Mr. R

It's been a year-and-a-half now since M and I made the epic sojourn to Kailash and Manasarovar. Although overwhelmingly brilliant, I simply could not find the right words to describe the journey for a long time. Eventually, I thought it best to document it bit by bit, one wonderful experience at a time. The Lake Where No One Lives came first, hopefully others will follow.

While there are several noteworthy stories to share about the sights we set our eyes on, equally inspiring and interesting were the 40-odd people we shared our pilgrimage with. Names are hazy and easily forgotten, but their faces and their smiles, their words and their deeds, will remain etched in my memory forever. 

There was Maa, who had literally turned blue after catching a cold but went on nevertheless. There was Doctor S, who I'd witnessed administering stitches to an elderly lady after she had met with an accident. At the end of the procedure he touched her feet, thanking her for the opportunity to serve her. Both pairs of eyes welled up, rendering useless any further words between them. There was also the girl who made my dip in the Lake possible, who helped me walk into the cold waters with courage I never knew I had.

But most of all, I remember this one man, whom I shall refer to as Mr. R.

Mr. R, with silver-gray hair, was probably in his late fifties. He was the kind of man you could tell was very handsome in his youth, good enough to have been a movie star. His frame was muscular and there was a certain beauty in the way he held himself and took his long strides. As you'd know if you've read some of my previous posts, I take great interest in observing people who catch my fancy, and Mr. R was certainly one of them. 

So observe, I did. It was hard not to. Impossible, really. The man was remarkable not just in terms of physical beauty, but also physical endurance. The cold and high altitude that had gotten to me, a person half his age, had seemingly no effect whatsoever on his health and attitude. While the rest of us bundled up in layers, he went about regally in the only flimsy pair of clothes he had packed - as a man on a true pilgrimage would. Due to the lack of hot water, the group abandoned bathing as we gained in altitude. But not Mr. R. He continued to cleanse himself with ice-cold water at every stop we made, after washing his clothes. As he waited for them to dry, he would chant aloud Sanskrit verses on the praise of Lord Shiva. 

Naturally, I was not the only one whose attention he had managed to grab. A few considered him a man of extraordinary physical strength. There were rumors doing rounds that he would walk all the way from Chennai to Tirupati and back, once every month. Others in the group said he was a show-off, trying desperately to gain some attention by openly defying the rules. I'm not sure if the whispers ever reached his ears, but they seemed to be of no consequence to him. He seemed set in his mission, whatever he'd decided it was.

It was around 4 am on a dark, chilly morning in Paryang, Tibet, when my intense observations of the past week had actually led me to do something I never expected I would. The group was readying itself for the next leg of the journey, the all important one that would lead to the Lake Manasarovar. I was ready ahead of time, completely uneasy with the climatic conditions, having vomited non-stop from altitude sickness the previous day. It irritated me beyond reason that I had to have fallen sick while on the journey of a lifetime.  As I walked out of my room, I tried to gather my thoughts, focus myself on devotion and nothingness. And that's when I spotted in the hallway, a lone figure, seated on a wooden stool. Faint chants told me that the person was none other than Mr. R. Dressed once again in his flimsy t-shirt and pants, he was engrossed in singing the praises of the Lord, while all around him were busy looking for toothpaste and waiting for some hot water to arrive. 

I stared. I could not believe it. What on earth had this man done, I burned to know, to have possessed such an extraordinary control over his body. Here was a man, who at the age of fifty could do something that I could perhaps never, ever hope to do in my lifetime. Here was a man who had mastered something that I have been struggling with ever since I could remember - the body. He was comfortable in his skin, comfortable in his discomfort, and for that, there was no way I couldn't have done what I did next. I walked straight up to him, and bowed down at his feet. 

At first he didn't notice me. A few seconds later he did, but his chanting continued nevertheless. I shed a few tears, got up and walked away, realizing how far I was from where I wanted to be. Also realizing that maybe not too far, if I could only find a way to bow down to every creation of the creator, just the same way.