We reach Bareilly for lunch by mid day
and have the good fortune to be hosted by the Bishop of Bareilly, His Grace
Anthony Fernandes. I particularly
enjoyed this lunch because his dogs, Rani and Sultan, were scampering around
and soaking in all the love and affection from everyone around. They were the
cutest pomeranians and when a whole lot of monkeys entered the vicinity,
threatening to attack, these two ran at them and chased them off with a
vengeance you wouldn’t think they’d have. Being so small, they still managed to
scare off the whole troop.
And then they came and sprawled
themselves across the floor for us to pet them and love them.. He he..
After the whole incident, the Bishop was
having a friendly conversation with Alan and his crew, Raihun, Kles and Dap.
Alan says, “It’s so dangerous! If those
monkeys attack, it’ll be really bad..”
“Yes, the monkeys are quite a menace
here. But luckily we have Rani and Sultan to ward them off... Do you have
monkeys in Shillong?”
Alan waves a hand to the others behind
him.
“Yes. Three.”
Hahaha! It was cool to be so free with a
Bishop..
This place was also special because it was
where our girl’s dance academy Nrityarpan
was. It was their place and though we couldn’t visit their academy or spend
much time here, it was still a piece of home and it always feels nice to come
home.
We reach Motinagar in Uttarakhand in the
evening. We’ve overshot the scheduled time by a few hours, but I guess that’s
ok. We all get a uniform as such, with white shirts and caps on which ‘Jago
Yuva Bharat’ is printed. Then we board these 6 gypsies which have the backs
fully open (the same kind you’ll find when you go to Jim Corbett Park or
safaris and all) and we all clamber into them and start out towards the market.
On the side of all the gypsies there’s a board which has information about our
campaign printed on it and while we’re passing through the markets, people are
actually slowing down their vehicles and coasting alongside us reading them!
And sooooo many people around us, as we passed, shouted to us, “Jago! Jago!” or “Jago Yuva Bharat!” and smiled at us. Some even waved! One person
shouted, “Arre, hum to jag gaye!” And
we shouted back, “To kuch karo!!” He
he..
Savita was standing next to me and she’s
from here, so she’s giving running commentary of all that we’re seeing as we
ride by.
“Haan,
to jaisa ke aap dekh rahe hain, yeh humara market hai aur yahan par har cheez
milti hai, jis bhi cheez ki aap ko zaroorat hai, aap ko yahan par mil jayega. Joote,
kapde, khana, peena, khilone, kitaaben, sab kuch. Aur yahan par (points left) aap ko har kisam
ke fruits mil jayenge, ye vala market fruits ke liye mashhoor hai, har kisam ke
fruits, raseeley fruits, ache quality ke fruits yahan par milte hain.Sev, kele,
tarbooz, kharbooze, cheekoo, angoor aur vo sare fruits jo bahar se bhi aate
hain.Fruits hi fruits. Aur yahan par aapke right ko hospital hai jaisa ki aap
dekh rahe hain. Brij Lal Hospital. Yahan par aap apne aap ko theek karva sakte
hain agar aapko koi bimari ho, ya agar aapke dost ko bimari hai to aap unko
yahan la sakte hain, aur bimari nahi bhi ho to aap ja ke dekh sakte hain ki
logon ko kaise theek kiya jata hai. Aur yahan sadak par jaisa ki aap dekh rahe
hain, log chal rahe hain...”
It was very enlightening.
One thing I noticed was that we did get
late, but I felt kinda glad because there were more people in the market places
in the evening than there were in the afternoon (for when the rally was
actually scheduled) and so there was more awareness about the campaign. And
with the response from all the fun people from the markets of Motinagar,
Haldwani and Kathgodam, it made it all the more worthwhile.
We reach St. Teresa’s Sr. Sec. School in
Kathgodam where we are to have the program and after a couple of moments of
playing ‘statue’ for the news photographers, John calls a few of us for the
inter-religious prayer. We reach the stage and John asks me to read the section
from the Bhagwad Gita. I lift the Book, and it’s in Hindi! I completely forgot
that this could be a possibility, even though Hindi is the primary language
here. I had retired my Hindi-side of the brain after the 10th
standard. But I read the verse 3-4 times and it didn’t seem that difficult.
Later I realized that talking to the girls all this while throughout the trip
increased practice and familiarity of the language which made reading it easier
too. If it weren’t for this, I probably wouldn’t have noticed.
I read a passage from the Gita, John
read from the Quran, Monika read from the Guru Granth Sahib and Prashanth read
from the Bible. It just felt like a very cleansed atmosphere there, in a sense,
encompassed by prayer from all sides.. I realized, this was the first time in
our entire journey where it was ‘us’ who held the prayer ceremony. It felt special..
And it was even more special when the accompanying hymn was “Ek Hai Bhagwan”
which drove the point home. I dont know about other people, but I felt really
happy to be part of something so diverse yet uniting at the same time..
Later in the evening, a Taize Prayer
service has been arranged and everyone fills the hall. The only illumination is
the numerous candles adorning the Taize Cross in the front of the hall. The
whole room is replete with silence, a silence blanketed with devotion. The hymns starts and people join in. Very
gentle, soft voices complemented by gentle strings. For that 1 hour or so,
everyone here was lost in the bhakti,
and the collective surrender into prayer through song was a beautiful thing to
witness and experience. If ever you get the opportunity to participate in a
Taize Prayer, seize it. You’ll cherish it.
We come out of the hall after the prayer
and it’s rained a bit bringing down the temperature drastically. I even joked
that Uttarakhand should be renamed Uttarathand
coz it’s so cold here. Hehe..
We go upto our rooms and a cute little pomeranian
is scampering around sniffing us and enjoying the affection. Later we find out
that it’s Sultan’s (from the morning) brother! So it figures that he has the
same approach to asking for love..
Made me think.. Love.. It’s like
prayer.. No matter what language, it’s always the same and just as powerful.. In
words, through song.. Even when it has no words..
Quite profound, isn’t it?
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