John and George leave for Rishikesh - February 15, 1968
From BeatlesWiki
| Event | |
| Date | February 15, 1968 |
| Short description | John, George, and wives leave for Rishikesh. |
| Location | Rishikesh, India. |
John and George fly to Rishikesh to study meditation with Maharishi Mahesh Yogi. Mal Evans meets them there. As Cynthia, John's then-wife remembers, upon arriving, there were no fans to greet them. Instead, they climbed into three taxis and passed through villages filled with "incense, sewage, gorgeous kohl-eyed children, and hideously deformed beggars." The meditation retreat was 150 feet above the Ganges River, surrounded by jugnle-covered mountains. The thing that surprised them, though, were the luxurious utilities, such as swimming pools and heliccopter pads. The whole camp was surrounded by barbed wire. They all lived in six bungalows, with rooms having only a bed, a chest of drawers, and a lamp. Their only heat was a bowl full of water left outside the door. When they arrived, they were instructed to take off their clothes and wear uniforms. The men wore kurta tunics and the women wore silk saris. The meals were eaten under a cloth tent in the camp. As Cynthia Lennon remembers, "We began to realise that we needed very little to find contentment. It was an extremely relaxed and simple existence, which is what ashrams are supposed to be about. Everything was focused on meditation and being at ease." Mia Farrow, who arrived shortly beforehand, said "it was a strange, and colourless place. We moved as if in a dream and spoke only where necessary, in the respectful, hushed tones of visitors to a graveyard… The Beatles brought an element of normalcy to the place." Normally, the course included two ninety-minute courses given at 3:30 and 8:30 PM. However, because The Beatles arrived late, they got extra lessons from the Maharishi. Paul later said, "John and George had gone to Rishikesh with the idea that this might be some huge spiritual lift-off, and they might never come back if the Maharishi told them some really amazing thing." It was intended, however, to make them into teachers of meditation. Mike Love of The Beach Boys, who was alsoi staying there at the time recalled Paul saying that "becoming a teacher ‘wasn’t the lad’s cup of tea’."
