The date in my journal reads October 31, 2010. It was on this day that I intended to carry myself to the internet cafe and post an entry reflecting upon my time lived at the ashram. But my thoughts arrived only as far as a pocket-sized, spiral-bound notebook. Words fill the college-ruled lines to the brim: splattering over the edge like childhood's spiral-paint creations. Red morning, blue wind, green rice fields and orange marigolds vie for recognition as the days pass with pages left uncrinkled. A quiet afternoon leads cold winter hands to finger the pen-and-ink moments left to simmer on the shelf. Too little time has passed for the gathering of dust; just enough time gone for words to marinate in the flavor of homecoming's gratitude. Grateful for journeying out; grateful for arriving home; grateful for the opportunity to share soft moments of reflection.
October 31, 2010
I kneel at the edge of the reflecting pool and dare to look into glass water. My eyes, two green-as-grass luminous orbs cradled in blue. My lips, a watermelon crescent-moon that personifies happiness. My cheek bones, sure and steady and sharp like an eagle's laser-vision and a ballerina's poise. My hairline, the ocean shore reaching out and up like dawn's light on morning waves.
I see myself alive and blooming as tender grass, watermelon juice, the dawn-tide and a jubilant pirouette. I am always new and evolving, yet closer to my nature -- the essence born of my mother's womb. The path of yoga helps one learn the importance of cultivating a positive and compassionate relationship with self. By learning to fan the flames of one's inner light, she is able to share the cartwheeling sparks and fireflies with the world. So goes the saying: "one must love oneself before she is able to love anyone else." Perhaps I did not understand this as a zealous youth determined to be a martyr in order to show my worth. Now, in the quiet of morning meditation, understanding rises up from the depths of my soul like the gentle laughter of a mountain spring. "So glad you finally noticed me," my soul giggles.
And so, love flows from a vessel that receives rain and sunlight with open arms and sings cascades of plenty over its edges and out into the world. How to share of a cup that is empty? Love not from the shallow-depths of insecurity and fear or from the scraping sound of emptiness; share love from overflow and abundance and light-spilling over the soft contours of the soul.
The teachings of Yogi Vishvketu-ji are characterized by joy and bliss. During the practice, we are mindful to always be aware of the breath - the life-force energy that moves gracefully in and out through the nostrils, feeding our lungs and blood and vital organs with nourishment from the Ganges winds. Healing energy is everywhere and always available to us -- nurturing oxygen, sound, light, relationships, stillness, flowing movement, beauty. We must allow our minds to expand as endless as the ocean so that we might re-think of food not only as fruits and grains and tastes that touch the tongue. What about tastes that touch the soul? The heart? The nerves from toes to crown? We feed through our five sense and through what is beyond sensory perception -- our connection to the Ocean of Consciousness. The Ocean of Divinity. The Ocean of Life-force energy that reverberates in each and every one of us. The macrocosm in every microcosm (the entire universe in a single grain of sand). The microcosm in the macrocosm (I am a part of all that I see).
"Respect yourself," says Yogi Vishvaji. "Smile to yourself as you inhale one deep breath of gratitude. Yoga is Being who you Are. Union. Ceasing to swim against the current; ceasing to doubt the rocks that seem to obstruct the river's flow. Obstacles only come into existence when we grant obstructions the power to dissolve our confidence. We are born with an inner resilience and goodness that wants to shine forth. Yet, so many times, we run from the light, because darkness is more anonymous and easier, perhaps. Yoga is opening to inner goodness and with dedication, cultivating that goodness in each moment of every day: thought, word and deed."
I realize it is quite impossible for me to recount a story of the past month in the ashram without delving into the spirals and swirls of the internal journey. The dance of blood cell and tissues reconfiguring; the spark of new synapses forming. The past month has been about dedication, faith, energy, courage (fearlessness), support, growth, friendship, new experiences, and embracing each new day as it comes. I feel honored to learn in the presence of a teacher who embodies the yogic teachings in his every word, thought, action, smile. Moving into Bliss with Yoga is the title that Vishvaji chooses for the trainings he offers. The perfect title for the course. Through breathing and stillness, stretching and deepening, expanding and contracting, strengthening and surrendering, flowing and cultivating subtle awareness, laughing and crying - through experiencing Union in myriad ways, we move into Bliss with Yoga.
At the beginning of the course, the training group sat down together and wrote out our intentions. Intention-setting, or Sankalpa shakti, is an integral part to the practice of Yoga. What do we hope to receive from the time at Anand Prakash Ashram? What do we hope to offer? I wrote:
I open myself to learning a wholesome combination of tools -- the practicality of anatomy and class-sequencing and the spirituality of mediation and philosophy -- that will allow me to share the teachings with courage and humility.
I open-heartedly offer enthusiasm, joy, playfulness and smiles.
I smile as I re-read the worlds I wrote one month ago. As if fingering the beanstalk's magic beans -- seeds sown in fertile soil and encouraged heavenward by light and water. The seeds are sprouting beautifully, with strong roots and wing-like leaves spreading wide and happy. Open-hearted and fearless, emerging through earth's surface with great enthusiasm: a trumpet's song, honeysuckle's sweetness, a bumblebee's generosity. Even if there is a troll waiting in the heavens at the top of the beanstalk ladder, my heart will not shy away from the challenge. One breath at a time, one smile at a time, one openhearted ounce of faith at a time, we learn to see challenges as blessings.
I have learned both practical and spiritual tools that will help me to begin the journey of sharing the yogic teachings with courage and humility. This is the beauty of Yoga: it is a spiritual practice and a lifestyle; it is not a religion based on particular names of gods and holy places. Yoga is not an exclusive path that says "this way to heaven," all other roads to the flames. One Truth, Many Paths. What is that Truth? Love. Union. Kindness. Connection. Yoga is a science of living. And by science, I mean art as well. Art and science are interchangeable in this context. Both are words that imply craftsmanship, care, diligence, dedication and an ounce of belief-yolk, an ounce of faith. (How can we be dedicated if we do not have faith?) A practitioner of any religion can embrace the practice of yoga -- pragmatic tools for cultivating awareness, balance, strength and peace through the integration of body, mind and spirit. Through the recognition of Oneness with all and the dedication of seeing the Divine in all living things. Or ... if the word "Divine" is uncomfortable because it is too similar to "God," we could simply say: feeling reverence and love for all. Recognizing the macrocosm in the microcosm: To see the whole world in a single grain of sand ...
Under the guidance of Yogi Vishvketu-ji, my practice has deepened and expanded awesomely. Through breathwork, physical postures, chanting, meditation, concentration and the study of philosophy (and, moreover, the application and practice of the teachings in day to day life), the seeds of goodness and possibility in me are watered daily with the most nourishing foods. Moreover, the dedication, joy, enthusiasm and inspiration I feel cartwheel and dance and affirm each moment anew that I am committed to being who I am and sharing the best of me with the world generously and fearlessly. Practically, the experience of myriad practices and approaches to purifying mind, body and spirit encourages growth and awareness and offers tools for sharing the teachings with all who wish to learn. (Many paths, one Truth.) Spiritually -- dedication, faith, energy, enthusiasm, joy, a teacher who guides me with love and encourages me to look inside, listen to the inner voice and discover the glow that has been there all along.
I express my abundant gratitude for the life-changing experience of waking before dawn on the banks of the Ganges during a month of inspiring and transformational practice. I celebrate the enthusiasm I feel for what is to come: consciously sowing fertile seeds, weaving colorful threads into vibrant tapestries, and approaching each moment of life with a craftsman's attention and care. Now is a marked moment. The beginning of the rest of my life. I am committed to the yogic path: fully embracing the practice as a guide to discovering my best self and learning how to share the sparks and glow with the whole world. Each and every moment (each thought, word and action), is powerful. I am now a certified yoga teacher and able to begin the lifetime journey of teaching and learning and growing. I am dedicated to the yoga family; I am dedicated to embodying hope and hard work in a journey inspired by an intention of multiplying goodness and well-being everywhere. I am full of love and full of zeal. We are the one's we've been waiting for. We are the ones who are delivering ourselves from the complexities we have created; step by step, we are becoming the change we wish to see in the world.
This is what I have been doing for the last month. Not just simple, vegetarian meals and pre-dawn yoga classes. I will be digesting the course and continuing to learn for months to come. I express my deepest gratitude for the blessings the journey through India (and through my soul) has bestowed upon my life. For not a single moment will I forget the gift of continual opportunities for growth and expansion.
Om shanti, shanti, shanti
Peace everywhere and all around
Friday, December 3, 2010
Monday, September 27, 2010
Haridwar: First Glimpse of the Ganges
On the banks of the Ganges, I sit. A river made holy by the myriad believers who, for centuries, have gathered at her banks to wash, to pray, to sit in stillness and watch her water flow. The steps leading down to the swift brown current, fast and full with the recent rain, are covered in leaves, trash, dung, peanut shells and floral offerings. A child bathes happily under the sweet gaze of his young mother, beginning the day with a thick soap lather and a shivering giggle. Sadhus cloaked in orange gather together under the shade of the riverside Bodhi trees. Women use hand mirrors to apply make-up and bindis before stepping riverside for a morning ceremony. The riverside is alive with chatter: temple bells and singing bowls mapping the sun's journey over the horizon.
Just minutes after I arrive on the ghats, I am approached by a semi-official man with a semi-official book of receipts who asks me to make a donation to the maintenance of the riverside community. "Free feeding for poors-beggars, old sages and for all who wants," he says with a salesman's cheer, his eyes just inches from my own and leaning closer. "And for ceremonies, too," he adds. I smile and hand over a hundred rupee note, still slightly skeptical but encouraged by the enthusiasm of the twenty eyes staring at me from all sides. "100 rupees very little contribution," says the officer. He flips through his companion book and finds a few words of English with amounts of 2000 rupees and beyond. "I am a student," I respond, keeping my reasoning simple. "Please accept what I offer." The riverside women, hand -mirrors held close, darken their lashes and eyes before smearing themselves with whitening cream. No rain in the sky today and still I am soaked by India' unfailing sensory overload from sun-up til sun down and into midnight's shadows.
I sit on the steps with my shawl veiling face and eyes, hoping to dissolve into the hypnotic Ganges flow and evade the curious eyes of the riverbank dwellers for just a moment. And as a single moment dawns and faces, like a firefly, a larva, an aphid born and laid to rest in the same instant, Mona Lisa is by my side. Mona Lisa, the spirited young woman who speaks with confidence in broken but practiced English explains to me that I should come with her to Calcutta. "Two single women traveling alone can become friends traveling together," she smiles. In another time and place, I might say yes, impressed by her sweet persistence, which includes stories of her paramedical training, her life as a classical Indian singer and a thorough explanation of her identification card. She pulls out a handwritten and carefully preserved business card that in another hand could be easily mistaken for a laundry-drenched pastime. "And look here," she adds, showing me an immaculate florescent print out of Ram Dev and his wife with bloody-mouthed Kali and Tara in a totem-pole like arrangement. Mona Lisa sings to me and waves her henna-laced hand like a Bollywood star. "God bless you," she says as she makes a tentative gesture in the shape of a cross. "And God bless you, Mona Lisa," I reply with my hands folded in Namaste. "Good luck in Calcutta."
I continue walking. The sun rises high. I miss the breakfast hour completely, hunger dispelled by the buzz of morning activity. A happily naked toddler looks up, her eyes thickly defined with black powder, shielding her young pupils from the sun and subsequently making her look like a princess. Her mother smiles, six or seven months pregnant with the next. This is who I would give the hundred rupees pocketed by the riverside official. We hold our gaze for a long moment and continue walking our separate ways.
The banks of the Ganges are bursting with color. Hundreds of locals and Indian tourists flood the water's edge with marigold and bugambilia offerings and bathe happily or not so happily by the bucketful. One of the not so happy bathers is a toddler on holiday with his young parents. He is adorned with blessing necklaces and a thin string around his waist, nothing more. Dad drags him to the water as Mom tries to focus the camera. The young boy screams in protest as he is dunked into the current. I step away, embarrassed to maintain my sideways glance any longer. I make my way up river where children and women are squatting on small mud and rubbish islands, fingering through the trash in search of something. Fresh water mussels? Snails? Discarded jewels? Coin offerings? I sit down, feeling comfortably anonymous with my veil. But not two breaths do I take before I feel a tap on my shoulder.
"Namaskar, madame."
I turn around to see two orange-clad sadhus gazing at me. White beards, black umbrellas and neutral business-like expressions.
"Namaskar," I reply, knowing they've got me cornered.
"Country, please," continues the alpha of the pair.
"U.S.A." I say with a smile.
"It is not money we want," the leader continues. "Rice, flour, vegetables: this we want. Come."
I follow willingly, knowing the rule that once sadhus have you you are to respect their request, if at all reasonable.
"10kg of rice, good," states the sadhu, sure that I will continue to comply as easily as I have thus far.
"100 rupees of rice," I say. "100 rupees is what I offer."
The sadhu shakes his head in disappointment, but I know my offering is appropriate and stand my ground with ease. I hand him the money, snap a photo, receive his blessing with folded hands and bowed head and slip quietly from the shop and back to the clamorous street. A plump woman whose heavy eyes witnessed the transaction is quick on my heels.
"50 rupees, sister. Chapatti, rice."
"No, sister," I reply, not slackening my pace. She persists thirty meters more and gives up.
I duck out of the river boardwalk and onto the busy alley-way streets, bursting at the seams with vendors on bikes and surplus cheap merchandise: bangles, plastics, blankets, incense, metal-ware, spices and balls of dough deep-fried in oil. I dissolve into the noise and chaos just as I dissolved into the Ganges flow of morning. I walk with a playful confidence and smile: the kind of confidence that comes from deep humility and a willingness to put judgment aside and just be.
Just minutes after I arrive on the ghats, I am approached by a semi-official man with a semi-official book of receipts who asks me to make a donation to the maintenance of the riverside community. "Free feeding for poors-beggars, old sages and for all who wants," he says with a salesman's cheer, his eyes just inches from my own and leaning closer. "And for ceremonies, too," he adds. I smile and hand over a hundred rupee note, still slightly skeptical but encouraged by the enthusiasm of the twenty eyes staring at me from all sides. "100 rupees very little contribution," says the officer. He flips through his companion book and finds a few words of English with amounts of 2000 rupees and beyond. "I am a student," I respond, keeping my reasoning simple. "Please accept what I offer." The riverside women, hand -mirrors held close, darken their lashes and eyes before smearing themselves with whitening cream. No rain in the sky today and still I am soaked by India' unfailing sensory overload from sun-up til sun down and into midnight's shadows.
I sit on the steps with my shawl veiling face and eyes, hoping to dissolve into the hypnotic Ganges flow and evade the curious eyes of the riverbank dwellers for just a moment. And as a single moment dawns and faces, like a firefly, a larva, an aphid born and laid to rest in the same instant, Mona Lisa is by my side. Mona Lisa, the spirited young woman who speaks with confidence in broken but practiced English explains to me that I should come with her to Calcutta. "Two single women traveling alone can become friends traveling together," she smiles. In another time and place, I might say yes, impressed by her sweet persistence, which includes stories of her paramedical training, her life as a classical Indian singer and a thorough explanation of her identification card. She pulls out a handwritten and carefully preserved business card that in another hand could be easily mistaken for a laundry-drenched pastime. "And look here," she adds, showing me an immaculate florescent print out of Ram Dev and his wife with bloody-mouthed Kali and Tara in a totem-pole like arrangement. Mona Lisa sings to me and waves her henna-laced hand like a Bollywood star. "God bless you," she says as she makes a tentative gesture in the shape of a cross. "And God bless you, Mona Lisa," I reply with my hands folded in Namaste. "Good luck in Calcutta."
I continue walking. The sun rises high. I miss the breakfast hour completely, hunger dispelled by the buzz of morning activity. A happily naked toddler looks up, her eyes thickly defined with black powder, shielding her young pupils from the sun and subsequently making her look like a princess. Her mother smiles, six or seven months pregnant with the next. This is who I would give the hundred rupees pocketed by the riverside official. We hold our gaze for a long moment and continue walking our separate ways.
The banks of the Ganges are bursting with color. Hundreds of locals and Indian tourists flood the water's edge with marigold and bugambilia offerings and bathe happily or not so happily by the bucketful. One of the not so happy bathers is a toddler on holiday with his young parents. He is adorned with blessing necklaces and a thin string around his waist, nothing more. Dad drags him to the water as Mom tries to focus the camera. The young boy screams in protest as he is dunked into the current. I step away, embarrassed to maintain my sideways glance any longer. I make my way up river where children and women are squatting on small mud and rubbish islands, fingering through the trash in search of something. Fresh water mussels? Snails? Discarded jewels? Coin offerings? I sit down, feeling comfortably anonymous with my veil. But not two breaths do I take before I feel a tap on my shoulder.
"Namaskar, madame."
I turn around to see two orange-clad sadhus gazing at me. White beards, black umbrellas and neutral business-like expressions.
"Namaskar," I reply, knowing they've got me cornered.
"Country, please," continues the alpha of the pair.
"U.S.A." I say with a smile.
"It is not money we want," the leader continues. "Rice, flour, vegetables: this we want. Come."
I follow willingly, knowing the rule that once sadhus have you you are to respect their request, if at all reasonable.
"10kg of rice, good," states the sadhu, sure that I will continue to comply as easily as I have thus far.
"100 rupees of rice," I say. "100 rupees is what I offer."
The sadhu shakes his head in disappointment, but I know my offering is appropriate and stand my ground with ease. I hand him the money, snap a photo, receive his blessing with folded hands and bowed head and slip quietly from the shop and back to the clamorous street. A plump woman whose heavy eyes witnessed the transaction is quick on my heels.
"50 rupees, sister. Chapatti, rice."
"No, sister," I reply, not slackening my pace. She persists thirty meters more and gives up.
I duck out of the river boardwalk and onto the busy alley-way streets, bursting at the seams with vendors on bikes and surplus cheap merchandise: bangles, plastics, blankets, incense, metal-ware, spices and balls of dough deep-fried in oil. I dissolve into the noise and chaos just as I dissolved into the Ganges flow of morning. I walk with a playful confidence and smile: the kind of confidence that comes from deep humility and a willingness to put judgment aside and just be.
Saturday, September 25, 2010
The Train
I chose the 54 hour train-ride south because I knew the journey would be like nothing else I've experienced thus far. I chose the 54 hour train-ride north because I knew I could weather the railway with grace. Four and a half days of life in a rail coach watching the world rush by through open windows, hypnotized by the endless green expanse: an endless green thickly embroidered with skyscraper garbage heaps and anonymous cows feasting on the stench.
How to re-create the whirlwind inundation of rail-side existence? The eternal matchbox-city slums putt-putt by, frame by frame, as the train reaches the outskirts of the city; haphazard yet carefully mended roofs of burlap, tarpaulin and broken metal flash sunlight and burning garbage direct to eye-level; a child swings from a rope hung in the single tree outside a broken line of plaster-colored shacks; two egrets pose lovingly on the staunch backbone of a long-horned cow; trash sits; children play; more trash burns; hammers tap-tap; the smell of fresh piss hisses and a line of bare bums squat on the railway before going home to their huts on the edge of midnight's train whistle. How to share the sensory overload of the whirlwind journey of boxcar eyes that stare out the train's barred-windows as the world rushes by? I feel like a spinning druid: flashes of color, words and song; sparks and fireworks exploding.
Apart from the endless garbage that lines the rivers, railways, mountainsides, cities and villages, the breadth of India between Delhi and Kerala is green farmland. Potatoes, Corn, Rice and Squash for endless miles. Banana trees and coconut palms joining the patchwork fields as the train moves south. Entire families work the harvest together. Big sister cares for baby under the make-shift shade of a broken umbrella. Mom's sure hands sow new rice seedlings ankle-deep in mud. Dad and brother man the two-mule plow and ready the next field for planting. Children harvest with agility and grace, making time for a quick game of tag or an approximation of cricket before the sun sets.
I think I would love India if I took the time to learn Hindi. In fact, I feel my love growing even with my stapled tongue. I love the kind faces and enthusiasm: a happy outburst at every hello. I love the attention to detail: blessing scarves at the source of water, the florescent-colored face flowers hanging in every doorway just over the fresh embers of burning incense. What we might call tacky in the states is gorgeous in India because everyone believes in everyday celebration. Celebration that merely begins by blessing doorways with garlands of flowers and throwing rice and spending extra rupees on special incense to make the living statues of Krishna and Lakshmi happy. India: the land of constant celebration, eternal fireworks, explosions of the heart and symphonies of chaos. All of this crazy color bounces off the walls of a rail-car packed with happy sardine-packed passengers and still I grapple with the filth and stench and the everywhere-is-a-dumping-ground philosophy. Any which way one turns, paper teacups and plates and foil packets filled with remnant curries fly from the window. Bags of chips and biscuits and plastic soda bottles by the hundreds carelessly launched to join the rubbish fields. Impossible to get over the shock. Still, I attempt to dispel the trash-drowning helplessness I feel, I focus my senses on the musical quality of my surroundings. A composure would faint from a musical overload on the aisles of the Indian Rail. Each passing vendor delivers a perfectly-pitched jingle with unparalleled stamina (hour after hour on repeat) and each beggar stares with eyes deep enough to silence the brass buzz. Children play a wooden-spoon symphony and sing with a sweetness that smiles when a shower of coins meet the tin of hand-held cup. Tap-tapping canes. The swish of brooms and outstretched hands, May I shine your shoes, madame? I mumble and tumble because I am too overwhelmed to try and make sense of the two-day chug-a-choo on the Indian Rail: two days intensified by the heat of juxtaposed polarities. The most beautiful beside the most wretched; a barefoot bangle-clad woman peering through the sheer veil of an orange sari to focus her eyes on the reeking hillside of human-waste in search of a coin, a discarded scrap, anything hinting at worth. Over and over again.
The paradox of India: we love her even as we hold our breath to keep from getting sick. A druid spins dizzy and exhausted--overcome by love and anguish--and surrenders to chaos, because that is the way of India. Parades and color and tears. Surviving with a blood-orange vivaciousness made of sweat, frying butter, gentle laughter and a warrior capacity to persist, one cup of tea at a time.
How to re-create the whirlwind inundation of rail-side existence? The eternal matchbox-city slums putt-putt by, frame by frame, as the train reaches the outskirts of the city; haphazard yet carefully mended roofs of burlap, tarpaulin and broken metal flash sunlight and burning garbage direct to eye-level; a child swings from a rope hung in the single tree outside a broken line of plaster-colored shacks; two egrets pose lovingly on the staunch backbone of a long-horned cow; trash sits; children play; more trash burns; hammers tap-tap; the smell of fresh piss hisses and a line of bare bums squat on the railway before going home to their huts on the edge of midnight's train whistle. How to share the sensory overload of the whirlwind journey of boxcar eyes that stare out the train's barred-windows as the world rushes by? I feel like a spinning druid: flashes of color, words and song; sparks and fireworks exploding.
Apart from the endless garbage that lines the rivers, railways, mountainsides, cities and villages, the breadth of India between Delhi and Kerala is green farmland. Potatoes, Corn, Rice and Squash for endless miles. Banana trees and coconut palms joining the patchwork fields as the train moves south. Entire families work the harvest together. Big sister cares for baby under the make-shift shade of a broken umbrella. Mom's sure hands sow new rice seedlings ankle-deep in mud. Dad and brother man the two-mule plow and ready the next field for planting. Children harvest with agility and grace, making time for a quick game of tag or an approximation of cricket before the sun sets.
I think I would love India if I took the time to learn Hindi. In fact, I feel my love growing even with my stapled tongue. I love the kind faces and enthusiasm: a happy outburst at every hello. I love the attention to detail: blessing scarves at the source of water, the florescent-colored face flowers hanging in every doorway just over the fresh embers of burning incense. What we might call tacky in the states is gorgeous in India because everyone believes in everyday celebration. Celebration that merely begins by blessing doorways with garlands of flowers and throwing rice and spending extra rupees on special incense to make the living statues of Krishna and Lakshmi happy. India: the land of constant celebration, eternal fireworks, explosions of the heart and symphonies of chaos. All of this crazy color bounces off the walls of a rail-car packed with happy sardine-packed passengers and still I grapple with the filth and stench and the everywhere-is-a-dumping-ground philosophy. Any which way one turns, paper teacups and plates and foil packets filled with remnant curries fly from the window. Bags of chips and biscuits and plastic soda bottles by the hundreds carelessly launched to join the rubbish fields. Impossible to get over the shock. Still, I attempt to dispel the trash-drowning helplessness I feel, I focus my senses on the musical quality of my surroundings. A composure would faint from a musical overload on the aisles of the Indian Rail. Each passing vendor delivers a perfectly-pitched jingle with unparalleled stamina (hour after hour on repeat) and each beggar stares with eyes deep enough to silence the brass buzz. Children play a wooden-spoon symphony and sing with a sweetness that smiles when a shower of coins meet the tin of hand-held cup. Tap-tapping canes. The swish of brooms and outstretched hands, May I shine your shoes, madame? I mumble and tumble because I am too overwhelmed to try and make sense of the two-day chug-a-choo on the Indian Rail: two days intensified by the heat of juxtaposed polarities. The most beautiful beside the most wretched; a barefoot bangle-clad woman peering through the sheer veil of an orange sari to focus her eyes on the reeking hillside of human-waste in search of a coin, a discarded scrap, anything hinting at worth. Over and over again.
The paradox of India: we love her even as we hold our breath to keep from getting sick. A druid spins dizzy and exhausted--overcome by love and anguish--and surrenders to chaos, because that is the way of India. Parades and color and tears. Surviving with a blood-orange vivaciousness made of sweat, frying butter, gentle laughter and a warrior capacity to persist, one cup of tea at a time.
Monday, September 20, 2010
Munnar
My happily cartwheeling thoughts put on their finest British accent as I stroll through the tea estate: an ocean of endless green rows, so perfectly planted, so perfectly manicured. The hills are alive with the sound of music and the sweet kiss of soft rain. Every angle of the green expanse is a postcard. Just to the west, a perfectly symmetrical pyramid of green-plaited rows rises regal from the mist. Like something one expects to see on an elite garden tour where pruning sheers are paintbrushes and working hands the color of sunshine are descendants of Monet and Van Gogh. Nature would not craft the hills in this way - as predictable as the sound of a typewriter's clicking keys, but the green-striped ocean of tea is beautiful.
What is most remarkable is the brilliant quality of color amidst the dancing glow of drizzle and sunshine. A thousand shades of green: young tea leaves with a sun-glaze shine; old tea leaves on the edge of a purple storm; young tea leaves in the soft shadow of morning rain; old tea leaves smiling at noon's sunbath sweat. And decorating the hills like candy or Christmas ornaments are the tea estate houses, where hundreds of fieldhands live with their families. The modest concrete buildings are painted the most brilliant shade of indigo -- a blend of the brightest sky-blue and a newly bloomed violet. Indigo bright walls with red tin roofs, turquoise doors, florescent yellow dahlias growing in the garden and a clothesline showcasing the whole color-spectrum of breezy laundry. I snap photo after photo to capture the radiance of the color explosion: an impossible task. Camera can capture the gateway-moment to memories but cannot sing the sweet buzz of life happening in such a swirl of vibrant color.
Men and women painted ebony by the sun walk barefoot through the steep green ocean rows and prune the tea plants over musical chit-chat. Men work with a machete like knife to clear the beautiful lantanta and morning-glory weeds that encroach upon the neat seams of the tea slopes. Women work with special pruning sheers that have an attached bag for gathering the tea leaves. In an instant of clip-clipping, the ebony handed smile fills the small bag and in one smooth motion delivers the green harvest to a large bag worn on her waist. Generation after generation the same: all day planting, tending and harvesting tea. Like mother and father; like grandmother and grandfather. Since the British came and saw green fortune in these hills. It's surprising how beautiful deforestation can look when so carefully groomed and green.
I am glad to meet these tea-estate hills, where the land-locked ocean is manicured-green and the houses are colored indigo and smell of woodsmoke and spice. I am glad to meet the hospitality of barefoot fieldhand generations and feel silenced by the calm, steady rain. I am glad to chance upon this friendly tea-estate town where school girls wear fresh flowers in their braids and smile bright-eyed into the softness of morning: their pink bows reflecting lantana light. Munnar: high up in the Kerala clouds, a green tea-estate ocean blooms its way into high-noon cups and saucers across the world.
What is most remarkable is the brilliant quality of color amidst the dancing glow of drizzle and sunshine. A thousand shades of green: young tea leaves with a sun-glaze shine; old tea leaves on the edge of a purple storm; young tea leaves in the soft shadow of morning rain; old tea leaves smiling at noon's sunbath sweat. And decorating the hills like candy or Christmas ornaments are the tea estate houses, where hundreds of fieldhands live with their families. The modest concrete buildings are painted the most brilliant shade of indigo -- a blend of the brightest sky-blue and a newly bloomed violet. Indigo bright walls with red tin roofs, turquoise doors, florescent yellow dahlias growing in the garden and a clothesline showcasing the whole color-spectrum of breezy laundry. I snap photo after photo to capture the radiance of the color explosion: an impossible task. Camera can capture the gateway-moment to memories but cannot sing the sweet buzz of life happening in such a swirl of vibrant color.
Men and women painted ebony by the sun walk barefoot through the steep green ocean rows and prune the tea plants over musical chit-chat. Men work with a machete like knife to clear the beautiful lantanta and morning-glory weeds that encroach upon the neat seams of the tea slopes. Women work with special pruning sheers that have an attached bag for gathering the tea leaves. In an instant of clip-clipping, the ebony handed smile fills the small bag and in one smooth motion delivers the green harvest to a large bag worn on her waist. Generation after generation the same: all day planting, tending and harvesting tea. Like mother and father; like grandmother and grandfather. Since the British came and saw green fortune in these hills. It's surprising how beautiful deforestation can look when so carefully groomed and green.
I am glad to meet these tea-estate hills, where the land-locked ocean is manicured-green and the houses are colored indigo and smell of woodsmoke and spice. I am glad to meet the hospitality of barefoot fieldhand generations and feel silenced by the calm, steady rain. I am glad to chance upon this friendly tea-estate town where school girls wear fresh flowers in their braids and smile bright-eyed into the softness of morning: their pink bows reflecting lantana light. Munnar: high up in the Kerala clouds, a green tea-estate ocean blooms its way into high-noon cups and saucers across the world.
Thursday, September 16, 2010
Sitting on a bus in Delhi
As the afternoon drizzle of rain kisses Munnar's tea-fields green and gold, I take a moment to glance through the pages of my haphazard journal. The black and white composition notebook offers a sweet familiarity; I have been writing in such journals for a decade: pasting pictures, etching crayon-happy drawings, scribbling short cafe-napkin thoughts and writing longer discourses on anything from the beauty of spring crocuses to the shame of jet-sprayed soybean fields that poison happy cows, well-meaning earthworms and uninformed people. The India journal is particularly haphazard: a conglomeration of train station data, inspired chapter outlines of the yogic texts I have been assigned for the upcoming Yoga Teacher Training, and momentary gusts of inspiration that spiral their way into essays and commentaries much like those I post on the blog. As I finger through the soft-lined pages, I come upon an entry I wrote while in Agra, the rough industrial city that draws hundreds of thousands of tourists to see the breathtaking dawn beauty of the Taj Mahal. The Agra entry communicates the laughable chaos that describes travel in India: so many faces, fragrances, possibilities and impossibilities. And so, I choose to look over my shoulder at the month past and share the following entry.
_______________________________________________
Sitting on a bus in Delhi, I think about the crow of madness . This phrase is used by Jane to describe life in Nepal and India: sunshine is beaming one minute and the next, storm clouds bring chaos and inexplicable lack of reason.
First, there is the famous head-wiggle: the same side-to-side gesture with the half-tilt of a lopsided metronome can mean "yes," "no," and "maybe." Does this bus go to Agra? (Head-wiggle and mumble.) Leaving at 11am? (Head-wiggle and wave.) The bus might get to Agra eventually, taking more than 5 hours to go 200 kilometers. And the bus could start its engine at 11am and move to leave around noon. Maybe there will be a 10 minute lunch stop that is really an hour. And you might order butter nan for 30 rupees and pay 50 because today the manager is changing the menu. And the bus might have air-conditioning that feels like someone is trying to cool you with his breath or with the air from a deflated balloon. The journey could be great and maybe the bus corresponds to the ticket you bought from the travel agent who pocketed more than the price of the ticket in commission. And maybe you eat lunch in the Delhi slum and arrive for dinner in an upper-class Agra marble-floored apartment. And maybe you feel more comfortable sitting on broken cement with the flies than you do being served lemon-soda in a crystal glass by a 12 year-old family servant. Both images of India. Both wings of the mad crow. The script of this film is being written as we speak and there is no one being paid to make it all make sense. So: let us choose good-humor to set the scene and live out the chaos with a generous smile and an enthusiastic head-wiggle that means "yes," "no" and "Of course I'll fall into the flow of this wild-ride that colors India's everyday with sweet unpredictability."
_______________________________________________
Sitting on a bus in Delhi, I think about the crow of madness . This phrase is used by Jane to describe life in Nepal and India: sunshine is beaming one minute and the next, storm clouds bring chaos and inexplicable lack of reason.
First, there is the famous head-wiggle: the same side-to-side gesture with the half-tilt of a lopsided metronome can mean "yes," "no," and "maybe." Does this bus go to Agra? (Head-wiggle and mumble.) Leaving at 11am? (Head-wiggle and wave.) The bus might get to Agra eventually, taking more than 5 hours to go 200 kilometers. And the bus could start its engine at 11am and move to leave around noon. Maybe there will be a 10 minute lunch stop that is really an hour. And you might order butter nan for 30 rupees and pay 50 because today the manager is changing the menu. And the bus might have air-conditioning that feels like someone is trying to cool you with his breath or with the air from a deflated balloon. The journey could be great and maybe the bus corresponds to the ticket you bought from the travel agent who pocketed more than the price of the ticket in commission. And maybe you eat lunch in the Delhi slum and arrive for dinner in an upper-class Agra marble-floored apartment. And maybe you feel more comfortable sitting on broken cement with the flies than you do being served lemon-soda in a crystal glass by a 12 year-old family servant. Both images of India. Both wings of the mad crow. The script of this film is being written as we speak and there is no one being paid to make it all make sense. So: let us choose good-humor to set the scene and live out the chaos with a generous smile and an enthusiastic head-wiggle that means "yes," "no" and "Of course I'll fall into the flow of this wild-ride that colors India's everyday with sweet unpredictability."
Monday, September 13, 2010
Let go, sister
Varkala Beach, Kerala
Coffee cup in hand, his baritone voice steals the breath of morning as he spirals into a disordered rant of feeling conflicted, confused, maybe a bit angry amidst the postcard beauty of the turquoise tide of Varkala Beach in south India. That swallows the plastic, paper and putrid rubbish generated by this billboard happy tourist paradise. I do not feel alarmed. The calm of morning meditation and a barefoot walk in the first-light stillness rises up easy as cloud-vapor and fills my lungs with patience. Yesterday it was me who was tumbling off the edge as Madonna's Greatest Hits on loudspeaker repeat induced a wrestling match with my conscience and we we battled our way through fabricated beach paradise in search of the real India. A patient ear to listen is all a friend can offer. The rage will subside, as all feelings do, once the heavy heart pauses long enough to recognize the futility of its dizzying angst.
I want to get out of here. (When hard rain falls, we all go chasing the sun. Grass must be greener over there.) I want to go to the real India. (It does feel strange to lounge on the manicured boardwalk crammed with restaurants and textile shops and cafe lattes.) Where is the stench of urine and rubbish that was becoming so familiar? (But whose to say what the real India might look like? To ask the street-sweeper who lives in Shadipur slum? Or the CEO of Barclay's Bank? Or the French ex-pat who makes a living pushing drugs North to South and beyond? Which way to the real India?)
Maybe this is not the right question. Maybe feeling uncomfortable in the seaside tourist hub, complete with mood music and Continental Breakfast, only takes a traveler further into the blindness of unsatisfied eyes.
"What is it you want to see!?" screams an anonymous voice as the broken leg beggar who walks like a two-legged spider makes his daily rounds. "He is holding his hand out -- there: right in front of your big blue eyes! Real enough for you, sister? Or must you join the trash-pickers on their daily hunt for savory scraps in the rubbish heaps by the river?"
"I didn't mean to be so arrogant," I try in my meekest voice. "It is wrong of me to arrive here with eyes glazed by expectation and folklore. How to un-stitch the seams that make my mind so thin-lipped? I just thought, you know, marigolds and smiling sadhus; bangles and bright-eyes; poverty turned to plenty by the strength of the human spirit: the immortal bass-drum heartbeat of the human will to survive. I just thought...temple bells and bindis and a spiritual strength unparalleled and...God, I must sound so ignorant. Spiraling downward like a hawk's last flight.
Sideways head-nod. The tailor looks up from his foot-powered sewing machine, acknowledges my feigned attempt at redemtion and offers a soft smile anyway. "You understand, sister. India not possible without a smile. Without at love. So many people. So much poor. Sun rise again today. Foot still working the sew machine. No heavy heart. India no easy. Ask that man. Selling postcards all time but not selling. Just smile him when he ask you again and again. So many eyes only looking downward. Heart weary. Smile like a small coin in the cup."
Real? Not Real? Authentic? Fake? I have invented these concepts on the basis of my expectations. On the colorful illustrations that arise from storybooks and films and daydreams. Of romanticized jungles and rivers and sadhus and snake-people and bodhi trees and prayer-beads; imagination fixed on classical tabla, orange marigolds, turquoise saris and ash-covered ascetics, eyes as bright as the flames of morning pujas on The Ganges. Kingfisher beer and Madonna's Greatest Hits did not make it into the picture; nor did rubbish-covered cliffs and espresso coffee. How arrogant of me that by seeking the real India I am seeking my own preconceptions as if life should have frozen when I first heard the sitar or read Siddhartha or saw footage of the ghats at Varanasi. Frozen in time just for me: waiting for my arrival. Can I do anything but laugh at myself and feel the earth beneath my feet? Wave at the jovial fisherman who have enough sense not to be concerned by what is real and unreal and instead allow their bare feet to adjust from sandy shores to pavement with ease. The very act of "looking for something" is dust in the eyes of what is. Blinding. Itchy. Disappointing.
"Let go, sister. Beauty here. Maybe no business, but sunshines and jokes and tea. Real or not real? What is this? Today is. Tomorrow, not yet. Fishermen fish. Tailors sew. Mother feed child. Father smoke cigar. Bird play on wind. Same, same but different.
Chuckle. Foot-pedal starts drumming; fish nets are cast; babies are tied to shady trees in safe bed-sheet cocoons; restaurant hosts sing the same hopeful jingle to each light-eyed passerby. Would it be better if I were jumping rope in the slum with the beggar children whose smiles make me laugh and weep? Would I be better? The question is un-useful and self-centered. Why ask it? Where I am is here. Who I am is me: a tiny grain of sand on the shore of the Arabian Sea, no better and no worse for touring slums or vacations destinations. Just me. A young woman not fit to decide what is Real or Unreal. Whose days are better lived barefoot and quiet, listening to the steady ease of the tailor's foot-pedal machine stitch-stitching the familiar patterns that make up the beautiful fabric of a humble, seaside life.
Coffee cup in hand, his baritone voice steals the breath of morning as he spirals into a disordered rant of feeling conflicted, confused, maybe a bit angry amidst the postcard beauty of the turquoise tide of Varkala Beach in south India. That swallows the plastic, paper and putrid rubbish generated by this billboard happy tourist paradise. I do not feel alarmed. The calm of morning meditation and a barefoot walk in the first-light stillness rises up easy as cloud-vapor and fills my lungs with patience. Yesterday it was me who was tumbling off the edge as Madonna's Greatest Hits on loudspeaker repeat induced a wrestling match with my conscience and we we battled our way through fabricated beach paradise in search of the real India. A patient ear to listen is all a friend can offer. The rage will subside, as all feelings do, once the heavy heart pauses long enough to recognize the futility of its dizzying angst.
I want to get out of here. (When hard rain falls, we all go chasing the sun. Grass must be greener over there.) I want to go to the real India. (It does feel strange to lounge on the manicured boardwalk crammed with restaurants and textile shops and cafe lattes.) Where is the stench of urine and rubbish that was becoming so familiar? (But whose to say what the real India might look like? To ask the street-sweeper who lives in Shadipur slum? Or the CEO of Barclay's Bank? Or the French ex-pat who makes a living pushing drugs North to South and beyond? Which way to the real India?)
Maybe this is not the right question. Maybe feeling uncomfortable in the seaside tourist hub, complete with mood music and Continental Breakfast, only takes a traveler further into the blindness of unsatisfied eyes.
"What is it you want to see!?" screams an anonymous voice as the broken leg beggar who walks like a two-legged spider makes his daily rounds. "He is holding his hand out -- there: right in front of your big blue eyes! Real enough for you, sister? Or must you join the trash-pickers on their daily hunt for savory scraps in the rubbish heaps by the river?"
"I didn't mean to be so arrogant," I try in my meekest voice. "It is wrong of me to arrive here with eyes glazed by expectation and folklore. How to un-stitch the seams that make my mind so thin-lipped? I just thought, you know, marigolds and smiling sadhus; bangles and bright-eyes; poverty turned to plenty by the strength of the human spirit: the immortal bass-drum heartbeat of the human will to survive. I just thought...temple bells and bindis and a spiritual strength unparalleled and...God, I must sound so ignorant. Spiraling downward like a hawk's last flight.
Sideways head-nod. The tailor looks up from his foot-powered sewing machine, acknowledges my feigned attempt at redemtion and offers a soft smile anyway. "You understand, sister. India not possible without a smile. Without at love. So many people. So much poor. Sun rise again today. Foot still working the sew machine. No heavy heart. India no easy. Ask that man. Selling postcards all time but not selling. Just smile him when he ask you again and again. So many eyes only looking downward. Heart weary. Smile like a small coin in the cup."
Real? Not Real? Authentic? Fake? I have invented these concepts on the basis of my expectations. On the colorful illustrations that arise from storybooks and films and daydreams. Of romanticized jungles and rivers and sadhus and snake-people and bodhi trees and prayer-beads; imagination fixed on classical tabla, orange marigolds, turquoise saris and ash-covered ascetics, eyes as bright as the flames of morning pujas on The Ganges. Kingfisher beer and Madonna's Greatest Hits did not make it into the picture; nor did rubbish-covered cliffs and espresso coffee. How arrogant of me that by seeking the real India I am seeking my own preconceptions as if life should have frozen when I first heard the sitar or read Siddhartha or saw footage of the ghats at Varanasi. Frozen in time just for me: waiting for my arrival. Can I do anything but laugh at myself and feel the earth beneath my feet? Wave at the jovial fisherman who have enough sense not to be concerned by what is real and unreal and instead allow their bare feet to adjust from sandy shores to pavement with ease. The very act of "looking for something" is dust in the eyes of what is. Blinding. Itchy. Disappointing.
"Let go, sister. Beauty here. Maybe no business, but sunshines and jokes and tea. Real or not real? What is this? Today is. Tomorrow, not yet. Fishermen fish. Tailors sew. Mother feed child. Father smoke cigar. Bird play on wind. Same, same but different.
Chuckle. Foot-pedal starts drumming; fish nets are cast; babies are tied to shady trees in safe bed-sheet cocoons; restaurant hosts sing the same hopeful jingle to each light-eyed passerby. Would it be better if I were jumping rope in the slum with the beggar children whose smiles make me laugh and weep? Would I be better? The question is un-useful and self-centered. Why ask it? Where I am is here. Who I am is me: a tiny grain of sand on the shore of the Arabian Sea, no better and no worse for touring slums or vacations destinations. Just me. A young woman not fit to decide what is Real or Unreal. Whose days are better lived barefoot and quiet, listening to the steady ease of the tailor's foot-pedal machine stitch-stitching the familiar patterns that make up the beautiful fabric of a humble, seaside life.
Circus Swim
Day at the circus, night in the slum, this is the title of the upcoming chapter in A Fine Balance and a fitting description for walking through the flooded streets of New Delhi. The constant chatter of street vendors, car-horns, power-drills, oily-hungry bicycle wheels, peaceful-easy cows and squealing dogs is not unlike a buoyant circus anthem. Different color: Delhi is not a red and yellow circus tent; but the tap-dancing optimism of the Big Top is strangely present amidst the clamor and filth of these crowded streets.
The streets of Pahar Ganj are crowded not only by people, pushcarts, bicycles, sledge-hammer demolition and an endless line of tea-stalls but also by water: flooded. Flooded by the monsoon rain that creates slop pools of mud and garbage on the drain-less streets. Flooded by people scurrying through the puddle-playground as they dodge rickshaws and motorcycles on their way to wherever they are going. Flooded by overwhelming olfactory stimulation: the stench of piss and shit and bloody meat hanging in the window, waiting for the next eager customer. One does not walk through the streets of Delhi but swimsthe rushing waves, taking care to come up for air every now and again.
Today we walk away from the tourist gauntlet of Pahar Ganj and into the Muslim neighborhood across the bridge: on the other side of the train-tracks. We allowed ourselves to get lost on the narrow medieval streets that zig and zag their way under a web of withered electrical wires,florescent laundry and decrepit buildings. I take a deep breath, feeling more anonymous here. No one tries to sell me anything but just stares with harmless, curious eyes, observing my white skin as a part of the grand circus. Like the bearded-lady, perhaps: "Step right up and see the strangest of the strange: a green eyed girl whose skin knows not the brown kiss of the sun!" I look out at the world so busy buzzing around me and marketplace eyes stare back, wondering at the strange creature who has entered the familiar web of their existence. Which one of us is the museum display? Which one of us peers out from behind the glass display? Neither. The rain falls upon us both.
When we pause a moment under the weary barber-shop awning, I see her. The shopping bag hides her small frame but her black onyx eyes cut through shadow and stench and find my smile. Beauty shines forth in unexpected places: a young girl in a white dress walking so easy through the circus-strange mess of shit and marigolds and blood and bananas and temple bells. The rickshaw wheels and pushcarts interrupt her feather-light steps with the jarring staccato of sweaty effort, but onyx-eyed girl does not miss a beat. She carries on her way with a sweet nonchalance as if the mud-happy motorcycles, irritated taxi horns and three-legged dog gangs are the most ordinary of characters. But for me, a nameless witness, I stand amazed at the resilience of this child's ease and confidence amidst the chaos and circus-strange intensity of the flooded Delhi streets. The corner of my smile perks up with a sweet breath of gratitude: children are among the best teachers of perseverance and grace.
The streets of Pahar Ganj are crowded not only by people, pushcarts, bicycles, sledge-hammer demolition and an endless line of tea-stalls but also by water: flooded. Flooded by the monsoon rain that creates slop pools of mud and garbage on the drain-less streets. Flooded by people scurrying through the puddle-playground as they dodge rickshaws and motorcycles on their way to wherever they are going. Flooded by overwhelming olfactory stimulation: the stench of piss and shit and bloody meat hanging in the window, waiting for the next eager customer. One does not walk through the streets of Delhi but swimsthe rushing waves, taking care to come up for air every now and again.
Today we walk away from the tourist gauntlet of Pahar Ganj and into the Muslim neighborhood across the bridge: on the other side of the train-tracks. We allowed ourselves to get lost on the narrow medieval streets that zig and zag their way under a web of withered electrical wires,florescent laundry and decrepit buildings. I take a deep breath, feeling more anonymous here. No one tries to sell me anything but just stares with harmless, curious eyes, observing my white skin as a part of the grand circus. Like the bearded-lady, perhaps: "Step right up and see the strangest of the strange: a green eyed girl whose skin knows not the brown kiss of the sun!" I look out at the world so busy buzzing around me and marketplace eyes stare back, wondering at the strange creature who has entered the familiar web of their existence. Which one of us is the museum display? Which one of us peers out from behind the glass display? Neither. The rain falls upon us both.
When we pause a moment under the weary barber-shop awning, I see her. The shopping bag hides her small frame but her black onyx eyes cut through shadow and stench and find my smile. Beauty shines forth in unexpected places: a young girl in a white dress walking so easy through the circus-strange mess of shit and marigolds and blood and bananas and temple bells. The rickshaw wheels and pushcarts interrupt her feather-light steps with the jarring staccato of sweaty effort, but onyx-eyed girl does not miss a beat. She carries on her way with a sweet nonchalance as if the mud-happy motorcycles, irritated taxi horns and three-legged dog gangs are the most ordinary of characters. But for me, a nameless witness, I stand amazed at the resilience of this child's ease and confidence amidst the chaos and circus-strange intensity of the flooded Delhi streets. The corner of my smile perks up with a sweet breath of gratitude: children are among the best teachers of perseverance and grace.
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