India

It may be that I'm having another one of my pseudo existential crises. Doesn't happen to me often...but it surely does when I go to India. We’ve just recently spent a week vacationing in southern India, more specifically in Chennai, where our good friends Kathryn and Cherno from our Gambian days now live. I guess we could call it 'vacationing', although I would tend to think that people don’t usually go to India for a vacation. There is just too much going on there for one to be able to ‘vacate’ the mind so as to be free of duty and activity. And yet, for me, the two times that I’ve been soaking in the vibes of this land of Gandhi is when I’ve entered this cryptic abyss which causes me to question whether my presence on this planet really matters in the grand scheme of things. I suppose India does that to some people.

 Most vehicles, especially trucks, buses, and vans encourage
the blowing of horns. I guess the sound of a horn
is more inline with 'Hello, I'm here',
as opposed to 'Get out of my frickin' way!'

Despite the constant noise, (we heard more honking during the 20 minute taxi ride from the airport to our hotel than we had heard during the two years in Bangkok), the rubble and the dust (my over-sanitized Canadian hang-up with cleanliness is rearing its ugly head again), the hotness and humidity (yes, I am still complaining about it being hot), the spectacular and omnipresent explosion of colors caused by the traditional Indian wear and Jasmine flowers in the hair (I am obviously skewed toward women here), the consistent and immutable smell of curry (maybe I should not have had that third helping of Moong Dal Cheela at breakfast), the intensity of the perpetual and  dizzying masses (how can it not be? ...compared to Canada, India has 35 times more people in 1/3 of the 

There must be something spiritually extramundane
about random cows wandering around everywhere
leading a purposeless existence

surface land area of Canuckland), I find that there is a certain vibe in India that is conducive to self-reflection of one’s motives and values. Oh yeah, and what about all those random cows wandering around as if they own the place?  

Its not that these occasional periods of introspection only occur when I am in India, but my experience has been that this rich vast land of mystical dreams and multi-cultured traditions is ripe for meditation, self-reflection, and soul searching. It's where it has always worked for me. Gustave Flaubert, the French novelist once wrote : “Travel makes one modest. You see what a tiny place you occupy in the world.” The claustrophobic feeling like I am drowning in a sea of people (not to mention all the other elements mentioned above that make up the Indian landscape), leads my precious sense of worthiness to plummet to the depths of insignificance when faced with the grandiose and intense dose of humanity that is India.

Madeleine sitting with the girls. No chatting, just sitting.

During my life journey, I have encountered several faces of my modest existence in the form of happiness, truths, sadness, depression, success and failure. As I continue my path, life never ceases to teach me a few things, such as, let's say...euh.. you know you’re getting old when you stoop to tie your shoes and wonder what else you can do while you’re down there. Nothing earth shattering, just plain truths that get truer and truer as you grow older and older and become wiser and wiser.

This is just one of the many truisms of life that I am compiling in my list that, when check out time from this planet arrives, I will bequest to all for posterity, guiding all of mankind in all aspects of his/her future existence. As I sat regaling at a Burger King in Chennai, from the depth of my being emerged another insight of life that will surely merit a place in my legacy of truism... I shall keep this for the topic of my next entry.