An Idiot in the Classroom

The sententious sermon slips through my soul like a snake in a stream,

Unaware if it’s dead or alive.

I reject to receive the rhetorical knowledge,

Like a yak in the mountains, only thinner.

Faith

I was travelling from Yumthang Valley to Yume Samdong, also called the Zero Point, in Sikkim in a Jeep. With a temperature below the freezing point, cool mountain wind caressing my face and a terrain that was bound to either take your heart away or your life, I felt blessed to be there at that moment, far away from the worries of the world, far away from expectations and deliberations, free from the sweet shackles of shimmering relations. Just me.

And then I came across these stacks of stones placed very carefully on both sides of the road. And there were many of them. I asked my driver, who was a local resident of Lachung, the nearest inhabited place, about them and what I got to hear was at one hand a very simple and straightforward explanation, and on the other hand a deeply moving expression of faith and beauty amidst the toil of nature.

“We are Buddhists. This is how we pray to our God for the Snow.”

“Ok. Tell me more.”

“This is the time when we expect snowfall in our land. Where you are going now, Sir, you will find fresh snow. You will play with it and click pictures. For us it’s the matter of livelihood. As you can see there is no snow to be seen around even here at Yumthang Valley, leave alone Lachung.”

He was right. I was waiting with baited breath to see the snow all around me but all I could see was the visage of huge naked rocky mountains.

“If we do not get the snowfall in time, our crops will die. If that happens, it will be extremely difficult for us to carry on with our livelihood. So we pray with these stones to the God for a timely snowfall.”

He said this and drove his way to Yume Samdong, dodging a few boulders that rolled their way down on our jeep. And then it struck to me. Even when you are at a place so far from worldly distractions, worries and woes, you are afraid. You are afraid of the nature and for your survival. This is what makes us a living creature. And to counter it, we have faith. Faith.

Let me be here and soak in all the pleasure, for the nature beholds the beauty.

And let me feel the fear, for everyday I used to die.

Let me live the moment and take a leap of faith.

And let me be a stone left there to pray.

I opened the window of my jeep and inhaled life.

(First published on http://shishirkc.tumblr.com)