“Light Rain” Lyrics

I wrote these lyrics as my bus pulled away from Mcleod Ganj at the end of the summer. I felt that the sadness of leaving was something a lot of people, especially travellers, could relate to and wanted to write something to express that, which could be sung with melancholy in bars across South Asia by men with beards and women with those baggy indian trousers. Fairly confident I didn’t manage that, “Wish You Were Here” (I heard that Floyd song SO many times that vacation!) -style. But here are the lyrics anyway, cos lyrics, poems and stories are always for sharing.

Light Rain

Light rain. Light rain.

I’m leaving in light rain.

I tried, but I couldn’t leave in the sun,

So I’m leaving today, in light rain.

.

Old friends.

I wish we were old friends.

Give us time, so we can grow bored of each other.

(Oh,) Let us grow bored!

.

I’m leaving in light rain.

Couldn’t leave in the sun.

.

Linger. Linger.

Can’t stay, so I’ll linger,

While this bus, drvies me far from my thoughts.

Some time every day, I’ll linger.

.

So I’m leaving in light rain.

Couldn’t leave in the sun.

.

Keep near. Keep near.

You say you’ll keep in touch.

Must you? Please don’t “keep in touch”.

Won’t you just keep near?

.

No, I’m leaving in light rain.

Could never leave in the sun.

Photograps 14/09/2011

I finally got up to go for another run and… (white stuff = mould)

TIPA road (on which I live) in the early evening

The free elephant picture the lovely Rajiv gave me!

Mcleod Ganj theatre. Aw :-)

Sweets, anyone? These are actually yummy. Deep fried and all honey-ish and warm. No calories, of course.

Note the man in the middle, turning around the ferris wheel with his feet!

Sun tumbling down the mountain

Note the amazing path!

PS. / Cultural tensions 1

I should say, although less of the ‘everyday’ stuff is novel now, there’s so much under the surface coming out that’s fascinating. I’m writing my article on the relationship Tibetan women have with their culture: whether and why they want to preserve it, how far they think western support depends on cultural preservation (and whether this holds back individuality and internal criticism), how far the women (of different ages) actually identify with the culture… It’s been really fascinating so far, and I’ll write something about it or pop the article up here when it’s done.

For now, this is one of the most enjoyable academic research papers I’ve ever read: http://spot.colorado.edu/~yehe/env%20and%20planning%20A%20paper.pdf

The author, Emily Yeh, a Tibetan, highlights that in the states there’s a bipolar racial divide, with people being identified as either ‘white’ or ‘black’, depending more on the perception of their worth in the eyes of whites than their skin colour or even class. Cambodians, then, are black, as they tend to be very poor and dependant on welfare, while immigrant businesspeople from Hong Kong, Japan and China are ‘white’. Tibetans’economic st atuses are equivalent to Cambodians, but they manage to be seen as more ‘white’ because of the romanticism surrounding Tibetan culture.

So, Tibetan parents and grandparents are very unhappy about their children who are associating with black American culture- getting into hip hop, hanging out on basketball courts, using ebonics* etc. While these youths are frustrated by parents’ subservience and deference to whites and want to express their freedom to rebel and diverge from that profitable image of Tibetan perfection.

In fact, while older Tibetans see association with rap music etc as signs of dilinquency and a threat to Tibetan culture (‘imitating blacks’), young Tibetans see it as a perfect complement to heavy activism within the Tibet Freedom movement: rap is a way of expressing their strength, style and independence from whites, and even a mechanism for raising awareness around the world and recruiting more support for Tibetns.

And if you don’t have time for reading the article, here from it is an interesting excerpt from the author’s discussion of Tibetans’ amateur rap:

A few, however, rap explicitly about racism, expressing a much more accepting view
about Tibetan belonging in the larger category `Asian Americans’ than do older
Tibetans who were not raised in the USA (who emphasize Tibetan uniqueness):
“ThiS 1 is for all my asains………. StanD uP and FiGht ….. if u eva call me a chink // i`ll
drown u in my kitchen sink // … // half of u poeples are jus stereotypical // … // to all
my azains get up stand up // like Bob Marely cuase we fed up // and we aint gonna let
up // ask me agian if i know kung fu // i`ll take out my blade and cut // cut u up into
peices like pizza and deliver u before 30 minutes is due // … // we got cars that can`t
even match up to yur price// girls so hot they melt ice// as long as im asian im
reppin my pride // ain`t got nuttin to hide // always got a phat ride // and grls world-
wide // this is an asian invasion // got lov weather u tibetan or malayasian // so we
don`t need no hateration // cause we the next generation // … muthafukaz…..recongize
and respect……..thas a wrap” (24 November 2001).
Perhaps most interesting, though, is the invocation of Tibet in some of the rhymes.
Several of the teens frequently make references to their identities as Tibetans, though
through the form of African-American hip-hop. In this example, the author, one of the
basketball court teens, portrays himself as a direct victim of Chinese oppression, even
though he has never been to Tibet:
“ … i remain silence in Tibet cuz of tha chinese regulation // now that i got tha right
of speech, i bust our words that can fill out tha whole ocean // now dont try to get
into too deep // cuz i smoke you out like smoking weed // scared tha fuuck outta
you that you won’t even dare to speak” (3 November 2001).
Others make culturally specific Tibetan references, such as to reincarnation:
“ … if failed, no option but to digest bullets into ya chest // and rest in peace and
follow your fate // n i’ll be wishing you to reincarnate // again in tha body of
a human being wid a soul of a MC who comes back to battle // but not to
regulate …” (3 November 2001),
to Tibetan snow leopards:
“like a mosquito, i suck up your bloods like a juice // gettin your muscles loose // and
then i’ll finish you off like imma hungry Tibetan snow leopard killin’ a moose”
(13 November 2001),
to Buddhism:
“Be thankful that I didn’t break your girls virginity // and just cause im Buddhist,
Imma atleast leave you with some dignity” (28 November 2001),
and to monasteries:
“you lost so jus admit // while yo ass is monastic // my shiet is fantasticno im not
sarcastic” (13 November 2001)

I especially like the snow lion/ moose narrative

Sally

*Wikipedia: Ebonics: (from the words ebony and phonics) is a term that was originally intended to refer to the language of all people descended from enslaved Black Africans, particularly in West Africa, the Caribbean, and North America. Since 1996, Ebonics has primarily been used to refer to African American Vernacular English (AAVE), a dialect distinctively different from Standard American English. (Wikipedia)

Urban Dictionary: Ebonics: A poor excuse for a failure to grasp the basics of english. When in doubt, throw an “izzle” sound in the middle of any word of just string random thoughts together and insinuate that they actually mean something. When backed into a corner, you can always claim that it has something to do with a sort of symbolism or is a defining trait that makes your race great, versus own up to the fact that it is essentially laziness at it’s finest.

Plim-plizzle, my nizzle, don’ foget bouts tha six-fo, chuch, dawg up in da hood, chilly my grilly. fo sho.

11.09.2011. Last week begins!

Hello! I hope you’re well and happy.

 

Sorry for not blogging in a while! I’ve been reading to catch up for next term and writing a lot for TWA’s “Dolma” magazine, and then all the usual lovely distractions of walks, going out, teaching etc. Also, I think once you’ve been somewhere for longer, less of the things around are novel.

 

Well, actually, recently I’ve been trying to notice for you all the things that are ‘novel’ to me/ you here. Voila my list of Things That Surprised Me:

 

- Before you put on any clothes, use a towel, or climb into your sleeping bag at night, everything must be thoroughly shaken and examined to make sure there are no anaemic woodlice inside.

- Monkeys haphazardly swinging across electricity wires are, like, sooo standard.

- Tibetans love Bob Marley (Now I can’t remember why that surprised me, but it did. Singing redemption song with them at a disco really brought new meaning to it…)

- There’s quite a tension in Tibetan society as people want to uphold the culture/ traditions/ positive international image and also enjoy their freedom and access to Western goods and media.

- People often throw their garbage down the side of mountains, into streams etc. In fact, I once did this. I asked Gina, who’s the maid for my landlady, where to take my rubbish, and she led me round to the stream at the back of the house and pointed and gestured vigorously for me to throw it there. I was pretty aghast! What to do? “I can’t throw my garbage in a stream!” But then, “If this is where the garbage goes here, I guess there’s no choice? I’ve not seen any bins around town.” Looking back I really should have taken the garbage back home and looked for an alternative, but at the time I was swayed by Gina’s enthusiastic gesturing and the load of rubbish already there and no doubt an element of laziness and confusedness. Anyway, now my bin is about 3 times as full as it should be, because apparently there is a rubbish wagon that comes, but it comes at SOME time between 8 and 9 on SOME mornings and it’s usually raining and I’m usually running late…

- Many older Tibetans spend most of their time muttering “Om Mane Peme Hum” (while doing other things), which is a mantra that prays for happiness for all sentient being. It’s kindof the Tibetan national prayer. Which is nice!

- It really can rain rather a lot, and in addition, if you leave anything unworn/ unused, be it (in my case) a rucksack, a pair of sandals, a book on Aristotelian ethics, a pencil case, a PLASTIC LID, the top of your peanut butter jar… etc, it gets COVERED in mould (potentially pictures to follow).

- People REALLY love the Dalai Lama. When he’s giving his teachings, some are listening attentively, some are just sitting and chatting or ‘waiting’. For the Big Moment- when he walks past. Then, full attention is on him, but no eyes- heads are bowed, backs stooped-, and the air is silent, the whole room on tip toes and holding its breath. Then as soon as he’s gone, lunch is served, teachings about compassion and not grasping are over,and everyone begins clamouring, at times violently, for the free food! On this note, Tibetan Buddhism is, like all religions, an institution as well as a philosophy, and the institution and traditions are probably stronger in society than the philosophy and more philosophical spiritual practices (e.g. praying is more popular than meditation or study). But there does seem to be more engagement with the philosophy than in some other countries, possibly because of a mixture of the Dalai Lama’s influence and because of the large proportions of people who are monks or nuns, who seem to really engage with the big questions and also talk to others about them.

- Four momos (Tibetan dumplings) for ten rupees (15p)! Yes!

 

Anyway, enough of that. Today I went shopping! I met a really nice vendor called Ravi. He seemed genuinely just very kind and warm from his chat and friendly smile, and his honesty was confirmed when I asked the price of something I clearly wanted, and knew was normally 500, and he told me it was 400. He proceeded to offer me very fair prices for lots of things I wanted, told me any stories behind them, and helped me find the nicest things (secret for now, cos they’re presents!) and when I’d got my selection together, he took off about 10% of the price again! THEN, as I was paying, he found me a really gorgeous picture of an elephant drawn onto velvet (picture to follow) and gave it to me as a present! Elephants are for protection in Hindu culture, he told me, and their tusks are lucky, so apparently this one will protect me! (I don’t believe in all that, but it will make me smile). He asked whether I’d like to have tea, but as soon as the words “No thank you” had started to leave my mouth he was also smiling and saying, “No, it’s ok” and carrying on the conversation. I love buying good, beautiful presents from genuinely, rarely lovely people!

 

My last week is beginning now. It’ll be busy one in the office, writing my article for Dolma Magazine, taking in the final submissions, editing a 12-chapter report on Women on the Tibetan Plateau, and trying to make a few meditation drop-in sessions and Buddhist philosophy classes as well as teaching at Gu Chu Sum as many days as I can and having last chats with people!

 

One of the ex-political Prisoners at Gu Chu Sum has temporarily adopted me as his teacher, which has been nice because the number of volunteers has allowed it to be two/one-on-one recently, and he’s really good fun, good to talk to and an incredible person! He’s called Lhamo Kyab (you can google him!). He came to India from Tibet in around 2003, and unlike many men fleeing Tibet, he had the courtesy to bring his wife and children WITH him! Once in India, he learnt about Tibetan history (not easy to do in Tibet, where the Chinese are watching) and what he learnt made him feel like he had to do something for Tibet.

 

So, having previously risked the treacherous, heavily guarded, one month night time trek across the Himalayas to safety and freedom in India, he again packed his bags and, leaving safety, freedom, and the comfort and love of his wife and children, he headed back over the Himalayas to Tibet. His plan was to fly the Tibetan flag from the hill overlooking his home city, where lots of people would see it; he wanted to give them a feeling of cheer, hope and resistance, to help the chances of a successful uprising to win Tibetan freedom in the future. (I’m yet to chat to him about whether he thinks an uprising of Tibetans could ever be successful and if so how. Ihe 2008 one didn’t bring Tibet freedom, though it did awaken a lot of young minds in Tibet to the injustice). Anyway, the Chinese authorities were following him and caught him, and found the flag in his bag (again, I’d like to ask if he had it stitched into the lining or anything, or just loose!). He was charged with splittism and something like “returning from India”.

 

So he was put in prison for three years. Of course, he was tortured: he’s only recently regained hearing in his right ear (thanks to an operation here in India) which I gather he lost simply through very violent beatings, which he suffered while strapped to a metal chair. His beatings in Tibet meant he had to be hospitalised there, too, to keep him alive and even in hospital, he was strapped down to the bed (the Chinese don’t like prisoners to die in prison as it looks bad on their records, so they either try to save them, or let them free of prison a day or two before expected death; so many die within a few days of being let out of prison). Furthermore, in his whole time in prison (except, presumably when he was taken to other rooms for torture), he was kept in one tiny cell, with no light, nothing but stone walls and floor, where food was simply pushed through a flap once a day. The food was little and like the water very dirty, so they were constantly sick and weak. He was kept away from the murderers, thieves, rapists etc because he was considered dangerous.

 

Sometimes he’d share his small cell with another political prisoner. He made good friends with one who wrote a book called something like “No Silence in the Himalayas” (he was translating the Tibetan title for me). I bet you form very close friendships sharing a cell like that with someone for 2 years! He said they talked a lot. This friend, for writing the book which detailed problems with Chinese rule in Tibet, is serving a ten-year sentence and is still in that prison, probably that cell, today. He tells me his friend was terribly thin and weak while in prison because of the food and torture and he’s very worried for him: not only is prison so very, very miserable while there, but his health for later is being ruined- IF he somehow doesn’t die.

 

Reading about all this is one thing, but imaging the person who’s been through it sitting there and telling you about it all. Because it’s his history. It really is his friend still there today. It makes it all horribly real to you.

 

Lhamo Kyab keeps campaigning for his friends still in prison in Tibet. He tells me he still feels sad sometimes when he remembers prison and the sufferings and fear so many Tibetans are living under. But he mainly keeps telling me how happy he is, what a good day he’s having, etc! Every day, he’s beaming and joking around and paying complements to people. Because going from 3 years of darkness and torture, to reunification with his wife and children, with whom he now lives, in a free country where he’s supported to live and learn was like more than a dream for him. His ear is better, and he looks healthy. He takes the kids swimming at the weekends, when they ask.

 

Let me know if you’ve any requests before I leave. My bag’s looking pretty full but I am accepting present requests: books on Buddhism, nice throws, clothes, scarves, jewellery, notebooks, statues and Buddhist artefacts like singing bowls… Let me know!

 

Lots of love and though I’ve had and am having an incredible time here, I’m looking forward to home and uni, and seeing you all again too! I don’t feel sad to be leaving. Yet!!

 

Sally x x x

Photos 5.09.2011

End of an era: Final proof that my troublesome neighbour has left the country. She’s been deported to England though…

Beautiful evening drawing over Mcleod

Caption contest? This is one of the pots they use to cook rice at the Dalai Lama’s temple. And an impressed old lady.

The day before I took this, that bit of road was flat. Now that dip is over a foot deep. I can’t help recalling my summer internship with Tim Farron MP, where every second villager complained about potholes or slow drainage.

The coolest temple in the world. Note the large mouth in the background: You climb inside this to go through a mock-cave system in the semi-dark, and it’s like going on one of those maze-in-a-trucks at a local English fair. Similar numbers of fake snakes inside. More Shivas.

Monks riding the swing boat at the fairground in Mcleod. I LOVE the expression of the monk at the front!

Manimahesh Pictures

Dalhoisie, called “Little Switzerland”. Had a brief horse ride here! Had forgotten how stubborn horses can be…!

Monkey helping with the maize harvest, seen from our main office.

Eagle! These are always flying about, like crows in England!

Jewellery-maker buffing silver earings in a shop in town

On the Manimahesh trek

On the Manimahesh trek

On the Manimahesh trek

India holds such a variety of people. from religious Sadhus, to modern business-types, to beggars, traditional older women, tibetan monks and nuns…

Me with some demons :-)

FREE FOOOOOOD!

Inside the decorated free food tent. About 3500m altitude in a remote valley, halway up a hill in Northern India. The lake district has a lot to learn!

Free food servers. Note the massive pans!

The camp. Again, lake district, take note!

Where we slept (and Tasha on the bed). They gave us FOUR blankets!

Sleeping quarters

Unmade beds: Foam over rocks, and they were comfortable!

Glacier

Across the glacier, looking up the mountain

Glacier and flowers

HUGE Shiva statue. Bam Bam Bolay!

Lots of people took horses up. They were tiny, strong things.

The faithful looking at Shiva’s Kailash mountain as its peak emerges from cloud

Manimahesh lake. To the left is the girls’ bathing section- shame they couldn’t divide the lake equally, but I valued the privacy. Also, glacial lakes are COLD!

Tent, Kailash mountain, me.

Me in front of Kailash

This tickled me.

Men bathing in the holy lake. Nice eh?

Kailash and streamers

Kailash and streamers

Kailash and the lake

Kailash, Manimahesh lake and I

I liked how the clouds tumbled along the ridges. Very magical-looking in ‘real life’

An encampment and those same ridges and tumbling clouds.

Goats! For you, Mum!

Beautiful sunset clouds on the walk down

Beautiful sunset clouds on the walk down

Beautiful sunset clouds on the walk down. This was really glowing.

Walking down at sunset

Men singing lively religious songs around a shrine in one of free food tents

Alpine view

Sun coming out! Look at the cool surface of that mountainside that’s lit up!

Inbar and Surrinder, chillin’ on a rock

“Those lovely mountain humps- check it out”- Yuan Yang, adapting Black Eyed Peas’ “My Humps”

Another cool valleyside

The horses had to carry SUCH heavy loads up the hill! Gas canisters, great bags of flour, very fat people… :-(

LOTS of the valleysides in Chamba look like this. And there are many, isolated, houses and villages on there. Imagine living somewhere like that! There aren’t even roads to them. One of the ladies at work recently visited a village that could only be accessed by a 12 hour walk!

Note the mountainside jutting out at 45 degrees…

Lovely light on the trees, not quite captured by my camera

Colourful woman navigating grey ant-farm-like paths on the mountainside

Big Shiva again!

Manimahesh Pilgrimage/ Trek

Hello! I hope you’re well!

I’m back from my pilgrimage to Manimahesh, a 13,390 foot (4080m) high lake in Chamba district, Northern India, incredibly sacred to Hindus as the creation of Lord Shiva after his marriage to Parvati, and a lake overlooked by him from Chamba Kailash mountina, where he takes his annual meditation retreat from the underworld.

It was loads of fun! The scenery was actually quite alpine… except on a seriously massive scale, and with exaggeration of every feature: mountainsides so steep and vast they were like great flat sheets, reaching down, down, and down into a valley bottom you couldn’t even see; long tumbling waterfalls held captive by deep mountain crevices; flowers everywhere- yellow, purple, plum-red, cream; and giant rocky features posing in the wackiest, most exuberant, shapes. You can see the pictures I’ll put up soon.

The fact that this “trek” was a Hindu pilgrimage, and only reachable by hours of driving along a long, winding mountain passage (at times reaching over 5000m), made it a trek like no other.

The inaccessibility meant that few Western tourists took the pilgrimage, and in the three days we spent walking, and the two days travelling, I didn’t see a single Westerner. That’s a pretty rare experience for tourists in India. It was obviously rare for the Indians to see us there too, as almost everyone we walked past greeted us warmly, with great enthusiasm. They were easily delighted by our shouts of “Bam bam bolay!”, which means “Smoke weed, smoke weed, Shiva!” and is one of several traditional calls people cheer while climbing and descending the mountain. There was free food on offer for pilgrims all along the walk and car journey, and wherever we passed the food stops those serving would strain with a quite extreme enthusiasm to make us stop and eat. When we did stop, those running the food tents would come to welcome us, find us chairs and insist we sit on them, offer us chai, and smilingly find us extra free things to take, like sweets and packets of biscuits. I felt a little silly, but the overwhelming feeling was that it was touching that they so wanted to make us happy. Along the walk, too, many fellow pilgrims offered us free sweets. At times it felt like being six and on holiday in Southern Europe again, where I used to get extra attention for my ginger hair. One old man on the trek insisted I take one of his two walking sticks for descending the mountain (even though he’d just begun his 26km trek). At times like that, it was simply hugely humbling and filled you with loving awe for so many of your fellow human beings. To spend two days around hundreds of people, each new one pleased to see you, eager to cheer and welcome you, and unquestioningly generous in their attempts to do so, was really an enjoyable experience.

In the past I’ve felt uneasy about getting extra attention because of my white skin. But this time it felt ok. Most just seemed pleased and surprised that people beyond their own culture were taking an interest in that culture of theirs. Others, especially the older ones, were overheard by our Indian friends expressing how impressed and inspired they were by the independence of two young women finding their ways to the mountains of Northern India to take a trek. It would be cool if their inspiration turned into action- I was surprised that, like many of the Tibetans, our independence inspired them, when I expected they’d see it as something alien and somehow inappropriate for their girls. I hope they thought, “I, or women/girls I know, could be independent like that too”.

Of course, I’m not really independent. Them saying that actually made me feel really thankful to my parents, for bringing me up to be able to be here, doing this volunteering, going on treks…: to have the curiosity, and the confidence (and basic safety-training!) to satisfy it. It’s incredible what they’ve given me there. Thank you!

Anyway, skip the post below unless you really want to bore yourself silly, and enjoy the first set of photos in the post below that!

Very Long Trek Through Embarassingly Short Patch of Buddhist Jungle

On getting back to Mcleod Ganj, I was able to attend a day’s teaching by the Dalai Lama. It was on the subject of becoming a Boddhisatva. Boddhisatvas are people who have reached enlightenment, but rather than escaping the cycle of birth and rebirth (“samsara”- the basic nature of which is suffering) they choose to be reincarnated in order to help others escape the suffering of samsara. I always thought that anyone who was truly enlightened should have to (want to) become a Boddhisatva: how could that desire not result from the compassion for all living beings that accompanies enlightenment? Anyway, the teaching was basically about how to live compassionately and (in turn) happily, and how Buddhism helps one in that.

 

The immersion I’ve had into Buddhism here has really made me think I should take Buddhist philosophy ‘seriously’, and let it enlighten my own life. There’s actually a lot of sense in Buddhism alongside a little apparent nonsense: and not just sense, but important sense. Buddhist philosophy really investigates our psychology, and also teaches us to investigate our own psychology too. Awareness is one of the first steps in Buddhism- it shares that with philosophy and in fact, Hume, Didero etc expressed many of the central teachings of Buddhism concerning the nature of the world and ourselves. Next, Buddhism brings your attention to the aspects of life (specifically, your psychology) that bring suffering. And it doesn’t just leave it at that. It asks, “Well, that’s reality: so, what should we do given that?” A question only moral philosophers get to. The individual is challenged to really investigate the answer to that question and live by it. Buddhism offers all sorts of guidance on how to find the answer to that question- intellectual and emotional paths to explore, meditations to do to increase awareness and self-direction… And at every step, it’s made clear that one is travelling in ways that will improve one’s own life, as well as the lives of others: travelling to an all-round better, good, life.

 

As I said, moral philosophers also ask that question, “How should we live, given that?” Sometimes they do so in an interestingly different way from Buddhists, though. For example, both Hume and Buddha pointed out that, when we go looking inside for something to call “I”, we find nothing deserving of that label. Rather, “I” is a concept and identity we put on a collection of different and varying things- thoughts, feelings, physical elements, etc, none of which are independently sufficient, and a necessary list of which is also impossible to draw up. There’s no substantial, independent, “I”.

 

My understanding is that Hume then said, “But if I say that to my friends, they’ll think I’ve gone nuts. I mean, even to me it just feels so odd that I can’t really take it seriously, or do anything useful with that awareness. So, I’ll just put it in a box in the corner and leave it alone- forget it- while I get on with my life.”

 

The Buddha, by contrast, said, “This lack of a self-originating ‘I’ is a real fact about the world, and so something we must (seek to fully understand, and then) use our understanding of in deciding what to do with our lives. What implications does it have?” And he taught many ways to meditate on and understand the emptiness of “I” and how that should impact our lives.

 

Perhaps I’m being unfair to Hume there: perhaps they both asked “What implications does this have?”, and Hume simply answered, “None” and Buddha answered, “Considerable”. Buddha gave suggestions for how the weirdness of that fact about the world (the empty “I”) could be integrated into our consciousness and how it could help liberate us; Hume denied that such integration was possible.

 

Anyway.

 

This is not to say I’ve converted to Buddhism. Some of the teachings have helped me a lot though, and so I’d like to learn more.

 

For example, last night I went to get myself a lemon cheesecake. I felt a bit weak, probably from altitude. I knew it wouldn’t actually help. But then, it was delicious. While I was eating it, I realised so clearly, “Ah, this is the attachment Buddhists are talking about!”

 

“I knew this cheesecake existed, and I desired it, and I will desire it in future now that I’ve tasted and also acquired the response of indulging. I desire it even though its pleasure is so fleeting while its cost is more permanent. Costs… Its specific, cheesecake, cost is money, waistline, arteries, and distraction from what I’d most like to consume my time and thoughts.

 

“My enjoyment of all sorts of nice things has evolved to generate attachment, like my attachment to nice cakes- I’m attached to nice views, dreaming, beautiful music, tasty food… It’s not just a case of liking them. I am attached. The two currently go together in me, because when an object catches my eyes, in turn it pulls me feet to wander off the track towards it. Distraction is common to all attachment: the (potential and often actual) taking of one’s hand and leading of one dreamily off the path one most wants to follow (if the object desired lies off that path). Sometimes we’re so distracted we don’t even have a sense that there is a path from which to go astray. Often, in fact. I think Buddhists learnt to separate the awareness of enjoyment-potential from attachment: so something can catch their eyes without catching their feet. At first, they achieve that through conscious effort to remove the desire. Later, the desire just ceases to arise from the awareness of, e.g. yumminess.

 

The cheesecake was a nice clear example for me of how attachment pulls me from the path I really want to follow: I want to do all I can to support really good charities by giving them all the money I can while remaining reasonably cared for; but I spend more money than I want to, given this charitable goal, on unnecessary, tasty, often unhealthy (either in quantity or ingredients) food. My idea of an ideal life is one where I don’t buy lemon cheesecakes (or other unnecessary food): I just buy what I need to be healthy and give the money saved away to good charities.

 

The pleasure I get from food is really a low-quality pleasure: however intensive the pleasure is in the dimension along which food can be enjoyed, the pleasure from food is still so fleeting and does not contribute at all to my long-term sense of well-being. In fact, it detracts from it in through the attachment it creates, or the attachment of which it makes me aware.

 

In my ideal life I not only spend potential cheesecake money on charities. I also have more spare time and mental energy to dedicate to (e.g.) charities. I’m not distracted by thoughts of lemon cheesecakes, and I can get on with doing thing I really value- things that lie ON the path I want to follow. Perhaps reading, learning, exercising, meditating, developing good relationships, providing a really useful service to others… Whatever.

 

Hmm. Even for that list of things, it seems the ideal is to be able to chose them without being attached to them. I don’t know if and how that works. Buddhists say that meditation on the interdependent and hence ‘empty’ nature (empty meaning interdependent and not self-originating, rather than nothingness) of all things cuts the cord of attachment to them. That seems understandable but I’d have to go there to know. Also, how enlightened beings actually make choices given a total lack of attachment is something I don’t really understand the Buddhist explanation for yet.

 

Back to cheesecake: if you only look at the moment of eating cheesecake, you think, “Well, that was a good thing to do, my tongue enjoyed that!” But if you look at the whole picture, you see that you’re tied to the mast, and are opting for behaviour that adds more ropes.

 

Now look, I know, I know: it’s only a lemon cheesecake. I didn’t beat myself up about this. It was just such a clear, simple example of one thing holding me back, of one big way and reason my life feels in a frustrating disharmony, of something that wouldn’t be in my idea life. As I was eating it, it felt so funny that I’d bought that cheesecake! There was a monk sitting on the table next to me, and I couldn’t believe he wasn’t seeing me as a person quite straight-forwardly buying their way into samsara (the cycle of suffering and rebirth), as so many (he must believe) blindly do.

 

Choosing actions that strengthen the ties to all the things from which we want to be free… It’s what we do, and I don’t know what life is like not doing that, what shape, if any, enjoyment takes without attachment. I don’t know really what the alternative ‘path’ is, how a ‘free’ me would live, and I can’t even be sure that there is this great golden path at all. But I know I’ve recently been frustrated by life tied to the mast, where it at least feels like there’s a better destination to pursue, of which I have a partial view through the clouds. I guess we can feel disharmony without knowing that harmony is attainable.

 

The second question might be, if harmony isn’t available, which disharmony is best to pursue?

 

A few days ago I was worrying that giving up attachment meant shaving off a big part of your humanity. I feel less like that now. I don’t know that I want to give up all of my attachment- attachment to things ON the path seems at least unproblematic, and potentially helpful/ necessary.

 

But giving up some attachment- to things off the path- actually allows you to be human in the way that feels right, best, most human, to you.

 

One thing I find funny and hard to understand… Your life is comprised solely of seconds (“All you touch and all you see is all your life with ever be”. Thank you, Floyd). It seems like some of those seconds are improved by the tongue’s contact with the cheesecake (or whatever). But sitting here now, I’m ambivalent as to whether my life in future contains cheesecake or not. Why?

 

Is it because I’m lacking proper perspective? Because I’m not taking sufficiently seriously pleasure that is masked by time- pleasure in the future?

 

Life is made up of those pleasant, or pleasureless, or unpleasant seconds, and that’s all there is to it- so they shouldn’t be treated with ambivalence.

 

But I think my future-cheesecake ambivalence isn’t there because the pleasantness of those future seconds doesn’t matter much to me. It does matter. It’s all that matters, along with the pleasantness of others’ seconds.

 

I think my ambivalence to future cheesecake is there because the pleasantness of future seconds can’t be treated as independent, stand alone things.

 

By this I don’t mean something like, “You can’t judge a sandcastle by the quality of its individual grains: you have to look at the whole formation made when they come together”. I’m not sure life is like that, even though it often feels like it is (as its often portrayed in Greek tragedy, where so much of the quality of one’s life is painted as if it rests on the nature of one’s death, because that seems to be so integral to life’s overall ‘shape’).

 

But rather, I mean that the way some sand is placed (or not placed) at one point in time, builds or precludes the foundations for other placings of sand in desired ways. Eating cheesecake as a result of attachment might preclude, or essentially rest on something else that precludes, the happiest life- seconds- I can have. As I said, it stops me giving the money to charity that I want to give. And the attachment that accompanies it makes me feel that I’m not able to direct my life as I’d like.

 

Cheesecake-eating, against a drab backdrop of attachment, acts like a colourful shell on the sandcastle. But wouldn’t we rather not have that drab backdrop at all?

 

What I really want is a life that is very pleasant- where the pleasure/ happiness of my seconds is a deeper and fuller one than that of cheesecake eating and the (yawning! :-p) gulfs between each episode!

 

To have that, I think the happiness needs to be based on things more internal, that are more beneficial for others, than cheesecake-eating.

 

The Dalai Lama said yesterday that not only does an effect (cheesecake eating) depend on its cause (attachment), but the cause also depends on its effect- for its identity as that cause. Everything is interdependent. In this case, the precise attachment wouldn’t be the same attachment without cheesecake-eating as its effect. It’s not that not eating the cheesecake somehow reaches back in time and changes the nature of the cause. Sadly. But the mutual interdependence of cheesecake-eating and attachment suggests the cheesecake-eating is even less of a pearly shell than it seemed before: because that dreary backdrop has no existence without the placement of the shell.

 

But anyway, as I said, what we really want to do is to replace that drab backdrop-shell combo with something better. I want my seconds to be bright, not because of endless pearly cheesecake-eating sessions, but in a fuller way that, if it exists, I think must come from very different things. I could make a guess at the list: automatic, unwavering compassion to other people and oneself; awareness, of one’s psychology, others’ psychology, some essential facts about the world; bringing together one’s heart and one’s mental life and one’s action through that awareness and training; the peace of mind and heart that results… Perhaps.

 

I’m not sure yet how attachment, enjoyment, valuing etc intermingle. And while saying all this, I’m yet to actually understand how bad attachment is: how far does it really remove me from where I want to be? Is it just an unproductive puritan tendency that makes one think it’s responsible for ones failings? Is it easier to just give in and not worry about some of the ‘little details’ of your life that aren’t quite right? Is attachment to most things ok? (Was cheesecake an exception rather than a rule?- Humans are prone to generalising where generalisations aren’t justified. -Spot the irony-.)

 

Maybe it depends on what your own concept of the good life really is. One thing I don’t like about Buddhism is the conviction that achieving enlightenment is undoubtedly the best way to use your human life.

 

The Buddhist’s point is this: The Buddha said that the likelihood of being born a human is equivalent to the likelihood of a turtle who is swimming in the wide ocean coming to the surface with its head through the one yoke floating on that vast sea. This is because while you’re in the other realms (animal, hell, hungry ghosts, gods etc) your ability to accrue the good kamma needed to escape the realm slim to none; it takes eons. For example, if you’re born into the animal realm: animals just don’t have the reflective power and self-restraint to build-up good kamma- they’re just reactive- so they’re stuck in the realm for AGES (seems a little unfair, right?). But while we’re humans, we have reflective power, the capacity to understand ourselves and reality, the ability to see alternatives, to work towards the good ones… we have the ability to relatively simply develop good kamma, and what’s more, the rare ability to achieve enlightenment and escape samsara. So the message is (“For heaven’s sake! …”) take this rare and precious chance to reach enlightenment, before you descend into the dog realm for half of eternity!

 

But when I think of people who are really good people living well, I don’t think of monks (though, all right, the Dalai Lama is doing quite a good job). I don’t even think of people like Martin Luther King, or Gandhi, after looking more deeply into their life stories. I think about people like my old child-minder and those community-leaders (hidden or unmissable) you see on programs like “The Secret Millionaire”, or just in your local community. Those people whose hearts and actions are basically turned to helping people who need help- not just their family and friends, but a great portion of those in the general community, where they see suffering and a chance to relieve it and make life a little, or a lot, brighter. They’re not saints, and might be happier if they were a bit more ‘saintly’ in respect of having greater peace of mind. But I can’t see just one mould for ‘right-living’. These people have their way of doing things, and it seems like despite involving some suffering, its basically a great way. Why must we be perfectionists? Perfectionism can slow us down, and if living well is all about compassion, shouldn’t we just get on with it?! Get on with helping others rather than pausing to faff about straightening our minds to perfection? I think we can help people prior to perfecting compassion.

 

I know that we probably all could find spare time to read a bit of Buddhism and work on our minds. Just like we could find time to do more exercise, see our friends more, read more of those novels on our long list, volunteer in the local old people’s home, learn Japanese, write a book, learn to paint… But we can’t do all these things, and we do have to make a choice about how important each really is to us. When I wonder, for example, whether, in order to do best by others, I should spend spare minutes reading about vipassana or reading about the relative merits of ways of improving living standards in the Global South (the first steps to which do not, I believe, require an expert insight into Buddhist philosophy given the lack of treatment for excruciating and isolating diseases such as Schistosomiasis, etc), I’m drawn to the latter. But hey, also being open to new, unpredictable sources of inspiration is also a good thing (part of the reason I’m in Mcloed Ganj right now) so perhaps we shouldn’t plan the path too carefully, and perhaps we shouldn’t only be guided by such specific judgements of importance.

 

…Ah, but when are we wisely but blindly following out hearts and when are we being lead blindly from our favoured path by unhelpful attachment?…

 

What a rant. I don’t know, sitting here, whether that was all so blindingly obvious as to be duller than spending hours watching a man paint a grey, empty, dining hall a slightly darker shade of grey, or so confused and misguided as to be like… watching a him paint a tasteful oakwood Oxford hall with a sickening, disastrously 80s, monstrosity of garish patterns. At least it couldn’t all be as disastrous as that metaphor.

 

Enlighten me! Don’t you know I’m interdepending on you?!

21.02.2011 (Part 1: The Return of The Neighbour)

Hello! Time for another destinationless ramble around the ragged hills and tussocks of my misremembered stories. I’m going to post them in separate blogs, because each thing I have to write about it so different.

So, Part 1: The next instalment of the ‘problematic neighbour’ saga (rapidly becoming an epic). The last episode was not, in fact, the penultimate. She’s back.

A few days ago, I returned home from dinner in town to the sound of a dog crying and yelping pitifully upstairs. I went up to investigate, and found that it was Shushi’s (‘problematic neighbour”s) dog, which had been left in her room. Now, at this point, Shushi had been away for around a week, so I was really concerned for the poor dog- alone, when it clearly craved company, and as far as I could see without food or water. It was chained to the window bars, and I almost let it off so it would at least be able to fend for itself. But firstly, I was somewhat concerned that Shushi might come back and put an axe through my door, and secondly, I didn’t think it would be too keen on the life of a stray while we could keep it alive from the open window (though she did look like Lady from Lady and the Tramp, and I quite liked the idea of hooking her up with one of the nice strays that accompany me on my walks, and making them both some spaghetti).

I asked Gina, the maid for the elderly couple, whether it had any food or water, and she said she’d fed it, but either she thought it already had water, or she couldn’t give it water because its bowl was too far from the window that had been left open (she doesn’t know much English and my Hindi’s next to non-existent). So I stroked her a bit, which calmed her down, then left her. Then she picked up howling so pitifully, and her lack of water concerned me so much, I went back up, taking her some water and a banana (yeah, I’m sure that’s what she needed- Potassium…).

It seems like the dog has inherited some of its owner’s insecurities. After I stroked her for a while, she suddenly looked very untrusting- her eyes widened and she kept turning away from the window in apparent fear, then coming back again with eyes asking for comfort, and going away again, coming back. Then she just stood back from the window, held her big wide eyes on mine, and panted and whimpered and howled in so much distress, all the time looking at me, then darting her eyes round the room, and looking back at me in fear and confusion. OK, so I may be attributing human emotions to a dog with too much confidence, but what else can I do? When she started this, I left, as I didn’t want to reward it and was also clearly not helping by then.

Later that night, Shushi came back and I heard another loud argument, which seemed to consist in the elderly couple telling her to look after her dog properly. But there’s really no use in arguing with her- she searches out the most vicious, spiteful arguments and seems to look to continue them as long as possible, rather than respond to reason. But at least the poor dog had company again.

The next morning saw (well, in my case, heard) another vicious argument. I worry that she’ll strain the hearts of the poor elderly couple upstairs- they get so wound up by her and they’re in their 80s now. A few moments after the couple had left the argument, she let out this heart-shaking scream, just like those screams in terrible 80s horror movies when the girl sees something that is unmistakeably Phantom. She held it for unnervingly long. Then let out another couple.

After that, I’ve just felt very very sorry for her, and I’d like to find out about what sort of support their is for people with mental health problems around here. I hope she does get deported, because once she’s in England she should get treatment, and as long as she’s treatable, that could make all the difference. I expect she’ll still be a severely unpleasant person, but at least not one who is also so insecure and distressed.

Part 2: Not like Top Shop

A couple of days ago, Tasha and I were browsing the street stalls when a vendor called, “Yes, girls, can I sell you something?” I find that quite an annoying introduction, so I was surprised when said vendor turned out to be really nice, and a very interesting shopping experience evolved.

 

He invited us to look at the clothes in his shop (rather than the street stall), and we did as Tash was looking for a top. It turned out the vendor was called Imran, was from the most beautiful area of Kashmir’s mountains, was on around his 90th day of Ramadan and about to break fast when we left, and ran the shop business with his brother.

 

I was amazed by the amount and variety of stock he had- how could he possibly purchase all that and sell it, from this little alleyway shop in Mcleod Ganj? It turned out he has a wholesaler, and sells to retailers all round the world. They make orders to villages up in the mountains, which gives the villagers a decent livelihood. Thinking of all the charitable sewing training schools I’ve now seen, I asked whether they taught the villagers to sew. But he set me right- of course he didn’t, he was a businessman, and the villagers learnt to sew (‘by whatever means’) because they want to meet and keep his orders. The clothes were really high quality, and it was useful for me to be reminded that charity isn’t the only, or often the best, way of helping people have a livelihood.

 

Imran also let us watch some jewellery being made- at this stage, the young boy was polishing silver earings with an electric buffer wheel. Imran told us this one boy (aged 24) made all the shop’s jewellery from scratch- designed it, melted and shaped the metals, added the precious stones…. This was staggering, because Imran showed us the jewellery cabinet, and there were some absolutely stunning items there: very creative, yet beautiful and subtle designs. And all totally different. This boy had quite a talent, as Imran also acknowledged.

 

After we gazed at and thumbed and asked questions about the precious designs in the cabinet for five minutes or so, Imran asked if we’d like to see anything we might want to buy (aware from the start that those objects were beyond our price range despite being within our intrigue, and happy to discuss them anyway). “Silver or fake silver?” He explained that fake silver would go black after a while, but was cheaper. He told us how the price of silver had risen from 30 to 75 lakh in the past year or so, as people increasingly chose it over gold (which was still around 250 lakh, if I remember him correctly). He told us what the different precious stones were, and where they originated (mainly Tibet and Iran). To give us the price of earings, he weighed them on a very precise scale, multiplying the weight by the cost/kg of the metals and stones. And he was more than honest about it: there was one pair I really liked, and after weighing them he told me the price was 1200 rupees (about 16 pounds). I said I’d have to consider and come back if I was going to spend that much, and in a non-pushy way, he reassured me that he would give me a good price. “In fact, these earings should be more, but I already added a discount for you”. I thought this was just harmless but classic salesmanship. But he hesitated, then turned the calculator to me on which he’d been calculating the price. “1395″ it read. “See, this is the real price.” I apologised that I was such a bad customer, taking up around half an hour of his time and then not buying anything! “No no, don’t let people make you feel bad, like you’re a ‘bad customer’. About 50-80 people come in my shop everyday. For some, they like my goods and my prices and they buy a little, or a lot. For others, the items and the prices aren’t right, and they don’t buy anything. It doesn’t matter at all. For me, I want you to be happy, and as long as you leave my shop happy, I am happy.” So before I leave India, I’d love pop back and find something special there to buy… Although I still like to avoid having pretty and precious, expensive things… I don’t really get the attraction. The experience in the shop is the valuable thing, really.

 

So it wasn’t like going into a TopShop! Can you imagine the lady behind the till approaching you and telling you a fascinating story about the shop management structure, the production line, the trends in the market for the raw materials, life in their home in the Kashmiri mountains, and then inviting you to see the most interesting products being made at the back of the shop, letting you chat to the designer… ?!