadhu on the shoulder when I arrived because I wanted to thank him for showing me where something was. Omanand said later that in India sadhus are not to be touched. It is extremely interesting why they shouldn't be touched as well. It's all about energy and vibrations and because sadhus have renounced to all wordly things and vowed to life chastity and celibacy, it's just not good to be touched, especially by a foreign woman, whose vibrations are very different to the vibrations of local women.
This leads to another thing I learned the first few days I was here. I wanted to help around the kitchen to prepare food and give a hand to the cook, who cooks very nice vegetarian food for quite a few people everyday. Unfortunately I am not allowed to do that though and again it's all about vibrations. It is believed here that when someone cooks he/she will pass on his/her own energy onto the food. The food in this ashram cannot be cooked by someone outside their cast, if anything it can be cooked by someone from a higher cast but I guess not by a foreigner, which I totally respect.
Also, you eat everything with your right hand (yes you understood, no fork and knives here) as the left hand is considered impure because used for things like going to the toilet and stuff like that. So especially when you take prasad from a guru or saint, you pick it up with your right hand on top of your left hand, then pass the prasad onto your left hand and eat it with your right hand, possibly never really touching the mouth and saliva, which is thought to be impure.
When women are on their period they are not allowed to go close to any gurus or saints or temples or in the kitchen.

At first I really had to concentrate to remember all these small things as I felt nervous to mess things up but they have now become almost natural and the funny thing is that I went for a quick meal at a restaurant the other day and when given a fork I had almost forgotten how to use it! I dropped it on the floor and had to ask for another one. I then realised that eating with the right hand is sooo much better.

have a lovely day!