The Rabbit Hole 🕳🐇 issue no.37 [travel issue pt I]
🇮🇳 🛫 adventures in India: Delhi, Rishikesh, & Varanasi
Dear reader,
This month’s issue of Rabbit Holes is going to be a bit different from our usual programming :)
I’ve been traveling India for March / April - So staying true to sharing my honest rabbit holes each month, i’ll be sharing the intellectual rabbit holes that have been triggered from all that i’ve experienced while traveling.
I’ll also be sharing ALL the sights, eats, & exps I can wholeheartedly recommend, in the case you travel to either India or Italy in the future.
If this is not what you’re interested in, feel free to e-mail me back and i’m happy to provide a refund for this month :)
Currently i’m about halfway through my trip. Here’s an overview of why i’m traveling and where i’m going:
🇮🇳 India Itinerary
India has always been on the list as a place to have my models challenged and expanded. In the last 2 years especially, i’ve gone pretty deep in exploring non-dual philosophies like Taoism and Indian philosophy (advaita vedanta) - both intellectually and experientially.
I can’t begin to even describe how this has inverted my orientation towards self and reality (for another post). Meanwhile, living in SF had begun to feel a bit disheartening for me - a lot of the “philosophy & spirituality scene” & corners of Twitter, felt like it gleamed the surface of “it” but never went fully there.
I was beginning to feel that many treated philosophy and spirituality as “entertainment” or an experience to have like one chooses at a buffet, as opposed to having their life fundamentally grounded and evolved from it.
Going to India for me felt a bit like a quest to find the “real” and “the root”. Careful not to be attached to a specific outcome for this trip or pine for “specific experiences”, my goal in building the itinerary was to immerse myself in places that could be potentially opening and deepening. “Fuck around and find out” so to speak. Here’s a google map of all the places I gone to in India.
Delhi (Governmental capital) - 2 days
Rishikesh (Yoga capital) - 1 week
Varanasi (Prilgrimage/Spiritual capital) - 1 week
Mumbai (India’s financial/cosmopolitan capital) - 5 days
Kochi (Home to Ayurveda and architecture) - 4 days
Poonthottam Ayurvedasram (located 2 hrs away from Kochi) a medical retreat spa for panchakarma (ayuveda method of detoxing the body) - 6 days
🇮🇹 Italy Itinerary
In putting together this itinerary, I was inspired by where German Philosopher, Friedrich Neitzsche, spent parts of the year in contemplation and meditation to write his greatest works.
Friedrich Nietzsche was acutely sensitive to place: to the taste of sea air, to the sweep of wind across the coast, to the narrow confines of medieval walls or the tumbling breadth of an Alpine vista framed by the window near his writing desk.
He was convinced that the effects of environment, climate, and terrain on one's life and thought were both tangible and profound.
I’ll be visiting a few of the cities he frequented in Autumn (google map):
Milan - 1-2 days
Lake Como - 2 days
Lage Maggoire - 2 days
Turin - 2 days
Portofino - 3 days
Florence - 2 days
So far i’m coming up on almost 3 weeks in India. The purpose of this section is to bring you guys along with me & share all the noteworthy things i’ve experienced, ate, and seen so far.
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