In a world where everyone
lives, more or less by the guidelines of the religion they follow, I am of
those few who do not believe in religion. That does not mean that I am not Hindu,
I am. The best part of being a Hindu is that it’s not a religion. It’s actually
an age old way of life. For every un-written decree, there’s totally acceptable
way out of it. So, its all who you want to be. You get to choose your own good,
bad or evil. All you need is a little faith, in the better good.
When I decided to go on Badrinath-Kedarnath
yatra, it wasn’t my faith, spirituality or religion that was calling me. I felt
a sense of responsibility that being an avid traveler I should go with my
parents so that I can be of some help. Yes I knew the travel will be tough, I
knew that they would not be able to handle it by themselves and I knew that
they would not accept this or accept me as a grown up. I went because I felt I
should.
I wasn’t hoping a soulful
awakening. I wasn’t expecting anything to be honest. It was one of the few
trips when I planned nothing and went as blank as a new slate.
On the way to Haridwar, our
first pit stop, it was my shear enthusiasm of seeing the Ganga
at the foot steps of Hari. Haridwar- the door to Hari. This is where Ganga becomes calm. Interesting isn’t it, how we personify
a natural element!!
Kedarnath greeted me with a
sense of empowering responsibility for people around me. I had taken responsibility
to bring back a wife to her husband. Yes, my father stayed back at the foot
hill, as he came face to face with his fears. Height, crowd and cold feet.
This is what I had been dreading and somehow I was mentally prepared for.
I asked my mother, if she wanted to continue. I knew I couldn’t force her
against her will and I knew saying that ‘I’ll take care’ was a big
responsibility. There was no network and no way I could have let my dad know
that we, specially mum was safe and sound for next 24 hours. I don’t know what
was going on in my mind, when I was trying to convince my teary mother that it will
be fine. I have no idea how I juggled between separating the required woolen in
one bag and trying to rent a room for my dad for the night. I was little scared
but once you have made a plan you just
have to stick to it. Fear has no place once you commit. I wonder if I would
have gone ahead with the journey, incase my mum would have decided to stay back too.
The 14 km trek on mare took 4
hrs and let me tell u,- “it hurts”. Halfway through the trek, the scene completely
changes once you can see the snow covered Himalayan caps. The enthusiasm of seeing
snow for the first time is so infectious that I couldn’t stop smiling every
time my mum would shout in a childlike high pitch enthusiasm- “ohh see there…and there and there”
The temple is surrounded by
snow caps on three sides. The mornings clear sun makes those mountains appear
they are just a hand away. The air is so clear in the morning that it gives a
very different 3D perspective from what you remember of night before. And its
etched in your brain like something carved on stones. I could not believe that
nature could be such an illusionist but there is was like a curtain of the
theater changing scenes from a Shakespearean drama.
I have been to many Shiva
temples as a child, but what I saw there at Kedarnath was something different.
A faith that can make an old fragile woman climb mountains. Everyone is a
little achiever following their call. There, seeing pure faith that drives
people to achieve something really difficult gave me a reason to believe in
will of human being. Its will that drives us, to do and achieve what may seem a
huge mountain of a task.
After Kedarnath,
Badrinath was like rediscovering the science
behind the religious places. The smell of sulphur in the natural hot springs
tells you to open your senses. Join the dots together and understand how religion
is the oldest paper written on natural geophysical science.
On our way down, Hrishikesh gave me calmness and a sense of achievement. I have no clue what had I achieved, what did I do differently, but it felt nice. Felt nice to sit on the marble floor, dipping my feel in crystal clear water and looking at people around me in harmony. If it is your religion that binds you together, gives you a rhythm to sing a song together in sync with thousands of strangers, it is beautiful. I may not be religious but I believe in faith, I believe that if something can bind so many strangers together in One group and can direct them to a greater good, it is all we need. We needed it thousands of year ago to create a civilized society, and looking around all those faces following an age old tradition inculcated in them through generations, felt nice. I was singing, what they were singing, I was one of them. At that moment I wasnt just a traveller, I was one of them- A Yatri. Its so ironic that I found my reason on be there at the last leg of the Yatra.
We travel all the time to different places for a reason. I often travel far to see something different, different landscape, people and culture. This was yet another travel that helped me travel within, to find a stronger person, not religious yet someone who understood the religion she belonged to a tad bit better.
...That its the faith drives us. We may find our faith in the glow of dim light coming from a single diya, we may find our faith in a flat stone, thousands of miles above sea level and we may find our faith in a cacti- "Brahm-Kamal".. but its important to find that faith!
Why do we travel so far, is
to ask ourselves how a matter of coincidence made something so beautiful. We
travel so far to fine something in the core of our mind. Faith, that can make
you move a mountain or certainly climb
one!
