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3.35 AVERAGE
3.35 AVERAGE
After reading the back of the book I thought this would be funnier and more about love than religion. It started out okay. The author had left her job in Australia and traveled to India to live with her boyfriend. It quickly became about her journey through all the different religions she found there. Some of it was interesting, but overall I found the book boring.
Didn't completely finish this one... its interesting in terms of her perspective and travels in india... but like many travel narratives ends up kinda self absorbed at the end, and the reflections kinda dwindle.....
adventurous
challenging
dark
emotional
hopeful
informative
inspiring
reflective
medium-paced
This is a great book if you're thinking about traveling to India. Sarah Macdonald doesn't pull any punches in describing the country - it's down and dirty and it takes her a long time to fall in love with it. Late in the story, when she welcomes some friends from home into her now-Indian life on their first trip through the subcontinent, she sees in them the horror that she first experienced herself. And thus realizes how far she has come. I couldn't promise that I'd love (or even like) India, but Sarah's journey is more than geographical - it turns her into the kind of person you'd have to be to survive, and take anything from, the Indian experience.
I enjoyed this book, but it didn't match what I thought it was going to be. The opening chapter, the cover, the blurb.....everything led me to believe it was going to be a humurous travel memoir. Although it had those elements at times, it was much more of an exploration of one woman's journey of self discovery as she became accustomed to living in a country as foreign as India. There was much discussion of her quest for faith and a fair bit of lengthy description.
This was really an enjoyable read for me. I came across this book in an 'open library' in KL, and the blurb seems pretty interesting.
I didn't realized that the author was Australian. So there's a bit more perspective into that. Anyway.
This is the author's memoir about her year/s spent in India. She wasn't really working, but more like supporting her partner/husband while he works as a correspondent. But they're both in the journalism world. At first, she hated India, but eventually she opened up to it. And India is this "hub" of a lot of cultural and spiritual and religious stuff. And so begins her journey to discover these.
And I enjoyed reading about her "spiritual" adventures, that it makes me want to visit India (again). I learned that even though Hinduism is the religion of the majority, there is more to it than that. At times, it felt like, "maybe this is similar to Eat, Pray, Love" (I haven't read the book btw, but only watched the movie). I reckon they'll be very similar. But while EPL might have more romance, this one doesn't (SM wasn't even with her husband most of the time!). It felt more like an expat's wife's adventures. Honestly, apart from me thinking, "wow she must have a lot of money", it didn't really seem much like a privileged, spoiled Westerner (this word was used a lot in the book - Are Australians considered 'Westerner' btw? They're more like 'South East' haha, anyway) doing random things because she has time and money. But because she was really just curious. And searching.
(Haha, I'm defending the book a bit, dami kasing haters. Anyway, kanya-kanyang tastes. Hehe!)
---
'We Indian people, we look at the people more poor, more low, more hard than us and we be thanking God we are not them. So we are happy. But you white peoples, you are looking at the peoples above you all of the times and you are thinking, why aren't I be them? Why am I not having that moneys and things? And so you are unhappy all of the time.'
Australia is supporting the war against Afghanistan but is refusing to accept Afghan refugees; it's at the end of election campaign fought over a boatload turned away, while poor crowded Pakistan somehow struggles with two million Afghan refugees. What I've missed most about Australia is its low density, its space and its capacity for solitude. I understand my compatriots want to preserve this space but such a pursuit seems selfish here. This war has shattered my Great Australian Dream - the fantasy that I could be part of the world community with all its benefits but isolated enough to be safe and separate from its violence and brutality.
I didn't realized that the author was Australian. So there's a bit more perspective into that. Anyway.
This is the author's memoir about her year/s spent in India. She wasn't really working, but more like supporting her partner/husband while he works as a correspondent. But they're both in the journalism world. At first, she hated India, but eventually she opened up to it. And India is this "hub" of a lot of cultural and spiritual and religious stuff. And so begins her journey to discover these.
And I enjoyed reading about her "spiritual" adventures, that it makes me want to visit India (again). I learned that even though Hinduism is the religion of the majority, there is more to it than that. At times, it felt like, "maybe this is similar to Eat, Pray, Love" (I haven't read the book btw, but only watched the movie). I reckon they'll be very similar. But while EPL might have more romance, this one doesn't (SM wasn't even with her husband most of the time!). It felt more like an expat's wife's adventures. Honestly, apart from me thinking, "wow she must have a lot of money", it didn't really seem much like a privileged, spoiled Westerner (this word was used a lot in the book - Are Australians considered 'Westerner' btw? They're more like 'South East' haha, anyway) doing random things because she has time and money. But because she was really just curious. And searching.
(Haha, I'm defending the book a bit, dami kasing haters. Anyway, kanya-kanyang tastes. Hehe!)
---
'We Indian people, we look at the people more poor, more low, more hard than us and we be thanking God we are not them. So we are happy. But you white peoples, you are looking at the peoples above you all of the times and you are thinking, why aren't I be them? Why am I not having that moneys and things? And so you are unhappy all of the time.'
Australia is supporting the war against Afghanistan but is refusing to accept Afghan refugees; it's at the end of election campaign fought over a boatload turned away, while poor crowded Pakistan somehow struggles with two million Afghan refugees. What I've missed most about Australia is its low density, its space and its capacity for solitude. I understand my compatriots want to preserve this space but such a pursuit seems selfish here. This war has shattered my Great Australian Dream - the fantasy that I could be part of the world community with all its benefits but isolated enough to be safe and separate from its violence and brutality.
absolutely hilarious. a must read for anyone who's been to the exotic subcontinental land of India! :)
At first I was absolutely appalled by the poverty described by Sarah on her return to India. As I started to settle, I very much enjoyed her explorations of the religions within the sub-continent, it added to my own knowledge and provided an opportunity for further reading.
I finished thinking our own spirituality is made up of our discoveries within our lifetime. The religion of our childhood should not be the religion of our adulthood. We have a responsibility to ponder and reflect. If it's about rejecting conventional religion. so be it. If its about taking bits of many, again so be it.
I finished thinking our own spirituality is made up of our discoveries within our lifetime. The religion of our childhood should not be the religion of our adulthood. We have a responsibility to ponder and reflect. If it's about rejecting conventional religion. so be it. If its about taking bits of many, again so be it.
Fun easy read about living in India. Helped me prepare for traveling in India.
I just loved this book, one of my favs. Great writing from MacDonald as she explores Indian culture and faith.