Day 13 of 20

Oh well...after a lot of thinking and memory jogging, i am still not able to recollect, when exactly we made this trip..i was not in India in 2001 and half of 2002, so was gone again in mid 2004, it must be sometime between mid 2002 and mid 2004. Its strange how i can vividly remember how i felt and what i experienced, but even after trying damn hard, am not able to recollect the year and month.

I do remember telling myself, at that time, that it took me good 25 years to see the place that was the reason for my birth, and also when we got down in chickmangalur station, i felt the cold, and felt my skin burn due to dryness...so i can safely say it must be late 2002 or early 2003. I remember when i got down at chickmangalur station, it was not the big city, a modest town, and not any mystical that i have imagined it to be. I think, we got down in the early hours,I can remember the cool breeze as we came out of the station, as it was yesterday.

We hired a cab...I don't remember if we rented a room, but i am sure, we must have to freshen up,coz we went up the mountain during the day and left before nightfall. Our brain is a smart machine..it doesn't really waste memory on mundane details, only the one's that leave an impression on you, get recorded.I always wanted to write a diary as i forget dates and years, but never did for the fear of laying my life out in open for anyone to read.

The journey i remembered going up the mountain..We noticed freshly made a walkway beside the road and when asked, the driver told us, that some devotees do pada yatra to the top of the mountain and that they started doing so recently. And i could see some saffron flags here and there, people were going up and down in bikes, once in a while as we ascended. In conversation with the taxi driver, we found out that this now the new place for the hindu-muslim fight for ownership of the cave on the top. A smile broke invariably, not just me, the saint who's blessing i am, is also admist a religious difference. i was going to his meditation place and the place he is reportedly still seen to ask to make it easy to marry D, and make sure the religious differences that were causing us problems be gone and lo, here he was stuck in the same kind of situation. There was a question on who he is, some said he was a muslim and wanted muslim sajjada nashin's to take care of the chilla as they have been for centuries and some said he was a Hindu, a re-incarnation of Guru Dattatreya and hence all the hindu rituals need to be followed and to reinforce that the newly started pada yatra.

I now wondered, what was he going to do for me, who was dealing with the same situation. I remember smiling to myself and telling the saint in my mind 'Oh well, there you go, we both are in the same situation. If you are not able to handle these crazy people, what can someone like me do..All i can do is wish you all the best and you do the same for me' .

The road is the not the best i have ever seen, in some places broken , and some places non existent and there is a tinge of red everywhere, the mountain has the red soil. Some curves and turns were pretty tricky, a small mistake and you will end up in the valley and probably no-one will come looking for the remains. There was this intensity to establish ownership in this place, that neither of the both religious people cared for the development of this place.A proper road would have done everyone good, but who cares for all that stuff.

As we ascended, the imagination i had about the magician, Dada and the princess, was finding a canvas, i was imagining a magician, wicked, wearing big black robe, bald head, red cruel eyes and long nails roaming the hills, bothering and tormenting people, and i imagined a saint, long beard, white one piece kaftan, with a serene look on his face and a stick in his hand, and the beautiful and delicate princess, looking helpless in the mid of the ruthless jungle.

As i still was lost in the world of my imagination, we reached the place where the gavvi( means cave) was. It was a very small place, with hardly any shops, very few places, not thronging like other holy places, a sense of quiet prevailed. To enter the gavvi, we had to take bath in the nearby waterfalls...and apparently these waterfalls have mystery, that no-one has ever been able to solve, they say a lot of geologists have come and did numerous studies but never found where the water was coming from. Me and my mother, went together and there is another practise that is followed here, you need to discard the clothes you are wearing right there after the bath, you do not take your old clothes with you. They had a small covering where women can change, nothing fancy and very primal(was better than nothing). After the bath, we changed into fresh clothes, and threw away the old ones right there. I dont know why they do it, but i am guessing, it giving up old bad self and changing into a garb of good.But again, thats my theory, i really dont know why they do it.

A lady who was helping us there, we saw here next day, wearing the saree my mom had left the day before :). If it has no spiritual meaning, it definitely gave clothes to the people there who could afford any new.

Will continue in the next post....

Note:I couldnt write the post yesterday...hmmm...dont blame me, blame the number 13 :)