India … Lah?

December 31^st, 2003

Namaste -

(A cute mouse just ran across the floor). 

I'm starting my third week in India, and as of tonight, I'm back on the "Beautiful India" bandwagon. The tide was turned by a visit to Benares University this afternoon, where I met a charming American named Christine, who is on a six-month yoga trek.  Together we explored a peaceful and spacious modern Hindu Temple. Although what really turned the tide was a two hour yoga class (my first in six months!) which I just completed.  A charming (two charming people in one day!) Indian chap took me through a series of Hatha Yoga postures, and then for good measure threw in 20 minutes of Pranayama Yoga, which has overall left me feeling quite relaxed, and like the energizer bunny all at once.

I'm in the Holy City of Benares (recently renamed Varanasi) on the banks of the sacred Ganges river. When I say Holy City I mean that Varanasi is an important location in the Hindu Religion (I almost said Paradigm) - thousands of Hindus come here every day to bathe in the sacred water, which is said to wash away sins. The riverbank is lined with miles of stone staircases descending into the water, covered with half naked hindus - and here in public view the dead are burned in funeral pyres which fill the air with ash.   There is a a large fire, there a family in morning, and there at the edges of the flame, two colorful human feet which have not yet begun to burn.  I sat for a while watching the bodies burn, and wondered if I was being morbid - but I think not - I think it is important just to see. Just to sit with it. It is said that those who die in Varanasi attain Moksha - Liberation - freedom from the cycle of Karma and rebirth.

(Given that Benares is, as such, a quick Gateway to Heaven, You'd think the suicide rate would be through the roof!  Or, maybe, I'm not the only one who thinks that being incarnated isn't always all that bad.)

This of course can be read about in any guidebook. I myself first learned about Varanasi, along with many other nice things, by reading comic books.

The City of Benares is bit like Venice (but with cows?) - a magical labyrinth of narrow alleyways, smelling vaguely of sewage. The Sacred Ganges is septic. Despite recent efforts to control the output of raw sewage into the river, the water swarms with sacred bacteria - something like a million times the amount that is supposedly safe for bathing.  Even so the Hindus keep on bathing. I think therein is some special clue to the true meaning of "cultural relativity" - water that would kill a western scientist cleans the souls of the Hindus. I think Grant Morrison put in best in saying "This is the Sacred Ganges - The Microbes are part of the Magic!"

I was actually thinking of trying my own luck with taking a sacred dip - but then three nights ago I came down trembling with fever regardless - and lost a confusing and painful two days to bedrest and anti-biotics.

India is fucking Intense and Sasha (Canadian EAP Sasha) put it well when she said "There's nothing like it" During my first 12 hours in Calcutta I sometimes wondered if the plane hadn't hit a quantum bump and landed me on some level of Dante's Inferno. (I know that sounds clever but really it is what I thought.) The filth, the poverty, the people, people, people, and so many different kinds of people (and cows?). The constant chorus of spitting has me at last comprehending the "no spitting" Laws in Singapore - but in Calcutta the men urinate on the side streets with such frequency that taking an evening stroll means strolling through whole stretches of Urine soaked sidewalk. At last I understood what is meant by "culture shock." I escaped almost immediately on a night train to Darjeeling in the low Himalayas.

Darjeeling (This is what Darjeeling Tea refers to) is lovely if freezing in Winter, and I gave up the extremity of culture shock for sub-zero temperatures (I had packed for the tropics). Still, mountain folk are wonderful, and Darjeeling is made up in seemingly equal parts of Indians, Nepalis, and Tibetan Refugees. I ate tasty food, drank tea by the pot-full, and awaited consoling emails from those who might understand ( "I too escaped to a hill station to regroup" wrote Lura Dolas, and "regroup" has become one of my favorite words.)

...

I had to forward the above paragraphs to myself, as the hour was growing late and I was afraid that I would miss my train.  I rushed from the Internet cafe into the streets, caught an auto-rickshaw, and zoomed toward the train station, arriving just in time to wait five cold, cold hours for the train to show up.  In the meantime I made friends with a couple from New Zealand who had quit their jobs to travel for a year, while behind us loitered a train-station cow, who eventually napped on the concrete.  At about 4 AM the train finally arrived, and I joined in the mad throng who scrambled to find their seats.  Quickly throwing my small backpack on my bunk, I then proceeded to secure a spot for my larger pack, weaving this way and that as the crowd surged through the cabin - my big bag was secured and I looked up to discover that my small backpack had been stolen - along with my passport, plane tickets, and a small collection of items of personal value.

Aiyah.

 I spent that night restless, watching my recently augmented Buddhist detachment battle it out with my cynical materialistic side (I am an American).  By the morning, I had more or less mourned my loss and was determined not to let this ruin what already seemed too short a trip.  The train reached its destination and I joined my New Zealand friends in locating the bus to exotic (and erotic) Khajuraho, by which point we had also picked up a Korean Couple (very impressed that I knew how to say "hello" and "thank you" in their native tongue, thank you Tae Kwon Do) and a surly Hungarian woman named Gabi, who teaches Biology in English back home, and who had recently been suffering from the inevitable bout of Diarrhea.  Together we found the bus, crammed full with people like a can of sardines, and hence followed a jumpy, bumpy ride, which lasted for four hours before the bus finally arrived in the middle of nowhere with a flat tire.

Not quite in the middle of nowhere.  There was an odd, flat structure with a purpose that I did not understand, and here and there in the distance, people worked at jobs that I couldn't quite comprehend.  Also, we just happened to stop directly beside a very small cage containing two very, very angry monkeys.  I've seen this same monkey everywhere - Singapore, Malaysia, Thailand - but never in a cage.  Nevertheless, there they were, just across the road, hissing and throwing dirt at us as we stopped to observe their plight.  I felt very sorry for the monkeys - they were not happy and I cannot imagine why they were imprisoned like that, out in the middle of nowhere.  But, being in Hindustan (the proper name for India?) I found myself thinking like a Hindu. and remarking that these nasty monkeys must have very, very bad Karma indeed.  So maybe this is what happens to to murderers and rapists and unscrupulous Big Business-Men ... But the point is that I felt sorry for the monkeys.

I was just beginning to wonder, "what does this mean?" when the Bus started up again - to the credit of the bus operators, they had replaced the tire in record time.

...

Three busy days in Delhi, scrambling to get my tickets and passport replaced.  I find myself loving Delhi one minute only to lie awake at night tormented by the yelping of abused puppies in the alleyways below - (they call it the wheel of karma for a reason - people abuse puppies and are reborn as puppies who get abused by humans who will be reborn as puppies - what a fucking mess).  But the plight of the street dogs and the many beggars aside, I find Delhi to be spectacular - having all the mystery and self-importance of Washington DC - all the alluring and powerful monuments - and yet one finds oneself also in the middle of the third world with all its woes,  amidst a cosmopolitan locus of modernity, a hotbed of international politics - confluently.  I find that the energy here is powerful and magnificent - something I can feed on amidst all the hunger and confusion.  Today I visited the government buildings, which seemed an iteration of the American Capital, built in crimson Sandstone - and if you look closely, you see that there are monkeys on the roof.  "There are a hundred Indias" wrote E.M. Forster, and I think that Delhi is the beating heart of at least a dozen of them.

On my first day here,  I scrambled about the Main Bazaar looking for a comfortable and cheap hotel that would take me despite my lack of passport (they watch the tourists like hawks here) - when suddenly an Elephant (carrying tourists) came barging through the crowd, forcing taxis to the curb,  It was stereotypical and ridiculous - why oh why bring an elephant into such a narrow and congested street? - but stunning all the same.

My constant attempts to make friends with these foreign Indians and the disappointing frequency with which each "friendship" turns into a request for money (as a white tourist I am a target for the unscrupulous) I have on occasion found myself quite lonely.  Then, at those moments when I think all Indians must be shits, ("most Indians ar shits, as are most English," --Forster again) I meet an Indian fellow on the train who shows me his english poetry, which struggles to express the nature of Love and God - we talk for hours, and as I leave the train, he tells me that I am his best friend, and that he loves me.

Christmas would have been very lonely but that I met my friend Rhonda (EAP Singapore Rhonda) and together we spent a good five hours soaking in the aura of the magnificent and ridiculously overpriced Taj Mahal (Fifty cents for Indians, $17 for Tourists) - perhaps I should be happy that India is finding new ways to rake in the cash ... but all the same I wonder how much of that money will actually go to feed the endless hungry mouths that populate and exponentially repopulate the country.

I'm not sure what to write about the beggars.  I give when I can and yell at them to piss off when I don't have any small bills.  Some of them are very hungry and will always be beggars, and need help.  Others give you a dirty look if, as a white person, you do not immediately give them enough money to feed them for a week, and as far as I'm concerned those folks can, as I often say, piss off.  I've met people without hands, people without feet.  Always I try to talk to these people without offering pity, because I think pity is damaging (not to mention insulting) - and the amazing thing is that some of them, though they still need always support, seem more at peace and happier than many Americans.  Others, of course, are wretched and miserable, and you do what you can, but at some point, you have to start to put up your walls ("How dare I ignore an outstretched hand?" -- A. Morissette).  One night I found my pockets full of small bills and I broke down completely, handing out everything I had.  Immediately I was surrounded, the night came alive into a throng of old men and women, bare-footed children wrapped in blankets, tugging at me and following me back to the hotel in a cluster, echoing again and again the words "Hello"  "Hello"  "Hello"  "Hello"  "Hello"

And it keeps getting worse, as far as I understand it, as each family has 4 to 6 children as a kind of insurance, so that across the world the rich get richer, the poor get poorer, and in India, the poor multiply and multiply - you may say, they need to stop!  More mouths, less food, more competition! And I have said this myself - stop having kids, think about the future!  But also I look at the world and I wonder how we live with ourselves for always turning away from this - they need to stop multiplying, yes, but we need to stop ignoring!  I don't mean that we should impose our values, but would it kill us to stop turning our backs and to open our hearts?  I do not mean that we must give up our Gucci bags and Armani suits - only that there is a far cry between the refusal to acknowledge, and the willingness to communicate.  And as I once said in a play, "communication is everything!"

At her last concert in Berkeley, Ani Difranco said of America, "Myopia is strong here, and the mind control deep."  And yipee, it doesn't take a rocket scientist to see that she's probably right.  America could use some waking up to the global consciousness, no doubt about it.  But in coming to India I find that I am proud to be an American all the same.  And how surprising!   I'm beginning to understand how Madonna, in singing about American Life, can say "you are the best thing I've seen" and "Fuck it" in the same song.

(As this is perhpas my one chance to tell everyone what I think after six months abroad, I will say that America is indeed none other than the latest Bully to perch atop the global primate hill, throwing its girth about without regard for the little sentient beings it might crush.  A self aggrandizing and thick skulled Bully to be sure.  But at the same time, I think that with a regular fitness program, some up-to-date education, and a dash of laughter - this America might yet prove to be a svelte, felicitous, and even benevolent specimen of  21st century Terra Uberorganismos - but I suppose time and memetic evolution will tell.

But returning to the beggars - "I don't give to healthy children," says a haughty and brilliant British Parapsychologist named Serina.  We have met in the late of night at the train station, going from Darjeeling to Calcutta.  (I lied when I said I had gone to Darjeeling out of pure escapism - also I had gone there to hear the Dalai Lama lecture on Buddhism).  Serina teaches parapsychology at a yoga college six months out of the year, and doesn't give to healthy children because she thinks its wrong to encourage begging among the bright and able bodied.  And for the most part, I agree with her - some of these kids grow plump and hostile from handouts, like chipmunks in a park - they'll never try to do anything else, and one day, they'll stop looking "cute."  And then of course, the main selling point becomes wretchedness - and these beggars are some of the best actors I've met in all my years in the theatre.  That sounds awful, I know - and I don't mean to imply that it is all an act - their suffering is real.  But, at the same time, the reality of their suffering is their main selling point - and in a capitalist country, you are still a person as long as you have something to sell.  So, they take the reality, and beef it up - all of my theatre friends, I invite you to India as a study of acting - I've seen children in crutches clutching their stomachs in agony and begging for money - half an hour later running about on healthy legs, giggling joyfully with their friends as my rupees chime in their pockets.  They live on their ability to look dirty, sick and helpless - and all the same, that is what they have to do to survive.  And then, of course, there are the people who have no hands.

(Sometimes they get sloppy - once amidst a group of kids who took me for a sucker, I came across a lad who made hunger motions with one hand and stuffed his face with potato chips with the other.  "You're Eating!!" I bellowed, pointing, and a stunned silence followed.  Needless to say, I did not give those particular little urchins a dime - and one must find a way to keep a sense of humor about all this, while accepting the gravity all the same.)

Calcutta turned out to be lovely, by the way, and middle-aged Serina (the parapsychologist) had much wisdom to offer about adjusting to life in India.  Our train was late, and she and I spoke for a long time about "psychic studies" - how it is becoming a recognized academic field in California and England ("not in Singapore!" I heartily chuckled).  Serina doesn't share my optimism that the Psychic is moving toward a more prominent position in human civilization - "It has always existed on the edges of society, because it deals with the borders between worlds," she says, "it will always be this way."  I do hope she's wrong.  But oh well.  Whatever.

I try not to give money to healthy children.  But sometimes I donate to schools.  And sometimes I buy healthy (but hungry) children food.  Because in the meantime, it is what it is.

...

New Years Eve in Delhi - I had hoped to be lounging on the southern beaches by now, but alas a stolen passport makes for trouble on a divided and bordered planet.  I secured the last of my travel documents this afternoon, and I'll finally depart for Bombay at dawn.  Time is running short, but I'm very grateful to be headed for the Hindu heartland at last - and a return to the tropics --!  For all the warnings I got about India, nobody told me that the north was freezing in winter!

Delhi has taking its tole on me, with a whole class of people seemingly dedicated to removing money from white people by any means possible.  Today I snapped and told a fellow that he was like a Mosquito - "You try to suck my blood!" I sneered (he had taken me 60 KM to arrive at a destination 5 KM from my starting point, and demanded that I pay the full amount on account of the price of gas!!).  And when he started to curse at me under his breath, I spun about, glared at him, and bellowed, "BAD KARMA!" at which point we promptly went our separate ways.  I've been feeling guilty all day that I looked this guy in the eyes and told him that he was a parasite - but I must admit, I also have been hoping that he feels guilty too.  At least then I'd know we have something in common.

All the same, Three weeks ago, in Bhodgaya (where the Buddha attained enlightenment [?]), I pass a little girl on a dusty road at dusk.  She watches me from across the way.  And then as I cross her path, she presses her palms together over her heart, bows her head, and says, "Namaste."  And I stop, press my palms over my heart, bow my head, and say "Namaste" in return.

So I send all my love to all of you - and wish you a very happy New Year! - 2004 at last!

Om Shanti,

Jonathan

PS  Did you read this entire letter?  Good God!!

PPS  I would love to hear from you.

"Thank you India, Thank you Providence, Thank you Disillusionment, Thank you Nothingness, Thank you Clarity, Thank you Thank you Silence!"  -- A.  Morissette

"Adventures do occur, but not punctually"  --EM Forster

Back to Travels