INDIA

Himachal Pradesh - A man who knows his way

"A man who knows his way there can defy all the police of India´s summer capital, so cunningly does verandah communicate with verandah, alley-way with alley-way, and bolt-hole with bolt-hole."

Rudyard Kipling

All the princesses of India stare through their wood-carved decorated windows to look at this caravan passing through the villages, suffering the Himalayan heavy snow falls. They expose their delicate skin to daylight to strongly desire him, arousing that warm thing between their legs. But he cannot stop his caravan’s journey for like the itinerant musician, the jealous husband would chop his head off for just one look.

Listen all God’s angels are crying for the choir sings Lacrimosa in this Requiem, one more legend is about to fall. Kim is lying agonizing in bed of death. As the black clouds cover daylight, end becomes closer and closer, more frightening and anguishing than ever before.

A monkey almost stole my glasses when I was leaving Jaku Mandir in Shimla. He jumped on the back of my shoulder, grabbed me and tried to take my glasses off my face. Fortunately, I'd been quicker than him, I took them off just before he grabbed the frame. The bastard didn’t give up without twisting them. Curiously, the temple houses Hanuman, the Monkey God, commander of the monkey army in the Ramayana.

A few days after I learned that Hanuman is also Lord of the breath, Son of the Wind God, bears five faces and dwells within us in the form of five winds or energies, pervading our body, mind and soul...

in Light on Prãnãyãma by B.K.S. Iyengar

Back to Odder, the birds are still singing. The fields are becoming green as spring approaches.

I went to the mountains. There the crows croaked Kim has disappeared in a heavy snow blizzard. Thence none has heard his faith.

About the Buddhist bell that calls for Puja, as the shaved skulls gather in a half moon assembly, religious chants are sang in Buddha’s joy. The dark mahogany robes still in the sun, sat in unison near the large leaves of the fruit trees.

Female voices reciting religious chants are heard through the night.

The sweet and the salty tea

The nuns, the chomos, bring the food for lunch and dinner, by the earth path on which the Svastika and the four Jewels of Buddhism have been drawn. They do it every day at more and less the same time, slowly with no hurry, carrying sweet milk tea or the salty butter one to calm our thirsty souls.



Around 1900, a Japanese Zen Buddhist monk travelled during a few years between India and Tibet. Here some of his comments.

About the Tibetan style of debating:

"... When he (one of the participants) utters the word of a question, he beats time with hands and feet. The teacher always teaches the catechist that the foot must come down so strongly that the door of hell (will) be broken open, and the hands must make so great noise that the voice of knowledge (will) frighten the devils all over the worlds..."

Ekai Kawaguchi

In Tibet, the Sky Burial consists in chopping the dead corpses into smaller pieces, and in leaving them in an open place to feed the vultures. Among Tibetan monks, some are responsible for this preparation.

"... They prepare tea, or help themselves to bake flour, with their hand splashed over with a mash of human flesh and bones, for they never wash their hands before they prepare to take tea or take food, the most they do being to clap their hands, so as to get rid of the coarser fragments. And thus they take a good deal of minced flesh, bones or brain, mixed with their tea or flour... When I suggested that they might wash their hands before taking refreshment, they looked at me with an air of surprise. They scoffed at my suggestion, and even observed that eating with unwashed hands really added relish to the food; besides, the spirit of the dead man would be satisfied when he saw them take fragments of his mortal remains with their food without aversion."

Ekai Kawaguchi

Everything looks clearer now that the midst has disappeared from my mind. The mountains are called mountains, the valleys, valleys and the snow peaks become sharper as they reach unseen highs. I have been blind for one thousand years, I was figuring unlikely landscapes and other images. Nonetheless, the way down deep into the valley is long but how extremely rewarding. Guide my foot on this journey so I may not lead astray.

I don’t trust those men who walk hand in hand in the street, and sit on each others knees.

My boat has been drowned by pirates on the river. Now I am wandering in the jungle for days without seeing any human trace. I’m probably walking in circles.

There is no future, no past but only and simply present, merely and mainly now, here and nothing more. No past memories, no forgotten experiences, no sorrow, no regret, no slavery, no attachment to the non-existing thus unattainable illusory future. But ever joy in present moment.

There is no way to portrait such beauty, only an infinite fraction can be memorized, despite of that fact, it boasts itself in front of our eyes, without anything that could be done to possess it.



I cannot draw the insects nocturnal continuous noise nor the tropical unbearable heat.