Four Days

22/7
"What is Auroville"
7am. The day began terribly. Bijoy and me were supposed to go to this screening of "Doshi" in Auroville together. But over the last few days, I have noticed he has changed a lot and there seems to be a lot of distance growing between us. After 4 months of working on the film in Kerala, he has not even asked about it, leave alone see it. Instead he has time to go watch HANGOVER and leave the responsibility of dropping Anjal and Sid back home at night onto me. Anyway, if I had a greater sense of myself and an understanding of the trivialities of these experiences, I would have looked above it and forgotten about it. But I am still walking towards that path. I have not reached the beginning of it yet but I can see it. And after this trip my mind will open a little more to accept that I have been touched by the hand of a divine being. It feels great. Anyway, getting back to the morning I called him and said I would prefer to go on my own in my car and, as I had expected, he lost his head and asked me to go alone. Well. I didnt realise this decision would help me find something magical later on. I decided to go alone. And what a drive. I enjoyed every minute of it. I have a newfound love for Tamil Nadu. The road from Krishnagiri to Pondicherry was quite breathtaking. Like photos from an old torn book on a lost hinterland in Tamil Nadu. If only the book would be accompanied by a CD containing the lost film music. Gorgeous trees, lovely browns and greens. Beautiful local people, the colour of their skin. All very visceral. I felt I was now in a place called Etherea. On reaching Pondi, I realised after speaking to Lalit in Auroville that I had gone on too far so I drive back and was on my way to Auroville. I frequently wrote this place off as some uber-cool hangout for the spiritual wannabes of Europe. When I entered Auroville, I realised I thought right. I didnt get a great vibe in the beginning. I went to the guesthouse and it was deserted. Lalit told me to meet him at the auditorium at 6:30. I reached a little earlier. The path was kucha, trees everywhere. Suddenly I saw the Matrimandir, the iconic circular-shaped meditation centre right in the middle of Auroville. There seems to be a whole new world operating here. A world cut off from the superficiality and materialism of the outside world. A city of friends. How cool. The auditorium was nice, lovely energies. The film looked and sounded cool. No bad cables, no inefficient sound chaps. It was all pucca. At around 6:45 the crowds started filling in. I met Lalit, lovely chap, no flowery "hi, how are you sir, its a pleasure to have you on this eventful day" garbage. To the point. I like that. The audi was full. The film began. Went off really well, lots of laughs and everyone really seemed to enjoy Mr. D's warm personality. They all connected. As it got over, Doshi hadn't arrived yet so the Q&A began with me. Great response. They asked me what was my inspiration, what was the secret of capturing the uncurtained personality of Doshi on camera etc. Doshi then arrived and the applause was overwhelming. Then the discussion progressed to the masterplan of Auroville, which is now Doshi's responsibility after being invited to join the Auroville board of governers. After the film I had a few nice conversations. Mita, one of the Aurovillians who has been here for 13 years, told me how lovely the "portrait" on Doshi was. We spoke for a bit. She has a lovely energy to her. Especially liked her Erykah Badu-esque headgear. And her lovely accent too. She introduced me to a chap who is responsible for the green belt, an oriental chap who didn't wear a shirt to the screening. That itself speaks volumes. No? I got her number and she also invited me to her office the next day for a chat. I was very curious to see what she does. Lalit then asked me to come by to the Centre guesthouse for dinner. Mita showed me the way there. There were a few others and we all chatted. I felt quite at home, there was no frivolous talk. I learnt about the alternative schools (the "vandi" school - a mobile school in a bus that Lalit's wife talked about sounded rather interesting), the thoughts and the soul of Auroville. Very inspiring to see this kind of a settlement.

23/7
"Listen"
Woke up, decided to call Mita. Switched off. How disappointing. I accepted the possibility of not meeting her. As I was getting set to head to the beach, she called. After a round of confusing directions, and a few wasted miles, I finally found the lovely blue and white house. She showed me her space. Apparently, she specialises in the development of the ear, after having researched the Tomatis method. Her work is mainly focussed on increasing the potential of the ear. She told me about an autistic boy who she has had a lot of success with. She also suggested we work on a set of portraits about people living in Auroville. A nice idea and I bet I would learn so much from such an experience. Hope its in the plan for me. Its amazing to see people like her. It makes me realise how petty my life is and how little I am doing for the community. The best part about Auroville is the community involvement. Since, its a small community of like-minded people, it makes more sense to work towards the betterment of it rather than being in a housing society flooded with families worried only about their own betterment and their next fully-loaded car. She gave me an article she wrote on Auroville back in 2000 and a little leaflet about the Tomatis method. I headed to the beach, hung around there for a bit and then headed to Tiruvannamalai. On reaching TVmalai, I couldnt find a place to stay. And then suddenly, like a gift from God I found Arpanaa. A lovely hotel facing the sacred mountain. Very comfortable, very posh, quite expensive too. I decided to stay in for the day as I was quite tired. So far so good.

24/7
"Starring Shanmugham"
I tried to wake up early. No such luck. But everything was working in a pattern. My grid says I was meant to meet a certain Shanmugham around 9ish. As I stepped out of the hotel, everything just clicked. His auto stopped right in front of me and we just connected. I wanted to visit the main temple. I wasn't aware how much I was going to experience. He took me to the temple but since it was crowded he went into a small lane and we stopped in front of Yogi Ram Suratkumar's house. A "God-child" from Tiruvanamalai. One word. Wow. I entered the house and it was filled with all his paraphernalia, from Charminar cigarette packs, to old clothes, to blessing lines on the walls, to all sorts of photos of him. It was all quite beautiful. I didnt feel like leaving. And there was a caretaker who looks after everything, lights the lamp, keeps the chanting of his name playing 24/7. He was a beggar who lived off leftovers and was constantly stoned by civilians. A very interesting story for film. And its not really been documented. Wow. How many opportunities at every corner. Which one do I grab? I really liked Yogi Ram Suratkumars energy. We then went to his ashram. Large sprawling auditorium with a shrine for him and many women chanting his name repeatedly. How bizarre. We also visited the really cool Ramana Maharshi's ashram. The photographs of him were really breathtaking. Its totally out there, this place. I am so fortunate to see all this. And all along Shanmugham was with me talking to me in English, Hindi, Malayalam and Tamil and if I knew Kannada and Telegu, he would speak those too. After a healthy vegetarian lunch at Anbu Mess, we went to see this Swami who lives about 15 km from TVMalai. He was asleep. We waited. Finally when he woke up and we were invited inside. I didn't get a great vibe from him as he asked me for money and I dont know something didn't seem right. There were a couple of families there too, everyone touching his feet asking for the Swami to pray for their daughters marriage, for their son to be successful in IAS etc. I found all this quite boring really. Anyway, that's that. We also went to another Swami's house but he passed away few years back so there was only a caretaker who looked like JP's mom and a little doggie called Kumar. :) Shanmugham dropped me off at the hotel by about 5. Oh, I almost forget. Before that he took me to his nephews little shop. Ramesh arts. He does paintings of filmstars, those classic ones of Rajni and Kamal. And ofcourse Vijai, Vijaykanth, Ajith and Vikram. He was telling me how he has lost a lot of business because of the digital revolution. I asked him to make a painting of Sid and gave him the passport-size photo I had in my wallet. He loved his face. What lovely people. I told him I will come by later to his shop to hang out. After taking a nap, at around 8:30 I came back to Ramesh arts and hung out with Ramesh and his friends. We spoke of art and how Ramesh wanted to call the painting "Sweet boy". The painting looked gorgeous. Amazing sense of detail. I cant wait for Mum to see this. I will gift it to her to keep at home. And oh, I forgot to mention I bought one of those mini xylophones from a shop in Auroville. A gift for Bijoy's office. I think that instrument has a lot of good energies. Wow, this has been a great trip so far.

25/7
"Panchabhoothi at Shankarapuram"
Shanmugham landed up at 9. On the dot. He took me for breakfast to a fantastic little place. The idli/vada was outstanding. And a choice of three chutneys. Heaven. I wanted to visit Yogi Ram Suratkumar's house again so went there and hung out for a while. I took some more photos. Felt more at home today. We then headed to Shankarapuram, the place that has the famous Panchabhoothi, 5 points of Shiva's presence. Shanmugham was driving my car. Insane driving! The landscape out there, 40kms from TVMalai was gorgeous. Rocks, trees, herds of cows, and very few people. Really out there in the hinterland. I felt off the earth as I walked barefoot in these temples almost burning my feet from the scorching heat. But it felt great going to these small temples. We went to pick up Hariharan, a pujari, from his house and he took us to all these spots. Each of these temples had interesting pujari's. The young lad who looked like he could be the next Tamil superstar, the pot-bellied pujari with the rather peaceful face and hair tied in a bun (not to forget him, Shanmugham and Hari busy tying the massive garlands on my cars bonnet), the strangely psyched out swami with the reverberating singing voice accompanied by the mechanical drums. All characters for film. All shot, all documented. Ready to go and be part of "This is a documentary of my life". After visiting these five temples, we headed back and after waiting for almost half an hour got some lovely food to eat at Anbu mess. Then Shanmugham took me to his house where he took the garlands and tied them on the bamboo out on the porch of his very humble home and beautiful children Poornima, Gauri and Ramkumar. Santosh Kumar wasn't there so I didnt meet him. Took some photos of the street kids. Then we went to Ramesh's house and he came back with us to his shop and showed me the painting. Framed in the classic ornate golden frame, it looked beautiful because I am now able to see beyond the so-called gaudy aesthetic of the frame and into the heart of love, of a painting made with real love. He also made a black and white sketch as an extra to keep on top of the TV, as he recommends. I hugged them and thanked them for their work and gave them 1300 Rs. I know its not much, I should have given them more. I will. When the time is right and when my hands begin to really live. Then. Wished goodbye to Shanmugham and Ramkumar and I headed back on the long drive back to a world where I dont belong.