Ice Snow in the Indian Country

The village where i am now is eerily quiet, nary a vehicle or sound ..This morning, I noticed that the steps in front of the house where I am staying is slicker than usual and after warming up the car drove towards the Clinic. More like Sailing in that the car had no grip of the road and it was swaying. I was so deeply engrossed in listening to BBC world services that i was taken out of reverie only when the car spun around in front of the clinic.. I noticed that two indians in another car were keeping a respectable distance.. they told me later, perhaps spirits will protect you but you are a danger to others..

No one was at the clinic, and the clinic was shut down.. Now the problem of getting back to the house. Someone suggested that i leave the car there and get a ride with them, which i did. The photo shows the darkening skies of the morning and pictures taken of the same scenery at 6 pm, when the mellowing sun had decided to peek out.

Like the Indians say, never take Nature for granted, always listen to its pulse... you can have BBC another day..

Culture of Poverty

The Culture of Poverty

Today is March 9^th, 2009 and I am in the richest country. (By their own reckoning and calculations.) But I am amidst a very disadvantaged part of that population. This is not Japan... you would know why if you are to read the just published book,

The Spirit Level: Why More Equal Societies Almost Do Better by Richard Wilkinson and Kate Pickett. Allen Lane, 297 pages. In a review, it was written: Within the rich world, where destitution is rare, countries where incomes are more evenly distributed have longer lived citizens and lower rates of obesity, delinquency, depression and teenage pregnancy than richer countries where wealth is more concentrated.

So I am in a rich country, with a distribution of wealth similar to many Latin American countries, but without much destitution...Poverty yes, but not destitution, the kind one would see in SlumDog Millionaire!

I met a 35 year old from the Culture of Poverty today.

What is Culture of Poverty? Anthropologists would immediately recognize this sociological moniker of Oscar Lewis.

The culture of poverty concept is a social theory explaining the cycle of poverty. Based on the concept that the poor have a unique value system, the culture of poverty theory suggests the poor remain in poverty because of their adaptations to the burdens of poverty. (From Wikipedia)

The culture of Poverty is not just about MONEY and income but as many thinkers have pointed out, it is about values which are upheld by the society and also by individuals in that society. Those of us who are travelers would agree with my Meskwaki teacher, who told me... We may be poor, but we have our culture; we don’t mind poverty, we can deal with it, but it is misery that we don’t like. Recent excellent literature in English from India, (Vikas Swarup: Six Suspects; Arvind Adiga: The White Tiger) mould the characters with the motto: it is not just about poverty but Suffering…

Let me tell you about this representative of the culture of poverty. He had a nonchalant way of talking, the friendly way of talking of his people. He is 35 years old. He was happy to see me, having come to get some medications from the Pharmacy. He has not taken any medications (which he receives free of charge) since he left the job because he did not like the rules and regulations and the control the supervisor had over his work habits. (He was the janitor at a Clinic). He had been to the Casino, and had won some money, 1500 USD and has been in a splurging mood, and he and his wife has been out drinking each night and also visiting popular all you can eat restaurants in the vicinity. He looked at his watch and said, can’t wait to leave to go back to the city for some drinks and food.

The nurse opens the door and slips me the result of his blood sugar, it was over 525 mg/dl, a level at which any “normal” person would be suffering enough to be admitted to a hospital. Are you OK, yes, I feel fine…

He then began ranting and raving about his wife’s 18 year old son, who has dropped out of school, and thus depriving himself of a chance to learn a skill, ability to exercise his body by playing football...Now, I am told, he stays in bed during the day, at night gallivants around, with other in his age group..

Where is his father? I asked. His father lives nearby with his new wife and a daughter who is 16 years old. This boy used to live with them, but the father had kicked him out of his house after the boy made the girl (who is the daughter of the wife of his father) pregnant and before he turned 18, he was already a father. Now with no education, no skills, depending upon his mother for his daily expenses, this young boy stare into a future of darkness.

When I was his age, I was working, I was responsible, did the chores around the house, my new friend continued. This kid does not lift a finger, sleeps most of the day, does not prepare food for himself, throws something into the microwave oven and waits for his mother to prepare him something to eat in the evening and give him some money to go out and have fun with his friends.

My friend, to whom I had just administered 10 units of Insulin to bring his high blood sugar down, said... Soon after my sixteenth birthday, my girlfriend who was 16 at that time gave birth to my daughter... I worked hard and always provided for the girl who is now 19...

Words of a soldier of the culture of poverty, who at 35 is already a grandfather (his stepson has a one year old daughter!)...Unemployed and very soon unemployable, with no great skill to offer the society, and his health failing. (Even though he has type 2 Diabetes which affects adults, he has had this diabetes since he was 19 years old and is already beginning to show signs of complications such as early blindness!)…he has already created directly or indirectly another generation to carry on this legacy of poverty... Money, Job will not carry him out of the hole he has dug in the society, the very same society which discriminated against him and he is paying it back by becoming a burden and creating another generation of burden... and he will have the greatest revenge… by dying early... to hit this competitive society where the material production is most valued, he dies and deprives the society of its investment on him, whatever little it was. He will not pay them back and even in his death, he will continue to demand payments for those he had created…

I felt immensely sad. A life without hope. A darkness. And this in the richest country, he has become the measurement of the crimes the society as committed: dropping out of school, teenage pregnancy, alcoholism, early death.

“Society prepares the crime, wrote Adolphe Quetelet, a Belgian statistician, in 1835, and the guilty person is only the instrument.”

So I present to you, the instrument of the Culture of Poverty.

Who comes to your Blog and reads them? NEOMETER

Just a few days ago I added this NEOCOUNTER to the blog. I never thought many people would have the time or inclination to read random postings, but it was nice to see that in a few days time, 55 people had visited the site, and more people had looked at the profile.. but what is interesting is that these people were from 24 different countries.. that is the power of Internet, something like this would have been impossible without the internet.. Diversity and Velocity.. this is our world now

By the way i got the neometer from an excellent blog of an armchair traveller who has interesting things about travel and sites and geography at his site

http://armchairtravelogue.blogspot.com/2009/02/strange-town-of-setenil.html

all the best and i would also make an effort to read other people's blogs.. just to show that someone is taking time to read what they write...

Jiddu in India and Rachel in Hong Kong...

A mind which is seeking permanency soon stagnates.. said JKM.

But like moths to the light, we are standing in line to conform. Here he is talking about the mind, but for most of us, we don’t even reach the level of thinking about it..we are trying to preserve our bodies and their integrity, mainly by providing it by comfort, mainly by coveting money, mainly sacrificing everything else.. in the end a life of very little consequence. An absence of life which took up some space, reproduced and left some evidence behind!

I meet people like this in Asia, in the name of Family, they destroy the uniqueness of the individual. They have thought only about money, what to do with it when they have it, and while they don’t how to accumulate it and what is that they must do to accumulate it.. discretion, good taste, enjoying the aesthetics are not part of the picture here..

Why are people so keen to follow this? They are willing to sacrifice themselves and their ideals for this, this idea of a future, where they would be healthy and happy.

In her book, Theatre of the Mind, the Paris based New Zealand Psychiatrist had written, most people are waiting as if the stage is about to open and they would feast on some show, without realizing that their life is the show and they are already on stage, only that they have forgotten their lines.. the scriptwriter without a training has left his job and gone, now the grown up man or woman faces a situation in which they are forced to imitate what the others say, rather than have the courage to think for themselves..

All this while being selfish. Selfish to an extreme. In the end what? If those surrounding you, closer to you cant love you, what about the humanity which you have completely ignored, do you expect them to love you? and are you going to the grave knowing that not many people loved you and that you played no significant part in any ones life, including your own children?

There is something of a connection between Security and Decay, you can achieve security only through some process of corruption and decay. That which has stalled cannot bring you happiness, that which is moving, the mind, which is fluid, which is open, will be happy..

But how many of us have courage to do that? to be free like that?

Written after getting an email from Rachel in Hong Kong who likes Jiddu Krishnamurti, one of the lesser appreciated Indian philosophers. This note is  dedicated to her.

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.