Usha and Mary on balcony of Aradhana

Obviously, we have to obtain Maggie’s approval for me to stay here with Usha. I am glad I have rested, for my command appointment is the very evening of my arrival. Off I go at the specified hour to tap at a little turquoise-blue door in one of the tall white walls, which is in a block owned by the Ashram. Maggie, cool and petite, answers the door in person, since her servants have already gone for the day. As I step up to the open door, I take a quick moment to take in the place. You can hardly tell where the garden ends and the house begins.

Without any social niceties, Maggie invites me, “Come on in. Let’s sit and meditate.”

I am a little surprised, but this is India—anything goes. When Maggie hands me a thin cotton pad to sit on the polished cement floor, I realize she is more Indianized than indicated by her spacious home, big bathtub and bevy of computers. I have been practicing sitting cross-legged to prepare myself for this trip because I know Indians sit on the floor a lot. Nevertheless, I practiced with a thick cushion. Here I am given a pad, not even one-quarter of an inch thick, exactly like Maggie’s. With quiet sanctity, we seat ourselves on our little woven squares and close our eyes. We must have sat for some thirty minutes—long enough for both of my feet to fall asleep and my ankles to turn red under the stress of the hard floor. Sweetly and softly, Maggie’s voice ends the session and I rearrange my legs, hoping they will rouse themselves before I have to stand.

As it turns out Maggie had an inspiration during the meditation. She has a draft of an old manuscript that she had written some years ago and had put away in a cabinet. By happenstance, she came across it just the other day. When she spotted it, she wondered if it were a sign that it was time to get it polished for publication. Since I am adept at word processing, she flashed during the meditation that I might be able to help her by typing the manuscript on to computer disk. I tell her that I will be happy to spend a couple of hours a day typing her manuscript. So I guess means I am welcome to stay at Aradhana.


In the morning, Usha and I awaken early to go for a walk by the sea. Although it’s only 5:30 a.m., we find many residents lined up on the sea wall to view the sunrise. As we watch, Lord Surya spreads his rays out over the sea turning it into a shimmering, sparkling golden cape for himself. After only five minutes, the show is over and the round disk of light beams bright and hot, so we head for the shady streets.

Large trees, planted in hidden gardens behind high white walls, line the streets. My favorites are the big jasmine trees that dangle bell-shape white flowers over the sidewalks. We detect their sweet fragrance long before we can see them. Daily we pass several huge pipal trees that I come to know and love. As I stand and admire their huge branches canopying the street, I often muse: How many birds and insects have these trees housed through the years? One little creature after another has completed its life-cycle meandering up and down and around this maze of branches; this was the only world they ever knew.

Within a few days I settle into a regular schedule. Usha leaves for Maggie’s early, so, after our morning walk, I settle in to writing and editing for a Bombay magazine. Then in the afternoon, I work a couple of hours on Maggie’s manuscript. In the early evening, I take advantage of being so near Aurobindo’s ashram and go over a group meditation. By the time I return, Usha is back home. She dominates in the preparation of dinner because she is such a wonderful cook. I am content to help with the chopping of vegetables and the stirring, following her instructions.

After eating, we again walk to the sea to stroll along the wall. It is a favored pastime here. The many cement benches that line sidewalk are filled with people who prefer watching the strollers instead of the waves. It seems that people-watching is more fascinating than beholding the waves—but not to us. Usha knows one grassy spot where we can sit and watch the waves roll and tumble, roll and tumble, endlessly. The waves present such a contradictory combination of peaceful and powerful crests. Little wonder they are said to represent our emotional life. Slowly, the moon creeps up over the sea. The ocean delights as it surges to scatter the moon beams; they seem to know they are sisters. The world is incredibly wonderful. I am so grateful to have time for such moments to be enfolded in its beauty.

In contrast, from our verandah, we witness the swirl of activity caused by the presence of our little neighbor, Ganesha, the deity of the temple. Daily women arrive in their colorful silk saris with gold borders, escorted by men in white cotton, dressed in their Indian compromise: a white European-style dress shirt with an Indian dhoti wrapped around their waists. Keshava, a real live elephant, ambles down the street collecting coins with his trunk. After he takes a coin in his snout, he reaches overhead to give it to his mahout, who rides on his back. Then he gives a blessing by touching his trunk on the top of the donor’s head.

Keshava definitely gives me an opportunity to confront my primeval “he’s bigger than me” fear. I love the way he scoops up the coin out of my hand, but the tap on the head afterwards throws me into paroxysms of anxiety. Every time, I have to challenge and chide myself to go through it. Actually, my fear is not totally unfounded. Although temple elephants everywhere greet thousands of worshippers every day without any incident, an occasional accident does occur. Recently, a famous movie star was walloped on the head by a temple elephant, one whom he considered his special pet. A week later, the actor died from the injury.

Since we are in the middle of the Tamil festival season, a solid gold chariot takes the deity out for an evening stroll through the neighborhood at least once a week. Here, as in most processions, the main idols stay at home, but stand-ins are temporarily vested with their powers. Everyone lines the road to take a blessing, while many walk along side the golden chariot. A young priest informed me that it was made in England by the Queen’s craftsman some fifty years ago. From our balcony, we have a great view of the coming out of the deity to start the procession. However, the downside is the deity has a late curfew, and returns home long after we have gone to bed. Without our supervision, the tall chariot often tears down our telephone wires, even though one attendant carries a long pole with a hook to lift any sagging lines up out of the way.

Procession of Deity by temple stalls

Although small, and not particularly ornate, this temple is quite famous among the Tamilians, so it is included in all the pilgrimage tours. In addition, all the latest model cars, buses, tractors, and lorries pass the portals of the temple. Actually, the temple was specially built to accommodate them. They can drive right up and park in front of the wide entrance, so that the priest can run out to wave some flaming, smoking camphor over the hood to bless the vehicle. The trucks, buses and cars come from all over Tamil Nadu, since many drivers will not transport their first cargo or passengers until they have come to this temple to receive Ganesha’s blessing. Parrots, crows, mynas, cows, goats, hawkers, beggars and lepers complete the colorful, noisy, rushing crowd. It seems as if the whole world exists right at our door step—and maybe it does.

Early one morning, when I open the door for our daily walk, I discover a beggar sleeping on the walkway, using the one step as a pillow. Upon hearing the door, he starts, takes one look at me, and bolts like he has seen a ghost. He leaves behind his worldly possession: one tin can with a couple of short dirty strings and a rubber band. I leave the can there, but he never reappears to retrieve it.

Another day, a young boy shows up on our doorstep. Although Usha attempts to talk to him in several languages, he does not utter a word. Judging from his small size, we think that he must be from the South. Even Usha cannot guess his age since many Tamils can pass for eight even when they are fifteen years of age. Our outcaste sweeper, who lives on the street corner diagonal from us, signals that she has food to give him. When he falls asleep before dark on our little patch of yard, Usha goes out and puts an old woolen shawl over him. The next morning, all we find is the crumpled shawl lying on the curb. We never see him again either.


Fortunately, Maggie is not an early starter, so Usha continues to have time for our morning walks. Once while we are walking down our street, I comment, “It’s so strange. Have you noticed all these squashed nimbus [a type of small lime] in the street?”

“Oh, Nancy. Haven’t you seen them run over the nimbus with their vehicles?”

“The cars and trucks run over the nimbus? I hadn’t noticed that at all.”

“Yes, that is the sacrifice. You know that these trucks and buses are dangerous to humans—
especially with Indian drivers. So instead of having an accident and extracting the juice out of some poor fellow, it takes the juice out of the nimbu. When the priest burns the camphor he also gives the blessed nimbus for the vehicle to squash. So its thirst for blood is satisfied.”

“Whatever works, we say.... but does it work?” I interject.

“They believe it does, so that probably helps.”

“Not if they drive like idiots, as I have personally witnessed.”

“You have a point, but, relatively, there are few accidents in India.”

“It’s true. In all my travels, I have never seen one.”

By the time we return home from our morning walks, the whole area has become a turmoil of pilgrims, hawkers, beggars, lepers, lorries, buses, cows, and honking horns; all vying for their place—although no one is going anywhere in these narrow streets. This tamaasha (melee, but Indian-style) lasts without pause all day long. However, peace returns quickly after the temple closes at 10:00 p.m. when the big overhead lights are turned off. Since they open again at 4:00 a.m., the street people immediately settle down beneath their rags. It is our favorite time to sit out on the verandah soaking up the cool breeze that sweeps up from the sea every evening. We seldom talk; we are content to stare at the stars and soak up the silence.

But sometimes the cool dark quiet does not last. I have witnessed several scenes of the Indian drama from that verandah after midnight. One night the police arrived with night sticks and roused all the beggars and sent them packing. Uniformed officers crashed and broke all their clay cooking pots and tossed all their other belongings into a pile in the middle of the road. Hidden in the dark shadows of the verandah, I watch as everything goes up in flames.

The next morning, the beggars are all back in their places, business as usual; just as if nothing had happened. Except for our sweeper, she is in such a tizzy over the broken pot—her only cooking vessel—that Usha gives her an old aluminum pan to replace it. The sweeper is delighted to have this unbreakable and unburnable pan, so she sets to work sweeping the porch and walkway with a big smile, toothless and red, stained from the paan she eats. She is an hour later than usual because of the tragedy, for she usually has the small porch sparkling clean each morning before we get up.

Usha surmises that she was not born an outcaste, but was rendered one by her handicap; she is a deaf mute. Because of her handicap, an arranged marriage would have been impossible. We assume that years ago she joined the street people and married a leper. They have one daughter—delivered on the street—who has fared better than her parents. She is married, lives in a small mud hut in a nearby town, and has a darling little boy. He comes to spend a week on the sidewalk with his grandparents a couple of times a year.

When he is here, the sweeper rushes forward with the boy to get my blessing whenever I pass. I have a lot of difficulty with this Indian custom, so I divert their attention by carrying a packet of English biscuits or a piece of candy to give him. Then I pat him on the head, which passes off as a blessing. Because of him, I begin to carry candy to hand out to all the little angel-faced urchins I meet. Once a year, our sweeper and her leper husband go to visit their daughter. They are gone only a few days, for they have the best corner at the temple and do not want to forfeit their claim. I am told that if a new beggar shows up, he is often run off by the resident beggars because they do not want to share their holdings.

A regular disturbance in the night is the pounding made by the little orange-frocked sadhu [hermit] smashing nuts for her paan. She is our only temple sadhu, a term applied to the various renunciates who wander about, living off the offerings of others. A tiny gray-haired woman, she always dresses in orange, although no one really thinks that she has taken the vows of a sannyasi, or renunciate, which would qualify her to wear the orange cloth. It’s possible that she donned this color of the swamis in order to get bigger donations; it has been done before. She is quite agile and always picks her prey carefully. She heads straight for the most affluent-looking devotee. If the offering proffered is not up to her expectation, does she tell him off: long and loud. I cannot understand her Tamilian tirades, but her tone of voice tells plenty.

Many Indians, including our sweeper, are addicted to paan: a combination of betel leaves, areca nuts (supari), calcium paste, tobacco, and various other condiments according to individual taste. The chewing of this paan, believed to assist digestion, has long been a tradition, for there exist many beautiful antique silver boxes to hold the various condiments. Even a poor villager will carry a metal box with little tins filled with the various fixings. The betel leaves are fresh and can be purchased at any tobacco stand. The betel leaf is spread with white calcium paste and sprinkled with the areca nut pieces. This combination makes the awful red color that you see on teeth and lips and in the streets—also in the elevators in Bombay.

Areca nuts are so hard that they have to be shaved with a knife or broken into pieces with a nut cracker, again many artistic ones exist. However, our sadhu uses the country method—pound them to death. Every week or so, she has a supari attack in the middle of the night. Crash, crash, crash, beats her hammer. When I just cannot take it another minute, I crawl out of bed, take my flashlight and shine it down right in her face. She takes the hint and stops.

If a bus load of pilgrims arrive in the middle of the night, our street is the best place to park to wait to be first in line when the temple opens at 4:00 a.m. They blast bhajans (spiritual songs) on their boom boxes, pee in the gutter, and make all sorts of racket. They never quiet down until the moment I think: it’s so late, I may as well get up. Even if there are no pilgrims, one of the vendors at the temple stalls always shows up before 4:00 a.m. to get ready to sell the camphor, fresh nimbus, incense and flowers for worship. First thing, he turns up the volume on his cassette player to the highest blasting capacity. I keep threatening to run out in my night gown and teach him some English—you know, the dirty words—but at 4:00 a.m. who has the energy?

While I am taking in the parade of nightly local color, Usha is sleeping soundly. She has given up on fresh air and has closed all the shutters to her room and turned the ceiling fan up to high to drown out the noise. All Indian houses have lots of open windows, but they are equipped with solid wooden shutters to keep out the monsoon rains and the summer heat—and noise—along with iron bars to deter the beggars, robbers and especially monkeys. I eventually get so tired from sleepless nights that I have to barricade myself inside and turn on the fan too.


By coincidence, the subject for my first editing assignment for the Bombay magazine is Ganesha. Since he is our neighbor, I feel like I can get into the spirit of it. The Hindus are not really idol worshipers; their idols are symbols for a higher reality. There are many gods who represent the various aspects of the Infinite, but none is dearer to the heart of the Hindu, even the educated ones, than Ganesha. In each and every temple, both in north and south India, no matter the principal temple deity, Ganesha is worshipped first. It may be a little embarrassing to the modern-day university students that one of their gods is an elephant, actually, elephant-headed, for he does have a human body. Nevertheless, even in Bombay, students line up the day before exams to break a coconut before Ganesha. It’s insurance for a good grade.

Why an elephant-faced god? Couldn’t the ancient sages have foreseen that the day was coming that would produce a specimen of man whose scientific knowledge and evolutionary theories would not countenance that an animal—in whatever form—could wield power over the concerns of human beings? To comprehend it, one has to understand the Hindu theory of energy fields in the human body. The energy flow that connects these chakras, “wheels” of energy, is called the kundalini, or serpent power. The source of the energy is the first chakra in the lower pelvic region. Those who are able to see subtle energies perceive a red lotus flower with two petals and a white elephant in this lowest—but fundamental—energy center. So one could say that the elephant represents the prime mover in the individual.

There are many stories of the adventures of Ganesha in the various Puranas (epics). A favorite one tells of Ganesha and his brother Subramanya reaching the age of puberty. They are both steamed up to get married, but their parents present them with a challenge. The first son to circle the world will be the first to be wed. The elder Subramanya takes off in a cloud of dust, while Ganesha seems to dally for a moment. Then he calmly and reverently pays homage to his parents, none other than the illustrious deities, Lord Shiva and Goddess Parvati, by doing pradakshina, “circling” them three times. Then he meanders over to lie down under a tree for a nap. The courtiers of the royal family, even the royal couple themselves, are perplexed at this strange behavior. How can Ganesha hope to catch up with Subramanya, who, flying high on his divine swan, must be already half-way around the world? Nevertheless, Ganesha appears totally unconcerned about all the murmurs and laments.

Finally, after some time, his brother comes winging in and declares his victory. “I have arrived first,” he shouts, not seeing Ganesha, still lounging in the shade of a tree.

“No, I am already here. I was first,” pipes up Ganesha.

“That’s impossible, you could not have beaten me,” declares Subramanya; for, instead of a beautiful swan, Ganesha only has a small mouse to carry him around the world.

Then Subramanya finds out that Ganesha has never left the premises. He rants and raves, and calls for justice.

“No, no. You are mistaken,” Ganesha proclaims. “Mom! Dad! Come over here and help us settle this dispute.”

Fortunately, Lord Shiva had not been called out of station to do his tandava dance, which destroys the wicked, so he is available to arbitrate the dispute between his two sons.

“Now exactly what is the trouble?” he patiently inquires.

“Subramanya is accusing me of duplicity. He says I did not circle the world to win the race. In fact I did circle it—three times.”

“But, son, you have been lying here under a tree. How can you contend that you won the race?”

“But, father, don’t you recall? This very morning I worshipped you and mother with pradakshina three times.”

“Well... Yes... You did. But what does that have to do with the race?”

“The goal of the race was to circle the world. Correct?”

“Yes, that is correct.”

“You and mother are in essence the world, even the universe. Correct?”

“Yes...”

“So when I circled the both of you, I circled the entire universe. And I did it three times.”

His divine father had to admit that his younger son had indeed circled the world three times and had won the race. It was not a matter of duplicity, but of cleverness.

In addition to this astuteness, aided by his brawny forehead and brain, Ganesha has become favored for his sheer strength. His ability to remove obstacles, either to material plans or spiritual goals, has put Ganesha in the place of honor by today’s worshippers. Although I feel no personal connection, it is somehow a solace to know that the little solid silver Ganesha is practically at our feet—since we live on the second floor. I love to pass through the temple gates and get a glimpse of his form, shining above the crowd of worshippers who form a constant kaleidoscope of movement and color. Many times I feel that my cells are alive and singing in this strange milieu, as if I am part of a swirling, whirling colorful mandala. I feel so wonderfully comfortable with the flow of my life here in Pondicherry that I have not minded staying longer than I planned.