Faith

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!!

Well she wasn’t calm, she was cold and had enough current to take you off your feet if you don’t hold on to the chains in the ghat. The dip in Ganga makes you feel fresh, when the blood tries to run faster in the veins to warm you up. Haridwar is known for the aarti at Har ki Pauri. For the first timers at Haridwar,  go to the Har ki pauri facing the Ganga temple. Don’t let the crowd sitting all over the ghat intimidate you. Its only next to the temple, where you can see the legendary aarti.

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!