Thursday 13 September 2007

Travel: Pushkar, India







These are my photographs taken in Pushkar.


This summer I travelled around India. This was my third time visiting the country and people often ask me why I keep going. All I can say is that I feel an invisible pull towards the country that I am unable to really articulate. Perhaps it is because India is so different to Britain, or perhaps it is the staggering landscapes that change vastly as you move up and down the country. India is a place of colour, the people are friendly and inquisitive (sometimes to the point of annoyance, the last thing you want when you arrive in a new town in the burning midday sun is deal with a gang of rickshaw wallahs fighting over who gets to take you to a hotel), perhaps this is what appeals to me. Or is it the constant contrast between the spiritual and traditional with the modern, or the combination of different languages and different religions? India is one of the places in the world where such a variety of people can live together and accept each other.

One place that I remember most fondly from my travels, is the small pilgrimage town of Pushkar in Rajasthan. This small desert town clings to the side of a small, beautiful holy lake, surrounded by bathing ghats and 400 temples. The town is amazingly small, with no traffic allowed in the narrow maze of streets.

It is said that Lord Brahma dropped a Lotus flower in Pushkar, creating the lake which is the central focus of the town. Mythological literature describes Brahma as having sprung up from the lotus originating in the navel of Vishnu. Brahma then becomes the source of all creation, the seed from which issues all space, time and causation. His consort Saraswati was manifested out of him, and from their union were born all the creatures of the world. He is the inventor of theatrical art, and music and dance were revealed by him. He is sometimes depicted with four heads representing the four Vedas and the four Yugas (great epochs of time), other times as Visvakarma, the divine architect of the universe. Saraswati is the wife of Brahma. Literally her name means 'the flowing one'. In the Rig Veda she represents a river deity and is connected with fertility and purification. She is considered the personification of all knowledge - arts, sciences, crafts and skills. She is the goddess of the creative impulse, the source of music, beauty and eloquence. Artists, writers and other individuals involved in creative endeavours have for millennia come on pilgrimage to Pushkar to request the inspiration of Brahma and Saraswati. According to the theory that shrine myths are often metaphorical expressions of the specific power of a pilgrimage place, the lake, hill and area of Pushkar have a spirit or presence that awakens and stimulates the human capacity of creativity.

As soon as I arrived in Pushkar I was hounded by a group of men trying to get me to go down to the lake to perform a blessing on my family, and donate a large sum of money, telling me “yes madam, you British and Americans, you pay well, you give often 1000 rupees.” 1000 rupees!! Thinking this was just another scam to get money out of me, I ignored the offer and made my way to the hostel I would be staying.

During the next days I became entranced by the magic of Pushkar and understood its magnetisms that so many travellers, Indians and foreigners alike, felt towards this beautiful little town in the middle of the desert. Every where I looked there were narrow streets (full of ‘holy’ cows wandering about) leading down to the lake, covered in small shops selling fruit, silk and incense. Pushkar felt completely different to all the places I had been to so far, compared to the rest of India, Pushkar had an air of calm perhaps due to its highly spiritual and religious history. Also, the town was completely vegetarian, which was ideal for my vegan self.

I began to feel the days slip past me in a haze; I had already stayed in Pushkar a week longer than I planned, yet I was unable to leave. I had fallen into a relaxed way of life, which I knew would dissolve the second I got back on the bus to my next destination and rejoined the chaotic business of India.

Knowing that I had to leave in order to have enough time to reach my other destinations, after two weeks, I decided on my final day to go down to the lake to perform a blessing. A Hindu priest took me down to the lake and we kneeled by the side of the water. It was dusk and the sun was just going down, creating a beautiful golden glow, showing the beautiful colour in the saris that surrounded me as people bathed in the holy ghats which surround the lake. The priest asked me to scoop up some of the holy water and repeat after him an incantation to Brahma, and say the names of my friends and family I would like to bless. He then placed rose petals in my hands and asked how much I would give the lake in order to bless my family, funny how religion and money often get so inexcusably entwined. I told the priest I would give him fifty rupees (about sixty pence) ten rupees each for the people I care about most and an extra ten for good luck (Indians often add one rupee on a bill for good luck so I thought the priest would appreciate this). The priest looked mildly taken aback but ginned and wobbled his head all the same, and continued with the blessing. As I threw the rose petals into the lake (a gift for Brahma), the priest tied a red and yellow woollen bracelet around my wrist as a symbol of the blessing and “a ticket to all the temples in Pushkar”.

As I walked barefoot by the side of the lake on the burning hot ground, I looked as the sun set below the beautiful white temples. Pushkar was a beautiful and enticingly magical town, and I felt very lucky to be there.

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