London can be busy a busy place needless to say, so earlier in the year (April in fact! That's how behind I am on posting), I decided to go to Gloucester. The cathedral there is again another wonder, cathedrals never cease to impress me. This one in particular is where the first two Harry Potter movies were filmed (Wheee! Inner dork alert), the stained glass window there was at a stage the largest in Europe (its size makes up an entire tennis court) and apparently shows one of the earliest recordings of golf being played.
From there I had the lucky chance to go on a 10-day silent vipassana meditation retreat, learning the ancient technique of meditation taught in India more than 2500 years ago as a "universal remedy for universal ills". Wandering the grounds in silence, noticing the spring flowers change and grow every morning in the woodlands on the retreat grounds did more than a sermon could have done methinks.
When the course was over and everyone dispersed back to reality, I held back to walk in the Hereford countryside. I stumbled upon a peculiar car graveyard that had succumbed to nature. Armed tanks, vintage trucks and cars no longer of use had been discarded in this strange section close to the retreat. It gave me satisfaction to see how they had surrendered to nature, becoming more beautiful in their acceptance of their fate. And with that acceptance of letting things be, I returned back to London with a little bit of Goenka's and nature's teachings.
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