Home for the Holidays

First off, to all of my readers, I wish you the happiest of holiday seasons.  I've rewritten this next sentence six times, starting with "May you . . .  " but I can't quite find the words to describe what I wish for each of you beyond that first holiday greeting.  Perhaps that is because I believe that each of us has to choose what we wish for ourselves.

Perhaps also, because I know this time of year can be as challenging and sorrowful for some as it is joyous and celebratory for others.  Perhaps because I know that gratitude is such a huge part of my experience - and I can't mandate that for anyone else.

I am home for the holidays.  Completely unexpectedly.  I realized, on the morning of the 24th, alone in my guest-house bedroom in Delhi, that I couldn't stay there, so far away from the people I love over the holidays.  And I am grateful that I listened to the voice inside that said, "go home".  Especially when my mind concocted a dozen reasons why I should 'tough it out', 'stay the course' or whatever . . . . stories that started with the four-letter-word "should" and were designed to punish me for wanting to be where my heart was guiding me to be.

It was the right decision to come home for the holidays; to connect with my beloveds.  To touch hearts with those that I love, and to reground in what is important to me, to what guides me, to all the intangible things that make this place home, and these beautiful people my family.  It is also the right decision to return to Delhi in the new year.  I am not giving up on India, nor am I running away.  I simply needed to go to my source.

It has been one of the most challenging months of my life on many levels.  Culture shock comes in many shapes, forms and layers.  Moving to a place, even temporarily, to live and work is very different from traveling to / through a place.  Even though I ended up 'living' in Guatemala for almost 5 months - I went there as a traveler, as an explorer, and I stayed because I was content.  I had no one's agenda but my own.  Moving to India for 5+ months to work has a very different flavour, and a very different impact on the psyche.  And for all the surface similarities between these two developing nations . . . the differences are both subtle and immense.

It has also been a very challenging month for some of the people closest to me, and I treasure this opportunity to come home, and even as I seek and accept support and comfort, I am able to provide them.  This is the way of love, of family, of community.  And as I sit typing in the middle of the night, my body profoundly confused by time-zones and jet-lag, I am immensely and profoundly grateful for all that I have.  And truly, for me, that is what this season is about.

Christmas has never been a religious holiday for me.  As a child we celebrated Channukah in our home, and went to my maternal grandparents' for the Christmas tree, presents and santa. As I found my spiritual path, the solstice has become the most spiritual meaningful for me.  As an adult, I celebrate all three: all of them to me about a returning, nurturing, sustaining of the light - around us, within us, and between us. 

So, over this holiday season, I celebrate the vibrant light within me, and within each of the beings who touch my life.  I celebrate all that I have been blessed with - the joys and the sorrows, the challenges, the successes and the failures.  I celebrate the ecstasy and the laundry. And I am grateful for all of it.

I've decided what I want to wish for you.  I am wishing you all a celebration of the light - may you feel its warmth within, and see it reflected in the eyes of all those around you.

Namaste

The Taj Mahal

This past weekend, like millions before me, I made the pilgrimage to Agra, to see the Taj Mahal.  While I was there I had the privilege of seeing the story of its conception enacted, in full beautiful colour, at a local theatre.  I'm not sure what I expected of the weekend, or my experience, but it was definitely a thought-provoking one for me. It was also a gift.  The weekend was organized by one of my hosts here, and I was provided with a full-service tour, including a 'night-viewing' of the Taj under the light of the moon: this happens only 5 days a month: the full moon, and the 2 nights before and after. My host's connections not only enabled the night-visit, but also allowed us to by-pass all of the line-ups. Hours worth.  Really.

Many of you may already know the basic story of the Taj Mahal.  All I knew before I went was that it was supposed to be one of the "7 wonders" of the world - big, opulent and beautiful.  The words "Taj Mahal" have always to me been synonymous with wealth, luxury, and splendor . . . but that's really all I knew.  What I discovered is that for many it's also synonymous with love - it is a mecca for lovers; a place symbolize the power of love and devotion, to come in celebration and sanctification of a union.  Wikipedia explains that: "It was built by Mughal emperor Shah Jahan in memory of his third wife, Mumtaz Mahal. It is widely considered as one of the most beautiful buildings in the world and stands as a symbol of eternal love."   One India tourism site claims it as "the ultimate monument to love"

I confess, as a die-hard romantic, who can never resist a love story . .  . I was surprisingly nonplussed.  The structure is stunning.  The grounds are amazing.  The symmetry (the entire site is designed to be perfectly symmetrical in all four directions.  The hand-carved etchings and semi-precious gem inlaid designs are exquisite.  It is an architectural and artistic monument of immense beauty.  Perhaps a monument to devotion: 22 years of labour, thousands and thousands of dollars (350 years ago!) No idea how many million or billion that would translate to now.  I thoroughly enjoyed and appreciated wandering the grounds, taking in the beauty of the structures and the gardens, walking through the mausoleum.

Sadly, in my soft, squishy, rose-coloured glasses, love-story obsessed heart . . . . I just couldn't get past some of the not-so-romantic, and not-so-widely-advertised, pieces of the story. Frankly, even the basic story doesn't quite do it for me.

Apparently, the emperor was devastated when his third wife, who was his favourite, died during the birth of their 14th child.  I can't help but think that being his favourite wasn't in her highest interest - clearly, it's what killed her!  However, in the age-old tradition of great tragic love stories, love should prevail beyond reason and beyond life.  So, on her death bed, she implored him to grant her a last request:  Please, Emperor, do not be a king to your children, be a father.  And keep me close to your heart, love me always.  The Emperor was  devastated by her death and vowed to grant her request.

Continuing the tragic love-story theme, he couldn't eat, he couldn't sleep, he couldn't rule . . . he became obsessed with his dead beloved, and so he vowed to build a monument in her honour, to keep her close to him always; and this monument should be of the greatest wonder and beauty in the world. just as his Mumtaz had been: and so the concept for the Taj Mahal was born.  Sounds romantic - wouldn't every woman want a man to love her so much that he created something like that in her honour?   Except that I really wouldn't. In her shoes, I'd really have wanted to him to focus on the first part of the request: parenting the 14 children they created together: they are the real monuments to love. 


On the one hand, there is something powerful about any place that people flock to for prayer, and once built, and the Empress entombed there, the mausoleum was occupied regularly by followers coming to grieve her loss and pay their respects.   Not to minimize their loss or her importance, but I wonder if they'd have felt the loss quite so keenly if the Emperor hadn't abdicated his responsibilities to his people (and his children) while he focused on having this monument built.

And then there are the labourers, artisans, architects, and designers involved in the project, who are said to have been maimed; their thumbs cut-off, after their involvement in the project, in order to ensure that no one tried to duplicate the Taj.  I believe, truly, that the energy of the builders is left in the stones of a structure.  How can it be a monument to love if it was built by the hands of slave labour, living in fear?

I've thought about it a fair bit since the weekend, and I admit - there is something romantic about creating something beautiful in honour of someone you love.  But I guess that's the rub: something beautiful that honours love.  If I happen to fall in love with a ridiculously wealthy and powerful man, I really hope that should he be inspired to spend that kind of money on something in my honour - that he do it building hospitals, schools, housing for the poor . . . something to truly make the world a better place, something built by people paid fair wages, who were also invested in making their lives and their world better.

But perhaps there is redemption in the mecca that it has become.  Perhaps the energy of reverence and love, offered by its many visitors helps to balance out the misery of its conception.  Perhaps the joy that it brings to people, the opportunity to contemplate, to revere, to believe . . . are also something powerful, and worth acknowledging. Perhaps it provides an important opportunity to think about the concept of love, and how each of us wants to live that out in our lives. It has certainly given me something to think about over the last few days.

Three Weeks in India. I can go home now.

 The last time I saw my 'boss' before I headed off to India, he said to me, half-jokingly,  "please promise you'll stay at least three weeks?"  I know that he's never been to India, but I think in that moment he suddenly had some deep connection with the immensity of this journey he was sending me on.  And he's a wise, wise, man.
Because at the 3 day mark I was ready to pack it in, but I couldn't, because I promised.  At the week and a half mark, I was SOOO ready to come home!  But I couldn't.  Because I promised. And at the two and half week mark . . . yep, you guessed it:  I want my mommy, and I want to go home.  But . . .I bet you know what's coming: I promised.  So, here I am at the three week mark, and I can go home now, because I've kept my promise.

Funny enough, now that I have the choice, I'm ready to stick around and really experience this place. I don't know how Peter picked 'three weeks' as the magic number, but it appears to be just that.  The last week has been an emotional roller-coaster, dominated by frustration, impatience and irritability.  (To all my friends and family who have borne witness and listened to me vent, Peter and I thank you.) Something shifted last night as I slept, and I awoke softened, more open, more able to see what is . . .and what's possible. 

There is so much to learn from this incredible country, from its people, from its heritage.  When I pause to think about a place with thousands of years of history and heritage, as compared with my country that really only recognizes a couple of hundred years.  wow.

I won't say I'm smitten with India; just like Delhi streets, the relationship is just not that clean.  But, somehow, I'm hooked, and I'm ready to open myself to her.  And there are so many opportunities here to both look outside myself and look deep within as Mother India shines her mirror back at me.

The paradoxes and contradictions here boggle my mind. Every day I pass poverty on the streets like I've never seen. I spent Sunday afternoon with a friend and colleague at her golf & country club, surrounded by immense wealth, and had a powerful conversation with her about holding that place of paradox.  I know that part of my journey here is to make peace, hopefully once and for all, with the incredible wealth that I already have, and the freedom it provides me. (I have a Canadian passport.  I actually kissed it the other day, as I recognized just what privilege and freedom that passport affords me).   We talked about that balance, the ever grey lines around what is enough . . . and the implacable, painful realization that no matter how much we give, we cannot solve all the problems around us.

Literally, my head begins to ache as I think about these things.  Some part of me can't let go of the notion that there is a systemic solution or a system of solutions that could change how we all co-exist in the world . . . . like a series of threads that if we could just reconnect them, would return us to balance.  I am grateful to know that even as I get older, wiser, and generally more cynical, I remain an idealist.  May I never grow up or out of that.

And may I never be hardened so that I can't see and feel the pain of the children on the streets, or the dogs that limp along hungry.  And may I continue to open my heart to see the balance, rather than getting trapped in the sorrow.  To laugh at the simple joy of children playing; even as they weave amidst the traffic, trying to sell me things through the car window . . . and get distracted into playing tag when I won't buy.  Dogs, sleeping in the sunshine, looking content in that moment.  The cabbie smiling at me, surprised, as I give him a 20 rupee tip (about 50 cents).

I truly do not know what this journey holds for me.  I have spent the last three weeks struggling against the not-knowing, wailing against the injustice of the universe demanding that I surrender into trust.  I can't promise I won't continue to put up a fight occasionally, or that I won't continue to have moments of home-sickness, overwhelm, or just general India-fatigue.  In fact, I think I can promise that all of the above will resurface again and again . . . .but I'm ready for them.  I survived my first three weeks in India, and fulfilled my promise.  Now I'm here because I choose to stay, because I am willing to trust the path unfolding in front of me.  Because I can't resist, like a child in front of a christmas tree laden with gifts, the opportunity to unwrap the packaging and see what I find.

PS: Of course I know that I always had a choice to go home if I really wanted to, and I never really considered throwing in the towel . . . but it was touch and go for a moment or two, I'll admit.