{"id":1541,"date":"2024-11-19T01:18:56","date_gmt":"2024-11-19T06:18:56","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/veggieperu.com\/blog\/?p=1541"},"modified":"2024-12-15T03:15:04","modified_gmt":"2024-12-15T08:15:04","slug":"puducherry","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/veggieperu.com\/blog\/puducherry\/","title":{"rendered":"Puducherry"},"content":{"rendered":"

In February last year I decided to explore some of the highlights of Tamil Nadu I had never visited before. I went to Puducherry (formerly known as Pondicherry) on the northeast coast. The city had been a French colony until 1954 when it became \u2018Union Territory\u2019, \u00a0and it has a distinctly different vibe to it with its tree-lined streets with European style architecture in the colonial heart of the city, its numerous coffeeshops and chic boutiques, and the long beach promenade interrupted only by a several meters high Gandhi statue in the middle. You will also find a number of 18th<\/sup> and 19th<\/sup> century churches. One can hire a bicycle to explore the French quarter, also known as \u2018white town\u2019 or take an exploratory sunset heritage walk around. You will find that many of the streets have retained their French names, whilst many of the coffeeshops still offer French food.<\/p>\n

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I managed to find a budget guesthouse with lots of character at the edge of white town with many street food dhabas, restaurants and a market nearby, so I could explore everywhere on foot. Here I settled into a tiny rooftop room with a private terrace overlooking the city, but soon I was crowded out by a myriad of hungry mosquitos, so I resettled into another room with no view within the same guesthouse<\/p>\n

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One of the main attractions was the famous Sri Aurobindo ashram, founded by the Bengali political activist, poet, philosopher and educator Aurobindo Ghose (1872 \u2013 1950), after he withdrew from political life and permanently settled in Puducherry in 1910. In 1920 he was joined by the charismatic French occultist Mirra Alfassa who became known as \u2018The Mother\u2019. In reality, a community encompassing more than 400 buildings within the city soon came into existence, of which the \u2018ashram\u2019 served as the center where both Sri Aurobindo and \u2018the Mother\u2019 dwelt, and where now their physical remains are found in the flower covered marble shrines in the shady courtyard.<\/p>\n

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In 1926 ‘the Mother’ took over the running of the ashram after Sri Aurobindo went into permanent seclusion. From this date onwards he dedicated his life exclusively to meditation and the writing of his works on \u2018Integral Yoga\u2019.<\/p>\n

\u2018Integral Yoga\u2019, also called supramental Yoga, is a yoga-based physical practice and philosophy that has as its goal the spiritual evolution of humanity, thus manifesting the Divine on earth.<\/p>\n

The Ashram, according to Sri Aurobindo, “has been created with another object than that ordinarily common to such institutions, not for the renunciation of the world but as a centre and a field of practice for the evolution of another kind and form of life which would in the final end be moved by a higher spiritual consciousness and embody a greater life of the spirit.”<\/p>\n

In 1968 \u2018the Mother\u2019 created the experimental township of Auroville. The name is derived from both the French \u201cAurore\u201d (dawn) and \u201cville\u201d (village\/city). Additionally it is named after Sri Aurobindo. \u2018The Mother\u201d stated that \u201cAuroville wants to be a universal town where men and women of all countries will be able to live in peace and progressive harmony, above all creeds, all politics and all nationalities. The purpose of Auroville is to realise Human Unity\u201d.<\/p>\n

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A half hour Thukthuk ride from Puducherry on a forested road took me to Auroville, passing colorful South Indian temples with giant statues of Hindu deities on the way.<\/p>\n

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The community of Auroville is spread out over quite a large territory of forest. At the main entrance point there are fancy boutiques stocked with clothes and crafts produced in Auroville (they have workshops in the \u2018industrial zone\u2019, dedicated to \u2018green industries\u2019), amongst them the Auroville cosmetics brand Maroma, known for its high-quality perfumes and face creams. There are also numerous restaurants and bakeries providing healthy wholefood meals, catering especially for the Western palate. The living quarters of the around 3500 residents (2\/3 are made up of international residents) are widely spread out. Visitors are also welcome to stay in one of the numerous guesthouses.<\/p>\n

What makes Auroville so special is that organic farming, integral education and the arts are promoted and given their due space of importance for the wellbeing of the community.<\/p>\n

Thus economic model promoted is one based on personal growth instead of capitalistic ideas.<\/p>\n

The aim of its economics would be not to create a huge engine of production, whether of the competitive or the cooperative kind, but to give to men\u2014not only to some but to all men each in his highest possible measure\u2014the joy of work according to their own nature and free leisure to grow inwardly, as well as a simply rich and beautiful life for all.<\/em><\/p>\n

Sri Aurobindo<\/p>\n

“For in this ideal place, money would no longer be the sovereign lord; individual worth would have a far greater importance than that of material wealth and social standing. There, work would not be a way to earn one\u2019s living but a way to express oneself and to develop one\u2019s capacities and possibilities while being of service to the community as a whole, which, for its own part, would provide for each individual\u2019s subsistence and sphere of action.”<\/em><\/p>\n

(A Dream, The Mother<\/em>)<\/p>\n

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A beautiful walk through the forested trails took me to the heart of the town to the golden golf ball shaped Matrimandir which was conceived by Alfassa as “a symbol of the Divine’s answer to man’s aspiration for perfection”. Silence is maintained inside the Matrimandir to ensure the tranquility of the space, and the entire area surrounding the Matrimandir is called the Peace area. Inside the Matrimandir, a spiraling ramp leads upwards to an air-conditioned chamber of polished white marble referred to as “a place to find one’s consciousness”.<\/p>\n

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Unfortunately, it was not possible to go inside the meditation dome during the time of my visit as it had been closed to visitors since COVID times. But I had a great time exploring Auroville and I hope to be back one day and stay for a few days in order to explore this interesting project further.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n

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In February last year I decided to explore some of the highlights of Tamil Nadu I had never visited before. I went to Puducherry (formerly known as Pondicherry) on the northeast coast. The city had been a French colony until 1954 when it became \u2018Union Territory\u2019, \u00a0and it has a distinctly different vibe to it … Continue reading Puducherry<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":1545,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[407,109,1],"tags":[31,206,33,208],"class_list":["post-1541","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-india-travel","category-india-trips","category-vpablog","tag-india","tag-india-group-tours","tag-south-india","tag-spiritual-journeys-india"],"aioseo_notices":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/veggieperu.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1541","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/veggieperu.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/veggieperu.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/veggieperu.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/veggieperu.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1541"}],"version-history":[{"count":7,"href":"https:\/\/veggieperu.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1541\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":1616,"href":"https:\/\/veggieperu.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1541\/revisions\/1616"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/veggieperu.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/1545"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/veggieperu.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1541"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/veggieperu.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1541"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/veggieperu.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1541"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}