2005 India Seeking Puzzle Pieces

Seeking Puzzle Pieces: A Family PilgrimagetoIndia

November 24 to December 18, 2005

Pilgrims: Lois Gray & Kay Gilmour, Kathy Gray McClain & John B. McClain, III

APERSONALINTRODUCTION

“Who am I?” and “How did I come to be here?” are universal questions for most of us human beings. When we’re young, those questions can be answered directly or metaphorically. But as we get older we become more interested in our ancestors: where and how they lived, from what countries and ethnicities did they derive their heritage, how did they get to America. Sooner or later, everyone probably senses some desire to see the part of the world where his grandparents or great grandparents came from.

Those of us lucky enough to have story-telling relatives usually have a store of tales about life in other places where our forefathers lived. Sometimes we are fortunate enough to have experienced some of the traditions of those places kept alive in our American families: special foods, different holiday habits, second languages, native dress, minority religions, old family jokes repeated every time folks gather for special occasions.

My father, Aubrey, and his younger sister, Olive, were born in India because their parents were British Methodist medical missionaries there from l907 to 1931. Alone together, my grandparents, before my father came along in 1916, established a clinic for lepers, ministered to the sick and injured from their various parsonage homes, dedicated schools, provided pastorate services in Methodist churches for both British citizens and Indians (where my grandfather preached in Tamil). Even after their children arrived, they continued their dedicated work in various capacities. The places where they worked were mainly Bangalore (now India’s Silicon Valley), Madras (Chennai as it is now called) and Tuticorin: all in Southern India. My sister and I had always heard that our father was born in Madurai, but my aunt has recently discovered that her mother went to that city (about 70 miles from their

home) only to give birth in a hospital. At her discharge, the family returned to Tuticorin on the extreme southeast coast where they lived until our aunt came along in l919. When she was only about 11 months old, they were transferred to Madras where my grandfather took over some district superintendent duties. Later still, my grandfather served the church in Bangalore.

While my grandparents worked and lived in primitive and difficult conditions and endured blisteringly hot weather (compared with their English homeland), their children experienced the magic of growing up in India, feeling as at home there as the native-born Indians. My sister and I grew up hearing stories of that enchanted childhood from our father who died quite young (only 36) while we were still just kids (12 and 8) ourselves, but our mother kept him alive for us by also repeating the stories and continuing to cook some of the Indian dishes she had learned from our grandmother. So for us, these stories weren’t just fascinating tales of childhood adventures, they also constituted much of our concept of who our father was.

Because of that emotional connection with India, his life there was also a considerable part of my own self-image and identity. When I was young, his birthplace made me feel special and different: after all, how many American kids had fathers born in India? Even when I was older, I felt that same sense of my own identity being somehow informed by his exotic childhood and youth. Later on, that country called to me but I never wanted to visit without my sister’s being able to come along as well.

Finally, this year, we were able to travel there together along with Kay and John. We planned the trip for several months with considerable input from our Aunt Olive who was able to tell us what places we should concentrate on. She had gone back herself in 1971 and had been surprised that some of the sites she remembered were still there but dismayed at how many were gone. We found a tour company that was offering an intriguing itinerary for Northern India and the owner (an Indian born in Bangalore) agreed to help us plan a sojourn for the four of us in Southern India too. We were provided with guides and drivers as well as being able to prepay for hotels and airline tickets as necessary. This really turned out to be just like “having one’s cake and eating it too.” We had all the freedom we needed to see the sites we were aware of associated with our family in the South and still received the advantages of group travel in the more tourist-interesting North!

And what a trip it was! Filled with the emotions aroused in the South and the awe raised in the North, all four of us felt that this was indeed a very special pilgrimage to an ancient culture suffused with many different influences from so much of the world: Central Asia, Iran, Greece, Afghanistan, and Great Britain. The actual travel was grueling often, exhilarating most of the time, stupefying always. What we saw and experienced was so complex that it is challenging to try to express it at all. Kay’s and John’s pictures do a more complete job, but still it is necessary to organize the trip in writing as well so that we can remember as much detail as possible.

A chronological theme seems simplistic since the order in which we saw things is really irrelevant. The historical approach seems pedantic and, though perhaps interesting, not really the source of our reactions to India since we went there pretty much ignorant of that convoluted story. One typical organizing principle of many of my previous journals has to do with the wildlife we hope to see and how we managed to do that. Though we certainly hoped to see tigers in their own habitats, animal viewing was not the reason we wanted to go to India.

So what to do? Kathy and I went to try to see India through our father’s eyes to try to understand better the stories he told us and to extrapolate from that insight a fuller portrait of him. In so many ways, our father is a jigsaw puzzle to us, one in which an insufficient number of the pieces have survived. We were hoping that this trip to India would restore a few more to us so that our picture could be more complete. Perhaps that metaphor will be best to use in presenting what we gained along the way.

PIECESFROMINDIA’SHISTORY

How did the India the British encountered come to be? The Indian civilization is one of the oldest in the world, certainly much older than Britain’s own. To understand what India looked like at the time the British began to rule her in earnest (1857), we must gather some facts about her history before the 19th century.

Most archeologists now date the beginning of a separate Indian culture to 2000 B.C. because of discoveries made in the Indus Valley in the l920s. Two sophisticated cities (Mohenjo-daro & Harappa) have been excavated there and they are considered the birthplace of Indian civilization. From there the people crossed into

the subcontinent and began to populate the lands. There is some controversy among archeologists and historians about the exact origin of the indigenous peoples: some separate the Northern and Southern Indians into different ethnic groups the Aryans in the North and the Dravidians in the South. This is a simplistic conclusion based chiefly on skin coloration: Northern Indians are fairly light-skinned and Southern Indians are rather dark brown. However, DNA analysis and other studies have conclusively proved that both the Aryans and the Dravidians are Caucasian, regardless of skin tones.

Some scholars and archeologists even believe that using the descriptor “Aryan” to describe the Northern Indians is incorrect. They believe that the mistake occurred when some German scholars mistranslated the word “arya” in the Vedas (sacred books written in Sanskrit) because of its similarity to “Aryan.” Those scholars believe that the word actually means “good” or “virtuous” rather than having any connection with racial or ethnic derivations.

Whatever the truth, the unhappy fact is that there is considerable prejudice among Indians themselves based on skin color. The lighter a person’s complexion, the more chances he has in the business world, the entertainment venues, in the social milieu, and the political arena. Furthermore, the Hindu religion’s caste system has tended to correlate with skin color biases since it appears that the Brahmins (highest caste) are usually supposed to be the lightest while the dalits (the untouchables) are darkest. This is just one of the pernicious influences of the caste system; there are many others.

The original inhabitants of the Indus Valley were probably a mixture of peoples from the Iranian plateau and central Asia (Mongols and Turkic folks). Of course, there were also incursions from the Europe of Greece with some gene deposits made to the ethnic bank account. Alexander entered northern India in 327 B.C. and would have gone deeper into the subcontinent had his army not been so exhausted and dispirited. Some of them were so sick of war and conquest that they elected to stay where they were rather than even trying to get back to Macedonia. Perhaps more Greek genes mixed with Northern Indians than ever reached those Indians inhabiting the South. Certainly, there are more examples of Greek influence in statuary, architecture, and other archeological finds in the North than have ever been found in the South.

Though prehistory is certainly important, more relevant to my journal here is the history of modern India, beginning with the Mughal Empire which started with the invasion of India by Babar in 1526. However, it is necessary to note that when Babar conquered northern India, there were already Hindu rajahs and maharajahs ruling territories of various sizes all over the subcontinent. Mughal is the Indian word for Mongol and it is true that Babar and his troops came out of central Asia by way of Afghanistan. History says that Babar was related to Genghis Khan on his mother’s side and was kin to Tamerlane through his father. Though Babar was a Moslem, he was tolerant of other religions and did not seek their extirpation. Therefore, he did not seek to destroy the Hindu royalty or to eliminate their fiefdoms; he only wanted to be acknowledged as the supreme ruler of India Through his conquests, he certainly achieved that desire.

Much of the architecture and art seen in Northern India was created by the emperors of the Mughal Empire. Therefore, it is surely essential to understand a little bit of their impact on Indian culture. After all, the glorious Taj Mahal itself is a product of Mughal culture!

Babar was a warrior-king whose main interest was in conquest and subduing any opposition to his rule. To subjugate India, he had to defeat Afghans and Rajputs who claimed the land as theirs. Babar won a great battle at Panipat in 1526, thereby solidifying the gains he had made in smaller increments in the years from 1510 or so. He fought decisively because he had superior weaponry including gunpowder that had hitherto been unknown on the subcontinent. Babar apparently died a natural death even though he had been such a great warrior and participated in so many battles.

His son, Humayan, who ruled from 1530 to 1540, is usually seen as a rather incompetent dreamer. However, that may be an unfair judgment since he had three treacherous younger brothers to contend with. Despite his kindnesses to them, shown by granting them high positions, not only did his brothers continually oppose him, one of his father’s generals also fought him and actually unseated him for 15 years after which he fled in self-imposed exile to Persia. Finally the King of Persia helped him regain his throne in 1555. Following his restoration, he practiced religious tolerance so the melding of Mughal and Hindu traditions could proceed. He tried to be a better administrator and ruler too. However, he suffered an unfortunate accident, falling down a stairway in his haste

to begin his required afternoon prayers and died in l556. He is chiefly remembered for the tomb his widow built for him in Delhi. It is a monumental structure of Moslem design that begins the tradition of impressive funereal building. On the same grounds, his widow also built an impressive building to honor her own parents.

However, Humayan’s greatest achievement was probably his son, Akbar the Great, who is considered the best of all the Mughal emperors. He was a man of excellent administrative gifts, of effective military strategy, and of a tolerant spirit towards other religions. His strongest gift to India however was his enormous interest in the arts, philosophy, science, and politics, these traits being a valuable inheritance from his father who loved all things Persian. Because he was very shrewd in managing his kingdom, he married many, many princesses from Hindu states and territories in order to cement happy relationships between himself and his empire with the Hindu rulers.

Akbar ruled from 1556 to 1605. During his lifetime, architecture which combined Persian and Hindu elements became supreme and is represented in many palaces, forts and mosques still admired today.

The “ghost city” of Fatehpur Sikri outside Agra is one of Akbar’s most stunning and extraordinary architectural masterpieces. Because he was childless for such a long time, he was supremely hopeful when a Sufi (Moslem sect) mystic predicted that he would have a son. When Shayk Salim Chisti’s prediction came true and his son, Jehangir, was born, Akbar built a beautiful white mosque in Chisti’s honor. To this

day, Moslems praying for children come to make offerings at this gem, “The Pearl Mosque.” Next, Akbar decided to move his capital city from Agra to a new site about 15 kms away from the city. This enormous complex took two years and 50,000 laborers to complete and it is magnificent to this day. The luminous “Pearl Mosque” is its heart and soul, but there are many residences, audience rooms, a harem building (Zenana), gardens, pools, administrative structures still extant as well. The whole is built of red sandstone in a beautiful marriage of Persian and Hindu art and architecture. Everything is on a massive scale so that one’s immediate reaction is awe. Ironically, this new capital city was inhabited by Akbar, his family and his court for only 14 years. Then, for reasons still considered moot, the beautiful red city was abandoned and the court returned to Agra. Most scholars and archeologists believe that an insufficient water supply was the primary reason for the desertion.

Akbar’s son, Jehangir, continued the tolerant leadership of his father, also perhaps because his mother was a Hindu. Jehangir chose his name because it means “Conqueror of the World.” He combined his grandfather’s desire to rule more and more territory with his father’s love of the arts. Jehangir ruled from 1605 to 1628. He was known for his impartial justice, treating Muslim, Hindu and all others equally under the law. Jehangir was a patron of the arts just as his father had been. His reign is the transition period between the art of his father Akbar and his son, Shah Jehan, architect of the Taj Mahal. Jehangir loved color and he utilized red sandstone with inlaid colored stones, gems and marble in his buildings. Numerous insurrections clouded the empire during Jehangir’s rule but he was able to repress them all.

When Jehangir died, he left a problem for India in that he had 4 sons who all claimed his throne. One of the sons even imprisoned his father while he dispatched his brothers to the next world. Once ensconced on the throne, he became Shah Jehan, the famous builder of the Taj Mahal, in memory of his favorite wife, Mumtaz. The ethereal beauty of that tomb structure has come to represent the most glorious realization of the wedding of Mughal and Hindu architecture and decorative arts. And, in truth, it is a sublimely lovely edifice. Even after all these years, the white marble gleams pellucid in the moonlight, turns a liquid gold in the afternoon sunlight, and pales off into a pink softness as the sun sinks below the western horizon. Photographs do not reproduce its loveliness partly because its size is never realistic in them. It is amazing to see how huge the Taj actually is since it never loses

its delicacy despite its size. Probably the photos are a poor imitation partly because they seldom contain people to give the building any sense of perspective.

Shah Jehan revived the military interests of his great grandfather, Babar, and brought more parts of India, formerly under Hindu leadership, into the Mughal Empire through war or threat of war as well as judicious marriages. His empire was even bigger than his forefathers’. However, he was also a cultured man interested in the arts, sciences and philosophy and he continued to support those pursuits. Shah Jehan was the emperor from 1628 to 1658. His reign was relatively peaceful and definitely prosperous.

Aurangzeb, Shah Jehan’s son, was the last of the effective Mughal emperors and he was the most religiously fanatical of them all. During his reign from 1658 to 1707, he repressed Hinduism and the Indians who practiced it. He burdened Hindus with heavy taxation because of their “non-Muslim status.” Knowing that Hindus also perform pilgrimages to holy places as do the Muslims, he created a “pilgrimage tax” for Hindus only. Needless to say, the Hindu majority seethed under these injustices and rebellion became a common response to his policies. The Marathas were a Hindu organization of lower caste people who fought Aurangzeb through guerrilla tactics and were never defeated by him. Interestingly enough, they were a group that the British were never able to subdue either. The British finally just left them to themselves in their fastness in the northeast mountains. Apparently that was the desire of the Marathas because they did not come out of their own territory to war against the British once they were left unmolested.

In the meantime, the shores of India had been visited by the Portuguese, the French and most lastingly, the British. The West Coast of India was the place claimed by the Portuguese: the island of Goa and its adjoining bit of mainland. The French occupied what is now Calcutta and other places along the East Coast of the subcontinent. The British started their eventual colonization of India by settling the business of the East India Company in a little fishing village on the coast that finally became the big city of Madras.

In 1583, Queen Elizabeth I sent a ship to the Indian subcontinent to reconnoiter the possibilities for trade. Sixteen years later, she granted trading rights to a group of London entrepreneurs who organized themselves into the East India Company. From 1614 to 1857, Company ruled all India through a brilliant technique of keeping

the maharajahs and rajahs divided from each other but still trading partners of the company. It is said that no more than 50,000 Britishers lived in India at any one time and yet these few people administered the entire subcontinent for the enrichment of Britain.

In 1857, some Indian soldiers called Sepoys rebelled against the East India Company, probably because of a false rumor that said the bullets the British gave them were actually oiled with lard from the very animals the Hindus believed was sacred--the cow. Muslims believed the bullets were greased with swine lard that was anathema to them. Though probably a false rumor in both cases, the East India Company was unable to quell the rebellion and the British government decided to rule India through the Crown.

Thenceforth, India became the jewel in Victoria’s crown and the British Raj was established. The Raj itself was governed in the Queen’s name through an appointed Viceroy. This form of government lasted until l947 when independence was finally achieved largely through the influence and efforts of Mahatma Gandhi. India has been the world’s biggest democracy ever since.

The early modern history of southern India was quite different in that the Mughal Empire never extended much below the midway point of the subcontinent. Therefore, Southern India has a much “purer” Hindu heritage without Persian or Mongol influences. The Pallavas (4th century to 9th century) and the Cholas (9th century to the 17th century) were the chief ruling families of Southern India until the early 18th century when the Nizam of Hyderabad and the Maharajah of Mysore were the most influential leaders.

Even the Hindu temples are quite different in the North and South because of the differences in the histories of the areas. There are now mosques in Southern India because Muslims have spread all over the country. Two of the staunchest opponents of British rule in the South were Haider Ali and his son Tipu Sultan, both of whom were Muslims. Their palaces and tombs look different from such Muslim structures in the north.

MYGRANDPARENTS’PUZZLEPIECES

Because its history, predominant religions, culture, and customs are so totally different from those of European-derived civilizations, India really does create “culture shock” in first-time visitors. Kathy and I had always been intrigued by the ways in which our grandparents adjusted to such an exotic lifestyle for the 28 years they worked in Southern India. Surely their surprise and initial discomfort must have been enormous. Perhaps they were protected within a certain insularity based on their Christian assurance that they were bringing a much-needed religious message to the Indians lost in a pagan darkness. However, in none of their writings did they convey any sense of their own feelings of superiority to the people among whom they worked and to whom they ministered, both physically and spiritually. Their admiration of the kindness, mutual concern and respect the Indians showed one another is clear in all their comments. In the current climate, many people question not only the motives of missionaries but also whether or not they even have the right to try to supplant other people’s religions so closely entwined with their cultures.

Whatever the conclusions drawn today, I believe that the motives of my grandparents included love and caring for Indian people and a desire to relieve some of their physical and social suffering. In one essay my Grandmother wrote an answer to some skeptics who asked her how she dared to preach a new religion to the Hindus when their own faith had served them well for many hundreds, even thousands, of years. The same people pointed out that Hindus are a spiritual people whose religion is closely interlaced with their daily activities and all the significant events of their lives. My Grandmother wrote in agreement about the religious devotion of the Indian people, but she strongly disagreed that their religion had served them well. As part of her evidence, she cited the pernicious effects of the caste system that is so closely bound up with Hinduism, with the inferior status of women in Hinduism and Indian culture in general, and with the fatalism inherent in the belief in reincarnation. All these factors proved to her that Hinduism had not been a religion “good” for the people who practice it. In her mind, that conclusion provided all the justification she needed.

It is also important to point out that my grandparents did not go to India to live the life associated with the British Raj. They were not even petty nobility and they did not live in British conclaves where they would have rarely experienced contact with

actual Indians, except as servants. Had they remained in England, they would have most probably have been solidly middle class with the monetary and social advantages of that economic strata. Instead, their Christian beliefs and their personal selflessness led them to India where they lived and worked among the Indians, foregoing all the material and physical comforts their home in England would have afforded them.

My grandfather had gone to college, seminary, and an extra year of medical training in tropical medicine before he left for India in 1907. My grandmother took her nursing training in the intervening years before he came back to England to bring her with him to India. On their arrival in Madras in 1911, they were married in the Vepery Road Methodist Church where he was later pastor.

Working to establish himself and to master the language, my grandfather also had to acclimatize to the weather in South India which is always described in terms like “scorching” and “blistering.” Once Grandmother arrived in India, they continued his work together among the lepers in Madras and its environs. This service required them to travel many jolting and uncomfortable miles in bullock carts out to the small villages where lepers were required to live in isolation since their disease was as feared as it has always been in every culture acquainted with it. The trips would often take them several hours since a bullock cart is very slow making no more than four miles an hour. Once in the villages, they would personally bathe the lepers in Chaulmoogra Oil (the only medicine available at that time). It was certainly not curative, only palliative, relieving some of the sufferer’s discomfort temporarily. They performed this task at what they believed was great risk of contracting the disease themselves. In those days, leprosy was considered an easily contagious disease. They continued this service for more than 6 years until they were transferred to Tuticorin even further south on the coast of the country.

During much of that time, my grandfather was studying the Tamil language so that he could begin to preach the Gospel to the lepers as well as other Indians who came within his ken. At first he and my grandmother could speak only rudimentarily and it was not possible for him to “preach.” They felt that their service to the people around them was an example of Christian love which would have to suffice until my grandfather was fluent enough to actually offer sermons in the Indians’ own language. In addition to his medical ministry, my grandfather was also responsible for religious services among the British Christians living in whatever area he was

assigned. Once he had learned the language, he was also assigned pastoral duties to the Tamil Methodist Church in Chennai for the Indian population.

My grandfather was also very interested in education for the Indian children and youth and he established schools for them and served as headmaster for at least one of them.

Meantime, my grandmother had to learn to cope with the hardships of living in a quite undeveloped country. There was no refrigeration so she had to learn to obtain foods that would not spoil at the local markets. There was no electricity either, so she had to learn to cook as the Indians did. Maintaining standards of personal hygiene for all the family was also a struggle since of course there was no running water and bathrooms were non-existent. The houses they occupied were usually unscreened and such materials were not available; therefore she had to place mosquito netting around all the beds and maintain it without holes in an effort to avoid anyone’s contracting malaria. She was able to keep her family free of the disease, but she herself was a victim and almost died from the dreaded illness on at least two occasions. In addition, there were nearly no doctors, pharmacists or dentists to rely on if anyone became ill. Washing clothing, bedding, and linens was also a laborious chore.

While managing all these domestic duties, my grandmother continued to help my grandfather in his own responsibilities in the medical arena. When they were in larger cities where it was not possible for them to go out into the villages to visit the lepers, those poor benighted souls often found their way to the parsonage. Other sick and injured parishioners and their friends and neighbors often came to the door of their homes in the city to ask for medical help. Sometimes up to 55 in a single day, according to my grandfather’s notes. When my grandfather was working in the religious “vineyard” and not at home, it was up to my nurse grandmother to help these people.

In many ways, she seems even more heroic than my grandfather. It is difficult for me to believe that these two loving and generous people were trying to “harm” the people they served. In my opinion, they were sincerely motivated by concern for the people they worked among. Selfishness and self-aggrandizement were not part of their personalities or of their actions. Nor were they motivated by a sense of the “white man’s burden.” Any reading of their letters, their essays explaining their work

to British and later American churches they hoped would support missionary work, or their diaries proves that they loved the Indian people, did not feel superior to them, and even supported their desire for independence for their country!

The last point is easily proven by the fact that my grandfather was invited to meet with Gandhi when the Indian leader was well into his independence movement mission. My grandfather stated that the only thing that disappointed him about Gandhi was his unwillingness to convert to Christianity! He was much impressed with his knowledge of that religion and his life of asceticism and peace. He believed that Gandhi had the best interests of the Indian population uppermost in his crusade for India’s freedom from colonialism. His admiration for Gandhi was so deep, he wished that he could be seen as a model Christian!

When my father was born in l916 and his sister in l919, my grandparents were very much into their Indian lives. They continued in their ministries, pastoral, medical and educational. The children were often tended by ayahs (Indian nannies) since both parents were so busy. As a matter of fact, both children learned Tamil easily as youngsters. They actually spoke the language with no British accent. Sadly, during their first sabbatical back to England for a year, they both pretty much forgot the language. On returning to India, my father picked it up very easily but never again could speak with without a distinct British flavor. Despite their parent’s dedication to their labors “in the field” as they termed missionary work, both children remembered happy and loving family life. They did not feel neglected by their parents and very early on learned the importance their parents attached to their work. While in elementary school, both children went to schools established for English children. When in high school, they were sent to boarding school where the children of high caste Indians could also afford to matriculate.

My father delighted my sister and I when we were youngsters with his stories of an enchanted childhood in such an exotic culture. He spoke often of his adventures in the parks and woods near where they lived, of his companions in sports such as field hockey and soccer, even a tiger hunt with a classmate and his maharajah father. He told us “horror” stories which deliciously thrill and yet frighten children: the yogi he saw who held his arm up so long that it finally began to rot, of the fakirs who pierced their tongues with sharp needles and yet showed no pain, of snake charmers who could handle their “pets” with impunity, of enormous spiders, scorpions, and venomous snakes in the everyday lives of his family and friends.

My grandmother’s much more matter-of fact story about having to wrap the family members’ legs in paper bags to prevent insect bites while they sat at table for meals seems more horrifying to me now. She also told of the cobra who slithered into their house and clung to the ceiling while my grandfather rather ineffectually bashed at it with the straw part of a broom. My grandfather had his own wonderful story of having been bitten by a viper when he was visiting a small village. He quickly and surprisingly clear-headedly tied his shoelace as a tourniquet round his left middle finger, the shoe continuing to dangle from his hand. The villagers, much more used to seeing people die quickly from snakebite, were simply amazed at his survival and even lack of ill effects from the bite. They and the Hindu priest who came to minister to him were also bemused by the “medical treatment” of the dangling shoe. Because they were so stupefied, he took advantage of the situation and preached a bit of the gospel to them. They listened to him and were similarly taken aback at his story of St. Paul having similarly survived a snakebite in Biblical times. The villagers simply could not believe that God would allow such a thing to happen to a “good” person. So I suppose they consigned both St. Paul and Grandfather to the category of “bad” folks.

Thus it is easy to see that we were raised on stories of the dangers, the exoticisms, the sheer wonder of Indian culture and were primed and ready to see as much as we possibly could for ourselves. These jigsaw puzzle pieces were the intriguing bits we already possessed when we ventured into the country ourselves.

AUNTOLIVE’SPUZZLEPIECES

My father’s younger sister, Olive, was our principle and most important source of information about where to search in Southern India for evidence of the Gray family having lived there. She herself had gone back to India when she was in her 50s and her memories of the return trip were quite instrumental in her advice as to where we should go. Equally salient, she also could tell us where not to go since she had already searched for “tiles” and had found them missing: such sites as parsonages connected with my grandfather’s pastorates, the Mission House they had inhabited while he was not a pastor, the apartment building they had lived in at Tuticorin. This helped us to narrow our searches to a doable mileage triangle of Bangalore, Ootacomund, and Madras.

As mentioned before, we had always believed that our father was born in Madurai but she was able to tell us that while he had been delivered at the Mission Hospital there, the family had not actually lived in that city. When she was there in 1971, the hospital was still functioning but we decided it was not worth a visit on the off chance it was still standing in 2005! Besides, even if it was there, a hospital where a birth had occurred did not seem very evocative to us.

Of course, over the years Olive has shared many stories of the life they lived in India and often enough they are quite different from the tales our father told. Since she was both younger and female, we knew that her experiences of life there would be of another nature than his. Olive remembers more domestic details than our father ever shared with us. His stories were more centered on adventures and escapades, sports and oddities, animals and Indian rites he observed in the streets. He was the older brother and he probably spent more time with boys his own age than with her.

She has told us that he was a bright boy, a good student, adventurous but not a problem to his parents. He was active but also liked to read and enjoy music. But whereas she remembered taking music lessons when she attended boarding school in Ooty (the Breeks School which still exists and functions as a school for Indian boys and girls), she does not recall whether or not he also took lessons there. He was at Breeks two years before she enrolled there. We believe that she would have been at home with her parents in Bangalore attending school there while he was away at school then.

School records indicate that our father started school there in 1927 at age 11 and left in 1930 at 14. The records for Olive show her enrolling at Breeks in 1929 and leaving in 1930 (she was 10 when she started and 11 when she left).

We know from her wonderful three-volume work she called “The Gray Legacy” that the family spent almost a year in England on their return from India. They would have gone to school in England for that period. Then our grandfather was sent to Hollywood, Florida, to be pastor at the Methodist Church there for 3 ½ years. Both our father and our aunt attended high school in Dania, Florida, and graduated there. Somewhere around l935-36, my grandfather was transferred to another church in central Florida and Olive went there with her parents.

My father stayed in Dania because by that time, he and my mother were engaged to be married and he did not want to leave her. They were married in l936 at the Dania Methodist Church by my grandfather who returned to perform the ceremony.

Sadly then, from about age 18, Olive and my father were no longer geographically close to one another. This separation, as well as the inevitable lack of closeness caused by both their marriages and subsequent child-rearing, has resulted in gaps in Olive’s memories of our father’s life and personality after they both reached adulthood. There are certainly records of their keeping in contact, especially through both of their devotions to their parents: there are pictures, personal letters, reports of visits through letters to their folks who were not always present at those meetings. My father’s early death precluded the renewed ties they might have cultivated when both were older and less preoccupied with their immediate families and responsibilities. Nonetheless, Olive has certainly been a much loved and appreciated source of knowledge about our father’s early life and their shared experiences in India!

PUZZLEPIECESFROMOURSOUTHINDIANVISIT

So what did our South India visit add to our jigsaw puzzle portrait? The answer lies in “what” we saw there. The flights from Miami to Paris (over 8 hours), the layover in Paris (about 3 hours) and the flight to Bangalore (also over 8 hours) produced four sleepy and tired pilgrims. We landed in the wee small hours Bangalore time in a misty rainfall (we had been told by everyone who knows Bangalore that it would not rain on us there for sure so much for predictability). It had seemed to take an inordinately long time to get our luggage and clear passport control but that was probably because we were so discombobulated and worn out. At any rate, once outside the airport building, we were met by Mr. Williams, a representative of Jet Tours, who took us to our first Indian home base, the Taj Residency Hotel. As we drove through the eerily lit streets, it was difficult to believe that we were finally in a place where our father had lived for at least 4 years of his young life.

The Taj Residency was to be the first of several Taj-chain hotels we stayed in and all of them were really delightful facilities 5 star for sure! Though this hotel was under renovation, the section we occupied had been fully restored and was very comfortable. It took 6 people to welcome us into the hotel, get us registered, take

our bags up to the rooms and usher us into the luxury we would inhabit. The bellman who came to our room was shyly proud of the many amenities in our room newly laid bamboo floors which were ever so silky and shiny, a flat screen plasma TV on the wall, beds that floated you weightlessly into dreamy comfort swaddled in fine linens with puffy duvet, and downy pillows, a most ingenious desk arrangement that moved on smooth castors along a large wall unit which allowed convenient use of the desk while someone else watched TV, a comfortable couch, easy chair, table and lamps. The whole effect was to envelop the guest in every convenience and ease. Obviously this experience did not resemble our family’s life in India in any way! We learned later that electricity is so scarce in many Indian cities that there are planned black-outs to conserve the resource for periods of higher demand. Therefore, the dim lighting had a rational explanation; it wasn’t some plot to keep us from really seeing the city. The few street lamps were blurry and the streets were wet; little traffic was to be seen but after all it was about 2 a.m. In barely suppressed excitement, we tried to take in everything that slipped past our van’s rain-dotted windows. The only concrete thing we learned was that the airport is far from where we were staying.

Bangalore

The next day would reveal a city which our night peek had not really predicted However, we were dismayed to find that there was considerable smog which prolonged the hazy appearance of Bangalore. We were all able to sleep fairly well but we were up around 8 a.m. anyway and met downstairs for our first Indian breakfast. A sumptuous buffet was spread before us with an international assortment of morning foods—Western, Japanese and South Indian. Of course, we wanted to eat only Indian cuisine. There were many things we recognized from our own home as well as Indian restaurants in the USA: dhosas (little turnovers in soft dough, naan (baked puffy breads with many different fillings like onion, meats, potatoes), mangoes, cantaloupe, and chutneys (both tomato-based and mintbased). There were also items new to us: particularly sambar sauce (tomato based curry sauce to be served over rice and usually served at every meal not just breakfast) and idlis (a steamed soft rice cake with little or no flavor of its own). We scrupulously avoided the fresh fruits trying ever so hard not to become victims of “Delhi Belly” (turista or Montezuma’s revenge in Indian parlance in the first few days). The tea served was delicious. We enjoyed that beverage throughout the trip.

We had been told that our guide, Mr. Murthi, would meet us in the lobby of the hotel around 2 p.m. but here we were up and at ‘em way earlier than that! So we arranged for a driver to take us to the Baldwin Schools and to the Richmond Township Methodist Church beforehand. Now the traffic was dense and chaotic. Every kind of conveyance seemed determined to block our way cars, trucks, bullock carts, motorcycles and scooters, bicycles, propane-powered covered scooter-like vehicles. Furthermore, the streets were filled with pedestrians human beings in amazing numbers, cows wandering as they would anywhere and everywhere, quiet and well-behaved dogs, and even goats.

This tumbling stream of movement was accompanied by what we finally realized was an ongoing “conversation” between all drivers played on horns, bells, and whistles. Each vehicle had a request painted on its rear—“Please Sound Horn”—and everyone responded musically. There was a veritable oratorio ongoing through the streets, as drivers warned one another when they were passing on the right or left, when they wanted to pass, or when they just wanted the other drivers to note their presence. It was obvious even in those first few minutes that any visitor to India would be a fool to try to drive himself anywhere!

As we stopped and started our way down Richmond Town Road, we tried to imagine if this street had changed much in the intervening 80+ years since our family had lived here. The buildings with their myriad tiny shops looked as if they could easily be that old and older. We passed the cantonment where the British army and government officials had lived, walled off from the Indian street life. The huge cannons originally stationed at intervals along the wall had been removed after Independence in 1947. Nowadays, the Indian Army has its headquarters in that area. The residences, barracks, and administrative buildings are still nestled within the tree-filled lawns and gardens the British created probably trying not to feel so far from home.

Though our family did not live sequestered away in that British biosphere, they certainly lived the most English lifestyle here in Bangalore that they had ever lived in India. Our grandfather was the pastor of the Richmond Town Methodist Church from about l924 to l928. They lived in the parsonage there and the children attended the two schools within easy walking distance of the church grounds Baldwin School for Boys and Baldwin School for Girls.

The church was for English Methodists and the schools for the children of English residents. It is surprising to us that our grandfather enjoyed his time here, because he always said and documented in his writings that his happiest and most satisfying work in India was among the Indians themselves. He loved his medical work among the poor and the lepers and he thoroughly enjoyed his pastorate at a Tamil Church.

The Baldwin School for Girls on Richmond Town Road was our first stop.

The school now enrolls Indian girls from elementary school through college. The front steps of the building lining the street was filled with young women attending the college portion of the facility. As we drove inside the compound, we could see the administration building as well as many buildings spread over a large area. We tried to find someone who could tell us something about the school “back in the day” but never found anyone in charge. We recalled that our Aunt Olive had reported to us that the school was much larger when she visited in l971 than it had been when she was enrolled there. We gave up trying to figure out which buildings would have been there in her time and left the area on foot, heading out for the Boys School.

A very kind man (our first example of what considerate, polite and generous folks Indian people are) offered to lead us there since he was heading that way himself. Now we jumped, hopped, stumbled and scurried along the pock-marked sidewalk which often disappeared entirely into large holes and broken cement trying to keep

up with our “pied piper.” Though he was a short man, he strode along quite briskly, not at all deterred by the snags we kept running afoul of. We passed the structured garden behind the Girl’s School which Olive had recalled to us as the place she crossed through on her way to school accompanied by her ayah. She recalls vividly still the occasion on which a mad fellow with wild eyes had chased them begging for alms. We could just picture the 5 or 6 year-old British girl desperately running away down the manicured walkways of the little park.

A left turn one block away from that site brought us to the street where the Baldwin School for Boys awaited us under a metal archway proclaiming its name.

As we approached that entrance our excitement grew. Here is where Daddy went to school from about age 8 to 11. Surely here we would retrieve an important puzzle piece because this complex enclosed his young years and taught him how to interact with other boys, how to understand his home country’s place in the world, how to study, how to play sports like hockey, soccer and cricket. We were much luckier here as we entered what appeared to be the Administrative Building because we were directed to the Head Master, Mr. Nehemiah.

What an understanding and sympathetic person he was too! We told him why we were visiting and he kindly offered to give us a guided tour of the school. This facility also takes children from about 8 through to college, but now the students are Indians rather than English children. Mr. Nehemiah’s own parents had also taught at this school since 1948 and he himself was a graduate of the Baldwin School.

He was obviously very proud of this institution and was in process of trying to compile a history of the school. Unfortunately, the climate in Bangalore is very inimical to the preservation of paper and there are virtually no records of the early years of the school still extant. The Headmaster was very hopeful that we could add to his store of information, but unfortunately such was not the case. We have no records either and only know that our father attended the school until l927 when he transferred to a boarding school for the beginning of his high school years.

Despite that fact, Mr. Nehemiah took us around the campus and showed us which buildings were there in the 20s there were two of them, the current Administration Building (Oldham Hall) and Mandol Hall. Oldham Hall was named after the Methodist bishop under whom the school was founded in 1880. The money had been supplied by an American named Baldwin. We found that the sports field was in exactly the same place it had been then as was a one-story building which housed the swimming pool and changing rooms.

Just outside the walls of the playing field was a mosque which dated from before the l920s, so now we knew where our father had learned to mimic the muezzins’ call to prayer. He heard them several times a day everyday he attended the school. It didn’t take too much imagination to picture our father as a child (we have photos of him from that period) standing in the midst of the grassless field listening to the strange call from the minaret. Perhaps, that’s where he honed his skills of mimicry which he retained right into the time of his life when Kathy and I knew him. Sometimes we could persuade him during supper to demonstrate those alien calls to prayer!

Seeing and feeling our excitement, Mr. Nehemiah rather touchingly even told us which walls and floors were original in the buildings so that we could see which ones our father had walked on and been sheltered by from the sun, rain and heat of this city. I knew that I had long wanted to see this place but I was surprised at the depth of my emotions on finally visiting. I could see my father’s small head covered in dark, almost black, hair standing out on the field among the fair-haired English boys during the games they played. I could picture his darker complexion coloring the tableau of glowing faces looking up at the teacher in front of the classroom. Actually, pictures do demonstrate that our father’s coloring was quite a few shades darker than that of his immediate family all three of them had typical English complexions, peaches and cream with light brown hair. Several of the young Indian boys we saw darting around the field had the same thin legs and slight build our father had at that age. I did feel that I knew him a little better seeing this place and imagining him in it. Baldwin School for Boys definitely provided a puzzle piece!

When we finished at the School, it had started to mist and then rain again so the very kind Mr. Nehemiah arranged for a man working at the School to drive us to the church some few blocks away and then back to the Girls School where the cabdriver still awaited us, we hoped.

The Richmond Township Methodist Church however was not so evocative because the original church had been torn down and replaced with a more modern structure and the manse had also long ago been razed, though Olive had seen it in l971. The only original thing still standing on that property was a building about to be torn down as soon as money could be raised Stephens Hall, estimated to be about 125 years old by the ladies working in the church office who also told us that the building had served variously as a fellowship hall, a place for smaller prayer meetings or other services, and a storage facility. They unlocked the doors so we could go inside and it was clear that it was a venerable old place in need of extensive repairs or demolition. Probably the churchmen of today have the right idea. Also on the property is an enormous tree that is probably old enough to have shaded English congregations back all those years ago. Here, it was easier to imagine our grandfather at work in his ministerial capacity than placing our young father in this context. Nonetheless, we were very pleased to see the church and to meet the wonderful Indian people who attend and tend this church presently.

Now it was time to get ourselves back to the Taj Residency and Mr. Murthi to begin the more “touristy” exploration of Bangalore. Despite our exhilaration, we could not fail to exclaim anew at the wonderfully choreographed traffic pattern and movement on the streets. They are really something that must be experienced to be understood! Indeed, all through our Indian visit, this remarkable traffic flow would amaze, dismay, frustrate and yet embody for us the civil disposition of the Indian people. Without their courtesy and consideration of one another, no one would move at all on the totally inadequate roadways of the country! Perhaps, it is driving that has taught these people their impeccable manners, but probably not; it seems maybe their manners are only reinforced by the their highway infrastructure.

Mr. Murthi, our guide, and Mr. Ganesh, our driver, had just arrived at the hotel when we returned from our independent explorations. Mr. Murthi spoke with heavily accented English but it did not take us long to understand the rhythms of his speech and we liked his sense of humor and his dignified manner. Mr. Ganesh spoke less English than Mr. Murthi, but he obviously understood a great deal because he often laughed at jokes and responded to comments with smiles and appropriate gestures. Both gentlemen were swarthy with very dark hair, Mr. Murthi actually the darker of the two. Both were personable and good companions for the rest of our tour through Southern India.

We learned immediately from Mr. Murthi that Bangalore is an old city, having been founded in the 1500s by a lost and hungry maharajah who was given a bowl of boiled beans by an old woman he found in a hut. He named the city he founded after that dish with which she saved his life. So Bangalore means “the boiled bean city.” There are 7 ½ million people living here today.

The city is in the state of Karnataka in which 23 million folks altogether live. The city is 45 kms. by 35 kms. in area so it is rather large. It sits at about 3000 ft. elevation and is known for its salubrious climate. Today, Bangalore is the “Silicon Valley” of India and the seat of many of the call centers we reach when we call from the USA wanting help with software or hardware problems as well as credit card inquiries and all the rest of the outsourced jobs we all know about at home. The smog of the city is produced by its other principle industries, automobile manufacturing, electronics, and metalworking.

Our first visit was to the Parliament Buildings for Karnataka State built in the l950s. The construction is grand and impressive and European in style with the facing being white marble. The Supreme Court is housed in a red brick building erected by the British as an administrative facility. There is considerable security around these structures since the Indians must deal with terrorism fairly regularly, though most of it is home-grown Moslem versus Hindu, political factionalism, and societal upheavals. Therefore, there is no opportunity to see inside these places. The complex is set in an attractive garden & park setting with large trees, many of them blooming flame of the forest, jacaranda and bougainvillea at this time of year.

Next, we drove through Cubbon Gardens, created by the English, in the center of the city and it was sad to see that much of the garden is not very well tended these days. Olive had mentioned to us that the family often picnicked in this lovely place. We wound our way through the park towards Nandi Hill where the largest granite statue of the Nandi Bull is situated.

This bull is venerated because it is considered to be the “mount” or vehicle of the god Shiva. The carving is enormous, very black, and is usually bedecked in marigold flower garlands by worshippers. In a few days time, a special ceremony was to be held on the grounds.

Many little stalls will sprout up on the grounds where peanuts will be sold as offerings that the pilgrims to the shrine can make to Nandi. Peanuts are reputed to be Nandi’s favorite food. During our visit, a Brahmin priest marked our foreheads with a red bindi or spot as a sign of forgiveness for any sins we might have committed.

Here we learned that the spots Hindus wear just above the space between their eyebrows are not caste marks; they are marks of religious devotion and sacrifice. Often, they are referred to as a “3rd eye” through which the devoted Hindus is supposed to look inward to examine his behavior and the purpose of his life.

Olive well remembered visits to this ancient Hindu shrine surrounded by lovely gardens where everyone picnicked and enjoyed family time together. Bugle Hill is the highest point in Cubbon Gardens and we climbed that as well for a good view of the garden and the city beyond. The granite slabs leading up to the little pergola on the hill were very slippery in the continuing rain but we made the ascent without mishap; of course, it was the descent that was more daunting but we all managed that as well.

Next we went to another garden, this one designed by a local maharajah for his wife. It is called Lal Bagh (lovely garden) and is noted for the variety of the plants within its confines trees from all over the world as well as flowering shrubs and annuals.

The British added a glass pavilion modeled on those in Kew Gardens and Brighton for Sunday afternoon band concerts. It is well preserved but no longer serves the same purpose. As we discovered, most folks use it now as a shelter for the sudden rains during all seasons of the year. We enjoyed that aspect of its graceful lines too. It is a remembrance of the strong British heritage in Bangalore.

Also in this garden is an amazing geological phenomenon an enormous outcropping of millennia-old granite, thought to be some of the oldest exposed rock in the world. Scientists estimate it to be 3000 million years old. True to what we would see all over India, there is very little effort expended on preservation activities or on attention to public safety. Folks are not warned against climbing on the rocks even though they are extremely treacherous when wet. Nor are safety steps, handholds, banisters or other assists to walking safely among them present. We supposed that means India has not yet become a litigious society and more power to the people for not thinking that way.

As Mr. Murthi reminded us, most of the government buildings, the museums, public structures were legacies from the British. The bungalows nestled among flowering plants all over the central part of Bangalore are also remnants of British life here. Now those small houses are prized dwelling places by the Indians. Unfortunately, though, Mr. Murthi told us, the number of those “heritage” buildings here is very small now. Sadly, there just isn’t money to spend on big preservation projects anywhere in India, so not only British relics are falling into disrepair and ruin so are many of the buildings and gardens of Indian history.

By this time Kay had really fallen ill with the cold she had apparently contracted during the two long flights to reach Bangalore, so she remained in the van at our last stop the Mysore Silk Emporium. Here we spent about an hour shopping among the incredibly beautiful silk saris, so colorful and rich with no two alike (the same was true on the streets the ladies all wore the wonderful colors but you never saw them “see themselves on their outings”), the pashmina shawls and ties, the beautiful Rajasthan-style pants and overdresses to complete the outfit. Kathy bought herself one of each and we all bought gifts and other things there. The store ladies measured Kathy for her blouse to go with the sari and made it for her while we ate supper back at the hotel. Then it was delivered to her room at about 10:00 p.m. perfectly fitted and sewn.

A loose pattern to our days in the south was established on this first day of the trip: there was very often no time for lunch scheduled into the busy itinerary we had set for ourselves as well as that offered by Jet Tours. So after the shopping for silk, we were returned tired and hungry to the Taj Residency for our buffet supper which was really delicious again. All kinds of meat curries, breads, veggies in sundry sauces, and gulab jamon for dessert were arrayed before our willing eyes. This was

the 2nd pattern all through India almost everyday we had gulab jamon to complete the meal. This dessert is delicious and we were all quite familiar with it before our arrival in India: it is a rather dense ball of yogurt cheese rolled in a thin breading and quick fried and then covered in a very sweet runny honey syrup. Amazing that such a simple snack can be fixed in apparently the same way and yet taste so different in diverse restaurants.

At dinner, we excitedly discussed our first impressions of India and discovered later on that many of these quick “takes” held for the rest of the visit, despite the old saying about “first impressions being deceiving.” All four of us had noted the many stray dogs everywhere we went, but we had also been relieved to find that we saw none of them who looked starved or mangy. They were also the most well-behaved dogs we had ever seen in packs and bunches and without any specific human direction. They never barked (even at night), they didn’t growl or menace passersby with raised lips or bared teeth, they didn’t beg for food, and they did not molest the other animals also crowding the streets.

Of course, cows were also ubiquitous and they too were exceedingly polite creatures though they were not especially concerned when they tied up traffic or blocked entrances to buildings. Where the dogs would scatter under these circumstances without being ordered to do so, the cows would stand fast placidly and stolidly in their bovine dignity until they took a notion to move on. None of them looked hungry either; as matter fact some of them were downright sleek, fat and shiny!

We all remarked on the astonishing traffic in the narrow, potholed streets, and constant warning sounds all around! The wonderful little yellow covered scootercabs were always filled to danger levels as they darted among the larger vehicles, avoiding cows, trucks and cars. The motor scooters were often overloaded with whole families, dad, mother and a couple of kids. Many women drove the scooters on their own ladies of all ages too. Buses were filled from inside out up to the roof that was made completely invisible with passengers filling all the space. These buses make clown-filled circus cars look embarrassingly empty!

We also were all so delighted with the beauty of the people, their faces, their clothing and their marvelous posture and walking styles, so rhythmical and graceful. There are many variations in skin tones but in the south, the people are predominantly quite swarthy. It is said that out of every 10 men you see in India, at least three will be downright handsome and at least 7 of ten women will be knockout beautiful. We all agreed that in Bangalore that statistic was proved true.

The women’s clothing is particularly eye-filling the saris so varied in their ripe and tropical colors, the loose draping adding to the sinuousness of their gaits. Whether the saris were richest silk or poorest cotton, the colors were bold but not garish, the fit was modest and most becoming to all shapes and sizes, and they were clean and spotless as were the ladies themselves. Though we would see most men in cities in Western dress, we rarely saw women anywhere dressed in other than saris or the pants and overdress outfit. We saw a few men in Bangalore clad in more traditional Indian dhotis but not many in the city and then they were usually poorer and older men. Never in even the most crushing crowds were we ever aware of body odor among the Indian people who are obviously scrupulously clean in their persons and their clothing.

So on our very first day in India we all said we loved it! We were happy with the puzzle pieces we picked up here and looked forward to finding many more in the days ahead.

However, I am getting ahead of myself here first I must get us out of Bangalore and up the Western Ghats to Ooty. We left about 8:30 a.m. on a Sunday morning so the traffic was a bit lighter, but it was still busy enough that we had to remind ourselves that Sunday is not a religiously-designated day of rest in India. Hindus don’t observe any special day of the week as requiring religious observances; they go to shrines and make offerings whenever they wish to do so and for devout Hindus that means daily. So there is no pause on Sundays because of church-going traditions of the past as there is in Western countries.

Anyway, we left Bangalore under blue skies for a change and crisp but not cold weather. We drove in the countryside for quite some time, now discovering a new aspect to Indian road travel the one lane or one & a half lane roads that connect most country towns with the each other and the bigger cities. The driving now became a bit more challenging for Mr. Ganesh, but the riding for us became positively hair-raising. Buses passing side-by-side where there is only one lane, with cows, goats, people, and dogs on both sides of the road, trucks tooting and trying to get around everything else on the road too, cars and vans mixing it up as well, not to mention the little yellow propane-driven cabs. As you are staring at the bus

approaching you head-on in your same space, you think, “Well, this is where it will all end, there’s no way we are not going to smash right into that bus!” Then out of the corner of your eye you see that the van is moving over a bit but that a very ponderous and slow-moving oxcart is right in front of us. So even if you miss the bus, you will most certainly ride up on that ancient conveyance killing driver, oxen, cows, pedestrians, dogs, goats and all! Meanwhile, the horn conversation is ongoing and things still seem to be moving along without catastrophe. When you get right up on the oxcart, you are not too surprised to read the ever-present sign on its rear “Please sound horn!” What a country, what a ride, what an experience!

Our long and harrowing ride took us through lush valleys where sugar cane, rice and coconuts were being cultivated. We saw oxcarts loaded with sugar cane which is beautiful in the fields since it has a pale purple feathery topknot as it is ripening. In between the larger farms, many smaller vegetable patches were spaced and there were folks out tending them in the cool morning air. It was obvious that we were climbing into the hills above Bangalore and its surroundings and we knew that we had to make a really steep ascent to get into Ooty itself. However, not surprisingly, Mr. Ganesh needed a rest from the really tense driving so he could relax and get some lunch. About noon we stopped at a nice restaurant where the bathrooms were Western-style and we people-peeped and bird-watched while the imperturbable Mr. Ganesh enjoyed not driving for a while. He really is an excellent driver, as one would have to be to survive Indian highways!

Our first sightseeing stop was at the Summer Palace of Tipu Sultan built in 1789.

This very ornate palace is open and breezy. Every surface is covered with paintings: murals, intricate decorations with flowers and birds, columns of interesting shapes and sizes. The palace sits in a formal garden where young students were exploring. They became more intrigued with us and the young ladies wanted their pictures taken with us. Unhappily, the palace is not being maintained very successfully. The weather takes a toll on the paintings and the pictures. But it is still possible to see the glory of the place when it was the seat of Tipu’s power. Tipu was a Muslim local leader who resisted the English successfully through 3 wars. His father, Haider Ali, had also stood fast and ruled his fiefdom without interference. Tipu tried to ignore the British, but was unafraid of confronting them when they made incursions into his area of influence.

On the walls of his summer palace are 4 murals portraying scenes from the 4 Mysore Wars in which Tipu opposed the British. He was successful in three of these battles, but during the fourth he was betrayed by his own minister who shared the whereabouts of the secret entrance to Tipu’s fort with the British and they were able to enter the fort surreptitiously and destroy his palace within the fortress as well as the fort itself from within. During the battle to save his fort and his palace, Tipu was killed. After that, the British then controlled the area formerly under Tipu’s command. This event put the British within striking distance of the city of Mysore. The maharajah who ruled Mysore made an alliance with the English, avoiding open conflict with the them, thus saving his own kingdom for himself.

The Cauvery River bifurcates into two separate streams around an island and it was here that Tipu built his fort with his palace inside its protective walls. The summer palace on the shore of the River was never attacked by the British because it was essentially undefended anyway. The minister told the British that the key to entering the fort on the island was through a small watergate which the people living within the fort walls used to go back and forth to the river to obtain water. Tipu’s resistance was the last significant obstacle to the British control of south central India.

The other significant site to visit connected with the ill-fated but brave Tipu was the tomb he built for his family as well as himself. The burial complex is called a gumbaz and Tipu also had a small mosque built next to the tomb. In Southern India, women cannot enter Moslem mosques for any reason, but we learned that in the north women most certainly can visit mosques and we did enter several up there.

At Tipu’s gumbaz, we saw the typical Moslem burial pattern. The gravesites are marked with large marble rectangles with a triangular ridge on top for women and an elongated flat shape for men. Family members often bedeck these stone monuments with scarves and flowers. These structures are usually outside the main tomb edifice, where the leader and his parents are buried beneath a central dome. Even the leader’s wife is buried outside this structure as are his children. His mother & father’s tombstones flank Tipu’s own under a dome of stained glass. We would see this pattern repeated in many other Moslem burial sites in Northern India.

Mysore

After viewing the ruins of Tipu’s fort, we drove through its still-intact marble Mysore Gate and headed towards that famed city and the Mysore Palace. Though Indira Gandhi abolished Indian royalty in 1972 citing its inappropriateness in a democracy, the maharajahs often live in small apartments within their erstwhile palatial homes. This is certainly the case with Mysore’s current descendant of the maharajahs.

The beautiful palace is enormous and has been deeded to the state, except for that residence area, so that the public can visit it and view the splendors of the Age of the Maharajah’s glory. The present occupant is childless and when he dies, even his residence will become part of the larger complex and belong to the state of Karnataka. No doubt these huge palaces are much too expensive for one family to maintain any longer, so these descendants of Indian royalty find themselves in the position of many of the British brethren who must lease out their baronial manor houses and palaces for public tours and other uses or give them up because they cannot pay the taxes on them.

We saw the Mysore Palace in the distance as we are found our hotel for this evening, the Southern Star. This was not a Taj hotel nor was it a 5-star facility. It was more likely a 3-star hotel, but it was adequate and it was our base for only one night. The food was decidedly inferior here as well. We had a quick lunch (only mediocre) after we checked into our much less classy rooms, and then we headed out for sightseeing in Mysore.

The Mysore Palace, interestingly enough, was designed by a British architect under commission to the then Maharajah in the late 1800s, yet it has a modern flair for showmanship and design. The place is huge with enormous presentation rooms, private apartments, dining rooms, audience areas, artistic display hallways. Photos are not allowed inside even though the ornate decorations, complicated designs, and magnificent architectural details cry out to the camera-wielding tourists wandering through the edifice with slack jaws and depleted vocabularies trying to express their amazement.

We had already learned that entering temples (either Hindu or Jain) required one to be barefooted out of respect to the god or goddess within. Now we had discovered that walking through the palace also was done shoeless this practice necessary to restrict wear and tear on the stunning marble floors throughout the palace. This magnificent palace offered a clear testimonial to the splendor in which the maharajahs lived. The many public rooms for receiving different kinds of guests (whether foreigners, Brahmins, ordinary citizens and petitioners) also testified to the pomp and ceremony these Indian princes enjoyed.

Some rooms were decorated with pieces of colored glass and mirrors as well as precious and semi-precious stones. Others had painted scenes from the life of Vishnu in his ten incarnations. There were teak carvings everywhere even on high coffered ceilings. The goddess Lakshmi also appeared being showered by elephants with pieces of gold in wall-carvings and paintings. Lakshmi is the consort of Vishnu who is seen as the goddess of good fortune. Hanuman, the monkey-headed god, is also seen all over the palace as is Ganesh, the elephant-headed god, who is the son of Vishnu and Lakshmi and a great favorite all over India.

In passing, we learned that Mysore is a city of about 2 million people who are considered lazy and spoiled by their fellow Indians. The people evidently do not have to work hard here and the technology centers have not reached Mysore so young people who do want to move ahead need to migrate to Bangalore to take part in the economic boom times there. Nonetheless, even without significant industry, Mysore is a hazy city as well, with a strong benzene smell floating in the air (probably a result of the use of generators to produce electricity during black-outs and because of the tremendous amount of traffic on the roads). Perhaps it was due to the cool weather, but even though there are all the usual animals loitering about in the streets as well as piles of trash and garbage (there is no garbage pickup in most of India so the detritus just collects in the streets for the animals and the poor folks to pick through for something valuable), there were very few incidences of unpleasant odors as we walked and rode in the city streets.

At night, the palace exterior walls, corners, rooflines, tablatures and architraves are outlined with myriad white lights.

The impressive gates leading into the grounds are also lit up with the bright white lights. The sight is lovely and magical. Indians and foreign tourists fill the courtyards waiting for the show to begin. There is even a huge steel mirror hung near the Western gate where people unable to walk the complete distance can look away from the palace into the mirror and see the spectacle quite easily and memorably.

We returned at night to see that show and then following our experience there, Mr. Murthi led us through the open market where fresh fruits, vegetables, colorful conical piles of dyes in every conceivable hue, shoes, clothing, housewares, and electronic gear are sold in tiny stalls lining extremely narrow passageways winding their way through the large maze.

We learned the stalls are rented from the municipal government and are available for bidding every five years. Here we saw again the polite behavior of Indian people. We squeezed our way through the labyrinth filled with so many shoppers and yet there was no shoving, no pushing, no rude words or gestures. Just as it happens in the streets, the traffic moves smoothly and accident-free through these tight pedestrian walkways.

We were particularly surprised at how fresh and delicious the fruits and veggies looked. Of course, we were also frustrated by their attractive appearance since we dared not purchase any of it. Among the fetchingly displayed things we saw were pomelos, oranges, finger bananas, melons, pineapples, tiny grapes, and pears. The veggies included carrots, parsnips, peas, cabbages, cucumbers, butter beans, field peas, chili peppers, and spinach. We had already noted that peeled cucumbers are a favorite street-side snack for Indian people and we saw that these veggies come in a variety of sizes and colors.

It was 10 p.m. when we finally were ready to return to the hotel and Kay was really tired and sickly by then. Our wait for Mr. Ganesh to bring the van around to where

we were waiting in a side street seemed interminable, especially to Kay who was rapidly fading out. But finally we got back to the Southern Star and gratefully went to our rooms for a shower and a much-needed rest before an early start the next morning. Even on “early to rise” morns, it is not especially difficult for us since we are waking up around 4 a.m. anyway just the jet lag hanging on. After a slight controversy at check-out because the hotel charged us for water from the mini-bar even though they did not supply us with any bottled water in the room (not a 5-star hotel for sure), we were ready for a visit to Chamundi Hill, overlooking the city. We needed the forgiveness we hoped to receive there after the ugly thoughts we had dealing with the front desk! This hill, the highest in the city, is crowned by a Hindu temple dedicated to the goddess Chamundi who overcame a buffalo demon troubling the people in this area. It is one of the most sacred sites in South India, according to our devout Hindu guide, Mr. Murthi.

Before we drove up the hill however, we stopped to visit St. Philomena’s Church built by the 25th Maharajah of Mysore to promote ecumenism among all religions. The church was modeled after a European Gothic cathedral but it had strange items inside things sacred to many religions, in particular Christianity, Hinduism and

Islam. Evidently his purpose has been realized because we saw people of various faiths in the church, some of them even performing devotions or saying prayers. There was an enormous wasp nest hanging in one of the outside arches on the cathedral and it made me think what a hornet’s nest religion has been in the world with each one sure that it is the right and only way and that all the others are heresies or myths. This church is a reminder of that enmity among different faiths even as the Maharajah was hoping for a rapprochement between religions in his kingdom.

After we left St. Philomena’s, we drove up into the hills to reach the holy site for Hindus.

This would also turn out to be the case in front of all the temples we visited. The devout always find for sale the items they need before entering the temple.

The street leading up to the shrine was filled with stalls selling items for sacrifices or decorations and there were many people already standing in line to enter the temple. There were cows hanging about as well as one young calf. This shrine is a pilgrimage site so there are always plenty of devotees on hand. In addition, the vendors were there to provide the worshippers with the trays of offerings they needed: coconut, lotus flower, and marigolds.

We removed our shoes and stood in line to enter the temple. There was a silver column in front of the inner sanctum which told us that this is a “living” or functioning temple, not just an architectural relic. After considerable jostling in the narrow passageway inside the temple heading towards the altar, we reached a point where we could see the black-faced, flower and silk shawl draped goddess (deity or ‘diety’ as Mr. Murthi pronounced it). The faithful continued forward (we went out a side door) until they reached the Brahmin priest who marked their heads with the bindi or tikka mark to show they had earned forgiveness. Another priest gave them flowers for a burnt offering on their way out the door. As we were leaving the area, Mr. Murthi showed us the last of the ritual. On a stand at about waist height rested carved wooden heads of the buffalo demon and Chamundi’s feet carved in silver. Powders of different colors are spread about the table.

The penitent takes some of the powders and rubs them into his hands before he makes the “namaste” (a bow with hands in prayerful gesture) towards the silver feet showing his submission to the goddess.

Outside the holy shrine, we were putting our shoes back on when the young calf approached Mr. Murthi. He had some marigold flowers that he fed to the animal who gratefully and gently took them from his hand. He was a shriven penitent who was now showing proper veneration to the sacred animal of his religion. He looked pretty beatific as he fed the creature.

The view from Chamundi Hill down into the city of Mysore wasn’t shabby either. We could clearly see the wonderful palace set in its solitary splendor within its large grounds and gardens. The blue sky soared away above us and we could feel that this temple, so intricately carved with all the figures of Hindu gods and goddesses, is a very special place for the Indian people

Properly blessed by our visit, we began the trip of 74 kms that would take 4 ½ hrs to complete when we reached our next destination Ootacamund (AKA Ooty).

Ootacamund:QueenofHillStations

Once on the road towards that city, we understood why it would take so long to reach. The road up the Western Ghats (western mountain range) from Mysore is narrow, potholed to depths approaching strip mining, and curvaceous to the point of there being 36 hairpin turns to negotiate before arriving in Ooty. It really does take spectacular driving skills to make this drive and yet avoid accidents, disfigurement and death. Thanks to Jet Tours for choosing Mr. Ganesh because he possessed the appropriate skills to bring us to this “Queen of Hill Stations,” as the British called her, intact, alive and in total awe that we had survived!

Kathy’s introduction to Indian style toilets must be mentioned somewhere, so it might as well be here. We stopped for a snack and we were warned that there might not be another place in quite some time. We got the key to the ladies room and took a peek. It wasn’t too awful (we would certainly visit worse ones during the trip) but it was Kathy’s first look at a squat toilet. This fixture is at floor level with porcelain footprints to show where you place your feet.

Some of them actually flush but most do not. Some have water-filled buckets with ladles or plastic cups floating in the water that you are supposed to use to wash out the porcelain bowl. Nowhere do you want to put your hands, not on the floor certainly (which is usually quite filthy), and not on the walls to keep your balance, or to help you stand back up. For women who are not used to squatting these facilities can be quite a trial. Kathy decided that she hated them and refused to use them anywhere else. She always waited until a Western-style toilet was available. Others of us did not have that luxury.

However, there was some excitement of another sort before we reached our journey’s end. We were driving through Bandipur National Park, still in the state of Karnataka, enjoying the rhesus monkeys gamboling by the roadside as well some spotted deer in the forest. Even a working elephant was there to greet us. As we crossed the state line into Tamil Nadu state, we were flagged down by a young man in a sports shirt and trousers who gestured to Mr. Ganesh that we must pull over. He did not look “official” at all, but in a little white car at the side of the road, we could see an older man in a military looking uniform. Mr. Ganesh got out of the car and went over to the uniformed man to see what the matter was.

Well, that fellow asked for every sort of paper that Mr. Ganesh could produce to prove that he was a licensed driver, certified to take tourists from state to state, etc.

There was much to-ing and fro-ing between the cars as Mr. Ganesh attempted to satisfy the official with the appropriate paperwork. Even a cellphone call to the office in Bangalore was insufficient to let us pass. This whole process was becoming more and more tense when two fellows came out of the woods swinging machetes. We already had seen that there were three young men in the car with the uniformed man. Even Mr. Murthi was becoming edgy and we soon realized that this was a shakedown and that the man wanted to be paid a bribe (of course, he called it a “fine” because Mr. Ganesh’s papers were not in perfect order). Once that was understood, Mr. Ganesh began the bargaining process to try to bring the requested bribe down from $40.00 dollars. He was able to get off by paying $20.00 and we finally drove away. Both Mr. Ganesh and Mr. Murthi were relieved but fuming about the situation. Mr. Murthi was embarrassed that we had seen this seamier side of Indian interstate affairs.

Finally released from our tension which had not yet quite metamorphosed into actual fear, we tried to enjoy our drive through Mudamalai National Park in the state of Tamil Nadu. After all, “someone” had paid to get us this far! We asked Mr. Murthi if Mr. Ganesh would be reimbursed by Jet Tours so that the bribe did not come out of his salary and we were assured that would be the case. We also asked if the “official” and his henchmen could be reported to some authority for discipline but Mr. Murthi said it would be useless to do so and might even bring more serious repercussions against Jet Tours or Mr. Ganesh himself. Mr. Murthi muttered this was a problem based on the inability of people to see themselves as Indians rather than citizens of one state or another. He also said that such bribes were a sign of the corruption in government which has never been properly addressed. Two other vehicles had been flagged down while our payment was being determined, but both of them got away much quicker. The lone driver of a van had to produce credentials and apparently also paid a fine because he was mumbling and making angry faces as he returned to his van to continue on his way. The other car was not detained long at all and seemed to have gotten away with no “fine.”

So we dropped the subject since even well-meaning actions can often result in miserable unintended consequences. Instead we laughed at the antics of blackedfaced langurs who watched the entire shakedown with evident interest and then the

further frolics of their brothers and sisters further down the road. These all-white monkeys (except for their faces, hands and feet) are larger than the rhesus monkeys and much shyer with human beings.

As we continued on our way, we had some anxiety in the backs of our minds that another “inspection” might be demanded, but we were not further harassed on the road, even by very much traffic. Evidently, this was not a particularly popular route into Ooty and soon we would see another reason why it is not shakedowns are not popular with anyone and the 36 steep hairpin curves do not make for efficient transporting of goods or people.

The drive up grew more and more alarming as the road climbed ever higher, then narrowed, and rapidly deteriorated. Cars and trucks behind us constantly tootled at Mr. Ganesh because our Toyota van was not a bit happy about the ascent, its own load, or the constant turning. By now, we knew that the horn blowing meant Mr. Ganesh should be moving over to allow faster vehicles to pass, but there was no place to move, so maybe the constant beeping was just a habit of Indian drivers.

When we met vehicles coming down toward us the space between was no more than the proverbial “coat of paint” especially if the vehicle was a truck! We all felt compelled to draw in our breaths trying to make the space needed by our van a bit less. We were all counting those 36 S-curves down and willing the trip to be over when things got even dicier fog was rolling in making it almost impossible to see the side of the road, where there were steep fall-aways. The Nilgiri Hills, like our own Smoky Mountains, produce their own mistiness because of all the vegetation growing on their sides. The word “nilgiri” means “blue” as this persistent mist creates a bluish cast to the hills. We all unclenched our hands, breathed more deeply and nervously laughed as we finally drove into Ooty Mr. Ganesh probably more than any of us!

Olive had told us about some of their rides on this same road when the children were driven up and back from school. She well remembered our grandfather and father having to stop the car (this was a 1920s something Ford) as it overheated on the climb and pour some of the water they were carrying into the radiator to cool it off before proceeding. She remembered the drives as being very long and we could certainly believe that since our own had taken such a long time even without any

overheating. Still today, though, the road is a strain on modern cars too we saw several stopped on our way with the radiators boiling over!

This charming resort town had been built by the British in the early 1800s around a tiny village called Udagamundalam (since Independence, the town has reverted to this Indian name and now is the home of about 75,000). Perhaps the Brits had trouble with that tongue-twister and renamed it to something they could say more easily. However, everybody in the past and today still calls the town “Ooty.” The little city sits on the shoulder of the Nilgiri Hills among tea plantations and vegetable farms on steeply terraced lands at around 7000 ft. It has a natural lake (and a salubrious climate which the British greatly enjoyed. Brits from all over Southern India would visit Ooty on vacations in order to escape the scorching hot summer weather in sea-level towns and cities. Though the British are gone now, much of their influence is still seen here in the buildings, the churches, the schools, the hotels and the famous “Snooty Ooty Club” where snooker was apparently invented.

What drew us to this former English paradise was The Breeks School where our father and aunt attended boarding school during their early teens before they left India permanently. (See Page 19) .Our father was enrolled there from l927 to 1930 and Olive attended from 1929 to 1930. Obviously it was a co-educational facility, chiefly for the children of the British, but it also admitted boys from high caste Indian families as well. The school had been founded in the late 1800s and is still functioning today for the education of Indian boys and girls. The curriculum both then and now is based on the English educational model.

Home for our two nights in Ooty was the 125-year-old Taj Savoy Hotel a graceful facility spread out like children’s blocks over a broad and gentle slope.

(Our grandparents had stayed here when they visited their children at Breeks and Aunt Olive had stayed there when she returned for a visit in l971.) There was a main building containing reception, dining hall, shop, and kitchen facility. Then the duplex bungalows took off in a semi-circular arc from that structure. The rooms were really small suites with fireplaces, updated bathrooms, dressing area, and a separate porch.

All amenities were available in this wonderful 5-Star hotel, though the dining room provided rather slow service. To get a cup of tea while awaiting the meal required some rather heated persistent requests of the waiter which were always greeted with a warm and understanding smile, but no tea was forthcoming. Our first visit to this establishment required a 45-minute wait for a “cuppa”! We could never figure out why it took so long but we did get some hints this was definitely off-season for the Savoy and all teas were freshly brewed, but still .the wait seemed inordinate to us, especially since we were so thirsty most of the time. Also, it was quite a bit cooler in here than in Bangalore, so a warm drink was even more enticing.

The food served here was advertised as British Indian cuisine and it was somewhat different from the meals we had enjoyed so far particularly, there was not nearly as much peppery heat, there were more Westernized versions of familiar dishes like chicken curry, and there was also mango chutney which we learned was a British enthusiasm not an Indian one. Anyway, the kitchen staff did serve some good dishes even though we did have some waiting times. However, they did redeem themselves on the morning we left Ooty by having 4 boxed lunches ready for us at 5:30 a.m. which contained enough food for us to have fed all the students at The Breeks School a good meal.

The other much appreciated item we found at the Savoy was a book on the history of Ooty written in about 1910 by a British Army officer. It detailed the building of many of the structures in the city, the churches, schools, and administrative buildings. It discussed how these places were financed, gave interesting histories of the churches and the several boarding schools in the area, and, of course, the Ooty Club. We copied some pages from that volume on their school and on the church they attended to share with Olive on our return home.

After our very long lunch break, we met with Mr. Murthi and Mr. Ganesh for a ride up to Doddabeta Peak where Olive told us many family picnics had been held when the folks would come up to Ooty to visit their children. The peak was over 8000 ft.

There is a “new” observation tower on the peak now (new, at least since Olive’s visit in l971) and we duly climbed that and realized we were all feeling the altitude a bit. Of course, Kathy and Kay were also sick (colds and upset stomachs), so that didn’t help, but we all made it to the top. We quickly saw Pykkara Falls and enjoyed a quick peek at the panorama below us before the foggy mist rolled in and covered all with its fluffy blanket.

There were many different varieties of birds flitting about in the trees and bushes but we had no Indian bird book so we just had to admire them without any proper names to attach to them. Many Indian families were enjoying the park as well but they could also partake of the delicious-looking snacks being offered everywhere along the trail up to the very top of the peak. We had to content ourselves with bottled water, but that was all right too since we were also drinking in the scene imagining our family there enjoying each other’s company as well as whatever goodies my grandmother had brought along for the al fresco lunch.

Before making our way down, however, we had stopped at a Toda Hut model to read about that hill tribe. The Toda are a mountain people, small in stature, and not eager to assimilate into the wider Indian culture.

In the 20s, they were well-known but pretty much left alone since their degree of ferocity was untested. During some picnics, they would be seen passing through the area, and the children expressed some fright at their wild hair, fierce faces, and strange clothing, but they did not bother the British nor did the British interact with them. Grandfather said that they only wanted to be left alone.

Today there are only about 1600 pure Todas left and their children do go to school and the adults do intermingle more in the commerce and society of the Indians. The hut on display demonstrated their ancient form of shelter and many still prefer these homes today.

The thick air produced very poor visibility so our ride back to town was once again pretty much of a strain on our nerves and Mr. Ganesh’s serenity. Lower down in the valley, the mist cleared again and we visited a tea factory.

One of the reasons why the tea from this area is so good is because of this everpresent moisture in the air. The tour was interesting and we learned about the process turning the tea leaves into the drink we were really enjoying in India. It is labor-intensive since the leaves are cut by hand, they are spread out for quickdrying by hand, and much of the machinery used later on in the process is old and requires considerable human attention. However, the product is delicious and the tour guides wisely gave us each a cup of their special blend of cardamom tea that was truly delicious. So, of course, we had to purchase a few sacks to take home with us. They turned out to be excellent investments for two reasons: they taste good, and the bags were so large that it was easy to divide them into smaller bags for Christmas gifts to fellow workers for Kathy and John’s offices.

We went into downtown Ooty looking for a pharmacy to get some antibiotics for Kay & Kathy, some decongestants, and nose drops and some personal items. We were all stupefied that we were able to buy the antibiotics with no prescription but even more so at the price of this entire purchase less than $5.00 US for it all. While we were walking along this main shopping street, we saw a big sign on a low hill just above the downtown it read “The Breeks School.” Olive had told us that the school was very close by the town so it was easy for the students to go to little shops for supplies and snacks. And sure enough, there it was, right where it had been when our father had been a student there all those years ago!

We stopped at St. Stephen’s Church (Union), the oldest house of worship in the little city, built in 1830. It was neo-Gothic in style, fairly large, and it was decorated with items taken from Tipu Sultan’s palace in his fort doors, woodwork, and even some of the marble and stone. We were met inside by a couple of church members, one of whom was the church musician and he played an ancient and slightly out-of-tune piano for us enthusiastically. We also explored the cemetery attached to this church and were not surprised to find that the graves were for Britishers who had died in Ooty while serving in India, as soldiers, pastors and priests, administrators of businesses and government functionaries. Most were very old gravesites, relatively few even up into the 1920s or 1930s.

On our way back to the Savoy Hotel, we passed the little Union Church where dissenters worshipped, among which number would have been our Methodist father and aunt. We would visit it at greater length on the morrow. Meanwhile, Mr. Murthi told us to get a good night’s rest and be ready for another full day of sightseeing in “this Ooty,” this time including the Breeks School.

Using “this” as a modifier was one of Mr. Murthi’s most charming rhetorical peculiarities as in, “this Ooty contains 75,000 people”; we also appreciated his use of the adjective “shocking” for anything wondrous or beautiful as in, “this palace is really shocking;” and we also liked his rather scrambled use of the past perfect tense instead of “has been” Mr. Murthi said “was been” as in, “the present maharajah was been living in this palace since his birth.” None of this should be taken as a slur on Mr. Murthi’s excellent command of English (after all, we know only two words of Tamil: “Paysathay” and “Paysamalitavi” which our father taught us meant “Be Quiet” politely or “Shut Up” less courteously). A college educated man, Mr. Murthi was effortlessly fluent in English and these little “fluffs” merely added to the charm of his speech.

The next day found us at the “Toy Train” station in Ooty, watching the uniformed children head to their schools and office workers hurrying off to their offices, while we waited with the other tourists, mainly Indians, for the 9 a.m. sightseeing train.

This little narrow gauge train line powered by an old steam engine also carried passengers between cities in this area from Ooty to Coonore. Nowadays, its principle purpose is to take sightseers through this beautiful valley in the Nilgiri Hills. Some of the stops along the track were English names and others Indian: Lovedale, Ketti, Aravankadu, Wellington.

About 1,000,000 people live in this valley and they work chiefly at farming; here they can grow mushrooms, tea, and flowers for export. The valley is lush and green and the farmhouses look quite prosperous compared to other housing we have noted.

In Wellington, people work in the old munitions factory built by the British, now serving the Indian armed forces. Many of the workers live in the old English army barracks on the munitions plant grounds. In Coonore is lovely Simm’s Garden built by a British army officer. This public park slides down a hillside towards a little lake and it contains specimen trees and plants from anywhere Capt. Simms could get them.

Tiny women in their bright saris are the groundskeepers here and they were friendly though English was obviously not their native tongue.

Across the street, Pasteur’s Rabies Institute still stands. Here Pasteur developed and tested his rabies vaccine which has rendered that disease much less of a threat to humans and animals. Apparently, there is still laboratory science conducted at the Institute so some people find employment there as well.

We shared our train car with some Indian college students on an outing and it was amusing to watch them behaving just like young folks on a field trip from school anywhere. The boys made loud jokes and the girls giggled a lot. Every once in a while they broke into song which produced peals of laughter from the whole car. None of this was conducted in English so we missed a lot, no doubt! Two young women sitting on our same row were not of the school crowd and they occasionally looked at us and smiled shyly. They were using the train as transportation because they got off at one of the small towns after bidding us a friendly goodbye in English!

We drove back to Ooty from Coonore in our little van (Mr. Ganesh met us there) and we were again just stunned at the condition of Indian roads. Our little van was constantly falling into major potholes and then laboring to climb back out of them. Why an axle didn’t break or why the little Toyota just didn’t say “Forget it!” and give

up, I don’t know. The potholes are so huge and so close together that it’s really not accurate to say we were on a road at all—we were in potholes with a little bit concrete between them every once in a while! It’s like the old joke about wanting a little coffee with your milk this was a tiny smidgeon of road between the potholes.

Our excitement was building (or maybe it was just the rising anxiety over the constant bumps and jolts that lifted us off the van’s seats) as we got closer to Ooty because now we were going to visit The Breeks School.

Founded as a memorial to the first British Commissioner of the Nilgiri Hills, Mr. J. W. Breeks, the school opened on Church Hill (its present location) in 1886 and has been in continuous operation ever since. The school buildings are red brick and the whole property is fairly well cared for, unlike so many older structures we have seen. We entered what appeared to be the Administration Building and were quickly shown into the office of Mr. N. Raman, Principal. He was somewhat reserved at first, suffering from a cough and cold, it appeared. He warmed up a bit as he caught some of our excitement over this visit and pulled out a record book of the enrollments during the l920s. To our great satisfaction and pleasure, there, in the appropriate years, appeared our father’s name and Aunt Olive’s. The records showed when they enrolled, how old they were, what school they had transferred from, and what level of education they had reached along with information on our grandfather.

Right there on those wrinkled pages, written in a very clear hand, was our father’s full name and all that information. A thrill of recognition almost like a shock ran through us to see this long ago puzzle piece! Somehow words on a page make things more real than spoken words and here we were in that place seeing Aubrey Denis Gray written in the Book of Registrations.

Our father, from 11 to 14 ½ had lived here and studied here. He had walked the same streets we had explored last night. Here he had met the maharajah’s son who took him on the tiger hunt we had heard about all our lives. It was at this school that angry Indian cooks often put cigarette butts in the morning porridge to enjoy some pretty revenge against the Brits or at least their children. It was in these streets that boys who had the misfortune of wetting their beds had to carry their wet sheets through the town for all to see their lack of control. On the playing field here, our father had his nose broken playing soccer (or maybe it was hockey). These contemporary records, few words though they were, seemed to make our father’s teen years more real to us. This was a most auspicious day under bright blue blessing skies we had found what we sought. Another missing piece of the jigsaw puzzle fitted into place firmly.

Though it was good to see the Union Church where non-Anglican Christians worshipped in those days, the place didn’t have the same emotional overtones as the school. However, it wasn’t hard to picture our father and aunt, with scrubbed shiny faces and Sunday best clothes and shoes, in these pews listening to the minister who also happened to be the headmaster of the school during the time they were in residence. Probably, when Grandmother and Grandfather were visiting on a Sunday, the whole family went together to this church. It is now a muted avocado green and has a traditional appearance, not nearly so grand as the Anglican Church, St. Stephens. It is about 25 years younger than St. Stephens as well. Its greater simplicity is not surprising since in those years, dissenters, as they were called, were protesting against “popish” elements in Anglicanism.

The sun had settled down behind Church Hill and the Union Chapel as we rode back to the Savoy for our last night here. Kathy and John had successfully sustained a fire in their fireplace the first night and were determined to do so again since Kathy was feeling a bit iffy because of her cold. Kay was feeling somewhat better but still had the persistent cough. John & Lois had tried out the hammock in front of the bungalows earlier in the day and had tried to talk Kay and Kathy into attempting a graceful swing. But it was too chilly for anyone to want to stay outside after dark. So we said good night to Mr. Murthi and Mr. Ganesh and went to our rooms, knowing that our wake-up call would be very early in the morning 4:30 a.m.

Our leaving Ooty was just as treacherous as our arrival dawn was still just over the horizon so there was little light but the misty fogginess had definitely settled over everything. The windshield kept fogging over and the wipers could barely swish it away before the blinding vapor clouded our vision again (and Mr. Ganesh’s too). A few people and animals were astir and, as usual, crowding the shoulders of the narrow roadway, making it even scarier that visibility was so reduced. We were on

the same route as we had taken back from the Toy Train ride yesterday, but everything looked so different—a world transformed by the dark and murkiness. But gradually the dawn began to break over the hills and we could pinks glowing in the east and then golden light gliding along the hilltops. The puffy clouds changed color and the whole world looked like a Fragonard painting. We held our breath at the beauty, for a change, not in fear of the low light and terrible road.

The dark leaked away behind the hills and the farms and fields materialized in the crepuscular light. Hard as it was to believe, the roadway heading down from Ooty towards Coonore and Coimbatore where we were to catch our flight to Madras was actually worse than the side we had driven up the day before. Potholes were more jarring, frequent and deep. The tired little van often bottomed out in these cavernous holes. As the light increased so did the traffic, especially the trucks bringing veggies and other supplies into Ooty. Kathy was much improved from her cold, but now the symptoms of upset stomach had resurfaced and she spent quite a bit of time in the rear of the van concentrating on her interior.

The trip down took the usual 4 hours, including a stop where Misters Murthi and Ganesh could have some breakfast. We broke into our boxed lunches and ate what we could. There were two enormous sandwiches each and bananas. All good, but way too much for us. When we reached Coimbatore, Mr. Murthi and Mr. Ganesh were prepared to wait for our plane to depart before they left, but we assured them that wasn’t at all necessary. They had an eight hour horrendous car trip before them to return to Bangalore and needed to start out as quickly as possible. We gave them each their tips, thanked them for their wonderful help, and sent them immediately on their way home

Chennai(Madras,totheBritish)

We didn’t wait long for our flight and we were amazed that they actually served a hot meal in the 40 minutes we were on board the plane! And US planes don’t feed you even on 3 and 4 hour flights! The trip was good and we could see the ground the whole way to the coast, making for interesting sightseeing. All our luggage was awaiting us as was Marcus and a driver from Jet Tours. Kathy had been a little apprehensive about our long drive and our flight, but she was feeling much better when we reached Madras.

Our first stop was to check into the lovely old Taj Connemara Hotel. Aunt Olive had stayed at this same hotel on her return visit to India. The hotel is quite luxurious and venerable with pictures in the hallways of all the famous and notable people who have stayed here.

We just about had time to deposit our luggage, visit the loo, freshen up a bit and then we hurried down to meet Stanley, our guide at this site. We knew that there was much Indo-British history in this place as well as several spots we wanted to visit connected with our family’s history. Since we were leaving Madras the very next day, there was no time to waste!

Our first and most wonderful discovery was that our very dignified and knowledgeable guide, Stanley, was a Christian. That is pretty amazing in a country where only 2-3% of Indians are followers of Christianity. But what really blew us away after we had told him about what we wanted to see was the even more astonishing fact that he was a member of the very church our grandfather had been pastor of all those years ago. Stanley appeared to be in his 60s and he had been a member since he was in his teens. Though his family were Indian, they had been living in Sri Lanka when he was born, but they had returned home when he was about 12. How in the world we ended up with Stanley as our guide was too coincidental to believe, but it was certainly our excellent fortune and we really appreciated him.

Appropriately enough, Stanley had the driver take us to Emmanuel Methodist Church first thing. When Grandfather was pastor there (at two different times), the Church was called Vepery Road Methodist Church.

At that time, Britishers were the parishioners; now, of course, the members are Indians. It is a very busy church, according to Stanley, with excellent attendance every Sunday. The church conducts many outreach programs for the community and is very active during the week as well. We looked in the parish records for some notation of our grandparent’s wedding that occurred in April 1911, but could not find one. However, we did find records of his two pastorate periods at this church 1923-25 and again in 1929-30. And, even though the church has been remodeled a few times since our grandfather’s time, prominently displayed near the altar area is a list of the pastors at the church since its beginning. In gold letters, we could read “W. G. Gray” twice.

Stanley also introduced us to the current minister, but he was not particularly happy to see us since he was on his way to conduct a funeral at another site. He seemed pretty preoccupied, much too busy to talk with some Americans looking for British roots. Stanley seemed a little embarrassed by his minister’s brusqueness, but he himself more than made up for any deficiencies in that quarter. He was an excellent historian of the church and showed us what changes had been made over the years. He also took us into the church office and we looked at some pictures of the church in earlier times. The ladies in the church were very helpful and kind too. We took several pictures in and around the church building and again tried to use our imaginations to understand how it might have been back in the 20s and 30s. Unfortunately, the parsonage at this church had also been removed in order to make room for a fellowship hall, offices, and storage.

Having told Stanley that our grandfather had also been pastor at the Tamil Methodist Church, he next took us there. This is a red brick structure that has not been changed much over the years.

Stanley reported that it too is a very active church with a large congregation. Moreover, most services at both churches are now conducted in Tamil on most occasions. That church had no records to speak of; again the terrible South Indian climate has taken its toll. However, at the back of the church was a large plaque with the names of all the ministers who have served here as well. Though they had grandfather’s dates of service impossibly wrong, it was still good to see his legacy recorded there.

The minister at this church was much more welcoming, friendly, outgoing, and interested in the fact that our relative had been a pastor there. He even offered a prayer for us when we were leaving. Kathy and I were not a little embarrassed at having to admit that we were not Methodists, but he did not hold that against us and said a nice prayer anyway.

As we drove around this really big city, the first port and headquarters started in India by the East India Company, Stanley told us a few other important things about it. Presently, it has a population of 6 million people and it is one of the hottest places to live on the subcontinent. Nonetheless, it has thrived since its founding and continues to do so today.

The saddest thing to us was that this was the only place in India where we ever saw an accident and it involved a truck that hit a bullock cart and killed the matched pair of white Brahmas. We felt bad for the animals, but even worse for the man who owned them. Surely they must have represented a considerable part of his personal wealth, if not all of it; but Stanley assured us that the truck driver and/or the company he drove for would have to reimburse the man for his loss.

After the leaving the family “precincts,” we drove along the beaches on the Bay of Bengal to reach the Church of St. Thomas, the oldest Roman Catholic church in the country. Jesus’ disciple Doubting Thomas is supposed to have begun the conversion of India by preaching in what is now Goa. At one time he was buried in the crypt at this church, but Portuguese descendants of Goa families requested that he be removed to that part of India. This church now claims to have a major relic a little finger of the Saint. The church also seems to be attracting people of many faiths but there are a goodly number of Indian Catholics who attend this church as well. It is very large and quite beautiful, all in white marble with wonderful stained glass windows and many lovely side chapels.

St. Thomas also has several outreach programs to help poor, young and/or sick people. It would appear that the Christian churches in South India have continued to work through various kinds of ministries even though their accomplishments in terms of percentage of Indian converts remains small.

Next we visited a famous and very large Hindu temple dating from several centuries back. It was quite colorfully painted (Stanley told us that the temples refurbish their exteriors every couple of years with new coats of paint) with the gods and goddesses also often carved in larger than life-size proportions. There were also plenty of smaller friezes depicting stories from the lives of the gods as well as their animal servants. Surprising to us was the use of neon lighting on the temple structures. Sayings and greetings were lit up like Las Vegas. This particular temple was dedicated toVishnu.

The temple complex contained several buildings and courtyards for sacrifices and prayers. The inner sanctum of the temple was manned by Brahman priests who marked the penitents with the typical “third eye” on their foreheads. This mark denotes the willingness of the worshipper to “look within” at his own soul. The typical column was present to denote that the temple is a functioning one and the

goberum (or entrance way) was very impressive. There was considerable incense being burned as well as flowers emitting their odors all around us. I began to feel sickly and thought perhaps the “Delhi belly” was upon me for sure. Then I realized that I had a terrible sore throat and headache, so I knew that Kay and Kathy had passed the infamous cold on to me. By the time we finished exploring the temple, I was really sick. The backseat of the van looked really inviting and I got back there and slept until we returned to the hotel. After a shower and some soothing ice cream for supper, I definitely felt better. Kathy was in the more annoying (to herself) than sick part of the cold and Kay was much better except for her persistent cough!

The next morning was our chance to visit Mahabalipuram though the forecast hurricane standing off the coast in the Bay of Bengal made us wonder about the advisability of going south. However, our flight to Delhi didn’t leave until right after the noon hour, so we jumped in the van with Stanley and went tooling off down the coast highway. We watched the surf becoming more angry and foamy and the winds were picking up too; but the weatherman had assured everyone that the storm would not make landfall until this night or early in the morning.

The coast drive was revelatory of how the poor fishing people live along the coast, especially since the devastating tsunami of December 2004. Most of the folks didn’t have very substantial housing before the disaster, but now the governmentconstructed huts are even more pitiful.

The whole area did not look wholesome at all, but these folks are waiting for their government to help just as the victims of Katrina and Rita are waiting in our own country. We saw that these fisher folk also keep goats that live right along the main road with them.

Their boats are pulled up on to the beach for safekeeping when the men are not out fishing. Netting to be repaired is piled everywhere as well. Swimming is not a popular activity along this section of the Bay of Bengal because it is pretty much sharkinfested. This area was one of the poorest appearing places we saw in India, probably made much worse by the tsunami.

This coast highway is really good, especially when compared with all streets and roads we saw in other places we have been so far. Mahabalipuram is a World Heritage Site so the Indian government maintains the highway in good repair to make it easily visited by foreign and domestic tourists. The site is about 45 km from Chennai itself. We passed many small hotels and restaurants catering to the Indian tourists, many of them right on the beach. Hindu temples were always interspersed among these commercial enterprises. The coast was attractive and most of the foliage was very familiar to us Floridians oleander, bougainvillea, lantana, and jacaranda.

There are several blocks of little shops and stalls where modern rock carvings are made and sold before the World Heritage Site is reached. We walked along the street, smiling at the monkeys, goats and donkeys that lined the tops of the shops. We could never really see how the goats and donkeys reached the roofs but somehow they did. They looked down at us from their high vantage points and seemed to grin at us as well. The monkeys would follow us into the Site itself and gambol and scamper among the huge carved stones and temples.

Mahabalipuram is a place of historical and religious significance. The Pallavas who were dominant in southern Indian from the 4th to the 9th centuries were probably most responsible for its art work. The site is centered on an enormous granite outcropping right on the shore. Huge temples and grottoes, and larger than life animal statues have been carved out of the living stone over those years.

Temples are colonnaded with several styles of columns and then within the “room” created by carving out the stone ever deeper, there will be friezes with animals, gods, men and the depiction of many stories of the interactions of these figures. Gods performing miracles in answer to the people’s supplications and sacrifices; animals carrying their particular gods in procession: Shiva riding Nandi the bull, Lakshmi riding her tiger, Ganesh on his mouse; people tending their cattle or planting in the fields. The carvings are marvelously life-like, incredibly delicate especially considering the lack of sophisticated tools these early people possessed, and spectacularly beautiful. There are huge elephant statues around the very large site. There is a pagoda type temple very near the crashing waves on the shore; a breakwater has been created to try to prevent this structure from being totally undermined and lost to the tides. It was of especial concern when the tsunami’s effects was being assessed, but by some fluke it survived with no real damage.

In front of one of the enormous elephant statues, there is a large, uncarved, boulder of granite. We have a picture of our father and our aunt sitting on that boulder when they were about 9 and 12. We have another picture of Olive on the same stone when she returned in 1971 for a visit back to this favorite vacation spot of the family. So, of course, we wanted a picture of Kathy and I atop that spot during our visit. The whole series is quite evocative to us of family heritage and continuity.

Aubrey and Olive Gray in 1928

Aubrey’s Daughters, Kathy and Lois Gray, in 2005

We had a particularly nice buffet lunch at a lovely hotel right next to the World Heritage Site and then visited the gift shop associated with the Site. Things were reasonable in price and proceeds were dedicated to the maintenance of the wonderful place, so we did quite a bit of shopping there decorative pillowcases, statues, pictures, postcards. After a stroll through the grounds of the hotel (where we saw worker ladies in their saris actually trimming grasses between stepping stones with scissors!), we headed for the beach so we could touch the waters of the Bay of Bengal. Temperature was about what it would be in Hollywood at the same time of year. Then it was time to head for the Chennai Airport so we could fly to Delhi to join the Cross Culture tour of Northern India and meet our fellow adventurers on this part of our exploration of India.

This flight took us away from the area imbued with emotions because of its connection with our family and into a part of India they never even visited during their time of living here. Our Aunt Olive thinks that Granddad may have gotten to Delhi once but she does not think he ever even saw the Taj Mahal. Certainly, there would be no family associations to trace down to visit. Hardest to realize was the fact that we had only been in India 5 days. It felt so much longer, but we were reaching across a span of many years in this part of the visit. We really did not have time to process what we had seen or felt in the South completely, but we did realize that we had encountered several places that helped us fill in a small section of that jigsaw puzzle picture.

THISANDTHAT

Flight Security

As we have become accustomed, our Jet Air flight to Delhi was very well run. Despite the most rigorous security measures any of us have ever seen anywhere in the world, flights leave in timely fashion, meals are served in record time, and things seems to be in very good control. Indian airport security is amazing. When you arrive at the airport, you are not allowed into the gate waiting areas until about an hour before your flight. You then go through a security check that involves personal searching (men in one place, women in another), luggage checks and x-ray inspection, and all kinds of paperwork, tags and stickers to prove you have passed these safeguards. Then you wait in the gate area for your flight to be called. As you proceed out of the building, your hand luggage is checked again and some people

are pulled out of line for another personal search (patting down is pretty thorough). You go up the jet-way and present your boarding pass and then your carryon is checked again for the appropriate stickers. You are also cautioned to save your ticket stub because it will be checked again as you deplane. This detailed procedure was minimum. At some airports we underwent more repeat checks. During one boarding, we actually were frisked in a booth out on the tarmac and this was after we had already been wanded, patted down, and checked through!

Maybe this much security is required because of continuing internal hostilities in India between political factions, religious groups, and castes. Whatever, we landed safely in Delhi and were taken to our hotel in this capital city at once: The Taj Palace. It is another 5-star property and we enjoyed it. We had a light snack in the Café Fortuna there and it was tasty. By this time, Kathy is feeling much better, Kay’s ears are completely clogged and Lois cannot talk due to the cold. But we are ready to begin our explorations of Northern India. There was no meeting of the group today, so we went to bed early and nursed our various ills John exulting in his good health!

Trip Rejects

We met the fellow travelers in the morning and thought that we had a compatible group. There was another family of four visiting together because of a similar history. Rick’s father had been born in India because his grandfather worked for the YMCA and helped to establish clubs in Northern India. However, his father and his aunt left the country at 4 and 1 years of age respectively, so he did not have the same feelings about his visit as Kathy and I. His father had never returned to the country of his birth and there were no family stories since he had no real memories to share with his family. However, the folks seemed friendly and as eager to explore as we were. That family consisted of Rick, his wife, and 2 sons. Then there was a married couple, and three single ladies.

There will not be much said about our fellow travelers because as the trip progressed we grew to dislike them more and more. They were chronic complainers about everything. They carped and whined and griped audibly. They attacked our guide, Suez, about any inconvenience even when the matter was not under his control. They were infuriated with him because Air India cancelled one of our internal flights, causing us to have to fly during the day rather than at night, thus

losing some of our sightseeing time. They bashed him over the fact that two days before our arrival in Delhi the government had seen fit to close the Red Fort for renovations, as if he could have prevented that from occurring. And, like the proverbial elephants, they never forgot or forgave anything that went wrong. Though the Red Fort closing disappointment was discovered on our first day of travel, they recurred to it all the way through the trip! Every time something new was not to their liking, they recalled their anger over the Red Fort and the cancelled flight. Most ridiculous of all, they lambasted Suez because Indian roads are not American highways: it often took us many hours to cover what were really short distances but the road conditions did not facilitate efficient travel. What Suez was supposed to have done about the roads in preparation for their arrival remained a mystery to us.

The most common and irritating grousing, however, was about any changes in the written itinerary. We had all received a final itinerary just days before we left, but it was not the same one that Suez had. Therefore, the group continually secondguessed him about the day’s schedule, about the order in which we would be visiting places, and whether or not he was omitting sites mentioned in our schedules. Even when he explained that we would be seeing everything highlighted in the brochure and schedule but at a different time of day, they would not be placated. They would not desist from moaning and groaning about the change even when he explained that some places were better visited at hours other than those in the schedule for reasons of lighting, crowds, and traffic. They were always absolutely convinced that Suez was cheating us out of something wonderful!

The four of us began to find them intolerable and were barely civil at trip’s end. Unfortunately, though the displeasures were first expressed by the other family group, their negativity gradually pervaded the mental attitudes and audible comments of all the others. They were rude and hateful to Suez and we are pretty sure that some of them actually “stiffed” him at tip time. Anyway, they were folks we will not be keeping in contact with and we had to actively ignore them and refuse to be made unhappy or frustrated with our wonderful trip to Northern India.

All our own family group liked Suez and were impressed with his ability to get things done in a way transparent to us, to get us in places where we might not have been permitted, and in his obvious knowledge of the history, current culture and political scene in India. He seemed to know people everywhere we went and certainly knew

how to work the system. He and Ati (the owner of Cross Culture) were able to pull off the miracle of getting Kathy and John on the trip extension well into the regular part of the trip. That meant they found plane reservations both domestically and back to the USA, as well as hotel accommodations, and all other aspects of the trip. It also meant that Suez accompanied us on the trip extension. Had Kathy and John not joined that portion of the trip, we would have all been on our own, having to manage all the little details that Suez accomplished so easily and without any trouble to us! However, the sour folks who continued on the extension with us (three less than the regular trip) did not like him any better than before and we certainly were no more enamored of them.

At the very beginning, we four also found Suez a bit off-putting because of his nasty habit of chewing some sort of tobacco-betel nut blend that made his teeth appear to belong to a vampire who had just partaken of a blood meal. Gradually we were able to overlook that failing and enjoy his thorough knowledge of Indian culture, history and present day events. He is a Muslim who is the head of his very extended family, responsible for all its members. He enlightened us about Indian family relations. In particular, we found it helpful to learn that in most Indian languages there is no word for “cousin” so those relatives on both sides of the family are called “brothers and sisters.”

The oldest competent male is the head of the extended family and must see that all family members are fed, educated, treated when they are ill, married to appropriate people, insured their fair share of whatever family wealth and property there may be. It is indeed a heavy burden to bear for people who are not wealthy.

Suez had a couple of personality traits which we found somewhat annoying (as well as detrimental to his financial interests): he tended to “brag” a bit about his family’s position, wealth and importance and he discussed his own personal life a bit more than most of us needed to know. As a guide, his biggest fault was his unwillingness to answer questions about the schedule directly or at the time asked. Perhaps, however, that was a passive-aggressive way of “getting even” with the rotten tourists in our group. He proved himself to be a thoughtful and kind person too and never returned rudeness with sarcasm or invective. Taken as a package, Suez was an excellent manager of travel in a very complex society, he had all the right connections to get things done efficiently, and he knew his “stuff” regarding all aspects of the culture we might think to ask about.

NORTHERNINDIA(FEWCHANCESOFPUZZLEPIECES)

Though we knew that there would be nothing in this part of the country that could be directly connected with our family, we hoped that learning more about this remarkable country would help us fill in the background of our jigsaw puzzle. Perhaps we would learn more about what makes India so special. Perhaps we could connect some of the culture with our understanding of how our grandparents related to their adopted home as well as how my father grew to be the person he became. Those were our hopes at any rate.

Delhi

The chief evidence of Muslim culture in India available to the tourist is the architectural heritage. The Moghul Emperors discussed at the beginning of this journal were all Muslims and because they were rich and powerful, they could have forts, castles, palaces, mosques and tombs of great proportions and intricate designs built anywhere and everywhere they wanted them. Delhi, the city, was a creation of Shah Jehan (builder of the Taj Mahal) in about 1648. He created the city for his capital and thus he adorned it with many large buildings and structures.

The largest and most impressive of these is the Jama Masjid which remains today as the largest mosque in India.

The monumental complex was constructed over several years from 1644 to 1658 and it required 5000 artisans to create its marvelous designs and its basic architecture. The materials used to build this place were red sandstone and white marble. There are 3 gateways, 4 large towers, and 2 high minarets in the complex. We were amused by the many green parrots that nested in any crevice or crack they could find in the structure. They flew over our heads and raucously called out to one another all during our visit.

Other structures to be seen in Delhi of Moghul design are Humayun’s Tomb built by his grieving widow to house the remains of her beloved husband (the emperor who had died falling down a stone stairway) in about 1572.

This building now encloses the tombs of about 1000 Muslim noblefolks. It too is constructed of red sandstone and white marble and it is considered the earliest example of the Persian influence on Indian architecture. We also visited Isa Khan’s tomb which predated Humayun’s by about 20 years and like all the others it is enormous (a small village occupied the space in the early 20th century) but the architecture does not show the Persian influence; it is more purely Indian in design, with large decorative canopies, lattice screens in marble, and glazed tiles.

The highest tower in India, the Qutub Minar is located in this area also and it reaches 72 meters in height; it is constructed of red and buff sandstone in alternating layers.

A more modern place we visited here was Raj Ghat, the site of Gandhi’s cremation and memorial. There is a black marble square overflowing with a continuous fountain as well as being bordered by an eternal flame. Marigolds are seen decorating the black block in tribute to Gandhi’s reputation as the father of the

country. In this same garden spot, Indira Gandhi and her son Rajiv also have their cremation spots memorialized. The lawns are deep green and well-cared for but the area is fairly simple and unadorned.

We also visited India Gate, a triumphal arch built by the British in honor of the 80,000 Indians who fought with England in the First World War. It is now also the site of the tomb of India’s unknown soldier. An honor guard is always present at the Gate. Lit with floodlights at night, it is an impressive site. Soldiers of different religions are given the honor of guarding the tomb of the unknown soldier in weekly rotations: a Hindu one week, then a Sikh, then a Jain, a Muslim next and so on until all major religions are represented. A Sikh was the guard of honor the evening we visited and he was quite snappy in his red jacket and black turban. Sikhs always wear turbans because they never cut their hair. There were many people, mostly Indians, at India Gate that night and they were all behaving respectfully. Even though those 80,000 Indians may not have had the right to decline service with the British, they had obviously fought with courage and dedication.

Delhi and New Delhi really sort of melt into one another so it is difficult for the tourist to know when he has gone from one part of the city to the other. Most of the ancient edifices are in the original part and most of the current government buildings (mostly left over from the British days) are in the newer sections. The streets and avenues of the city are the best we have seen (and the best we would ever see as we later learned) and traffic flowed well. There were signal lights and lane markings to help with safe driving and there were a minimum of animals to be seen on the streets among all the cars and trucks. The real problem with the city was that shared by all Indian cities and larger towns smog and pollution! Besides winter being the period of climatic inversions which trap smoke and dust in the lower atmosphere, the lack of a regular electricity supply is the chief culprit. All businesses, restaurants, stores, apartment buildings, and public places turn on their generators as soon as the electricity is interrupted and so the smog builds and builds and has nowhere to go since the upside-down bowl effect keeps it from dissipating.

Jodhpur:TheBlueCity

Our next destination in northern India was the city of Jodhpur, on the edge of the Thar Desert in the State of Rajasthan. We had to fly there during the day on Air India since an early afternoon flight had been cancelled. (one of the unforgivable sins attributed to our poor guide, Suez.) That meant we arrived around noon and then left the next day with a return to Jodhpur scheduled a day or so later. This switching of the trip’s order caused huge consternation and rancor among our fellow passengers. Oh well, this was to become the “pattern” throughout the trip.

Amid much grumbling about a delayed lunch, Suez nonetheless persisted in his plan to give us a home-hosted meal. The bus deposited us in front of a house in the outskirts of town with a balcony open on the street and lots of flowers and plants decorating the grating on the balcony.

The lovely little lady welcomed us into her home and we immediately removed our shoes as we had been instructed to do before we arrived. There was a fairly large living room/dining room area off the balcony and we were invited to sit on the pillows and mattresses lining the walls. Low tables were arranged around the center of the room. A few at a time, we were invited to visit the kitchen which was so very tiny that it was hard to believe that the lady could turn out enough food for our group, especially since she was preparing everything fresh only when we had arrived.

While we waited for our hostess to complete the meal, we talked uneasily among ourselves and explored as much of the house as we had been invited to see. Suez had told us that this lady was middle class economically and also a Muslim; however we would not see any differences in the foods she served because of those factors. She too would not be offering beef. Kathy and John saw a tiny mouse skitter towards the pile of our shoes and take a few sniffs. Apparently Western feet were not inviting, because he did not stay long at his explorations.

Finally the food emerged from the kitchen on trays brought by our hostess and her daughter. The meal was rather like a “tapas” meal in a Spanish restaurant. There were many small dishes of different things to be sampled by everyone. Suez told us this would be the best meal we would enjoy in India, but even after the trip was over I don’t think any of us agreed with that prediction. As a matter of fact, it is difficult for me to even remember what we had that was especially tasty or unusual. I know her chapattis were warm and delicious but that is about all I remember distinctly about the meal. We all thanked her warmly and appreciatively and reboarded our bus for the rest of the trip into the city of Jodhpur.

So what is Jodhpur famous for besides giving its name to a distinctive style of riding breeches? Its chief calling card is definitely the beautiful and overpowering Mehrangarh Fort built on a bluff almost 400 ft. above the surrounding desert plains.

It is a sandy-hued enormity erected in 1459 by an embattled maharajah named Rao Jodha. He meant for the fort to put a stop to all the attacks his kingdom had been enduring, so the walls are 68 ft wide and 117 ft. high. From its commanding position, the Fort certainly appears to be impregnable and it did prove to be so. Nowadays, the Fort is a museum to display the riches of the era as well as the armaments, the architecture, and the furnishings the nobility enjoyed.

Interior Walls of magnificent design and workmanship

The museum is informative and impressive and it was our first look at the splendor that the Northern Indian rajahs enjoyed. Some rooms have stained glass windows and skylights through which the desert sunlight plays in marvelous colors. Other rooms are more inward looking and have bits of mirror and semi-precious stones reflecting light from their walls. There is delicate, carved wood and stone adorning corridors as well as rooms. Sandstone and marble lattice screens separate parts of the palaces from the fort areas.

Highly decorated infant cradles, thrones, and carriages are also on display. In all history, everywhere, the rich have lived so much more luxuriously than the poor, but here in India the contrast seems even more stark. These maharajahs lived in ostentatious magnificence while their subjects were existing in the most appalling poverty and need.

Standing on the ramparts of the fort, one can see to the east the tiny houses and other buildings painted blue. A good salesman must have come through the city at one time with a really good deal on blue paint and now the townspeople look upon the color as something lucky. It does make for an interesting backdrop to the ochre fort above and the gleaming golden sun rays playing again the shiny blue surfaces.

Looking westward, one sees the crematoria area bounded on one side by the Jaswant Thada, or white marble cenotaph, marking the area where Hindus are cremated after death. Even this view is remarkable for the gleaming white walls of the cenotaph and the smaller monuments marking various ghats for the cremations. The brazen desert sky of blue arches over all and creates a breathtaking panorama.

Most people walk the narrow alleyways leading down from the fort into the center part of the city and we certainly made that trek too. The narrow passageway is stone-lined and rather slick even in this dry climate. Here the poverty of India is quite obvious and stark. The little buildings where the folks live and work crowd the alley and push pedestrians, cows, strangely silent dogs, children relieving themselves, businessmen selling little items like pots and pans, water jugs, clothes, and all into the shadowy stream of motion. Because it was winter, there wasn’t much smell on this squalid route, but we could only imagine what odors the combination of human and animal wastes, strange cooking odors (kerosene, cow-

patty fuel, & coal), and rotting vegetation and other food products would have produced! This alley in Jodhpur was the most dispiriting place I saw in all of India.

John had an adventure of his own here. Ever the alert photographer, he spotted a young bull ambling along just behind us. He turned to get a face-on shot and the belligerent fellow charged him. We all scattered but John jumped highest; however, he got his photo!

More modern history produced a maharajah here named Man Singh (1803-1843) whose palace in the lower part of the city is also a fine museum. The architectural features of his home introduced us to the style for most such palaces. There is usually an outer audience atrium for the common folk to meet with the Maharajah to discuss their problems, quarrels, etc., an inner, more intimate audience chamber for him to meet with important people and dignitaries and then the innermost part where the ruler and his family actually live. The least decorated but still quite impressive section is the public arena, the audience chamber is usually quite splendid with many columns and highly decorative arts displayed, and then the private residence is often more simply but still richly decorated.

The other important things to be seen in Man Singh’s palace are the wonderful paintings he commissioned from various artists depicting life in the palace, in the desert around Jodhpur, the religious holidays and their particular rites and customs, grand parades, royal hunts, and important marriages. These pictures are quite large and very colorful even today. What an intimate glimpse they seem to offer behind the scenes in a maharajah’s public and private life. Modern historians and biographers trying to recreate visions of these times must really treasure these fine creations both for their intrinsic charm and for the history lessons they provide!

Jaisalmer:TheGoldenCity

Still in the north westernmost state of India, we headed ever further towards the setting sun and the heart of the desert on our way to Jaisalmer, the city closest to Pakistan that we would visit. The Thar desert is a spare but beautiful place because of the golden palomino color of its sands and because of the magical dunes that pile up the further west we went. In different light those sands could look pink too. The desert itself is stony and harsh.

The slippery sands soften its appearance and make the surroundings romantically beautiful. Looking more closely, one can see the perpetual dust on everything especially the stricken trees and bushes along the roadway. Thorny acacias are most common and they seem right for the surroundings; they lift their leafless branches like skeleton fingers poking holes in the blue sky. The colorful bougainvillea blossoms struggle against their furry coat of dust, trying to shine through with all their beauty. The sun shines pitilessly on all: the cattle and camels, the people in their filmy but colorful clothing, the thirsty plants. There are some native animals in

Carrying Laundry to Lake

this desert area, chiefly chinkara deer and black buck, but we see only one or two far away from the road, trying to find bits of shade. Even in December wintertime, the temperatures here are hot but we can only imagine how torrid this area becomes under summer suns.

Rajasthan is the only place in the world where camels actually pull carts and we saw several of these conveyances on our long ride.

Camels thrive here and are also used for riding as well. It is the single-humped dromedary camel who lives in this part of the world. Villages are small; usually the few buildings are huddled together in parched agricultural fields. Suez tells us that smuggling and poaching are ongoing problems here as they have always been. This part of India is also a transshipment area for drugs but India herself does not produce drugs.

We see many peacocks, the national bird of India. Suez informs us that the birds are tough but very destructive of crops. Male peacock tail feathers are used for many things, decorations, fans, and brooms, chiefly to sweep temples. Everywhere we went, we were enticed to purchase some of these peacock products but all of us knew that they could not be brought back into the USA.

The further west we proceed, the stranger things look. The bushes and trees become flat-topped, still covered with dust but very peculiar in shape. Huts are round with thatched roofs. Ladies are wearing the trousers and matching kneelength over-dresses. Like the more traditional saris, they are very flamboyant and made of several different kinds of materials like cotton, linen and silk. The road keeps improving and that is surprising until Suez tells us that there is a very large military post in Jaisalmer so there must be a good road to keep the military moving. We see lots of neatly made fences which seem to enclose nothing and that is a puzzle to us.

Black-faced sheep live in this desert environment as well as “Joseph coat” goats. And, as always, there are dogs everywhere well-behaved and preternaturally quiet. Surprising it is to learn that they grow mustard, chili peppers and watermelons in this terrain. We keep expecting to see cactus growing but there are none we can spy.

Occasionally we see stacks of red peppers drying in the sun and here and there are ladies in their brilliant colors sitting among the piles separating the dried peppers from their green leafy tops. For this, the ladies make 70 rupees per 12 hour day about 50 cents.

The scenery keeps getting hillier and even drier if that is possible as we continue on our way. Off in the distance rises a white Hindu temple sparkling under the desert sky. The closer we get, the larger it grows in our eyes. Signs advertising STD are incongruous even though they are everywhere. However, it does not mean what we Americans think instead it signifies “short trunk distance” and refers to telephone availability.

The cattle here are tough Brahmas; we see women pulling down limbs of the acacias for their cattle to feed. The grass is coarse and very hard on animal teeth, even cud-chewers like the cattle. At one place, we see a long line of cattle flowing over the golden sands without any apparent human guidance; it looks like a migratory herd of wild animals but we know it is not.

Another strange sight on the road to Jaisalmer is a lone equestrian statue out in the desert wastes. No park around it, no delineation of any kind actually. Suez tells us the statue commemorates some probably now forgotten local hero.

The statue makes me think of Shelley’s poem “Ozymandias.”

I met a traveler from an antique land Who said: Two vast and trunkless legs of stone Stand in the desert. Near them, on the sand, Half sunk, a shattered visage lies, whose frown, And wrinkled lip, and sneer of cold command, Tell that its sculptor well those passions read Which yet survive, stamped on those lifeless things, The hand that mocked them and the heart that fed: And on the pedestal these words appear: “My name is Ozymandias, king of kings:

Look on my works, ye Mighty and despair!”

Nothing beside remains. Round the decay Of that colossal wreck, boundless and bare The lone and level sands stretch far away.

Some of man’s more recent mighty works appear in the pylons bearing electric wires across the sandy wastes, marching like toy soldiers into the distance. Military convoys begin to crowd the roads as well. Suez points out a sign that marks the turnoff to the town of Pokaran where India conducted its A-bomb tests. In another place, he shows us the area where conventional weaponry is test-fired. “Armies, Kings and Slaves, How small the little race of man.” Yet we are so self-important in our selfishness and rush to power. Here we certainly look small and very vulnerable in this harsh and remorseless place whose beauty is often overshadowed by its menace to anything living.

We stopped at a small family compound to see how the people are living and we found women at work on typical tasks of housekeeping cooking, making bread, sewing, repairing the floors and walls of their homes with a mixture of mud, cattle dung and water.

It makes a surprisingly durable covering for the hut walls as well as to walk upon. There were children everywhere, curious and asking constantly for pens. Suez told us that most of these children use the word “pen” thinking it means money or candy. However, he also told us not to give them anything unless we had some spare pens they could use in their schoolwork.

Back to reality along this road that produced so many different feelings soon our stomachs were telling us that we were all hungry. We stopped at an old “haveli” (mansion) that had been converted into a tourist haven with gift shop, restaurant, and western style toilet facilities. We sat outside in the shadow of the handsome building and enjoyed a delicious lunch. They even offered a tasty orange drink similar to Fanta, but this one is a Pepsi product called “Merinda.” We tried to find this drink all the rest of our trip in India wherever we stopped.

Another interesting stop was at the home of a local pharmacist. He produced opium for locals to use for pain relief. We found him cooking his product over an open fire with his granddaughter watching attentively. His wife was shy and stayed in the background during our visit.

At last our long ride was over and we were within the apricot glow cast by this beautiful golden city and the fortress high above the main road.

Its big fort brooded over the city at a height of about 170 ft. and it glowered menacingly at would-be attackers. We wanted to visit and we promised not to become vandals while there. By the time we reached our hotel, some of us were regretting an earlier meal. Lois had “Delhi Belly” symptoms for sure and the night was full of visits to the bathroom in our nice hotel. However, by morning with a little help from Imodium, she was an eager tourist again. Good thing too because we were out of the hotel and on the road by 7:30 a.m. The bus let us out at the town center lake that was surrounded by some lovely old buildings radiant in their Cotswold colors.

The water in the lake was less than wholesome-appearing but the kingfisher we saw hunting for breakfast did not hold back; indeed he caught a small fish and consumed it while we watched.

An elderly gentleman with a magnificent mustache played a lute and sang.

Down and away from the lake setting, we could see the crematoria ghats for the poor people with a few monuments and several piles of sand. Next, we made a visit to a folk museum run by a local schoolteacher who had begun years ago to collect curiosities of several kinds: handicrafts, strange tools, jewelry, paintings, statuary, sheet music, books, and postcards. A real variety of things some for sale to tourists to support the place and other items definitely not on the market. It was interesting and very ambitious of the teacher.

As we wandered through the morning streets, we began to learn some of the lines the local wandering vendors used to entice us to buy from them: “short cut,” “make my day,” “morning prices,” and “change my luck.”

While we continued our walking in the city streets, the young entrepreneurs became annoying and we tried various methods of shaking them off without being completely rude. One young man who just wouldn’t give up on me even though I would not speak to him finally forced me to try a new approach. So I said in Spanish

that I did not speak English and didn’t understand him. To my surprise and chagrin, he immediately switched to a much more fluent Spanish than my own!

He finally left me, or rather I left him, when we entered a Jain temple inside the Jaisalmer fort. We took off our shoes, leaving them with the ubiquitous “shoe-watch man,” (there is always such an enterprising person at every temple entrance), and entered into the small marble enclosure.

There we learned that Jains do not worship one god, but rather their 24 different prophets. The statues of these prophets look very much like statues of Buddha in body position, cross-legged with hands folded, but the eyes are always open while Buddha’s are usually depicted closed. The quite intricate and amazing stone carvings in this temple include Hindu gods and goddesses as well as birds, animals and flowers.

Tourists are asked not to look into the holiest of the interior shrines and they are also requested to walk clockwise around that altar area to show proper respect. We had been told not to offer money to anyone in the temple since Jain’s are quite wealthy and support their temples themselves. However, we were certainly asked for tips as we made our way around the temple marveling at the artistry and craftsmanship we saw.

Jaisalmer has always been a center of silk production in India even though the silkworms themselves are not cultivated here. The threads have always been sent here for the fabrics to be created. In India there are 53 different kinds of silk produced while in China only 3 different types are made. Jaisalmer was at the junction of the Silk Route and the Spice Route and was very prosperous at one time. An evil prime minister of the area actually destroyed the economy of his own city by putting onerous taxes on the merchants he thought were becoming too rich and powerful The merchants outmaneuvered him by simply moving out of Jaisalmer, thus causing the city’s population to plunge from 80,000 to less than half that number. Today the city is coming back into a more affluent condition through its three main industries: silk production, stone cutting, and tourism.

Our stroll led us through this lovely and gracious old city filled with the beautiful haveli (mansions) of those early rich merchants. Now these opulent buildings belong to the city and many are open to tourists. Those merchants were so eager to

show their wealth that they vied with one another through the magnificence of their homes. The intricacy of the stonework facades was their most common field of competition. The delicacy and beauty of these lattice screens, window “shades,” and the walls themselves are a true wonder. The streets in front of these splendid residences were filled with tiny stalls, pedestrians, cars and pedicabs, goats, cows, monkeys, camels, dogs and birds.

The characteristic saffron sandstone produced in this area and used to build all these palatial homes has an uncanny ability to change colors in various lights. It is an ochre color when in shadow, shines out like “gold to airy thinness beat” under the direct rays of the sun, and fades to a pale pink as the sun begins to fall away in the western sky. No wonder Jaisalmer ships so much stone around India it is a truly attractive natural resource here.

Before leaving the city environs, we went up to the topaz fort rising above us. Actually, the entire living area of Jaisalmer is within the gigantic walls of this 12th century citadel. Prince Jaisal, the city’s founder, built his palace at the highest point (100 meters) above the marketplace. Sonar Kila (the fort’s full name) is quite impressive and we enjoyed seeing the beautiful stone carvings there as well as a demonstration of turban twirling. The material of the turban is about 15 ft. long and can be made of any kind of material from cotton to silk.

The guard in the palace area showed us how he twisted and turned his scarf-like cloth until the entire turban was formed and sat neatly on his head.

Our dinner place tonight was called by the undignified name of Marwar’s Pit Stop. It certainly deserved a better designation because it is quite a nice hotel and restaurant. The rooms are in the form of round huts with thatching set amid lovely grounds with flamboyant blooms, colorful birds, a very inviting swimming pool and outdoor dining area. As a matter of fact, we were all wishing we could have stayed in this different and quite lovely spot rather than in our charmless marble “vaults” at the 5 star hotel we were occupying.

Udaipur

It is 180 miles from Jodhpur to Udaipur, a pleasant trip really, with a wonderful stop at the Maharani’s Garden for lunch. It was a lovely oasis in the Rajasthan desert terrain lush with plants and birds. There are hotel rooms here too, individual cottages really, surrounding an outdoor dining room under a huge tent. The breeze was refreshing and the food quite delicious. We enjoyed the colorful birds, particularly the cheeky fellow the Indians called the “tiger’s dentist” because of his habit of helping other animals with their dental hygiene; they are supposedly so intrepid that they clean the tiger’s teeth by pecking around for the remains of the tiger’s dinner courageous indeed!

On our way to charming Udaipur, we had one of our most wonderful experiences as tourists in India. We stopped at the magically beautiful Adinath Jain Temple in Ranakpur about 56 miles from the larger city.

This temple is the largest Jain structure in the country, covering nearly 4500 square yards. It is situated on the curve of a boulder-strewn river in the heavily forested Atavalli Hills. The temple was built in the 15th century and its nearly 1500 individually decorated columns are a testimony to the artistry of the craftsmen who could make marble carving resemble lace work rather than stone carving. The columns were deliberately created with an imperfection as well since the Jains believe there can be no perfection on earth.

The temple is completely built of glowing marble, capable of changing colors with the angle of the sunlight playing among its marvelous pillars and life-size statues of elephants, tigers and other creatures. Suez had previously reminded us that Jain temples are heavily endowed and that no one in the temple should ask for money. We were also asked not to give any tips if such were requested by the guards standing around the temple. We knew that we could not wear any leather products or shoes while visiting in the confines of the temple. So we had all dressed accordingly, no leather belts or any other kind of leather accoutrements (such as camera cases) and we were all prepared to give up our shoes whatever their material make-up.

Following a brief introduction to the temple itself, Suez gave us all the freedom to wander and wonder at our own pace through this incredibly beautiful structure.

The photographers were approached by guards, and even a priest, volunteering to show them behind cupboard doors, into side areas that they might have missed, together with some explanations of individual statuary and carvings. Apparently some of these camera carriers were wordlessly asked for tips by outstretched palms and some even verbally solicited. Some of our group apparently ignored Suez’s advice and felt compelled to respond with rupees; our brave and stalwart John did not. However, everyone reported to Suez that they had been so approached. Suez reacted with high dudgeon and went to complain to the temple priest about this disgraceful behavior in the temple! He full well knew that the very priest he was “innocently” reporting to was the one who had solicited money from our group.

When Kay, Kathy and I rounded a curve in the temple structure following some really loud bellowing, we found Suez at the bottom of a marble stairway looking up at a half-naked, wild-haired, body-painted priest who was screaming jeremiads while gesturing with all the theatricality of Charlton Hesston as Moses berating the idol worshipping Israelites. This priest was the angriest person I have ever seen and his eyes were wild with fury and outrage. He really did look like an Old Testament prophet calling down the vengeance of God on malefactors. Suez was shouting back just as angrily and pointing his finger at priest in accusation. Of course, all this was conducted in a language we understood not at all, but the unadulterated anger radiating from both the priest and Suez needed no translation. Other tourists in the temple were drawn to the confrontation as well. For several minutes, the peaceful temple rang with the ongoing debate. Those who could understand shrank a little while they stood and we all looked on incredulously as the war of words and gestures continued.

It ended suddenly, like a rapidly dissipating summer storm of lightning and thunder will just disappear, and Suez motioned for all of us to follow him out the front entrance of the temple. We had all just about finished with our gawking and picturetaking, and we were somewhat uneasy about what had just transpired, so we willingly followed like ducklings struggling to keep up with their mother. When we got outside and had retrieved our shoes, we all insisted that Suez translate what had been going on. He readily complied even though he seemed a little dubious about our possible reactions.

“Well,” he said, “as you could no doubt see for yourselves the priest was really very much outraged at my charge against the guards and the mysterious priest! Of course both of us knew that he was the priest in question and that filled him with self-righteous indignation since he had been caught cold!” We all queried further saying, “But Suez, he wasn’t just defending himself and the guards, was he? He definitely was on the offensive as well! What else did he say?”

With a decided twinkle in his eye, Suez finally told us the whole story. All the pointing and gesturing towards the front portal of the temple had accompanied the priest’s ordering Suez to “leave and get those meat-eating bastards out of my temple.” All of us probably surprised Suez when we fell into gales of laughter and enjoyed the fact that we had been thrown out of the most famous Jain temple in India. Actually, this experience was probably the only one that all 13 of us shared with the same feelings of hilarity. So much of the time we were not on the same page regarding the events of the trip. Repeating the story to one another never failed to produce more convulsive laughter. We can truly say that we loved being thrown out of the temple!

And that wasn’t the finale to our abortive trip to the Jain temple compound. Mae and I decided that we needed to find a ladies loo before continuing on the road trip to Udaipur and Suez directed us to the facilities just below and adjacent to the temple. Neither of us brought any money because, again, Suez told us that we wouldn’t be asked for any. Once more, Suez wasn’t a very good predictor of his countrymen’s practices. Mae and I entered the really filthy and totally repellent “facility” and found two ladies supposedly “working” in the area. But if they had done anything about cleaning it up, I would not wanted to see it before their labors. They actually were sitting on the unspeakably dirty floor chatting and laughing.

The doors on the stalls opened creakily to reveal the most squalid and stinking squat toilets we had yet encountered. However, we had decided to brave whatever conditions we found because we knew the road trip would be quite a bit longer. So, after finishing our business as speedily as possible, we started to leave the area. The women were holding out their hands for a tip and we just shook our heads to signify a definite “No!” The younger of the two women leaped to her feet and barred the exit doorway with her filthy broom. Mae and I looked at each other in consternation. Mae dug into her jeans pocket hoping that she had a coin or two to secure our release, but I decided that this situation was untenable and started straight for the

woman who then held her broom across the doorway. I looked her right in the eye and said in English, “Let us pass!” I lifted my arm to push the broom aside as I said those words in my most steely voice. She either understood my English, the determination in my eyes, or my almost aggressive gesture, because she moved quickly aside so May and I could leave.

When we returned to the bus, we were laughing uproariously again and everyone wanted to know what had happened. So we told them that not only had we “meateating bastards” been tossed out of the temple, but Mae and I had been held hostage for a tip in the ladies room! Now Suez erupted and started a determined march towards the administration building on the property, all the while muttering what a terrible impression was being made on foreign tourists and how ashamed it made him for his country. Kathy and John did not realize just where he was heading and they started following him. As soon as they picked up the drift, they hustled back to the bus because they knew that fireworks were going to be set off in that office!

Sure enough, when Suez returned to us, his eyes still blazing as had the enraged priest’s, he told us that he had really given the Administrator of the temple compound to understand his disappointment, anger and outrage at his fellow Indians’ behavior! And how doubly awful that all this had gone on at a religious facility of all things! Apparently, the Administrator had made soothing sounds to Suez but he was not mollified upon his return. While we laughed at the situation, Suez continued to stew about it so we stopped mentioning the subject until he could get beyond it himself.

It is culturally fascinating that Suez took the whole thing so seriously and was so embarrassed; however, he told us that he believes that he is an ambassador/representative of his country when he guides foreign people and that anything that reflects shame on India is really hateful to him. Conversely, we Americans found that our amusement at having been ejected from a religious building was one of the few things we could all share with merriment and a sense of camaraderie when we seemed to have so little else in common.

Udaipur is a comely city of 700,000 that has adopted cleanliness as its motto. It certainly was the cleanest city we saw in all of India. These citizens are so dedicated to neatness that they collect their own garbage to dispose of it when the city

garbage workers go on strike or just miss their street for some reason. And it was true—we never saw the ubiquitous piles of trash that we had gotten so used to.

The city is built around lovely man-made Lake Pichola in the middle of which sat our unbelievably palatial hotel The Taj Udaipur Palace. It really does sit right out in the water and must be approached by water taxi from the shore.

Our rooms here were the most posh we stayed in while visiting India. Everything was marble and carved wood and splendid appointments. It had been a maharajah’s summer palace built 250 years ago and we surely felt like royalty ourselves staying here. Kathy and John even had a veranda of their own on the top floor of the hotel! Every room of this wonderful hotel overlooked a lily pond or the beautiful central terrace garden. There were many princely details such as ornate marble pillars, beautiful paintings, elegant glasswork windows and walls, intricate decorative hangings and inspiring views across the lake at other palaces and beautiful gardens. A truly unique and magnificent hotel.

Our dinner that night was pretty spectacular too we enjoyed the meal at a rooftop restaurant under the shadow of the City Palace, a very imposing structure where the current maharajah descendant has his apartments. Our view from the restaurant was our own imposing hotel lit up like a ship directly across the lake waters from us.

The food we were served here was quite tasty as well, from the “flowery-tasting” soup to the fine gulab jaman for dessert.

Our last stop before reaching Udaipur was a visit to a Bushnoi village for the opium ceremony those people offer to visitors. To reach their compound, we took jeeps through a preserve for plants and animals that the Bushnoi maintain. We saw black buck and spotted deer all through the drive in addition to the peacocks. The Bushnoi are really dedicated environmentalists apparently and do everything in their power to avoid hurting plants, trees or animals. In forest areas where they live they will defend trees from being cut down with their very lives if necessary.

The family we were to visit were middle class people in Indian society. They had a neat compound where three generations lived together: the patriarch and his wife, their son and his wife, and their grandchildren. The patriarch (or grandfather) had a most wonderful face ringed with a white turban that met a cloud-white beard of some considerable proportions. His skin was deeply grooved and his face was brown as a toasted cashew nut. There was a warmth to his welcoming smile and his eyes twinkled mischievously. His little 4 year old granddaughter sat in the circle of his arm with an obvious delight in her own face.

His wife wore heavy golden earrings and an enormous gold nose-ring, as well as a colorful sari, but her poor face suggested years beyond her chronological age she was 68 according to Suez.

As we looked about our American group most of whom were in their sixties and even seventies, we could see that none of us had experienced the hardships in life this lady had endured. Indian women work very hard physically and then must bear the children as well. Their many responsibilities create the faces they must wear as they age and the look betrays that toil clearly.

The younger couple looked to be in their 30s and both were handsome in appearance and well-dressed too. The young woman was the shyest of the group and did not interact with us at all, though she did smile happily when we all looked on the baby in her arms with pleasure and approval. The young man assisted his father in the opium tea celebration , but none of the family was fluent in English. So we depended again on Suez for translations.

The preparation of the tea was an elaborate ritual that started with squeezing a small amount of the opium liquid into a little special pitcher and heating it up to a certain temperature.

The patriarch stirred it constantly to avoid scorching the viscous fluid and he added the water at the appropriate time in the process. The two ladies of the house

produced many different cups and saucers so that all of us could sample the brew which was said to confer a blessing on visitors. I must admit that I was so tired of being a victim of various GI distress situations that I managed to avoid taking a cup because I was afraid that germs are not killed by opium, even heated opium. John, Kay and Kathy all tried it and pronounced it rather bitter even though some sugar had been added to the mixture.

The Bushnoi are agricultural people who keep animals for what they produce that can be utilized without harming the creatures: eggs and milk in particular. This family also had cats for pets and there was one lovely feline with the strangest amber eyes. These people also harvest seeds, fruits and bark from the plants and trees that grow in their area and they grow vegetables and peppers as well. We all enjoyed our visit with these friendly people and were glad to know there are some native environmentalists living in India!

We drove over the mountains to reach Udaipur at the end of our visit with the Bushnoi. The terrain was different from that out near Jaisalmer in that it rather resembled the altiplano in Peru rather than a true desert. There is obviously more available water here and everything looks greener and less hard-bitten. Farms are more lush and trees taller and bushier. However, there was still considerable desert dust covering everything we passed. Perhaps this area is the oasis of the Samm Sand Desert.

The Mewar Palace of Udaipur was a very impressive place chiefly because of its enormity over a kilometer in length and built entirely of marble. Of course by now we had been taught that the marble was not used for opulent show particularly but because it is the commonest and most available building material in these parts.

The palace has 4 distinct sections: a sacred part, a public section, a semi-private audience area, and the private residential apartments. The whole is decorated with

beautiful murals, mirrored rooms, fabulous appointments with statuary and art objects. When taken as a whole, it is truly eye-popping in its grandeur.

We learned a curious fact about Lake Pichola on whose shores the Mewar Palace sits in March and April of this year (2005) the lake was completely dry and jeeps had to be used to transport people from the shore out to the Taj Palace Hotel! Now in December, the water level is high in the Lake and there is no problem running the boats. There are two smaller city lakes in Udaipur as well and we soon noted that the waters in these three lakes are used for just about everything: drinking water, bathing of people, cleaning clothes and even motorcycle washing! The water was pretty unpalatable looking to us though.

After the wonderful Palace visit, we went to the Princess’ Gardens where we walked through vibrant and flamboyant bougainvillea and watched an imaginative fountain display. This Garden had been built by the Maharajah so that his wife and daughters could

disport themselves in a lovely setting beyond the prying eyes of the curious. There were life-size elephant statues everywhere around the central reflecting pool and a very high wall surrounded the entire garden. Hidden in smaller corners and nooks of the garden were statues of frogs, snakes, and birds. A very beautiful and restful place the princesses enjoyed.

In Udaipur we had a very unusual lunch one day at an Indian “fusion” restaurant. Because electricity is “off” in Udaipur from 11 to 2 p.m., this restaurant’s open roof was welcome. We sat surrounded by blue walls which reached up not to a ceiling but to the blue of the sky itself. Bold colors were used all over the small eating establishment and the food was really delicious. We found it a welcome relief from the strictly Indian food we had been consuming for so many days now.

Dishes at this restaurant included European touches mingled with Indian sauces and spices. Our tastebuds were tickled first with a bruschetta, followed by a tasty banana fritter with capers in a mustard sauce. Then the entrée arrived in the form of a chicken breast filled with soft cheese. The meal was completed with a piece of chocolate layer cake of all surprises.

Another very special place we visited in Udaipur was a museum set in a private residence. There was also a shop filled with antiques and the most amazing paintings. We watched the artisans create these precise pictures in an old style with dazzling colors and tiny scenes of Indian life in times past. The paints were all mineral in content except for the vivid yellow produced from the urine of cows fed on mango leaves. We also learned about the various materials used to paint these scenes upon: camel bone (supposedly only from the bones of animals who died natural deaths), silk materials and rice paper. We were also treated to a viewing of the most incredibly intricate sandalwood carvings by a master who loves to create little doors and drawers in his carvings which reveal hidden delights. Some of the creations fold in upon themselves for hanging or table display. Their delicacy was really quite special and beautiful and their prices were quite impressive as well.

One late afternoon and evening was spent enjoying a boat ride on Lake Pichola over to the Jasmandir Palace to watch the sunset play on the tawny walls of the Mewar Palace, the gleaming white marble of our own hotel, and the many buildings along the Lake’s long shoreline.

This particular palace had been built by the crown prince of Udaipur for a “turban friend” of his who had been banished from his own home because he had tried to unseat his father from his throne. This story had a real “rags to riches” twist because after about two years, the friend became the Moghul Emperor of all India, Jehangir (already written about in the history section). When our Aunt Olive visited this same palace in 1971, the old maharani was still in residence and acted as their guide through the building; however, she had gone to her great reward by the time of our visit.

Drives through the clean streets of Udaipur were enjoyable for several reasons: elephants work these streets right along with the vehicular traffic, cows stand anywhere they like, and burros and goats are seen trotting along the rooflines of the buildings. Shutter shapes and colors are different and interesting and it is amazing to see the flow of people entering and leaving the streets through hidden alleyways and secluded doors. Some of the roads were so tight that it was a surprise when the bus could navigate through them, but they were always colorful and filled with the lovely people of this country in their gorgeous clothing.

Before flying out of Udaipur, we were taken to yet another maharajah’s structure this one a hunting lodge that is still owned by the man who can no longer call himself that royal name. He has turned his lodge into a comfortable looking hotel that helps him support the stables on his property where he raises a very special breed of horse the Marwari. None of us had ever heard of this kind of horse, but we were all soon captivated by their marvelous distinguishing feature their ears!

Purebreds of this type horse come in all colors from dapple grays to dark chocolate, but the preferred color pattern is black and white. These horses have large feet for better sand travel and they are fairly heavy bodied.

It’s the wonderful ears that distinguish them however. The horses can turn their tall ears to face one another and touch tips so that they outline the shape of a traditional valentine!

It’s really quite fetching and endearing. They are much better cared for than most people in India and live in very plush surroundings with grooms and hostlers catering to their every need. The maharajah’s polo ponies are also housed in these same stables and they too are well tended.

The maharajah also runs his stud farm and hotel complex as an agricultural experimental station, so we saw considerable plantings and there were many employees working in that area too. This is obviously an important place in Udaipur since it provides lots of jobs for local people at many skill levels. It was clear that though the owner was stripped of his royalty, he is quite clearly still a very rich man.

Our flight from Udaipur was delayed for an hour but the time passed quickly as we all observed the elaborate security precautions at the Maharana Pratap Airport. American airports should send observers to India to see how efficient check-in procedures are and how smoothly their very strict security measures are applied. The several different searches, pat-downs, thorough luggage checks, and questioning the passengers go through make these airports seem much more likely to deter terrorists from getting aboard flights.

Jaipur

We arrived at this very large city (2 ½ million people spread over 60 square miles) at about 3 p.m. and immediately observed why it is called the Pink City. Most of the downtown structures are covered in some pink tone or other ever since a visit here by King George V. The city had been founded in 1727 by a powerful Maharajah, Sawai Jai Singh and is said to be the first “planned” city in India. The streets are 34 meters wide and buildings in the central city cannot be more than 17 meters high. They have a commission to prevent construction that might disrupt the timehonored appearance of this gracious city.

We had a late lunch in an amusingly named establishment the Air-Conditioned Restaurant in a poorer part of the city but it was fun to watch the passing parade through the dusty windows in front of our long table and the food was good. Camels pulling drays filled with huge loads of unfired pottery, oxcarts loaded with harvested mustard, elephants gaily painted in pastel chalks with intricate designs, and then the usual mechanical vehicles interspersed among the animals. What fun Indian traffic is to observe!

In Jaipur we saw the real contrasts between a relatively prosperous central city and the real poverty on the outskirts. We just thought our restaurant was in a poor section; the road out to Lal Bagh (our deluxe tent accommodations) revealed a much needier part of the population to us. Many make-shift tents and shelters in sand declivities with shanty towns around them on the roadway. Some of this was reminiscent of South African townships. People did not appear to be hungry however and that was a relief. As usual, the folk standing about were laughing and talking with their fellows and most were busy at something. Even the dogs and cows did not look like they were hungry.

Everyone was growing mustard or marigolds on whatever plot of land was available to them for agriculture, so there were tiny gardens and large fields too. Indians eat a lot of mustard and marigolds are a staple of their religious lives needed for festivals as well as regular visits to the temples. Idols are always decorated with long strands of marigolds and animals are similarly caparisoned as well, especially cows and elephants.

When we arrived at our tent “hotel” we could certainly see that we were not going to be living like the Indians we had just passed.

These were very luxurious accommodations with all the amenities you would find in a first class hotel. There were hardwood floors, nice furniture including desks and chairs, a comfortable bathroom, double tent walls with the inner one being adorned with a flower motif. The entrance door and the windows all zipped open when air circulation was needed but we were cold and grateful for the heater that warmed our space. However, visitors in summer no doubt appreciate the air-conditioning that is also available. Even the “front porch” of the tent cabin is carpeted with oriental rugs and there are two chairs and a couple of side tables in case you want to sit out and look at the stars of an evening.

There was a central administrative building of red brick and the dining hall was in another building whose interior had been decorated to look as though it was a large tent too. We were met by the typical entertainers who played sitars and drums to accompany young boy dancers very skilled at traditional dances involving improbable head and neck movements that seemed physically impossible. What is hilarious about all these welcoming ceremonies no matter in which city they take place is that the dancing and singing is always done to the accompaniment of the poorest rendition of “Frere Jacques” that can be imagined. The silly tune is scraped out on some tinny sounding instruments and strangled out of some little flute-like

device and then beaten to death with the drums. There must be many French tourists to India these days. Certainly no one played “Yankee Doodle” for us.

After supper we met at the fire circle to see some more entertainments more dancing and drumming with women performers added to the previous men and boys. The best of the evening though was the fire-eater. He was really astonishing as he swallowed various sizes of fireballs and then, like a dragon, spewed it out in huge gouts in our direction all without any apparent injury to himself.

We were all tired after a long day and retired to the wonderful tents after the firedance sequence. It was then that I discovered that I had fallen to yet another ailment this time the “bloody flux” as I called it hemorrhagic cystitis. I had not been drinking enough water thus far and now the price was to be paid for that decision. Luckily Kay had brought both urinary antiseptics and analgesics so I did not have to spend a really miserable night with multiple painful trips to our lovely “facilities” and by morning I was cured—a miracle for sure. From then on, I drank as much as liquid as I could pour into myself without regard for where the next toilet would be. And I had no further flare-ups on the rest of the adventure.

Our city tour took us through the nine separate sections of the city each named and inhabited by different professions. We passed, but did not visit, a monumental structure built to honor the Prince of Wales on his visit in 1899. It is impressive from the outside as it tries to combine Indian details on European construction. Today it houses a rather non-descript collection of relics of the Raj period and is rarely visited by Indians as one would expect. We also passed the much photographed “Palace of the Winds” which Suez assured us was not necessary to visit since only the enormous façade holds any interest. It is at least 4 stories high, Pepto-Bismol pink, and regularly punctured with various windows and doors which allow birds to roost and the light to swirl against the various textures and openings creating light and shadow play all during the day and even at night when it is lit.

We were on our way to a most interesting spot—an observatory built by Jai Singh, the city’s founder. The site is quite spectacular since it is composed of enormous structures for viewing constellations, huge sundials, buildings whose configurations allow for calculating azimuths and heights of heavenly bodies.

The structures have grace and beauty and the science on which their shapes are based is amazingly accurate. Many of them are simply stairways up to a viewing platform that points to a particular star or constellation at different times of the year.

There is one such dais that allows you to find the North Star any time of the year since its viewing platforms are approached by 4 different sets of stairways of differing heights and facing different directions. The vast sundial is constructed as a double sweeping arc decorated with various astrological signs. One of the arcs will give the time during half the year and the other will provide accurate times during the other half. Present day astronomers have been quite surprised to find that this enormous time piece is only 2% less accurate than atomic clocks of today and this site is grounded in 17th century science! Rather than being housed in an enclosed structure as are modern observatories, this complex is an outdoor facility which makes it quite astonishing and impressive.

After visiting Jai Singh’s Observatory, I was sorry that my father had never had a chance to travel in Northern India because he was always fascinated by the stars and knew quite a bit about locating the constellations and particular stars within them I am sure he would have greatly enjoyed this curiosity. I can remember lying out in our front yard in Dania with him on blankets as he pointed out Betelgeuse, Altair, Aldebaran, Rigel and Antares (remember, Kathy?) in the night sky. But, alas, I cannot claim this visit to the fabled observatory as a piece of my jigsaw puzzle.

Most of us greatly enjoyed the beautiful morning at the Observatory under the cloudless blue sky, but John certainly did not. He was getting sicker and sicker as the morning went by. He stood listlessly around the various structures and sat down on walls and fences whenever he could. His face was whiter than his striking hair and beard. When it was announced that our next visit would be the City Palace, John wilted visibly and decided on a return to the bus for a nap while the rest of us entered the very imposing palace which now houses a museum for arms, one for exquisite paintings, another for textiles, as well as the current private residence and the municipal offices. The entire complex is so beautiful that it is often used for movie sets and one was being prepared as we visited.

There are many entrances to the palace as well as interior doors and all are different and all are wonderfully decorated with mosaics, paintings, carved wood jambs, marble pilasters or some imaginative combinations of these techniques.

Besides the varieties of decorations, the doors and entranceways also had differing shapes pointed arches, rounded arches, horseshoes, squares. We were told that the entire complex is painted every year and that it takes three months to complete the job. So it is no wonder that this City Palace really looks spiffy.

As we exited the palace, we were met by a snake charmer with his “pets” up dancing to the flute music. Though we knew that the cobras had probably been defanged, it was still just a little unsettling to be standing so close to their bobbing heads. Suez thought he would really amaze us all by picking the cobra up and fondling it like a Tennessee religious snake handler. Kay surprised him by calmly taking the serpent from him and playing with it herself.

When we returned to the bus to head for lunch, John was sicker than ever and said he would wait there while we ate. Kathy had been starting to feel a little punk but thought maybe something to eat would help, so she joined us in the restaurant. By the time the meal was over,

Kathy looked so grim that Suez decided that both she and John needed to return to the Hotel Meridien (A French-run hotel that was quite posh and very comfortable) where they would stay for the next day and a half, having succumbed to some violent food poisoning. As it happened Mae and the other Kay decided to stay in the hotel as well; guess they weren’t feeling terrific either. So far our Kay and I felt fine and we never did identify what Kathy and John had eaten at the tent camp hotel that we didn’t. But whatever it was, we were happy that we didn’t eat it; they were pretty darned sick (Kathy had vomited before reaching the hotel and John barely made it into the room before he lost it all too.)

Those of us still standing arranged to meet Suez at 3 p.m. to go for a visit to a twoyear old Hindu temple built by the fabulously wealthy Birla Family of India. This uber-rich family builds these temples and dedicates them to the people of India in many different larger cities. This one in Jaipur is one of the newest to be constructed.

The temple is built of white marble and combines traditional with modern elements. Religious personages from many of the religions of the world are depicted here in carvings along with the Hindu deities.

The faces of Jesus, Zoroaster, Buddha, Socrates and others are outside the temple, on columns, pilasters, and the exterior walls while scenes from the life of Vishnu and Shiva and other lesser gods are portrayed inside. In a nod to more Western church architecture, there are even stained glass windows which appear somewhat alien to us because the stories and characters depicted are Hindu rather than Old & New Testament tales as we are accustomed to. The temple is on a small hill and there are marble steps all around it to reach the entrance. The whole edifice and its surroundings are very beautiful indeed.

Of course, it would just not be right to visit India without a trip to a carpet factory and Jaipur is where we made that obligatory call. The carpets were displayed with a sweeping flourish as the salesmen rolled them out dramatically. The carpets, made of wool, cotton, silk, and even yak hair, deserved the treatment. They were lovely and we just couldn’t resist bringing a couple home with us. Kay’s is a very subtle pattern of squares with different depictions in each square; the silk and wool

combination is composed of many gradations of earth tones. Lois’ is the “smiling tiger” pattern with a tooth-bearing tiger rampant on a background of emerald green; the tiger is woven of yak hair and silk. Both are really beautiful in design and workmanship. It was unbelievable but Kathy and John had enough room in their luggage to pack them up for the trip home.

On our return to the Meridien we found John had managed to get up and shower so he looked considerably better. Kathy had been actively sick just a few minutes before we got back, so she had not really been out of bed except for necessities.

One smell and look at food in the glass-house that was the hotel restaurant sent John scurrying back upstairs without his supper. We had tea and toast sent up to them lest they should become hungry in the night.

The Meridien is a very nice property, but it did not have curative powers for Kathy and John. Though he appeared for breakfast and thought briefly of trying to join us for the day’s activities, he decided not to do so in the end after his small meal. Kathy never believed that she could make it through the day, so she had already elected to stay among the comforts of the hotel. As it eventuated, they both made good decisions because the day was very long and tiring.

They would have been pretty miserable had they tried to join us. We hated that they had to miss the first and most exciting adventure of the day: the visit to the marvelous Amber Fort.

We already knew that the Fort was aptly named from having passed it in both the daylight and the nighttime when it is illuminated. The sandstone used the build the fort on a high hill over the city of Amber is a protean material in the colors it can reflect. Amber is an accurate description at certain times of the day. At other times, the stone glows golden or even pink, depending on the angle of the light shining upon it. Oddly enough, however, the name Amber does not designate the color at all the word means “high”. So the Amber Fort is a high fort built in the rugged hills about 5 miles from Jaipur.

This fort is a splendid blend of Mughal and Hindu styles and was built in 1592 by Raja Man Singh. It is constructed of red sandstone and white marble. Its forbidding exterior belies the paradise that exists within the fortress: marvelous art and architecture, delicate marble carvings, airy marble screens, double rows of columns with elephant capitals, mirrored rooms, bejeweled audience halls, a multitude of impressive gates and doorways with inlaid ivory, semi-precious stones, intricately carved wood panels and even private gardens. The corridors in the zenana (harem or women’s quarters) are wide, breezy and cleverly arranged to provide the ladies with absolute privacy but also the chance to see what is going on outside their compound. The fort is laid out in 4 different sections with stairways connecting the levels. There are the private residence, the women’s apartments (zenana), the public and private audience rooms, and the temples. The whole is protected by massive walls impervious to attack from the maharajah’s enemies.

The most exciting aspect of the visit to the magnificent fort however is the approach to it! Thanks to a unique labor union, modern guests can enter the fort like a maharajah themselves riding atop a gaily caparisoned elephant.

The road to the main gate is quite steep actually though one can choose to walk. But what a mistake that choice would be! Climbing a ladder to a platform that is level with the howdah on the elephant’s back is much more exciting in anticipation. The howdah is a square box with a thin cushion on its floor where two people can sit with their legs outstretched in front of them. The mahout (elephant handler) rides right on the elephant’s neck with his feet beneath the ears. Our elephant was named Sangwallah and a fine specimen she was, too!

The ride is not exactly smooth but it is memorable! The elephant’s gait feels rather like riding the deck of a pitching ship there’s a lot of rolling and wallowing in it. The elephants move ponderously and gravely, but on top of their backs, there’s much more motion than you expect from observing them walk. But despite the lack of comfort, the ride is a necessity to experience the barbaric splendor of the fortress and the life of the maharajahs. The elephants move steadily up the road and it is easy to block out the signs of modernity and imagine that you are arriving at the palace in the 1600s, dressed magnificently in silk threaded with gold, bringing news of the latest battle. Using the same transportation that the royals would have employed greatly enriched the experience of visiting the fort.

What is this special union though? As our van approached the fort, Suez told us that the elephants have a union. Union rules govern how many trips an elephant can make to and from the fort per day (no more than 2 in the morning and 2 in the afternoon), guarantee them health inspections periodically by government veterinarians, and insure that all elephants in the union can work every day they are needed. After the morning rides, they are taken to the lake and given a bath and allowed to play in the water and play they do. It was great fun to watch them swimming, diving, using their trunks as snorkels as they completely submerged their bodies, using them again to provide showers for themselves or their fellow elephants. Some of them toyed with balls floating in the water for their pleasure and others gamboled with the baby elephants. These living pieces of history are marvelous to see in this environment where they used to be essential to travel, war, and work.

As exhilarated as we already were, there was still more to come our visit to the adjacent Tiger Fort. To reach this fort, we took a wild jeep ride to the top of the hills. Tiger Fort is purely military no royal residencies here. Of course, there were barracks for officers and men and even they had gardens within the fortress for their enjoyment. Tiger Fort predates the Amber Fort and it is almost entirely undecorated since it had a functional purpose rather than pure pleasure. We enjoyed watching the monkeys congregated outside the entrance. These blackfaced langurs were expecting that they would be fed by the jeep and van drivers and, sure enough, most of these fellows arrived with crackers and chapattis (bread) to share with the creatures.

We had another chance to observe an angry Suez here too a movie set was being prepared in the interior garden of the fort and we were not going to be allowed entrance there. Suez flew into a snit and announced to the guards that if his guests were not going to be able to visit the entire Fort, the entrance fee should not have been collected. The guard was a little confused but would not relent. So Suez asked for a superior guard and presented his complaint to that functionary. As that fellow rocked back on his heels to escape Suez’s angry words, he decided to relent and let us tour the area on the battlements and we did!

Again, our day was so spectacularly beautiful that we felt especially blessed to see this splendid place under such cerulean skies.

After another delicious lunch, particularly the soup at this restaurant, we went into downtown Jaipur to walk down the main street of the vendors. This stroll was quite fascinating and got us out among the Indians going about their daily lives rather than observing everything from the bus.

The little stands selling the same items are lined up together which made us wonder how anybody makes a living. First, there is a row of about 10 veggie stands all showing the same veggies: carrots, mustard, onions, beans, tomatoes. Colorful yes, but how do the buyers decide which vendor to patronize.

Then there will be a line of “shops” offering plastic jugs and basins. Again, the colors are bright and beckoning but pretty much the same—how to make a decision. Walk along the loud street a little further and you come upon the fellows who sell metal pots and pans, again cheek by jowl with one another. Interspersed in all this commerce are the cows poking at the trash piles, the dogs slinking between human and bovine legs.

Bangles and trinkets are found in another block and fruits in yet another. We walked about 2 miles through the city and were very impressed with the industriousness we saw everywhere. Men and women both act as sellers and both sexes are seen doing the shopping. What an experience we all felt that we had come much closer to real Indian life after this walk.

Our last two stops of the day gave us glimpses at other aspects of Indian life. The first place we visited was a fine jewelry store where we learned how gems native to India are cut, polished and set into exquisite designs from history as well as more modern looks. Rubies, emeralds, diamonds and sapphires are mined in India and the country has a long history of working these gems into marvelous baubles and bangles, earrings, tiaras, rings, bracelets, necklaces. This place was fun to visit, as a

museum is pleasurable, but there is no need to covet any of the objects on view because they are way too expensive for most folks to even think about. But they were certainly beautiful to contemplate

Before returning to the Meridien, we went to the Samood Haveli—a small city palace form the 17th century, now a tourist hotel. The structure had been built for a wealthy merchant family rather than nobility and it had a more intimate grace and loveliness, perhaps easier to appreciate than the monumental forts and their interior palaces which we have been awed by everyday. The dining room was filled with beautiful paintings, covering all the walls and ceiling. The pictures were in shades of blue and depicted life among less wealthy Indians than the maharajah’s palaces. They were exquisite just the same. The center garden was a lovely oasis from the hustle-bustle of busy Jaipur too.

As the van carried us through the usual cacophonous but still orderly traffic, we tried to remember the words that Johnny Mercer had put to Rimsky-Korsakov’s “Song of India” because we believed we had seen everything he described in our visit to Rajasthan and its fabulous cities: Jaisalmer the Blue City, Jodphur the city of maharajahs, Udaipur the lakeside city, and Jaipur the Pink City. We had seen the desert, small villages with agricultural peoples, the splendor of the forts and temples, and the menagerie of creatures that live among the Indians on a daily basis.

Song of India

And still the snowy Himalayas rise

In ancient majesty before our eyes, Beyond the plains, above the pines, While through the ever, never changing land As silently as any native band That moves at night, the Ganges shines.

Then I hear the song that only India can sing, Softer than the plumage on a black raven’s wing; High upon a minaret I stand

Upon an old enchanted land, There’s the Maharajah’s caravan.

Unfolding like a painted fan, How small the little race of man!

See them all parade across the ages, Armies, kings and slaves from history’s pages, Played on one of nature’s vastest stages. The turbaned Sikhs and fakirs line the streets, While holy men in shadowed calm retreats Pray through the night and watch the stars. The lonely crane flies off to meet the dawn, While down below the busy life goes on, And women crowd the old bazaar.

All are in the song that only Indian can sing, Softer than the plumage on a black raven’s wing;

Tune the ageless moon and stars were strung by Timeless song that only could be sung by India, the jewel of the East.

Now here’s a puzzle piece all right! Kathy and I have always loved this song, especially as sung by Mario Lanza, and all our emotions about all three (our father, the song & Mario Lanza) were conflated into that love. And here we are experiencing so much of what the song is about and remembering how much we enjoyed listening to our recording of it. Even if being in Northern India didn’t add anything new to our actual knowledge, it certainly helped us to a greater awareness of the emotional power the idea of India has to move us and recall our father to us very clearly. “Song of India” has that resonance for us as well!

RanthamboreNationalTigerReserve

Our next adventure, a tiger “hunt,” would continue our emotional connections with this enchanted country. As already mentioned, one of our favorite stories as children was our father’s tale of his chance to go on a real tiger hunt with his school chum, the maharajah’s son. However, we were also glad that our tiger hunt would not end in the tiger’s death that was the part of the story we hated and so did he.

Luckily, Kathy and John were completely recovered today since we had a very long road trip ahead of us, going from Jaipur to Ranthambore in another Indian state. For

me, this day was almost a lost one entirely. I was sick, sick, sick today and spent most of the day asleep on the long back seat of the bus. The roads were so bumpy that I was pretty regularly completely levitated off that seat into the air and then dropped quite unceremoniously back down with a thump that didn’t help to settle my stomach. Several times we had to take to the bushes on the road side for potty stops because there really weren’t any tourist facilities on the route between Jaipur and the tiger reserve. The knot in my stomach didn’t budge until late in the afternoon when I finally vomited into a plastic bag (thank goodness since I was on the bus when the eruption finally happened). Then I felt much better for a while.

We arrived at the Sawai Madhoper Lodge in the reserve about 1:30 p.m. We were due to be back in the bus for the first of our two game rides at 2:30 p.m. and many of the group were able to squeeze in a bit of lunch, but I couldn’t face food at that point. However, I was absolutely determined not to miss the drive out into the jungle. We had been warned that it would be chilly, maybe even downright cold, by the time we were headed back to the Lodge, so I brought all the jackets I had with me.

The safari vehicle was a really large jeep-looking affair, completely open on top. There was plenty of room to accommodate our whole group with no necessary bunching up. Still feeling quite “iffy”, I joined the others with enthusiasm nonetheless because we were told that a mother and two cubs had been spotted on the morning drive that very day. So we all had high hopes indeed. We sped along

the paved road a few miles before turning onto the rough, sandy trail into the park. The wind had been blowing a gale through the jeep and we were ready for a slower pace. We traded the hurricane for lots of dust, but that was fine because we were all at a fever pitch to see tigers in the wild!

We weren’t very far into the park when we saw and heard “spotted deer” with their peculiar barking call. Plenty of tiger food about for sure.

Peacocks were everywhere in evidence as well. A few more bounces and facefuls of dust brought us face to face with the larger species of this jungle the sambar deer, about a third again as big as the “spotted” variety and possessed of much more formidable antlers. More fast food for tigers, but maybe a little harder for them to bring down. This jungle was not at all what our preconceived notions had suggested it would be. Much sparser in vegetation, very few understory plants and tall slender lightly foliaged trees rather thick vines and heavily- leaved trees. Beneath this sparse canopy, grass type plants grew rather than shrubs and bushes. The grasses ranged from ground-level to higher than a man’s head. Perfect cover for tigers whose stripes and golden color hide them very well among that growth.

It wasn’t long before we saw another tasty treat for tigers wild boars which apparently are also abundant here. These creatures are much more rounded than peccaries in our southwest and actually look quite a bit like the feral hogs in our own southern forests and preserves. We were definitely assured that the tigers did not need to starve (or be fed by humans) in this area. Perched high in the crotch of a dead tree, we did see a Scops’ collared owl dozing the afternoon away. He paid us no attention as we roared by and didn’t even crack an eyelid to peer at us.

The driver had favored us with a couple of potty stops along our drive, but when we parked at a waterhole for a while to see what might wander up, suddenly I realized that my illness had a “bottom” line as well and I had to get out of the jeep in a big hurry. The driver, the guide and Suez were all alarmed about my urgency in dismounting the vehicle because it was impossible for me to hide in the grasses their eyes were huge even contemplating that possibility.

It was quickly decided that I would just get out of the jeep, head to its rear (no pun intended) and everyone else would keep eyes forward and while I squatted in the dirt immediately in the shadow of the vehicle. When I climbed back in, much drained but relieved, I was having chills and the amount of clothing I had brought was insufficient. One of our fellow travelers lent me his sweatshirt and Kathy gave me her shawl to cover my head and shoulders. I really looked like a European war refugee by now so pale, drawn, and piled up in a mishmash of clothes.

The picturesque waterhole ordinarily would have enchanted me because there were sambar deer, cormorants, herons, and crocodiles all around it. When I got back into the jeep, I tried to concentrate on the scene before me but I was pretty much washed out. It was getting dark and the driver started us back towards the Lodge. All eyes were peeled for tigers, but we saw no evidence of them this evening. The many stone ledges and boulders strewed through the reserve were perfect places for tigers to lounge and look at their kingdom, but none were involved in that activity as we sped past. We knew that any number of tigers could be just out of sight in the grasses lining the roads though.

We were all disappointed that we hadn’t seen any felines on this trip, but we were still hopeful because we had another game drive to try our luck in the morning before we had to leave. I was completely out of it by the time we got back to the

Lodge and only drank bottled sparkling water with fresh lime juice before turning in, hoping for a better day tomorrow.

And that day dawned quickly too we were out on the trail of the tigers at 6:30 a.m.

We passed yesterday’s owl in his favorite perch and he was just as imperturbable as before. It is still not possible for us to tell what color his eyes are because he refused to open them for us. Today we added a crested serpent eagle to our list of animal sightings, but there were to be no tigers today either, despite the best efforts of our dedicated driver and camp guide. Actually, Suez was getting a little nervous about the length of time we were taking because he knew that the rest of our schedule for the day was pretty grueling. However, the guides were just determined and searched everywhere. The closest we got to seeing a tiger was spotting the pug marks from a male and female walking along the sandy track together. These paw prints are enormous but even more impressive was the length of their strides. That alone was graphic proof of the huge size of these Bengal Tigers. The Indian government is really trying hard to preserve the tigers in this and many other appropriate national park areas but human pressure on the land and prey animals is hard to combat. Tigers need a large territory after all, but at least the government and the local people see that the tigers add to the economic prosperity of their country because so many tourists come to see them!

Kathy and I have at least seen the environment and habitat that tigers can thrive in. We can imagine our young father stalking warily in these grasses with his Indian friends looking for the same quarry we sought. The way our father related his story to us was made more real after we saw this terrain. He and his young friend apparently found themselves, unexpectedly, in front of a cave-like rock overhang at the edge of a small clearing. Surprised to be alone, they peered into the darkness of the grotto and then heard behind them a low but very menacing growl. Whirling around, they saw the mother tiger and to the side, the maharajah and his beaters who had apparently been driving her forward. The danger was immediate to both the boys and the tiger, but the maharajah shot and killed the tiger with one-shot accuracy. The beaters and guides then entered the little cave and retrieved the two tiger cubs and brought them home for the royal menagerie. The mother tiger they carried out of the jungle and slung her long body over the hood of the maharajah’s car. We always hated the end of the story but then so did our father at the time he told us about it perhaps as a young boy he was only excited by the experience but as a most tender-hearted adult, he tolerated no cruelty to animals.

Disappointed but resigned, we left Ranthambore after showers and breakfast at 11 a.m. instead of the 9:30 a.m. that Suez had been shooting for. We had been warned we would have a very long day, but we had no true idea of just how long and arduous the trip would be. We were driving now to Agra, through the major brickmaking section of India. We don’t know if the heavy loads the trucks and carts had to bear because of shipping the bricks caused the problem, but this “highway” had the deepest potholes we had yet encountered! At every “dive” and jounce, we were all just sure that the bus’s axle would break or we would bottom out so that there would be no climbing out of the hole. The road condition thus made for our slowest going yet. To match the roar of the traffic noise outside, a dull rumble of discontent began to build inside our comfortable bus because it seemed we would never reach Agra. The light began to fade and we had long since run out of possible potty stops, instead, heading for the bushes beside the busy road as the day drug on. Sporadically a querulous voice would break out of the muffled murmurs and Suez would be skewered with a sarcastic comment or angry suggestion regarding the next meal, or how much longer could the trip possibly take and why weren’t we going to stop at Fatepur Sikri when that site was on the itinerary for today? Of course, the fact that we would have to visit under the moonlight did not seem to be relevant to our chorus of complainers.

Agra:TheCityoftheTajMahal

Ultimately, we did reach Agra around 7:30 p.m. and everyone was either too tired or too disgruntled to want to have supper in the Mughal Sheraton dining room. The four of us were too fatigued to be hungry and too short on patience to want to dine with our crabby fellow tourists. A couple of the stingier ones insisted on dinner since they had “paid for it when they bought the tour” so Suez was forced to accompany some of that merry crowd.

The biggest disappointment in Agra was evident immediately however the extremely smoky and polluted atmosphere. Generators by the score provide the evening electricity to businesses and homes; therefore, the air is almost too thick to breathe. Even inside the air-conditioned Sheraton the air was quite acrid and it bit at the mucous membranes of the nose and mouth. The climatic conditions here in Agra in wintertime produce a “capping” effect that keeps the air pollution trapped at low levels during the nighttime hours. During the day, the conditions would be improved we were promised.

The day seemed to take its toll on several folks: Mae came down with the infernal cold that is making the rounds, I’m still a bit under the weather with the GI complaints, and even Suez was feeling bad enough that he occupied the backseat of the bus today trying to sleep off whatever miseries he was dealing with. The acrid air filling the lobby, halls and even our room was causing Kay no end of coughing and hacking. Kathy and John seemed to be holding up fairly well at this point, having lived through their “Jaipur Jollies.”

It was true the day greeted us with clear skies, a cool temperature, and clean air! It seemed that everyone was feeling somewhat better as well. After all, we were now headed to the “Ghost City of Akbar” or Fatepur Sikri. Suez had assured us that morning light was better for photography and viewing at this site and everyone seemed willing to believe him today (of course, he had said that yesterday too when no one was willing to hear him). Conditions improved even more as we left Agra behind. Before getting out of Agra though we drove through some very poor sections of town with garbage piled up everywhere, much more squalid housing, and even poor air quality. Suez told us that though Agra is one of the richest cities in India, the city government is totally corrupt and that no one in power cares at all about the living conditions for the poor residents. Though there is plenty of money to keep municipal electricity supplied, the politicians prefer to spend the money elsewhere and let the people continue using their generators despite the fact that disease and discomfort follow along with the severe air pollution.

On the way to Akbar’s magnificent city (already described in an earlier part of the journal), we passed a cattle market for the buffalo. Big black buffalo crowded the roadsides and oozed over in the traffic lanes. There was much shouting as the owners attempted to control their beasts at the same time they were trying to buy and sell there. We saw the results of a couple of accidents, two of the few actual mishaps we saw on the whole trip despite the utter chaos of the roads in India. One truck had overturned and was lying on its back like a turtle with its wheels spinning uselessly in the air. The other wreck was an example of what our driver labeled “Kissing Trucks” two vehicles had actually slammed into each head on. Most amazingly, no one involved in these two incidents had been seriously hurt probably because the traffic moves so slowly along this utterly ruinous roadway.

We left tranquil Fatepur Sikri and returned to Agra to visit the Fort, the mini-Taj and the real Taj Mahal. Skies were still clear in Agra and the faint smoky residual in the air was not as annoying as before. The Agra Fort was built for the Mughal Emperor Jehangir, the wastrel son of Akbar. He was a drunkard who really left the governing of his empire to his clever Persian wife. Though he had a profound interest in the arts, it appears that he enjoyed them most when he was highest. The fort structure now looked pretty familiar to us since it is in the Hindu style with Persian accents.

The palaces within the fort itself are as beautiful as any we have seen and the whole effect is confirmatory of absolute splendor and wealth. One of the best views of the Taj Mahal is from the battlement of the Agra Fort looking across the Yamuna River. The glowing white Taj appears to hover lightly just over the treetops and silver ribbon of the river like a great white Lippazaner stallion performing his “airs above the ground.” Since we had nothing to provide perspective we weren’t able to gauge the size of the structure from this distance away.

When we left this fort, John had a turn at meeting one of his personal demons—face on. Two snake charmers were sitting by the gate and we stopped and watched them.

Suddenly one of the men put his turban on John’s head and had him squat down and play the flute himself. We got a good picture of him, charming the very creature which he really doesn’t like at all.

Before a fateful lunch, we went to visit the Mini-Taj, built by Jehangir’s shrewd wife for her parents and siblings. This beautiful gem is in a transitional style between Akbar’s red sandstone and the purity of white marble used in the Taj Mahal. The building looks very like a miniature replica of its older brother as it is approached through its beautiful garden setting through any one of three amazingly ornate gateways. However, the façade is not undecorated as is the marble of the Taj. Rather there are myriad designs created with inlaid stones, gems, multicolored rocks, marble of differing shades, creating a beautiful look but definitely a “busier” design.

Next it was time to lunch prior to our visit to the site that the majority of people most associate with India The Taj Mahal itself. During these tumultuous times, folks cannot simply visit the site at their leisure. Multiple security checks are necessary and visiting hours are strictly enforced so that a person cannot avoid the searching and x-raying.

We were all initially delighted with the lunch spot chosen for its fairly close proximity to the Taj and its promised American cuisine a Pizza Hut. Granted some of the pizza toppings looked pretty “foreign” to us, still it was possible to order a pepperoni and cheese pie and get something that appeared reassuringly familiar. Needless to say, there was no ground beef topping and no pork either. Veggies of several varieties can be selected and even fruit toppings are possible. Cucumber, a great Indian favorite, can even be added to the pizza. The waiting time seemed overly protracted but maybe that’s because we were all anticipating something that tasted

like home. The pies did finally begin to trickle out of the kitchen and some tables were eating before others saw any food being brought.

By the time we reached the checkpoint to begin the process of entering the Taj, several of us were feeling very peculiar indeed. As we waited in line to be frisked and have our bags and backpacks searched, I knew that bad things were brewing deep in my innards and I wondered how long I would be able to stand in this line, much less explore the Taj and its expansive grounds. Mae was also looking pretty unsettled and some others weren’t particularly happy looking. The security entrance to the Taj complex did not permit much of a look at the famed building itself but we amused ourselves as best we could by laughing and talking to others in line around us. Kay noticed a really attractive young Indian woman right next to us who was bringing her children to see the Taj. We all conversed a bit and Kay asked her if she lived in Agra and she said that she did not. Kay then asked her if she was from nearby and the lady smiled sweetly and said, “Not really.” And then we all chimed in asking her how far she had come to bring her children here. And she smiled broadly and said, “Atlanta!” We all got a big laugh from that “small world” proof and the “easy assumptions that are wrong” situation.

Finally we made it through the very thorough checkpoints and walked on towards the Taj. In our eagerness, our whole group separated and moved at different paces. However, wherever we were when we first saw how huge the Taj actually is, our reactions were the same “Wow!” None of us had expected the complex or the building itself to be so enormous. Perhaps that is because photos usually are taken without any people in them to provide any perspective. The photographers were rushing about looking for the best ways to shoot different yet effective pictures, how to include the double image by utilizing the reflecting pool’s echo of the Taj, how to keep all the people milling around all over the grounds and the courtyard from detracting from their photos.

By now it was about 4:30 p.m. so the light was beginning to change rapidly. When we first entered, the Taj was a gleaming rather stark white color. The red brick buildings which flanked it on both sides were glowing as if consumed in dark flames. The Yamuna River behind the Taj was a stainless steel gray line reflecting the sunlight sharply. The water in the reflecting pool was ruffled on its surface by a slight breeze so the image of the Taj was not crisp. Kathy and I ended up walking together while Kay and John were among the photographers. As we marveled at the

building’s purity of design and beauty of construction, the sun quickly turned the white marble into a salmon pink color and dulled the red brick buildings into smoldering coals. In just an instant, the color changed to a pale yellow-orange shade as the red brick buildings continued to glow.

The angle of the sun became sharper and now the Taj was as golden as the dome of many a state capital building in the USA. The red brick buildings were now almost blue-black. What a kaleidoscopic show of colors played on such an elegant background. We were surprised to find that visitors can enter the very crowded room below the dome of the Taj and look down into a crypt area where lie Shah Jehan and his beloved wife, Mumtaz, under their typical rectangular raised grave markers. There is a lovely carved marble screen of the greatest delicacy encircling the large round opening in the marble floor we walked on in our protective “booties.”

When we left that very close environment, I realized that the “brewing” had now matured into some more urgent and I had to find a bathroom. Looking rather frantically around the grounds, especially at both red brick buildings, I found nothing reassuring. About that time, Kathy and I ran back into Kay and made her

aware of my dilemma. I had noticed a line of shrubs extending out from the righthand side red brick building and also had seen no people wandering over that way. So asking Kay and Kathy to keep watch for me, I made a determined rush for the shrubbery. Luckily there were still no other folks about when I arrived and squatted quickly behind a huge tree in the hedge line and relieved myself of the offending gastrointestinal contents. Feeling really humiliated and awful about the whole experience, I skulked away from the area and rejoined Kay and Kathy, only to find them engaging a Chinese girl in conversation, asking her to take their picture, inquiring where she was from, and several other things to keep her from moving in my direction. The poor girl may have been heading for the bushes too, but they had protected me from a final abasement anyway.

With that ordeal over for the nonce, we went in search of John. We found him beside the reflecting pool and then we all sat on a wall facing the Taj and waited for the moon to complete her rise into the eastern sky. The stars twinkled with their faraway fire and the moon was huge and luminous in the dark firmament. The Taj transformed herself into an enormous earthbound moon of the most icy white brilliance under the influence of our earth’s lunar companion and those marvelous stars! With the full moon floating high and right of the its mirror image on earth, the picture was truly spectacular. Two bright moons lighting up the night! How amazing to have such an ethereal experience of beauty combined with an utterly animal urgency and embarrassment in the same place and time! We humans really are composed of the angelic and the animal!

Though I had managed to avoid any further incidents at the Taj, I was really horrified to learn that there was another stop before we headed back to the hotel at a marble factory where inlaid marble tables, screens, and other decorative accessories and furniture pieces were created. We were to enjoy a demonstration of the painstaking process of creating these inlaid pieces and everyone was eager and curious. I, however, spent the entire time, save a very few minutes, in the restroom at the factory. As soon as I would creep out in some little hope of seeing a bit of the demonstration or at least examine a few examples of the finished products, I was “called” urgently and rudely back to the restroom! Can’t imagine what the gentlemen in the factory thought was going on but perhaps they have seen many tourists with “Agra Ague” before. I did manage to steal a look at a couple of dining room tabletops which Kay and I both liked very much and we took careful measurements, as well as instructions on how to order the one we thought would fit best in our

house, after we got home. Then we finally returned to the Sheraton Hotel for the night. I was so relieved to get there where there was a facility right in my room!

INDIA’SRELIGIONS:ANYPUZZLEPIECESHERE?

Religious Conflicts Then and Now

The Muslim influence in India is of longstanding and the rivalry between Hindus and Muslims has created many problems over the centuries. The British left the problem pretty much unresolved when they granted India its freedom after the partitioning which created Pakistan and East Pakistan (now Bangladesh). Many Muslims elected to leave India and migrate into Muslim majority Pakistan while many Hindus left that part of the world and moved into India proper so they could live in a Hindu majority country. However, many others of both religions chose to stay in place, preferring to live where they had always lived rather than following other religious immigrants. The world still lives with the residuals of that fatal mistake as Hindus and Muslims clash within India and the question of the Kashmir province is left unsettled, a source of continuing conflict and violence. Some of the Northeast provinces of India are also contentious because of the lingering religious differences. None of this unrest looks likely to disappear any time soon though occasionally hope rises as the Pakistanis and Indians talk to one another again and mention that they would like to resolve the Kashmir stand-off.

The world itself is more violent today than it was in our grandparents’ day and there are more clashes between religious groups today that erupt out of a war of words and beliefs into violence against one another’s houses of worship and also against persons professing other beliefs. Even the offshoot sects of Hinduism (the Jains and the Sikhs) occasionally attack each other or the dominant Hindus as well as the Muslim minority. In general, the very low percentage of Christians in India does not seem to promote the religious strife that the other religions do. The Christians seem to stay out of the conflicts and do not generate ones of their own. Since all the protestant sects in India finally melded together as the Christian Church of South India, there is no internecine discord among them. The amalgamation of those churches had been discussed even in the 20s and 30s while my grandfather was still in India and it was accomplished after Independence in l947. The relative accord among the protestant churches there even before their convergence is testified to by the ease with which my grandfather moved from

being a Baptist to becoming a Methodist because that denomination could afford to support his work!

Much as we might like to believe that our grandfather’s work (and that of others like him) had led to a mass conversion of Indians to Christianity, such is certainly not the case! Overall, Christian Indians make up a little over 2% of the population, though in Southern India, the percentage reaches 3%. Because India’s total population is over a billion people, that is not an inconsiderable number of Christians, but obviously the vast majority of Indians practice other religions. Furthermore, Indians are known as a spiritual people who value their religious affiliations and participate regularly in the rites of these various faiths.

Like the Middle East which spawned three of the world’s major religions (Judaism, Christianity, and Islam), India too is a source of religions which a large of number of people in the world practice: Hinduism and Buddhism. Something like 82% of the people are Hindus while Buddhists are fewer in number than Christians. Though Buddhism came to life in India, it is an almost non-existent influence there today. More on that puzzling fact a little later. Muslims make up about 12% of the Indian population because most of them left for Pakistan at the time of Partition in l947.

The four largest religions of the world are Christianity with 33% of the world’s population, Islam with 18%, Hinduism with 13% and Buddhism with 6%. Sikhism and Jainism (much smaller offshoots of Hinduism) do not even total 1% of the total. But still, it is clear that Indian religions taken together are second only to Christianity in total number of adherents across the world.

Hinduism

Hinduism is the world’s oldest organized religion and its religious texts are the oldest scriptures in the world (predating the Hebrew Bible by at least 2000 years). People erroneously believe that Hinduism is a polytheistic religion but in actuality it is not. The religion acknowledges one god over all: Brahman. But it postulates hundreds of other “deities” that are presumed to be facets, assets, and forms of the one god. Others believe that it is a Trinitarian religion because the three main gods who are worshipped are: Brahma the Creator, Shiva the Destroyer, and Vishnu the Preserver. However, these gods are in reality three aspects of the God of All (Brahman). There are male and female forms of the God, animal/man combos like Hanuman the Monkey God and Ganesh the Elephant-headed God, even the River

Ganges itself. Devotees are free to choose any of the aspects of the God that appeal to them and their needs; however, the majority of Hindus choose either Shiva or Vishnu as their principle deity.

Hindus also believe in the transmigration of souls (Samsara) and in Karma which is the accumulated sum of the good and bad deeds over all the lifetimes. Karma determines whether the soul returns as a human being moving closer to Moksa (liberation from Samsara & attainment of enlightenment) or as a lower life form such as mammals or even insects. Hindus believe in the 4-fold Path of Life: Dharma (righteousness), Artha (material prosperity), Kama (gratification of the senses) and Moksa (the supreme good which is liberation from Samsara).

Jainism

This religion is a syncretism of Hinduism and Buddhism and there are approximately 4 million people who claim Jainism as their religion, almost all of them living in India. The Jains recognize no supreme creator of the universe. Instead, they accept the Universe itself as the only eternal entity.

They have 24 prophets whose teachings they accept as the fount of knowledge and behaviorism guidelines the first of these prophets is Adam and the most recent is an Indian holy man born in 1459. They believe in 5 principles of living: Ahimsa (nonviolence), Satya (truthfulness), Asteya (honesty), Brahma (monogamy) and Aperigraha (detachment from the physical and material world). In their quest to follow these precepts, the Jains build beautiful temples to their prophets, they practice strict vegetarianism, and they refuse to harm any life form other than plants. Really devout Jains will not even consume root vegetables because a worm or insect might be killed in the harvesting of that vegetable. Extreme Jains even wear face masks at all time to avoid accidentally breathing in an insect and killing it. The object of following these 5 principles is to free oneself from the wheel of reincarnation by becoming completely detached from the world.

Sikhism

This religion is an amalgamation of Hinduism and Islam, founded in the 1400s. There are about 22 million Sikhs worldwide with the majority living in India. They reject the caste system of Hinduism as well as idol worship. They have their own sacred texts called the Grantha. The Sikhs accept the concepts of reincarnation and

of karma and they also practice a form of baptism for cleansing of sins. Like Muslims, they are obligated to pray several times a day to their one god who has many names as in Hindu worship.

The spiritual goal of Sikhs is to live in a loving relationship with God. They definitely do not practice non-violence and, indeed, are known as fierce warriors. The British often used them in policing their fellow citizens and in putting down rebellions in India. Sikhs also served Great Britain in both world wars.

Buddhism

The fate of Buddhism in India is a great mystery. Siddartha Gautama, the founder of Buddhism, was an Indian prince who renounced his privileges and lived ascetically while meditating to achieve enlightenment. Once he attained that state, he began to preach his message. He started his ministry at Sarnath among his five disciples and his teachings proved to be compelling and popular. One of India’s greatest early rulers, Ashoka, actually converted to Buddhism and attempted to make it the state religion.

Siddartha Gautama, called The Buddha when he attained enlightenment, was born in 535 B.C. in Northern India. Buddha also preached the need for enlightenment achieved through total detachment from the world. Only through attainment of this state, nirvana, could an individual escape the wheel of reincarnation. He taught that nirvana could be achieved by three practices: Sila—good conduct based on equality and reciprocity; Samakhi meditation; leading to Prajna enlightenment.

Buddhism quickly spread over most of India and to a great extent supplanted Hinduism when the Great King Ashoka converted to the religion. Born in about 302 B.C., Ashoka was the third in a line of rapacious and cruel rulers. He himself killed at least one of his brothers to take the throne and he was ruthless in attacking neighbors of his territories. After one particularly horrific war, Ashoka was apparently overcome with remorse and began to practice the Buddhist precepts to which he had given only lip service previously. He tried to create a moral government that would no longer pursue wars of conquest, that would treat all citizens fairly and with kindness and encourage those attributes between individuals as well. He even began to teach his people to treat animals with respect and tenderness, offering them medical care as they would for humans. He even ordered

that the people begin to practice vegetarianism and avoid killing animals. He also was tolerant of other religions and wanted their devotees treated with justice.

Historians now believe that Ashoka was a truly excellent ruler, maybe one of the greatest the world ever knew. He encouraged Buddhist monks to educate themselves and then to share what they learned with the common people. He sent monks to other lands to teach the precepts of Buddhism as well and his evangelism was certainly successful in China and Japan where Buddhism is still a large religious influence. The national symbol of India is the Ashokan capital, taken from one of the columns he erected to inform his people of his edicts. The capital of this column is composed of four lion heads looking in the four cardinal directions. After Ashoka died in 232 B.C., the influence of Buddhism gradually disappeared from Indian life as Hinduism reasserted itself as the dominant religion.

It is interesting to note on a visit to Sarnath, the shrine to Buddha, that the monks and devotees are from other countries: Thailand, Japan, Korea, China, Tibet. Indians are conspicuously absent except as tourists. They are not seen praying at the various sites or in the Buddhist temple close to Sarnath. It’s amazing that after having been a dominant religion in India during the period of Ashoka’s reign Buddhism has virtually disappeared from the subcontinent. So are there any puzzle pieces for me in this religious mosaic of India? Probably only one a reason why Christianity has not swept the Indian masses into its fold. It appears that one main theme connecting all the religions born here in India is a belief in reincarnation. From this belief spring both the need to break away from that continuous wheel and the methods of effecting one’s escape complete liberation from this world and its entrapments. Christianity does not accept the idea of reincarnation and offers no guide to avoid it. Though there are many concepts in common with all the great religions, such as honesty, correct behavior, justice, kindness to others, and the like, the Indian religions all allow men to move through various stages of existence in order to achieve some sort of enlightenment. Most of them also offer many different “gods” or facets of one God with whom to identify and from whom to ask blessings, security, and relief. When a person has been raised with these beliefs, it has to be incredibly difficult to abandon them in favor of such an alien set of concepts as Christianity. My grandfather always said that the Catholic Christians could be more successful at conversion than the Protestants because of their panoply of saints and because of their more colorful rites and rituals performed throughout the liturgical calendar. Catholicism was easier for the Indians to accept,

at least superficially. All these religious themes and practices must be an important explanation of why there are fewer than 3% Christian Indians despite all the evangelism since St. Thomas came to India to preach Christ’s message all those centuries ago right up into the present day.

EXTENSIONTOTHEHOLYCITIESOFINDIA

Speaking of planes, trains and automobiles, our only train ride on the famous rail system left by the British was to be on the day after the Taj Mahal adventure. That day also marked the end of the regular tour of Northern India and the beginning of the 3-day extension that we had finally gotten Kathy and John aboard. It also meant that we would lose three of the most contentious of our fellow travelers so that there would be 10 of us now visiting Khajuraho and Varanasi (old British Benares on the Ganges).

However, my going on the extension or to the hospital the night after the Taj visit was still to be decided. After getting back into the Sheraton, I continued to have urgent diarrhea about every hour until there was nothing left inside except water. Finally after 4 Imodium pills, 2 Cipro tablets and 2 Lomotil obtained from Mae, I was able to get to sleep from midnight till 5:30 a.m. When I awoke, miraculously I was cured! Both Kay and I were mightily relieved because we had to leave for the train station fairly early.

I had eaten no supper and I did not eat any breakfast for fear of getting things started up again. I did take the necessary pills with some sparkling water and that only made me nauseous, but not subject to the diarrhea again. All night and this morning, my mournful mantra was, “I ain’t coming here no more!” meaning anywhere in Asia! My misery was such that I really meant it too. That night that I spent wondering if I would be going on the extension, Kathy and John enjoyed visiting with Suez in his room at the Sheraton. They got to know him better personally and shared some of their life with him as well. Their patience with the chronic complainers in our groups was even more strained after this time spent with Suez on a more personal basis.

We left for the train station at 7:30 a.m. driving through the smoky air of Agra. The station was not too far from the Sheraton and we made good time despite the morning traffic. Our train was an express and actually it was pretty much on time. The porters Suez had hired got our luggage aboard quickly and efficiently. We found

our seats scattered over two cars but all the luggage was accounted for prior to our pulling out of the station. Our old first class train car (dating from the 20s) was supposedly air-conditioned but not so we could tell it. The car where John and Kathy rode did have the promised air-conditioning. However, it was cool outside so the temperature in our car never became uncomfortable.

The seats were comfortable and the cars ran quite smoothly over the rails. Car attendants passed through periodically selling snacks, tea, water, newspapers and magazines. The countryside beyond our window went by at a good pace for sightseeing and the entire trip was enjoyable and entertaining. We were heading SSE from Agra towards the city of Jhansi, home of India’s “Joan of Arc.” This redoubtable lady, Rani Laxmibai, in 1857 had defied the British, laying down her life while striking a blow for Indian independence, at the head of the army she had raised in her hometown. She is revered all over India for her bravery. However, we were not to see much of her town since we merely disembarked the train there and then were picked up by our new driver and van for the trip to Khajuraho. We could readily see that Jhansi is still a military town since there were transports and convoys filling the all the streets. Our poor driver had to practically fight his way out of the city, dodging all the huge trucks as well as the customary civilian traffic.

Orchha

The road, once we left Jhansi, was really just a joke as usual and expected, enormous caverns dotted the traffic lanes and all India’s indigenous species of animals crowded in on the motorized vehicles! We stopped fairly soon at a new hotel and restaurant for lunch in the small town of Orchha. This was a very good rest stop because the hotel’s central garden was pleasant and there were excellent western-style toilets. As we waited in the garden for our specially prepared meal, we watched birds and monkeys scamper about. The flowers were brilliant and profuse too. Everyone said that the meal was one of the best we had enjoyed in the whole country, but I have to report from hearsay since I only drank a little soup. I was hungry but afraid to get peristalsis on the move again.

After the delightful stopover and delicious lunch, we walked across the highway to a wonderful 16th century palace compound built by a Rajput Hindu maharajah Rudrah Pratap (1501-1531 A.D). He had moved his capital to this area and needed an appropriately imposing royal citadel to be erected. However, he had barely gotten started with his plans when his son Bhartichand (1531-1554) ascended to the throne at his father’s death. Bhartichand actually built the first royal palace, the

Rajah Mahal or king’s palace in dense forests beside the Betwa River. His brother, Madhukar Shah (1554-1592) completed the complex with the special entrance gates, the camel barns, and the various courtyards. A very clever man, he imitated the tastes of the Moghul emperors and offered his beautiful daughter to Emperor Akbar in marriage. That cemented excellent relations between himself and the imperial court. He was thus allowed to live in the splendor he had acquired for himself and to administer his own fiefdom (the kingdom of Bundelkhand) as his family had always done.

Madhukar had also shown tremendous courage and independence (maybe hubris and stupidity too though it all worked out in his favor) when he had been summoned to the Court of Akbar and had the temerity to wear on his forehead the tilak (mark of Vishnu worship) which had been forbidden by the Islamic Moghul emperor. He strode proudly in for his audience with his head held so high that Akbar could not have failed to see it. Legend has it that Akbar was much impressed by this brave man and from then on allowed Hindus to wear the tilak without punishment.

The Orchha citadel is very impressive for its size and complexity.

However, money is not being spent on it rapidly enough to prevent significant

deterioration. The magnificent blue tiles which apparently faced the walls of the buildings surrounding the central garden are now represented by only a few still clinging to the plaster enough to give your imagination a hook on which to hang a mental picture of the place in its erstwhile glory.

The palace is 5 stories on one side of the garden and 4 stories on the other and is of considerable grace in architectural detail. There were remnants of paintings in the palace rooms, chiefly scenes from the life of Vishnu, which retained an amazing amount of vitality and freshness despite their neglect through the years.

The camel barn was also very impressive though not so highly decorated. The stalls were very large and high since camel heads sit high on that long neck. The thresholds into the stalls were also high off the ground since camels can step very high. However, we couldn’t help but feel a bit sorry for the cameleers who had to get over those tall thresholds too and muck out the stable over that height as well.

We were enjoying a perfectly beautiful day with cool temperatures and very low humidity. The blue sky was cloudless and seemed very far over our heads. Poor Suez was not having his best day. He was obviously sick though he refused to admit it. While we were all wandering around the citadel, he was reclined on a stone bench trying to sleep. It was hard to believe that some of our still grouchy fellow travelers were angry with him for that little collapse. Guess he was supposed to be always at their sides with conversation and explanation regardless of how he felt.

The Orchha royal citadel was such a fascinating place that none of us was eager to resume the bus ride. We knew it would be at least another 4 ½ hrs. before we could arrive in Khajuraho. This road was like a macadam roller coaster the whole way and was filled with the usual traffic. Poor Suez risked further condemnation from the “old and irascible” by having very little to say to keep them amused and by sleeping in his seat most of the time. We finally reached our Holiday Inn in the center of Khajuraho about 8 p.m. and we had been “buoyed up” along the way with the constant undercurrent of mutiny and insurrection among our fellow travelers.

I was grateful that my innards had stayed quiet the whole day and that I had a little appetite for supper. Of course, the fact that the buffet contained a tray of tiny (but real) baked potatoes might have helped stimulate that hunger. The potatoes tasted so good to me that I ate 3 of them along with some asparagus soup which was also quite tasty. Then it was off to beddies to get ready for the next day.

Khajuraho

Khajuraho was founded in the 10th century as Vatna and later one of the capitals of Bundelkhand in the 14th century, the town has flourished, faded, blossomed, and wilted again several times. It lost its political and religious significance in the 1500s. Now it has the special designation as a UNESCO World Heritage Site, so its reputation, wealth and fame are in full bloom again. The Chandelas rulers who were in power in the 10th and 11th centuries built the many temples in this landscape.

Of the original 88 structures, there are now 22 remaining, divided by convention into the East and West Quadrants. The West Quadrant contains the best and oldest of the surviving structures. The East Quadrant contains relatively newer temples and more of them are Jain in design.

Under a glorious blue canopy in a lawn-like setting offset with brilliantly blooming bougainvillea and oleander, Mr. Sharma, our local guide, took us through the setting providing cogent and interesting commentary on almost everything we saw. It was so clear (and heartwarming) to see how much he loves these shrines and the artwork that adorns them. He explained to us that most of the temples had been deliberately defiled by Muslims in the past and are therefore not functioning as modern places of worship. Therefore, we could visit them without removing our shoes. There is one Hindu temple currently in use now and we were allowed to visit it too if we went barefoot.

These temples are all built on high platforms so that the viewer is constantly looking up at the carvings and the construction. This elevation renders the artisans’ achievements all the more admirable since the proper prospective was so difficult to produce. The shrines are wildly intricate with stone carvings of incredible delicacy and vitality. All but three of them are built of sandstone and those three are constructed of granite. It is just awe-inspiring that the artists could render such marvelous figures in those obdurate and resistant materials.

Every possible surface on each temple is filled with these figures of people, animals, plants, and gods. The animal figures are very real in appearance as are the entwined plants and flowers, but it is the human statues that are the most amazing! The talented artists have created figures that seem to have movement, individuality, and life. Many of them appear to have been caught in a dance step, or in a private moment brushing their hair, arranging their costumes, turning around. Point of view

is so unique and effective many of the figures are sculpted to appear that they are facing away from the viewer. Often, the viewer is looking over the shoulder of the statue into the same mirror the figure is watching. Some of the figures are even humorous; a woman twists around trying to scratch her back and another bends and turns attempted to fasten her dress. The faces of both men and women have expressions signaling differing emotions and individual features. Remember, too, that the artist’s medium is unyielding and pitted sandstone and granite; yet these statues have skin that appears soft and limbs that are pliant and plastic. These people seem real and alive. Finally, the abundance is defeating; there is just too much to comprehend and assimilate.

Of course, the famous Kama Sutra sexual imagery is here as well people portrayed engaged in all kinds of sexual activities. The third stage in Hindu spiritual ascendancy is the appreciation of the sexual nature of man as well as all the pleasures of the senses. This penultimate state in spiritual development precedes the final stage which is liberation from the world entirely. There are several themes in the tableau scorpions on the thighs of the statues represent sexual desire; women with firmly crossed legs are supposed to be in the throes of sexual temptation, men exhibiting curly-lipped smiles are attempting seduction.

One of the most famous of the temples here, a slightly more modern one, has been constructed with three domes: one in the Muslim style, another in Buddhist manner, and the last in Hindu design. It is very impressive indeed and it is only to be wished that the three religions could co-exist as beatifically and serenely as these domes on this one temple.

In the Eastern Quadrant, there are only a couple Jain temples still surviving and after the vibrancy of the Hindu shrines in the West, these are of much less interest and beauty. We must admit that our attention was easily swayed from Mr. Sharma’s discussion here by the sight of the thinnest and hungriest looking dog we saw on the entire trip. She was an obviously nursing mother who was literally giving herself up to her puppies. While the rest of us impotently sympathized, Kay, in her typical fashion, left the temple area and went to the little shops we had passed and purchased food for the dog. She bought cookies, chapattis filled with veggies and potatoes and finally a quart of milk. The dog gratefully ate it all though she clearly preferred the milk and cookies a dog of “infinite fancy” to be sure. Kay also left money with the shopkeeper to keep feeding the mother dog milk everyday for two

more weeks after we were gone. Whether or not he would do that, who can say? But Kay made the humanitarian decision and trusted him and his Hindu respect for life animal and human.

Did we pick up any new puzzle pieces in this famous city? I think not—except that we were both very sure that our grandfather would have been outraged by the erotic carvings and we think that our father might have been amused. So nothing new here really, but it was still an interesting visit to an Indian shrine of great beauty and craftsmanship.

Our 40 minute flight from Khajuraho to Varanasi was uneventful except for the really thorough security check we endured at the tiny airport where this is the only flight of the day. We were x-rayed, body searched twice, frisked twice, and had our bags checked twice as well.

The elaborate checks delayed the flight a few minutes but we certainly felt safe as we boarded. And, as usual, in that brief 40 minutes, we were given orange juice and a sandwich of cheese and mango chutney for lunch. These Indians are really efficient!

Varanasi(BenarestotheBritish)

We landed in Hindu India’s holiest city in the early afternoon and, somewhat ironically, our first visit in the city was to Sarnath, site of the birth of Buddhism. On our way there, we were surprised to see that this very old city is also fairly clean no piles of garbage and trash topped with dogs, cows and goats rooting around in them. The streets were very busy, of course, but maybe a shade more orderly. That impression however would not stand the test resulting from the rest of our visit.

Sarnath is the site where Buddha preached his first sermon to his five disciples after his own enlightenment. This place is marked mostly with ruins now though there is an amazing complete structure that looks like a manmade Devil’s Tower in Montana.

It is a huge, round, thick tower with an enclosed top. An early English visitor to Sarnath drilled a hole through the tower to try to learn something of its structure, meaning, and purpose, but all his found for his trouble was a stone tablet at the bottom which commemorated Buddha’s first sermon. Perhaps that is enough of a find, actually. Most of the ruins were once monasteries for the study of Buddhist texts and promulgation of the faith. The majority of those monasteries had been built by Ashoka the Great, first Indian ruler to convert to Buddhism. He had nearly constant construction going on between 222 AD and 232 AD, the height of his reign.

The presence of so many devout Buddhists from several countries proves that though Buddhism lost its hold on India’s peoples, the religion still has great influence among many peoples of the world Chinese, Tibetans, Koreans, Japanese, Burmese, Thais in particular. At the time we visited, we would see representatives from all those countries in prayers, devotions, sacrifices (candles and flowers) and ritual activities such as making circuits around the enormous dome-tower and affixing little pieces of gold seal to the walls of the ruined structures. Buddhist priests from various countries were also in evidence and Suez taught us that it is easy to recognize from which countries they hailed by their dress. Tibetan monks visiting Sarnath wear red robes, Thais wear short saffron garments, Burmese are attired in longer saffron robes, Koreans are in green, and Japanese in dun colored clothing.

We visited a small, but excellent, museum on the Sarnath site where there were many statues, figurines, and carvings which showed the influence of Greek hairstyles, clothing, and even the art itself all dating from the time of Alexander’s invasion of India. The original four lion headed capital from Ashoka’s pillar also is housed in this museum. It is probably twice as large as a modern traffic light and the carving of the lions is done in a reddish marble. As has already been mentioned, this capital has been adopted as the symbol of modern India.

The last site to visit here at Sarnath was the temple devoted to Buddha adorned with murals of scenes of his life from his virgin birth, to his dissolute life as a prince of India, to his temptation in the desert, to his enlightenment, his preaching and finally his death from eating poisoned pork offered by a supposedly devout old woman.

Morning came very early this next day as we were going to take a sunrise boat ride on Mother Ganges to see the morning prayer vigils. Our bus drove us most of the way to the river, but the streets close to the Ganges are much too narrow, steep and sinuous so we walked the remainder of the approach. This gave us the opportunity to observe the awakening city. Vendors at tiny stalls were eating breakfast, brushing

their teeth, arranging their bits of merchandise, cooking chapattis and pouring out jugs of milk. Ladies were sweeping the street in front of their homes and shops. It was very quiet despite the activity. Cows and dogs crowded the roadways already squeezed by the tilting old buildings. Hurried steps were nearly impossible in the stenotic lanes among all the confusion.

But we arrived in time to board the heavy rowboat that took our group out onto the sacred river. We were handed lotus flower cups filled with marigolds and a lit candle to float upon the waters as the sun rose over the eastern shore. It was chilly and still very quiet with a soft “throw” of fog hovering over us.

Some lights were seen in the temples & hostels that line the western shore and gradually we began to hear the chanting start, low and guttural, rising in pitch as the sun began his climb out of his nighttime rest in the river waters.

The clumsy boat had seats along its gunnels rather than across the middle. The pilot stood at the back of the vessel and two small but sinewy men sat in the bow facing us as they pulled on the sturdy and crude oars. They pulled hard and completely lay back on the bow as they finished each stroke. The Ganges is a formidable force and it took strength to navigate against her tides, even though she is very low (almost 7

meters lower than usual) at the time of our visit. So our progress was slow but that was perfect for observing what was going on around us.

The eastern shore of the river appears to be uninhabited at this point along her course. No buildings were visible, no sign of agriculture, no people or animals were observed. The land appeared dusty and dry with a layer of fine sand hanging between the earth and the foggy mist above it. As the sun gradually rose above that dusty bed, we cast our little candles onto the waters and watched as they flowed backward away from us twinkling in the increasing light.

On the western shore we now saw people bathing in the Ganges, collecting its waters in plastic jugs, washing their clothing, drinking the holy water from their cupped hands and standing hip-deep in prayerful attitudes. The piety of these people was palpable and their adherence to the faith of their fathers could only be seen as humbling.

Even our grandfather could not have failed to be impressed by the devotion of the Hindus to their Mother Ganges. And we know he was impressed because he wrote admiringly of this very trait of the Hindus he worked among. Of course, he would have wished that all this piety and devotion could have been directed differently.

Our strong oarsmen pulled our craft further up the river until we passed the cremation ghats (an upraised platform on the river slope). A funeral was being conducted even as we floated by. Only the men of the family accompany the wrapped body down to the river to immerse it in that holy water. Then they place it atop a bed of wood and straw. More wood and straw are piled on top of the body. Prayers are said and the funeral pyre is lit. It takes about 4 hours for the body to be reduced to ashes. Smoke was rising from a couple of ghats already on this morning. All Hindus desire to be cremated and have their ashes scattered on the waters of

Mother Ganges. According to the Hindu religion, bodies must be cremated only in the daylight hours except in the 4 holy cities of the country, Varanasi being the most important one. In these cities, cremations go on day and night everyday.

The sun did not “come up like thunder” this morning; rather the shining red-orange disk slipped between the cushions of fog, smog and mist in a distinctly undramatic fashion. We were able to see the buildings lining the river more clearly and the sight was not pretty. Most of the temples and hostels are in ruinous condition and many of them have clearly been abandoned, though pilgrims “squat” in them when they are in the city temporarily. Some have been splashed with brightly colored paint, but the effect is only garish. Since there were many fewer people present than we had expected (thousands we had anticipated) and because the sunrise was not particularly beautiful, we felt that the whole experience was somewhat “underwhelming” but definitely interesting.

Our walk back to the bus took us through those same serpentine streets, but now there was more light and much more vehicular activity. This part of Varanasi is very poor indeed but there did not appear to be despair or desolation among the residents there. Many people were laughing and talking with one another and the vendors were fairly busy selling small items to their neighbors.

One would not want to contemplate what type of sewage disposal was available to these people because it was pretty obvious that there was none. The streets had gutters which ran with filthy water all the time and animal wastes had to be sidestepped frequently. Nonetheless, the people, though thin, did not look emaciated or starving.

We stopped for a visit to a side-by-side Islamic mosque and Hindu temple that were heavily guarded. We had to be searched before entering the compounds which were surrounded by high fences. Soldiers with big guns stood guard at every opening in the fences and the holy buildings. Even with all the precautions, we were not allowed to enter either of these holy places. This site has been the scene of sectarian violence often and the government seemed to be trying to prevent such outbreaks again. (However, we learned later on March 7, bombs were exploded at 3 different sites in Varanasi, killing and wounding many people and we wondered if one of the sites was that temple/mosque compound we visited.) Religious zealousness has been the cause of so much misery in the world over the centuries. It would appear that when the first couple of humans crawled out of the cave and, looking up at the stars, decided there must be a God or Creator, they could not agree on just who he was and how we should react to his existence. Since then humanity has been at war over their various interpretations and no religion seems to have escaped the hostilities.

After leaving that contentious site, we visited a durga temple where animal sacrifices had been practiced up until the British outlawed it in the 19th century. This temple is dedicated to “Durga,” a manifestation of the goddess Parvati in her role as a war diety. We were not allowed into this temple either, but we could stand in a corridor surrounding the temple proper and look down into the sanctum. Non-Hindus were asked not to try to enter the temple itself. Devotees here brought traditional offerings of coconut, lotus and marigolds rather than killing animals on site. All four of us were very relieved that the practice had been banned.

We had a chance to rest a bit after breakfast and it also gave us the opportunity to get some money changed so we would be ready for the tipping that would happen the next day. What makes this interesting is how different the exchange rate could be in just a few hours.

Our first exchange (the hotel would exchange only a certain amount in the morning and then would be open for business again in the afternoon for another set amount) was made at the rate of 44.20 rupees per dollar and those few hours later the rate had sunk to 44 per dollar. Volatile currency the rupee!

Our afternoon adventure was really quite entertaining. We went by twos in bicycle rickshaws down to the river again to view the evening prayers. What an excellent way to experience this whole event. The streets were smoky and the pollution was getting ever thicker as the sun went down. The crowds of people were merrily walking or riding as we were down the busy central avenue where the vendors were selling snacks, offering cups, balloons, cotton candy, trinkets and copies of religious objects, chapattis, ice cream, flowers, peeled cucumbers, sliced pineapples, fans, postcards, scarves, shirts, and even sari materials.

The streetlamps strung above the street were weak but each one had a mist halo around it that helped disperse the light so that the merry atmosphere could be clearly observed. People were in a festive humor and the crowded street did not exasperate them at all. Most ladies were dressed well in really bright colors as if for

a holiday. The crowd was composed of all ages of people from the really elderly to the children.

When we got within a block of the riverfront, our rickshaw man stopped peddling and we got out to complete the trip on foot. There were bleachers set up facing the river and there was a stage in front of those seats that were completely filled by the time we arrived. But there was plenty of improvised seating available on walls surrounding and protecting trees, on stairs up to the buildings, on building buttresses. The stage was already peopled with 7 priests resplendently clad in red robes decorated with gold sashes and piping. Many objects surrounded each priest: feather fans, candelabra, smoking pots of incense, and many items we could not identify.

Much brighter lights illuminated the stage area than we had seen on the streets approaching the river. Long ropes were strung from bells hung in the canopy over each priest. These ropes reached into the audience in the bleachers and when the prayers or “arthi” began, folks took the ropes and kept up a constant ringing of the bells throughout the ritual. The monks were mostly young and they chanted in loud and clear voices. The evening prayers are a salute to Mother Ganges with a request

for her blessing on each one in the crowd. The monks pick up the objects one by one and hold them up, first to the east, then to the north, then to the west, and finally to the south, all the while intoning the prayers. Meanwhile the cacophonous bells are continuous pealing. The whole ritual looked as if “staged” for the tourists rather than performed in response to religious devotion. Not only that, the whole ritual seemed absolutely interminable. The prayers were long and monotone so there was little interest in them as music. The ritualistic addressing of the four cardinal points with each of the sacred objects took forever to complete. Tourists were popping up everywhere taking pictures from various vantage points. It was difficult to tell which people were there out of religious duty and which were tourists like us. There was no attempt made to keep a respectful silence nor did the onlookers seem to participate in the prayers. It really did appear to be a spectacle and for a short while it was just that then it became repetitious and boring to those of us who had no understanding whatever about what was going on.

After about an hour and a half, though it seemed much longer, we finally mustered the troops and everyone walked back to the spot we had left our rickshaws. We climbed aboard and returned up the still riotous street filled with folks who had apparently never gone all the way to the river for the “service.” The energy that filled the atmosphere on the street did not seem to be particularly “religious” just a couple of blocks away from the “arthi” performance but it was electric and highly contagious. We came back to the van really exhilarated. However, some of our irascible group were still unhappy, even the one who had thrown a fit about getting “to the arthi on time.” Seems she was bored by the whole thing and wished we hadn’t stayed so long. Some people can’t be pleased!

By now we realized that we were never taken back to the hotel after such an experience. The day had to end in a shop of one kind or another tonight we visited a silk brocade store. We were shown how silk is made through various methods from very “hands-on” to the merely mechanical. Then we were shown gorgeous items made of the silk brocade. Vibrant colors, satiny textures, rich designs really beautiful things and at such reasonable prices compared to what we would be paying at home. So needless to say, we bit Kathy and John bought wall hangings of elephants and the Taj. Kay and I got bedspreads and pillow shams.

We had dinner on our own at the Radisson Hotel which was not far from our own place. The meal was mediocre but they did have “firni” and this was the first time we had seen that delicious dessert since we had arrived in the country. So we couldn’t resist and it was cool and refreshing as it is supposed to be.

Our last morning in India was spent trying to force our purchases into our already tightly stuffed backpacks. Luckily, Kathy and John came to the rescue again and took some items that we simply could not cram into our own spaces. We left the Varanasi Airport on JetAir around 1:15 p.m. and arrived in Delhi about 4:30 p.m. All our luggage arrived with us too, so that was very special. The bus that picked us up from the airport then drove us around the city for a while, killing time really until they could take us out to dinner one last time on Cross Culture. We saw the houses of parliament again, the wonderful India Gate, a couple of lovely city gardens.

Finally, Suez signaled the driver to turn towards the Garam Masala restaurant set in a lovely garden. John said it was one of the best meals we had all during the trip and certainly all of us agreed that the “starters” were especially tasty. During dinner, Suez took his leave of us and we were now in the hands of the driver and local guide who would get us to the Indira Gandhi International Airport on time, early in fact. So early that we could not check in at that point and had to mill around outside the gate area. Indian airports do not allow passengers to proceed to their gates until the flight is called. Then the folks can begin the intensive check-in and security procedures. After the pat-downs, luggage and body searches, x-raying of luggage, then it is possible to go into the seating at the gate.

Praise be, our flight to Paris was uneventful and we did sleep quite a bit on the way. The wait was not overlong in Paris either and we then flew on to Miami both legs on Air France. All our baggage made it with us and we got a taxi with ease and returned home to Hollywood where we had started out on Thanksgiving Day.

FINALPUZZLEPIECES

So, did we complete the jigsaw puzzle of who our father was during this heretofore unimaginable journey? That, unfortunately, is easy to answer with a lamentable, “No!” Did we find some pieces that contributed something meaningful to us? That question can be answered with a grateful “Yes!” I believe that we have more of an understanding of our grandparents’ work in the mission field as they termed their calling how difficult it was physically and psychologically to live in an alien culture and deal with such poverty, such need, such social rigidity and injustice, so much disease and hopelessness. Finding the churches Grandfather preached in still functioning and ministering to Christian Indians was gratifying and made us realize quite powerfully that he had not worked in vain. Though we did not find evidence of his tangential work in education and health care, we believe in his accounts of those efforts and in their merits. Seeing Grandfather’s name inscribed in the records and rolls of those churches made his life there more real to us. He was a part of the history of the British Raj surely the kinder face of British rule there. The 3% Indian Christians in South India were proof of the worth of our grandparents’ lives and arduous work.

What about our father? It is always difficult to imagine your parents as children and teenagers and when you lose one of them prior to your own adulthood that effort is even harder. I know that seeing the schools he attended, the neighborhoods he played in as a boy and a teen, the churches he went to, the landscapes his eyes saw, his name inscribed in enrollment records, even the tiger country where one of his most dramatic stories played out, made him more real and perhaps even more understandable. The trip was positive to that degree but on the other hand searching for such external signs of his existence made me realize even more profoundly what a terrible thing it was to have lost him before we really knew him!