One trip to the holy city of Benares, the city of temples, of shrines, of red tikas, of saffron clothes, of shikha clad men and ochre sporting women & you are confounded by myriad of thoughts. There is the common, everyday, middleclass man/woman, like my mother is, who starts his day by visiting a few temples of his deity/ies and bathing in the Ganges. Clad in minimal clothing, as befits a temple visit, these early rising denizens of a city that dwells on Lord Shiva’s trident, make this not a religion but a way of life. This is as much a part of their routine as bathing or eating everyday is. I am calling this a way of life because there is usually nothing transactional (overtly) in the relationship. It is a way to deconstruct the road to peace and well being.
And on the other hand is the curious, SLR carrying, shorts clad, hat sporting, white skinned tourist who dwells and contemplates this way of life. He has his own methods for deconstructing the road to peace. He is more explorative than ritualistic. He is more curious as he doesn’t understand it and drawn in as his own world is moving rapidly away from belief systems. Away from him and towards individualism. Both these polarised worlds clash firmly in Benares and produce a wilting of the slits and reverberating, settle down, in the clanking of the temple bells.
I look to these worlds with as much curiosity as familiarity, as much belief as questions, as much joy & love as hatred and ask myself seldom and often if I can belong to either or both.
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