Shivarathri with Mauni Baba

Shivarathri on the ghats, sans phone, no connectivity with the exteriors. Seeing, living, breathing Benaras. Loading up my memory with blank blue spaces with orange highlights, that meeting with V. Prakash, the Tamil mainstream film industry's fairest son, he also spoke of rounding, likes alcohol, then those hours spent filming Mauni Baba, silent baba who hasn't spoken to anyone in fifteen years, watching him as he makes everyone bend and hit them on their back with love, that superior power of the Naga baba's, talking of which I finally witnessed one baba balancing on a stick that went through another baba's lingum, full power, 30-sec monumental act of super strength, Siddhi, of times spent with Bhootnath in Kshameshwar ghat talking about Siddhi and Yoga, of those moments in Balu's shop, cigarette in hand, looking at Telugu pilgrims fighting their way to Kedareshwar temple, then again at night visited Mauni baba, V. Prakash giving him a leg massage, lots of laughs, fascinating character, of mind and body, only in the now, lives in a cave, son of the Earth, one silver eye, this is the time of Benaras, when the passing world will see only the mirages and illusions, they will see the white light enter the soul and create a sunfull horizon, acting upon the current time, Benaras Standard Time. Hallelujah!

Alaga 3

Circulars sent out to aircrafts hovering over the Ganga, the space of time sandwiched in the crescent moons silver happy-lining, blasted out onto the sun's peripheral rays, effervescent in thought the thoughtless ones come out into the open, in tents, in orange, their rasta hearts singing untame tunes of the past and the future, the present only a carrier of time now. Time, being now, transported out of time, shuttling around the Earth like pyramids in sector Autumn 8, their relentlessness spearheading a whole new revolution of men wrapped in cotton, their mouths foaming silken threads and monumental earthquakes, hot springs gushing out of their sahasrara, their untamed hearts now waking in the bathroom light and staring into the reflection of Jesus Christ in the water, that piece of the river that flows north suddenly, that section of light passing through the trajectories of so many wanderers, their hearts seeing lies in the blood-red circus, this Maya, this illusion we call reality, this momentary lapse, this seasons best kept secrets residing in wooden boats all coloured blue to represent the omnipresent character of water, of it being there everywhere, looking, feeling, touching all life, making them present, here and now, how did we learn to float, yet we drown, it comes with such force, it asks not how to continue, it only thinks in circles, like those timeless circulars sent out to aircrafts hovering over the Ganga. 

The Wait

Waiting to go someplace else, waiting, grounded on algorithms and algebra, waiting in lines, waiting for time to make pretty faces, waiting for the fire to burn off our faces, waiting for the sun to rise again, and set, then we wait for night, then we wait for sleep. When will this wait be over? When will we supersede the human form and become pure consciousness? 

One evening with Neha and her family

Neha

Nidhi

I spent the evening with Neha's family in Seergao, a village close to Benaras. People were celebrating the birthday of Sant Ravidas, one of the important saints of Benaras. It was a wonderful evening. At home they fed me Aloo Paratha and Tomato chutney. In their simple home, I saw simple joys. Simple ways of looking at things, simple questions. Simple people going on about their simple lives. Very refreshing!

Be inconsistent,
Shake the norms,
Challenge conventional thinking,
Break rules,
Think harder, think lesser.

Shiva's Chivas

Idea for a film.
Man decides to get drunk and commit suicide in Benaras, Shiva City. Buys a bottle of Chivas. After he downs a few rounds, he walks the gulleys and ghats and ends up having many encounters with strangers. He loses all his money, gets on a boat, meets a pretty Japanese photographer, has dinner on a roof-top restaurant. Every now and then he tends to his hipflask. Life seems worth living again. Next day he quits smoking and drinking and begins learning tai-chi from a French Dhrupad singer. 

Two chai's with Raju

Raju, chai-shop owner, sitting next to me. We are talking about madness. He says "Sab log pagal hai" (everyone is mad), "kuch log paise ke peeche pagal hai, kuch log pyaar ke peeche pagal hai" (some are mad after money, some over love). He says the one who calls another mad is mad himself first. In Benaras madness is everywhere. Its also called Kashi. The land of Kashi and Shiva. The place where dialectics plays trumpets in every street corner, in every cul-de-sac, in every set of eyes. There is madness in the flames burning bodies, madness in the things that make up the surrounding, the light of the sun is mad with glory, the tree is mad about the sky, that's why it looks upwards, treefingers open to receiving the sunlight and transmitting them to us mad people walking the earth. We see the birds fly, mad about the wind, mad about aviation with that certain look in their eyes. Isn't life itself mad? To think how we have two hands, two legs, two nostrils, two ears and the primordial two eyes. Dialectics again. Polar opposites. Like the eight of infinity. Going up the curve, then going down again.

The Ego has landed (020213)

Welcomed with street celebrations, trumpets and trombones, the musicians in red, Iranian vibrations from Israeli man with a Saz, Raju and his pearl-like eyes, the way he laughs, Tommy's wagging tail, jumping claws on thighs, rub on the stomach, colour of the sky at night (first time at night), fireworks in the sky while I sip chai with Raju on Shiva-Ganga swing, the water from the tap, Vishwanath and his nonchalance, the look in his eyes as I stare at his green hoody, timelessness and endlessness, uncertainty and impermanence. This is Benaras city. Welcoming you since 2000 BC, seat number 11, room number 11, eleven eleven, twenty-three hundred hours and eleven minutes on the clock. 

Of Benaras, the Zen City, I am a City-Zen. 

The Return

I am returning soon,
to the sounds, the images of people by the river.
With my guitar I'll croon,
to the lights, the shadows of Ganga, the giver... 

O’ Benares, what have you done? I find myself helplessly trapped in your story, lost in your streets and consumed by your fires.

It was a special evening. Sunset-time. Madeline Peyroux playing through my Bose, Tommy hanging around, kites in the sky, that deep blue something ready to happen. I wish I could freeze that moment. Si looked so peaceful as she stared at the sun, that perfect circle in the sky, that primordial shape in my eye.

Aghora Shiva Heart

Benaras to Dubai...

Oldest to newest,
Sense to Nonsense,
Timelessness to Time,
Chaos to Organisation,
Happiness to Unhappiness,
Gridlessness to Grids,
Systemless to Matrixes,
Circles to Angles,
Toe to toe to back to back,
Rivers to deserts,
Monkeys to Camels,
There to here...

And guess what
"I see three faces in the mirror."

I miss

I miss my Kashi. I miss the times on the terrace, two chai's, cigarettes, Tommy, birds, monkeys. I miss the peace in the oasis of the Shiva-Ganga lodge. I will return soon and hug the trees, pet the dogs, the calves and the cows, walk the gulleys and the ghats and find everlasting peace in a boat on the Ganges...