A very long journey inland

I forgot to mention one other glorious aspect of my stay at Amritpuri. On that last evening, after we got rained off the beach, I took myself off to watch a puja being performed in a small shrine that I believe used to be Amma's meditation room, before things started to expand on such a colossal scale. A puja is basically a spiritual/religious ritual or ceremony of gratitude performed for a special occasion or a specific deity. I arrived after this one had begun and wasn't really sure as to its exact purpose, not that it mattered particularly to me what it was for or about - I was simple totally entranced as a result of complete sensory saturation. It was hard to know whether to keep one's eyes closed or open as there was so much to take in. As the swami performing the puja continuously chanted a hypnotic and monotonous stream of verses, coming close second in the soundscape was the heavy sound of the rain clattering onto the roof and bouncing off the drainpipes, made all the more dramatic by the occasional crash of thunder followed by lightening. Added to this was the distant sound of Amma's musicians playing their celestial music in the nearby darshan hall, and the constant low-frequency buzz of Amritpuri itself. All the while, swami was repeatedely tearing up countless petals from beautiful flowers and showering them onto the altar, covering them with water from a silver jug, then adding more flowers, then water...ad infinitum. Add to this the flickering light from numerous burning candles, and what you had was a truly gorgeous feast for the eyes. To top it all off, with the ever-present smell of intoxicating incense, I again found myself lulled into some other-worldy blissed out state. I had never realised a puja coul be so beautiful; those Gods are truly blessed.

Nonetheless, the following day I managed to tear myself away from Amritpuri, with more classic lack of preparation. Bizarre, really, that I chose to take absolutely zero advantage of the numerous and helpful amenities at Amritpuri, especially that one quite useful place, the travel desk. Preferable to my adhoc mind with its bizarre priorities (an hour is always better spent doing yoga or meditating than on boring things like organising one's way around India.....) was to wait until the bewitching hour and launch myself into another unknown journey. Besides, I had looked on the map, and the next destination was only about an inch away, slightly north but mostly west. No problem, I thought, looks like about a five hour journey (I have never been much good at map-reading or visual things in general, and apparently still am not improving). Sadly, my predictions failed to take into account some rather large mountains that were in the way, namely The Western Ghats. Oops.

The journey didn't get off to a good start. For some reason, despite having walked passed it numerous times, when it came to the crunch I couldn't find the exit to the ashram. I literally spent 20 minutes walking around the complex with my heavy load, trying to orientate myself and find that gate leading to the bridge over the backwaters. So that by the time I finally did find it I was completely exhausted and had to sit down for a rest. Eventualy I found my way to the bus station in a tuk-tuk, and innocently asked for a bus to Kodaikkanal. When I finally managed to get the attention of the men standing around in the information office, who were far too busy contemplating each other's navels than to talk to me, all I got in response was a series of blank stares. One KEY thing about trying to communicate a Hindi word to an Indian person is that you have to get the pronounciation JUST RIGHT. No variations allowed, not even the slightest misplaced stress or hint of an accent. They won't even attempt to try to match what they hear coming out of your mouth to any possibly even remotely relevent word in their mindbank. No, it is YOUR JOB to get it right. Which sadly means you will end up standing there trying endless unintelligeable pronounciation variations, looking like a total freak as the crowds begin to form around the wierd white tourist. This was a particularly good example of such a moment, and wasn't helped by the fact that, not only was my pronounciation slightly off, but I also had some key letters in the wrong places. Somehow I eventually made myself understood, but rather than quash their bemused reaction, it only served to make it worse. Their faces read something to the effect of: "why on earth would anyone choose to take the bus from here to there?, you clearly have no idea and you are in for one hell of a journey, love." It turned out I had to backtrack all the way I had come, taking a bus all the way up past Alleppey and through to Fort Kochin on the coast, and only then could head inland. My route in to Kodaikkanal, a hill station in the Western Ghats, was to be possibly the most convoluted route possible, via countless tiny villages and towns, basically in something close to an enormous circle. And better still, the bus didn't leave until 5pm, three hours later, a small but significant fact that I could have found out if I had only bothered to glance at the easily accessible timetables on the ashram walls.

Still, apparently this is the way it had to be. Om.

That was one hell of a journey. The bus was totally rammed, so I found myself standing. No bother, I thought, I am young and fit, I can stand for a while, even though I do happen to be standing right at the front with my face far too close to the front window and not a lot of hope if we come to any kind of a sudden halt. Several hours later, my ears ringing from the glorious accompaniment of the ever-reliable horn-honking, I was still standing. At about 10pm I managed to get a seat and got chatting with a lovely Indian lady who was desperately trying to feed me digestive biscuits, insistently telling me that they were her new great "no fat" discovery (Indian biscuit culture is a whole other commentary in itself). As the journey continued into the night, more and more people piled into the bus, including an entire family who proceded to try to fit themselves into a two-person space next to me. Om. That night I learnt about sharing and caring - it doesn't matter whether others are your family, your friends, or whatever. We are all in this together, and you simply do accommodate anyone and everyone as you would yourself or your best friend. Personal space and barriers dissolve and you merge with those around you. And so, with the limbs and luggage and god-knows-what-else of countless new friends boring into me from all directions, I journeyed into the night. One Indian man did his utmost to ignore this unwritten rule, and boy did he cause a stir. Standing next to me in the aisle, somehow or other he managed wriggle his way down through the mass of people vacuum packed into a rigid standing mass, to actually lie, foetal position, on the floor of the bus. Bear in mind that it was about 1in the morning and he was no spring chicken - at least 70, at a guess. People let him be for a little while, but when even more people tried to get on the bus, they simply weren't having any of it - space was needed and he had to stand. He was either totally out for the count or defiantly ignorant - for, though people started to poke and push him, tug his hair, and shout streams of insults, he just continued to lie there. After about an hour the driver finally got involved and stopped the bus, refusing to go any further until the man stood up. And so he did eventually, and that was that. A few others gave him one last piece of their mind, but that was basically the end of the saga - no bitching, no hard feelings, just work with the system and everyone is happy. Something tells me it wouldn't quite happen like this at home.

At about 3am I simply couldn't hold it any longer and had to have a pee stop. We seemed to be having a break at yet another tiny mountain town where boatloads of people were hanging out at the bus station in the middle of the night, so I made a run for it, having thought I had communicated to the family next to me not to let the bus leave without me. After putting all my speed-peeing skills into practise, I emerged from the toiled only to see the parking space where our bus had been now empty and my bus, with all of my belongings aboard, nowhere to be seen. This was where the aforementioned, rather undignified, screaming and yelping Arianna saga took place, as I hopped about trying to find my bus, only to see it pulling out of the station. When I finally managed to get back aboard, needless to say I did feel like a bit of a wally as the entire bus (and bus station for that matter) stared at me wondering quite why I needed to make such a fuss.

And so the endless journey continued, with its noise, dirt, wind, incomparable bumpiness, and basically 5-star discomfort in every way. Better still was that I was surviving on the glorious nutrition that is Indian bus station food - every possible fried and sugared delicacy known to mankind - which makes one feel all the better once one's belly has been bounced around for a solid 20 hours. At 4am I got turfed off the bus in Palani and instructed to find my connecting bus further up into the hills from here. My first official Tamil Nadu bus reflected the starkly different economies of the two states - if I thought Kerala government buses were grimey, this took it to a whole new level. Thankfully, though, there seemed to be no light power on board, so I was pleased to remain blissfully ignorant about the true identity of the very wet and sticky stuff was that smothered the seat I chose to sit in. Om. And just when I thought I couldn't feel any more windswept, grimey, sugar-teethed, greasy and generally completely rank. Still, deep inside, and underneath all that tiredness, everything was still absolutely fine. Perfect, in fact.

The 60 kilometre ascent from Palani to Kodaikkanal takes about four hours, and is a breathtakingly beatiful if slightly terrifying switchback ride. Thankfully, as we started our ascent, the sun started to come up over the Palani Hills, doing a good job of fooling me into thinking I was fresh-as-a-daisy and ready for the day ahead. In true Indian style, we made the fundamental chai breaks which I used as chances to make friends with the local monkeys, and we finally made it into town at about 8am. From there it was a short taxi hop out again and even further into the hills to a stunningly beatiful and secluded spot, the site of my home for the next week or so, the little ashram that was the light at the end of my tunnel. Thank the Lord, the unprecedented 20-hour journey did eventually come to an end, not without leaving its trace in the dirt and grime residue caked into my every pore.

India. Om.