Outpourings of an Erratic Mind

Implications of a dark evening

2012-01-30T09:26:00.001+05:30

            Strange things happen after dark. I had heard this being said a thousand times before, and had probably even experienced it on my own in a mild form, so far. But the dark evening of the 29th of January, 2012 brought me to the realm of the experienced ones, those who have legitimate and rightful reasons to preach this wisdom. Now that I have raised the bar of expectations high and exposed my story to the poor light of a possibly low climactic judgement, let me narrate it out loud to provoke some disappointment and lead the way to the lighter observations that came to me like the great flash of enlightenment, documenting which, by the way, was the main purpose of this blog tonight.

           While coming back from a friend’s house in Haldwani at the after dark phase of this Sunday evening, I could not find a rickshaw. Having waited for a few minutes I decided to walk my way to Kaladhungi Chauraha, a place where I could easily find a rickshaw back home. Soon enough I got bored of walking alone in the bustle of the crowded city and decided to talk to mother back in Almora. I dialled her number and started talking to her. She told me about this and that and so did I. Then I came to the topic which brings us quite close to the climax of this story. Before the climax a little background is of immediate requirement. I had got a phone last year from Surat and I had being meaning to buy myself a memory card ever since. Now that I had misplaced my iPod I decided to finally bring this plan to action and actually buy one. So I told Ma to send my phone earphones to me in Haldwani. She asked me where I had kept them. As I was about to tell her that they were in the front pocket of my small sports bag that contained my old history notes, I felt a cursory but firm slap on my hand that was at my right ear holding the phone. For a minute I was excited to think that some old friend was probably in town and wanted to surprise me like this. But I was also afraid that my phone might have fallen on the ground and had possibly broken as I could no longer feel it at my hand. But there was no sound of plastic meeting concrete.

            This, now, is the climax of the story; the main part. As I was looking at my left side for my phone I heard the familiar sound of an engine of Yamaha RX100 at my right, shifting forward with great speed. Busy as I was in the thoughts of my earphones and searching for the exact words to say to Ma in order to help her locate them, it took me a few seconds to realize that I had just been robbed. The biker had snatched my phone with an impressive dexterity and was now holding it between his teeth as he continued to increase the speed. For a second he turned his head back to check whether I was following, and I am sure I saw him smile with my phone in his mouth compelling him to turn that theft into a pleasant grinning experience, of course exclusively for him. I was too dumbstruck to run after him and in a second or two he had already disappeared. My immediate reaction is going to be considered a fake affectation for the sake of gaining some respect after thus losing my mobile, but I swear on all my lost contacts that it is true. I thought I had to buy a new one anyway. Even the vibrator in this one was not working properly. What followed was some formality in the police station et al, and is drag and boring, and moreover only a stupid ending to an exciting incident, so I am not writing about it.

            Later in the evening after dinner as I was watching some TV with Kucki da a funny thought came to me. How many adapters like mine are left all alone in the world without their respective mobile phones to attach themselves to? They might feel somewhat like the war-widows who were courageous enough to send their men to the war front with high hopes, but unfortunate to receive the news of them having being captured by the enemy with no hope of return. They, then, spend their lives always dangling from the switchboard, like split ended hair strands, waiting to be detached from the head one fine day. I felt pleasure at this sadistic comparison.

            They don’t end here, my observations. I missed a lump in the front pocket of my jeans that I continued to check after intervals, and every time I found it not there I got worried for a second and then relieved that it was actually stolen and that I hadn’t forgotten it anywhere. Few labels have been attached to me for some time now and only partly for the right reason; one, that I am always on phone and the other that I am very careless. I am on phone, but not always and who isn’t careless sometimes! Just that I am caught at the wrong place, at the wrong time. Anyway, today my phone took away both these customary accusations with it, though only for the time being. But I do have a reason to rejoice. No distractions and a temporary holiday from the albatross round my neck. I could concentrate more on the TV and once back in my room I could read some Turkish poetry in translation, something that had lately found it difficult for itself to squeeze some time out, because of a stupid but addictive game in the phone.

Thank you thief, however may you rot in hell!

What's going on!!!

2012-01-10T13:51:00.001+05:30

Today, like many other days at home in the hills I woke up in the designed, fraudulent, deceitful morning of early January. There was no sun in the vicinity, despite it being a Sunday and the sky was covered in a sludge of dark clouds, so dark that the only light from the window in my room gave me an impression that there’d been a snowfall early in the morning. It was quiet; not even the birds chirped that chirped always, the stillness that only followed a snowfall. I threw my fur filled quilt at one side of my bed and jumped at the window, hoping to see the landscape outside covered in white moss: trees, mountains, flower pots, the old wooden bench, everything covered in pure pashmina. But as I ogled at it from the wiry mesh of my window I saw the old adulterated version of this fairy tale--- hills without snow!

So much frustration over a trifle, you must think, but my occasioning pain only doubles as I break to you that the undeserving, unchosen land of abject aesthetics, writhing under its confused etymology, Pathankot, has witnessed a snowfall last night. What is going on?!?

Arundhati Roy's take on the Anna Movement

2011-08-23T20:14:00.002+05:30

Arundhati Roy is one of those journalists/writers/activists in India who have a high survival understanding in a field where a static absence means death. She keeps controversial topics close to her chest and very honestly (and unfeigningly) maintains the i-dont-care-what-you-think-of me facade. She often speaks against the wind so as to preserve her position at a distance from the rest of her lot and stay alive. Her style is that of over simplifying things that have more complex solutions and complicating the matters that may have easier resolutions. She frequently reminds me of some modern witch who likes to be called a psychic behind her eyes highlighted with kohl, and who likes it even more when people call her a little cranky.

She has been on my list of irritating good looking women ever since her over simplified version of the Indian Naxalite movement; then she graduated to a new level when she spoke the simple absurdities in/about Kashmir. And in between she has had random opinions on India’s nuclear policy post the Pokhran nuke test. The latest point where she opened her supple mouth to bring some misplaced venom out was at the anti corruption movement led by Anna Hazare. She is highly critical of not just the new bill but also of the man and the entire movement. Though not in clear words, she calls Anna a fake Gandhian.

It is difficult to understand what problems can an ‘intellectual’ have with this movement (other than the mentioned attempt at standing away from the rest of the bourgeoisie intellectuals) that is clearly in favour of fighting corruption. Here are a couple of things that according to my analysis are responsible for this.

1. Roy has always been very vocal about her abhorrence for Narendra Modi, and despite the 2002 stain on the Gujarat collar Anna Hazare praised Modi’s development model in Gujarat.

2. Anna Hazare has had an old association with the RSS.

3. Anna does not support the popular practice of caste based reservations, and not just talks but also has brought into practice the Gandhian model of self dependence based on equal distribution of work in his Ralegan Sidhi.

4. Anna’s movement and the ongoing campaign is being handled by people who are associated with NGOs that gather their funds from multinationals like Coca Cola and Lehman Brothers. She is clearly upset with Arvind Kejriwal and Sisodia's NGO ‘Kabir’ that has received a donation of $400,000 from the Ford Foundation in the last 3 years.

5. Arundhati Roy, at the bottom of everything else, is a leftist and pays her homage to Marx by opposing everything that has a stench of a robust Capitalism and a hint of decentralization.

She has always been wary of globalization and privatising government wings to corporations and NGOs. Her biggest concern is that such NGOs and corporations will be out of the Lokpal bill ambit and hence will be free to do corrupt practices themselves. But what she refuses to understand is that it will ultimately be the tax payers’ money that will run these NGOs and corporations and wherever that goes the periphery of the Lokpal jurisdiction will go.

But sadly, I do not expect any sense of rationality from her. Had she been in possession of the right senses she would have made far better use of her Booker Prize money than donate it in a movement to stop a Hydel Power Project in Gujarat.

Reservation politics

2011-08-11T23:30:00.002+05:30

Watching a political debate on the movie Arakshan being banned in three states of the country spurned an uncomfortable anxiety in my heart and liver. The panellists included a movie maker, a film critic and two Dalit activists. The caste of the former two was not declared so I presume they did not belong to the political jackpot class of the ‘down-trodden’. As expected there was a lot of hue and cry on the issue and a lot of absurd things were said that make you laugh in disgust when you hear them but leave you worried at the state of mindsets that are only becoming more and more popular, after the funny moment is over.

One panellist even said that the Bollywood filmmakers should take a cue from their Hollywood counterparts who foraged their ghettos to bring forth black actors, directors and other crewmen for the sake of equal opportunity and representation, and do something like that for Dalits in India. I have no idea about who those ghetto-raised actors and directors are, and on what research he based his statement on, but I was really aggravated to hear such a stupid thing coming out from a representative of a class that is supposed to be suppressed and needs to be brought up at the same pedestal as the rest of us in the country. If the leader who guides them believes in such alienating gimmicks then they sure have a bleak future and there is no way they are going to be a part of an Indian population that does not need to wear a caste badge on the sleeve.

The present state of the matter is so bizarre and so heavily ionized with political radicals that a casteless society in India is an impossible task. The caste system is being made more and more prominent by raising reservation ratios in colleges and institutions of merit. Every election campaign is considered incomplete without fondling the mammaries of caste. This practice is slowly but ruthlessly dividing the country into two portions of the reserved and the unreserved. Each of which has grudges against the other. The British were supposed to have devised and very efficiently brought into practice the system of divide and rule in India, and logically enough their successors have now become aware of the evil legacy.

I want to ask the ones who demand equal rights for the Dalits whether they will be able to remove words like ‘caste’ and ‘reservations’ from their electoral speeches! This is the only way to bring them at par with the rest of the country, by treating them exactly as the rest. And I promise, in less than a decade people will forget what ages have failed to wipe off from the Indian panorama.

"We dont need no education"

2011-06-28T17:33:00.003+05:30

It’s not every day that we get to spend time with those who like to think on their own and have a perspective that’s out of the box. And when one happens to run into such company it is too irresistible to let the opportunity go. They also serve as mothballs to keep the vulgar idiots away, and are a boon for petty hosts tired of laughing at perverted jokes and anecdotes. I happened to have been stuck in a pair of stilettos that didn’t even fit me, one evening—a knight in distress, when this mixed crowd of dames and dandies paid a visit. After a couple of shots of some harmless spirit we found ourselves involved in a hot exchange of opinions.

I spoke my face red and my voice hoarse on the present state of the country, and how Mother India was writhing in the talons of the government; and how the Congress had proved time and again only too efficient in licking foreign arses (to manage what the blind, sentimental and non-budging Indians had continually been holding out to them—the reigns of the nation); and how the only other option the BJP, or shall I say the NDA promised a muddled up instability in the wake of the non-secular firmament (read bullshit)that they had to wake up to every single morning; and how the Left irritated the one who might just otherwise work, like blood sucking mosquitoes, and rendered smooth working impossible (why wouldn’t they demand what they wanted straight away at the beginning and save us all the drama, and the news channels their precious time slots for televised adaptations of the apocalypse prophesied by hermits and crooks?); and how the rest of the political fraternity attacked the national carcass like hyenas when the mighty lords had had their fill. And I realized that all it did was raise the pressure I my arteries and disturb the rhythm that once was lub and dub. The government continued anyway to dance on a pagan ditty from Mount Etna, dressed in bold nothingness with sticks in hands and the nation for the beast in the barbecue at the centre. A young kid with spectacles touched the kill to check whether it was time, and giggled. The rest of them giggled in unison and reverence as a tribute to the great grandfather of the kid who was once their leader. Maybe it was the initiation that was so painful. Once the rudiments were settled things would get better. I lighted up a candle, having lost my prescription for natural optimism.

Someone suggested a refill, and we were on the highway again. In order to calm myself down I took some deep breaths that really helped. I wondered if soon deep breathing exercises and the pranayam would be coupled with the non secular bhagwa party, as Baba Ramdev had been, who had been endorsing it for a long time. After all Anna Hazare’s austere stage couldn’t escape the stains of mud that flung from the quicksand that gobbled up Babaji. And while Anna had years of positive only results at Ralegan Siddhi and elsewhere, poor Indian Yoga had made a return from the west without a passport with a tag of Tantric Sexuality attached to its ear. The government could blame it all on the impish Hindutva goblins, and declare it anti national as it might hurt the secular sentiment of the Indian Preamble like our notorious national song. I took a few more deep breaths, not only because I needed them but also because my elders had taught me to be law abiding, and I might as well do it when it was still legal.

The crammed up living room began to lose its citizenry as the speakers fell silent and a part that formed the dumb congregation sniffed a possible escape door opening. Someone demanded to forget it and look elsewhere. Some of the rising inmates sat back down and I played the fall guy by saying, “Ya... OK!” as if it was me who was offered the chalice from Lethe. We spoke about contemporary literature in India for some time and soon drifted to the dangerous precinct in the neighbourhood that was freedom of speech and expression. It started in a light colour with Sardars getting annoyed on sardar jokes, but the burning of Rohinton Mistry’s Such A Long Journey by Shiv Sainiks and the disappointing decision of Mumbai University to withdraw the book from the course curriculum proved the Enfield greased cartridges that we took rounds to bite into and set the rest of the night on fire.

Then came the ghosts of M F Hussain and Tasleema Nasreen and the students of the Fine Arts College of Baroda and Lucknow. History started yelling aloud from the top of the Kabah, and the pre Layla-al-qadr pagan daughters of Allah became the mouthpieces of Swedish caricatures. We turned into mediums and the spirits made us speak like Saraswati in Kumbhakaran’s tongue. Episodes glided before our eyes from texts of history and politics. The stream of our consciousness was on rampage. How the ancient tradition of India made us proud despite Thapars and Majumdars! The peaceful co-existence of 6 theistic and 3 atheistic schools of philosophy without the spilling of a drop of blood was hard to imagine. There was jeering and sneering at the Brahmanas; the writers of the Vedas were even called Donkeys by Charvak the sceptic, but at end of the day there was a tap on the heart and an unsaid word ‘respect’ in the eye. Today a handful of religions, all ahl-al kitab with clear distinction of duties, find it difficult to nod their heads in harmony. Independent acts of mischief are linked with a resilient religion in order to maintain the status quo at the Parliament.

We were still wondering what the discussion was all about in the beginning that had led us to feeling so aggravated and sick. Someone strummed on the guitar and we stepped out of that hypnotized state. The simple rhythm of the cheap acoustic box made us smile. These were the first set of smiles in the entire evening. The melody was simple and eased the pleats that had formed in our hearts. There was no piece of knowledge to counter it, no argument to object to it. I let out a sigh that had been in my ribs as a nascent breath of fire since forever. This was beautiful. We don’t need no education, I mumbled and the guitar picked my words and played the Pink Floyd number. We don’t need no thoughts control. For the first time the lyrics made more sense to me than ever before. The singing went on for an hour before we fell asleep like babies.

An Osama dead...

2011-05-18T22:10:00.003+05:30

As kids we read the story of a shepherd boy who was a habitual false alarm raiser. He announced the attack of the wolf on his sheep for fun, and almost lost credibility, so much so as to lose his cattle when the real attack took place. A modern event in correspondence with this legend has been the killing of Osama bin Laden. I expected just another gimmick when a Nisheeth informed me –half in jest—that he had killed bin Laden. I naturally reacted with a, “yeah right… is it another Facebook application that you’re entertaining yourself with?” but his rebuke on my ignorance led me to the television and I discovered that his news was half correct. Osama had been killed, though not by Nisheeth but by American soldiers.

I surfed all the news channels to read the BREAKING NEWS flash that it was a hoax and America had once again been tricked, but none came. By the evening Indian news channels (esp. Times Now) surfaced similar suspicions as mine about the dead man really being an Osama and not just a dummy to please Obama. The body had been quickly disposed off in the sea and no direct telecast seemed apt like it had been in the case of Saddam Hussain. And all information about the dead man’s identity and his DNA samples lie with the U.S., so we are supposed to believe them, i.e. until the ‘real’ Osama comes up with yet another video cursing and middle fingering America.

Anyway, the whole world seems to be rejoicing the fall of the Al-Qaida chief. But was killing of Osama really worth all the blood spilling around the world? Everyone knows the answer and there is no point stating the obvious. Let us stick to the lighter part of the story. Our esteemed royal man (outside the royal Gandhi family, of course) Digvijay Singh pugnaciously condemned the way Osama was thrown into the brine. He is of the opinion that even the fiercest of the terrorists deserve a decent last ceremony; an Islamic burial. Had only America declared its intentions before quickly committing the blasphemy (of giving Osama a Jal Samadhi and not killing him, for the latter is a complete no-no in the Indian political context; we would have rather begged Pakistan to give Osama to us and let him spend the rest of his life in our prestigious jails), I assume Digvijay would have volunteered to accept Osama’s body and give him the truly deserved Islamic burial on our soil, somewhere in U.P. where there’s a need for serious Congress (re)fixation. This was the least he could do as the General Secretary of an All India Congress Committee that is chronically embarrassed by the man’s radical illustrations of experienced-in-naivety vocabulary.

The purpose that Osama’s killing really serves is a political maelstrom in Pakistan (sometimes I really feel sad for our clinically removed pustule that opted for the vish in the churning of the Indian Ocean in the name of partition). It brought a bucketful of good news for India. First of all, it gave the Indian media some masala to cover in the lull after the Lokpal bill controversy. Columnists, who were beginning to work on their autobiographies in all the spare time, got the required nudging to beat the dust off their decade old diaries and books for interesting facts about Al-Qaida, world terrorism et al. The political leaders of the Opposition parties received go-aheads to pester the government to do things that obviously even they wouldn’t do if in power—talking about terrorism with Pakistan in just the right tone.

As far as seemingly direct implications are concerned, I don’t think the killing of Osama (even if it’s true) makes any difference other than a symbolic one. I don’t expect the Al-Qaida to have sat idle all this while and nursed their leader for gout and hernia and all the ailments that pundits claimed he was suffering from. With or without him they are more alive than before.

Nostalgia

2011-03-06T21:03:00.002+05:30

Thousands of kilometers away from the hills that have always been my home, today the non-chalant clouds in the sky reminded me of Almora. Phone calls and news on the T.V. continually update me of the pangs of pleasure and cold that my hills go through. I can well imagine trees swishing behind their poky blades, as men and women walk around draped in shawls over thick woolens; a laconic air of cheerfulness about the ruddy cheeks of children in schools, with folded hands pressed together with an animated effort fighting faded blazers; solipsistic yogis in ochre coloured garbs, with hair flowing down their ochre caps– protected by cool winds behind their impressive beards, reading on the stairs of the Kasar Devi hill or listening to an exciting commentary of a cricket match running close to their ears out of a dull plastic radio. How routine it was only a few years back! Travelers would come and go and inform me that it was heaven on earth– hamin asto.

I am a traveler, a vagabond now going from one railway station to another– living in cities with big names, bigger histories and biggest financial standings. Emasculated by the boredom of avarice these new homes fail to give me a motherly embrace, not even a foster mother’s caress. People here tell me with great confidence that I have come from a land that’s the closest to heaven on earth, and why? They look happy here under the scorching sun, then why do they expect me to be sad and try to make me realize that I ought to be at home, not in an alien place!

Most of the time I give them unyielding replies– a mere this or a fad that– to make them stop their stupid nauseating comments in a fumbling version of my tongue. But today I am reminded of home. All their bewilderments and awe at an abseil to an infernal land from the paradise at my own will makes so much sense to me.

I would have been preparing for the evening with an iron stove stuffed with dried pieces of carefully chopped wood– saggad, a Kumaoni word drawing parallels with the plenary gatherings of the Canterbury Tales. Families and friends would gather around for the flame. Women would knit, men would make jokes, and I would displace a burning loner of a coal in the saggad to the centre with a pair of tongs where it gets some air and helps the wood burn, with an eye half closed because of the rising smoke. A kid would request to throw some sweet potatoes inside. After an hour everyone would be served a little portion of the baked sweet potatoes. A community is rejuvenated– love is shared in the sweetness of the baked potato.

But it is all a dream. There are no families gathering for the sake of the warmth of the burning log. There are no kids requesting any trifles anymore. The distance from Almora gives me moments like these when I can reminisce, make up stories like these that have never happened with me like Lamb’s imaginary children. My dreams give me the strength to play the music as it pleases my soul, to make people do as marionettes tied on my fingers, to create the neverland that I have heard of in the stories of my elders. And it gives me confidence to feel pride when people say my land is a paradise with lives so simple.

And look, the clouds are gliding away in the sky. They are traveling like me to some other version of me to help him remember what he must. They are dry clouds that do not rain. But they always shower enough on me that I let my head and my limbs out of my carapace to catch as much as I can to drench myself thoroughly. Come again, clouds! You remind me of home!

Monkey trouble

2009-10-03T13:54:00.006+05:30

No offence, but Hanuman was a nuisance at Ashok Vatika. Alright, he was a secret agent and an under-cover spy cum messenger and all that but like any other member of his clan was a trouble to aesthetics. Ever since monkeys have begun to sabotage my garden, my sympathies for Ravana and his gardener too have started to take a prominent shape.

They come stealthily at any hour and move around innocently to find out if the ground is safe for some monkey business. Once the inspection is over, hordes and hordes of vanars head towards my pagan Eden — a procession that reminds me of the pictures of the great migration at the time of partition; corpulent chiefs walking grimly as philosophers behind the last of the sloth stricken elders. The younger ones, the enthusiastic teens, the zealous adolescents and the chivalrous youth all take each other on to who would do the greatest damage.

They eat up young shoots of hydrangea and mince its white flowers under their feet/hands. They chew tender rose buds without once chidden by the thorns that always run my fingers through even as I pluck out the weed. Some tiny tots jump on the rat ki rani bush until branches bend permanently to an unnatural angle, or they get bored and go on to climb the little Christmas tree that has remained a ‘little’ Christmas tree as the ‘little’ monkeys never allow it to grow past its littleness.

When finally they get noticed and are cursed upon under terrifying shouts and tall staffs, they retreat to their neverland with groans and coughs leaving behind a garden of sacrilege and a lot of monkey poo.

Ravana was a great demon (no pun intended) but it is instances like these that win him supporters. I have reasons to believe that his garden was dearer to him than even the reverend mother Sita. First, he was a father figure to Ashok Vatika and had seen it grow, while Sita was a new comer and a captive at that — can you ever imagine loving your captive more than your daughter! Second, Ashok Vatika had far more attendants to take care of it than Sita mayya —why would you give an over the edge importance to your garden over the woman you want to woo! Third, thanks to Sagar’s Ramayan I know the Ashoka Vatika was guarded by a whole team of skilled security personnel, including women officers (hmm so you get reminded of Gaddaffi after all) and Sita’s security was handed over to a couple of employees of the same agency —you guard the garden in order to protect it from birds and monkeys, but Sita’s security was to keep her from running away.

Had Hanuman only been an intelligent diplomat of the Yes Minister brigade, he could have easily fetched Sita along with a life time supply of bananas as extortion barter in exchange of leaving Ashoka Vatika to itself. But he did not do so. Why? Why did he choose chaos over order? Even Robert Langdon would have no answer. But I know why! It is the age old itch of a monkey, the impish sadism that we often notice in their great grandsons and our contemporaries — Bajrang dal(is).

Now every time I run after a bunch of monkeys to scare them away from my garden, they khau khau me as a reminder that it’s their legacy, every garden in the world; look at what their ancestors did a couple of yugs ago. Why, O why did you set an example so fiendish, Hanuman ji!!!

Intoxicated By Nature: Crank’s Ridge

2009-08-26T13:34:00.002+05:30

A black meandering road, as steep at points as Shiva’s cascading hair, runs through the Kasardevi temple to the town of Almora, and on the way slows down over the Crank’s Ridge. Once popular as the Hippie Hill, the ridge is spread some picturesque 6 Kms from the town, and still holds the traces of the early 70s’ air when loaves of brown bread and bottles of peanut butter were a rarity to be found only among the visiting foreigners, in some nooks and yet some corners. The green ridge is located at an elevation of 6500 ft. on the sunny side, overlooking the beautiful Himalayas that glitter with every sunrise and blush a crimson red at sunsets.
In the 1920s and 30s the place was frequented by artists, writers and spiritual seekers, who came here to invoke their respective muses, and draw transcendental inspiration from the rustic surrounding. The first fountainhead of Indian tradition in the west, Swami Vivekananda came here way back in the 1890s and spent some time meditating in a cave near the Kasardevi temple. Notable western Tibetan Buddhists, W. Y. Evans-Wentz and Lama Angarika Govinda made Almora their home and practiced meditation at several places on the ridge. Hollywood actress Uma Thurman(then a little kid) with her Buddhist scholar father Robert Thurman spent six months with Lama Govinda as a part of his doctoral dissertation in the summer of 1971. Although there is no evidence, some locals press that the Beatles too visited the place during their stay at Rishikesh with Maharishi Mahesh Yogi; while Bob Dylan’s visit is a documented fact.
What is it that so compellingly lures tourists-in-search-of-peace to the Crank’s Ridge? Geologically there is an alleged gap in the Van Allen Belt above the ridge, which apparently makes it a less strained area with a relatively eased magnetic tension. Easy and abundant availability of hemp on the slopes makes it yet attractive to the weed loving post hippie crowd that likes to spend time in quiet, solitary confinements of nature. Almost a 1000 ft. above the Almora town, the weather at the ridge is a constant pleasure in summers, and a delightful heaven for those who love winters. Practically, it has achieved such credibility through the word of mouth of the already-been tourists, and more and more tend to follow.
The most common sight for one walking on the ridge near the Kasardevi temple is that of a lonely yogi sitting sometimes at the upper temple gate; sometimes wandering in the jungle with a radio set close to his ears listening to cricket commentaries. Often foreigners− mostly Israelites now, instead of Austrians as before− pass one by with a “Namaste” and a simple grin. Ask them and they will tell you what brings them to Almora and particularly to Crank’s Ridge in their gesticulating jerky English, in expressions that are more than flattering. Nathan, a ‘weed’ as he calls himself says, “The mountains speak to me here,” bringing his half-cupped fist close to his left ear. “I used to go to Dharamsala every year, but now I like to stay here all the time,” he says patting his adopted stray dog.
Many locals have converted their homes to petty hotels where foreigners stay their visas out. Indian tourists prefer to reside in luxury resorts that have bloomed into good business in quite a little time. Fortunately, the ambience has managed to remain as serene as ever. It is still the Pine and Cedar trees that make the most noise, and not vehicles and men. It is one of those places that bolster our wounded spirits and recharge our energies. One must go there for a dose of intoxicating nature.

Humble Porch of Buddhism in Almora

2009-08-24T13:54:00.003+05:30

One of the most attractive religions—inviting enthusiasts to pay a visit and leave without a hint of conversion—in the world is Buddhism. An enormous literature notwithstanding, it remains an enigmatic sect largely because of the patronized language—the remote Tibetan. The scripts on walls and boards of monasteries promise an artistic mysticism inside. And many people enter the gates with sheer curiosity rather than any religious fervour.
Among other Buddhist gomphas or monasteries in Kumaon, one at Almora is as candid and quiet in a corner as anywhere else. The serpentine bumpy road to Binsar, at a 6 odd KM distance from Almora town, turns at a beaten path that leads one to the same spot where Lama Anagarika Govinda decided to settle for good almost eight decades ago in 1933. The monastery then was a tranquil stone structure managed at quite a small level by Kungang Rigjan (pronounced as Rigzing). Rigjan was a Tibetan Buddhist monk who had a jewel of an offering for Lama Govinda—the Tibetan word. Instructed thoroughly in Pali in Sri Lanka, Lama Govinda found an almost independent school of Buddhism in Tibetan literature. And everything learnt prior to the Almora experience glided back to pose as an important backdrop. What was to follow was as magnanimous as the order of ‘Arya Maitreya Mandala’.
Today the monastery is made to look stronger and even somewhat modern on the outside with cement plasters and glass, but the insides have the same echo of thousands of years of Jatakas and ancient wisdom. As one leaves the asphalt concrete for the afore-mentioned beaten path, the upward trek comes to a halt pretty soon at the gate with symbols from Buddha’s first teaching in the Deer Park, Sarnath also called the Dharmachakra Parivartan (two deer sitting on either sides of a wheel, looking up to it in reverence). A closely cropped grass field, inside, leads one to the monastery, that is being looked after by monk Konchok Dhenphel these days.
Standing enviably tall at the young age of 33, Dhenphel is already a punctilious monk. He is the eldest son of the family and was sent to study Buddhist theology in Bangalore about 22 years back. Having completed his basic education there, he left for Dehradun after 7 years, where he studied under the ‘Drkung’ tradition and began to practice as a junior monk. The monastery at Almora follows the same ‘Drkung’ tradition with their holy Guru Drkung Kugun Rypund residing at Dehradun. It has been a year since his return; he is young and has an interesting, fresh outlook of Buddhism.
According to Denphel, Kungung Rigjan’s wife Sonam Chodon was adopted by Lama Govinda after the former’s death. She was looked up to by the entire Tibetan clan in Almora, and was venerated as Holy Mother after his demise in 1985. At the backyard of the monastery stands a stupa with the last earthly remains of Kungang Rigjan buried under. Close by is also a bigger stupa dedicated to Lama Govinda (beside that of Sonam Chodom), who’s ashes albeit are contained in the Nirvana Stupa in the district of Darjeeling.
Also in the neighbourhood is a meditation centre with a unique curriculum. The course is not just another one for rejuvenating wandering souls, it spans to a somber 3 years, 3 months and 3 weeks time, adding to a total of about 1206 days. Three groups have already passed out and a fourth one is in the middle of its term. The students are not allowed to walk out of the meditation centre. Only in exceptional cases like yajnas and other poojas which they are allowed to attend, can they come out to the monastery, otherwise even that is prohibited. The present batch has a motley crowd of 16 students, none of whom are from India. Dhenphel says, “Most people interested in attending the meditation course are from outside India. Most of them come from South Asian countries like Taiwan, Singapore and Bangkok. Many from the west are queued to enroll in the next session.”
The trainer in the meditation centre is not same as the priest in the monastery, although he is the only one who’s allowed inside. There are special trainers with immense experience and excellence in delivering the technical and spiritual nuances of vipasana meditation.
Being very time consuming the locals can not attend the meditation sessions, but some often go to the monastery and spend hours in the quiet atmosphere. It is the most low-profile places in Almora, but if tumbled to, is probably one of the most attractive. No wonder foreign visitors go there and recommend the same to their friends back at home. It is time that Kumaonis themselves start exploring it.

The Swan Song

2009-08-24T12:22:00.004+05:30

Few plunged at the opportunity of exploiting the golden void that suddenly developed with drapes falling down off Jaswant Singh’s book. The BJP, already in the mourning, was so taken aback that the otherwise politically hungry wolves’ attacks were seized by a double edged instrument of violence that was held by a razor-sharp butt by the party itself. The instrument did strike Singh but also imparted a deep wound on the BJP that will remain open and bloody for a long time to come.
If there is someone enjoying this the most it is the media, for they are making the least noise about it, and against their notorious tradition, are keeping away from passing an objective judgment. A sly decision—with the music of impatience growing all around(even in Pakistan)—to use the still hot embers of the situation in the barbeque to present a grilled and crispy debate over the credibility of Jinnah’s secular image. Something that would have otherwise fizzed out with a book review and probably an editorial had it been scribbled out of the quill of an historian, has provided food for some more hunger in the present case.
Back in the BJP the picture is nastier than it appears to the rest of us. Kulkarni’s resignation in the midst of denials at holding any reference to Singh’s expulsion is only the beginning; what follows is only too predictable. One who’s been keenly observing the party for some time now will hardly find it difficult to look at the pattern of the dominoes in motion. If Bajpayee ji’s departure from active politics was the beginning of the end, this is the soprano of the knell. The unsinkable has begun to repeat history, and there are not many life boats on board.