Kino on responsibly planning a trip to India

I just watched this video Kino just posted, where she answers a student's question about how to plan for a trip to India in a financially responsible way. Hmm... it seems that perhaps Saturday is becoming my Kino-video posting day: I can remember at least two Saturdays in recent memory (see this post and this post) in which I posted a Kino video :-)

Anyway, coming back to the video above, Kino starts the video by sharing how, for her first two India trips, she had to live as simply and minimally as possible between trips, even going to the extent of staying with her parents. This is a pretty significant revelation, especially if you think about how so many people in this country consider moving in with one's parents as a grown-up to be a rather "loser" thing to do; or maybe this is just my perception, I don't know. But anyway, this seems to suggest that sometimes, you need to take a step back in the eyes of the world in order to take a big step forward.

I also find it very significant that Kino stresses the importance of taking your regular day job seriously, and seriously reconsidering if you have thoughts of quitting your day job just to go to Mysore. Although Kino doesn't quite put it this way, I think if we read between the lines of what she is saying, so to speak, we can also understand her to be saying that ultimately, it is important to build up trust and goodwill with your employer by doing well at your job if you are planning on eventually asking for an entire month off to go to India. In other words, going to India for a month doesn't mean that you have to become a flaky hippie (no offense to all of you hippies out there; I heart hippies too :-)). She also stresses that there is no need to be impatient or to rush to go to Mysore; taking one year, two years, or even five years to save and prepare for the trip is fine.

I feel that all this is good advice to take into account if you are thinking of going to Mysore. Especially for me, in light of the Mysore trip that did not materialize for me earlier this year. I will keep working on making it happen.