Holy Cow: An Indian Adventure by sarah macdonald

★ ★ ★ ★ ★

April 17,2025

I am biased about this book because I have a tremendous fascination with India. It is the one place in the world I most want to visit. The son of my very good friend is dating/living with a girl from Bangalore. I keep hoping they get married so that I will have an excuse to go there, and have some Auntie-jis to look after me. I am sure that if I ever go, I will be as appalled and sickened as Sarah in the beginning and the other Westners she encounters. The filth, the crowds, the pollution, the stench, the beggars (I've never seen a leper)...I know it will be hard for me. My hope is that, like the author, I will overcome these feelings, relax, open up and simply enjoy India for what it is.

I really loved this book! It hit on all my favorite buttons: travel, relegion, self discovery, and of course India. I loved Macdonald's wry Aussie sense of humor and her engaging writing style. I appreciate her ability to explore the many relegions and cultures she encounters, to see the best in all of them, without becoming a devotee to any of them. I like her honesty about her relationship with her husband and the demands India put on their relationship. I admire her ability to love.

This book inspired me to put of few of the Bollywood movies she mentions on my library request list. Oh no!

I would recommend this book to anyone with a sense of adventure and an open mind. I plan to re-read it before I go to India...if I am ever lucky enought to get the opportunity.

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King_Of_Heaven

★ ★ ★ ★ ★

April 17,2025

“Holy Cow! An Indian Adventure” is the first book of author Sarah Macdonald, an Australian journalist and radio host. The book is an autobiographical log of her adventures and travels within India. Having already traveled to the country a decade earlier, Macdonald was reluctant to go back. Nevertheless, she follows her husband there and is able to experience the country once more.

Readers will be able to see a clear transformation of Macdonald throughout the novel. She begins her life in India as a complaining tourist with a smug attitude—it is clear she traveled back to the country half-heartedly. However, her cultural ignorance wears off as she is immersed in the vibrancy of everyday Indian life. For example, she learns early on how cows take first priority on the roadways. She notices this, laughing, “I've always thought it hilarious that Indian people chose the most boring, domesticated, compliant and stupid animal on earth to adore, but already I'm seeing cows in a whole different light” (11). By the end of the book, Macdonald is more appreciative of the differences between India and her home country of Australia, and is educated about various languages and religions the country contains.

Religon plays a huge part in “Holy Cow!”. Essentially, it is the story of Macdonald’s own spiritual journey and path to enlightenment. This occurs through exploration of the several religions India is home to; for example, elements and practices of Hinduism, Islam, Jainism, Christianity, and Judaism are all featured. At the beginning of her travels, Macdonald is uninformed about many of these religions and provides descriptions of the key beliefs and practices of each within her book.

Though Macdonald eventually becomes a more accepting and appreciative traveler, readers should be aware of her extremely harsh and honest tone. Some of her observations of India’s cultural norms and religions might be considered disrespectful and offensive to many readers. She writes from the perspective of a comfortable, middle-class woman who has always had her needs met. So when she “struggles” with certain aspects of life in India, it is hard to feel sympathy for her, especially when she is surrounded by others less fortunate. In addition, Macdonald is often very critical of her environment, yet at the end of the book she has a powerful self-reflection and is able to examine her own lifestyle and beliefs.

Within “Holy Cow!”, the author notices and addresses some of the cultural inequalities facing women in India; however, she makes absolutely no plans to help the women or enact change. For this reason, I would not consider this book to be feminist. Though she does express some disapproval at the way women are treated, Macdonald uses her book to highlight other issues and discuss religious matters.
Overall, I would recommend this book, as it is well-written and humorous. However, her comments might offend some readers and travelers should beware: her harsh view of the country might negatively affect your love of one day traveling to India.

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TEAMNENO

★ ★ ★ ★ ★

April 17,2025

I can't decide if I want to give this a 2 or a 3, I guess because I kept feeling like I couldn't decide if I wanted to finish reading it or not, but I did. And it was good. Just not good enough to be a page turner. In spite of the fact that it's about what I really enjoy reading--an outsider in a foreign culture, but she doesn't take herself too seriously, and she's on a spiritual search and has the time and resources to do it right and is in the country that seems to have the biggest selection of ashrams and spiritual centers of every variety.
Sarah is in India with her fiance and the Australian Broadcasting Company. I won't let out a few secrets out of the bag, because this book is really worth reading.
I think it's me more than the book. It took me over a month to read this one small book and I almost didn't do that, the pesky knee replacement just kept getting in the way--mentally, physically, emotionally, brain-function wise. Annoying to say the least and not lie. I think I will give it a 3. I think it would have gotten a 4 last year. Oh well. I can feel myself getting back to normal and reading my second book of the year. Yea!

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Chan

★ ★ ★ ★ ★

April 17,2025

I loved this book once I finished it; however, the cover, title and back cover are misleading.

I expected a humorous romp through India, but this book really explores serious themes and real-life situations, albeit with humor. I wanted a light-hearted introduction to India as I was headed there - what I got instead was a hard look at some of the good and not-so-good about India.

I found the beginning of the book hard to take, bordering on xenophobic; the tone changes as the author begins to "understand" India, and the book becomes very rewarding from this point. Overall, the book is a memoir of McDonald's visits to various regions of India in search of understanding of India's various religions.

I applaud Sarah McDonald for being honest in her writings, even self-deprecating at times. I also loved how, although a self-professed atheist, she approached each religion with great respect and a genuine desire to understand.

I've been in India a week now, at the time of writing this review, and I can say McDonald's book was a great primer to India. Highly recommended if you want a contemporary, Western perspective on India that's more about true understanding than poking fun at India's idiosyncrasies.

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Agerno

★ ★ ★ ★ ★

April 17,2025

Unable to finish -- Macdonald includes some good similes and bad humor in fits and spurts throughout, but the story itself rides a line that teeters toward 'Eat, Pray, Love,' but without the effortless charm, intriguing story, or good writing of Elizabeth Gilbert. She tends to make outlandish claims about India and Indian people, only to hedge back from her own assertions with claims of, "India is beyond absolutes; it's the cruelest and the kindest, most spiritual and most horrible, etc." She tries several forms of spiritual exercise but without any challenges being faced or personal struggles discussed beyond her personal discomfort while acclimating in the country.

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jwheeties

★ ★ ★ ★ ★

April 17,2025

A good book that no one should take too seriously. She actually starts off a selfish, egocentric woman aghast at the quality of Indian life and grows into a spiritual investigative journalist of sorts.

I traveled to India this past year and her accounts from a western perspective are accurate. But with time, the beauty of India reveals itself to travelers and she shares this with readers.

It's a funny memoir that gives a cursory background of the spiritual-religious forces existent in modern India.

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Estener

★ ★ ★ ★ ★

April 17,2025

I'd be interested to know if a narrative of some guy's spiritual journey even has the possibility of being compelling to me. It always strikes me as suffering categorically from the same intensely boring, masturbatory egotism as freshman fiction. I really do hope that one can transcend the genre, because I think spiritual journeys, in and of themselves, are often good stuff. Sigh... as it stands, though, either I have an empty soul or I wish others would keep their soul-fillings to themselves.

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Saichi_KaSaHa

★ ★ ★ ★ ★

April 17,2025

Finished. 5 stars from me. Review to come.

So cold here at the moment I needed to read something about a warm place. India is on my list of places to visit before I die so till then I can't get enough books to whet my appetite. It was a pleasant surprise to find out Sarah Macdonald is Jonathan Harley's other half. He wrote "Lost in Transmission" which I liked tremendously. Harley writes about his time as ABC reporter in India & the east generally and Macdonald quit her job at Triple J & went over to him there as she was tired of their long distance relationship. It's interesting to see some of the events he described from her perspective. Not far into it yet...India is a rollercoaster of a place to describe and so far I'm feeling the pitching and lurching of the extremes possibly more so than what I felt reading Harley's book. I see the cover blurb mentions Sarah seeking spirituality, but so far it's nothing like that "Eat Pray Love" book- Sarah doesn't approach India with those kind of new age blinkers.

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bought today 1 of 12 books for $10 the lot.

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