Lady with the Lotus - Sojourn in Sigiriya, Sri Lanka

Originally published 9/10/07 on Desicritics

Image courtesy of Desicritics

“No flash! No Flash!” It was too late. I had already captured the Lady of the Lotus on film as well as many of her companions, all half nude and gorgeous. I thought the guide would rip the film from my camera. Instead he actually held my left elbow and moved me along the narrow rock trail of Sigiriya and lectured me. “Light destroys color. Picture is 479 AD.” He said the last as ‘Ayedeee’. I felt bad and said that I had moved the setting from flash to auto, but clouds and shade at the instant I took the picture brought the flash. Sorry. I like my color picture better than the black and white one in Ajit Mookerjee’s The Arts of India, 1966! But his is pretty good too. I actually missed the lotus in his picture the first time I saw it.

So where in the world is this place? Sigiriya, or Sinhagiri, or Sihagiri which means ‘lion of the rock’. It is in Sri Lanka. What a wonder it is. Ayers Rock in Australia is grand but this stone, this monolith is huge and appeared black when I first saw the massive rock with the sun behind it. It rises out of the green steaming jungle like a supine lion. It compares to Machu Picchu or the Masada. The latter comparisons are appropriate in that both were places of human settlement, on the rocks, as was Sigiriya.

Our party spent the night in the Sigiriya Village Hotel. The rooms were wonderful, though we did have to ask for bug spray. Buzzing mosquitoes in the room make for whining, irritable, unhappy campers. The next day our gang of four was deposited at the base of the big rock and we began our hike to the top. The first two hundred feet were relatively easy. That is where I got into trouble taking pictures of the naked women. The rest of the climb was up to us. The guide had been up those metal ladders a hundred times and we did not look like the type that would leave a big tip. He glanced up at the top, at the snaking, spiraling metal rungs and ladders that stuck to the face of the rock like clinging ivy. He smiled politely and left, shaking his head and muttering, perhaps some words like pagal amni.

Up, up we climbed. No big deal as long as you don’t look down. Stretches of the climb were steps carved into the rock itself which were shiny with a paten of hundreds of thousands of feet that had polished it since the 5th. Century. On top at last! At one time there was a small city at Sigiriya. There are cisterns and baths, foundations for many rooms, strolling areas, cooking areas, (slave quarters were down below, they had to commute-climb to work each day). The drop-off was something to write home about. It had claimed the lives of quite a few, we were told, including unhappy princesses and concubines left all alone, perched high above the jungle floor, their lord and masters slain in a fraternal war.

The legends of Sigiriya feature Kasyapa, who according to some was a security nut who used the rock as an impregnable palace. Our guide had mentioned that this usurper of the throne of Anuradhapura loved beautiful women. He had five hundred of them, each one more beautiful than the other. And he was really smart; he had their pictures drawn on the rock surfaces, kind of a Playboy fresco thing. Really, that is what the guide said. I think Kasyapa had read about Solomon of old who had a thousand, but had never left any pictures to prove it. Was Kasyapa an ancient historical role model for Hugh Hefner?

Solomon of old, wise old Solomon reputedly had a thousand wives, but that is just a story that emerged from the Old Testament. No pictures please. (Muslim and ancient Jewish guys didn’t like to have other men snoop around in their private zennanah or harems. Some covered up their women so only their eyes could be seen. They had strong religious inhibitions against displaying the female form.) But one of Solomon’s favorites was enshrined in history in the Song of Solomon. His words still have a pretty good ring to them. “Thy navel is like a round goblet, which wanteth not liquor... Thy two breasts are like two young roes that are twins...Thy neck is a tower of ivory... How fair and how pleasant art thou, O love, for delights.” Wow!

Kasyapa left no flowery words behind, he paid artists to draw his beauties. The Lady with the Lotus is a knock-out. Let me name her Sita. When I see her there, high on the cliff above the jungle far below I say, “Tell me, female of the forest, who thou be and whence thy birth. Much I fear thou art a Raksha wearing various forms on earth.” (From Romesh C Dutt’s translation - Book 6, The Ramayana, Sita Lost). She holds a lotus flower that I had not noticed at first. Typical occidental reaction, the prurient first, the artistic second and the meaning behind it all, the religious connotations, last. “To the oriental and especially the Buddhist, the lotus flower is sacred and its blossom is filled with meaning. For the occidental this flower contains little more than satisfying beauty.” (William Ward, The Lotus Symbol: Its meaning in Buddhist Art and Philosophy, 1952, page 135.)

The historical version that is least liked in Sri Lanka is the one put forward on Remyc.com.

“Think Devil Tower with a health spa on top. “Rising 650 feet out of the ground, this Eighth Wonder of the World, long believed to be the fortress of a mad king, has been revealed for what it really was: a Tantric sex initiation. King Kasyapa had 500 wives. He was a 5th Century Hugh Hefner. Sigiriya was his Playboy Mansion.”

I found it very disappointing to read in this person’s account that he had never even been there. Terrible. Playboy themes sell.

One who did visit at a time when the pictures on the walls were fresh was John Still who in 1907 observed that; “The whole face of the hill appears to have been a gigantic picture gallery...the largest picture in the world perhaps. The pictures covered an area, 140 meters long and 40 meters high, and there is ancient graffiti which refers to the 500 ladies in these paintings."

The story goes that later on, this glorious wall of paintings became a disturbance, a distraction. Sigirya had become a religious monastery, and the young monks kept sneaking down to take a peek and neglected their holy books and uplifting thoughts. You have it, most of the best pictures, frescos, were destroyed. That hurts philosophically. Remember the Bamiyan Buddhas that were destroyed because of religious zeal? Amazing!

The gardens at the foot of the monolith are beautifully laid out. In their hay day they must have been stunning, filled with jasmine and rat ki rani; the fair ladies must have taken excursions down from their high life to stroll and sit beside the pools and listen to the birds and watch the peacocks strut. The gardens have three aspects, Water, Cave and Boulders. The water gardens are the most sophisticated in design and water fountains work today that were designed long, long ago. A visit to them will give a grounded perspective to Sigiriya.

I took out my photograph of the Lady with the Lotus from the album yesterday. The Ektachrome colors have faded; she looks pale, washed out. There is only one way to fix it. I must visit Sri Lanka again, this time with a digital camera so I can download Sita and make her my screen saver.

Sita’s Dream

The lotus seed sinks into muck

Sleeps, then awakens from calls of ancient past

Listening, it stirs, shudders open and puts forth

Green tender leaves seeking sun and air

The lotus lies deep within black ooze

Awakens, draws life and strength from dark decay

Raises a brave and jubilant head within a day

Lifts its gold-pink face to kiss the sky

Adapted from Rhododendron Wine Factory, Memoirs of a Wanderer, by Harold Bergsma, March 2006

Do Asiatic Lions Still Roar in Gir?

Originally published 9/07/07 on Desicritics
Image courtesy of http://www.predatorconservation.com/

It is hard to believe we did this! We pitched a tent in an isolated area of a game reserve in lion country. I was awakened by the terrifying sound of a lion roaring. I was sure it was in the tent with us. There are few things as awe inspiring, or should I say exciting as hearing a lion roar in the wild. It is an instant adrenaline high. The hair stood up on the back of my neck.
Another time I was strolling along on a visit to the Lahore Zoo and stood bored and feeling sad for the scraggly, thin, lethargic 'Asiatic' lion there. He must have picked up on my intense stare and started to roar. In seconds I was surrounded by kids and their families all looking wide-eyed. I could understand how lady lions would be impressed.

The Maldharis who live in the Gir Forest in small gatherings called, 'ness' listen to the roars of the majestic Asiatic Lion almost on a daily basis. The lions regularly eat their cattle too. Perhaps they are used to the roars. It's a jungle out there! But the Maldharis don't want to leave the Gir reserve which they consider home, a place to graze their cattle. Dionne Bunsha's article, "A kingdom too small" presents an excellent review of the present, sad condition of the Asiatic Lion, the last remnant of a once large and widely distributed sub-species. Truly, their kingdom is too small, and the kings are too few, now some three hundred individuals. But it was not always this way. Once upon a time, the Asiatic lion really was the lion king.

The Asian Lion roamed a vast territory ranging from Greece through the Middle East and part of North Africa all the way down to India. This lion has been the focus of literature, the inspiration of religious texts, the model for motifs of entire kingdoms and the inspiration of poets and religious leaders in the middle east, south east Asia and even China. I often wondered where the Chinese got the model for their strange lions, you remember, the ones that stand guarding gates; stone lions poised menacingly at leading restaurants. The male Chinese lion is represented by a stylized lion with a ball under its foot; the female lion with a lion cub under her foot. Legend has it that the female's nipples are on her feet. How in the world did Chinese artists come to depict the lion that way? The answer of course; the Indian or Asiatic lion. Buddhists regard the lion as a protector of truth, a defender against evil. But, the Chinese had no lions of their own, you say. Correct, but the Silk Road, and the advance of Buddhism carried the images from India where the real lion roamed. The King of Parthia, in 87 AD gave China a gift of lions as China had none of its own.

In Indian art history lions are shown supporting Buddha's throne. Those lions are more realistic than the Chinese depiction of lions. On India's Republic Day the streets of the capital are filled with lion images. TheAshoka pillar, a symbol of the state of India, is surmounted by four lions with manes crouching back to back.

The word Singh, derived from the Sanskrit simha is a name that rings out in Indian history. It rings a note of recognition in other parts of the world. In fact the word was on CNN yesterday. Bearded men with turbans were being stopped in American airports and being requested to remove their turbans. It is hard to pat down certain areas. (I wondered about the Kachk, Kara or Kirpan that are traditionally worn by many, which are made of metal?) Many variations of the name meaning lion appear. Singh! Sinhagiri, (lion of the rock) Sinh, Simha, or in Gujarati, sawaj. I knew one other name for the Asian lion as I grew up and I think it is the best one by far, babbar sher; it has a princely ring to it that Rajas liked; Bir Narsing Kunwar (Nepal 1816), and later Shumsher Jang-Bahadur Rana. Kipling put the Tiger and the Leopard in the minds of his readers, worldwide, with the names of two other cool cats, Bagheera and Sher Khan. The Persians would smile, knowing that the name originated with them, shir. But the Persians did not have a monopoly on giving the lion a name. The Greek, leon sounds familiar, as does the Roman leo. The Lion King shamelessly picked up on it all and made a killing.

The Asiatic leo was the emotional experience of folks living around the Mediterranean and the Middle East throughout recorded history. What images are conjured up when you hear the words 'Lion of Judah' or 'Daniel in the Lions' Den' 'Richard the Lion-Hearted' or 'Bishan Bedi, lion-hearted cricketer'? How many great Indian leaders carried the name Singh?
It becomes an emotional journey to read of the historical distribution of the Asiatic Lion, 'last know lion killed in Tunisia in 1891' 'last known lion in Turkey killed in 1870' 'last know in Iran in 1942' last know lion in Pakistan killed near Kot Beji in Sind province in 1810' 'fifty lions were killed in the district of Delhi between1856-58'! Twenty five years later Blanford (1891) wrote that in India the lion is on the verge of extinction'. During the British Raj, the gora sahibs would engage in shikar, wonderful events hosted by local potentates with the lion in their name, the trophy in their mind. But not only did the Brits kill thousands of animal, so did many Maharajas. Mahesh Rangarajan, a well known historian of ecological change, documents amazing exploits of Indian rulers. One in particular, a certain Sadul Singh, Maharajkumar of Bikaner (1936) kept a Diary for over a quarter of a century recording all his shoots. "Nearly 50,000 head of animals and a further 46,000 game birds fell to his gun. Among these were 33 tigers... and a lone Asiatic lion." (See India's Wildlife History, Mahesh Ranagarajan, Permanent Black, p 160, Rs 250) Hapless animals would be slaughtered and the proud hunters would have their photo taken sitting behind the poor dead lion, or tiger. I have a wonderful old book, still available on Amazon.com, The Last Empire (1855-1911) by Ainslie Embre, in which there is a picture of a bored looking King Edward and a Raja posing behind a tiger. Such pictures were all the rage for those who served in India, as were carpets made of skins of animals, especially lion rugs that had a mounted skull with mouth wide open. As a child I loved to lie on the rug and reach over and put my fingers into the gaping maw and feel the teeth. Honestly.

Soon there were few lions left. Some attempts were made to breed the Asian Lion with the African Lion, to give it a genetic boost, so to speak. It was a bad mistake. Very soon it was discovered that the offspring developed all sorts of problems, including insanity. During one period about 200 of these Asiatic lions were sent to various zoos in different parts of the world as a program to insure the survival of the sub-species. "In the mid 1980s it was found that some Asian lions exported to the USA from the Trivandrum Zoo India, were Asian/African hybrids. Paul Joslin, former assistant director of Chicago's Brookfield Zoo had noticed that many "Asian " lions in US zoos lacked the telltale belly fold. He also noticed an increase in infant mortality which is indicative of inbreeding depression." There is a detailed description of the 'analysis of mitochondrial DNA which showed, that in fact these were hybrids. So the preservation efforts ended in having to sterilize all the breeding males. They will live out their sterile existence and their majestic once sexy roars will now be not much more than an impotent whimpers.

At the present time in Indian zoos, there may be dozens of 'retired' lions who have not been euthanized because of India's official prohibition about killing such animals. There are two categories for euthanasia, active and passive. The passive variety allows animals. Monkeys, dogs, cats and cattle are ignored, get by, survive on their own and eventually die off, or disease decimates a population. But the sterilized and inferior retired lions are a privileged group who enjoy a decent, sterile, segregated life with ample food until their death do us part. Humans, however, can be cruel to each other, kill off each other, kill off unwanted female children, but official policy prohibits such, and hopefully attempts to establish an environment for all life which is one of respect and preservation will prevail. Hopefully there are not many rajas or vast land owners around who still enjoy the shikar and kill off large numbers of game animals.

Now these magnificent lions are confined to a small area, the Gir Forest in Gujarat, some three hundred of them or fewer. Their future hangs in the balance; their fate rests in the hands of scientists and conservationists who seek to preserve them. It is not an easy task. The Asiatic lion in the Gir Forest now enjoys heightened world awareness. The extinction of this fine carnivore would be a world tragedy. This sub-species once roamed widely but was the victim of a number of factors that led to its being protected in a tiny area. What killed off the lions?

1. Human population explosions, increased farming, the cutting of trees and slaughter of game species was a major factor in the rapid decline of these lions. If people and carnivores compete for the same resources, guess who wins.

2. Trophy hunting systematically caused the demise of regional populations of lions. "Fifty lions in the Delhi area!"

3. Superstition and ill founded belief that lion body parts have magical properties resulted in animals being collected for sale to male Chinese people who wanted increased potency and sexual stamina. Lions are sexy creatures that mate as many as thirty times a day so it figures; if you eat certain parts ... It could be called imitative magic.

4. Climate change brings about habitat change, deforestation, desertification, lack of water supplies, all of which kills off the animals.

5. Parasites and insect pests can kill off entire prides of lions. From time to time there is a scourge of biting flies that torment lions so intensely that they have little appetite for game.
6. Anthrax, rabies and other diseases can wipe out animals.

7. Human pollution of environments with drugs, (remember the vultures) toxic wastes which pollute the water, the land and food sources kill off predators.

8. Sub-species and cross species breeding programs can create genetic monsters, infertility and non-viable populations of lions. In-breeding weakens the gene pool.

It is amazing with all that going against them that there are a few Asiatic lions left in the Gir. International conservation bodies and the Indian government are setting up a variety of approaches to preserve, protect and enhance the survival of this lion. It may be working; there may be hope. Lions are leaving the preserve and expanding their own territory. A few have even been reported on distant beaches far from their Gir Forest reserve. Their will to survive, to search for new territory, to establish new colonies are encouraging signs.

There is a sparkling new book about all of this written by an expert with a name to match - The Story of Asia's Lions, by Divyabhanusinh; Marg Publications, Mumbai, 2005. If you don't make it to the Gir Forest, you can imagine the roars as you read his wonderful book. The Asiatic lion still roars and people get goose pimples.

The Grand Old Trunk Road, Part I

Originally published Sept. 3, 2007 on Desicritics

It was not a goose step! The Pakistani border guard high-kicked his leg above his head some six feet and six inches above the ground. Across from him his counterparts made their aggressive moves, staying of course on the Indian side of the border of Wagah. Their uniforms were spectacular, and their head gear, looking like papier-mâché cocks combs added at least six inches to their height, making them look seven feet tall. I stood and watched the aggressive ceremony, a fierce, glaring, challenging, change of the guard ceremony. Just like the beginning of a cock-fight. On the India side a crowd had gathered to watch the tamasha. Wah, said a little boy as he gazed up at the very tall men putting on their display. Wow!

Way Back Then

The Grand Trunk Road I knew as a child when living in a unified India ran past our home in Taxila, and then south to Amritsar. The road was often rough, full of potholes, road-bumps galore in villages to slow traffic, and narrow. Later in the late 1980s I traveled north from Lahore to Peshawar and the road was similar. I am sure that now the pot holes must be filled and the road has been broadened to multiple lanes and shoulders reinforced. I am sure the traffic has increased ten fold, filled with gaily decorated buses and air conditioned coaches that can whiz one to Sukkur or Peshawar. I am sure that ox carts with lanterns hanging at the back, moving slowly at night, are also things of the past, or slow moving tractors pulling trailers piled high with sugar cane.

In my youth I crossed this area many times in my dad’s 1937 Ford. In our Taxila days we took the Grand Trunk Road down to Lahore and on to Amritsar to see the Golden Temple. Later in my teens we reversed the trip since we were living in Ludhiana and made our way as far as Amritsar and that was as far as we could go. There was a road block of huge proportions at the Pakistani border. Now as an adult, looking at the Wagah crossing I saw a strange phenomenon. I looked into India this time and thought about the tough time travelers would have on busses or in private cars getting across the border. The scene of the guards seemed to be a parody of the relationships between the countries, particularly on the Pakistan side. I felt it was staged hostility, challenge, a display of one-up-man-ship.

In Pakistan, I have traveled on the Grand Trunk Road all the way to Peshawar a number of times and have stood and looked across at the Khyber Pass and saw quite another border scene, traffic, lots of traffic seemed to be moving back and forth. In the local bazaars you could buy practically anything. When I traveled in the NWFP into rural areas to meet farmers who had been growing poppies and who now were trying to make it with alternative crops, (1985) I looked at the vast mountainous countryside, at the dark valleys with hints of green and small roads and trails. The border was porous and the tribal people moved back and forth with ease across the international boundary, the invisible line. My Pakistani counterpart from the Ministry of Agriculture pointed and said, “See. That is the line that separates us from Afghanistan.” Where?

The Durand Line, what is that? It is the line that demarked Afghanistan from the British Indian Empire, a line agreed upon with Amir Abdur Rehman Khan on Nov. 12, 1893, that has been disputed, discussed and cussed ever since. But the Pushtuns who lived on, around and across that magical border have always felt that the land is theirs, and they rule it as they deemed appropriate by their own laws and with their own leadership. They move back and forth with ease across the hills and valleys. It is a porous tribal border.

Those words, back and forth with ease, stuck with me. The Grand Trunk Road I knew as a child when living in a unified India ran past our home in Taxila. What a fantastic thing the old Grand Trunk Road was, India’s oldest highway, and certainly its most historic one. We traveled it with ‘ease’, dodging buffalo and bullock carts, people crowding on the road, camels, donkeys, and of course traffic that came at us which was bigger than we were, pushing us off onto the shoulder. But it was with relative ease that one could move and enjoy the cultural-religious nature of Mother India, its temples and statues, Hindu, Jain, Sikh, Muslim and Buddhist. What a fantastic, colorful mélange; no other road has carried such a baggage of history, which includes the magnificent Mogul cities. I would encourage you to look at Raghubir Singh’s book, The Grand Trunk Road: A Passage Through India to take a beautiful photographic tour of the road of roads. This corridor moves goods, people and of course ideas. In much the same way as ‘all roads lead to Rome’, the Grand Trunk led into the heart of the sub-continent from its most southern tip all the way to ... Wagah.

And Now

The narrow funnel that is at the Wagah border is extremely effective in holding back land travel. It restricts movement, traffic, goods, people and liberating ideas, though somehow there is hope, even in Pakistan; popular Indian songs, raunchy movies, and DVDs slip through and trade is increasing between the two countries. But the grand trunk road is truncated effectively at the Pakistan border. The greater the stress about Kashmir, the more the Pakistani sabers rattle, the tighter the funnel gets and the higher the guards at the border kick up their heels and look really fierce and the longer it takes for one to get through immigration and customs, even if all the right papers and visas are in hand! On the other hand, to the south, the road of roads is celebrated.

In 2003 the Indian department of tourism and culture and a tire company, Birla Tyres, came together to celebrate the Indian part of the road. “It is said that since the Aryan invasion of the subcontinent, 3,500 years ago, the road served as a corridor for movement of travelers, goods, armies ...”. Now that is a persistent road! The magnificent cities of Mogul and British India were highlights! The road was an open and effective land corridor connecting travelers to the wonders of India. It used to be that this corridor ran all the way to Afghanistan, through the amazing city of Lahore and on to historic Peshawar. But international border crossings have prevented what used to be a land corridor for cultural exchange on which people moved with ease. To the north the road led to cultural wonders now seen by very few from India. How many younger Indians have visited Lahore? How many Pakistani’s have visited India and seen its wonders? Few. The lack of a communication corridor has reinforced cultural biases.

In Lahore I was talking to a young Pakistani man about the Taj Mahal. He looked troubled. “The builder of the Taj Mahal was a Muslim. The great mogul treasures such as the Shalimar Gardens were made by Muslims, Pakistanis.” I reminded him of the partition and a unified India and that Muslim history on the sub-continent existed before 1947. I reminded him that Lahore, as cities go is ancient. Written histories go back as far as 1206. Europe at that time was, ah....sort of primitive. Genghis Khan and his hordes were on the move. But India was a thriving civilization. Qautb-ud-din Aybak was crowned Sultan of Lahore in 1206. The Silk Road was established, bringing trade items into India from China. In more modern history, Akbar the Great was emperor in the period from 1584-1598. Fantastic buildings were constructed in Lahore. Gardens with fountains were delighting the women of his harem in Kashmir and in the Punjab. Two hundred years later, 1776, a declaration of independence was made in America. Lahore was thriving. The Taj Mahal had been standing already for almost two hundred years in Agra.

Sipping garamchai we spoke now of our life in Lahore, the miserable hot season, the humidity and his visit to the Ravi early in the morning. I had written a poem that day, and of course had carried the draft in my pocket. We sat in a small tea house and drank tea. “Would you like to hear a poem I wrote about Lahore?” He smiled and nodded, not knowing what to expect. I cleared my throat.

CITY ON THE RAVI
Ravi city , fathered by many
Iron Fort, Ram Chandra named
Loh-Awar, a fortress by the river
Shabuddin Ghuri a despot’s abode
Fragrant gardens of Kamran Mirza
Zannana of Akbar, keep of Nur Jahan
Tomb of Anarkali, pomegranate blossom
A burial place of jealousy and regal shame
Aurangzeb the righteous, builder of mosques
Moghul splendor, Badshahi Mosque grandeur
Sikh and Guru strongholds, Mogul desecraters
Pakka British Raj, white bungalows and botanicals
Minar-e-Pakistan, Zia al Huq, land of the pure, wars
Capital of Islamization, border disputes, atomic rockets
Ten million dung fires, stifling heat, five calls to prayer
A Trunk Road sarai, life corridor; Khans and slaves alike
Oh glorious Lahore, City on the Ravi, fathered by so
many

Muj ko samaj nahin ahta. “I do not understand,” he said. “What is meaning of ‘fathered’?”

To the north there are wonders! In Kipling’s time the movement along the road led to Lahore. His story, The Gate of a Hundred Sorrows, was prescient of the horrors of the Partition’s woes and sorrows. Anthony Weller’s work, Salon Wanderlust, Days and Nights on the Grand Trunk Road, speaks of current Lahore and a different view perceived by Lahore citizens of their decaying Mogul treasures. “A Pakistani mother who wants to frighten a misbehaving child will still let him know that So-and-so Singh will come and get him unless he straightens out.” The Salon Wanderlust goes on to say that when you’ve been into your fifth great mosque or palace or tomb in a morning and find that the Sikhs had stripped it bare of the semiprecious décor two centuries ago, then used it as a “...dump, storehouse or whorehouse, it does something to how you might have enjoyed Amritsar.” I begin to see how the Wagah border guards on both sides got the expression on their faces. The nightmare of partition still rankles.

Grand Trunk Road - New Corridor of Asia

Originally published Sept. 4, 2007 on Desicritics

Road traffic may bottleneck at the Wagah border, but bilateral trade is booming between the two countries. The Economic Times (indiatimes.com) reported encouraging news on 10 Apr. that the bi-lateral trade has "...swelled from $235.74 million in 2001-02 to more than $1 billion last fiscal year." This increase in trading between the countries bodes well for improved means of moving goods. Many goods which come into Pakistan by land must be transshipped at the border. I was told that it took passenger buses about one and a half hours to get across the border. But infrastructures are improving. Electronic communication has greatly enhanced the trade across the borders and businessmen can more easily buy and sell using computer orders.
Though economic protectionism exists, both countries are trying to remove barriers to improve trade. India and Pakistan have opened banks in each other's territories. All this bodes well for the establishment of an international land corridor.

There are visionaries around who see not only the India-Pakistan links but an APIBM CORRIDER! (Afghanistan, Pakistan, India, Bangladesh, Myanmar)
Imagine being able to zoom along such a corridor as a tourist, researcher, as a trader or transporter of goods on roads that form a corridor all the way from Afghanistan through Pakistan, to India, the hub, to Bangladesh and Myanmar, a new silk road in Asia! Imagine the boon this would be to landlocked countries that border India, particularly Nepal that could tie into the linked roads.

RIS Policy Brief No. 30, March 2007 for the SAARC Summit held in Delhi on April 3-4 outlines a visionary look at ground transportation networks, that is, overland travel routes which if developed would make India the hub for commerce and trade in Asia. One item mentioned is "Strengthening Infrastructures at Borders." Reading the list of things needed to be done makes one wonder if all this is possible, however, there were similar thoughts years ago in a non-unified Europe and look what happened there. The Grand Trunk road is a reality, a somewhat uneven continuum that covers a distance of over 2,500 km. Imagine if it were easy for Indians and Pakistanis to cross their international border, what it could mean to families that have been torn apart for decades. Imagine how the information from an APIBM corridor would change the perceptions of the youth, in all of the countries.

Pakistan, looking into its future, has done its own smaller version of the road. They have developed the New Grand Trunk Road, also called the National Highway 5. I have traveled on many parts of it and there are some sections that are very fine. It begins in Karachi in the Sindh province, moves north to Thatta, Hyderabad, Moro, Multan, Sahiwal, Lahore, Gujaranwala, Gujrat, Jhelum and Rawlpindi. Then it turns east and crosses the Indus River and moves into the NWFP where it goes through Nowshera and Peshawar before reaching the town of Torkham crossing into Afghanistan. Regional cultural exchanges are occurring. People are mixing it up; Sindh, Punjab, NWFP; Baluchistan residents are meeting each other in Peshawar and Lahore. Afghani people are now a significant part of Pakistan's cultural experience through population movement of vast numbers of refugees coming from across northern borders, yes, some on the old Grand Trunk Road.

I looked up the record on the current SAFTA '2006 Agreement'. I was amazed at the number of "Sensitive" trade items Pakistan and India list. It is hard to imagine the bureaucracy that will be needed to enforce such trade exchanges. These are mere economic trade barriers. There may be detours, diversions of a socio-religious-cum-political nature which will hamper the establishment of a corridor; however, improved bi-lateral trade, people making lots of money may move the political policy makers of both countries toward more liberal trade policies. Money squawks.

The historical Grand Trunk Road could once again function as a corridor for commerce, trade and cultural exchange. It could be a mechanism to link Afghanistan, Pakistan, India, Bangladesh and Myanmar in a new Silk Road of Asia, not moving silk but cultural ideas. The SAFTA mentioned above could become the impetus for such a development. In the good old days of the Silk Road trade was confined by and large to movement of material across land. Now with global communications and air and sea transportation, land traffic may very well not be the major means of enhancing trade, however, six lane highways that tie southeast Asia together could create a vibrant Asian community, much like what has occurred between the European countries. But creating a corridor will be a complicated process.

India and Pakistan celebrated their 60th birthday last week! Congrats. Jim Hoagland of the Washington Post wrote an article, "A tale of two South Asian Nations" which appeared in the San Diego Union Tribune this morning, August 20th. 2007. "New Delhi had the air of the capital of an emerging world power looking ahead into a promising if complicated future. Pakistan marked the same occasion by sinking deeper into the past. The corrupt backroom dealing between military rulers and politicians that has produced a cycle of disasters for the Pakistani nation resumed-- aided by the hidden hand of U.S. diplomacy working to pressure President Pervez Musharraf's dwindling power in Islamabad." Bring back Benazir? This does not look good for Grand Road construction or repairs. It does not look very hopeful for open negotiations to create a functional land corridor.

Tragic as it may seem, the Grand Trunk Road Wagah international border displays may well be a thing of the near future. Posturing, high kicking, fierce appearance, Inshallah, will do the trick for now. But let's dream of a corridor.

An India Without Vultures

Orginially published Aug. 25th 2007 on: http://desicritics.org/2007/08/25/001132.php

I lay spread-eagled on a huge rock on a slope high above the Kali Gandaki River of West Nepal; the Annapurna massif towered above me. I had spent the morning climbing from our base camp near the river valley to the snow line, an altitude of about 16,000 feet. The air was thin, but the view was spectacular. High above me I could see a lammergeier, the Bearded Vulture. I lay absolutely still, waiting.

The huge bird with a wingspan of more than nine feet circled, losing altitude. The currents coming up from the valley below the cliff where I lay held up the bird; it did not flap its wings but circled slowly I could see the feathers ruffle at the back edges of its wings. Then what I had hoped, happened.

It set its wings for a glide and came to rest some thirty feet from me. I could hear the sound of air in its feathers as it landed. I lay still. It hopped toward me. When it was about ten feet away, I sat up. It hissed and spread its huge wings, then turned and hopped to the edge of the cliff and lifted off, still looking back at me with its sharp eyes, surrounded by a dark patch that looked like the mask of a bandit. It left behind one feather. I picked it up and quickly dropped it again. It was crawling with feather lice.The year was 1949. I was the junior member of the first ornithological expedition to West Nepal sponsored by the Museum of Natural History, Chicago, and the National Geographic Society. The Fleming expedition collected bird specimens all the way to the border of Tibet. It was there that I first heard about a Tibetan burial custom... well, not actually burial.

Bodies of dead persons are chopped up and these are fed to the lammergeier vultures. The birds become habituated to feeding at these “sky burial” sites. These birds also feed on corpses of wild animals and other animals that are disposed of after the skin has been removed for leather. They even fly away with large bones and drop them onto rocks to break them to get at the marrow. Some smaller bones are swallowed and digested. See pictures of this bird and other Indian vultures in Salim Ali’s The Book of Indian Birds, Oxford University Press, 13th edition, May 8, 2003)I read recently in the Parsi Khabar about another place where vultures are used to dispose of human remains. The Mumbai Tower of Silence has been used by Zoroastrians of India, the Parsis, as a place to dispose of their dead. Vultures gather to consume the remains, disposing of it in a matter of an hour. But few vultures are there now!

The sacred religious burial ritual may have existed since the beginning of their religion in the 6th. century B.C. It is in danger of being terminated because Asian vultures, which have throughout the ages of mankind been around abundantly, are now almost extinct. The British Medical Association (Nature and Animal Conservation- Global Issues, July 9, 2005) reported that 97% of the vulture population in India has crashed. What was once one of the most abundant large birds of prey in the world is dying out! Why?The verdict is in, but there is controversy about it for a number of reasons. There is an anti-inflammatory drug, diclofenac, similar to ibuprofen, which has been used by cattle farmers as a popular cure-all to treat a variety of diseases. When vultures feed on the carcasses which are traditionally left out for them, the drug in the meat creates kidney failure in vultures if consumed. It appears that the drug is a poison to vultures. Strangely, now dogs and rats have taken over the task of disposing of the remains of dead cattle from which skins have been removed. India has a population of 500 million cattle! There are 140,000 slaughter houses in India. Meat export is becoming big business. (See: Cattle: Locking horns over culture and business: India Together, Fri 24th 2007) What happens to the remains from slaughter houses? Few people eat dead cows that die of old age or disease. Dogs eat offal but are also susceptible to the drug; however, not many of them have died. Dogs are not up to the job. Nor are rats. This is a huge problem in India! Vultures, not particularly held in high esteem by people, are looked at as avian outcasts, but they performed a vital function in South East Asia, in Nepal, Pakistan, Afghanistan, India, Tibet and Sri Lanka, to keep the environment clean and fresh. Their extinction would be a massive tragedy, a more important event than the extinction of the Dodo. Controversy exists because there may be other causes for the extinction. Only a very small percentage of the cattle that are fed to vultures have been treated by diclofenac by farmers who, according to reports, got the drug from veterinarians. One report suggested that if only one in a hundred carcasses was tainted with diclofenac that would be enough to create the problem. I am surprised that so many Indian farmers are so sensitive about the aches and pains, arthritis and headaches of their cattle that they seek out treatment from veterinarians. I wonder.

Lead may be the culprit, as may other human debris that can be picked up by vultures and fed to their young. Animals that have been shot contain lead bullets and if consumed lead to death. Perhaps a strange virus is the culprit. But no, scientists now have come to a tentative firm conclusion, it was not a virus. Diclofenac is the culprit that has killed off the vultures, not vulture-bird flu. Have you ever watched vultures work on a huge pile of garbage? They pick over hundreds of items in the trash heap that humans discard.

In order to get samples of vultures to do tissue analysis scientists had to resort to using those found dead, hanging in branches of trees. Reports stated that because of cultural and religious prohibition against killing animals, vultures, they were not able to make a selection of vultures for tissue samples that were collected from the specimens they desired. I was unable to find out their sampling techniques. Were dying vultures from a wide distribution across the sub-continent utilized? There are 140,000 slaughter houses in India that kill cattle. Why couldn’t a few hundred vultures which were dying be killed for the sake of science? There are other questions yet to be asked, however, the scientific consensus is, that it is a drug similar to ibuprofen has killed millions of vultures.

Captive breeding programs have been established in a few places in India. If these fine animals can be bred in captivity they can be reintroduced into their normal habitats in later years. It was also hoped that caged vultures could be used in the Tower of Silence to dispose of the dead, but that plan had a flaw. Human beings consume lots of diclofenac and their corpses would kill off the captive populations of vultures as well and may have been the cause of many of their deaths up to this time. So what do they feed the other captive vulture populations? How do they insure that the animals used for feed will not contain the drug?

There has been a successful introduction of an almost extinct species through captive breeding programs; the California condor, however, it feeds almost exclusively on dead wild game, and perhaps free ranging cattle and sheep. There is now a flock of about 200 hundred birds and a viable population of the same species in Mexico. It does not appear that the plight of the condor and the Indian vulture are similar in the sense that saving the American condor is an emotional environmental issue to prevent the regional loss of a species, whereas saving the Indian vulture is a massive international social-environmental imperative that impacts on the lives of millions of Indian people.

If scientists are correct about what has killed the vultures, other populations of vultures may be threatened because of their consumption of human bodies. Diclofenac may have devastating implications for Himalayan vultures. The Tibetan “sky burial” custom may mean the doom of the Bearded Vulture and three other species of vultures that fly over that part of Nepal and China. If persons who have taken these pain killers and anti- inflammatory drugs, readily available across the counter, in Tibet and China and are disposed of in “sky burial” ceremonies, extinction may occur for these wonderful animals, which have existed on earth from one evolution, one rebirth to the next for thousands of years.

“Big Pharma”, the huge pharmaceutical companies that manufacture diclofenac, have done a great job of marketing it for human consumption and veterinarian use as well; their influence is all over Asia. It is a multimillion dollar business. The use of the drug is widespread to scattered populations across Asia.

An ecological disaster of huge proportions looms. Governments are slow and take a lethargic “...approach to pushing forward a promised ban on the drug, diclofenac, a cheap painkiller for cattle that is mortally poisonous to vultures.” This report reminded us of the Timarpur rubbish dump in north Delhi where the sky was once black with vultures, looking for cattle carcasses. Today the dumps are patrolled by dogs and rats. Rotting bodies of cattle remain for days which allows for the build up of other lethal pathogens, flies and other diseases. Governments must act now! Efforts must be made through all the media to inform the general population of what has happened, and how it can be stopped. Additional scientific studies, not blocked by socio-religious taboos should be performed. Our fixes for headaches may have become one of the world’s biggest headaches. I cannot imagine an India without vultures.

Relic Fervor

Originally published August 21st, 2007 at: http://desicritics.org/2007/08/21/000845.php
Republished by the Sri Lanka Daily News on August 23, 2007
Republished by the South Asian Media Net on August 24, 2007
Images courtesy of Sri Lanka Daily News


Travel with me to the Golden Temple in Amritsar, the Laxmi Narain Temple in Delhi, The Temple of the Tooth - Sri Dalada Maligawa in Sri Lanka, the Badshahi Mosque in Lahore and the Baha’i House of Worship in Delhi. Each edifice is unique and magnificent, an architectural
statement of the faith of its devotees. Each visit stirs the viewer in different ways; the awe of seeing thousands upon thousands kneeling before Allah in the vast courtyard of the Badshahi Mosque, the stunning, shining glory of the Golden Temple, perhaps the most beautiful in the world, the welcoming warmth of the Temple of the Tooth, the silent, amazing lotus-shaped glory of the Baha’i House of Worship in Delhi and the noisy but colorful welcome of the Laxmi Narain Temple in Delhi where all castes and faiths are welcome.

Such visits were special because they seemed to represent for me an experience that inspires faith in the creator, where I was lifted above the actual gold, stone and mortar, to thoughts of people’s adoration of the eternal. Perhaps each edifice was meant to inspire a phenomenon of faith that transcends logic, transcends the mere physical representations, the icons and brings one to a point of adoration of the almighty, the giver of light. These temples were not for me the actual objects of adoration; rather I perceived them as gathering places where people of different faiths sought peace, calmness, joy, and a hope for an eternity, nirvana. If there was adoration, I did not perceive it was for the physical objects, or for mere men who have lived and walked, rather for what these represented, what they taught.

Now, relics are a different matter to me. They include such items as a bone, a dried up mummy, ashes, a fingernail, hair, a robe worn by the master, a sliver of Jesus’ cross or even a footprint of a prophet. There seems to be an immense social-religious need to venerate such physical objects, primarily made of carbon. There is a current fever for obtaining ‘genuine’ relics. Selling the saints, reported by Phil Lipof, in WHDH-TV Special Report, (8/14/2007) presents a disturbing account of selling relics online. “With a click of the mouse, spirituality is up for sale!!” I wonder about that. Spirituality? E-Bay says that they try to stop the sale of blood, bones or body parts. “But there are so many items like this for sale at any given time; it would take divine intervention to catch them all.” Relics for sale to the highest bidder. Why?

Flash! The Taxila Cross, (8/14/2007), from the book, Shadows in the Dark, by Fr. John Rooney M.H.M. (Pakistan Christian History Monograph, No.1) “There are two further pieces of evidence that might seem to suggest a St Thomas connection with Pakistan, the one epigraphical, the other social. The epigraphical evidence is an interesting cross found at Taxila now lodged in the Anglican cathedral at Lahore, where it is know as the Taxila Cross. The social evidence concerns a fakir community which is said to be connected with Thatta, Sind, and to claims that it has origins in St. Thomas.”

Here we go again! The small cross has been taken over by the United Church there as its symbol, found in the ancient city of Sirkap some forty years ago. And you had better believe that there is controversy over this as well. All sorts of scholarly opinions are being proffered now to challenge the little cross as not being a “genuine Christian relic.” Strongest among the challengers are those who say that it is a type of cross that is more or less equilateral, thus not a Christian cross. This type of cross is similar to hosts of other such crosses which are of Buddhist origin. Oh brother, now the arguments are flying back and forth.

But relics create responses filled with zeal. The helpful and often accurate, Wikipedia says this about Muslim Relics: “While various relics are preserved by different Muslim communities, the most important are those known as the Sacred Trusts, more than 600 pieces treasured in the Privy Chamber of the Topkapi Palace Museum in Istanbul. Muslims believe that these treasures include the sword and standard of Muhammad, a hair from his beard, and the staff of Moses.” I was surprised at the last statement, that The Quran has “... been recited next to these relics uninterruptedly since they were brought to the Topkapi Palace.” Such fervor!

World Tibet Network News, (March 5, 2001) reported, “...large portions of the two massive Buddha figures in central Bamiyan province, dating back more than 1,500 years, have already been reduced to rubble, along with thousands of other statues throughout the country. It was reported that an edict had been published and, “... will be implemented Inshallah (God willing).” The article spoke of reports from Taliban officials about the destruction and the nature of the order from the Taliban Supreme Leader, Mullah Mohammad Omar who had authorized the iconoclasm. A hot storm of international protest erupted about this action of these fundamental radical Muslims.

Sadly, I had never traveled in Afghanistan to see the Bamiyan Buddhas, which stood some fifty meters tall. These statues which had existed since the third century BC are no more. Smashed, destroyed in the fever of a religious zeal that I do not comprehend. Such zealous fervor to obliterate the religious expressions of others is ‘old hat’ in many parts of the world, including Christian Europe. Our guide in Cusco, Peru said that a Spanish Catholic Church there was built over the priceless ruins of ancient Inca religious ruins. They even used beautiful hand-formed, fitted stones as part of their church foundations. There are stories galore of this type; one religion obliterating the beauties and joys of another.

Travel with me to Kandy, Sri Lanka and stand near the edge of the lake and look at the Temple of the Tooth. It was a quiet day and I stood with my wife and friends gazing at the temple. A few dozen of tourists and an equal number of those on pilgrimage had come to see the tooth were wandering around, climbing the steps into the temple. No, you can’t see the tooth; it is kept securely behind a protective wall and drapery in the reliquary.

It has not been brought to light since 1990 because of worries that the Tamil Tigers would try to damage or make off with it. Only its casket is now brought out during the annual festival. And what a fever of excitement there is when as many one hundred elephants dressed in finery make their way into the town as drums beat, flutes play and dancers leap about! Attendance at the Esal Perahea may number a million people from all ranks of Sri Lankan society. Tamil Hindus and many Christians take part in the celebration.

How did the tooth get to Sri Lanka? That is a story by itself, but one version is that the tooth was removed from the Buddha when the body was on the cremation pyre and eventually made its way to Ceylon hidden in someone’s hair. But that is not what is important. A tooth is there and it has been revered by millions upon millions for centuries and now there is to be more.

Sacred Hair Relics will be presented to the Sri Lankan on 18th July in Chittaghong, as reported by (narinjara.com, 8/14/2007). “President Mahinda Rajapaksa has offered state patronage to the event and several leading Buddhist monks and Ministers are to take part at the events related to the arrival of the relic in Sri Lanka.” Of course controversy now boils up. Researchers and critics cast doubt about the authenticity of the hair relics. There are obstructive tangles, calls for better means to determine authenticity. Hair, nail clippings, shrouds?Remember Emperor Ashoka? He converted to Buddhism in the third century BC. He was a zealot. He opened seven of the original stupas and collected their relics and, according to The Asokavadana, divided these relics into 84,000 portions and distributed these in his Indian empire, vowing to erect a stupa for each portion. Now that was amazing fervor! Perhaps that number was symbolic, or a scribe added a zero or two.

Is the reverence for relics something that transcends logic, transcends the mere physical object? Of what? Is the reverence for the prophet himself, or is the reverence much higher than that, for the creator, the eternal? Would the one crucified be pleased to see splinters of a cross venerated? What about the message? What does a little silver Taxila Cross have to do with it? Or is it the same feeling that I get when I visit the Golden Temple in Amritsar? Awe.

I have not read the Sermon on the Mount for quite some time. Do you remember it? Blessed are the peacemakers, blessed are the merciful, blessed are they which do hunger and thirst after righteousness...Jesus’ message is important. I went back to my library and pulled a little book from the shelf that I had read years ago, The Teachings of the Compassionate Buddha, by E.A Burtt, 1982, Mentor. I was refreshing my memory about Siddartha Guatama’s teaching because I was wondering how such obsessions with relics, the emphasis on the physical, ashes, the hair, the tooth, fit in with his message of gentleness, serenity, compassion, liberation from selfish cravings for the physical.

E. A. Burtt puts it this way in his Introduction, (page 20.) “Worst of all , perhaps, from Buddha’s standpoint, religion was straying through these and other vices away from the insistent, poignant, practical needs of men and women. It was not leading them toward true fulfillment and more dependable happiness; it was becoming mired in obstructive tradition, repetitious rite, and dead or cantankerous dogma. He conceived it as his task to break through or sweep away these obstructive tangles, to find an enduring solution to the real problems of men and to bring India and the world a saving message of light and love.”

River Dolphins and Baoli - The Passing of an Era

Originally published 8/12/07 on Desicritics.org http://desicritics.org/2007/08/12/002214.php
Commented on August 22, 2007 by http://www.anotherchancetosee.com/2007/08/susu-ganges-river-dolphin.html

At the age of twelve, the Jumna River flowing in the foothills of the Himalayas, a day's hike from Mussoorie, looked forbidding. I stood with my toes in the water and watched the swift, clear water pass by me, crashing against rocks in mid-stream. My bath was short, the water was freezing.

As an adult I stood in the shade of large Neem trees alongside the Indus River near Sukkur and the water was warm, brown and turbid. Boats were pulled up along the bank to the south side of the Ayub Railway Bridge. I was informed that these belonged to the Mohana boat people, who one man said were probably descendants of soldiers who had accompanied Alexander the Great. (You know, grey eyes, fair skin.)

I watched the boatmen ply their boats on the brown surface of the water and wondered how in the world any fish could see the bait on the lines that they put over the side. A man next to me explained that they were catching catfish and that they used the fat of the bhulan as bait. I had no idea what that was and so he drew a picture in the sand of what looked like a dolphin, except that it had a long snout. He assured me that it was a fine animal to eat, it had red meat, and, he laughed, even a penis. The thick layer of fat of the creature, he said, was irresistible to catfish because they could smell it in the muddy water.

Well! That started a treasure hunt. Over the years I have learned more about the habits of this strange creature, a dolphin which swims in the Indus and is blind in the usual sense of the word, though some authorities say it can perceive light. It does its hunting by emitting sounds and finds its prey by echo-location. They are attractive grey creatures with long beak-like noses and eyes that look small and clouded. Adults weigh between 180 to 200 lbs. and can grow as long as eight feet. Local fishermen told me the bhulan fishes on its side on the bottom of the river or even in more shallow tributaries where it can effectively catch its prey of small fish and crustaceans.

This is a whale of a story! A cetacean, or a member of the order of whales, swimming way up the Indus River, going blind in the process because of muddy water, yet surviving some ten million years of evolution, re-birth, in the waters that ran into the sea. But it has been a long, long time since the Indus ran happily into the sea with sufficient flow to support a small whale swimming into it. Then to top it all off, during the last half century these creatures got stranded in the Indus because barrages or bridges were built which limited how far they could go. Many got trapped between construction projects. One report I read said they went all the way to Nepal. But I will get to that later.

How many of these rare, wonderful creatures are left? I poured over the literature and sadly have to report that only four to six hundred of these blind river dolphins exist in the Indus and that their numbers are diminishing rapidly because of a number of factors. Over fishing, dam construction, navigation projects, pollution, habitat destruction and increasing food needs of a fast growing human population have all but made this animal extinct.
So what? Why in the world bring up this matter to readers? For a number of reasons. The words extinction, re-birth, evolution, pollution were mentioned above for a reason. This is a matter of great importance for action, for doing something.

You may recall the man Gaius Plinius Secondus, (23-AD to 79 AD) known more affectionately as Pliny the Elder in your history books. Well, imagine this, he wrote about the river dolphin way back then and listed it among many of the special animals of the part of the world which we now call India and Pakistan. His book, "Naturalis Historia" gave press to our dear friends the bhulan. Asked why he wrote about such things he gave a great answer. "True glory consists of doing what deserves to be written, and writing what deserves to be read."

The Pakistan government is doing things to help the blind river dolphin, such as prohibitions against catching them, fines for doing so and declarations about their near extinct status to literate populations. However, few local people who happen to get a river dolphin caught in their fishing net will simply throw it back, because it is dead, drowned. Of course not, they will eat it. Knowing that its fat is excellent catfish bait doesn't help, because many river dolphins will be caught for that reason alone. Hunger drives people and necessity is truly the mother of invention; dolphin as catfish bait! Dams on the river have isolated small groups of these creatures thus putting them into danger of inbreeding. It does not look very hopeful for this creature. It may be only a few more years and all of them will disappear. And it has happened before, very recently.

A similar creature called the baiji once flourished in the Yangtze River in China. In 1997 a survey was performed to count how many remained. Only thirteen were sighted. I looked up information about the baiji in the National Geographic News, 2007 and the CBS News of August 10, 2007, 11:20 a.m. and saw the sad words. "The Chinese blind river dolphin is extinct!"
One writer said it is the first cetacean that has become extinct directly because of humans. One reporter said that when he read the news he wept. Twenty million years of birth and re-birth of this creature has been going on, and in 2007 it is no more! Why did it become extinct? For all the same reasons mentioned above. River traffic has increased; populations have exploded with concomitant hunger which drove this animal to extinction.

But India is safe! Right? Is Bangladesh spared? Does Nepal have problems with the blind dolphins? In the Ganges this creature is called the Susu. If you are interested you can go online and watch a video of a Susu leaping out of the water and hear its whistle-like call. It is wonderful to see. Only about six hundred of them still exist in an area of heavy human population which uses their fat, you guessed it, for catching catfish. In the Brahmaputra River, scientists estimate that three to four hundred of the Hihu remain. In Nepal, in isolated sections of rivers a few may still exist.

Now we come to the fate of the baoli. For those who have not had the fun of visiting a step-well, that is what it is, a baoli. And it is really fun. As a child, in Pre-partition India I visited step wells. There was one in Delhi in the Red Fort. It was a 14th Century step-well that existed in a 17th Century building, according to some, built by Tughlaks, who constructed many baoli in Delhi.
Now, for all you Indian history teachers, a wonderful research project for your students could be called "Delhi Baoli". The need for drinking water and bathing water has always been an important part of the life of the common servant, slave or even the emperor of the day. The baoli was a vital part of this history. Has a survey with GPS accuracy been performed mapping defunct step-wells of India as well as currently operating ones? This sounds like a wonderful doctoral dissertation. Pliny the Elder suggested, "True glory consists of doing what deserves to be written..."

My own limited research revealed a sad fact about Indian and Pakistani step wells. Many are neglected and in disrepair. Yet these fantastic structures represent the "life water" of civilizations. Simply for the sake of our precious heritage these treasures need to be preserved so that our grandchildren can do as I did on an outing. Walk down the 84 steps of a baoli, touch the water and look up at the sky from deep within the well. Feel the damp bricks, breathe the moist air, mop a sweating brow and marvel!

Yes, I have seen the Taj Mahal and many, many Mughal ruins. None have stirred me as much as the baoli! Permit me to say Amin to Fauzia Qureshi's Conserving Pakistan's Built Heritage, 1994 in which he, happily, includes a section on step-wells and the neglect of these historical buildings, these underground monuments. I visited the Baoli Sahib Gurdwara, Lahore, near the Dabbi Bazaar to rekindle the flame of awe I felt as a child when I visited various baoli in the Punjab. Even the monuments that stick out above the ground are in sad disrepair and those that tunnel deep into the ground are either a bit dangerous to enter or are in neglect due to lack of funds. The Rohtas Fort in Pakistan, said to be built by the Afghan King, Sher Shah Suri, was an amalgamation of Puchtun and Hindu architecture. There are three wells there and the Main Baoli has 148 steps leading down to water!

Tourism! Sorry I mentioned it. Yet, tourism may in fact help to bring back and preserve India's treasures. Imagine a Baoli advertisement. But why?It matters. Humans are good at destruction, building atomic bombs that can obliterate civilizations. I may ask, but why? We are not good at holding on to our little treasures, even preserving the divine life-line of the little blind bhulan. A blogger, who called himself "stevenga777", wrote these words in 2006. "Thinking that I get to see these dolphins in heaven makes me happy..." What a nice idea, heavenly 'blind' dolphins.
I am thinking that I would like to encourage my grand kids to visit Pakistan and India. Dip their toes in the cool water of a half dozen baoli and search for the little blind water dolphin, the elusive and rare bhulan.

The Real Pakistan - Behind Char Divari

Published 8/04/07 on: Desicritics

The American public is dismally uninformed about Pakistan. What little it knows is tied to the news reports; Pakistan being an epicenter for terrorism, Pakistan being the hiding place for Taliban, Pakistan being the nursery for Al Qaeda, Pakistan as a new nuclear threat, Pakistan as the critical pawn in Southeast Asia for keeping the lid on Afghanistan’s political instability. Those informed Americans who read the journals or the daily newspapers or watch CNN rather than the soaps, see George Bush and Musharraf meeting together in Washington D.C. and Musharraf promoting his new book. The real Pakistani people? Hardly.

Who are Pakistanis anyway? Are they the sophisticated and wealthy elite in Karachi, Islamabad, Lahore? Yes. Or are they part of the Diaspora which now lives in Toronto, Seattle, London or Brisbane? Yes. Among these are the well educated, wealthy articulate groups that cluster in the world’s large cites and carry on with their lives, contributing their skills and expertise to the countries they have adopted. Yes, these are in large, the doctor-men, lawyer-men, business men and scientists-men whose expertise is part of what make America great. Their brains and talents become part and parcel of the fabric of our way of life; we are a county of immigrants like none other in the world and we are enriched by their presence, my fellow Pakistani Americans.

Who are Pakistanis anyway? We answered that. Did we? The well educated wealthy elite are a relatively small part of the total population of Pakistan. Who are all those other folk? We see pictures of some of them, almost always men, males, and young men at that, crowding the street, holding banners, shouting and screaming at the camera about a fatwah against an author who blasphemed, an inappropriate cartoon, about holy books being flushed down toilets, about the Iraq War, about the American bombing of a Pakistani village! Many of these young men having finished school, matriculated, at the secondary school level, are often jobless or performing jobs with very low pay, restless youths that cluster together in huge numbers in the ever growing urban populations of Pakistan in Karachi, Rawalpindi, and Lahore. It has been estimated that Pakistan’s urban population has expanded seven fold since 1951. It is a young and restless population.

But where are the girls, the women? Why don’t we see pictures of them? Is Pakistan made up of mostly men? Males? Who are Pakistanis anyway? Are they these male urban folk? Do males dominate? Are they in control? Yes. Some 34% of the total population now crowds into cities. Logically, of this group, almost 50% must be women. Where are they? What are they doing? Why don’t we see them? Oh, but we did see one, a beautiful, articulate one. Pakistan, an Islamic state had a woman, Benazir Bhutto, as Prime Minister, imagine, twice over! Yet where have all the girls and women gone? Oh yes, I remember the striking eyes of the young woman who graced the cover of National Geographic. Yes! And then there is Mukhtaran Bibi, called Mukhtar Mai by many, who was raped five times by members of the same family. Yes! Her book with Nicholas D. Kristof, In the Name of Honor, tells her story for the world to hear. It is an important story.

Behind Char Divari

Of Pakistan’s 169 million people, almost half are women in the vast and diverse rural areas of Pakistan. Rural women, approximately thirty three percent of the total population, reside in the countryside. That sounds idyllic, almost romantic. It is far from it. They bear huge burdens. “Women in Pakistan, particularly the large majority of rural women, bear a number of burdens which Islam and social custom places on them as they interact in a fast changing world. Three major burdens are sex segregation, (purdah) their legal status in Islam, and their role in the family. These are barriers to change; barriers to the ability of women to take part with their sisters in many rural development activities going on in the Third World.”1 Economic development and political participation have been shown to be tied to high levels of literacy in most developing countries and women’s participation is a key element in this equation.

I was in the remote hill station of Nathiagali with my own family and the ill-clad wife of the Forestry Rest House caretaker bent down to touch my feet. I reached out to lift her up and asked in Urdu, “What is it, my sister?” She, with tears in her eyes undid the swaddling clothes of the little child she was carrying in the crook of her arm and held it out to me. “Take her. Take her to America. Don’t leave her here. Please.” Why? What was her burden?

Women in Pakistan, women, who we in American call our better half, bear many, many children, endure poverty, labor unceasingly in brutal conditions in farms, they rear animals, cook, gather manure for fuel, wash clothing, sweep the home from early dawn until dark. My driver, Bashir Mohammed was glum. I asked him what his problem was. He replied, “My wife is pregnant with her ninth child. She is not well and almost died the last time. What can I do?” \

Look in the mosques at the first call to prayer and see how many women you count. Look at those who prostrate themselves in prayer and count the number of women. They are too busy, in most cases to pray along with their husbands, and are prohibited from joining him shoulder to shoulder, kneeling equally before their maker. They were a missing link in the social and economic development of Pakistan in 1989. 2. But this is 2007! The rural women of Pakistan still bear such burdens today; yet they are the tremendous potential for the country’s development. Demographically they are about half of the total, but it is very much a man’s world out there. Purdah is still a reality! What is this char divari business? It relates to purdah. Compare the street scenes in Delhi, Patiala or Dehra Dun to Peshawar, Quetta or Dehra Ishmael Khan and you will understand immediately. The women are absent in the latter three.

During the many years I lived in India in the North West Frontier Province, in what is now Pakistan, as a child, I saw a few women, just here and there, usually from the window of the old 1937 family Ford sedan as we drove past, rural women working outside their homes and in villages. Later in my teens, studying in Mussoorie at Woodstock School in the foothills of the Himalayas, I studied with a few of them, beautiful, bright and talented young Indian women. Later, in 1985, working on a World Bank project for the Ministry of Agriculture in On Farm Water Management, I saw a few women in the cities. I was one of the really fortunate ones. Amazingly, I was assigned a typist, a young woman we will call Naheed, who learned to be a copy-typist and do filing as she worked for me. She was the only woman in the Institute and the faculty dropped by my office with great regularity to talk ‘important business’, with me, of course. In Lahore, I was privileged to attend concerts where many wealthy, elite, sophisticated, educated Pakistani men and women listened to singers, ghazals, and players of musical instruments. I met two very beautiful Pakistani women at cocktail parties in Lahore, imagine that, who worked in the entertainment industry as actresses. I met a few other Pakistani women teachers, one who taught my son, in the American School in Lahore. In 1984 my fellow worker, who was assigned to me from Islamabad to visit rural farmers in Dehra Ishmael Khan, to set up regulations for Water User Associations, was an articulate and fearless young woman, Meher J. who had her BA in Sociology. She had been born a Thalomide baby and had one flipper arm and of course had never married. Yes, I remember each and every Pakistani woman I met and worked with, and know most of their names to this day. They were, as I struggled to do my work, my better half!

Culturally, women, particularly rural women, find little chance to participate in programs for personal and economic development. Yet, much is being attempted to assist rural women. Aid programs target women’s health and attempt to improve their life in a variety of ways, including pre and post-natal child care, improved nutrition and literacy programs. But, in order to be effective, such programs must reach millions upon millions of women, those same women who are, for the majority of their lives behind char divari, the four walls of the hundreds and thousands of compounds in Baluchistan and the Northwest Frontier Province. In order to be effective, all the girls of Pakistan need to become literate, to attend school. One particularly difficult and sensitive area needs much work, that is, women’s reproductive health care. But how does one access rural women, who in the name of honor, are under the protection of their men? How does one communicate with rural farmers and householders about the need to protect women from disease, including AIDS that these very men bring back to their households? How can their wives be protected?

There is one very bright light on the horizon. Pakistani women writers! The world is beginning to take notice of these articulate and gutsy women who are writing about their world. Deepti Priya Mehorta wrote in “Women and Words, A Review of Pakistani Women Writers, Boloji.com on Oct. 9, 2005 these words: “On a question of women’s writing specifically, Guahar remarked, ‘Writing may be the only avenue of expression for many women. Men may whistle, saunter around, behave badly. In Pakistani society, we women do not whistle, wink or make salubrious noises.... but you can write quietly.’”

In the Book Review section of Boloji.com, which means in Urdu, "okay speak up", more than a hundred excellent book reviews are presented! What a fantastic way to expand the voices of women! From my observation, however, unless there is a consistent and effective way for these hundreds of Pakistani women writers to present their valued points of view, their narrative to the world, much will be lost. Many of the publishers are little known and many titles are not easily available in the United States. But one book that should be touted is Hoops of Fire: Fifty Years of Fiction by Pakistani Women by Aamer Hussein, Sagi Books, Feb. 2000. This anthology presents stories that reveal the aching, the love, the frustration and the hope of so many Pakistani women. The more the world hears these, the greater will be the web of understanding, empathy and love for the people of Pakistan. Speaking of the web, the digital linkages that are possible to expand awareness for Pakistan and its people has not been well utilized. My Google perusal of ‘Pakistani bloggers’ was an eye-opener for me. What I often read was, men going about ‘whistling, winking and performing salubrious acts’, or decrying Pakki Bashing. We need quiet and serious women writers here as well. While the elite and powerful men go about planning wars, scheming political campaigns, building and tearing down empires, women, their better half are revealing the soul of their land through their writing. It may well be true that the pen is more powerful than the sword, especially if the better half wields it.

The millions behind the physical real mud-brick walls and the religious-cultural and psychological char divari are, from my viewpoint, the untapped resource for Pakistan’s development. Women’s development is the crucial tool to bring about change in Pakistan. But the high hard walls of fundamental religious belief and rigid social custom are difficult to breach.

Really mighty heart

The new movie, A Mighty Heart, directed by Michael Winterbottom will certainly open the eyes of many Americans to Pakistan our ally on the war against terrorism. Angela Jolie's role will bring many to the theaters to relive the awful abduction and killing of journalist Pearl. Tragic as that death was there is a continuing tragedy taking place; the abductions that go on and on in Pakistan, abductions of girls and young women. In Urdu the words "char divari" refer to the huge walled compounds which are the homes of millions of traditional people. Hundreds of young women disappear behind these "char divari' for life! Their families grieve about their abduction, but know in their hearts that their daughters will not return home. A few have escaped and returned home but the tragedy begins anew for these brave hearts. Their families frequently reject them, they have had sexual experience outside of marriage, they have been raped, they are unclean and non-virginal. They become victims all over again; family rejection, possible court action under "sharia", a trial which condemns them under the Hudood Ordinance, labelling them with "zina" adultlery, and then even a possible death penallty. Does this sound impossible? (What happened in Turkey two weeks ago ? An 18 year old girl was stoned to death, a brutal sight which we witnessed on television? ) One person with a really MIGHTY HEART is Mukhtaran Bibi who is fighting the injustice of the system in Pakistan with her new book, In the Name of Honor" which bravely speaks against her forced rape and their legal system that is based on religious fundamentalism. Now there is a Mighty Heart! Read her book, see her movie and support the battle against unjust abduction and the Hudood Ordinance of Pakistan.
www.haroldbergsma.com

MSN: ONE-WAY TICKET PAKISTAN TO AFGHANISTAN, $4 PLEASE

Interesting articles found on MSN: http://worldblog.msnbc.msn.com/archive/2007/02/23/67163.aspx
http://dailynightly.msnbc.com/2007/02/4_for_a_oneway_.html

Reply posed on Feb.27 2007
"One Way Ticket to Afghanistan" brought back vivid memories of my travels in 1985 to Peshawar and the border area as well as to some of the farmers who had been encouraged to stop growing poppies and grow other cash crops. As we travelled by 4 wheel drive vehicle across the open areas on the Afghanistan border I was struck first by the vastness of the place and how remote this area was. My meaning of remote is not only a geographical reference, rather refers to how little the rest of the world knows about this part of the earth and what goes on here.

Much has happened in the world and Pakistan since then, but one thing has stayed rather constant, that the border is not only porous but it has a fluidity that is hard to comprehend. As I read the account of the travellers in One Way Ticket to Afghanistan I was again struck with the huge problem that both governments face to control human population movements. Pushtun folk have lived on both sides of the "border" for years and have largely ignored it as they consider all of it, theirs. They move back and forth across the mountain passes freely. The implications of this for "security" are obvious. The international concern for Taliban action in the area is in direct proportion to this political and social fluidity. Not only do people move but they move their goods, their high value cash crops, their Katusha weapons, but their collective will to remain fiercly independent moves with them. The world needs to read more about this amazing border area where so many countries have struggled to exert controls. I lived in the area during last days of the British Raj and have read so many stories of conflict that occured there.