Up Up and Away

A mere 20 hours after we left Delhi we arrived in Siliguri station. Siliguri is a small town in the arse end of nowhere. We were instantly the centre of attention. Beggars flocked around us. No one likes to give money to children, and the beggars as always readily accepted food. The disquieting thing is, there quickly comes a point where you have to say no. Anyone with a brain and a heart then has to give some thought to what generosity means. The one extreme, of giving all your material wealth to the miserably unfortunate people you meet, is hopelessly sentimental and impractical. It's too far to walk back to Delhi. The other extreme, of never giving anything, seems needlessly cruel. So somehow you have to draw a line, and it's always going to be in some sense arbitrary and hard to justify. And Indian poverty is limitless. The individual poverty of these people itself is profound -- how much would you have, and how, to give to ensure none of them were hungry in a year's time? More than that, for every poor person you see, there are hundreds of thousands you haven't. Is one's motivation to be genuinely benefit people, or just to avoid feelings of guilt?
I was in the middle of a long process of ignoring the crowd of shit-poor kids milling about when someone passed round a packet of biscuits. I wasn't hungry, and the people near me had already had a biscuit. What to do. I handed them out to the kids, and felt pretty strange about it.
Maybe quarter of an hour later, when all knew there was not likely to be any more handouts, and the begging had subsided to a dull murmur, Annika managed to break out some filthy little angels from their role. Like all the kids we saw, they loved seeing pictures of themselves on our digital cameras, and were once more, briefly, just children.
The more experienced of us bartered for three jeeps into which we stuffed 25 people and an awful lot of luggage. Below you can see Sievert determined to ride on the roof all the way to Kalimpong. "Ze Indians do it all ze time" he protested when I tried to dissuade him, which seems to me a most unconvincing reason to do anything. Eventually we stuffed him safely inside and set off.
Quickly we left the lowlands and started climbing. The road hugged steep eroding hills and wound through narrow valleys. See the truck in the picture below for scale.
There were frequent, low-tech roadworks.
There were monkeys.
And there were awesome road signs.
We arrived in Kalimpong safe and sound on Saturday afternoon.
Sorry for the late post. It's gone bananas here with extra lectures and revision. Ciao for now.

We're off to See the Wizard

Last Friday after class 25 of us set off for Kalimpong. We started off in luxury, taking five large taxis from the door of the Institute to Delhi Station. We were going to celebrate Losar, Tibetan New Year, with Karmapa and his monks, and the mood was buoyant. Here is a picture of the humble beginnings of our journey.
As you remember, when I first arrived in India even the street outside the Institute seemed a strange and threatening place. Gradually it has come to feel pretty much normal. Delhi Station was a step up -- crowded and chaotic. A gaggle of Westerners with an enormous amount of luggage, which we refused to let the kulis carry, was something to be stared at, and I felt a little nervous and uncomfortable.
We found the first class sleeper carriage and settled into our places on the train without major incident. This is the most comfortable way to travel on Indian trains. Each section has triple-decker bunks. Several times on different parts of the journey the Indians sullenly refused any offers to change seats so that friends could sit by each other. This happy chappy picture below soon thought better of it and moved, however. While it's never wise to generalise, Indian people with a bit of money (the journey of over 1000 miles one way, first class, cost less than 20 quid) seem possessed of a pride which it's more constructive to find amusingly irrelevant than annoyingly unbecoming.
You could use of the carriage that rare adjective: clean; it also boasted uncommunicative waiters who periodically brought food and tea. The sandwiches, biscuits, and later curry remarkably resembled 1980's British Railways fare, packaged and lifeless, and for that reason were judged safe to eat by everyone. Boiling water was rendered unto us in miniature Thermos flasks along with two teabags, two packets of sugar, and enough water for one cup of tea.
We all really enjoyed the journey, and whiled away the 20 hours here by playing cards, meditating..
.. or just hanging out.
I took a lot of pictures. Here are some tents-cum-houses on the outskirts of Delhi. This would be perhaps a medium-class slum.
Here is a typical house. Note the way the builders seem unfamiliar with the concept of finishing the upward progress of buildings with a roof, preferring simply to stop when they run out of inspiration or bricks.
In England, whole lines can be shut down if a cow wanders onto the tracks. Here is a whole bovine clan living it large in the spacious environs of the railway lines. Note in the foreground the neatly shaped and stacked dung cakes, of which more later.
I like this guy. The scene reminds me a bit of Constable's The Haywain.
And speaking of which, blow me down and call me a gypsy if this panorama of deepest India doesn't look just like dear old Blighty. Along with the cricket played everywhere from sunup to sundown by barefoot kids, it fair makes you homesick.
Often you get the sense that nothing has changed for some people in the last 2000 years.
The most popular activities in rural India, from my observation, are: standing around, walking along slowly with something on your head, squatting, and idly cycling. Frenetic it ain't.
Although sometimes a real traffic jam builds up at the level crossings.
Ok well that was a long one, to make up for my extended absinthe. We'll pick up the journey from Siliguri next time.

Things You Never Thought to Carry on a Bike #2

...92 cardboard boxes.
Back from the Himalayan foothills now. It will take a while to digest that experience. I'll post something this weekend.

Who Knows Who

Wow - got quite a handful of comments, which is great. Thanks.
So someone called You Know Who had a couple of questions. Actually I've no idea who you are, and I confused myself trying to figure it out ;-) but I'll try and answer anyway.

Will I be answering questions posted in the comments? That would be a cautious Yes.
Did I paint the picture of the fool in the post Pure Fool? Hmmm, this suggests you don't know me, otherwise you would surely be aware I have the artistic talent of a bag of dead hedgehogs. So, no. It's clipart, I'm ashamed to admit.

And another unknown reader called The Apprentice has a practice-related question about how to sit for long periods. So I asked a few people.. A common answer was that the period you can sit comfortably for is a function of practice. I've found this to be true. I used to be able to sit for 20 minutes in full lotus before my legs fell asleep; these days it is 40 minutes. Then I just sit cross legged. By alternating between right-leg-on-top-half lotus, left-leg-on-top and cross legged you can sit for much longer.
I'm sure there's some value in observing your mind when the body is in pain, but for me there comes a point where it is a real distraction. If you're doing mindfulness of breathing or something like that you can alternate sitting with mindful walking meditation.
Another very interesting answer was that bodily pain like leg pain is just a function of your negative emotions, and that as mental blockages and energy channels are cleared by meditation, bodily distractions also fall away.
Does that help at all?
If any readers, most of whom are much more experienced than I am, have any other suggestions, please post them.

The Apprentice also asks for a description of the daily routine here. I'd love to write this, when we get back from our trip to Kalimpong. We're going tomorrow. The train journey is something like 24 hours there and 30 hours back, which even Virgin Rail on a bad day would find hard to beat.
It will be Losar, Tibetan New Year, a very auspicious time, when Karmapa will be.. doing some stuff, not sure what, and giving an empowerment. It will, I'm sure, be an adventure. Kalimpong is in the mountains near Sikkim, so no email or blog for the next 6 days.
Take care y'all.

We support your war of terror

I love this poster, which we saw in the market today, for so many reasons. There's the typical charming can't-put-your-finger-on-it-but-it-sounds-odd Indian use of English, as in "Do not encroach road".
Then there's the fact that women and old people have separate phone helplines. At first it sounds very considerate, but the more you think about it, the more strange it becomes.
The request to verify the bonafides (sic) of your tenants and servants almost sneaks past awareness.. then you're like excuse me? my servants?
The telephone number for the anti-terrorism control room is blacked out with masking tape, presumably for security reasons.
And my favourite part is the graphic accompanying the warning not to touch suspicious packages. As if you would ever see a package that nice in India. As if a terrorist could afford or would bother to use wrapping paper and a bow! Everyday craziness..

Things You Never Thought To Carry on a Bike #1

The first in our series of things that it would not have occurred to you to carry on a bicycle before you came to India:
A ladder.

Precious Human Life

One of the topics that we've been studying in class is the Precious Human Life. Whatever it is that you consider gives meaning to life, whether it be art, science, exploring the mind, philosophy or whatever, it's pretty clear that you can only do it as a human being. And when you look around at how many different kinds of things there are living, the proportion of them that are human is infinitesimally small.
But simply being born with mostly-monkey DNA is not enough for your life to be Precious. You also need freedom and leisure to indulge your chosen method of exploration. If you spend your life, as most people do, working very in order to feed yourself and your family, you just don't have the chance to get interested in much else. If you die of malnutrition before you're five years old, or live in a war zone, or have your rights repressed, you can't even think about anything else. If you're rich and free enough, you still need knowledge -- that is, access to education, teachers, methods, and peers.
Even if all these conditions come together, it is also certain that their concurrence is temporary and will at some point cease. You will become busy, or poor, and sooner or (if you're lucky) later, die.
In the centuries-old texts that we study, this is presented in exhaustive detail as a kick up the arse to meditate and study as well as possible right now, today, while we have the chance. And living 'in India' brings an edge to this contemplation. I say 'in India', because I'm not really living in India. I'm living in a small Western-Tibetan enclave. I sleep in a clean bed and have a hot shower every morning. I wear a different, clean T-shirt every day. I drink bottled water and take malaria tablets. I never eat on the street, where even the ice cream gave my friends food poisoning. I spend energy and money to put as many sanitising and nullifying interfaces as possible between every aspect of my activity and my surroundings. But I can observe; I'm closer to this Third World life than I was in England, and about as close as I want to get. I can observe calmly and dispassionately, because I know in a few weeks I'll be going home.
So what's to observe? Well, I've only seen the very best face of Delhi. We live in one of the poshest areas, but even here outside our gates the taxi drivers sleep in a shelter by the side of the road, as traffic and street dogs pass by. Our trips into town are all by taxi through New Delhi. The poverty and dereliction that you can see here are, apparently, nothing compared to the slums of Old Delhi. So I know that the people I see are, comparatively, doing all right for themselves.
Here's a guy doing well. He's got a job as a labourer. But how many labourers in England would spend the day carrying stone slabs on their head for a pittance?
Here's an animal doing well. Cows have right of way on the streets, and they all look confident and well fed. Still, I'm glad I'm a human being.
This is a market street where a lot of Westerners shop, and stay in little hotels.
What the picture can't convey is the terrific noise from the diesel generators outside every shop, the fumes, the beggars, and the cheap shallow atmosphere. And this is one of the major places. To escape from the crowds, we took a parallel street, and that was like stepping into another world. Here nothing was recognisable -- I wasn't sure what people were doing, or what function the buildings served. Is that a house or a cafe? Is that place being knocked down or lived in? Is that someone's bedroom just facing onto the street with no wall? Just what expression is that on these people's faces?
Like most of the scenes that really affected me, I have no photos. To objectify these peoples' lives in that way seems really rude, especially since the price of my camera would feed a family for a year.
Close by the market is the bus station - never a particularly nice place in any major city. Here's a from-the-hip shot of a guy not doing so well -- lying in the road in the middle of the afternoon with a half eaten meal next to him. Or vomit, it was difficult to tell.
As you often ask yourself here, is he dead or asleep? I think he's asleep.
I'm not complaining, or trying to impress anyone with exotic tales of deprivation. This is just how it is. Billions of people are deprived. And so I really appreciate how precious my life is. That I'm one of the very, very, very few fortunate enough to have all of the myriad conditions to be able to pursue my interest, which is to try to understand how the universe and the mind works.
And so, to meditate, and to bed. Goodnight.

Get off your arse and sit!

In the centre of KIBI, physically, and for want of a better word, spiritually, is the meditation hall. In Tibetan this is called ‘gompa’ (or ‘lhakang’, depending where you come from), which is much less of a mouthful.

This is what it looks like from outside..

Inside the space is impressively large.

Right at the far wall, facing you as you come in, is a large golden buddha statue, surrounded by what is probably an auspicious number, but which to me is just 'a lot', of little Buddha statues in little cases.

The gompa is both a hall for public events and a space for personal practice. The students have a communal meditation every day at 8pm, and you can come in pretty much any time and meditate on your own. Especially first thing in the morning and at weekends there are quite a few Western students (more committed or less studious than your intrepid reporter) doing their own practice.

Every day in class we can hear the unearthly sounds of trumpets and percussion instruments as a group of monks perform noisy rituals. Apart from this, which occurs a few times a day, I've never seen a monk sitting in the gompa meditating. They must sit in their rooms or somewhere else I don't know about.
Although the gompa is for the serious business of meditating, Buddhists, especially Kagyus, are not overly solemn, and around 8.45pm the gompa echoes with post-meditative conversation, laughter, the occasional playfight, and amateur attempts at playing the Big Green Drum.


Writing a blog can feel a little like shouting into the void. Thanks to those friends who've posted comments - someone is reading after all!

Dodging traffic

It's difficult to fully convey the living nightmare that is Delhi traffic in words. I've taken a few videos on my phone, but in my infinite cunning forgot the cable to transfer them to the laptop, so you'll just have to wait for that. In the meantime, let me take you on a typical journey. Starting at the battered wooden shed outside the Institute that houses the 'reliable taxi company', you can hire a car and driver for eight hours for a mere Rs550 (about six quid). If you're feeling brave, or don't have so far to go, you can just hail one of the auto-rickshaws that are forever buzzing up and down the streets, and negotiate a price.
Auto-rickshaws are small, nimble, traffic-dodging machines, which carry either passengers or freight.
And then you're off! Out onto the open road. My first journey in an auto-rickshaw scared me so thoroughly I realised after a while I was compulsively chanting mantras just to keep my teeth from chattering. When I got out I felt physically ill. Indians drive as only a people who unconsciously and thoroughly believe in reincarnation possibly could.
Yes, let's talk about the Delhi Highway Code.
1. Drive on the left and overtake on the right. Or vice versa. It's all good.
2. When turning right onto a main road, stop and check for traffic coming from the left. Wait, and then pull out just in front of them. They love that.
3. Drive fast. Get to the next traffic jam as quickly as possible.
4. Always give way to traffic which is bigger, more expensive, or more damaged than you.
5. Lane markings on the road, where they exist, are there for a reason -- to be completely ignored. Do your civic duty and maximise use of the available space on the road by wedging your vehicle anywhere it will fit.
6. Why put yourself at a disadvantage by indicating where you intend to go? Keep other drivers guessing and they will respect you more.

The auto-rickshaws are also open-air, so you get a good healthy dose of the Delhi 'air'. Here, having a cold is a blessing, because at least it dulls your sense of smell. A day taxiing around Delhi makes your lungs hurt. In this atmosphere, I don't know what to make of the large, overcrowded buses with the "Propelled by Clean Fuel" signs.
Many people told me before I left that India is "concept-breaking". I'm not so sure about this. If you think that, for example, tap water is always drinkable, then sure, that concept will be destroyed pretty quickly. But it's just replaced by the concept of tap water as either drinkable (in England, e.g.,) or not (in many other countries). Maybe 'assumption-breaking' is a better term. You've just as many concepts in your mind after a while in India; more and stronger if anything. I never had any ideas one way or the other before, but having seen it on the streets, I'm now convinced that transporting your wife and baby on the back of a motorbike is not a good idea. The fact that the driver was wearing a helmet seemed to hover between pointless and selfish, in the circumstances.
You can't leave a description of this vehicular assault on the senses without mentioning the constant racket of horns. Any space that cars, scooters, or auto-rickshaws go through reverberates with hooting, tootling, and honking. Quickly you realise that the entire meaning of blowing one's horn is completely different. It's not usually about berating someone who has infringed on your space (hah!) or broken the rules of the road (see above), but rather it usually means "I'm here!". "I'm overtaking you; please don't swerve wildly", "I'm here; stop driving towards me", or just "I'm driving! Isn't it great to (still) be alive?"
Overall, I think I'd rather take my chances in an unlicensed London minicab driven by a red-eyed Afhgan refugee. Again. Now there's something to look forward to.

Inhabitants

Even if it wasn't set against the backdrop of noisy, chaotic New Delhi, KIBI would still be a peaceful oasis. Three different kinds of people are sheltered here. Although it sounds strange to me to say 'kinds of people' instead of 'groups of people', that is how it feels. Maybe it's the shadow of the caste system... maybe it's my imagination.

The top stratum, then, in the sense that we get the best treatment, is the Westerners. It's difficult not to feel extraordinarily privileged in India, because even the poorest of us still have opportunities denied to most Indians. In KIBI we are guests, and really have it very easy -- we have our own rooms, three meals cooked for us every day, now we even have wireless Internet pretty much everywhere! Although to study everything thoroughly takes all the hours in the day, essentially we do more or less as we like -- nobody follows after us or tells us what to do. We can also feel special because this place was in a sense created for us -- for Westerners to study authentic Buddhist teaching.

The picture below is a typical scene of students hanging out.

At the bottom are the staff, mostly Indians. Here there are further divisions, where the cooks carry themselves proudly (and deservedly, given their excellent work), while the cleaners really lack any charwoman’s cheek, instead carrying with them a profound, silent resignation.

KIBI is also a monastery, and a number of monks live here. It was quite funny in class yesterday when Khenpo (our teacher) was, it seemed, just about to elaborate the traditional hierarchy of ordained monks being in a sense above or more worthy of respect than lay practitioners (his audience) due to their additional vows, but changed his mind.

I naturally feel like giving way a bit to the monks, so it was quite embarrassing when three of them stood back to let me go first in the lunch line. I politely indicated that they should go first. They responded by waving me ahead. I thought this was manifestly unfair and refused to queue jump. All three of them smiled and simply walked slowly backwards, creating a large gap which I reluctantly had to fill. Monks one, me nil.

Generally the monks are a bit shy to speak English, and I can't yet say anything above hello in Tibetan, but I did enjoy it when one friendly young fellow asked me for a laser. Surprised, I try to confirm this technologically implausible request. "A laser?" I ask, miming someone shooting a ray gun, Han Solo-style. “Pzap!”. Confusion. I try again. "Are you sure you want a laser?". "Yes, yes -- a laser. Do you have?" Eventually I was able to intercede as he was demanding advanced weaponry from another Westerner, and secure an eraser for him. One all.

One arena where the gloves are most definitely off between the ordained faculty and the laity is the table tennis table. This battered, rusty-nailed contraption occupies pride of place in the basement. A good brisk game of table tennis is just the thing for vivifying the humours when one has been sitting for hours. The monks play with varying levels of skill, but an evident fearlessness. They are forever smashing the ball into the net or into space while trying outrageous moves, which sometimes come off. Here you can see my arms dealer Lakwa Dorje giving it some.

KIBI Rules

Okay, so it's time for something a little less self-absorbed. Let me introduce you to the surroundings, and explain a little about why KIBI rules.
The building is basically a monastery in the old Tibetan style. It belongs to the Karmapa. For my non-Buddhist friends, suffice it to say that the Karmapa (now in his 17th incarnation, Thaye Dorje) is a most special and important teacher. He's not just a figurehead but holds in his mind all the teachings, secrets, and meditative achievements that power and support all the students of our Karma Kagyu lineage. The main reason I've come all this way is to meet him. You know, say hi, chill, maybe play some table tennis together.. Actually I've no idea what that will be like.
Back to the story. KIBI was founded 20-something years ago (you can tell I've been studying) by the 16th Karmapa specifically as a place where Western students could study Buddhism.

The location itself, as chaotic and dirty as it seems to me, is actually the prestigious government-controlled institutional area of Delhi, full of research hospitals and academic institutes. It's impossible to get space in. Nevertheless, the 16th Karmapa secured a large plot, on which now stands the central building, five storeys high, surrounded on three sides by the accommodation for students, staff, and monks.
The picture below was taken from the roof of the left-hand accommodation block. It's made up of eight photos stitched together. It's my first attempt at a panorama, and I hope to put some more up soon.

From right to left, you can see the entrance from the road, the gatekeeper's house, the inner gate, the courtyard, and the main building. My room is in the block at the back.
On the ground floor (behind the columns) is the gompa, or meditation hall. On the first-floor is a cafe, the student lounge, the computer room, and classrooms. The second-floor houses the library, in which I could quite happily spend the next 10 years growing pale and squishy with knowledge, and another classroom. There is a lot of empty space at the moment. The two upper floors are locked.

At least part of this space is the Karmapa's private quarters. He is in Kalimpong at the moment, but should be coming back in March to do some teaching.
The building itself is impressive in design, and has lots of architectural details.

However, it looks older than its years -- the Indian sun and monsoons really take their toll on paintwork and brick.

So much for the place. If I have time tomorrow, I'll introduce you to the inhabitants.

Get Yourself Connected

Emaho! I can now use my laptop again. One reason that it's so easy to stay in the Institute is that there is a little Indian man called Mr Chanda who calls round twice a day taking orders for stuff. He brings round staples like toilet paper and bottled water, but he can also source some more exotic things. Yesterday he brought round a voltage stabiliser, an impressive beast pictured below.

Every single piece of Indian electrical equipment I've encountered (with the exception, I'm hoping, of the stabiliser) is scarily substandard; from the power supply unit with its own internal lightning show to the plugs which only intermittently actually make electrical contact. The lights regularly go brighter or dimmer as the voltage from the mains fluctuates at random. So the stabiliser is an essential piece of equipment if you want to plug anything delicate like a computer into the Indian electrical system.
With this, and the temporary loan of an English-to-Indian plug converter (I didn't bother bringing one since I assumed that a former British colony would be bally sure to have some lying around, what), I can finally recharge my electrical equipment and transfer my photos!

For which stay tuned..

Pure fool

Ok sorry for the long time no post. In my infinite cunningness I omitted to pack a few essential items, such as a sleeping bag, blanket, coat, hat, and scarf. It's pretty cold at night here in mid-January. It's quite cold indoors even during the day. In fact unless you're basking in the midday sun outside, you'd better wrap up warm. Trying to rough it, 'iron yogi' style may have contributed to a minor collapse in health yesterday. In hindsight, the two weeks prior to coming over were so full of activity and devoid of sleep that it could have been expected.
The night before I also had a dream that I was pulling a long, dirty string from my stomach. "Purification!" exclaim my fellow students as I relate this. Yeah, maybe, I reluctantly admit. There is, they say, a strong effect exerted by imminent meetings with highly realised spiritual teachers, sacred places or simply studying dharma or meditating intensively, that causes people to get sick much more often than usual. This is said to be a purification of old, bad karma.
The reaction of the other students was touching and bemusing in equal measure. Everyone was concerned on seeing my pale face, and most people's reaction was "Oh! Do you want some medecine?". Well, I don't really know what's wrong with me, I would explain, so we don't really know what medecine would be appropriate. This reasoning in no way lessened anyone's desire to medicate me. I decided to eat less and sleep instead. Today I feel somewhat better, and was able to attend classes.
We have been discussing impermanence, and this precious human life and how fragile it is, which is very relevant. We also did phowa yesterday for a couple of relatives of students here who very recently died. This awareness of the fragility of life is with me every day now. I think it's healthy, as it gives you a bit of perspective and can encourage you to think about what is really important.
On the other hand, I really have to work on my paranoia. The cumulative effect of all the advice about India, how you can't drink the water or eat in most places, the impressive list of diseases that are rife here, the fact that everything is dirty, even the air, the frequency of people getting sick here, and the sheer in-your-face poverty of the place means I'm reluctant to even step out of the gate of the Institute. Tomorrow I hope to break my self-imposed isolation and go Outside.
Unfortunately, I also forgot to pack a plug converter, so I can't recharge any of my electrical equipment. I have taken some more photos, but I can't show you them yet..
Instead, here is an artist's impression of me in my cunningness so far:


Stay tuned and maybe it'll get interesting soon.