Looking for Auroville²

Another day, I started my run at four o’clock in the morning. But even at that hour you can’t run more than 400 metres before you start perspiring! And the Pondicherry streets are so uneven and full of holes! Still, I ran fifteen miles — seven and a half out and back.

They had told me that Auroville is about six miles from the Ashram. So I set my timer-beeper at ten minutes. After it rang six times I thought that I should definitely have reached Auroville. From the light in the sky I saw that an hour had gone by, so I knew for certain that I had heard the beeper six times.

Then I started asking people driving bullock carts where Auroville was.

One person said, “Oh, you have already passed it!”

I asked myself, “How can it be? Did I run so fast?”

Another person said, “It is one mile ahead.” So I kept running until I reached it.

When I was coming back, three or four dogs attacked me at the same time — out of the blue. I stood there and shouted at them. While I was shouting, the owners of the dogs also started shouting. Then they started laughing at me, and I started shouting at them in Tamil.