Reflections

I am honored to have been given the opportunity to explore and discover for myself the land that gives me my roots and my culture, the land from which I draw my strength and values. I saw and learned much, but also realized that there is almost an infinite amount left yet to discover. It warrants many, many more trips to this land in the future. I have a clearer picture of who I am and why I am this way; I have less tension about who I want to be and where I am going in life.

 

Being in India has taught me that there is so much more to life than waking up in the morning, going to school/work, eating food, doing homework, partying, and sleeping. There is so much to be discovered wherever we go, whatever we do, and whenever we do it. I have learned that if there is work to be done, then there is no better time to start than now. I have learned that there is no use worrying about what will happen in the future, for that is not in our hands. But what is in our hands is what we do now. I have learned that many people talk, but nobody listens; our character lies in our actions alone.

 

There is nothing more I can say about what I have learned. The time has come to stop talking, and start acting; the time has come to change the world. The question is not “Does the world want to be changed?” but rather, “Am I ready to change the world?” and to be ready, one must change oneself.

Adventure 17: D-103, Sector 40, Noida, India, to 543 Gateshead Drive, Naperville, Illinois, USA

I’m in the airplane, and I’m going home.

 

They say there’s no place like home, and they’re right. Having been away from home (and homeland) for so long, I can honestly say that I’m ready to come back. As much as I loved India and getting in touch with my roots, and even though I learned and gained so much, I’m still an American boy. Home is home, no matter what, and it’s time for me to return to it. This is only the second time in my life that I’ve been away from home for more than a month or two, the first time being when I was 9 and went to Chinmaya International Residential School (CIRS) for 6 months in India. The only difference between then and now is that this time I’m older, and can do stuff on my own… hence the traveling.

 

The airplane is currently somewhere near the Rankin Inlet, over the Hudson Bay.

 

The current time in Chicago is 1:45 AM.

The current time where I am is also 1:45 AM (this inlet is directly north of Chicago).

The current time in New Delhi is 12:15 PM.

The estimated arrival time is 4:31 AM in Chicago, which is about 2400 kilometers away.

The airplane is at an altitude of 11582 meters, with a ground speed of approximately 959 kmph.

It’s -47ºC outside.

 

I’ve been in the airplane for a little over 12 hours now, watching movies, reading, sleeping, and writing. It makes me think of the crazy amount of flying I have done since I got to India. I’ve never taken that many flights in such a short amount of time. In the words of one of my uncles when he found out about my itinerary before I came to India, “His itinerary is like that of a high-flying executive!” and indeed it was. I will be arriving home shortly, and resuming life back at home!

Quest 16: Finishing Touches

Well, it’s almost over.

 

I’m back in Noida, vacation’s finished. The schedule before going back home is kind of crazy; I’m going to another residential camp to learn how to teach spoken Sanskrit on the 19^th, which ends on the 29^th, and the 29^th is the day I’m leaving India. How does that work? Well, the two days I’ve got here are used for packing and preparing for the trip to go back to the States, and the day that the camp ends I will come home for about an hour to grab my bags and run to the airport! So right now i'm in pack-till-you-drop mode. Gotta get completely set to go before heading off to the camp...

Adventure 16: Road to Pondicherry

Let’s start where I left off. I woke up on the 30^th morning and got ready and everything, but we decided to leave at 6:00 AM instead of 5:00 AM. The drive was quite beautiful, because the whole thing is along the coastline. The ocean is really beautiful when you stop analyzing it and just watch. And listen. And appreciate. We stopped at a city in the middle called Mahabalipuram and I was told that this was where there used to be an ancient civilization (not that there’s any scarcity of those in India). But this one was different.

 

We checked out the ruins of an ancient temple, which used to be along the coastline (the shore has been manually moved a little bit further back). This temple was ridiculously amazing to explore. It was just me and my dad’s two main co-workers (literally, it was just us three at the whole temple site). I walked around it, inside it, through it (it is ruins, so naturally, the whole temple is – although intact – ruined). There were so many pieces of architecture and, probably at the time functional, stone tanks for water storage and other such tools and devices. I was amazed at the fact that although this was at least 1500 years old, it was so detailed in its architecture, so precise in its measurements, so thorough in its understanding of the laws of mathematics and physics. How did ancient civilizations do this without computers and calculators, and even without any machinery to do the sculpting?! I am always fascinated and amazed at the ability and potency of ancient artists and sculptors, who worked entirely with their hands and entirely out of inspiration. Even in today’s India, the sculptors still prefer their hands to machinery, on the side of the streets you can see them sculpting away their little idols and figurines out of stone.

 

In today’s society, we have become so dependent on machines to do everything for us – wash our clothes and dishes, do our calculations, even to write! We depend on computers for everything. Our brain’s functionality has either gone down or we have stunted it ourselves with the use of machines as supports where we don’t need them. It is like being born with fine legs, and then being given crutches at the age of 3, before your legs become fully grown and developed. Then by the time you are 13, you cannot walk because your legs’ growth was stunted due to the crutches you use, even though you never needed them in the first place!! This is what we are in fact doing to our brains and bodies today…

 

Anyways after exploring this temple and taking some cool pictures, we left the site and went to another ancient site called Panch Rath. This site is something of an architectural anomaly. There are five HUGE stones, like, the size of small huts, carved into the shape of raths (chariots). They don’t look like chariots to me, but who knows, they could have looked like that in ancient days. They’re huge structures that to my eyes look like little homes or temples. The part that sets this site apart from all other such sites is that each rath is made of ONE stone only. Only one! How did the sculptors do this? And why? But one can never get into the mind of the artist, we are left to our own opinions and judgments. But one thing is for sure – these things are works of genius. First of all, they’re REALLY old, and, obviously, still standing. Second, they’re all made of one stone each. Third, there’s no mistakes anywhere. There is one random stone elephant (which is the SIZE of an elephant!) made of one stone as well. Now, compare this with what we call Stonehenge… I don’t need to say any more. India could have had its own Stonehenge, but instead some artist came and converted it into 5 or 6 beautiful sculptural masterpieces!

 

Next we ate some amazing south Indian food for breakfast (it was around 9 AM by this time) and continued on our journey to Pondicherry, which was our next stop. When we got to Pondicherry, I felt like I had entered another world. The streets are all well-kempt, with no litter anywhere to be seen (ok, not ANYwhere… but where don’t you find litter?) and everything is so… western. We arrived at around 11:00 AM and made our way to the International Guest House of Sri Aurobindo Ashram, where I was to be staying. So we finalized my booking and I found myself in my room in no time. My coursework was officially done, and I finally disembarked at Pondicherry.

 

The next morning itself I went to go see sunrise at the beach, which is literally 2 minutes of a walk away from where I stay. I relaxed at the beach, toured around the area, checked out Aurobindo Ashram… Pondicherry is like the California of India. It is a coastal location, warm weather, cool people (everyone wears shorts, even at meetings!), new ideas, innovations, etc… I really like this place. I probably won’t be writing much more until I leave Pondicherry.

 

I’m on vacation.

Adventure 15: Chennai

Yesterday morning I left home at around 8:00 AM to get to the Delhi Airport by 9 AM, so that I could check in for my flight (which was going to be at 10:10 AM) on time. (Oh yeah, I came back to Noida from Varanasi on the 26^th morning… it was an overnight train, which was pretty fun. Not much more to say about that.) I ended up arriving around 8:40 AM and so I checked in, and sat down. I was flying Indian Airlines, and so naturally, at 10:30 AM I noticed that there was a flight that was supposed to leave at 9:40 that was still boarding. So I waited, and waited, and finally about an hour and a half late (not too bad!) I boarded my flight for Chennai. Now, my dad’s office is in Chennai, of which he happens to be the CEO. So when I arrived in Chennai, one of his chief helpers came to pick me up, and we went to the hotel called Green Park Hotel where my dad stays when he goes. It is such a sweet hotel… Take our 5-star hotels, add some extra service and food, and one of the coolest foyers I have ever seen, and you’ve got the Green Park.

 

After dropping my stuff off at the hotel, we went to my dad’s office. It is so nice! And my dad’s personal office space has this big sign on it that says “CEO” and under the sign is another sign that says “Rajiv Khanna” which was the coolest thing to see! I could just imagine when my dad comes here; he probably gets such an awesome reception and stuff, because in India, the corporate culture is different. The respect given to one’s boss is unparalleled. Even the respect given to the boss’s son (me)!! I felt like I was in a scene right out of a Hindi movie, the classic “son of the boss goes to dad’s office, meets office workers, they like him, etc” scene. So I met his workers and then sat in his office (which only gets used when he comes here).

 

I must comment here that it felt so awesome to be in my dad’s shoes for a while. Of course, I didn’t have to do the work he did, but just to sit there even felt so cool. The same goes for when I went to BHU. It was my dad’s alma mater, so it made it all the more special for me. Those of you who have gone to the college your parents went to, or done something your parents used to do when they were your age, or even visited your parents’ workplaces, doesn’t it feel special somehow? I think it does. Anyways I was so proud of my dad for establishing such a nice office and large company, and that feeling mixed with the relief of being done with my coursework officially was really nice.

 

After retiring to my room in the hotel, I realized how luxuriously we live in the States, and in classy places like Green Park Hotel. This is because only a few days ago I was in Varanasi, with no electricity, running water only half the time, no gas, and a temperature that was WAY hotter than Chennai… It occurred to me that even living in such a classy hotel, after having experienced what I saw in Varanasi, I could never get used to this. Just knowing that there are people out there in the world with nothing but a cloth to bunch up to put their head on when they sleep at night, outside, on bare ground in the heat of summer, it is so hard to live with oneself in such luxury. I realized our worlds are just little bubbles of security, especially for kids of successful parents, because the kids themselves were simply born into such luxury, they never have to work for it… they will never get to experience what 95+% of the world is going through. And without this experience, they cannot know what is going on! And yet, these are the people that run the world. We always talk about helping people on the streets, helping the poor, saving the world. But do we even really know what we are trying to save?

 

Of course, the problem is not the luxury we live in. It is the thanklessness with which we live in it. We complain about food, we complain about clothes, we complain about people, dorms, classes, TV, politics, weather, facilities; we complain about EVERYTHING. If we could just adopt an attitude of gratefulness for our circumstances, life would be so much more beautiful and meaningful. It is hard to adopt this attitude without knowing what we COULD be living in, I know; but maybe that means that each one of us should make a trip outside our little bubbles of security? Gratitude is the key to living a meaningful life, I think, but nobody can give you gratitude… you have to feel it. Step away from your security bubble, wander outside your comfort level, and observe the real world. Then gratitude will naturally enter your being.

 

Finally today I went to go see one of the friends I made at Veda Vijnana Gurukulam, Arvind Agraja. He lives in Chennai, so today I had a taxi ordered for me, and made my way to his house. When I got there, I saw that Bharat Agraja was also there, as were a few of the other students from the Gurukulam!! They were apparently finishing some week-long program they had set up for Sanskrit or something. It was so cool to see them after a couple of months! I sat with them for a couple hours and we talked, and then I had lunch there. After lunch, it was time to go. I left and then I asked the driver to take me around Chennai. He said ok, and we went first to Marina Beach. I got out of the car, and decided to walk around the beach a little.

 

Marina Beach is one of the biggest beaches I have ever seen. There had to have been over a thousand people within sight range, I’m not kidding. And it was something like walking into a carnival. In India, in big cities and in crowded places, the street vendors have a method of finding their way into the center of attention. And their stuff is always carnival-ish, which makes these locations a lot more entertaining than if it was just a lot of people in one place. So I entered the festivities and walked all the way to the ocean (which was a 10 minute walk, so imagine how big the beach must be), and then walked back to the car. It was a short but enjoyable experience at Marina Beach, and then I told the driver to go to our next location. He then took me to the hotel, so I guess he was satisfied (and so was I, I was exhausted)! It probably also has to do with the fact that the driver didn’t know English, and I don’t know Tamil, so we couldn’t really communicate very well. I used hand gestures to get my point across, but it seemed to work.

 

Anyways, tomorrow I’m leaving at 5:00 AM to go to Pondicherry, so I think I will end this entry here.

Course 5: Ayurveda Studies @ Banaras Hindu University

My study in Ayurveda at BHU was probably one of the coolest courses I have ever taken. It involved buying a book by my professor, Dr. Ram Harsh Singh (apparently many or most of the professors at BHU write their own books), and then reading as much of it as I could, asking questions as I went along. So what I did was as I finished each chapter, I would take detailed notes, and then write questions that came up along the way. When each chapter was done, I would go to Dr. Singh’s office (in the Ayurvedic wing of the Sir Sunderlal Hospital on BHU’s campus… how cool is that?). I would ask him my questions, and then he would answer them. Of course, he is now a retired professor, and just practices Ayurveda instead of teaching. This means that he can always be found in his office. So I went there as many times as I could, and asked many questions. He suggested very strongly that I apply for BHU’s Ayurveda program in the future… I guess he liked me a lot. Many people here are struck by the fact that I was born and brought up in the United States, and yet have an interest in ancient Indian knowledge. But even I don’t know why that is the case; it simply is. And I enjoy it. I get questions like, why do you like India so much? What are you doing in the United States? Uh, you’re studying mathematics and neuroscience in the U.S., and you have an interest in Sanskrit, Vedanta, and Ayurveda? How? And why??

 

It’s something that I know I will have to deal with for the rest of my life, seeing as I can’t change my birthplace. But I am rather proud of being American; it’s something that I don’t want to change. So I guess I got the best of both worlds… I was born in America, and my roots are in India!

Course 4: Cultural Geography of Varanasi

This was my fourth course here in India, and it was rather moving. I had the privilege of working with Dr. Rana P.B. Singh, about whom I wrote earlier in the blog. He is an excellent writer, and of course a great friend. We did not meet as many times as I would have liked to over the course of my stay here in Varanasi, but the times we did meet were very fruitful. I am honored to have gotten to work with him.

 

This course was all about exploring and writing about Varanasi. As you know, I have written a lot about Varanasi already here itself in the blog, but this course had a different motive. It was not simply to observe and then write about what I saw, but to observe, relate what is going on in the present to Varanasi’s history, and then react and write about everything. So I started by first trying to decide what to write about (I’ve never been in a situation where I have complete freedom to write about whatever I want)! I couldn’t decide what to write about for the longest time. Finally I realized, after a meeting with Ranaji, that lots of western authors come to India, and specifically Varanasi, and write about what they see, with a very shallow understanding and ultimately end up destroying the image of the scene. This frustrated me quite a bit, as you can imagine, and I decided to rectify a few of the misconceptions created by these authors in the west.

 

I identified several “problems” in India that western authors wrote about, distorting the true meaning behind the acts of the Indian people here. Then I went around as often as I could, observing the true situation, interviewing people, and then understanding what the true significance of the circumstance is. Finally I wrote as much as I could about what I found. It was a moving and changing experience, to say the least, but there is not much more I can say. Kashi is such a vast city, and I knew from the start that I would not be able to do it justice in just two months of writing. People in the past have researched it for over 10 or 15 years and only then began to write about it! Who am I to contend with such dedication and hard work? Varanasi has, indeed, given me a lot in the way of spiritual uplifting and self-development, and I only pray that I can give back even a fraction of what I have gained here.

Adventure 14: Exploring Varanasi

Today I saw pretty much every important and touristy location in Varanasi.

 

First I went to Godowlia at around 8:00 AM to meet Giridhar Mahodaya (if you will remember, he was one of my teachers at the Samvaadashaalaa in Delhi in January) because he was going to meet me there to be my tour guide around the city. We made our way first towards the Sanskrit College, called Sampoornaananda Vishvavidyaalaya (that’s not how it’s spelled, but that’s how it’s pronounced… which I think is more important). We had called a rickshaw driver, and on our way we stopped to pay our respects at a mandir. As we were walking inside, I learned that it was Gayatri Mandir, the temple dedicated to the Goddess Gayatri, and the Sun (the famous Gayatri Mantra is made to pay respects to these deitites). After receiving prasaad, or food blessed by divine presence, we headed out. We gave some prasaad to the rickshaw driver as well, and were off to Sampoornaanand.

 

A little funny note about prasaad: it’s quite interesting to see different people’s reactions to the fact that any bit of food is prasaad. Usually it is something sweet, and many old people’s reactions to sweet things is “No!” but as soon as you tell them that it is prasaad, they take it quite willingly. It is obvious that secretly, from the start, they were wishing they could eat it, but due to their apparent diabetes or whatever the case may be, they don’t take the sweets initially. But then they are given the reassurance that it has been divinely blessed/purified, and they gladly take it without further thought. Such is our faith! If it’s prasaad, I’ll eat it. The same thing goes for people who don’t like whatever it is you are offering them. Tell them it is prasaad, and they put aside all their distaste and dislike; after all, it’s divinely blessed – there’s really no way of saying no to that. Prasaad is such a wonderful concept.

 

We found ourselves at Sampoornaananda University next. It is a huge campus, similar to BHU’s but not on such a grand scale. It is beautiful; there are trees everywhere, and everything is written in Sanskrit (all the boards, etc.) because, well, it’s the Sanskrit University. People go there to become scholars in Sanskrit, so it would only make sense that their campus is full of it. As we were walking through the campus, we passed a really old looking chap with a baseball cap on and a walking stick, and really worn out pretty much everything. Giridhar Mahodaya informed me, after passing him, that he had just read about this man in the paper, with his picture and everything matching exactly this guy’s profile. He told me that this man had walked 55,000 kilometers (yeah, I know, that’s fifty-five THOUSAND kilometers) all the way from his native place, Maharashtra. After trying really really hard but not being able to resist talking to him, we walked up to him and asked him where he was from. He said “Maharashtra” and we looked at each other with crazy expressions like 3-year-olds finding some secret buried treasure in a sandbox. This was insane! A guy who walked 55,000 km across the country starting 18 months ago, and here he was in front of us, with no pomp or anything! He asked us how we knew about him, and Giridhar Mahodaya told him that he had read about him in the paper. This man, apparently, was not free from vanity. He told us he had been looking for that same newspaper all day, and while we were talking to him would not stop asking us where the local/good newspaper stands were, and why there weren’t any proper newspaper stores in this city. We had to detach ourselves from him after a while; it was time to go. He called out after us to make sure one final time we didn’t know of any good newspaper stands nearby that he hadn’t already checked out. (I really love India – the people are just so… unique). We were still amazed though; 55,000 kilometers… that’s a whole heck of a lot of kilometers. And he traveled it all by foot!! (Later, when we got back to Godowlia, we saw one of our friends reading that same newspaper, and silently laughed to ourselves).

 

Our next stop was the Bhaarat Mata Mandir. This is a sanctuary dedicated to the ancient land of Bhaarat, fittingly located in its oldest lived-in city. The reason it is called Bhaarat Mata is because its inhabitants worship their land as their mother; it is this soil that gave them (and humanity in general) life, and they give it proper respect. Bhaarat, of course, was way bigger than what is modern-day India. It was spread out all across modern-day China, Nepal, Bengal, Malaysia and Singapore to the east, Pakistan and Afghanistan to the west, and Sri Lanka to the south. It included all of the mighty Himalayan Mountains and great river Ganga; it stretched from ice to tropics. It was the most fertile land, teeming with resources, and the cradle of an ancient, complex civilization that figured out facts of the world and life through introspection and contemplation that modern-day science is still struggling to understand. In the last few hundred years, she has been stripped of her original glory and beauty due to invasions from the north… I’ll stop here for fear of getting passionate and angry. It is my motherland, after all.

 

Anyways, this mandir is a quiet-zone where there is a HUGE 3D model of the ancient Bhaarat. In it, even every mountain in the Himalayan range is labeled. It is such a fascinating thing to observe. Let me be a little more specific. It’s like a 20-feet-by-30-feet clay-cast model of India and surrounding land, all plaster-colored, specific down to each and every geographic detail, set on the floor. I don’t know how they did it but they did. This model is surrounded by about a 2-foot gap, with a railing that goes all around the model, from behind which you can view it (what people do is walk in a clock-wise fashion around the railing). It’s similar to a museum. There are stairs leading up and dowstairs, but the upstairs ones were closed, so we checked out the downstairs ones. These led to a tiny viewing window that was set at the very tip of Mother India, at exactly eye-level. So you could see the model, observing each geographic detail, at eye-level! And the interesting thing was, it was set at the base of the landmass, representing the feet of Mother India. We offered our prayers (it was like a temple after all) and paid our respects to the motherland. I was deeply touched by this experience, and anyone coming to Varanasi absolutely must come visit this temple. I didn’t want to leave, but Giridhar Mahodaya said it was time to move on, or we wouldn’t finish our tour of the city.

 

Our next destination was Varanasi’s train station, called Kant Station (I don’t know if it’s spelled Kant or Kent or Cant or what, because it’s not written anywhere at the station, but it’s pronounced “can’t” … I assume it’s spelled “Kant”). We reached the station and it is HUGE! It’s bigger than the airport in this city! I believe that is because the rail system is much more developed in smaller cities than the air system. This station is packed with parked cars, booths to buy tickets, booths to buy food/drink items, buses that bring travelers to different parts of the city, rickshaws entering and exiting with their passangers, and people! Everything is visible from outside, which is cool, because we didn’t have to go all the way inside to check it out (I needed to see it because this is where I’m going to be leaving Varanasi from, and I didn’t want to be lost on the day I leave).

 

After seeing Kant Station, we were debating whether to go to Ram Nagar or not (the city opposite the Ganga to Varanasi, where there is a fort and other touristy things to see), but decided against it as we were too tired and it was way too hot outside. Instead, we went back to Godowlia and parted ways there, probably only to meet each other in another year or two… But friends made in India are friends made for life, without any expectations. This is one thing I have learned to appreciate about Indian culture.

 

A little note about the weather here, it’s getting HOT. I don’t know the exact temperature, as I don’t get the newspaper and don’t watch TV, but it feels like 100 degrees Fahrenheit. And the local people tell me it only gets hotter… In May, temperatures reach up to 45 degrees Celsius! That means around 115-120 degrees Fahrenheit, and with heat index (it’s dry heat over here, not humid), it probably feels like 140. What that means is, it’s impossible to go outside… if you do, you will literally start to evaporate. Now, imagine this – there are people who live in little tents outside. And I don’t mean a few, here and there, I mean a LOT of people. How do they survive the summer? I am told that a lot of them don’t. This is the state of our beloved oldest city in the world. What are we doing? We are the ones causing this upsurge in heat, by polluting our land and water and air. Just by telling everyone to stop polluting, the polluting does not stop! A good deal of the people contributing are illiterate or uneducated, and don’t understand the harmful effects of polluting the land. I talked to a guy who came from Switzerland 18 years ago, and has been living here ever since, and he told me that in his 18 years here the weather and atmosphere of Varanasi has changed drastically. He is worried about the pollution in the air, and despite his strong body and serious love for this city, does not feel that he can stay much longer due to the adverse changes in the atmosphere.

 

In the olden days, I read, Varanasi was a woodland, full of greenery and lakes and rivers and was the perfect haven for the spiritual seeker. But now it is reduced to what will soon become a wasteland if people don’t start caring about their environment. The only way I can see this being done is by using the police force, ensuring that people do not litter, instating garbage cans all over the city, and pretty much redesigning the infrastructure. Now, if only the police force wasn’t so corrupt… If they catch you doing something bad, you just have to give them a few rupees and they let you go. I have learned that many policemen stop you with the expectation that you will give them some money; it is their way of earning daily bread and butter. But such is the way of the world, I guess.

 

All I know is, during the day, my room turns into a toaster. And it’s beginning to get uncomfortable, because I happen to be the toast.

Quest 15: Moving to Kabir Nagar

Today I moved from Nagwa to Kabir Nagar, which is a small colony right across the street from Durga Kund. It is a great place to be, there’s electricity and running water and it’s actually a home-like atmosphere. That’s about all I have to say about that.

 

Kabir Nagar is a great location; I can, from here, catch a rickshaw to Godowlia or to BHU for cheap, and the market is pretty sweet. I can get anything I want, by just walking to the main street because Durga Kund is a very visited/popular location.

 

We called a rickshaw from the street to come to Nagwa to pick me up (and my stuff) and somehow we fit it all into a rickshaw (such is India) and I went thus to Kabir Nagar. If you don’t know what a rickshaw is, it’s a bicycle with two wheels in the back instead of one. The person pedaling sits on the front seat (until which point it is just a bicycle), and in between the two back wheels there is a bench-like seat (it’s about 3 feet wide and 1 foot deep – not very huge) with a footrest for the rider(s). So somehow all of everything I had fit on that thing and I made it to Kabir Nagar! Yay!

Adventure 13: Household Work

Today was quite possibly the most adventurous day of all.

 

I woke up, performed morning routine, and immediately got down to business. Today I was going to wash my clothes, buy supplies for the apartment, and cook lunch completely on my own… right from buying the groceries. I was alone at home all day today, so I was forced to do everything on my own, though I wouldn’t have wanted it any other way. This is how one learns: by being plunged into situations where there is no other choice but to perform the desired skill. For example, I plunged myself into a situation at Veda Vijnana Gurukulam where I had no choice but to speak Sanskrit, even though I was barely introduced to it. But my goal was to learn Sanskrit! And so it happened. In the same way, I was plunged into today’s situation… and the desired techniques were washing clothes (with just a bucket, water, soap, and my hands… the best tools anyone can have), buying groceries from the street market (which included bargaining with the vendors… a perilous task, I was well aware, for someone not from here), and cooking a meal.

 

I filled the bucket halfway with water (lo and behold, you all can learn how to wash clothes too), and then added a decent amount of soap powder (detergent) into the bucket. Next I took the clothes I was going to wash (not too many, since I had just washed my clothes a few days ago – with the help of Ashwini, Upendra Mahodaya’s younger brother – but this time I was on my own) and put them into the bucket, and plunged them up and down a little bit, swirled a little bit, and then let them sit there.

 

While the clothes were sitting in the soapy water, I decided to go buy some groceries. This is the part that would be interesting, I knew. I had never done this on my own, so I wasn’t wholly confident of myself in this endeavor. I left the apartment with my cloth bag – empty – and some money. As I walked down the street that would lead me to the road that I otherwise take to BHU, where the street vendors all line up their stalls, I rehearsed in my head everything I needed, how much I was willing to spend for it, and how I would interact with the street vendors. I knew I’d have to put on a heavy Bhojpuri (the local dialect) accent so as not to let the vendors know that I was from America… otherwise they would raise the prices to triple or quadruple the amount! For example, if they knew I was not from here, instead of charging 10 rupees for a kilo and a half of potatoes, they would charge me 40 or 50 rupees… and if I tried bargaining, they would lower it to maybe 45 or 40 rupees, which for me would seem like a good deal (hey, 10 rupees off), but in actuality would be a huge rip-off.

 

I reached the long line of stalls, and started walking along it… looking for good potatoes (they actually all looked good to me…) and good parwal. I don’t know the name in English for it. It looks like a mini-cucumber, though the insides are not quite like a cucumber... I don’t know how to quite explain. As I was walking, I saw a stall where a lady was sitting there, kind of looking at me. I passed it, not knowing where I was going really, and she called out to me. “Hey, what would you want to buy?” she asked me in the common speak. I said “How much per kilo of potatoes?” in the same dialect (you have to get right to the point with these vendors) and she replied, “10 rupees for a kilo and a half.” I’m not perfect at imitating the Bhojpuri accent of Hindi (similar to a Texan in the United States trying to imitate a New Yorker or someone from Boston), but I thought to myself that 10 rupees wasn’t bad, which meant that I must have gotten away with it. I didn’t need to bargain in this case, but I also had no idea how much to actually buy. I figured, why not take the kilo and a half, because it’ll come in handy for the next couple of days. I said, “OK give me the kilo and a half… and how much for these?” I pointed to the parwal (at the time I didn’t know the name of it, and I knew it was going to give me away…) but she said, “Six rupees for a pao.” Got away with it again! A pao is quite possibly one pound, but they just refer to it as a pao, and if it isn’t exactly a pound, it weighs approximately that much. When vendors weigh out the amount they are going to give you, they hold up a balance (totally old school) in their hand, and put the desired weight on one side of it… often measured by a rock or collection of rocks. Then they put the equivalent amount of whatever you’re buying on the other side of it. Imagine the amount of weight lifting these people do all day!! One pao is measured by one rock about ¾ the size of my fist, the name for which is actually probably referring to the rock itself. So I got 1.5 kilos of potatoes (which ended up being a lot more than I expected) and a pao of parwal for 16 rupees, which is a little less than 50 cents. One of the coolest things about coming from a foreign country and living in India is that a little money goes a long way… if you know where to go and how to spend it. This only works in cities like Banaras… not cities like Mumbai, where all the prices are converted to scale for foreigners (the same amount of stuff that I bought would probably cost around 200 rupees in Mumbai, Ashwini informed me).

 

Next, after completing the mission of getting veggies for the dish I would make at home for lunch, I started walking back towards where I came from. On the way, as I was passing the fruit stalls, I stopped and asked a boy (his prices would probably be lower than the middle-aged men’s stalls) for the price of both bananas and oranges. I needed both at home, I was totally out of fruits and fruits are what are keeping me healthy here! He said 20 rupees for a kilo of bananas, and 35 rupees for a kilo of oranges. I bargained with him a little bit (you have to ask them how much they’ll really sell it to you for… it’s quite comical if you’re an observer, actually) and got a total of a kilo of fruits (half a kilo of bananas and half of oranges) for 25 rupees. This wasn’t much of bargaining, but I’m only a beginner, and it was actually not bad for me. I got 5 rupees knocked off the kilo-price of oranges! 25 rupees is around 70-75 cents. Again, not a bad deal from the American perspective (which is what I tend to see things from when I actually make purchases, I don’t know why)…

 

Finally I started walking back home, with the intention of stopping at a shop nearer to the apartment for some flour (for making rotis) and some oil to cook the vegetables in. The flour and oil have a standard price around here, so I couldn’t bargain for those… so I came back with half a liter of mustard oil (which is what we cook our food in here) and half a kilo of flour.

 

This whole process took about 45 minutes, and I would have gone on bike if I weren’t picking up so much stuff. I also picked up a 1-liter bottle of mineral water and some Parle-G biscuits (the best biscuits ever)… I ended up walking home with my cloth bag plus two little plastic bags full of stuff.

 

I got back home and unloaded all my stuff, immediately going to the bathroom where my clothes were waiting to be taken out of the bucket. I then unloaded the bucket one piece of clothing at a time, putting a little extra soap (there’s a separate special soap bar for this purpose) on each of the whites and forcefully scrubbing with a hard brush, then removing the soapy water from them, while adding clean water from a separate bucket. I have so much newfound respect for this kind of job – imagine squatting the whole time, with no seat or anything… just you, the bucket, the water, and the ground. Most people here have been doing this job since they were 5 or 6 years old, so they are in practice… but I was using muscles I have never had to use in my life! At the end of just 6 pieces of clothing, my back and my legs were sore (it doesn’t help that I have long legs, so when I squat they get in the way). But it felt really good to finish. I got up, and hung the clothes outside to dry.

 

Now, for food. By this time it was around 1:00 PM, and I was ready to get working in the kitchen. I quickly took a shower (I was done with the dirty work), and got cookin’ (literally). I first unpacked all the plastic bags I had originally put in the kitchen… realizing that I had so much stuff that I wouldn’t finish it all by myself even in the next couple of days… but that’s why there are two of us here! So hopefully it will get used up before it gets spoiled. Anyways I peeled the potatoes, cut them into little pieces, cut the parwal into little pieces (you don’t need to know the details, so…) then I put them in the pot with some oil and masalas and cooked all of it.  Since there is only one burner, I had to wait for the veggies to be done before I could make the rotis. (We seriously live in luxury in America, and I realize it more and more every day. We have running water all the time, electricity all the time, stoves with 4 burners, and lots and lots of other things that we don’t even realize.) I made the rotis – yes, successfully – and ate. I was so hungry that I finished everything I made… which was food for two people. This ended my real adventure for the day, and by this time it was about 3:00 PM. Then my work started… but I was so tired from the chores that I couldn’t get my mind to concentrate on my studies… So I fell asleep.

 

…And woke up at 7:00 PM, by which time Ashwini had come back. We chatted for a while, and then I got to work. Around 9:00 PM, Ashwini started making dinner and then we ate at around 10:00 PM.

 

Ok, now for the part where I tell you what I learned from this experience. First of all, I have SO much more respect for people who do the household work. If people ever look down upon housewives/husbands or homemakers, well, they shouldn’t. It’s quite possibly more work than going to a 9-to-5 job, because first of all, it is 24/7, and second, it involves a lot more running around. Imagine cooking food, doing dishes, doing laundry, cleaning the house… add in a kid or two (or three), plus the spouse in many cases, and all of their needs, and that is only the tip of the iceberg in the ocean of work that is maintaining a household.

 

I have a newfound appreciation for this kind of work. It really is an art, and requires a talent beyond just following protocol. Today’s adventure got me thinking about such things in much greater detail. There are unexpected twists and turns in every task, even when there are machines to help do all the work. You have to get the machines repaired every once in a while, know what needs to be done when, and who needs attention when. Essentially the homemaker is the best manager of time, resources, and people… without the recognition or the title. What humility one must have to be a true homemaker! I would like to acknowledge here the hard work and dedication of my mother since I was born (and even before that), who has taken care of every single one of my needs, my brother’s needs, the home’s needs, and somehow had time to take care of herself… without asking for anything in return. I have realized how much work she did for our sake before, but one can only truly understand the nature of another’s feelings when they are plunged into the other’s shoes. And today, I got a taste (and I repeat, only a taste) of what it means to take care of a household. So thanks mom (and moms everywhere), really.

 

I have also come to appreciate the reason there are two people in a household (essentially, why we have the system of marriage). One cannot possibly hope to take on the task of caring for the house and managing a job at the same time, and doing a satisfactory job of both (especially if there are kids involved… I had a tough enough time taking care of myself). It is written in our ancient scriptures that men and women have two different tasks towards a household, acting as a team, for neither can hope to accomplish all the tasks by oneself. There is great wisdom behind these words. In modern times, people shut these words out because of years and years of conditioning that says the opposite. In our society, men and women take on the same tasks at the same time, both trying to earn and take care of the house at the same time, resulting in extra money but an unsatisfactory environment at home. There is so much competition between the two! Who earns more money? Who does more work? Who contributes more to the house, who does this better, that better, etc… Since “work” in America nowadays does not require quite as much physical labor (thanks to machines) as it used to, anyone can do it, so the ancient wisdom of how to maintain a household is pushed to the side or forgotten entirely with the opportunity for everyone to “work.” However, we fail to acknowledge that it is in fact the women who have a natural tendency towards children (since they are the ones that bear them, after all) and caring for others (that many men simply don’t have)… Interestingly in olden times the household chores also required a LOT of physical labor, which the women alone used to perform. And we also fail to acknowledge that it is only by pairing up as a team, dividing and conquering, that a family unit (husband and wife) can properly take care of a home. Of course, if they are satisfied with always scrambling to make ends meet between work and the home, that’s a different story… but I have a feeling that almost nobody is totally satisfied in that situation.

 

The other great wisdom in these words of our ancient seers is that when the two partners in household management do not share the same duties (though it is not a bad thing if either one helps the other), there is never any competition between them and therefore reduced – if not eliminated – conflict in the home. However, there should not be a judging between the two jobs either, like “which one is more important” and the like, because neither one can function without the other. Keeping this in mind if we enter into a relationship, there will be a mutual respect for both jobs and things can only turn out for the best.

 

Again, I must write here a thank you note to my parents for carefully maintaining a peaceful household throughout my life, neither infringing upon the others’ duties, nor trying to prove that one was better than the other. They maintained a perfect harmony that I can only hope to achieve in the future. It is because of their stability and selfless effort that our house was always a welcome place to come home to, always a place of respect and dignity and gratitude and support, always acting as a sanctuary. I cannot thank them enough for that, nor can I begin to count my blessings for being born into such a family… and I am grateful every moment of my life for it.

 

I truly believe that if a family can operate as a unit that divides and conquers the tasks involved in creating and sustaining a home without judging or harassing any of the other members of the unit, then the home will always be a haven. I believe that my mother and father have created such a haven for our family, and I only wish such peace and protection upon everyone else as well. I cannot thank my mom enough for being the strongest person in the world and while taking care of household duties, being the superglue that keeps us all so perfectly united at all times.

 

I love you, mom.

Adventure 12: Living in Nagwa

On April 1^st I moved to Nagwa, a location in Varanasi right next to BHU, closer to where my classes for this month will be held. One will be in BHU itself, and the other one involves exploring the city itself. Nagwa is right next to Assi Ghat, the southern most ghat of Varanasi. I have effectively moved from one end of the city to the other. Here, I am living in Sanskrit Bharati’s office, which is an apartment essentially turned into an office/classroom setting. Refer to Quest 13: Upendra Mahodaya for a description of how the apartment looks. I sleep in the classroom, and classes are now actually held in the living room instead of my room, which is nice.

 

Upendra Mahodaya is such an awesome guy. Our conversations are only in Sanskrit, and this month I feel like my Sanskrit will be solidified. He says he’s been living in Varanasi for 10 years now, and has been alone almost the whole time… so he has learned to survive on his own. He’s originally from Bihar (refer to a map of India) and he came here for studies when he was younger. His age I don’t know, but my guess is 26 or 27. He’s been married for a year, but his wife is currently not here because she has her own examinations going on where she studies.

 

Here I am learning how to live. In the 5 days that I have been here so far, I have learned how to cook food from scratch (yes, including rotis directly from the flour, sabzi directly from the raw vegetables, etc.); how to wash clothes by hand (in a different style from the way I learned in the Gurukulam, which was just using a bar of soap… here I am learning to use soap powder and THEN the bar); how to interact with street vendors (basically learning to bargain, though first I had to learn how to even ask for what I wanted); how to use an Indian-style bathroom (they’re WAY different, let me tell you); how to ride a bicycle in Indian traffic… specifically Varanasi’s traffic (it’s SO much fun but requires SO much concentration); how to explore Varanasi from the perspective of a city-dweller, and many, many more things. Some things are really random and obscure, such as sitting down and standing up without the use of hands (which is pretty sweet though, I must say). In essence, if I come across a situation where I have almost no resources, I can live. The cool thing is that throughout all of this, I have been practicing what techniques of observation and exploration I had learned from the KFI center in Raj Ghat last month, and it is making my stay all the more effective and enjoyable. I love life!

 

Upendra Mahodaya taught me how to do all these things, and I am pretty sure it required a lot of patience on his part, because I asked him so many questions while learning EVERYTHING. No kidding. His family (mom, sister, and brother) came over yesterday to see Varanasi. He has been showing them around a little bit. He is leaving tomorrow and is only coming back on the 14^th, so I will be alone for the next week and a day… which is why it was imperative that I learned everything in the last few days, because without him I’ll have to do it all myself!

 

There are many, many of Sanskrit Bharati’s workers in this city. There’s another office of Sanskrit Bharati’s in Godowlia, which is the main market of Varanasi, located in the center of the city.

 

An interesting story:

 

I had gone to KFI on April 3^rd to see the performance of the kids I was teaching a cappella music to, but it never happened. They apparently didn’t have permission or something… anyways, on my way back from there I stopped in Godowlia and instead of taking a rickshaw from Godowlia to Nagwa, like I normally do, I decided to walk around the gullies a little bit. As I was walking in a gully, I randomly ran into Omkaar Mahodaya, a worker for Sanskrit Bharati. He asked me where I was going and I said nowhere, I was just wandering around the city a little bit! He asked me if I had seen Sanskrit Bharati’s office in Godowlia yet, and at that point I hadn’t, so I said no. He told me we were standing right in front of it. I looked to the left and saw, to my astonishment, a couple of other Sanskrit Bharati workers in the direction that Omkaar Mahodaya was looking. It was such a pleasant surprise! When Prithviraaj Mahodaya, another worker, asked me to stay there for about an hour so that he could come back and meet me and talk for a little bit with me, I said I couldn’t be in one place for so long, so I asked him where he was going, and he told me that he was going to Dasashvamedha Ghat to teach a class, and I asked him if I could go with him. He said it would be his pleasure to have me in his class, and he actually asked me to teach. I said I’d come with him, though teaching wasn’t really in my capacity. I told him I could only speak in Sanskrit, teaching was a different story. He said he was only going to this class to teach speaking to the students…

 

So when we went there I actually ended up teaching a class for Sanskrit Bharati! It was really fun, and the location is absolutely beautiful. It’s in a building that’s probably about 200 years old, or maybe a little more than that (I’m not kidding), all the way up the stairs where one has a stunning view of the river Ganga and Dasashvamedha Ghat through the ancient barred windows. I was told that this was a school for Sanskrit, though not owned by Sanskrit Bharati. It was hosting classes held by Sanskrit Bharati nonetheless, because their causes are one and the same, the service of Sanskrit. I made friends with the people there and they told me I could come there any time I wanted (which will come in handy in the future, I just know it). Anyways I thought the experience was pretty cool. I met this interesting swami there, who was also a student of Sanskrit, who was going to come back with us to the office in Godowlia.

 

Prithviraaj Mahodaya, the swami, and I left the place and started making our way back to the office. It was at this time that I mentioned to Prithviraaj Mahodaya that I wanted to get a japa mala. A japa mala is a chain of 108 beads used to keep count of one’s japa, or repetitive chanting of a mantra. The most powerful ones are made of a bead called rudraaksha, which has energy storing capacity, so when one does japa the energy from the mantra gets stored in the rudraaksha beads. As you do it more and more, the beads continue to increase in energy, and when this japa mala is worn around the neck it provides the wearer with the energy stored in the beads. It is said that one should not let it touch the ground, for in touching the ground it loses its energy. When the swami heard that I wanted one of those, he said that he had a new one, and that he would give it to me the next day (my contacts were already coming in handy)! So that search ended rather quickly.

 

The swami then took our leave (I still don’t know his name, so I keep writing “the swami”… sorry) and then I asked Prithviraaj Mahodaya if we could maybe search for what is known as an ashtadhaatu ring, which means a ring made of a mixture of 8 metals, I forgot which ones exactly… but basically what this ring does is at any given point in time, when a certain metal is needed to be on one’s body for curing certain ailments, this ring provides the metal for the cure. It has 8 of the main ones involved in such procedures I guess, so that’s why it is so useful. Also, some of these metals are said to have certain effects on one’s mental state, including reduction of anger, boosting of confidence, increasing of concentration, etc. Sometimes they can have adverse effects on a person, but you can only know how it affects you personally by wearing one, right? So Prithviraaj Mahodaya and I turned into a gully to look for one. This particular gully is a very famous one, known as “Vishvanaath Mandir Gully”, because it is this gully that leads to the most popular mandir in Varanasi, the Vishvanaath mandir. I went to this temple with my dad and Nani when we had first come to Varanasi. You can refer to Quest 12: Kashi Vishvanaath Mandir and Satish Mahodaya to read about the temple itself.

 

When we entered the gully, I was filled with a sense of medieval times, the way they portray it in the movies. Cobblestone street, the gully maybe 10 feet in width, winding, the proximity of the two sides shutting out the sun… the drone in the background of bargains being made between store owners and customers, conversations, and vehicles, and the occasional “moo” from a cow or bull… it was such an awe-inspiring feeling. We finally reached a little shop where a guy was selling rings and the like. We asked him if he had ashtadhaatu rings, and he said he did. They were apparently not in his display stuff, because he had to reach into the back of his shop to pull them out. Since we were speaking in Sanskrit to one another, he was treating us with respect (the interesting thing is that people associate Sanskrit with the divine, so anyone who speaks it is automatically given that association… even though Sanskrit can be used as any language as well! I’ve received several discounts so far just on account of me speaking Sanskrit)… He brought out the box of ashtadhaatu rings, assured us they were absolutely real, and I started to try them on. I found one that fit (actually the store owner helped me find one that fit) and put it on. It looked pretty cool, but also I felt an immediate connection with the ring. It sounds silly, but in this case if it weren’t true I wouldn’t have written this. Anyways Prithviraaj Mahodaya liked the idea of an ashtadhaatu ring so he picked one up too. We had asked how much it would be for one of them right when we got there, and the owner had said 34 rupees, but then while we were searching for rings that fit we started talking to him, and learned that he was also someone who had learned to speak Sanskrit, albeit 10 years ago. He said he was particularly interested in Sanskrit drama, and he appreciated our fondness for the language as well. So when we asked him again how much it would cost, he said 30 rupees. Of course it wasn’t much of a discount, but it was a discount nonetheless. And to get a ring that includes a little gold in it for only 30 rupees (between 85 and 90 cents) is a pretty sweet deal, by any standards.

 

That’s the story.

 

So basically, I am making tons and tons of contacts wherever I go, based on the fact that I speak Sanskrit and I’m from America. That’s how people introduce me to other people… they are like, “This is Varun Khanna, from America, and he speaks Sanskrit.” It’s kind of funny actually, as if being from America means that people shouldn’t be speaking Sanskrit or something… anyways I’m meeting a ton of people.

Again, I feel like Link from Zelda picking up small but useful/powerful (powerful?) items and certain abilities along the way during my adventure in India, which will undoubtedly be handy in upcoming adventures and quests.

...But interestingly, as I am acquiring experience and items here (how funny!) my interest in the use of the items is slowly decreasing, as cool as they are, because of what I'm learning here: which is to be in the present moment. It's not easy, and I'm obviously just beginning, but it's much more rewarding than being caught up in the past and in the future, which you can neither change nor predict, respectively. So it is the learning that interests me, the constant battle that rages within -- to focus, to be in control of the present moment -- and not the items that I am accumulating. I am not interested in what I was before, nor what I will become, but who I am now. It is in the present moment that true freedom and happiness lie, not anywhere else.

My current courses include Ayurveda with Dr. R.H. Singh, and studies about Kashi with Dr. Rana P.B. Singh. Both of them are pretty awesome (the courses and the professors), and I’ll write about them later…

 

Most importantly, I’m learning how to live. And I’m loving it.

Course 3: Sanskrit and Vedanta Studies @ Krishnamurti Foundation India, Raj Ghat

Of course, education (in the bookish sense of the word) is also going on here.

 

Every day from 6:30 to 7:30 PM in Swami Chidanandaji’s room I have a class with him. Our classes switch off on a daily basis; one day is Sanskrit, the next day is Vedanta. Our Sanskrit classes are just me and him, but the Vedanta classes… once people learned that we were having them, they decided to join (with permission) too. But there is one class every day regardless, and it is quite interesting.

 

In Sanskrit class we are reading the Vaalmeeki Raamaayana (in Sanskrit, of course). This is quite possibly the greatest epic ever written. It is about the adventures and quests of Rama, the son of Dasharatha and prince of Ayodhya, written by Sage Vaalmeeki. It is so interesting in the original language that it was written, because not only is it all written in perfect meter, but it is so detailed and dispassionate! It is interesting to see the differences between the original work and all the remakes after it. Many remakes are made with such devotion to Lord Rama that they fail to portray him as a man, ultimately transforming him into a God and praising him thus. But the original Vaalmeeki Ramayana simply portrays the attributes of Rama, as a man… a perfect man, but a man nonetheless. Dispassionate, truthful, and never ceasing to be interesting, Sage Vaalmeeki writes such a great story! Of course, the ultimate goal of the class is to learn Sanskrit from the reading, and naturally that happens too, because within the story there are so many vocabulary words and usages of different tenses, etc.

 

I’m fascinated by Sanskrit…

 

Next comes our Vedanta class. Vedanta is a subject that I have been deeply involved in my whole life. Vedanta is the culmination of the teachings of our most ancient scriptures, the Vedas. It is simply a stating of the Truth that underlies all of creation. The difference between the way I have been studying it since I was young and since I came here is in the approach to knowledge of any kind. I am approaching Vedanta as an “exploration” now rather than seeking an end, which would have been liberation from the cycle of birth and rebirth. I am learning that it is in the exploration that the freedom lies, not in expecting a goal to be fulfilled… for it is in that very expectation you are caught up in the future, and in trying to measure how much you have achieved, you get caught up in the past... which inevitably takes you away from being free and in the present.

 

Each Vedanta class, Swamiji takes a new topic and discusses it for one hour. It is always an interesting discussion, and it leads to intense contemplation on the topic later. I am glad that Swamiji is my teacher, for he is extremely intelligent/smart and very fun to listen to. He always makes jokes and will never let you feel bored. I like his classes, because I am in fact learning a lot in them.

 

Never a dull moment here!

Adventure 11: Holi

The day started out pretty slowly – I woke up, way later than my normal standards, got ready (which included brushing my teeth… and that’s it, and I’ll tell you why in a second), and went to breakfast at around 9:00 AM. Today was Holi, which is the popularly known harvest festival where water and colors are thrown at each other, making everyone look like artwork at the end of the day, or color-throwing session, whichever happens to come first. Holi signifies the end of the non-harvest season, as it happens to be getting warmer at this time of year. And when I say warmer, I mean HOT.

 

Once upon a time, thousands of years ago, there was a little boy named Prahalaad, whose father, Hiranyakashyap, was a ruthless tyrant. Hiranyakashyap demanded that everyone in his kingdom worship him as god, for he believed himself to be even greater than the gods. He had received several boons by penance enabling him to be virtually indestructible, for he could not be killed by any mortal, inside or outside, on the ground or in the sky, during the day or during the night, or by any weapons (why he didn’t just ask to not be able to be killed at all goes beyond my limited capacity for reason and logic. Maybe it was against the rules of asking boons, so he wasn’t allowed to? Maybe he just didn’t think of it? Maybe he wanted to make his invulnerability sound really cool? It is truly beyond me. If it were me, and I wanted not to die, I would have just asked for invincibility. Period. Or immortality, whichever came into my head first at the time). Prahalaad, however, was a devotee of the god Vishnu. Hiranyakashyap was very jealous and tried in many, many ways to make Prahalaad switch over (yes, conversion happened even then) and worship him. However, Prahalaad had perfect faith in lord Vishnu, or Narayan, as he is known as in the story. So Prahalaad worshipped Narayan, against the wishes of his father, and when the father knew he could not convert his son, he decided to kill him. To make a long story short, I will just say that Hiranyakashyap tried to kill Prahalaad using many methods, one of which was his sister, Holika, after whom the festival is named. Holika had a boon that she could not be burned by fire. So the idea was, take Prahalaad in lap, sit in fire. Prahalaad burns, Holika does not. On said date of burning, Holika took Prahalaad up in her lap, and sat in the fire. Prahalaad took the name of Narayan, and closed his eyes. Holika burned, Prahalaad did not. Thus on the night before Holi, many huge bonfires are started, representing the night that Holika burned, and the one who had faith in the lord was saved.

 

Anyways I would get on with details about my day, but I’m guessing some of you want me to finish the story of Prahalaad first. So what happened was, to keep the long story short (it’s not that long anyway, but to make a short story even shorter), the final way that Hiranyakashyap tried to kill Prahalaad with was a red hot pillar. He wanted to tie Prahalaad to the pillar, and let the boy die because of the heat. When he was about to do it, the pillar burst open and a half-man-half-lion creature erupted out of it. This was one of the avatars of Vishnu, called Narasimha. Nara means man, and simha means lion, so the name is rather fitting. Since Narasimha was not wholly a man, and not wholly an animal, and thus also not a mortal, he fulfilled the first criteria for killing Hiranyakashyap. Next, he took Hiranyakashyap to his palace and brought him into its great doorway. Thus they were neither inside nor outside. He placed him on his lap, thus letting him neither be on the ground nor in the sky. It was evening-time, so neither day nor night. And finally, he unsheathed his massive claws, which weren’t weapons of any kind, and ripped apart Hiranyakashyap’s belly. Thus ends the story of Prahalaad.

 

Around 9:45 AM, Kalpana and I departed from our breakfast location where we were greeted by Reeta Didi’s daughter Nishita. She put some color on both of us and we on her, and then we made our way to the other side of the Varuna River, where the kids of the Rajghat Besant School (RBS) were supposed to be playing Holi from 9:00 AM to 10:30 AM. We arrived there around 10:15 AM or so, and when we did, it was the most spectacular sight. Kids covered with all different colors on the edges of this HUGE amphitheater pit that they have at RBS, and in the middle was the largest mud fight I have ever seen. I had not taken a bath yet for this reason alone – I was going to get super dirty, and I knew it. So we started to walk down towards the pit. As we were walking down the steps, we were greeted by teachers first, got some color on our faces, and then we were greeted by the youngest kids. The progression was kind of funny – teachers first, then youngest kids, and then onwards up until the high schoolers. The youngest kids greeted us with some water and some color, squirting us with baby water guns and such. It was really cute, but when we moved on from there it became a true brawl. I made my way into the center of the amphitheater, and there the older kids were playing, including the kids that I teach music (a cappella, what else) to there. They saw me and basically loaded me up with water and color. I don’t know what happened to Kalpana after that; I was lost in the crowd of kids, as was she. And we were all slowly becoming the same color – mud.

 

I was watching the mud fight for a while, and during that time I got a lot of water and color thrown at me (and threw a lot at others as well)… but the mud fight looked so fun. I wanted to be part of it, but did not know how to join, as I had never been part of a mud fight before. Finally Shayur, who was also there, pushed me into the center of the mud puddle and I slipped and fell. And it was the best feeling ever. And it tasted good… The very second that I fell into the mud, about 10 kids from the 7^th grade (and probably other grades too, though the 7^th graders are the ones I know, because they are the ones I teach) piled up on me and smashed mud on my head, my neck, and basically every part of me that they could see. It was probably the most fun experience I have had, for many reasons. One, the ground was so soft that no matter how many times you fell it didn’t hurt. Two, it was mud, so when you ended up being submerged in it, it felt so natural… Three, it was all kids, and kids really know how to have fun. Nobody felt left out at all, and every single person was having fun. Including me. And nobody got hurt. When I got up again, I looked like everyone else – essentially a mud monster. And from then on until about 11:00 AM, when they finally stopped playing, I was as much a part of the fun as anybody else, and it felt so… good. I felt free, because I had nothing on me but my clothes, and I was so dirty (and when I say dirty, I mean covered with dirt… not dirty as in unclean, but take it how you will) that it didn’t matter what I did – I would still look and feel the same. So, without any inhibitions, I plunged into the festivities. At the end, I was soaked, covered in mud/color, hungry, exhausted, and indescribably happy. We climbed up the steps of the amphitheater and as soon as we got up there they served us chai (tea) and snacks. It was so hot and sunny outside that the mud that was all over my body started to dry up right away. I was thankful to be eating and standing in the sun.

 

From there, Shayur, Kalpana, Kevin, and I made our way to the guest house where we met Hema Aunty and Swamiji. We chatted for a bit, and then decided to bathe in the Ganga. The night before, we had made our way to a sandbar in the middle of the Ganga near Raj Ghat in a boat and spent some time there observing the many bonfires lit up along the banks of the river, because the night before Holi it is traditional to light a bonfire to symbolize the time when Prahalaad was saved from the fire by his faith in Narayana, and Holika burned. The sandbar was so nice and peaceful, and in such a perfect location, that we decided that was exactly where we would go to bathe. However, it had taken us one hour by boat to reach the sandbar. We decided to walk, as we discovered that there was a path by land as well, though not directly to the sandbar, but close enough where one might just be able to wade the last part of the walk towards it. So we started walking, and made it to the closest point (about 40 or 50 feet) away from the sandbar. Shayur and I saw some people bathing in the river there, and he told me “the safest thing to do when in a foreign land when it comes to getting into a river is look for where the locals bathe” so we started the journey through the water there. The locals there told us that we wouldn’t be able to make it across, it was too deep. Fortunately we are among those lucky few who know how to swim, so we started to swim across the river. Interestingly, we noticed as we looked back, we had a whole group of locals following us in a line, right where we had crossed. Our crossing, we assumed, gave them enough confidence to cross themselves. Anyways before they made it across, Shayur and I went to the other side of the sandbar and started to explore the water there, to see if it was indeed safe enough to bathe there. It was, and we got into the water.

 

I went to another location on the bank of the sandbar, and found a place where the meeting of sand and water had not been disturbed in what seemed like ages. I started to explore this little area, a world all on its own… with creatures I had never seen before, and the creatures of which were probably specific to this little formation only. The water was clearer than on the bank that we had come from at least, so I didn’t feel too bad about entering it. I played with the tiny fish that came up to explore my leg, dug a little sand with my foot and enjoyed the feeling of the sand giving way to my foot as it went deeper and deeper down, letting Mother Earth speak to me through her amazing grace. I called Shayur over, and we explored this world together, discovering more creatures we had never seen before, and becoming like little kids as they perform their experiments with nature formations they have never experienced before. We saw a little creature, about the size of my thumb, that resembled a lobster mixed with a grasshopper, with fins instead of wings. Though it was easy to catch, we decided to play with it a little. In playing with it we discovered that when it tried to get away from our hands, instead of swimming in the normal fashion with fins or even with a back-and-forth movement like a fish, it would barrel-roll away from our hands in the water, which apparently propelled it. This sort of movement was particularly fascinating, probably because we had never seen it before. This, I felt, is the definition of a true adventure.

 

We had to get back for lunch but none of us knew the time, and since judging by the sun it was just about lunchtime, we started to head back. On our way back we took a different route towards the KFI Rural Center Guest House where Kalpana and I would have our lunch. Shayur and the two uncles that came with us would then proceed from there to the KFI Main Guest House. On our way to the Rural Center, we walked through a village (which I had never seen before, surprisingly… despite the proximity to where I stay). In the village, the two uncles and Kalpana went on ahead because Kalpana was feeling a little nauseous. Shayur and I walked a little slower, taking in the village sights. It was truly fascinating, the transformation as we walked from total rural village (like you read about in the books) to semi-village with shops and whatnot, to something like township and finally to a brick road that would lead us back to the guest house.

 

On our way through the village a boy of about my age started talking to us, with slurred speech and a sway in his step. He put his arm around my shoulders and started to walk with us, and said his name was Sagar and he was pleased to meet us. He asked me where I was from, and I got away with saying “I’m from Delhi” (in these parts it is not the safest thing to announce that you are from another country, because people can flock you and are sometimes dangerous in numbers). His breath smelled strongly of something, but I couldn’t place the smell exactly, but I figured since it was Holi he was probably drunk on bhang. Bhang is a natural opiate that is a popular substitute for alcohol in India, though bhang can be found in almost anything, even food, especially on days like Holi and other religious holidays. It is good advice to not eat or drink anything from outside a trusted home base (if you don’t want bhang, that is) on or around such days.

 

We finally made it back to the brick road that would lead us back to our base, where Sagar left us and we continued on our path. At the crossroad where one path would take you to the guest house and one to the other side of the Varuna River, Shayur and I parted ways. I continued on towards the guest house to have lunch, and after lunch took the longest and most relaxing (and of course, most needed) bath I have ever taken.

Adventure 10: Varanasi, the City

A few days ago a brahmachaari came from Mumbai to visit Shayur and attend the completion of his purascharanam, which is a long, elaborate ritual at the end of which you have to feed some Brahmins… I don’t know too much about it, so I won’t try to explain. Anyways this brahmachaari’s name is Brahmachaari Samvid Chaitanya, so we call him Samvidji. I had never met him before, but when Shayur and I went to receive him at the entrance to the Krishnamurti Foundation I met him and we talked for an hour or so. Imagine a guy with a shaved head except for a little shikha in the back, which is just a little tail of hair in the back of the head, who laughs all the time, and pretty much resembles the Laughing Buddha (clothes and all). And speaks Sanskrit. That’s Samvidji. He’s hilarious, and is also always laughing himself. He was Shayur’s Sanskrit aachaarya (Sanskrit teacher) at the two-year brahmachaari course Shayur took that ended last September.

 

Today Shayur, Samvidji, and I made our way into the city for it was the end of Shayur’s purascharanam. We started by going to Kedar Ghat, which is on the other side of the city (as always), did some rituals in the Ganga, and went into Kedareshwar mandir. There we did some more rituals, offered our prayers, and left. After that we made our way to the Siddhi Vinayak Temple, which is located a little inside the city from Manikarnika Ghat, the funeral ghat. It is said that here, a cremation fire is burning 24/7. This is the traditional cremation grounds for Hindu families, because it is believed that it is most auspicious to cremate the dead at Manikarnika Ghat. And if one cannot cremate one’s dead here, it is said that even to bring the dead’s ashes here after cremation is enough to be very auspicious for the soul of the deceased. Interestingly, it is said that it is also most auspicious to bathe in the Ganga at Manikarnika.

 

We made our way to the Siddhi Vinayak Temple, for it was here that Shayur’s final ritual would take place. We said some incantations, and then he was ready. However, all 25 Brahmins had not arrived. One can always count on Indian Standard Time (IST, or sometimes DST for Desi Standard Time) when waiting for someone. Accordingly, all 25 finally showed up. However, the food had not arrived! How ironic. While we were waiting for the food, Shayur got a call from Kalpana saying that she, Chellam Aunty, and Josephine had arrived at Manikarnika Ghat with the help of Rita Didi in a boat, and they needed to know where to go. I was given the task of going down to the boat, retrieving them, and bringing them back up to the place… so I did. After bringing them over, Josephine started to feel a little uncomfortable, because being one of three women there, and the only white woman, she was not particularly prepared for the occasion. Josephine then left us for her hotel, where she was staying for 3 days before returning to Raj Ghat.

 

Finally the food came, and Kalpana and I helped Shayur serve the Brahmins, while Samvidji chanted some mantras. It was pretty awesome, actually. There isn’t much more to say about the food aspect of it – the people ate, they left, we cleaned up and then we left. Afterwards, Kalpana and Chellam Aunty sat in the shade a little distance from the river, while Samvidji, Shayur, and I made our way to the Ganga. We were at Manikarnika Ghat. I thought we were just going to go take a picture or something, and then be done with it, but Samvidji caught me by surprise when he said we were taking a full bath in the Ganga at Manikarnika Ghat!! So we stripped down to our boxers, and literally jumped into the river… and it was COLD. But once I was in, I didn’t want to get out, because a) I hadn’t swam in years, and b) it felt really, really good. Anyways we got out, and over our dripping boxers put back on our clothes. Both Shayur and I used our undershirts to dry ourselves a little first, which we then put on. It was so hot outside that this actually felt amazing. What an adventure! AND we all bathed at Manikarnika Ghat!!!! My clothes dried up pretty fast in the sun, and it was a great feeling to have bathed in the Ganga. I actually felt extremely clean.

 

We then walked back up to where Kalpana and Chellam Aunty were sitting. From there, all five of us made our way through the streets of Varanasi as we were really hungry. We stopped on the way for an orange juice from a street vendor. Let me tell you something about orange juice from street vendors. They’re AMAZING. Why? Because after putting 5 or 6 whole oranges into a metal machine that turns and juices the oranges into a big pot, they put a spoonful of masalas (spices) into each cup (for everyone who wants it), and then pour the orange juice from the pot into the cups. And then you drink it. And it’s just the best orange juice I have ever had, and since it was hot, it felt really good. Aftwerwards, we found a place to eat nearby, where Samvidji asked me to pick the food we ate, so I did. I picked some traditionally rich dishes, and we ate them, and were stuffed beyond compare. It was some of the best food I’ve ever eaten, or maybe I was just extremely hungry. One can never know.

 

Anyways, Samvidji basically told us that we all had to try paan. And I was totally game. But before paan, I bought a couple of laddoos, which are round, Indian sweets that are just scrumptious. I can’t explain how good those laddoos were. We all shared them and then moved on to the main street where we found a paan vendor. Paan is a combination of spices, and some other ingredients that resemble jelly but taste like sweet heaven, wrapped in a special leaf called a Paan Leaf. Also, it has digestive power, so people usually eat it after eating food. Now, Paan in Banaras is the most famous paan in the world. So famous, in fact, that there are songs about it. It is made with a special leaf that is smaller than normal paan leaves, and so fits easier in the mouth, and almost every man in Banaras (it seems) is chewing paan. Of course, their paan has tobacco in it usually, and other dirty-ish ingredients, so they not only get high, their mouths are always red in color, and they are always spitting red liquid out of their mouths, much like baseball players do in the west (though baseball players’ spit is not red, it comes from tobacco). What happens is, you chew paan for so long, and lots of spit accumulates in your mouth, and for the ones with tobacco in them, it is not the safest thing to be drinking that all the time, so they spit it out as often as needed. But everyone talks with what seems like a mouthful, and sometimes it gets annoying, but nobody seems to notice or care because everyone does it. So, we got a paan for each of us (without tobacco, of course). We enjoyed it very much (at least I did).

 

Then, moving on from eating laddoos and paan, we decided we would go to Kala Bhairava mandir. By rickshaw. So Samvidji and I sat in one rickshaw, and the other three sat in the other one. When we reached Kala Bhairava, we dismounted and prepared to go into the temple. Kala Bhairava is the “Guardian of the City,” a form of Shiva that has huge eyes, signifying his ever-watching state, and also his authority on right and wrong. Keep in mind that this is different from Kashi Vishvanaath, who is simply the ruler/owner of the city. I suppose ruler/owner and guardian are two different responsibilities. Anyways we made it into the temple, paid our respects, and then left. It was a rather awesome experience, because Kala Bhairava has this effect of humbling the devotee, which is a great thing if someone is trying to rid oneself of one’s ego. It feels good to have a huge watching guardian over you, because you feel like you have to act rightly all the time. But that’s a good thing.

 

 After we exited Kala Bhairava mandir, I was craving a lassi, because my experience last time had been amazing. As we made our way out of the web of streets that every temple in the city seems to be hidden within, we found a lassi stall. I hesitated, but then gave in to temptation and craving and asked the man how much a lassi would cost. He said five rupees for a small, and ten for a large. So I said to give me a small. Seeing that I had stopped, Samvidji also came over, followed by everyone else. I told them that they HAD to try a lassi in Varanasi, because it is just the best experience ever, served in an earthen pot and everything. So I had the first sip, and it was just as good as the first lassi I had had at Pehelwaan's. I was completely overwhelmed by good taste and smiles. The rest also tried one each, and they all loved it as much as I did. In fact, Samvidji even had another one. It was great!

 

We walked a little more through the gullies of Varanasi and Shayur and I noticed that every five or ten feet there was a door, not necessarily with its base on the ground, just randomly placed in the walls. We both wondered what was in those doors, or how one got into them. Or why they were even there. We passed one that was actually open, a door that was about three-fourths my height, and I looked into it as we passed. It reminded me of a world completely unexplored by mankind… Just inside it, in front there was a wall… there were two stairways, one leading to the left and one leading to the right, which didn’t seem like they could possibly lead anywhere, judging from the way the wall looked surrounding the door. But one can never know. I tapped Shayur on the shoulder and showed him because he had missed it and apparently he was reminded of the same idea. An unexplored world. He was just as tempted as I was to just jump inside and see where the door lead, but we restrained ourselves. I made a mental note to explore as many of these little doors as I could (no matter how dangerous; they make for excellent adventures) before I left Varanasi.

 

(I don’t know how many of you have played Zelda, but I feel like Link sometimes… I randomly pick up stuff here and there, keep it in my little cloth shoulder bag, and it comes in handy later on. And I carry around a flute everywhere I go… which for now acts as both the Ocarina and the sword… Sometimes my health is down, sometimes it’s up, sometimes I find things – like fruits – that restore it… It’s a strange but wonderful feeling to actually be the character you’ve always played as in video games...)

 

Finally we found our way out of the maze and saw the beautiful river Ganga. It was nearing sunset, so we decided to sit on the banks of the Ganga at a beautiful location on a bench under a big umbrella made of leaves. This umbrella concept is really famous in Varanasi. They are huge umbrellas, like the kind you see in America in peoples’ backyards covering their lawn tables or whatever, but made entirely of leaves. It’s a sweet concept. And they’re sturdy, no less. We discovered that we were sitting at Scindia Ghat. I don’t know the significance of this ghat, and neither did anyone sitting with me there. We talked for a long while, before we spotted Marc randomly walking along the ghats some distance from us.

 

I called out to Marc, and soon learned that he was heading home, by walking. By this time, it was around 5:30 PM, so I decided to go with him. My class would be starting at 6:30 PM, and I could not miss it! The rest of everyone said they would come by boat, so we bid them farewell and started walking. Many things happened on our walk home. One, I noticed how much attention white people receive from onlookers and people that they pass as they walk without actually wanting it. Everyone tries their bit of English, which usually consists of “Hello!” in a really annoying tone, and “Thank you!” and “Money?” (clearly asking for money, because of the ridiculous amount that foreign people have compared to them). Marc was handling the attention well, because I guess he was used to it, but there was a point when a kid from behind ran up to him and jabbed his knee from behind, which caught Marc by surprise (obviously), and then ran away back to his group of friends, making sounds like a dog. I think that was on purpose, just to scare Marc. Marc was relatively unperturbed, though he did mention, “That was strange.”

 

Another interesting thing that happened on the way back was our conversation. I learned that there are more people in the world who are interested in adventuring and such. He’s doing the same, but his motive is to write something about the city. He wants to write about the relation of the people to the Ganga, which I think is one of the deepest topics I’ve ever heard of. And I know he will do it justice, or at least come close. I was awed and inspired by his tale and his goal.

 

We exchanged pleasantries at the gate of the Krishnamurti Foundation Guest House, from which he went to his room, and I went to Swamiji’s class, right on time.