Ekla Chalo Re: Su.Chandra's Travel Tales and Travails

By suresh verma

A non-descript boy from the vicinity of one Tiger land relocates in the vicinity of another Tiger land, grows on Democratic opportunity in Independent India, travels from Kucch to Kohima and Kashmir to Kanyakumari; Asmara, Abu Dhabi, Bangkok, Dubai, Madrid, Mexico,Tennessee, Seattle, Yipsillanti in professorial cloak, passes through hair raising moments in the world of beautiful people

• Language: English
• Publisher: Partridge Publishing India
• Release date: Aug 14, 2015
• ISBN: 9781482845969

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Copyright © 2015 by Suresh Verma.

All rights reserved. No part of this book may be used or reproduced by any means, graphic, electronic, or mechanical, including photocopying, recording, taping or by any information storage retrieval system without the written permission of the publisher except in the case of brief quotations embodied in critical articles and reviews.

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Contents

Bang… Arrival!

Kumaon Hills and Scenes

The Awadh

The Himalayan Jewels

The J& K

The land of Vahe Guru

God’s Lands

The Mahabharat Lands

The Royal Lands

Mysterious Madhya Pradesh

Bapu Land

Land of Shivaji

Goa, Daman, Diu and Pondicherry

Tamil Nadu

God’s Own Country

Lord Jagannath’s Puri

Unforgettable Karnataka

Oh! Hyderabad

North-eastwards Ho:

Towards Alien Shores East

Towards Middle East

Sa’ana, Riyadh and Jeddah

Across the Red Sea: Eritrea

The U.S.

Seattlewards

No Learning Even After Stumbling

Good Bye U.S.A.

Hi Mexico

New York Airport Again

Beware of smaller airlines, Brussels / Frankfurt Terminus

European Shores

To ‘The Foreign’ After All: Spain

I lose my Passport

Travails: Each One of Us is an Enigma

Appendix A: Check List of Items gathered and Tasks accomplished, before actual departure:

Appendix B: Train Travel in India

Appendix C: Typical Indian Grandma’s Quick-sure First aid Remedies:

Appendix D: Important contact Numbers and Addresses:

Appendix E: Correspondence with Literati and Academia:

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S

uresh Chandra was born (03.02.1943/ 17.06.1941) at Moradabad town, under the shadows of the Kumaon ranges of the great Himalayas, in Uttar Pradesh. Its extreme climate of chilling winters, boiling summers and gushing rains upon hand-to-mouth children hardens one into an inexhaustible enigma. He finished his post-graduation here, only to test his mettle on the equally inhospitable plateau of Nagpur but inhabited by very hospitable souls in Maharashtra. In due course of time from college lecturer to Principal to university professor, he attended institutions of higher learning and research (M.A. English. Agra, M.A. Linguistics, Nagpur, Ph.D. Guru Nanak Dev University, Amritsar) and was widely invited to lecture at distinguished institutions and universities, from Western tip to the Eastern and from the Northern to the Southern tip of India and all the major continents like Europe, North America, Central America, Africa. Later he visited the neighboring country of Thailand in the East and the Mid East principalities of Dubai, Abu Dhabi, Yemen of Asia.

During this journey of life, he came across a variety of people, terrains and cultures with touching experiences, both moving and stirring. Here is an account of these travels with the remark that every incident recorded here is unprecedented, sometimes tragicomic and at other times, may be, challenging but each one valuable aid to the development of vision of life. He prefers to call himself a cultural anthropologist.

He is the author of Fresh Perspectives on Fiction: Anand, Narayan and Rao (2005); New Issues New Approaches; Essays in Literary Criticism (2002); Easy English (A Text Book for College Students) (2002); Essays in Comparative Literature (1998); Aspects of Linguistics and ELT (1992); Post-War American Writing: Capote, Mailer and Wolfe (1991); Culture and Criticism (1987); Origins and Offspring of English Literature (1970).

He has written fiction: Baba’s Tribe (1990); Trishanku (Hindi)(1990); Unbearable Darkness of Noon (2000). He has also translated Peter Pan into Hindi and 17th Century classic, Krittivas Ramayan, into English. At present he is busy giving finishing touches to his book Structure and History of English Language; a simpler approach to the most complicated religion of the Hindus and; a book of fiction.

Su.chandra’s has been a life full of hope without hoping; full of challenges without ever wavering either before or during the engagement; full of promise without there being any patronage. The present account may be read as that of the promise of freedom and opportunity as the gift of democracy. This story of the life’s journey of an uncouth lad to a store house of acquired info can be the story of any one after him.

Philanthropy is in his genes and he is available at [e-mail]

Bang… Arrival!

T he prospects of my arrival in this world started a storm: Mahatma Gandhi started the ‘Quit India Movement’ and my father was arrested for participating in it. He was eventually released to enable him to prepare to welcome me. I feel that the setting was perfect for me to be a wanderer: planes of Moradabad under the shadow of Corbett National Park separated by the vast stretches of Ramganga river and its minor cousin Dhela running parallel. Here was our farm stretched beyond the Dhela and bordering the Park. Deer—spotted and barking and also Nilgai –would stray into our farm with their litter in trail. The call of the sandy miles was irresistible and the lure of stealing cucumber, water- and musk melon was not dampened by the severe punishment that followed at home. There were and can be seen even today the well-barrels that stand guard like minarets in the deserts of Arabia—the irrefutable proof that there were housing colonies here, but swept by strong floods of the furious Ramganga those days. Not now, not since huge Earthen Dam has been built over it at Kalagarh. On its banks we learnt to swim and on its Ghats we would dive into the well-barrells. The background was formed by the Kumaon hills where the meter- gauge trains would chug up to stations so slowly that we would jump down the moving train and board it while still moving. Always without knowing anything of something like a ticket or caring for the Ticket Checker; If we saw or apprehended his approach, we would simply jump down the moving train and board the coach in tow behind. The coaches were not connected those days! No pantry cars, but village vendors hawking hot-gram, thermos-stale tea, trinkets, toys, seasonal fruit, books, balm and charms and what not. They were all ticketless and adept at slipping away at the sight of the ticket checker. That’s how we learnt to dodge the ticket checking system by imitation. Railways had a huge establishment here. It was a major employer and gave identity to the town, otherwise famous for brassware. Not highly educated but every corner had someone ‘foreign returned’—Moradabad Brassware being a cottage industry but selling worldwide; the adventurous would go securing orders from abroad. Its extreme climate made its people hardy and enduring. Unemployment was a phenomenon haunting only those who sought it. If not able to land a job, boys would invariably turn entrepreneurs. Its boundaries were marked by the holy Ganges to the west beyond which lay Meerut. To its east is the erstwhile state of Rampur separated by the river Kosi. To its North-west is the holy town of Haridwar, where the Ganges descends onto the planes.

Rail travel came to be associated with life’s journey early in life. Then, there was the annual Camping at Garh-Mukteswar for plunging into the icy waters of the Ganges. It was about a week of fun and frolic with lots of swimming and playing, eating and window shopping in the make-shift shopping arcades. It was hallmarked by children getting lost and found. We lost our younger sister in one such faltering sea of humanity, with lots of weeping and wailing for days together. But we were very fortunate that she was brought back by the person to great relief of all the members of our extended family. You may feel bemused to learn that those days the mela-special trains had coaches with wooden benches and broken windows and largely without lights. They covered a distance of 40 miles in 4 to 6 hours, stopping at every station and flag-station in the darkness of night. At every stop would surge a crowd that would throw its bed-rolls and trunks and tent-poles through the windows followed by the children and young and old men and women on to the heads of occupants perched on the ground or hanging by the luggage-shelf above. But, to my surprise, every one squeezed himself into some corner or gap even though without scope for movement of limb and sleep. That’s why some of our present day blue blood rulers call it cattle-class although it exists no longer after being abolished tens of years earlier.

The call of the train has so much deeply embedded in my psyche that I long to sit or loiter by the rail track under the shade of a tree and watch children put stone or metal pieces on the rail for flattening or powdering. The ticketless travel so much endeared itself that we would make it into a good pastime travelling from one station to the next and return by the next train. I distinctly remember that my father took me to Delhi by a night train when Freedom came in 1947. There was the Red Fort just beside the Delhi station and we simply walked the distance. Thereafter it was a regular affair to go to Delhi on every 26th of January. Father would walk me to the Darya Ganj through Chandni Chowk and we would occupy the front row on the pavement so as to be able to watch the magnificent Republic Day Parade. We would wait for hours without moving, in dense foggy mornings, wrapped round in a big chester-coat, its pockets full of groundnuts. This too much of association with the railways took away the fear of travel, so much so that I did not feel any apprehension when, later, my class mate mesmerized me to abscond to Bombay to become a hero in the films. I was a big bold boy at XI standard and he was a vagabond always talking of smoking cannabis and gulping of hemp. It is so easy to misdirect an adolescent to steal, murder, run away, smoke, gamble and the like because of the thrill of adventure it promises. I collected a few rupees I could lay my hands on and trinkets of gold etc. He was not amused at the sight of such a beggarly booty but could hardly say no after I had reported with the bag on my shoulders. Merciful Heavens, I was rescued in time before the night passenger train moved: father and mother and my elder brother had been out of breath running from one platform to the other to check every train about to leave for Delhi. Had I not been intercepted that day, I wouldn’t be addressing scholars at JNU, or intellectuals at the Vigyan Bhavan, in years to come. Neither would I be able to win attention and affection of great Indian novelist and social reformer Mulk Raj Anand (See Appendix ‘E’ 2-10).

While still in Moradabad, I never sat at home. Study or no study, adventuring was the only fascinating occupation. In the Govt. Inter. College premises was an old abandoned step-well that had a tunnel that was said to link Moradabad with Allahabad, 300 miles away, for passage of flood waters of Ramganga to the Ganges and vice versa. I feel this tunnel was used by Mughal rulers (Moradabad was founded by prince Murad.) for escape in times of danger or when needing reinforcements! We could go a few meters into it but darkness and fear of snakes and also endlessness forbade our adventure.

Kumaon Hills and Scenes

M y maternal grandmother was a teacher in the Govt. Girls College. Every year, during the Summer vacations, she would head for the hill station of Nainital, where lived her father-in-law. She would always take some one of us children (there were so many in the cluster of families of relatives) along. We were always on vigil about who would be asked to accompany her, this or the next time. So once when she took my elder brother along, I feigned to whine that I must be taken the next year. Nainital those days had great charm with the lake forming the centre of activity. Indeed, this is the region of 7 lakes in close vicinity of Bhimtal and Bhowali, visible in the distance from the peaks of Nainital. Around the time of afternoon, there would play the Provincial Armed Constabulary band on its expansive bank. People would flock to it, yachts and small boats floating on its dark waters in the background. On the right side was the ‘cold’ road, so called because it never saw the sunlight and was chilly therefore. However, the left side had wide bright sunlit main passage. There used to be an elite club here. The Government would shift to Nainital those days to escape the Summer heat and winds of Lucknow. At the entrance to the town, particularly down the bus station, there was a sulfur spring and the first thing I would do was to drink its waters, even though it was in trickles. On the outskirts of the town is a famous astronomical observatory. There is a University too although Nainital has always been a centre for education of the elite. Those days, I had only one fascination: collecting empty cigarette packs with multicoloured pictures of Englishmen in long hat or navy men in white caps, and playing with them.

Nainital has been the earliest school for my education in Indian sociology. It is here that I began my first job as a junior clerk in the Govt. Girls College. My parents were thoroughly dissatisfied with my academic performance. My education after the dismal show at the Intermediate Examinations was suspended. This was, perhaps a very bad phase in our family. We were 5 brothers and two sisters, all of us school-college going. It was too much of a burden to fill so many young devouring bellies and very trying for my father to stuff our school bags with the books and stationary besides paying fees. So, there was pressure on me to seek employment. My grandmother, Devki Devi, the Headmistress of a Govt. Girls School, a lady of great courage and pioneer in female education. It was she who decided to educate all the 5 of her sisters and 3 of them became teachers in girls schools and college. It was she who must have exhorted my mother to excel at the Board examinations and she topped it. It was perhaps under her influence that my parents decided to educate all their children.

With my dismal showing, she took me to Bareilly to present me to Gaur Bala, her friend and Regional Inspector of Girls’ Schools. Gaur Bala immediately obliged by issuing me a letter appointing me in the vacancy of a junior clerk at Govt. Girls College, Nainital. I was too thrilled at the prospects of living in Nainital. Here I found the College had all highly educated teachers and me a clerk on a salary of Rs.95. all inclusive. I discovered that the monthly charges at the mess in the market were a minimum of Rs.90. What would I do in the left over Rs.5. in the whole month? How I would buy my ticket back to home in holidays? Mercifully the Principal allotted me a small cubicle type of room for living. But, how would I meet other sundry expenses? It had the most positive reaction within me and cemented my resolve to resume my studies for a better life. I left the job after completing one month and came home with the determination of studying higher for better future. I also learnt here that the Hill Brahmins eat meat! The Head Clerk was the nephew of a well known communist leader, S M Joshi. He offered to feed me but the monthly expenses on a non vegetarian meal would be Rs.100. Later I learnt that many Brahmins like Maithilis, Saryuparis, Kanyakubjas besides Kumaonese and Garhwalis were all meat eaters! This was a great education because I thought that only Kayasthas and low caste Hindus alone ate meat! This education expanded to include all those living in hills and all Bengalis, Assamese and North Eastern Hill people among meat eaters. Who was not a meat eater then, except those living in the planes of the Ganges and the Yamuna? Later I found that South Indian Brahmins were more pious and abstainers. I remember with relish that the Principal of Dr. Ambedkar College, my boss in Nagpur, a very pious south Indian Brahmin, never ate anything from my kitchen except tea and banana. However, his attitude changed dramatically when he learnt that I would not touch non-vegetarian food!,

Other famous places in the Kumaon Hills include the holiday resorts of Rani Khet and Almora. The ruling deity at the later place is Golu Debata. Golu Debata’s shrine atop the steep and dark hill is a place of great reverence and consolation. It is widely believed that the weak and the helpless sufferers come to seek justice at the court of Golu Debta. They write their petition and tie it with the branch of the shrine tree. It so happens that more often than not their grievance gets redressed and they come back to offer a goat at the altar of Golu Debta. I watched in numbness when the priest struck the goat with all his might to sever its head at one stroke! There rolled the head and here writhed the body in extreme agony, unbearable to the ordinary human. But for the devout, this gave satisfaction of having fulfilled his commitment to a benevolent god! Incidentally, animal sacrifice is very common in all corners of the globe, particularly in pockets where tribal belief and ritual hold sway. I remember, my neighborhood friend’s elder brother at Moradabad once offered a goat in sacrifice on havan (chanting of mantras before sacred fire) at his home! Its cooked pieces were offered to all dear and close ones for Prasad. It is considered a symbol of prestige and stature in society to have animals subordinated: The elephant, the horse, the cow, the dog, the cat, the python…the list is endless and stops with the tiger and the lion and the cobra! With the changing times, however, people have become more compassionate towards animals and have stopped slaughtering them (earlier it used to be a buffalo!) and have substituted animals with vegetables like pumpkin.

The