Makar Sankranti-Ghughutia

January 13, 2020

Received through a WhatsApp message

Makar Sankranti is probably the most familiar name for this time of the year. Others like Pongal, Bhogi, Lohri all just follow it. Ghughutia is how it is called in our home Uttarakhand in India.

What is Makar Sankranti? मकर संक्रान्ति - Makar (मकर) means Capricorn. Sankranti (संक्रान्ति) in general means transition, change of direction. Makar Sankranti is when the Sun progresses into the Capricorn zodiac attributing to the movement of Earth. Thus in Indian culture, we have 12 Sankrantis corresponding to each zodiac. We also consider Uttaraayan (उत्तरायण - उत्तर + अयन) to start from Makar Sankranti. Uttara (उत्तर) means North and Ayan (अयन) means movement or progress (Progress of sun towards the north). Sun progresses northward towards Tropic of Cancer during the next 6 months that is when the Karka Sankranti happens leading Sun into Dakshinaayan (दक्षिणायन).

Makar Sankranti brings a change of seasons, harvest season arrives, days tend to get longer, the weather gets warmer and in Uttarakhand, the migratory birds start returning to the hills. Even today, people in Uttarakhand say that the cold will go away after Makar Sankranti. Makar Sankranti and the whole Uttaraayan period also have great significance with one's spiritual journey. We have a close relationship with the Sun. If we can understand the Sun and its relation with everything around, we can understand our relationship with everything associated with us including our mind, etc. The Gayatri Mantra associated with the Sun is also where one seeks wisdom and enlightenment. Though any time is good to make progress, this particular time is considered specifically good to make spiritual progress.

Makar Sankranti is celebrated all over India (and in some Asian countries too) in some form or the other. The celebrations may differ but the underlying theme is the same. In Uttarakhand, Makar Sankranti is celebrated both in the form of Uttaraayan and Makar Sankranti - Ghughutia or Kale Kauva (काले कौवा or black crow). Uttaraayani fairs are held across different towns. I remember going for it a few times at our local center for cultural activities - Parvatiya Sanskritik Utthana Manch (पर्वतीय संस्कृतिक उत्थान मंच) in Haldwani.

For Makar Sankranti, people across Uttarakhand make sweets out of sweetened flour, typically with jaggery and deep-fried in ghee. There are a number of things that are cooked:

• Ghughute - though all the shapes are called Ghughute this is the main one which is Ghughuta. This is made in a specific twisted crossover shape.

Deep-fried Ghughute

• Special Ghughuta for the crow - this one is made especially for crow.

Special Ghughuta for crow

• Various shapes - flower, sword, shield, damru, chakri (spiral), khajoor (dates).
• Gudpare - Usual square or diamond-shaped sweets
• Bade - Made with urad daal and are salty with a hole in the center

Ghughute and different shapes

Once the deep-fried Ghughute are ready, garlands are made with these by adding dry fruits (specifically fox nuts - मखाना and raisins - किशमिश) and fruit (usually an orange) in the center along with them. The garlands are then hung on the wall or kept someplace safe.  They look like the ones in the cartoon picture above.

The next day in the morning, kids wear their garlands, go on the rooftop of the house and call the crow to feed its Ghughuta and seek blessings. One can hear neighborhood kids also doing the same. Kids sing a specific song to call the crows. 

The song in Kumaoni:

काले कौवे काले घुघूती माला खाले
बडा पुआ खाले
ले कौवे बड़ा मेकें दे सुणो घड़ा
ले कौवे ढाल मेकें दे सुणो थाल

…..

In English:

Black, black crow, eat this ghughuta garland
Eat this badaa and pua
Black crow eat badaa, give me a gold pitcher
Black crow eat this shield, give me a gold plate

The advent of mobile phones and WhatsApp messages has also resulted in this morning ritual of Makar Sankranti to be done with messages these days. Once the Ghughute have been offered to the crow, one can enjoy it themselves. Ghughute are also shared with relatives and neighbors. By the end of the day, there is a vessel full of all Ghughute that came from various neighborhood houses that one won't be able to identify which was made by whom. 

Here are some other glimpes of Sankranti celebrations in India from last few trips:

A man with his decorated cattle on Makar Sankranti day

Makar Sankranti special Rangoli at the doorstep in Karnataka

Flower and Sugarcane decoration

When I got caught by the Police

December 30, 2019

In the rearview mirror!

This is a real-life story and I am sure many can relate to this. It used to be an embarrassing incident but since then has turned into a funny story and had inspired a few others in a similar situation. A number of us dealt with that initial anxiety caused by the thought of having to drive, specifically on highways. 

Do you know that driving on highways is one of the most common causes of anxiety? Its phobia version also has a name - Vehophobia.

I lived in California for about a year and a half without owning a car in the times when services like Uber and Lyft didn't exist. I relied on public transport to the extent that I was teased that I always needed to find a rental place next to the train station. After getting a valid license to drive, I finally bought a Car. 

It was 2011, a year after I had bought a red ferrari (aka car) and was actually driving everywhere but with a catch - I had not gone onto freeway alone ever. Every route would usually involve some highway in between, it was a bit tough for me to use it and not end up on the highway. To be my lazy self, I had turned the ‘Avoid highway’ option 'on' in the Garmin GPS device that I had, which meant that it’s going to show only the routes that go through internal city roads. Google Maps is smarter but these devices weren't.

Having survived two layoffs at Adobe during the downturn of 2009-2010, I was in the process of finding a new job. I was appearing for an onsite interview with a company in San Mateo, very close to my house. Almost all of us have some stress before interviews, presentations, etc. and I am no different. I took my car to get to the interview location. I was using my GPS navigator. There was a left turn that needed to be made to drive into the company's parking lot and I missed that!

The lane I was on became ‘Left only’ with a ‘No U-Turn’
 sign. Then the ‘Left only’ lane turned ‘Freeway only’. What more could I expect? It was like some conspiracy against me. My single shot ‘stresspresso’
 turned into a double shot one in no moment - the interview stress and the add-on of ‘I have no clue where am I supposed to go’. 

Remember my non-smart GPS device was on ‘avoid highway’ mode so it stopped telling me any route to get to my destination. The ‘stresspresso’ kicked in and I stopped my car on the side of the freeway entrance which had quite a lot of parking space but was neither a legal nor a safe place to park. 

Trying to find my route back through the dumb GPS device, I was just parked there when I saw the Police car behind me. The policeman came to my window and knocked. I rolled down the window and he said, “Mam, do not come out of the car. Why are you stopped here?”. I told him what had happened and that I was trying to find my way back and I was not comfortable going onto the highway.

We continued to talk through the window. Usually one won't be happy being interrogated by a Police officer but I was relieved that he came and asked. He understood my genuine concern and offered to help.

He said, “I will help you get onto the highway and take the exit”. He took out his loudspeaker and told me to follow him. 
“Look over your shoulder, merge with the traffic ….. take the next exit”, were the words before the man and his voice both disappeared. 

I got to the interview and also got the job offer, though I didn’t end up joining that company.

The 'No U-Turn' sign from that experience remained in my head. After that on a weekend, I decided that it’s going to be a do or die day. I will go onto the freeway and either will get rid of this limitation once and for all or won’t return home. I took the car, got on to Highway 101 and drove from San Mateo to Mountain View just to buy groceries at the Milk Pail Market. Since then I haven’t looked back. I also stopped relying on GPS and trust my mental map and navigation more than the smart maps now. 

Fear of missing the highway exits and not being able to find my way back was probably the primary cause of not wanting to drive on freeway. I dealt with the issue by using Google street view beforehand to familiarize myself with the route and exits. I left the other silent concern of 'who will be in trouble if I accidentally end up in a hospital?' aside.

I also reminded myself that the appearance of fear is a false evidence. Fear, after all, is False Evidence Appearing Real. 

Since then, this incident has become a fun story and every time I shared it, someone would quote either themselves or their friends who still don’t consider driving on the highway. Just recently, a coworker who had recently moved from another country and was in the process of learning to drive here and get a license mentioned that they are still learning and aren’t yet comfortable. Everyone else in that lunch group started sharing their embarrassing yet funny driving stories. 

Hopefully, this story will inspire someone to get past their fear of driving and not take it on themselves, it is a genuine and well known area of concern among many people. And I am glad that my so far the only encounter with the Police was a pleasant one. 

Until next year... 

Listen! Don't try everything in English

I mentor a young schoolgirl in India. We do video calls once a week and during that time I can either help her with anything that she needs help with or I will make her do some exercises. I was told she needs help with English so I focus on English. Frankly speaking, I was a bit conflicted inside that do I want to teach English. I was also told that these kids don't have people in their family who can help them. A whispering voice came from inside, "can you keep your ideologies aside and focus on the need of the hour?". Often we don’t realize that the little time we give to someone can mean so much to them. Let’s call this girl ‘Radhika’ for our conversation. She is in 10th std.

Radhika would ping me on our defined day with a WhatsApp message ‘Hi mam, today is my skype’ which often makes me laugh as I am not used to hearing mam and we don’t end up using skype. My initial impressions about Radhika was that she is a smart and fearless girl. Initially, I was supposed to talk to her in English so that she gets comfortable conversing in English but I decided not to do that and since she understands decent Hindi, we communicate in Hindi. 

In one of our chats, I asked Radhika if she had any specific topic she would like help with. She did come up with a topic - direct and indirect speech. I don't remember learning anything in school since it had been so many years. I explained to her how to convert direct to indirect speech in Hindi. I wanted to avoid just telling the general grammar rules as her teacher might have already done that. Imagine explaining direct and indirect speech in English when your explanation itself will have those. We did a few examples and then she had to rush to school. Before we hung up, I asked her if this was helpful to her. She said, “this was very helpful”. Since then I have seen her improve in the homework.

The next time I asked Radhika the same question, “do you have any specific topics you need help with today?”. "No", she said so I had to come up with a task for her. I made her read a story of a few pages from her textbook to see her level of comprehension. While she had a regional accent, her comprehension was good. I noticed that she has a habit of eating words. She would eat some of the articles (‘a’, ‘the’), interchange them or twist and make new words while in a hurry. I stopped and corrected her every time she did that. Then there was a phrase in one of the sentences - ‘part and parcel’. I asked her if she understood what that means. She read it as ‘part’ and ate ‘the parcel’. I said, "can you explain the meaning of the phrase to me?". To my surprise, instead of coming up with a verbose explanation in English she said ‘अविभाज्य अंग’. Next, there was the phrase ‘new dimension’. And she was quick to say ‘दृष्टिकोण’. Her textbook has English meanings of these phrases. I was so happy as she reminded me of myself during school and my love for the तत्सम words. By now I had guessed that Radhika is strong in Hindi. I was curious if she studies Sanskrit as a subject in school as Hindi isn’t her mother tongue. She smiled and said, “no”. I asked her why she smiled. I thought she might say what will one do with Sanskrit. But she said, “Sanskrit is hard to learn”. I didn’t say much and we moved on to reading the next paragraph. 

Why am I writing about her? Of course, she reminded me of my old days and brought a smile. But more than that I wanted to write about the overly hyped need for English speaking. There are other more dangerous things than not being able to speak in English, like making it mandatory to speak in English in schools, teaching in English when the kids don't know that language, thinking that getting educated in English medium is the only way to get a job, taking English fluency to be a sign of intelligence. Humans are born with a sense of inadequacy and if one is made to feel inadequate because one isn't proficient in a foreign language, it can't be anything other than a disaster.

While the listening, speaking, reading, writing order is probably good for learning one's mother tongue, it seems the reading, writing, comprehending, speaking may be better suited for learning a second language that English is. There is a fundamental difference when one learns something in their mother tongue versus when it is taught in a language that isn't their first language. It is much easier to learn a concept if it's explained in one’s mother tongue or a language close to that. It's also not important to fluently speak in English to feel confident. As long as one can read, write, comprehend it, that fulfills the purpose of learning English for most kids in India. One can get used to converse over time. It would be a bit worrisome to not be able to speak in your mother tongue but that doesn’t apply to other languages.

I don’t know where this girl will go but I do see the potential and the confidence in her. I hope I would be able to influence her fluency in the subtleties of life more than her fluency in English.

Laugh at your own risk

(scene from an Indian Railway compartment, people who don't like middle berth sometimes occupy someone else's berth and don't want to give it to the actual ticket holder)

Ramanashrama and Tiruvannamalai - Nov 2019

When I left for India, I had completely different plans for traveling there. I didn't end up following them due to various reasons. And then the visit to Tiruvannamalai worked out. I was silently hoping to visit the ashram once and it worked out somehow. We went to Tiruvannamalai with an extension to Pondicherry. 

Tiruvannamalai or Thiruvannamalai is a small town in the state of Tamil Nadu. Its named after the Annamalai - Lord of the Mountains, Shiva. The Arunachala hill is considered sacred.  

Arunachaleshwara temple with the Arunachala in the background

This early morning view of the Arunachala hill from the temple was amazing. We were there just after the full moon so the moon was also visible in the background. 

The Temple Gopurams are tall. I love the carvings and the elaborate designs on them. The four gopurams on each side are like the 4 Dwarapaal. The eastern one is the tallest and is called Rajagopuram. 

The eastern gopuram - Rajagopuram, tallest and is 11 stories

Nandi in the Temple

This big Nandi reminded me of my clay nandi. Having worked on the details, it was interesting to see how much details I noticed in this Nandi. 

Next to the Patala Lingam cave

This picture is interesting to me, I did not know I was being clicked from behind. 

This was taken while walking near the temple.

This is the most interesting part of visiting temples. There is just so much intricate art and carvings that you find in these hidden nooks and corners inside temple.

This one had so much detail. Having done some clay sculpting myself, I couldn't imagine the effort it might have taken to carve these on rock.

I had to literally bend down to take this one. Was hidden at the bottom corner of a temple mandapa base. This reminded me of the trip to Hampi few years back, when I got a good collection of these intricate stone carvings. They reflect the history very well.

Since it wasn't possible to find the name of each god figure I saw (names were written in Tamil), I am trying to find the references now. I think this is the personification of River Ganga as goddess on her vehicle Makara. The Makara is an imaginary animal form composed of a fish like body, elephant trunk, feet of lion, eyes of a monkey, ears of a pig and prominent teeth. It can be interpreted as a turbulent state of nature and the ornaments shown coming out of its mouth symbolize the pralaya and the Ganga may be having control over that to make it life giving. Anyways, if one can just take it as water god and do something to save water that would be enough. The symbolism in actually very interesting and leads to a profound understanding of reality than it just being an idol in some temple. 

The vaanar sena is always around in any Indian temple to feed and grow their family. This monkey took the coconut and the banana from someone and gave the banana to her kid. This reminds me of a hike to a hill in Karnataka several years back when a monkey took our cold drink bottle, opened the cap and drank in front of us :)

These pictures were taken randomly in the evening. I was just amazed to see the amount of work on these Gopurams. All I was thinking was how did they make these, did they build it somewhere else and got them here or the sculptors were sitting there to make these. The Gopurams are specific to South Indian Temple architecture so you won't see these in the North Indian temples which have an inverted beehive like structure called 'Shikhara' - mountain peak. 

This kind of completes the highlights of the Arunachaleshwara temple - dedicated to Shiva and is associated with the five elements - Pancha Maha Bhootas. Agni is the element that is worshiped here. Other Pancha Maha Bhoota Sthalams.

Arunachala Hill

We also did a modern (by car) Girivalam or giripradakshina - circumambulation of the Arunachala hill. It's a 14km stretch and people do it on foot. Usually around full moon. It was nice to see the hill from different sides. 

The other major part of the trip was the visit to Ramanashrama. In fact when I thought about the visit, the temple wasn't in my awareness. 

The tree that welcomes into the Ashram

Ramanashrama is very close to the temple. It's right on the main road and the gate feels like a school gate with an arch and board on top. 

It also rained in the evening and the peacock there was roaming around though didn't dance.

Samadhis of pets in the ashram

We sat in meditation and listened to the daily chants for a while. The bookworm inside me began crawling but the book store was closed at that time.   

We wanted to go visit the Virupaksha cave (Ramana Maharshi meditated there) and the Skandashrama. There are 2 ways to reach them. One way is from inside the ashram and other is close to the temple. The one inside ashram is longer. The one close to temple is 10-15 min but steep climb. We were a bit late but still went ahead through the shorter route but some folks who were coming back on the way told that its too steep and also that its probably late. 

The next day we took the way from the ashram. It wasn't too long. The way from the Skandashram to the Virupaksha cave is a path of downhill stairs. We decided not to take the same route back as it looked like getting on the road from the Virupaksha cave would take less time. It looked like we shouldn't have listened to the folks we met yesterday as it wasn't a bad climb for a pahadi. 

Way to Skandashrama and Virupaksha cave

Most people do the hike to the cave barefoot so the path was pretty much clean. There were a few yogi dogs and pigs on the way. 

Mid way you get this beautiful delight of the temple. The pictures are from my phone's camera so aren't doing the justice. 

Vaanar sena on the way 

Virupaksha Cave 

We sat in the cave for some time. There are 2 parts of the cave, the inner one probably the actual cave is a very small and dark chamber and probably accommodates 5-6 people. The outer one is likely built new and can accommodate more (say 10) people.

Monkey who couldn't meditate due to his monkey mind

While we were sitting outside the Virupaksha cave, one local person came and told us to go visit the Mango tree cave as well which was 10 mins climb down from there.

The well on the way to Mango tree cave

Mango tree cave where Maharshi lived

After this we started for Pondicherry. 

Until Next Time.....

Freedom From Fear and Rebuilding Trust

December 8, 2019

The recent Hyderabad veterinarian incident brought some thoughts from some experiences I had this time while I was in India. The fundamental problem behind these incidents isn’t really specific to India as we know, the crime against women is a global issue. 

The ongoing women’s dignity and safety issues made me think about how deeply-rooted the fears we have that we live with every day. There were 2 times when I had all the reasons to be careful and then the hidden fears underneath showed up on the surface. Being on either side of mistrust is ugly. 

I was traveling in a cab (a trusted one and I had no reason to feel unsafe) from one place to another through a bit deserted location, unknown to me and coincidently in Hyderabad. I have a habit of keeping maps navigation on while I ride in cabs. Almost 10 minutes into the ride, I noticed we are not on any of the routes I would expect us to be. I managed to keep calm and questioned the driver “where ARE you going?”. It looked like some miscommunication or mishearing on his side that he had a completely different destination in his mind. We sorted out the confusion, course-corrected, he profusely apologized and I told him that it’s all good, it was only a misunderstanding and not really his fault. I don’t know whether I should laugh or cry at the deep-rooted fears we have been living with every day. 

The second time I was outside with my sister and 6 yr old niece and after struggling to get an uber we finally found an autorickshaw (3 wheeler) to get back home from an area I am not very familiar in Bangalore. A few minutes into the ride the guy took a U-turn to a different route. My ‘alert’ antenna went up and I started questioning him. At that moment I turned on the navigation in maps. Then the guy started asking questions to my niece about her school including location, names of her teacher, etc. A child can only speak the truth so she answered and then soon slept off. His questions seemed unnecessary and I could see the sense of concern on my sister’s face. I silently told myself that we could scream or jump out of the autorickshaw if needed and then decided to enquire about him instead of letting him ask us more personal questions. I was curious about his extreme interest in my niece. Turned out the guy was a family man with a kid of similar age and worked as an auto driver for school kids drop-offs. Throughout the trip, he took many detours through small and not so well lit alleys and at one point I told him to just take the main road even if it takes longer to go from there. By the end of the trip, I knew about his family history, where he and his sister studied, and his life philosophies. My conclusion about him was that he was a well-intentioned super talkative person who wants to make a genuine connection with his passengers but is living in a world where trust has been eroded so much that it will be a while before we can have such conversations and not doubt a potential mishap. 

The fundamental need to live life with dignity and the sense that this freedom can easily be violated has caused a lot of women to constantly live in fear. No wonder we are seeing the women only parks, women driven cab services and such. It was uncomfortable to feel the same fears surface up now and then but the opportunity to be curious made the difference. Once you get past that, you would have likely discovered a new dimension that wasn’t visible before. Fear creates duality – it projects itself, distorting reality, creating false perceptions, changing the story leading to bad judgments. The outside world will change on its own time but till then meditation is probably the only foolproof way to transmute the mind and get rid of the impressions of the past.

Be careful, not fearful!

Navratri-Dussehra

October 8, 2019

Navratri (नवरात्रि) has been a great festive occasion since childhood. ‘नव’ means nine, ‘रात्रि’ means night. It's a nine-day celebration followed by Dussehra. Various forms of the goddess are worshiped through the nine days. Though she is one, she is represented in many different forms - Durga, Lakshmi, Saraswati for some and then the other 9 forms of her for others. 

As a kid, the last day of Navratri had a huge significance for us, young girls. We will get called to almost every house in the neighborhood, seated in a row our feet were washed, then we were worshipped and fed and at the end given a gift, usually a 1 or 2 rupee coin and sometimes a pencil or handkerchief if we get lucky. The first few of those visits would be great, as one would be with an empty stomach. After that one had to exercise some negotiation skills so that the host doesn’t put extra halwa or puri in the plate before one could protect it with the shield of one's own hands. The women after 9 days of fasting were just looking to get the blessings of the goddess and make their tapas a success through us. The day of Dussehra use to be reserved to go out and see Ravana-Dahan. 

The Devi incarnated to kill the demons and Lord Rama fulfilled his mission long back but what is the significance of these festivals today? On the surface, it looks like the time devoted to the worship of goddesses. One might call it the worship of women or the feminine power. If one goes a level deeper it is the worship of the power of manifestation, the shakti (शक्ति). The word Shakti has its root in the Sanskrit root शक् (Shak) - to be able to do something. Shakti is the energy or the power that creates, nourishes, sustains us and works through us. She is worshiped as hunger, thirst or anything else you name it and she is there.

Dussehra is a good occasion to think about where we are feeding our ravanas. Have the ravana heads in the mind died? The Kama (Lust), Krodha (Anger), Lobha (Greed), Moha (Delusion), Mad (Pride), Matsarya (Jealousy) all sprout like the heads of Ravana through the Ego and the feeling of smallness underneath. The false identification with these lets these heads feel like they belong to us.

Recently at least 3 different people at different levels of affinity with me, acknowledged that they had a feeling of jealousy towards someone. I must say they have got the strength to accept tough emotions otherwise almost everyone has them at some time to varying degrees. How does one resolve them? 

Sage Patanjali mentions ‘Pratipaksha Bhavana’ in the Yoga Sutra of Patanjali. 

वितर्कबाधने प्रतिपक्षभावनम्

‘When one is disturbed by the conflicting thought, one should think of opposite thoughts.’

It is a powerful thought to get back to the self before the Ravana heads are superimposed on others and the ramas are perceived as the killers. The source and the triggers for the ravanas are inside but the outside object is falsely understood as the reason for it. In fact, almost every conflicting emotion finds its root in the false sense of smallness - अपूर्ण भावः. This Dussehra may you focus more on the पूर्ण Rama inside you!

Pitru Paksha

September 15, 2019

Baba ji's (Grandfather) Shraddha

Have you watched the movie 'Coco'? It was a beautiful movie. You probably know the Dia De Los Muertos or the 'Day of the Dead' from that. But do you know what 'Pitru-Paksha' is? 

In Sanskrit, Pitru (पितृ) means ‘father’ and Paksh (पक्ष) means ‘fortnight’ or a period of roughly 2 weeks of the lunar calendar. In Hinduism, during Pitru-Paksha gratitude is expressed towards one's ancestors in the form of prayers and food offerings. The ritual is called पितृ श्राद्ध - that which is done with श्रद्धा (faith). I know less about the pauranik katha and the rituals but the contributions of those ancestors to our moral, intellectual and spiritual life are worth remembering. It is the time devoted to remembering those and their gifts to us. Many are on my mind right now. Among those my grandparents have been the eldest, I have been with 3 of them and only seen the picture of the other. 

Sometimes I notice many similarities in my habits and that of my grandparents’. It could be genetic or likely childhood influence. I particularly saw my paternal grandmother (‘amma’) as a very self-reliant person who won’t take help from anyone unless needed. I saw her taking care of all her things (including washing all clothes etc.) herself even at that age regardless of how much we tried to convince her not to. I saw her as a woman who had lived in a conservative society yet became open-minded when needed and would silently appreciate everyone around her. I see the same person in me now and then. 

Memories with my paternal grandfather are a bit weak (I was 8yr old when he left) but the habits have come down. I saw a few of his diaries of daily expense log records. I found myself doing the same many times just because it helped me resolve my internal world. At that time I didn’t think about him but I think it was coming from there. He was the one who somehow transferred the skills of sewing in our family that I felt it's customary to have a sewing machine at home. His bravery was such that when a snake bit him, he didn’t bother to disturb others and did the first aid himself in the darkness of the night. 

My maternal grandmother was a pillar of strength. I wrote this small poem as a tribute to her when she left 3 years ago.

वर्ष २०१६ मौनी अमावस्या को

ले लिया तुमने मौन अनंत 

आज तुम्हारे जाने पर 

ये मन है थोड़ा खिन्न 

शब्दों में ही लिखकर 

अब करे याद ये तुमको। 

थी गहन आवाज़ तुम्हारी कितनी 

सबको करती अनुशासित

सब सोचे था वो कड़कपन 

पर हमने देखा चिंता और प्यार। 

केश तुम्हारे थे काले कितने 

वृद्धावस्था ने भी घुटने टेके थे 

सारे नाती पोते भी करते थे 

मन ही मन में गर्व उन पर। 

पूजा पाठ में ध्यान था कितना 

करतीं सबके सुख की कामना 

कितनी भी कठिनाई आयीं 

पर हार कभी ना तुमने मानी।

इस जीवन में तुम अपने 

काम अनेक कर गयीं 

मुझको तो बड़े उपहार में 

माँ तुम मेरी दे गयीं।

पर अपने ही हंसालय से

तुम आज विदा क्यों ले गयीं?

Such is the legacy of these ancestors that I am not sure if we can ever compare to them. The little glimpse of them that I see in myself will forever be treasured!

Teachers Day

September 5, 2019

Inspiration for this post is a school friend who pinged me this morning and told that she was waiting to see an article on Teachers’ day :)

What makes one guru? 

गुकारस्त्वन्धकारस्तु रुकार स्तेज उच्यते |

अन्धकार निरोधत्वात् गुरुरित्यभिधीयते ||

(‘Gu’ means darkness or ignorance, ‘Ru’ means light or the essence. Guru is the one who removes the darkness of ignorance with the light of knowledge)

I have been fortunate (like most of us) to have found wonderful gurus in my school teachers all my life, even while studying in a government college where you really don’t pay to get an education. I was remembering all those dedicated teachers who gave me that much attention and brought out the good in me. Each one of them was an epitome of knowledge. May be they were the reason that becoming a teacher has always been a hidden dream somewhere. 

My teacher in 1st grade was the one who asked my parents to get my eyesight tested. I must say she really took me from darkness to light. I won’t have been able to grasp the fundamentals of mathematics without the middle school teacher who made them so easy to understand. They still make every single day bright with their good morning wishes. That foundation likely prepared me to support our intermediate maths teacher by being her writing hands when she could not see. Should I really say she could not see? don’t think so, given that her mind was so sharp to see everything. All I had to do was quote the problem and she would start telling me what and how to do. I couldn’t have understood what force means without the गुरुत्व of the physics गुरु who taught बल and गुरुत्वाकर्षन. I couldn’t have learnt to avoid the common english grammar mistakes without our wonderful english teacher. There were teachers who called us to their homes when the school was shut down due to protests. The teacher who encouraged me to try to maintain the good handwriting that even today when I write in cursive, it reminds me of her every single time. 

The expenditure on my education may have been लघु but what I got from all these teachers is really गुरु. On this teachers’ day, quoting the first verse of the guru paduka stotram by Adi Shankaracharya: 

अनंत संसार समुद्र तार नौकायिताभ्यां गुरुभक्तिदाभ्यां |

वैराग्य साम्राज्यद पूजनाभ्यां नमो नमः श्री गुरु पादुकाभ्यां ||

(I prostrate to those padukas of my guru, which are a boat helping cross the ocean of samsara, providing with the sense of devotion towards the guru and by worship of which I gain the empire of vairagya)

Nandi - Clay work

September 1, 2019

Art has fascinated me from childhood. As a kid I would draw and make simple greeting cards. When we use to go to my grandmother's place, I would take out all the wedding invitation cards and save those beautiful Ganeshas on them to draw. None of those folks would know that I cut the Ganeshas out of their wedding invitations before the cards go into trash. I must say some of them really spent a lot of money on those invitation cards. Then there was stencil and spray work, the wall hangings we made by bending the glass bangles, the modern Aipan where we would spend hours sitting at the Dehali (the door threshold). This blog has the most recent sewing crafts that I also learnt as a kid watching my grandfather, aunts and mother do. All my life I wore clothes mostly sewn by my mom or aunts. I bet they could open an etsy like store if they accepted their talents.

I joined a clay sculpting class recently where we make Indian clay art - specifically Hindu god sculptures. I had been thinking of taking this class since last 2 years but the time commitment didn't just fit in earlier.

As part of this 3 months class we meet weekly for 2 hours (so far every time the 2 hours got stretched to 5 hours) and then do our work at home. We are making 2 sculptures. This is the first one we made - Shiva's Nandi. Preview of the second one in the end. This class isn't about just doing some clay sculpting, you learn the basics and the science of how these temple sculptures are made. The different standards that are there and how the rocks (if they are sculpted on rock) are picked for each idol etc. The class is a mix of elderly and young folks including a good gender balance. The version below isn't the final product as we would be making the Nandi sit down. The ornaments on the feet are also missing right now if you noticed.

Here is how it looks so far. Completely immersed into the second sculpture so will get back to it in between that. It was interesting to see how much focus one needs to do anything in this work. One of the days I tried to multi task - listening to something while doing this work and it turned out to be a complete disaster. From then on I put my phone away and just focus on it. Will be updating this once the sculpture is finished.

This picture below is how we receive feedback. Notice that a lot of details including the Nandi head is missing in this. Yes, had to remove that blue line of bells after spending a good amount of time making them and putting it on the Nandi.

Adding a few more pictures of the Nandis carved on rock. I don't think I could get it any close to these but I am content with my Nandi.

[Update: Jan 1, 2020]

Here is how the completed Nandi looks. It has found a nice spot on my book shelf alongside the Shiva.

We are sculpting a Hindu God as part of the second sculpture. Below are the hands I made for the chaturbhuj bhagwan. Note how I have not made any mudras yet, bending those fingers is tough without breaking them.

Oornanabhi and the Samsara

August 8, 2019

Oornanabh in the Balcony

One of the names for spider in Sanskrit is - Oornanabhi, ऊर्णनाभि:. The inspiration for this post comes from this beautiful little spider that I found in my apartment balcony one morning. My daily morning routine is to go out on the balcony and offer some water to the sun god who provides us the light to keep seeing clearly. As usual I went out on the balcony and as I was about to go around the big planter so I could turn eastward, I noticed this little creature and his creation all the way from the balcony railing to the plant - approximately 4 feet. It reminded me of many things and for some reason brought a smile on my face. I decided to not disturb it or remove the web. The first day I tried to take a picture, it ran away as I removed the other planter and then the next day managed to go close and capture.

So how does a spider build the web? Spiders are known to be born with the intelligence of building their webs. Spiders have glands in their abdomen that produce silk protein. It can produce different types of these silk proteins that then solidify to become silk strands. Some strands are sticky which are used to form the bridge that form the strong foundation for the web. Sticky strands also help trap the insects as food. The threads are known to be stronger than steel threads. The spider uses other non-sticky strands in the web to move around without getting stuck in its own web while it weaves. It also uses the web to protect its eggs as well as for transporting itself from one point to another like a zipline. Spider can feel the vibrations when an insect lands on the web. Spiders also consume their own web to save the cost of regenerating the silk proteins again as they renovate or replace the web frequently.

A verse from Mundaka Upanishad illustrates the similarity between the spider web creation and the samsara creation:

यथोर्णनाभिः सृजते गृह्णते च यथा पृथिव्यामोषधयः संभवन्ति ।

यथा सतः पुरुषात्केशलोमानि तथाऽक्षरात्संभवतीह विश्वम् ॥

(As the spider creates and absorbs back the web, as the medicinal plants grow on earth, as the hair grow out of humans, so does the universe comes from the Imperishable.)

There is so much more to talk about the above but that is for another time. To create anything, one needs some intelligence and then some material. For example, this post was created using some intelligence and some material in the form of words. This is how Ishwara’s (ईश्वर) creation - the macrocosm, is understood. ईश्वर used intelligence as well as material to create the world. The creation is described similar to the spider web creation where the intelligence and the material are from a single source. It has the power to absorb the creation as well. Interestingly the same dance of creation happens within us - the microcosm. Our body cells die every day and new cells are born. Our thoughts and perceptions change every single day. Our dreams are another such example. They take birth using our own intelligence and the material is also some combination of our own memories or events we experienced in our waking state. We too have the power to come out of our dreams by simply waking up. We remain the same and everything else outside of that changes. Essentially the microcosm and the macrocosm are one. Should one be seeing themselves in a better light than they already do? Just like one sees ईश्वर?

Story of a young girl and my journey to Pilani

July 31, 2019

Almost 18 years back, a young girl who liked studying for the sake of enjoying her books along with her part time job of ‘झाड़ू-पोंछा’ suddenly got pushed into the outside world which she had no clue about. 

On a hot midsummer day, when her boards result was supposed to be out, late in the evening while she was thinking ‘first division to aa hi jayegi’ and dancing, her father comes home very excited and tells her that she had come first in the state. Along with him were a few ‘Amar Ujala’ reporters who asked her some stupid questions on what she wanted to do in life and what she thinks about politics. Having no clue of exactly what she could do, she gave the usual answer that someone who studied Maths and Science in intermediate would give - she wants to be an engineer. Next morning she looked at the newspaper with her picture along with her occupational aspirations thrown there, she felt like a ‘wanted’ criminal who now needed to hide somewhere and really start looking for an engineering college. Her childhood dream of becoming a teacher crumbled in a moment.

Life was very straightforward all this while. Go to school, pass the exams, move to the next class. She hadn't thought anything beyond her class to class movements. Then from somewhere a divine grace was granted  and some family friends mentioned that there exists a college called BITS Pilani. Until that moment, neither she nor her family was aware of BITS' existence :). They were those typical small town people who had no clue about the world outside of their clan. Before they could do anything, they realized she had missed the deadline to apply for the 2001 year when she could have got in. She had a sense of regret as well as hopelessness until they got connected to a Pilani Alumni who told them about the second semester admissions. She applied for the second semester and crossed her fingers. Around November 2001, she sat down in front of a cyber cafe computer to look at the results. Her mom's inner conflict was questioning ‘isn't she too young to go that far?’. After all these years, she may be away from home, she still longs for the same smell of eucalyptus trees, the winter and the sun, the heavier than herself razai and her cup of adrak wali chai with carefree moments.

Coming back to my own story and how I physically got transported to Pilani in the first week of Jan 2002. Peak north indian winter and the gloomy foggy weather in Delhi and Pilani wasn’t the best thing. Our overnight bus from Haldwani to Delhi got delayed due to an accident on the way and kept us waiting for several hours on the road. Then we waited 4-5 hours at Delhi bus station to find a bus to Pilani. The ride from Delhi to Pilani scared my mom more and I think she probably also thought of bringing me back with her. Then the BITS campus and our comfortable stay at VFAST guest house that night likely changed her perception and I was left at the hostel on my own the next day. It's been a long journey living away from home on my own but had been worth it. Not everything was as straightforward as life before Pilani but worth it regardless.