The car came at 4 in the morning. Dragging myself out of bed, I’m happy I packed last night but pissed I stayed up til 2. I get in the car, tell him were going to Pune, then tilt my head back and focus on passing out. Theres a misquito hovering over my backpack, and suddeny im wide awake, the windows rolled down, eyes darting around as the street lights pass and illuminate the flying vermin at different positions in the backseat. I hate misquitoes. Back home I don’t care, but here there’s a 1 in 4 chance that they’re carrying 1 in 5 diseases. After clapping my hands several times to get him, I’m pretty convinced he flew out the window. I close my eyes. When I open them, were at some truck stop in the middle of nowhere and the driver is nowhere to be seen. I’m too tired to worry about if ill get mugged so I go back to sleep .
As we pull to the entrance of the meditation resort, I see a white man with long grey hair strolling in the morning rain in a maroon robe. He seems to be smirking, as if he’s figured out some divine secret that no one else knows. What am I getting myself into.
The guard at the front desk chastises me for taking a newspaper off a stack of newspapers. You don’t know what those are for, he says with a condescending smile. You’re rude I say bluntly.
They point me to the guesthouse and I check in, receiving food vouchers and 2 colored robes. Maroon for the day, white for the night. Oh boy. After ditching my stuff in the room and slipping into the robe – its actually quite comfortable but I laugh when I look in the mirror – I head to the orientation center. They tell me to line up and get an HIV test. Oookay. The large swiss man in front of me comes out and smiles while the doc calls me in, already changing his rubber gloves. Must be like a goddamn factory line for him, day in and day out. He pricks my finger, puts it on a popsicle stick, and slaps my member number on it. Next.
Then the tour. An Italian man with long grey hair and a goatee talks so slow and deliberate I could have gotten a masters degree in the time it takes him to tell us about the hygiene here. He leads us to a small room and walks us through abbreviated versions of the “meditations” Osho created. The first is dynamic meditation, which starts with in intense breathing exercise. Breathe out, as fast and as irregular as you can, to change your normal conditioned breathing. Don’t worry about the inhale, your body will do that on its own. He demonstrates. It looks like he’s having a seizure. The elevated consciousness must come from the lack of oxygen to the brain. Next step, dance with your eyes closed. I like dancing. Catharsis is next, basically go as crazy as you want to, yelling gyrating, punching laughing crying. Just like acting class. Then, jumping up and down on the flat part of your foot with your hands up saing HUH with each leap. Then in the final phase, freeze in place and don’t move. This is Dynamic meditation. This will last an hour. I have no idea what it means.
After some chai and a bathroom break, we come back in and he asks us to put on masks and pretend to be someone else, introducing ourselves to one another. I want to say
Fidelio but I’m pretty sure no one else has seen Eyes Wide Shut. He asks us to stare at ourselves with masks on in front of the mirror. Then slowly take it off he commands softly. And look at the mask you are wearing beneath this mask. It’s supposed to be deep. But its about as shallow as a kiddie pool.
Next the video. An over the top musical telling you to wash your hands and not to caugh or fart in the giant pyramid meditation hall. It’s completely absurd, and as a result really quite scary. Come with me he says and we move thru the rain to the courtyard. I meet a british couple in their 30’s, tall skinny James with a shaved head and his cute red head Becks. They are almost as skeptical as me but seem to be enjoying it thus far. She’s been working in Mumbai, he finished a 6 month stint in Bangalore. How long you been out here? They ask me. I say just 6 weeks but I’m planning on 4 months. She laughs and says yeah I was planning on 6 months. That was 2 years ago.
We are introduced to 5 more “guides” or teachers or whatever who are really just trying to sell us more shit. Apparently there’s a Multiversity here, where you take classes in such topics as “the Art of the Heart” or much less defined “the Esoteric.” They’ve got ashram eyes and ask us to come closer and closer while they try to pull us in the tractor beam of their gaze. Their lips are moving but all I can hear is
Come with us… we can help you.. just take my hand. As we continue the tour there is a group of 20 dancing in the rain, completely soaked in their robes, each smiling to themselves with their eyes closed. Because it is loud thumping house music it is hard to view this as meditation.
I crash out for 4 hours in the afternoon, take a shower (thanks, video), throw on a white robe, and head out to Evening Meditation.
The Osho meditation hall is a state of the art Pyramid that seems more out of a sci fi movie than a spiritual retreat. I walk around the long way in, just so I can see the droves of white robes hovering down the walkway between 2 ponds, up separate stair cases and into the pyramid. I feel as though I’m in a star trek episode on some utopian planet and we’re all about to go get our minds erased by some super crystal. And when I get inside it’s not too far off – save for the crystal. As soon as it starts its – you guessed it – more dancing. People are spazzing out in the pyramid. A hundred white robes, gyrating wildly to some fusion trance music, old ladies, young men, fat foreigners, spirit seekers with beards, Japanese tourists, and me. Spazzing. Usually I love to dance but this feels forced. Maybe its in my head. I relax. Go with it. Lose myself in the music. No. It’s forced.
When the music stops, everyone puts their hands up and screams OSHO three times.
Sit. Meditate. My mind wont be still so I watch the thoughts pass by clouds in the sky.
What would my parents think? … What am I doing here? What seemed so fascinating from the outside is really quite empty, soulless, and lost here on the inside. A massive screen comes down in the front of the room and people prostrate themselves. OSHO appears like a mystical apparition. Long white beard, half closed eyes, lets every word hang in the air, dragging out his S’ssssssss til the words tickle your ears. His clothes are leftover wardrobe from Star Trek (I see a theme here), a purple vest with sharp V shaped shoulders covers a blue half cut sweater that looks more like chain mail. And a blue and purple knit cap. I mean for a Guru he’s got sick style. In the video, a man is asking him a question. “My life is being held together by a single thread. And that thread is you. Everyday I feel like I am dying, but I am glad. My only wish is to become as close to you as possible and spend as much time as possible with you.” Whoa. Osho stares at him for a few lingering moments, then tells a story about a Abraham Lincoln impersonator who convinced himself he was Lincoln. His next story is about an aunt who died whom everyone was glad in her passing but no one could express it out loud. A third story explained how he was scolded in math class for staring out the window. The teacher made him stand outside and the young Osho stayed outside for a month. I have no idea how they related to the mans question, an to be honest, I feel bad for that man. I wonder if he took his own life. The video goes black but his voice continues. Now he is telling jokes. Everyone laughs, which leads us into laughter meditation. The pyramid erupts into a deafening fake laughter, people hooting and hollering, the sound become muddled like the sound of a thousand desparate souls on some eternal fantasy chaser.
Then the dance party. Does this place ever stop dancing? The atrium is filled with black lights and loud electronica. You can get wine and smoke cigarrettes in the corner. A few middle aged women wear short tops that show their wrinkled stomachs as they throw themselves at men. Some salt and pepper haired guys stare devilishly at the 20somethings girls who try to be friendly but keep up their defenses. A Chilean mother and her daughter are the most normal people there and so I dance with them. Some Indian couples are trying to make a party but instead leave to get lassis. A grandpa stands in the corner pinching his fingers together like Buddha. His 70 year old female counterpart is walking in figure eights, not quite dancing, but moving just fast enough to be in time with the music.
Looking back, I wouldn’t have expected less. Osho is a controversial figure, and so were his teachings. He was a guru preaching sex towards enlightenment during a time when free love reigned. The US government charged him with immigration fraud and deported him. Some say the Reagan administration even tried poisoning him. He published over two hundred books and owned ninety nine Rolls Royces. And now, followers from around the world still come to seek out his wisdom. From what I can see, this resort is full of people who have given up on the real world, given up on a family, work, politics, religion, god, and all things that society values. But what does it replace the void with? As far as I can see, desparately chasing the next fix, always just out of reach. I’m glad I went. I’ll never go back.
