Back to the Blue House among the UmonHon

Air France Paris to Miami. a full flight, comfortable and safe flight. a little tedious, 9 h 40 minutes. five minutes for Immigration and less than one minute for Customs at Miami. They are now fingerprinting all non US citizens entering the USA.. 

A nice homecooked Jamaican meal waiting at the home of sister.. delicious.. and then a few short hours of sleep and time to go to the Land of the Indians.. the Indian Country

what all happens in such a short period of time..suddenly the air is different, the food does not taste the same, even the faces are different..

Gone are the fancy cars, well kept houses with tidy lawns... miles of fields now shivering under the cold..and suddenly you arrive at the village of the Indians..

I open the doors of the house where i stay, which we call the Blue House. An Indian patient and his wife had come during my absence and had cleaned the place up.. it was a nice feeling..

The American people in these parts are very friendly.. When I went to rent a car at AVIS the manager says to me, Have not seen you in a while? you would think they have other things to think of rather of worrying about a foreigner coming to their country once in a while.. such is their hospitality, friendliness and they are genuine when they say that..

I am looking forward to the next few days with the Indians, and believe you me, it is just like entering another time and space and i will slowly forget about every thing from that outside world, except of course Paris .. now that i have my homework to do in French...

Normandie, Friends, Food and Nostalgie

I think of the good friends I have made over the years, how did they enter your life, silently, and then become inevitably etched..some arrive and leave soon enough but some others, will stay, regardless of time and distance.. How different it was for our ancestors, who were born, lived and died within miles of their known world.. We are the generation of travellers, first of all genetic travellers, since many of us carry genes from various parts of the world, we are born into places where our parents were strangers, and we grew up in some other part of the world and then studied, more travels.. Lucky are those of us, who can maintain our cultural identity through all this commotion. Some escape this cultural confusion by saying that they are a citizen of the world, more metaphoric than meanigful.. we all belong somewhere.. and as the poet Pablo Neruda has said.. un alma sin raices es injusticia.. a soul without roots is an injustice.. I have always liked people with strong national identity, who did not let geography or politics sway them into believing something else..

Australia, Malaysia, New Zealand, Burma all have given me good friends.. just in that part of the world... the largest number of friends are still in Cuba...with the advent of internet, it has become easier to keep in touch ..

The couple who stay in a farm house which was built in 1750s, she is from Normandie and he is a Breton; what a delightful couple. unpretentious. warm and in their presence, you feel yourself glowing.. i was with them this past weekend.. 

it is a wednesday evening in Paris, tomorrow I fly to Miami, yet another change. Liminality it is called in Anthropology...changing worlds, but full of affections..

Two months of 2009: Two Trips to India, this is the second trip to the USA.. just sit back and enjoy..

and of course, this is France, there is always good food, a nice bottle of wine.. just add lustre to the friendship..

Three things the Blind Astrologer wanted me to do in India

Dear Friends:

I was in India for six days, but in three states, three cities and three nights spent on trains!

 

The Blind Astrologer had wanted me to do three things

A ceremony or a ritual in which prayers would be said for me and Morgan.

 

For to find my Birthmother and ask her for blessings.

 

To go pray in my ancestral temple..

 

All are metaphorical in that, the language is Indian, so I decided to translate it to my lifestyle.

 

I had five days... I was in Paris... 8000 km away...

 

Saw Slum Dog Millionaire. Have written a long review and emotional response to it. I don’t remember being affected by an Indian movie like this.

 

So I left for India the next day. Last of Breton crepes for a while, flew from Paris to Chennai/Madras.

Two in the morning, and friends are waiting for you at the Airport... they have full time jobs but they feel happy to welcome you to their country and their town.

 

 Met again with the Blind Astrologer; he did a ceremony for Morgan and Me.

How can he know so much about me?

The mother who brought you up is in Malaysia, I request that you go and see her between April 15^th and may 5^th. Can you do that? he asked

 

Then took the train to Bangalore and made an effort to find my birthmother, which I did.

Don’t wish to hold any grudges or resentments. But it is not a relationship, but a physiological tie... She did a syncretic religious ceremony for me, invoking every single pantheon of gods known to man...

When she was chanting, I closed my eyes, and I felt I was back with American Indians and that my friends were chanting for me. Some tears came to my eyes. My Hocank Indian sister Georgia would be very happy to know that I am with one of my mothers; like American Indians I do have more than one mother, they have the same respect and love for all their mothers; I wish I could say that.

She also did a ceremony to drive away evil eye, and I did the ceremonies much more for her, since she felt very happy doing it. Ritual and satisfaction.

 

On to Cochin. Saw all the people I needed to see. Lit the Shabbat candles at the home of Sarah Cohen. One of the last Jews alive there. Morgan had asked me to pray at the tomb of Nehemiah Motta, a learned man from 16^th century whose tomb has become a prayer spot for all religions.

 

While I was standing in front of the tomb, praying, for MM, two Israeli one sefardi and another Ashkenazi came over and wanted to interview me for a university project they are doing on Cochin Jews... I talked about the necessity of rituals...

Alon the sefardi of Moroccan origin asked me: if you don’t mind can I ask you what you were praying for.. I told him, I am praying to fulfill the requests of a blind astrologer.

 

What do you think about praying at this tomb? He asked.. I gave him a shpiel about symbols and rituals etc.. Then he said: I want to ask you one final thing, since you are an anthropologist...

 

How does the body react when you come home for the weekend?

I knew immediately what he wanted to know.., coming home for an Israeli soldier for a weekend...

 

Depending upon the country, I continued... In Israel, you come home for the weekend; the body will incorporate much of what has happened in the society and also the comforts of the society within that home...

 

When I go home to Tiberius, as I enter my house, my body becomes completely relaxed, I am another person, thank you for explaining... about Israel to me… said this sabra whose ancestors ,  like many of yours who would be reading this, were wanderers in Asia, Europe and the Middle East…

 

After getting back to Sarah’s house, I attended to some patients who had come to see me, Sarah insisting that everything must finish by 6 10 pm as the Shabbat started and she has a woman who after that for the next 24 hours would switch on and off her lights. The last act she does before psychologically retiring from the noise and commotion and activities of the week before and week ahead... is to light the candle, say silently her prayers…

 

I had examined a 62 year old lady, who is the mother in law of a person who looks after Sarah Cohen, our mischpochah, yours and mine, in Cochin in India... She has a dense cataract and I promised her that I would pay the expenses for that cataract... (Removal of cataract and lens implantation can be done in Cochin for a mere 80 usd…something many of us spend on a dinner)...

 

Today is Sunday 22 February 2009... Slum Dog may win the Oscar... I saw it last Sunday in Paris at a metroplex near Montmartre... the reaction in India towards the film is quite different from the adulation it has received in the west... many people are secretly ashamed that the westerners would see the reality of India.. Rather than the glossy Incredible India posters of the Tourist Office...Indians in India are so easily offended by anything negative about their country, it is a deeply ingrained inferiority complex...

 

I hope SlumDog...succeeds which is an exciting movie and the book which I have finished reading in the train and bus journeys of this week, is even more exciting by Vikas Swarup…who is a diplomat for the Government of India.   Hope Slumdog wins… it would do more good to India than all the glossy  Incredible India! And the insipid God’s Own Country slogans and posters have done for it... Be Humble, I say to my Hindou friends, be humble and accept the reality... there is talent in this country much more than the crappy movies of glitter and glamour with no sense of reality that they churn out... like the literature that is coming out of India...hopefully SlumDog would also be a turning point in the movie making in India..

 

I especially thought of three good friends of mine in Kuala Lumpur: MunChing, Abid Hussain and his lovely wife Sharmistha Banerjee... I remember Abid saying to me... when ARRahman who is nominated for Oscar for Music, if and when he wins, I would be proud, said Abid, as an Indian, I would be proud that an Indian could reach some honourable heights..  Congratulations to you Abid and Sharmistha…

 

At the tomb of Nehemiah Motta, I prayed for my mischpochah… which is all of you…

May the Spirits bring us all together... Bring contentment and take away any misery...

 

I am flying Air France tonight from Bangalore to Charles De Gaulle Airport in Paris.

My dear friends, I am going home to my wau, like the UmonHon Indians would say.

 

Yehuda Kovesh

 

(Dr Shaheb, Brother to two Indians: Georgia Gomez of Hocank and Sylvia Lopez of Kickapoo)(One British Jamaican)(One Ashkenazi and many sefardim… and lots of Cubans)

My Israeli Brother, Shimon, husband of Avital wrote to me recently:

 

My dear Sudah!

….Did you know that Kovesh in Hebrew could also be interpreted as: enchanting, captivating, and wonderful. And if you add "Kovesh Levavot" (hearts) it literally translates to a captor of hearts, or lady's man, Don Juan!!!....Now try to put that on your business card.

 

See you in Miami, UmonHon and HoCank countries in March. In La Habana in April.

 

 

 

Welcome to France and to 2009

It is by the sacrifices you do for another person that you would be judged on the capacity to help that person.

I have always done what I wanted, but however I have been lucky. People who do things only for themselves cannot be satisfied, like Rabbi Hillel said: if you are only for yourself, what are you? but to combine your profession into one in which your desire to help others is combined with your desires which helps you connect with the greater universe, which the Indians call the Spirituality. If you are not for yourself, rabbi Hillel continued, who will be for you?

And there is no time like the present time. If not now, when, asked the sage.

It is this concept of not wanting to be a participant in “If not now, when that many of the westerners or those people who espouse western way of thinking, can look at the future gloomily. A New Zealand psychiatrist had written : people are waiting for the curtain to open and the stage to reveal what will happen, what they don’t realize that the curtains are already drawn and we are the actors and on stage. And we are our own scriptwriters, we write what we want to say and when the script writer has packed up and gone home, the actor on the stage, ourselves, have nothing to say, looks around for someone to prompt to say something. Un alma sin raices es una injusticia, the poet must have echoed the same sentiments.. a soul without roots is an injustice.

I have always sacrificed for a group of people. Poor people of Jamaica, then American Indians and many many other poor people.. but the rewards have been many and I am judged by many by the rewards that have come my way, rather than the original intentions of mine which brought those rewards without being asked for. So they ogled at my comfortable life in Jamaica but not at the long days at the clinics in the countryside over rough roads where I had to comfort and give medicines to 100 patients per day..They praised the food cooked by my neighbor the chef on dinners that I put out every night in Cuba, without realizing that Cuba was one great sacrifice: financially, emotionally and chronologically. Everything was a gift. I carry that within my self. The first ever gift was Australia. Intellectual curiosity of Sweden was the next; the open mindedness of Americans came next, Anthropological education, medical education in Miami, one gift after another…but the greatest gift in my life of course is that I am a Jew.

2006 a great gift arrived at my doorstep. I was so overblown by it, that I remember clearly telling my nurse at the Indian clinic: I am sorry I can no longer work, I must go home and I will come back later..

This particular gift compares with the four greatest gifts in my life: being a Jew, being an Australian, being a doctor to the Indians and living in Cuba…these are ambient materialistic immoveable quantificable parameters, the presents that repeat themselves are the friends who have traipsed through my life…

2007 France  2008 Cambodia and Malaysia and Austalia and as I begin 2009, I know in my heart it would be France once again.

 

Friends, I have to be where I am needed and I am of more use

Where I get, in return the connection to the universe of human beings..

Yes, in 2009, I will visit Eretz Israel to see my nephew Shmulik and also my dear younger brother Shimon and his bride Avital.

Yes, in 2009, I will visit Malaysia to visit my best friend in Asia, MunChing and all the new friends I have made in Malaysia which has become my second home after France.

Yes, in 2009, I will visit Australia, even if it is just to see my friend Sandra and her husband..

Yes, in 2009, I will visit Cuba, to visit my colleagues and my daughter and relive the glorious moments of that moveable feast that was cuba for me.

Yes, in 2009, I will visit Miami, to be with my sister Jacqui, who is more than a sister to me.

Yes, in 2009, it would be also an year of Mothers; my birth mother in India, my other mother in Malaysia, my Cuban mother in la Havana..

Yes, in 2009, it would also be an year of Sisters: my sister Jackie, my sister Dar in Yakima, my Indian sisters, Georgia of Hocank and Sylvia of the Kickapoo (who said, you don’t travel alone, good spirits travel with you). There is a group of five women, I think of as one, all UmonHon Indians, one way or another: Vida, Mitexi, MiHusa, Noni and Michele.  I know I will see them all..in 2009

But in 2009, France will be my home, that is where I would be, my body and my soul and my heart, to be particular, Paris, France; at the little house in  Ave Jeanne by the Seine.

Saudade for Baracoa

stars have falen out of the sky

adding their glitter to the silent ocean

this night, we wait under the light of the moon

for the stars to reappear

clouds go by, the moon escapes from its grip

the stars in the water rejoice

our hearts are nets into which these stars

fall as we sail across these waters

its presence only to remind us that 

distances exist between us

and that which will be... overcome

our tears are the same, we are the same for the moment

the sky, the moon, teh stars have swallowed us

we have become part of each other, with indelible

impressions of our love stamped into each other

What all Happens in the Course of One Day?

WHAT ALL HAPPENS IN THE COURSE OF  A DAY

Guruji speaks in his broken tones on a clear telephone call from Madras; he wants to do a Pooja, a kind of prayer.. Yes Please, there is no better way than that to evict  bad luck..

News from KT of a PAS victory, a shot in the arm for Malaysian Democracy.

Skype to the rescue, conversations with clear tones to countries to the East.

Getting ready to go to Omaha. 10 50 am Discover that the Rental Car parked in front of the Blue House has been vandalized… 1105 the Policeman is here. Random Vandalism of the Bored Youth… Called Avis 100 miles away to report the damage, both back windows broken and the tyres let out of air.. Exactly two hours later, remember it takes 90 minutes to get to the Blue House from Omaha, a tow truck arrives with a replacement car.  This kind of service you get only in the United States.. Happy to rent from Avis.. over and over again..

A patient calls. Tell him about the vandalism. He lives 30 miles away. Within half an hour he is here. Checking out. Then begins to shovel the snow and clear the path. Sits and chats.

I follow him in my new rental car, to Olive Garden, a kind of an Italian Franchise Mall restaurant.. his favourite he says..I have never been there.. not much of a fan of Americanized food.. he orders Spaghetti with tomato sauce and I have gnocchi Veronese thinking of the days in Buenos Aires..

The night falls quickly. The gorgeous sunset turns into dark night within a few minutes. Snow on the ground but the air has warmed up from its frigid minus 18 F temperature of a couple of days ago.

Now writing these notes.. thinking of my home in Paris, my friends in Malaysia, Japan and my family here and there and as always about Cuba… 

The Shoe maker of Pondichery

The shoe maker  of Pondicherry

I had visited this erstwhile French colony in 2004, and just around the corner from the boutique hotel (now undergoiong reparations) was a hole in the wall leather worker and shoe maker. I remember pointing out to the model I wanted and within a day the sandals were ready, which I use still. The price was 600 inr ( about 20 usd of that day)..

Rue suffren is a leafy street with French mansions on both side of the street. A distinct French touch to it. You know that you are in India and at the same time, wonder where in India you are. 

I remembered the shoemaker but did not remember where his shop was. While exploring the street, taking pictures of the various French colonial homes, I found myself standing in front of the hole in the wall, hand made shoe factory that is what it was any way. Two workers bent over the task, and the owner, in conversation with two westerners buying a pair of open sandals for the heat and comfort of this country.

I pointed out to the same model, and asked the price, 600 INR he replied..( about 11 usd of today)…then I told him the story after the westerners had departed.

Four years ago, I was here and I bought a pair made and the price was 600 and I was expecting to hear the price of shoes have gone up to 800 or 900 rupees.. He looks at my face carefully and makes a mental nod as if he had recognized it.. he said.. Yes it is still 600 inr and I have not put up the price.

An Indian customer comes for repair of her sandals and he talks to her for while and then turns his attention to me..  I remember your face now. How long before you can make another pair for me?  Tomorrow evening it would be ready, said he.

And I realized that this man is one honest man.. in a country where Le Meridien charges 750 rupees per day for Internet access, The cunning autorikshaw wallahs charging whatever they want and then some more. Asking around for the price of handmade belts… 200 rupees sir.. what? They are being sold for 600 to 900 rupees at stores as Casablanca.. I realixed that he is content with his business which gives him a good livelihood and that he does have to be avaricious like the autorikshaw driver to try and extrat a few rupees and thus the bad feelings as well of the people visiting Pondicherry.

I ordered two pairs of sandals.. one to leave in Paris and the other in Miami; five pairs of sandals for my friends, all in all a princely sum of  3800 rupees for seven pairs of sandals handmade by Mr Shoe maker of Pondicherry. I will pick the products of his manual dexterity, which I was privileged to enjoy for the past four years, occasionally when I wore the sandals from Pondicherry.. I will pick them up on my way out of the city of Pondicherry.. taxi to madras and Air France to Paris…

The next day, after attending an exhibition at Annexe Colambani of Alliance Francaise, I came by this shop to get my shoulder bag repaired, and an extra latch added. After he finished his work, I wanted to pay.. he said: small small work sir, no need to pay..

 

Can you believe this is in India, in a tourist town?

I will find out more about him and his family and left him my visiting card which he displayed prominently. On the wall was an advertisement for a taxi service , since it might be his friend, I wanted to ask him for the taxi service, and his reply stunned me.. Sir, he is my friend, but he always charges the foreigners two hundred rupees extra so I think you should go to the Taxi Stand and organize a ride for yourself. Which I did and was able to get an airconditioned Ambassador to take us to Madras , into the city, to visit our good friend Srini and his family before going to the international departure section of the Madras airport…

M Mumurty, Give and Take Leather Products, No 20 rue suffren, Pondichery. Mobile Phone 9790667710