Part 1....

Written over the course of about a week to ten days…so if there are some tense irregularities etc (such as the statement 'I am now a full time English teacher), this is due to the rapid unfolding of events and my desire to tell it like it is….was…errr…will be…maybe

 

Around 03/02/10…somewhere in rural India…well, Kothi village to be exact, can't resist sounding dramatic…

 

Too much to write, I'll just let it pour out as it wishes. I've soared to the heights, but at the moment I am plumbing the depths of a cold and a possible hernia. What shall we expand on first? Well to be fair, I've pretty much covered all the lows of recent times in the above sentence. I'm yet to decide whether allowing myself to get fleeced for just under a tenner to have my ears cleaned counts as a high or a low. I was definitely amused by the successful subliminal marketing techniques, and the inescapable web my fleecer wove. The long and the short of the story is that I was in the heart of Delhi (Connaught place, which I guess is kind of like hyde park/jephson gardens, but a bit more citified…incidentally, I can't believe 'citified' is actually a word, but it is. Microsoft says so!) killing time before my friend finished work and we could return to Haryana together. I was in Delhi for the happy/sad process of escorting my new wife-to-be (or should that be Fiancée…I'm guessing one e for a man, two for a woman if my spelling and grammar check is working correctly) to the airport. I had just managed to spend a blissful half hour or so sitting on the grass, writing poetry and being completely anonymous. In the midst of the city my white skin did not act like the flame for the human moths that it seems to be when I'm deep in India's rural breadbasket. The weather is starting to hot up again, so I headed across the street to grab a bottle of water. A young Indian man about my age, with a very mild manner informed me that he liked my hair style. He then proceeded with the classics "what country are you from etc etc etc." His incessant interest in me meant I initially took him to be a Hari-Krishna, but I started to suspect an ulterior motive when he produced a little notebook to show me his English and I saw that the words in the notebook referred to 'ear-cleaning'. Said suspicions were confirmed when he collared me again after I had sat on the grass once again hoping for some peace and quiet. He produced photos of him cleaning a variety of youthful ears, then more English in his notebook, this time reading 'great work guys,' as if to affirm that the people in the photos were so happy with the job he'd done on their eards that they'd written him a glowing reference as a result. Whilst this possibility may or may not be true, the over-riding question I'm sure you all have is why did I say yes to having my ears cleaned in the first place instead of being deaf to his persistence (sorry, couldn't resist that one)? Well I'd been reading about some of India's various spiritual traditions, and around that time was reading a passage that described the importance given by a certain branch of knowledge to the connection between the ears and the process of inner awakening. Muggin's here clearly though what's good for the goose is good for the naïve western fuckwit, and so proceeded to ask my naggigly persuasive auditory hygiene technician what the benefits of his treatment were. His response was conclusively informative and succinct – 'ears connect everything. When ears are good, mind is good, eyes are good, smell is good' – this coupled with the reassurance of a no-obligation (definitely strings attached) 'check' was enough to ensure that yours truly was well and truly sold.

To be fair, he did remove from my ears wads of gunk that looked like they'd be more appropriate coming out of an orifice a little lower down my body, than being carved from my inner ear. The hilarity came when he announced that some of the gunk was too hard to remove without the use of 'medicine', which for all I know could have been nought but water, but which came in a convincing looking 'ear-drop' type squeezy bottle. He announced that 'medicine' was 250Rs, which works out at just over 3 quid. The arse-raping came when it was revealed that this was only for my right ear, and that 'medicine' for my left ear would be another 250Rs. Given that he cannot have squeezed more that 6 drops into my ears in total, and that a bottle of ear-drops cannot cost much more than a fiver, I began to understand how he managed to make a living. I'm not sure even cocaine or red-lentils have such a pricey mark-up as my 'friend' had managed to extract from me. All told, I walked away 600Rs lighter, but amused and educated. I'm not sure it's done sweet FA for my mind, my hearing or my sense of smell, but what price can you put on a good yarn – especially one which casts me in such an intelligent light!

 

The sharp eyed among you, and those of you who did not receive my txt message, will, by now, have probably just about finished lifting their jaws from the floor after reading the words 'my new wife-to-be.'

That's right…George is getting married!

The last two weeks have been a lesson and blessing like no other.

 

Two days later…I'd intended to launch into this part with a great passage on the inexpressible wonder of love's totality. I will still do this, but it's taken me a day or so to get back in front of a computer owing to certain health issues. The possible hernia is not a hernia (I'm pretty certain), but the cold on the other hand turns out to be a little more than a cold. I currently have a resting pulse rate of around 150bpm courtesy of some kind of virus that is causing my heart to quicken while at the same time clogging up my nasal passages and slightly inflaming my throat. Given the above is as below, and the inner mirrors the outer, my external appearance is looking none too healthy, in truth, it's become quite a sight, with a spot that I unwisely tried to pop just below my nose having developed into some kind of Impetaigoed monster. Since it is starting to look like I am breeding a new head on my top lip, I am taking applications for those who would like to name this gargantuan carbuncle.

 

The result of this illness is two-fold. Firstly, it has brought my preference for natural, body guided healing into conflict with India's (or at least my host family's) preference for allopathic medicine over anything else. I finally managed to explain why I did not wish to take beta-blockers (whose side effects number liver toxicity and lung disease) when I stood in front of a tree and explained that if there was a problem with a part of the tree trunk, one could of course take an axe to that particular part of the trunk and the problem would be solved…until a particularly strong wind came along and the tree would in a weaker position than it had previously been. Having understood my point, he called his friend, who is a homeopathic doctor, who has agreed to see me tomorrow if there is no improvement. In the meantime, I have compromised and taken some random antibiotics in the hope that tackling the virus might bring my heart beat back down again. It still feels a little as though I am using a machine gun to shoot a sparrow, but I guess when in Rome…

The second effect of the illness's cause is that I am confined to bed rest under strict orders from my Indian mother, so for you lucky people who've been craving a new blog instalment, there's nothing between now (1.15pm) and about 6pm except me, my keyboard, and a whole shitload of stuff to update you on. And even when I've finished with all that, I'll just carry on in the typically verbose fashion I seem to have developed, letting my imagination roam as and where it pleases.

 

But first…Love…

 

Actually, pause for a second. I have to be aware I am writing for a western audience, for whom it's often too much trouble to read the 140 characters of a txt of twitter update, let alone a 3000 word or so blog. So for those of you who like it short but sweet here's the last two weeks or so condensed into bullet points so you can return to doing whatever is more important.

 

• I am now a full time English teacher. I was a full time environmental science teacher, but when my lack of hindi and the students lack of English meant it took an entire 40min lesson to establish that you boil water to kill germs and make it safe for drinking, I figured I should swallow my pride and hand the job over to someone more native.
• I was chief guest at a cricket tournament – a truly bizarre experience, where I was paraded as per royalty on FA Cup Final day and was presented with a trophy to commemorate my experience.
• My girlfriend and I thought about breaking up, even though she was due to come and see me a week later. We then realised during the course of a pretty intense conversation (not helped by skype being totally f**king useless and cutting us off every other sentence) that infact we probably loved eachother more than we could have previously fathomed, but reckoned we definitely needed to see eachother to confirm this.
• The realisation of even greater depths and heights of loving experience flooded me with a whole new energy, which has helped to remove vast swathes of limiting fears and has amplified immeasurably my desire to be of service to this planet and all life upon it, and indeed all life full stop.
• I made a birthday cake for my host, who has the endearing, if infuriating quality, that he needs to know in detail what I am doing and with whom at all times. Thus, the fact that I was using my day off to stoke up my brick oven was far too much for his curiosity, and his insistence on knowing what I was cooking inside the oven meant the surprise was categorically spoiled.
• I attended a Hindu wedding. Pretty much similar to a sikh wedding, just with less money thrown around inappropriately…but complete with a shotgun being fired into the air completely inappropriately. At this wedding it proves even more impossible to enjoy a moment's peace without having to answer the statutory questions 'I'm from England' 'I'm teaching at the GMMCS' 'My name is George' 'no not like George Bush' etc etc
• My girlfriend (Fan) arrives. I am happy. This arrival it should be noted is in typically Indian/Rolleresque fashion. Her plane was inexplicably made to wait on the tarmac for two hours, apparently because there were no busses to taxi the passengers to the disembarkation terminal.. Meanwhile yours truly, having arrived approx 5 mins late, is having vivid daymares of his girlfriend (who is stepping onto Indian soil for the first time) having been swallowed up by the swarthing masses of Delhi airport. 3hrs later, the lovebirds are reunited.
• She has brought me lots of chocolate. I am very happy.
• Fan causes quite a stir at the school. Suddenly the strange customs of 'George sir' seem yesterday's news.
• After a fair amount of soul searching and baring, we realise how amazing we are together. Kahlil Gibran is a big inspiration in all of this
• We invite all the teachers and other staff members to a big lunch, which with the help of Babaji (the school's watchman) and the principal, we manage to get ready just before the bulk of guests arrive. Ultimately there are about 30 people who sit down for lunch. There arrivals have ranged from the fashionably offensively early (ie 1½ early, most likely for the express purpose of staring at the two goras making lunch) to the offensively fashionably late (half way through pudding). We are presented with gifts which are totally unexpected, and humbling, and then have to pose for numerous mobile phone photos
• We visit Chandigarh, and experience, courtesy of my mate Nav's relatives, the first in a line of incredible hospitality experiences that indelibly and beautifully mark our brief time together. We buy lots of Tibetan shawls, books and hot Gulab Jaman
• We get mobbed in Patiala bus station, more out of kindness and curiosity than anything else. Everyone wants to make sure we get on the correct bus, and we  are guided onto the right one by a kind soul, where we are met by the conductor who was on the bus on our outward trip. Things are simple from then on.
• We walk to the village where I was 'chief guest' at the cricket tournament, for the purpose of spending some time with the three amazing Peepal trees that grow by the side of the cricket ground.
• People attempt to mob us, yours truly asks for one minute of peace, and as best he can with about 50 indian villagers staring at us, I propose to Fan.
• She says yes. We offend old people by sharing a kiss in public.
• We pay our respects at the village temple, whose presiding deity is Lord Hanuman, who is the devoted servant of Rama (one of the incarnations of Lord Vishnu)
• We take what we're told is coffee at the house of the captain of the village cricket team. It's not coffee, but some cross between tea and coffee and a vast amount of sugar.
• We walk home in a loving daze, accompanied by a flock of parrots, who seem to be fan-faring our return home.
• In the evening we tell Sodagar and Narinder (our host and hostess), who are overjoyed, but also angry that we did not tell them sooner, so that they could buy us gifts
• The next morning we head to Delhi, where we are due to be staying with a friend of mine, who I've only met once, who has arranged for us to stay with one of his female friends. It could all go horribly wrong.
• It goes amazingly right. We are treated so kindly, and hospitably that it near beggars belief
• Fan flies home the next morning, leaving me with an aching, dancing, joyous heart and a greater profundity of gratitude for every breath I take
• About 4 days later I develop a cold, and my heart starts beating 2Quickly J
• After no slowing down after a couple of days I go to a local doctor and get an ECG. He diagnoses me with Paroxysmal Atrial Tachycardia and gives me a load of pills.
• Yours truly not being a huge fan of pills decides that after still no improvement the next day, alternative medicine is needed. A homeopath is seen, who assures that his pills will sort the problem
• Two days later, still no slowing down of my racing heart, which has a resting pulse rate of 150bpm…I head to a hospital just outside Delhi to see a specialist…

 

 

Now for the substance…which is love

 

A precursor is perhaps necessary. All is one, one is all. The one is love. Call it god, spirit, energy, anima, the all pervading, the tao, quantum entanglement, allah, the universe, life, light, whatever. For me these are all words (our limited ability) to describe what is essentially the same phenomena. Sunlight has infinite hues, and at any moment, one may be experiencing midday or midnight, yet the sun still gives of its light at all times and to all life. So it is with love. If we ask to be guided, aided, inspired etc we will be, it's as simple as that. This much is my opinion, and I guess I feel its important to state it, as it will help to make comprehensible some of what follows – statements such as 'I asked Love x y or z' etc

 

Are you sitting comfortably…?

 

Most Sundays I return to the house in Kothi (for those who are not clued into my living arrangements, I have a room at the school, but am also welcome back at the home of Sodagar (the school's managing director) and his wife Narinder whenever I wish) and in the early evening accompany Narinder to the Gurudwara (sikh version of a church/temple) to receive Prasad, which is consecrated food that is offered to God and then shared with the congregation. This particular Sunday was special for the village, as it was the first in their newly built Gurudwara. It is a beautiful, and quite grand building, yet in an understated, simple way, as though it wears its beauty and grandeur out of devotion and love, rather than for any ostentatious ends. Having bowed before the Garant Sahib (the Sikh holy book), I went and sat down against one of the walls, intent on getting a feel for the energy of the new space and to sit in quiet contemplation. I found myself focussing on a particular spot on the carpet, and decided to use this focus as a foundation for a period of meditation – some ascetics/seekers advocate focussing on the flame of a candle or the sun, I felt a dot on the carpet suited as well as any other device for stilling the mind's chatter – being an all too infrequent meditator, despite knowing the abundant benefits of even a small amount each day, I usually find it quite hard to drop into that clam emptiness that can be so nourishing. On this occasion, however, I found myself almost instantly clothed in a lucid nothingness, which required a bare minimum of effort to sustain. It intuitively felt as though there was some reason for the state I found myself in, so I simply asked if there was some lesson love would have me learn. The response was almost instant, and possessed an authority, delight and simplicity that were truly moving: 'find that still point in your life which is love, and from that point let your pen, your actions and your smile flow.' Nothing more, nothing less. I left the Gurudwara feeling grateful and uplifted, as though I was taking with me a vital seed that in time would bring forth forest upon forest.

 

Some of you will know my affinity for the shamanic world view – whereby all things possess a spirit and life in and of themselves, and share an interconnectedness with all things by virtue of the fact that all life is connected by a web of energy that permeates all things. This affinity has led me to tentatively explore shamanic journeying, which is a meditative process to access wisdom held in the realms of this life energy that exists beyond our five senses. There are many ways to access the shamanic state of consciousness necessary to interact with said realms, most common of which are drum, dance and use of sacred plants.

Accessing the shamanic state of consciousness is called 'journeying' – one uses one of the above mediums to travel to the other realms of being for the purpose of receiving guidance and information about whatever it is one might wish to know. Such information will be conveyed by guides, who one might label as spirits, or entities, but which are essentially informational energy patterns interpreted in such a way as to make them comprehensible to the subjective consciousness that is interacting with them.

 

I am aware I may already have lost some of my more empirically minded readers, but when one considers that quantum physics at any moment asserts that we exist in a universe whose structuring medium is consciousness (the experiment and the observer of the experiment necessarily exist in a co-influential relationship), that our universe may in fact be a multiverse, and that there are potentially at the very least 11 dimensions below and 13 dimensions above our 3-D reality paradigm, it becomes clear that for those who need a scientific basis in order to give credence to something, then the shamanic world view and state of consciusness may infact be the ways past cultures understood and expressed their interplay with what cutting edge quantum physics is only now beginning to provably understand.

 

The most prominent of my guides is a crow…and it is through my learnings in the shamanic realm, and through a conscious effort to connect with the rhythms of nature that I have arrived at the point where I am of the opinion that love is an objective and shaping reality that is subjectively experienced. Compassionate to an extent we can barely fathom, Love, like the absolute paradigm of maternal affection and care gives us whatever we ask for…whatever we focus on – hence the phrase that life is a self-fulfilling prophecy.

Why this rambling digression? My question since arrival in India (and for the last few years in reality) has been – 'how can I be of service to love?'

The overriding answer has been 'surrender'. Trust that if your intention is pure and you surrender yourself, you'll be in the right place at the right time with the right people and resources.

A couple of days later, two things happened. I'd finished reading the final of a trilogy of books on tantra (not the erotic commercialised love tantra, rather the ascetic, naked, ash covered, human flesh eating tantra) and had had a voice well up inside that affirmed – 'your heart is the still point'. The volumes on tantra cemented the learning that I'd been aware of for some time – that our every moment can be transmuted into an act of love if the purity of intent is there. It also blossomed an understanding of what to me felt like the true meaning of sacrifice and surrender. Sacrifice literally meaning 'to make sacred'. I therefore had a vision of my heart as a sacrificial alter, to which I sacrificed and surrendered myself daily. It brought through a surge of empowering energy quite incredible.

 

Time for a more subjective bullet point documenting of fact – the inner experience rather than the outer reality – beginning from the moment mentioned above, which comes somewhere after the cricket tournament guesting experience (of which I'll tell later). The event that really brought through love's surge was a conversation with my then girlfriend:

·      We both felt our connection had dropped off in recent weeks, so the conversation began with the voicing of the possibility of breaking up.

·      At this point I'd given up trying to make things happen. My attitude was 'whatever is Love's Will will be'

·      Everything mirrors everything, and as Fan and I peeled away the layers of our relationship and what had been happening in our lives to cause our tailing off, it became clear that, as had been the case in so much of our relationship, that our individual experiences mirrored eachother to such an extent as to be frightening/unbelievable/amazing/life affirming.

·      The feeling was as though our relationship to that point had been in bud, and was either ready to blossom together, or be sacrificed so that our individual paths could be followed with powerful lessons of love to dram upon to empower our steps

·      As the conversation drew to its end, we agreed that such a depth of emotion deserved being explored face to face rather than sacrificed without trying to work through it

 

Here are my poems the morning after, when I awoke with an energy I'd never known before and gave thanks to life, love and being…and just let my pen pour out my joy for the beautiful female mirror form love had blessed my life with…

 

The Lessons of Love's FANtastic Dance

 

I awake as though reborn from the womb of Love

Thou its vehicle of Mother

I am swaddled against the cold morning

By raiment of your joy

 

In my pulse is mirrored

Thy own heart's dance

And though this flower of love is yet to fully blossom

(For by touch it must be watered)

Still my truest self knows – in the stillness of my heart

That we will shine forth as its petals and its hues

And give Love itself cause to smile

With our beautifying of life

 

A Shining Heart

 

Though a thick fog covers the morning's stirring

There is nought can hide this sunshine in my heart

Whose core fire is my self-surrender

With rays of a lynx's twinkling smile

 

And from the ash of what has been

Springs the phoenix and the seed

With messages of hope anew

Of life's profound purpose rekindled

 

It was nurtured in the dark and stillness

To emerge the new moon's wave

Whose foam'd crest decorates our love

With the essence of life's deep and beautiful mystery

Expressed as the joyous moment's dance

 

Where all that was and is and is yet to be

Are the mirrors motive truths

Giving birth to Love's living image

Which is you and I and all that is

Offering ourselves as breath for Love

 

She Said

 

She said, 'I thought you'd be angry'

I thought, 'I thought I knew love'

And from my heart I laughed in wonderment

How could love be angry at seeing itself in the mirror?

 

I said, 'how could I be angry?'

'I have no time for anger in this love'

How could I be angry, as once again

She lifted me beyond a love I thought possible

 

This moment known, I care not what else may be

For ever will be in my heart

The moment Love chose us

To experience its joyous dance

 

I surrender now in gratitude, my heart, my soul, my all

With a prayer of blessing for my mirror

And a plea for grace upon my lips

Sacrificing all that is myself to my Self that is Love

 

 

·      The first night together in India and each thereafter was on the one hand a brutal revealing of self, a baring of souls, that led on the other to a blossoming of our love that far from being in doubt prior to being reunited, we simply could not have believed existed – can you describe the taste of an apple…sweet, crisp etc…but the only true knowledge can be the tasting of an apple yourself

·      Our shared appreciation of the experience of surrender brought such spontaneous moments of unexpected joy that we found ourselves constantly smiling with incredulous gratitude

·      Perhaps the most violent conflict I experienced within during this time was marriage or not marriage. One part of me yearned to give my self to the planet, stay in India as long as felt necessary, the other felt my soul and its duty lay in India, with this incredible love to deepen into – a rocket must take off from a launch pad. If the launch pad is not stable…well…

·      Voicing my fears – this is something that has truly empowered our union from the first moment, we've grasped the important of not holding back what's in our heart that must be spoken – as we walked the 4km to a village to see some amazing trees, I spoke of the two sides within, and by the time we reached the village we'd again connected so completely that I knew where my heart lay. I reached into my pocket to ensure the 10 Rupee ring I'd bought quietly at Patiala bus station was still there and clutching the ring my final doubts drifted into the slight breeze as I gave up my all to love and decided to build my life from that point on. I bid the winds of heaven dance for us, and the hands of life support us (thank you mr Gibran)

·      Thre trees were truly beautiful, and in the shade of one of their wondrously knarled and twisted ancient trunks…Fan said yes.

·      Eight days later I'm admitted to Intensive Care with an accelerated heart beat!

 

Stay tuned for part two…

 

Still to come…such delights as

                        Chief guest at a cricket tournament

                        Worshipping on the toilet

                        The gora couple cook lunch for 35 people

                        Incredible hospitality in Delhi and Chandigarh

                        The silence of the city

                        ICU, Keralan nurses, meat and needles

 

Massive love till then…