A panegyric to solitude

It is dusk. Light falls softly and disappears even as I look out of the window. I am sitting at my desk in a house so silent that I can hear a bird alight on the tree outside. No one comes in clamouring for attention. No one calls me outside to see icicles on the oak tree. No one interrupts me with an anxious "Haven't you worked enough for one day?"

The silence began two years ago, on a day full of the sound of running water...
My experience feels unique to me, but of course, it isn't.

We who live solitary are visited from time to time by great gusts of loneliness. We are scarred by those dismal hours in which what we have to do - without anyone helping us - seems too much. We are overwhelmed by a longing for the paired life we see others enjoy, simply for the joy of sharing intimacy.

But solitude brings a life full of satisfaction, warmth and even joy. Since the times of solitude can come to many of us unchosen, it behoves us to learn how to find these joys, so that we may live with dignity and grace.
Looking back on some times I have spent solitary, I see some moments crystallising in my memory. Like that first gentle, thin ray of sunlight after rain, there is a meagre, yet growing warmth that is indigenous to my solitude.
Where does this warmth come from? First of all, from memory, which holds together the skeins of my life. Solitude enhances memory. And so, curiously, memories strengthen the sense of continuity I feel with others' lives.
If my solitude has been lit by memories, then it has also been warmed by a growing sense of my own identity. After I had lived alone for a while, I found myself caught up in innumerable inner dialogues, between the self dying of the grief of aloneness and the self who wanted to live; the self who believed and the self who denied; the self who loved and the self who repudiated love because it hurt too much.
Haven't we known, Like Whitman, that we contain multitudes? Compassionate and cruel, mature and callow, wise and jejune? Haven't we always known that the colloquy between these warring selves has been waiting for us to catch up with it?
Caught up in these struggles, I have had the chance to come to grip with unexplained beliefs and answer important questions. Why do I do this and not that? What is being asked of me? What am I to do with my life? When I lived surrounded by people, some of the passion and insight natural to my inner self leaked away through the sieve of the daily humdrum. Alone, I was forced to pay attention to the question marks in my heart.
Solitude, I found, is that identity-making place where I learnt to fight my demons. And how many I had of those when my solitude began: the fear of the dark, the fear I would never be loved again... The risk for all of us who live alone is that our feelings may become the most important thing in our lives! We may brood resentfully about people instead of responding to them.
Every day, the solitary person - still fighting the all too human battle against growing up - must cope with something new. Quickly and painfully, you discover what kind of a person you are, what kind of inner resources you can muster. In solitude, as Rilke says, "there is no place that does not see you" - so only honesty is good enough.
At my most daring moments, I like to believe that what is going on is that ultimately divine work - the shaping of my soul. True, there are many agnostics hiding in the foxholes of solitude; some of them became that way because they were alone for much too long. Nevertheless, there is something in the nature of the solitary experience that contributes to the growth of the spirit. Many a solitude has been lighted by the discovery of what the Quakers call "that of God in every man".
Above all, my solitude is warmed by people and my new understanding of them. That sounds like a paradox, doesn't it? You may ask: isn't the solitary, by the very nature of her solitude, handicapped in her relationships with others? On the contrary, the solitary is particularly fitted for relationships. As Carl Jung says "No one is more sensitive to companionship than the lonely man".
We have empty, therefore, open hearts as we did not when preoccupied with just one love. We are freer to meet the stranger, freer to talk to him in depth,
The sorrows of others seem to enter my solitude framed by the understanding of my own struggles. Solitude is part of the inescapable enterprise of maturing. A time for solitude, well used, is a spillway for what has choked one's life; it is an illumination of the rest of one's experiences.
But it is not always tranquil. My inward life is sometimes the threshing floor of emotions. I suspect that solitude never leaves you the way it found you. You emerge from it angrier, or gentler, sterner or more compassionate; more bitter, or more loving; more shut within, or more communicative; but never the same.

Search out the joys of solitude. I have heard people say "Nothing good ever happens to me". I don't agree. My gratitude journal list my daily joys: "Today N called"; "S sent me some music"; "DB sent me wonderful candy"; "Had lunch with N, S and P and giggled madly over the way H behaves"... Reading those pages, I watch myself growing and can only marvel at how unpredictable and wonderful life can be!
Solitary, or coupled, the most important thing we can do for ourselves is to learn with ourselves with courage, humility and beauty.

O, the thorns we stand upon!

Too often am I accused of only focussing on all that's pretty about Shimla. But that's not just my attitude to Shimla, I assure you. This is pretty much the sum of my world-view. The construct of my memories is the result of my personal aesthetic which rejects that which is ugly and painful, vexatious and noisome!

And yet, where would we be if it weren't for the sordid and the troublesome? A garden would be really boring if it had only roses and no thorns, a life so dull and lacking in challenge if it weren't for the vicissitudes that life throws at us! If the dress weren't occasionally caught in the thorns, would we stop to look at and smell the lovely flower that grows unseen? I am forced to agree with William Penn when he says "No pain, no palm; no thorns, no throne; no gall, no glory; no cross, no crown"....



Thorns, to me, have become reminders of that which I try to escape. Sometimes, it is the commonplace that I try to escape, other times, the bizarre. I retreat ahead of that which vexes me by manipulating my vision and thrusting an alternate dream within a dream. Often, I offer a prayer upwards , not for my own escape, but for someone I hold dear, almost as a ransom.

On a more prosaic note, thorns are a woody outgrowth with a sharp point, usually of a stem or a branch. Plants grow these as a protection against herbivores. On a walk near Ghumma last weekend with R, I discovered this peculiar spinulose plant with little prickles growing, of all places, on the surface of its leaves. A helpful person informed us that this plant is locally known as "foota kanda", which roughly translates as "broken thorn". I haven't been able to locate its proper botanic name yet, but promise to update this post as soon as I do.

A towered citadel, a pendant rock, a forked mountain...

Travel into the heart of Kinnaur and it is inevitable that you find yourself at Sangla, an edgy little town ranged along the Baspa. The settlement has little to recommend for itself, except a sort of ubiquitous Kinnauri prettiness and a huge mountain which, my local companion explains is "the back-side of the Kinner Kailash", that last being one of the tallest peaks in these parts.

The greatest find in Sangla is the lovely old fort of Kamru. Locals are incertain of its provenance, claiming it to be anything between four to seven hundred years old. It is a structure found commonly in Himachal. A tall wooden building, several stories high, so located as to serve as both a fortification and a look-out point for the village.
The climb up from the village is a steep one,. If you find it difficult to breathe, blame it not just on the steep incline, or the low levels of oxygen in the mountain air, but on the views all around which take your breath away! Just look at this magnificent fortification. It is designed to inspire awe in the manner in which it forces the viewer to crane her neck and make her eye travel upwards!

At the entrance is an imposing gate. This is made of old wood, embellished with a gorgeous motifs made in beaten metal of some sort, probably copper. The vagaries of the sun, the snow and the wind have burnished the copper into most attractive shades of titian, russet and henna. The visitor must take his shoes off at the entrance and put on a Kinnauri cap and a sort of string-like belt as a mark of respect to the royalty and the presiding deity.
Tall visitors are warned: the door in the picture above is designed to make you lower your head as you enter! Also, the fort doors are open only for a fxed while in the morning. So, should you be interested in exploring the fort, make sure you present yourself at its portals no later than ten o'clock in the morning.

What you see above is the little structure through which the visitor emerges having passed through the imposing doorway of the Kamru citadel. Some interesting musical instruments hang from sundry nails on its walls, unintentionally creating a fabulous Manetesque, still-life like effect.

Directly to the left as you enter lies this tiny hut. Evidently, it is a storage space for the palanquin of the presiding deity. It is on this palanquin that the deity goes for an "airing". I do not mean this in levity. Through a medium, locally known as a "ghoor", the deity has been known to express a desire to go visitng her siblings and friends in neighbouring villages; thus occasioning much celebration and gaiety.

The deity of Kamru, Kali, is much feared locally. Several bloodthirsty fables are attributed to her. Most important of all is the local concept of "darohi" or treachery. Legend has it that the Raja who ruled from Kamru demanded vassalage from all the thakurs (headmen) of surrounding villages. One day, finding himself encircled by Tibetan, he sent out frantic messages requesting support from his vassals. However, he was betrayed by a thakur and a local tailor from the village of Chini who told the Tibetans a way by which the ramparts of the Kamru fort could be brought down.
The Tibetans, and indeed the traitors, had not reckoned with the powers of the deity which were ranged alongside Kamru's ruler. Those supernatural powers and the mundane reality of approaching winters, made the Tibetans abandon their plans and at length, the Raja was able to chase them out of the valley.
This episode, however, left a bad taste in the royal mouth. And so was born the concept of "darohi", or treachery. The recalcitrant thakur was reduced to vassalage and the tailor, poor man, lost his head!
The Raja then ordered that a representative of Chini village be present every year at the eight-day festival held in honour of his deity. The poor man is then plied freely with liquour until he's fairly senseless. He is then dressed up in a mock armour and made to perform a sort of burlesque before the assembly of Kamru's residents. The idea is to make the village of Chini a laughing stock and to parody the treacherous actions of the thakur and the tailor. Water is then sprinkled over the head of this representative in a symbolic representation of his "beheading".
To be sure, people from Chini told me that no one wants to participate in this mock ritual which keeps the memory of their traitorous ancestor alive. On their part, the Rajas who ruled Kamru (of the Rampur-Bushahr line) have eased things by allowing waterto be poured over the representative's hands, instead of his head!
The concept of "darohi", however, is alive and kicking. Acting like an oath of loyalty, today it ensures obedience of the rule of law.

Procrastination:

[proh-kras-tuh-neyt]

Delaying, loafing, dilly-dallying, frittering , loitering, So many words describe the essence of me! However, I strongly maintain that my imagination needs moodling,—long, inefficient, happy idling, dawdling and puttering. I don't think I'd be able to do my work, or write my blog, or wander around taking photographs if, as Rupert Brooke says, I could not dawdle away the wat'ry noon...
(Must take a moment to thank the subjects of the picture below. These men, government employees to a man, were found entertaining themselves on a working day. Do not ask, gentle reader, what the person behind the camera was doing!)


As a true master of the fine art of procrastination, I was rather taken in by something a very favourite blogger, Christine Kane wrote recently.
She said:
"If you're a procrastinator, it doesn't mean you're lazy!"

Produced below are her thoughts from her weekly e-zine. Thank you, Christine-guru. I'm going to finish reading that boring file, send in the promised article, collate photos for my book... Soon. As soon as I'm done updating my status message on Facebook, reading sundry (junk) emails and staring out of the window....

9 Simple Solutions for Procrastinators

Irony: As I started to write this article, I thought, "I'll just go play one Sudoku game first." I caught myself in the act and marched to my laptop.
People who say that procrastination is about laziness are probably the same people who think that anorexia is about not eating enough.

Procrastination isn't about laziness. It's about fear. It's about perfectionism. It's about overwhelm. We all experience it, and there are some tricks to help you get moving again.

Here are 9 ways to break the procrastination habit:


1 - When you get an idea, do some little thing to begin.
When I read Stephen King's book On Writing, I noticed something. I noticed that when Stephen King gets an idea, he writes it. Immediately and imperfectly.
Most people get an idea. Then they sit there. They wonder if it's a good idea. Then, they wonder if it's a good idea some more.
Got an idea? Begin it now!

2 - All hail small chunks of time!
Lots of us complain about having no time. My guess is that we all have lots of time. It just doesn't happen to be all at once.
Are you waiting for many hours of spare time to begin your idea, your project, or your taxes? Stop waiting! Learn to use the spare half hour that comes up here and there. (I gave myself 45 minutes to write this article just to take my own advice.)

3 - Agree to do it badly.
Set a goal to do it badly. Set a goal to show up. Let go of doing it ALL, or doing it WELL.
Some of my coaching clients' biggest victories have a lot more to do with getting over perfectionism and fear, than they do about getting it all done perfectly.

4 - Commit aloud.
Call a friend and say something like this: "I'm going to spend the next half hour working on my Law School Essay." Then go do it.
Call the friend after the half hour and make her congratulate you. Repeat daily.

5 - Define quantities.
Nebulous goals make for nebulous results. "I'm gonna get my office organized" is a lot like saying, "We oughtta do something about Global Warming."
Most procrastinators have a hard time defining quantities. We think everything needs to be done NOW.
When are you going to do it? For how long? Which part of your office? The file cabinet? Or your desk?
Define the goal and acknowledge its completion.

6 - Install this System Upgrade into your Mental Hard Drive: Less is More.
Have fewer goals. Have no more than three priorities for a week.
Why?
Because you're not lazy. You're just trying to do too much.
Find out what it feels like to accomplish one thing instead of not quite getting to everything. Wow – what a difference this makes!

7 - Do it first.
My first coach made me write songs first thing in the morning. He told me to schedule the 2-hour chunk as my first activity upon waking.
Why?
"Because you're telling the universe that this is your priority. And then the universe lines up everything to align with your priority."
Action grounds your priorities. It makes them real. It also makes your day easier because you're not wasting energy thinking about this thing you're supposed to be doing.

8 - Avoid nose-bleed activities.
Email, voicemail, web stats - any activity that bleeds itself into your whole day becomes a non-activity. It becomes a nose-bleed. When you do it all the time, you never complete it. You just let it slowly drain the very life force from you. Define times for these activities. Then, turn off your email, your cell phone, your web stats, until that time comes.

9 - Don't ask how you "feel" about doing the activity.
Have you ever committed to getting fit? And then when the alarm goes off, you lie in bed thinking, "Do I really feel like going to the gym?" (Like you even have to ask!)
Change this pattern. Make your decision the night before. Commit to getting up and going right to the gym, the computer, the blank canvas. Don't have coffee and sigh and think, "I'll probably feel more like it at lunch time." You won't!
If it's a priority, don't waste time asking yourself how you feel about doing it. Feelings are an easy out.

—————————

There. I did it. I wrote this article. And now, I don't even want to play Sudoku! How about that?

~~~~~~

(Performer, songwriter, and creativity consultant Christine Kane publishes her 'LiveCreative' weekly ezine with more than 4,000 subscribers. If you want to be the artist of your life and create authentic and lasting success, you can sign up for a FRE*E subscription to LiveCreative at www.christinekane.com.)

Hawaghar Re-Redux

I've mentioned the hawaghars in Shimla in earlier posts. I found two more! They are both located en route from Annadale towards Vidhan Sabha.

This one's close to Comar House:




And this one is located at the crossing Vidhan Sabha, Kennedy Cottage and Knockdrin:





Rest, rest, perturbed spirit! (Hamlet, Act 1, Sc. 5, apropos of nothing!)

Clematis and cabbage.

Nature has place for both, says the venerable Thoreau. So right he is, because not every every truth recommends itself to common sense! Some truths are romantic, others sensible. We must decide: do we choose to look at the cabbage or at the clematis? If you're an idealist, you may be tempted to conclude that merely because the clematis smells better than the cabbage, it makes better soup. But then you're entitled to such a perspective!

Walking in the Sheogh woods is ever a pleasure. Every month reveals fickle bugs and capricious flora. A little velvety starlet which caught your eye in March vanishes in September. That little black spiny fellow who went scampering under a bush in May goes off for his winter vacation and will only put in an appearance next year. Still, in the spirit of gathering ye flowers while ye May, one ventures back into the forest over and over again; unfailingly treated to some new species each time.

This time, I discover Clematis connata.

The Dictionary of Botanical Epithets describes this plant as "clematis "= climbing; "connata " = connate, fused together.
This is pretty lemon-coloured, bell-shaped flower about an inch long. It is mildly fragrant. It had four long petals that curve outwards and are finely woolly-haired when seen up close. The anthers are creamy green and the leaves, a glossy green pinnate. The flowers are hermaphrodite (have both male and female organs) and are pollinated by bees and flies. I found the flowers growing in warm, sunny, yet sheltered spots. The soil looked moist, but well-drained. The leafstalks had wrapped themselves around twigs and branches for support.

I'm tickled to find this smarmy and retro Alexander Bathgate poem in the Gardener's Book of Poems:

Fair crown of stars of purest ray,
Hung aloft on Mapau tree,
What floral beauties ye display,
Stars of snowy purity;
Around the dark-leaved mapau's head
Unsullied garlands ye have spread.

Concealed were all thy beauties rare
'Neath the dark umbrageous shade,
But still to gain the loftiest spray,
Thy weak stem its efforts made;
Now, every obstacle o'ercome,
Thou smilest from thy leafy home.

That home secure, 'mid sombre leaves
Yielded by thy stalwart spouse,
Helps thee to show thy fairy crown,
Decorates his dusky boughs:
His strength, thy beauty, both unite
And form a picture to delight.

Fair flower, methinks thou dost afford
Emblem of a perfect wife,
Whose work is hidden from the world,
Till, perchance, her husband's life
Is by her influence beautified,
And this by others is descried.

---

The humble cabbage is native to the Mediterranean and was known to the Greeks and Romans, even finds place in Cato's writings. Then man, it seems, praised it for its medicinal value and called it a vegetable that "surpasses all vegetables"! This is a herbaceous, biennial plant which is a great source of Vitamin C and riboflavin and contains significant quantities of glutamine, an amino-acid which has anti-inflammatory properties.

This leads me to conclude that some truths, no matter how unattractive, may actually be good for you!

The Secret Life of a Restaurant Critic

Finding a good restaurant to dine in in Shimla has become part fantasy, part obsession with me. Thus, when SdS proposed that she treat me to an early birthday meal in "a nice place", we both simultaneously guffawed and then sobered up at the thought of finding us that mythical nice place. A little while ago, P (who owns a very fine home in Baldiyan) and S M (who hates fish with a passion) had both recommended Spars Lodge.

So off we go, SdS and I. It is a nasty climb up. Spars Lodge is located on the slope which leads up to the Himachal State Museum in Chaura Maidan. Those of you who aren't strong walkers are advised to take a car up. This restaurant/guest house is placed not far from the gate, but might be too much for older or infirm persons to manage the slope. Be warned that a big Army person lives opposite Spars Lodge. I say this lest you find yourself startled by a bunch of gun-toting, baby-faced soldiers.

As you can see from the pictures above, Spars Lodge is a relaxed, casual place with furniture that's all wood and wrought iron. The decor is pleasingly minimal. The flowers in one of the vases look droopy, but on the whole, in consonance with the place. The restaurant is divided into two rooms. The section you see below is pleasantly cool and well-lit without dazzling your eye.

The one shown in the picture below has a pretty wonderful view of Chotta Shimla, Kasumpti and New Shimla. The only problem with this section is that one part of its roof is covered with some sort of acrylic ceiling which creates a sort of hot-house effect. I'm sure this would be most pleasing in winter, but the day SdS and I visit, it feels a little warm.


A great delight: not to have the latest Hindi film musical releases inflicted on one! You spot a little two-in-one stereo in a corner, but it remains mercifully silent through the course of the meal.
It is a little disconcerting to walk into an eatery and not be mobbed by the maitre'd or over-friendly waiters. Mind you, I'm not complaining. I'm one of those people who are always clear in their mind about what they'd like to eat or drink and am therefore prone to look askance at the staff of eating places which try to nudge me into ordering this, that, or the other. I also hate waiters who will rush you into ordering, practically ripping the menu from your unsuspecting fingers. Then, in Shimla, it is also likely that the waiter will greet you with a friendly wave and then disappear into the misty depths of the kitchen, only to emerge when you've collapsed with hunger.

None of this happens in Spars Lodge. A young lad saunters in from some level below, unseen to the diner's eye. He is courteous, but not smarmy. I have called the cafe ahead, informing them that SdS and I wish to feast on their much-touted trout. I remind him of this. He brightens in recollection. Oh yes, of course, so you are the one who called. Yes, yes, your trout will be ready in 15 minutes. He turns to leave. Err, could we have a drink of some sort, asks SdS, the soul of politeness, even under trying circumstances. He spins back. A drink? His forehead creases in concentration... okayyy, what will you have? A sweet fresh lime soda each, please, we suggest timidly. Fiiiiine, he says and goes back to wherever he came from. The soda appeals to my sweet tooth and goes well with the meal.

A little later, our meal arrives. Trout in lemon-butter sauce, with vegetables and mashed potatoes on the side. SdS and self, our coastal roots notwithstanding, are not fish-eaters to the manner born. Hence, when the "boy" lays our plates before us, each of us gives a little scream: we have caught the beady eye of the trout in our respective plates. To give credit where it's due, it is not the eatery's fault that we're squeamish. It's just that the idea of having food which glares at you somewhat nastily has us giggling and shuddering by turns!
We call the waiter and ask him if something could be done forthwith. Such as? he asks. Well, err... take it away and lop off the head and the tail, maybe? we say. Why don't you simply eat the stuff in the middle and leave the rest? he demands. Well, no, we couldn't do that, we whine. So with an ever-suffering expression perfected by women playing mothers in Hindi cinema, he bears off our plates away and returns with what you see below. The chef has hacked the trout's head off in a manner not unlike the manner used by the French on their Royalty during their Revolution!

This is what our meal now looks like:

We dig in. The trout has been steamed to perfection. It is tender and fresh. Evidently, it's been frozen (and then defrosted) just to the right temperature, allowing it to retain all its succulence. The skin still glistens and the texture is firm to touch. The sauce, a combination of lemon and butter, is subtle in its flavour and not overly salted or spiced extravagantly. It forms a lovely complement to the fish.
One could argue about the portion of the vegetables, but not about the way they have been cooked. The colour, flavour and texture are just right, but I would love to walk into the kitchen and show the chef how to make dice the carrots, julienne the beans and make florets of the broccoli. In their current form, substance wins over style! I won't say much about the potato mash because while making it is no rocket science, the chef at Spars Lodge does a good job of salting it to a nicety.

The remains of the day can be seen below, and are evidence that SdS and I have enjoyed our meal.

For dessert, I opt for banana fritters and ice cream, while SdS asks for apple pie and ice cream. No bananas, (and therefore, no fritters) and no ice cream, informs the waiter, a bit apologetically. So we both settle for the apple pie. This earns a score of 9 on a scale of 10 from SdS, that old apple pie aficionado, who has been raised on the epiphany-inducing produce of Bombay's Yazdani Bakery. The apple pie is soft, melt in the mouth and with the gentlest hint of cinnamon. If anything, the ice cream might just have focused the diner's attention away from its wholesome goodness.

Will I return? Most definitely. For I've spied some Anglo-Indian items on the menu that I'm dying to try. Particularly, chicken rissoles. A couple of mutton curries on the menu look promising as well. Also, the next time I hope to chat with the chef if mine host permits. The pricing does not burnt a hole into one's middle class pocket, which makes Spars Lodge a definite "must go back".

Of empty heaven and its hymns

I'm a teetotaller. But the closest I can come to explaining intoxication is when I listen to music. Urdu has such a beautiful word for it: خمار or खुमार. It is sometimes an intensified feeling of nonchalance. Sometimes, it is a clarion call, bluntly thundering. Other times, a beautiful opiate. Letting me lull myself into denial. Sometimes, it creates just the right atmosphere for thoughts. It chastens and subdues. It dissolves the straight and narrow. It perplexes and untangles. It confirms loneliness and then offers solace and companionship. It is my rampart, and my fort. No matter how out of tune my soul may be, it never jars. Sometimes, it feels sacred, and imparts a dignity and has inspiring aftermaths. Other times, it is secular and then brings in its wake an eartly cheer. But in any case, all good music resembles something! It stirs me by its resemblance to some object or feeling that may have caused it to be born.

An attitude of gratitude

This morning brought an unexpected gift. It came in the form of some thoughts shared by my friend Dick Richards who thanked me for sharing my world with him. Heading out for my morning constitutional, I was struck by the fact that I have so much to be grateful for:

• Friends. Those of you who stuck by me and those of you who went away. Those of you I've known for long and those of you I've only just met. You make my life richer by your presence.
  
• Family which gives and gives me only support and affection, pulls my leg when I act too stuffy, and does not indulge in guilt trips. Just lets me be.
  
• Good health, pronounced as 200% fitness by those in the know.
  
• A job which lets me travel and fool around and meet interesting people and do worthwhile stuff.
  
• A creative space which is my solace when all else goes downhill.
  
• Internet through which I've met some amazing people and made friends with them although they live miles and miles away.
  
• Shimla where I feel most centred and creative and content.

"Do you give thanks for this? -- Or that?"
No, God be thanked
I am not grateful
In that cold calculating way, with blessing ranked
As one, two, three, and four -- that would be hateful.

I only know that every day brings good above
My poor deserving;
I only feel that, in the road of Life, true love
Is leading me along and never swerving.

Whatever gifts and mercies in my lot may fall,
I would not measure
As worth a certain price in praise, or great or small.
But take them and use them all with simple pleasure.

~ Henry Van Dyke ~

People flicker around me

Sauntering the pavement, or riding the country by-road—lo! such faces!
Faces of friendship, precision, caution, suavity, ideality!
The spiritual, prescient face—the always welcome, common, benevolent face,
The face of the singing of music—the grand faces of natural lawyers and judges, broad at the back-top;
The faces of hunters and fishers, bulged at the brows
—the shaved blanch’d faces of orthodox citizens;
The pure, extravagant, yearning, questioning artist’s face;
The ugly face of some beautiful Soul,
the handsome detested or despised face;
The sacred faces of infants,
the illuminated face of the mother of many children;

The face of an amour, the face of veneration;
The face as of a dream, the face of an immobile rock;
The face withdrawn of its good and bad, a castrated face;
A wild hawk, his wings clipp’d by the clipper;
A stallion that yielded at last to the thongs and knife of the gelder.

Sauntering the pavement, thus, or crossing the ceaseless ferry, faces, and faces, and faces!
I see them, and complain not, and am content with all.

~ Walt Whitman ~

Moulded to some heavenly norms

An avowed anti-religious monument, anti-ritual person, I have already confessed to my abiding affection for Himachal's temples. But every now and then, I am brought up short. I stumble upon some structure, some pantheon, or tabernacle which reminds me of all the things that are so wrong about the Hindu faith.

The Bhimakali temple in Sarahan is one such place. Seen objectively, it is a not unattractive structure. It has the square shape structure, surmounted by a three-layered, pagoda-like roof typical of this region.

The "shikhar" or the top of the temple is embellished with a lotus, sun and sunburst motif. It is also festooned by half-moons and six-pointed stars which remind my companion of Islamic and Jewish motifs!

It would be wrong to blame the temple. It is merely a case of the temple's managers being (literally) more loyal than the king. In their zeal to prove that this is the most important relgious building in the region, nay, the state, they have applied the spit and polish routine so ardently as to have robbed the temple of the friendly homeliness which endears the viewer to similar structures elsewhere. The gorgeous wood has been polished with an alarmingly yellow-tinged varnish. While I'm not aware of the effect this synthetic application has on old wood, it does not seem a good thing even to my lay-person's eyes.
The interiors resemble a well-appointed (Public Works Department) guest-house, with the wholly-inappropriate marble floor covered in jmaroon and green jute matting and the wooden bannisters painted a snowy white. The poor deities look terrified, locked up behind huge steel bars in the sanctum sanctorum.

My distaste for this temple is further bolstered by the presence of that other entity I so cordially detest: the temple priest. The one in the Bhimakali temple runs to type. An insensitive motor-mouth, he assumes that my companion and I are not only ignorant of Hindu mythology (we are not), but also that we need a crash course right there and then. We are made to sit in the inner sanctum and out pours a lurid sacerdotal tale of lust, envy, anger and revenge. We both squirm, yawn politely and then, finally just resign ourselves to a boring afternoon's story-telling. Our plight is not very much improved by our lack of monetary offerings to this already apparently prosperous deity.

The irksome narrative is thankfully livened up the appearance of the creature in shining armour! We focus on its antics instead and come out breathing in relief.

Full of sound and fury

but, like the Bard, I won't say it signifies nothing!

When the rains burst upon Kinnaur where I was travelling last week, I realised for the first time in my life that in the vast dome of nature, there reigns a sort of controlled violence! There's a domineering fury entirely capable of hurtling all living beings into a common doom. It is as though the decree of violent death is inscribed on the frontiers of life, far away from the cocooned life of a householder.

Interestingly, the fury of the thunder exhausts itself in time and leaves the air calm and utterly serence in its wake. If only human anger could be like that!

....

I'll leave my trace upon you
like your own witch's hex
streaked through your hair
and lingering in your charcoal eyes

I'll have my madcap moonlight way
no matter how many fiddlers
call you to a dance of wooden marchers
I'll sear your palm with an eternal scar
So all the canny Cassandras will whisper
"Ah, there goes one of the lost!
He has been visited by a vagrant solitaire
singing a moonlight sonata
he has been wheedled by a will o' the wisp
from some moonlit moor,
he has been kissed by a flickering firefly
brushed by the touch of a wild gypsy spell
he has heard the cry of a loon....
He has been loved."

For luck.

Amigos para siempre

Religion is the frozen thought of man

There's a little village called Kao (pronounced "cow") about 7 kilometres from Karsog. The drive from Karsog is an interesting one, as it skirts the edge of the valley and offers enchanting panoramas of the jade and emerald dales spread out before you.
The temple of Kamaksha Devi is, in a sense, not unlike the almost pagoda-like structures you see elsewhere in Himachal. There are two structures. Approaching from the main road, you are likely to come up to the first and the bigger sanctum.

This one has sloping, slated roof on three, or almost four levels. Lovely little wooden cylindrical thingumajigs hang in lacy detail from its edges. They bob and sway in the gentle breeze.

The combination of mud, plaster and wood creates magic once again. The geometry of this 10th-century structure is hard to understand, but so very easy to extol. It is austere and ornate, artless and embellished at the same time. I circle it and circle it again,searching for some flaw, some little error. But the eurhythmy remains unbroken.

At the risk of sounding like a broken record, I am constrained to say yet again that the older "dehra" (the tall equilateral building you see above) is far more attractive in its Spartan look. I love its geometry. Its colours, weathered to mellow amber, beige, sepia, bronze and sorrel; its wood a deep mahogany here, a burnt sienna there with lots of cinnamon in between.

Inside, there is a disarray of objects religious: bells, drums, incense-holders, lamps, stale flowers. The priest is nowhere in sight, so one is deprived of the history of the place. Obviously, this deity bears some relation to the one in Assam, but we remain ignorant in the absence of those who know. Traditionally, this incarnation of the female deity Shakti represents the Goddess in her more violent, vengeful aspect. The idol kept in the sanctum, however, bears a benign expression. She bears her usual arms, the axe and the sword, but her right hand is raised in benediction. She is surrounded by adoring angels and lesser deities.

The slate roof is silvan, ashen and pearly by turns. The wooden pillars contrast most attractively with it.

The temple has a series of these carved wooden panels embedded into its walls at eye level. The images represent a number of members of the Hindu pantheon, all engaged in activities they're usually famous (or infamous) for. Hindu deities are notoriously human in their follies and foibles, but perhaps this is what makes them tolerant and forgiving towards their worshippers, and, in turn, earns them a great deal of personal affection.