26 Michael Zelnick Outside his elegantly simple house |
||
This is Sunday; Dhruva is free from his clinic so he’s taking me to Auroville for the day. We go by taxi. Auroville was created as an experiment, a centre for meditation, an international university, an agricultural revolution, an industrial adventure. It is to have a multinational community, and, with the imposing ideals laid down by the Mother (whose inspiration it is), Auroville should be a paradise on earth. A paradise on earth? Is it possible? Has it not been tried before? We live through such confusion, such uncertainty, such despair, of course we must try. The effort itself is the salvation. If we stop caring, we die. Striving for something outside chaos may not take us straight to paradise, but the striving, the effort — yes — the plunge into the dirt, must cleanse us, as it has cleansed Baruni. Auroville is supposed to be a city, but it’s still a latent dream. Its communities have high-sounding, meaningful names like Aspiration, Fraternity, Utility. Yes, a dream. (1)
Dhruva is directing the driver through unmade roads, over unmade fields, into unfinished building projects. We are going to see one of his patients. She is living in a stream-lined Mediterranean-type bungalow. She is also stream-lined in a cool, international but rather Mediterranean sort of way. She could be an actress, a painter, a writer; she could be married to an actor, a painter, a writer. She is beautiful - stunningly so because she is free and natural and honest. She is ageless. After the three of us have been talking for two and a half hours, occasionally skirting round the subject that keeps jumping into my mind — the Interview, she says: You will think me a heel, but I have decided I don’t want to talk myself into your book and excite others into the life-style which I believe happens to suit me right now, it’s too easy to do all that “look at me!” sort of thing. Her decision doesn’t surprise me, and I tell her so with much laughter. But now she is asking a pertinent question: Has it ever crossed your mind that you may never finish this book? Oh yes, yes…since the book was started, many things have crossed my mind. I explain it wasn’t in my power to start this project, and what is developing has nothing to do with anything I have accomplished, so as I see a greater power working, it’s that power’s responsibility to finish the book — should that be the plan: I am to be detached from the outcome. The dream — in this case — is to be involved in something beautiful. Should it remain a dream — well — it will still be beautiful. She now asks if meeting so many different people plodding along so many different paths is not confusing. I reply: Yes, that could be a distraction, but all I am doing is going from person to person like a bee gathering pollen. Whatever is offered I accept: I don’t have to judge or compare or criticize. I trust I am sufficiently grounded in my own guru and his teachings not to be overwhelmed by other pollen varieties. And I am seeing, feeling, learning that in essence all gurus, all teachings, all paths are pointing to one sign: How to achieve perfection. That is the great dream I am aiming to achieve. Dreams like that can’t confuse.
I am being shown some of the nearby Mediterranean style houses, all white and gracious, tasteful and spacious. They remind me of the unknown Ibiza in the 1960s, even the people — yes — especially the people. I’m almost sure before the day’s out some of my old Ibiza friends will manifest. It’s now time for lunch, but in the dining room (country-style Ibiza except for the Japanese furnishings) Dhruva is discretely asking around hoping someone else will fill the breach — half the day gone, nothing recorded! Meanwhile someone asks me if I would rent his house for a week starting from yesterday. Now I have a habit of liking to get things clear; I ask: You mean for six days? Actually — he replies — it’s only five days. The deal falls through. And just as well, for Dhruva is plowing through more fields and rough roads — we have retained the taxi and we are on our way to the Zelnicks. Michael is American, Shyama Swedish - Oh! - an Interview from a Scandinavian? Their house, late 1960s Ibiza — superb, with huge round window in the main room, thatched roof, and Italian baroque music zooming out of the stereo in the loft. Perfect setting to get high on Vivaldi. Or is it Albinoni? No, no, could it be Tartini? But I am not allowed to listen because Shyama has to take to the road with a brood of small children and Michael has agreed to start.
Interview 26 The effective cause of my getting interested in yoga was through my experience with drugs which started in college, I guess in 1963. The first time I did psychedelics, I was fortunate in that I had a spiritually aware guide. I had an experience without any essential clouding ever after, and I knew I would end up in an Ashram. I spent three years and about a hundred trips getting ready, so I thought it was meandering — I knew I would eventually go to an Ashram. My interest was in Buddhism — Zen — so I practiced on my own: reading, meditating. My intention was to go to a Zen monastery in Japan. I was living in Oregon, going to school, saving money: I had set a date to leave for Japan — 1st June 1968. I had earlier been in a Peace Corps training programme for India which I had dropped out of. But I kept in touch with a couple who, after serving in India for two years, met me on their return. They had planned to spend a short time here in Pondicherry but ended up staying several months at the Ashram. Through letters I knew they were impressed by someone they called the Mother. I was not interested then in the Hindu tradition, but when I met them after their return, I had an experience which I’m sure they were unaware of — I felt something extraordinary coming through them. Extraordinary enough to make me come straight to the Ashram in Pondicherry instead of my Zen monastery. Did you meet Mother straight
away? Can you describe the
meeting? Did you speak to her
in French? Did she speak to you
on those other occasions? What work were you allowed
to do? Why did you leave the
Ashram for Auroville? Did you have to get permission
to leave the Ashram? You didn’t have
to get permission to live in Auroville? What work are you doing
here? In what capacity? What is the significance
of this huge building? In this community life,
what are the arrangements for shopping, for food? Does this mean each family
gets the same basket? Do you still give time
to any sadhana? Is the life here more
difficult than in the Ashram? Is that because everything
appears to be freer? Do you see yourself living
in Auroville for the rest of your life?
There’s something compulsively appealing about these people’s honesty. Perhaps it’s due to elegant simple living. Swedish Shyama never returned with her brood — no Swedish Interview today! So goodbye Vivaldi – yes, it was Vivaldi. |
||
© Malcolm Tillis 2006 |