Wednesday, December 26, 2007

Their spirit knows no bounds

We had prepared quite a bit for the 'Nav Chetan Shibir' which ended yesterday- if you recall, I had written about it a couple of blog entries ago. NCS is a program offered by the Art of Living organization, designed by Guruji Sri Sri Ravishankar. The course is specifically targeted for people in the lower economic strata.

On Saturday last, Saurabh hired a drummer to walk along with us through the streets while we formally announced the Shibir.
To the sound of the drumbeats

The residents came out of their tiny tenements to see what all the fuss was about. We coaxed them to join us in the Shibir, at the venue (a temple hall). We told them that it would benefit adults and kids alike.

I guess they chose to only hear the word 'kids', judging by the fact that most of the attendees turned out to be in the three foot nothing range!

On the first day, the attendance turned out to be as lean as Shah Rukh's six pack abs. Nevertheless, those that turned up listened intently as we spoke to them about their health, the importance of drinking boiled water and ways to keep their surroundings clean.

They even followed our instructions during the Pranayaam sessions to a tee. Never in our other sessions did we see any adults perform with such precision and alertness.

Raise your hands and breathe in!

On Day two, they came in droves. A wonderful sight for any teacher to behold.

A teacher's Christmas gift!

We taught them meditation, or something which was akin to sitting quietly for a few moments. But what followed on Day three was an amazing transformation. The erstwhile noisy and restless bunch of kids sat still when we told them to meditate.

In a meditative mood
But of course, as we brought out the sweet packets, there was a mad rush to collect their goodies!

It was a truly wonderful experience for us. Saurabh's arrangements were superb, and Chaya really sparkled as she spoke in chaste Kannada.

If service should come with a smile- it comes real easy when you're amidst the three foot nothings...

Front L>R: Saurabh and Chaya, my fellow AOL volunteers

PS: I may not be writing in for a couple of weeks- am off for my Teacher's training course at the Art of Living Ashram. But I'll have lots to write when I return. :-)

Friday, December 21, 2007

Happy holidays!


The office looks festive with this dazzling Christmas tree. Folks are packing up to go home and soak in some Yuletide spirit.

Thought it's a good time to wish y'all Happy Holidays!

Wednesday, December 19, 2007

Here comes the Sun!

Here's a pic of the orchard in front of my office (VMWare) which is situated in a particularly green part of Bangalore. The orchard hosts Sapota and coconut trees. Sapota is a brown colored fruit of a medium size. The outer skin has a rough texture and each fruit comes with a shiny black, oval seed. The pulp, when ripe is really tasty. It has a unique flavor with a granular texture that tickles the tongue at the first bite.

When I 'framed' the orchard during my afternoon walk, the Sun seemed to have worked some magic of its own kind. Just look at the rainbow carressing the trees...

Tuesday, December 18, 2007

To do, or die

The debate of life after death is a very lively one, often kicking up a lot of heat and dust. Some say we just simply return to dust, while others insist that we simply move on, taking the comfort of another body. Like dropping the clothes you are wearing and wearing new ones.

So they say.

Not an easy notion to decipher, analyze and resolve. The debate will likely last a lifetime. Till death do it part, from us.

But I ask, while there's the present moment to live with, why really bother about what may happen later? Like, uh, isn't there enough to do in our current life?

Last Saturday, some of us AOL buddies went off to a nearby slum to invite folks to attend a program called 'Nav Chetan Shibir'. We've been conducting this program for slum-dwellers around our neighborhood.

Slums have literally mushroomed all over Bangalore ever since construction has kicked off in a big way. These people put together any odd pieces of plastic to create a makeshift tent. They cook, clean and sleep in these tiny tents.

The Nav Chetan Shibir program was designed by Guruji Sri Sri Ravishankar. It teaches people about hygiene, sanitation, good food habits and some breathing exercises. It also mixes in some fun, as we make participants sing and dance. Three consecutive days, each session lasting around 1 and a half hours. None of these folks can spare any more time- they work so hard throughout the day.

The particular slum that we visited had tiny houses fitted with asbestos rooftops. Each house had a tiny room and an adjoining toilet. The front door couldn't possibly be higher than 5 feet.

Not all the scenes were as pleasant as the smiles of these two girls.

There was Thomas the drunkard who chattered incessantly, often mumbling to himself. Even as we tried to move away from his reeking breath, he would lean forward and generously invite us to his home.

We thought there was some animal enthusiast amongst these folks who had tied a red ribbon around the neck of the neighborhood dog. On closer look, however, we were shocked to find that the 'ribbon' was actually a nasty red weal caused by some infection. We winced at the sight and wondered how the children roamed about freely with sick stray dogs frolicking about.

The 3-day program starts this Friday. Hopefully, by the end of the program, many among the slum-dwellers will start boiling their drinking water, washing their vegetables, cleaning their surroundings.

Well, this is life. Never mind what comes beyond it.

Thursday, December 6, 2007

Gooseberries are great but is there a God?

November seems to be the time for gooseberries. Mounds and mounds of them, in markets. Sorted out in different sizes.

The lemons are seen in plenty too. I noticed this when I visited the market a couple of weeks ago. A group of ladies clad in traditional saris were bargaining for what seemed to be a mountain of lemons. When the veggie vendor finally gave in to a mutually agreeable selling price, the ladies picked the best out of the ' lemon mountain' and made their way to a nearby temple.

I followed them into the temple.

One of them had brought a couple of knives and soon they sat down and set to cutting out the lemons into halves and scooping out the pulp. All the while they were smiling and chatting with one another. They seemed to have planned the project very well, for another lady brought out a bottle of oil, a matchbox and a big box of cotton wicks.


Soon they filled the lemon 'containers' with some oil and positioned the wicks so that one end of the wick faced the rim while the other was dipped in oil. They lit each wick and then placed each 'lamp' on the ledge that separated the inner Sanctum Sanctorum from the room where devotees were allowed to stand.

It was a beautiful site. The lamps reflected soft light on the deity, and I could almost swear that the Goddess wore an extra special halo, thanks to the loving work of these women. I heard later that the same process is followed with gooseberries as well.

Nature seems to take extra special care of us human beings. In winter, a windfall of fruits that are harvested are full of Vitamin C. Tomatos, lemons, gooseberries make their way to every nook and corner of the markets.

Nature has a very close connection with religion. During festivals, which seem to be clustered from August to December, the doorsteps are lined with mango leaves. Any Puja in the South India usually includes coconuts which are considered to be auspicious. A traditional meal is eaten off a freshly plucked banana leaf.

The Basil (Tulasi) plant is considered to be sacred and the leaves also have many medicinal properties.

A traditional Indian woman offers betel leaves with some fruit, when a lady guest visits her home. Hindus turn Eastwards in the early morning hours to pay their respect to the Sun.

I have often listened to and read about many academic arguments which center around questioning the presence of a God.

Do you know Him? Have you seen Him? Isn't the concept of God man-made, meant for insecure people?

The fact is that most people haven't seen God and those that muster enough courage to claim that they have felt an 'aura' only receive sardonic smiles from sceptics.

Must be your mental frame of mind. You know, psychologists believe that light can play tricks and make you see things.

So most believers and God realizers have learnt to shut up, fearing that they will be deemed weak or insane if they opened up to the general public. Now no one ever questions the presence of the wind (although no one has ever really 'seen' the wind).

For some reason, God is probably the most debatable subject in the world.

Perhaps that is so because He chooses to let us mortals argue and have some fun. Perhaps He even knows that He will have the last laugh. Perhaps He is actually humoring us from up above the mountains. From within our souls. And from the lemons that gently drop to the ground.

For my part, I simpy enjoy observing all the stuff that goes on centered around God and God presence.

I love listening to carol singers who drop by my house during Christmas time. I love watching children all dressed up in new clothes during Ramzan.

I have never tired of watching my neighbor create beautiful traditional motifs with rice flour in front of her doorstep each and every day. I had watched her daughter, (who is all grown up now), mess around with rice flour in her younger days only to receive a gentle slap on her hand by a vigilant mother.

So I wonder, why do sceptics spend all this time on proving the absence or simply disproving the presence of God, when they can enjoy so much along the way of knowing?

Why can't they shop for those lemons and enjoy lighting those wicks? If anything, they'd enliven any cold foggy morning...

Wednesday, November 28, 2007

I am not the do-er

For a tiny place called 'home'

For some time now, I have been helping a neighbor search for another apartment as the one he currently lives in had become dark and dismal after a builder decided to erect a multi-storeyed building adjoining his house, blocking air and sunlight which otherwise streamed through the windows.

Real estate prices are skyrocketing in Bangalore. It is, after all, India's IT city, reputed to have a salubrious climate despite global warming. Not really quake prone, although one personally quakes every now and then with alarming traffic snarls.
So there we were, shopping for an affordable aparment which is not necessarily a long haul from the office, the mall, the movie theater or the fruit market. Large enough to hold a small family, small enough to maintain. Good approach roads. The works. This went on for days.
Then yesterday, he suddenly stopped in his tracks on the pavement, looked at me and said "I need to rethink this idea of buying another flat. What if I die before I pay up the loan?"
I must admit, death is something that we all think of, every now and then. But we never even doubt that we would be picking up the morning milk packet lying at the doorstep the next day. We take it for granted that when it happens, it won't be so soon.
I did not say much yesterday during our conversation. But I did go home and take out a large blue diary. I began reading my notes on the Ashtavakra Gita.

Gurudev Sri Sri Ravishankar has called the Ashtavakra Gita "the most unique conversation that has taken place on this planet". The Ashtavakra Gita documents the unveiling of the highest knowledge from a saint to a wise king many thousands of years ago.

Through a series of taped lectures Sri Sri Guruji shows how, step-by-step, King Janaka is taken to deeper levels of understanding and how we can apply this knowledge to our own lives.

The lectures were originally held in 1991, in Bangalore Ashram. Guruji had a group of devoted followers who attended his talks.

I had taken notes from these tape which were recently aired at a nearby school. Every day for 30 days, I would walk in the frosty morning hours, armed with a pen and an exercise book, eagerly waiting to see Guruji's glowing face as he so beautifully articulated the message.

I read a page from the book. We feel we have it all. We feel that everything is in our control. Which is why we fear. Because we are afraid of losing control. But clearly spiritual scriptures indicate that we are not the 'do-ers'. And yet it takes great effort to 'let go'.

Even surrender has a way and a method. Every page of my notes on the Ashtavakra Gita had a lesson and surprisingly enough, I experience each lesson day by day. I am truly amazed.

I had a lesson to learn from my friend's alarming words yesterday. I closed my book and smiled at him and told him not to worry. About life, about death, and least of all, about an elusive apartment in a place called Bangalore...

Friday, November 23, 2007

The stamp album

We've been planning for this for every day since the past couple of weeks. We just had to go and pick up a stamp album together. It was to be a gift for her dad, and my daughter wanted to fill the album with all my husband's stamps before presenting it to him. Two weeks after his birthday.


But hey, our family lives in the Timeless zone. Which is why the owner of the nearby Dry cleaner's gets a shock when we turn up a week late to pick up the clothes. By then, he could easily have changed the name of his shop. Or remarried. But we always got our clothes back.

It's the same with intended places of travel. We intend, for a long time. We shuffle our feet as we watch our favorite TV program. Then my husband tentatively opens his mumble behind long beard: "Um, we should go to XYZ place. Well, his mathematically inclined mind tends to spurt short alphabets (and even signs) every now and then, by way of communication.

Like 'Hey, U'.

Hmm...

Oh, yes, that stamp album. We had globe-trotted in Bangalore (possible, coz' the world is flat any way- according to Friedmanian logic). Nope, no sign of stamp albums. It clearly showed that folks weren't into writing letters and licking stamps any more. Nor did they seem to find time to buy albums. Who leafs through albums anyway, now that we have Picasas and Youtubes?

But we were looking forward to picking out from the zillions of stamps stashed away in envelops and lovingly pasting them in a nice album. And presenting it to daddy dearest.

So like every other day for the past couple of weeks, we carefully planned our shopping. Today, my daughter even invited Vaibhavi (aka Vaibs), her best friend, to help choose the album.

"Do we have lunch first and then shop around?" This came from my daughter.

"I think donuts would be great for a pre-shopping brunch." This came from Vaibs.

"What do I wear? It's 12. noon so maybe a tee shirt would do well." Came from daughter.

"I'd add a sweater for good measure", I added, going all motherly and all.

"Hey did you know 'Hannibal' is running in packed houses?" asked Vaibs, almost in rhetoric. I began to wonder how good young Dr Vaibs was getting at doing post-mortems.

On our way out, Vaibs picked up her guitar as well. Who knows, she said. It might come in handy at the donut shop to add to the funky decor. Or to pick up a few pennies from a nearby hat. Or to bop the head of any geek who couldn't understand our love for earthly stamp albums.

Maybe we'll find one, maybe we won't. There is still tomorrow. And the day after. And the day...

Wednesday, November 21, 2007

Jelly donuts to just let go!

Yep, that's what I realized today, as I bit into a jelly donut. Blueberry? Strawberry? Not quite sure, but boy, did it taste good!

These days I'm sitting at home, and it was enforced, not by choice. I had to let go of my last job, and now I am waiting for another offer which seems be in the offing.

But my break is actually turning out to be just right.

It's hard to let go of both fond memories as well as rough ones- in sum, it's hard to let go of an office which you kind of made your home.

I started my job in this company all of one and a half years ago. I liked the desk they gave me, I liked the cupboard space and I liked the rack that stood loftily above the computer.

At first I brought in official books and stored them neatly in my cupboard. Then after a while, when I felt more at home, I brought in some papers and 'stuff' to read. I reckoned that I could bring my cup of tea to my seat and take a break while reading these papers. Then I felt more at home, even as my neighbors asked me about my family. So I brought in some photographs, a few pictures of my favorite God and Guru.

It's when you start lining your pictures on the shelf that you somehow sense that you are really taking the place for granted. A nice feeling actually- a kind of second home.

Then one day my manager called me into a cabin and broke the news. That soon I could be without a job. I took the news with some disappointment, some sadness. A flurry of memories began to rush through my mind and some even got stuck like a needle of a gramophone in a groove of an old record.

I knew that I really had to let go. Now that is hard because you often wonder: why me? What did I do? Am I really fit for such kind of jobs? Any job? Self-doubt, low morale were creeping in on me.

Okay, so I decided that instead of moping around, I would call it quits in this office even before the D-Day. Coz 'then I could start doing all the stuff I always wanted to do. I mean, if I'm going to worry and fret over when my last paycheck was going to come by, I would see no real meaning to life. Instead, I would only be losing out on precious time.

So I sent off my resignation letter and brought out a white sheet of paper. I wrote down all the things that I really wanted to do.

The very first on my list was to do another advanced meditation course- I had to do this to work my way to become a teacher for the Art of Living Foundation. I enrolled for the earliest date and had a wonderful time at the ashram. My chattering mind seemed to grow more quiet.


Gurudev Sri Sri Ravishankar at the ashram

Once I finished that, I started learning some Indian classical music. Just a few of my favorite songs.

And then I started reading all the books whose titles intrigued me. One among them was 'The other side of Belief' written by Mukunda Rao. It was a detailed description of UG Krishnamurti's philosophy.

I read with interest, sometimes nodding in assent, sometimes aghast by UG's opinions, and sometimes simply stunned by his experiences. He scoffed God and Gurus alike. Here I was trying to climb the ladder of spirituality to look at the world beyond. He said it was a futile effort. He said meditation was evil. But to me, meditation was an ethereal experience touching the core of my very existence. Well, UG was entitled to his own opinions, I opined, before moving on to Deepak Chopra's own rendition of how to know God.

Now I have beside me a couple of Agatha Christies, and a book on Yogavasishta. What next? Spirituality or suspense? I will have to make a choice, and I look forward to that!

I guess letting go isn't that hard after all. It's all in the mind. And I don't mind having a few good books and a couple of jelly donuts as well...