Part 2- Diary of an unknown SriVaishnavan travelling thro' America

[Guest guest]

Dear friends,

 

As I sit tapping out this posting on my keyboard, a

line from a very famous Vedic passage echoes in my

ears. In the Vedic "prashna" or passage called

"chamakam" there is a "mantric" chant that speaks of

the many wondrous blessings of life bestowed upon a

Vedic adherent. To the repeated chant of the Vedic

litany, "may cha cha may!" (meaning, "May I be

bestowed with (such and such) blessing..."), the

euphonious "chamakam" passage goes on to recount an

exhaustive list of several human blessings to aspire

for in life -- such as, for instance, well-being,

love, wealth, progeny, plentiful food, worship... so

on and so forth:

 

"sham cha may, mayas-cha may

priyam cha may 'nukAMascha may...

....

deerghAyucha may na'mitram cha may..."

 

Now, towards the end of one "anuvAka" of the

"chamaka-prashnam" there is a curious phrase, so full

of significance, that describes one of the rarest

blessing of life --

 

"na'mitram cha may..."

 

"na-mitram" in Sanskrit means "a state of being

friendless in this world"; "anamitram" is never being

in such a state.

 

One of the rarest of blessings a man can hope for is

never -- not for a single moment in life -- to be in a

state of "friendless-ness". Being friendless in this

world is the next worst thing to being orphaned. To be

orphaned in life is tragedy; to be friendless is a

curse. At every stage of one's life, says this Vedic

line, be it in childhood, youth or manhood, one must

always be blessed with the company of good and

abundant friends.

 

At no time in life is the value of friends more

strongly felt than in two particular situations. One

is in sickness or old age. The other is when one is in

an alien land, far from home, and amongst utter

strangers. The need for human friends and warm

companionship in old age is indeed very acutely felt.

It is a terrible thing indeed -- far more terrible

than ill-health -- not to have enough friends in old

age. In the evening of our lives, when it seems as

though everyone is shunning our company, it is in the

evening of our lives more than ever that we need lots

of friends with whom to spend the rest of time left in

the world. Similarly, landing up on foreign soil

amidst alien people, and not knowing the native

language, customs or manners -- i.e. being

"friendless" or "namitram", or feeling lost in a

faraway land -- that can also be equally painful.

 

One of the many reasons we are asked to chant the

famous passage of mantras from the Vedic "chamakam" is

to protect ourself against falling into a state or

situation of such abject "friendless-ness" in life. If

ever proof was needed of the compassion and solicitude

the Vedas have for human beings, it is truly in this

significant phrase -- "na'mitram cha may..."

 

***********

 

I regarded my first ever visit to the vast and great

land of America with a certain amount of nervousness

since I hardly had any true friends ("mitra:") there

to welcome me (although I must hasten to add here that

I have many close kin). But thanks to a very pleasant

experience that befell me by sheer chance, I did not,

after all, have to go friendless -- or, "namitram" --

in America. On the contrary, the real significance of

the Vedic phrase "na'mitram cha may..." came to be

driven home more starkly to me in America than at any

place else or anytime ever before.

 

************

 

Every year numberless people go to India as excited

tourists. Many of them transform into humble pilgrims.

 

One may go visiting the great many historic temples of

India as a casual tourist but there should be no

surprise if it is as pilgrim that one returns. I have

seen this happen all too often -- the tourist who went

to enjoy himself at the hill-resort of Kodaikanal

returns instead as a pilgrim of the famous Madurai

Meenakshi-amman temple; the tourist who went with the

purpose of shopping for silk returns from Kanchipuram

talking more about the great historical temples there

than about sarees or scarves; the tourist who went to

Calcutta to see the colonial splendour of the Victoria

Memorial there returns instead with accounts of a trip

to the Belur or Dakshineshwar...

 

I went to America too with a tourist's expectation of

plain fun and curiosity. Certainly, I did enjoy the

grand sight of the New York skyline from the edge of

Ellis Island. I watched too with gaping admiration,

alongwith hundreds of tourists, the great Statue of

Liberty. Again, as I drove through the maze of streets

in Manhattan and past "Ground-Zero" -- the sad remains

of the Twin-Tower site of the "9/11" carnage --I too,

like any ordinary tourist, could not suppress a lump

in my throat...

 

But although America greeted me as a plain tourist --

one amongst statistical thousands who throng the

country from all parts of the globe every year -- it

was with a pilgrim's humble but overwhelming emotion

that I eventually returned from the tour. And the

reason was, quite simply, a temple... Yes, a temple,

again indeed, but a "temple" of entirely another sort.

 

There are 106 great temples in India designated in the

Tamil language as "divya-dEsam-s", or "divine

provinces". Thousands of worshippers flock every year

to these beautiful places. In America, across the

length and breadth of the land, there are similar such

wonderful "temples" -- probably 106 or even more of

them -- which, in my opinion, deserve no less to be

duly designated and revered as "divya-dEsam-s". These

"temples" are "temples of learning". I mean the great

many Universities of America -- such as Yale, Harvard,

Stanford, MIT and a host of others -- all the great

universities that collectively have made America the

world's wonderland of higher education. Young and

brilliant minds from the farthest corners of Asia,

India, Europe, Latin America and Africa -- so many

students every year flock to these "divya-dEsam-s" of

advanced learning in so many fields and disciplines...

It would make anyone wonder why? I was no exception.

 

If there be but one compelling reason for touring

India and should that be in being able to visit a

"divya-dEsam" temple, then by the same token, I would

have no hesitation in saying, a tour of the USA is

well worth it for the sake of a few hours spent inside

any of the country's great many eminent universities.

The American university as a place of lofty learning

and knowledge is as sacred a patch of soil upon earth

as any holy "divya-dEsam" I have been blessed to

visit.

 

America, I realized, is really more sacred

"gnyAna-bhoomi" or "vidyA-bhoomi" than mere

"bhOga-bhUmi".

 

*************

 

On a clear and fine day in spring, March 20th '04 --

my first day in America -- I set out from New Jersey

on a long 4-hour route on my first ever pilgrimage to

an American "divya-dEsam" ... which in this case was

the University of Connecticut or "U-Conn" as many

young American students, I later discovered, call it

with the same sort of fondness a SriVaishnavan like

me, say, would refer to the "divya-dEsam" of Tirupati,

back home in India, as "malai" or SriRangam as

"kOvil".

 

The route took me past the arterially busy George

Washington Bridge, a big, bustling and nodal gateway

through which an unending stream of gnarled, and often

snarling, automobile traffic gushes in and out of the

states of New Jersey and neighbouring Connecticut. As

my car swung into the fast-lane along the long,

winding and snow-swept 'Interstate', I became aware

I'd entered, for the first time ever in my life, into

a whole new fabled world -- the world of the great

American highways... a vast, labyrinthian but

efficient network of roadways criss-crossing miles and

miles over a giant of a continent.

 

My companion and chaperone on the trip to the American

"divya-dEsam" was my good Muslim friend, Syed Nawaz

Ahmed. Nawaz and I had been classmates in school 30

and more years ago in Chennai, India. We had not met

-- nor had we corresponded with each other -- since

1972 when we both left high school to each follow our

separate ways in life. It was by sheer accident -- one

of those miraculous happenstances one often hears

occurs these days on the world-wide Internet circuit

-- it was pure happenstance that Nawaz and I came into

contact again in late 2003 --- after almost three

decades!

 

Nawaz had migrated to the USA in the early '80s where

in New York he had set up his own limousine-car

service company. He and his family had thrived, he

told me, and he was now presiding over a prosperous

business with many important clients including (he

told me in hushed tones) "top-ranking officers of the

FBI"!

 

Afer 30 long years, to meet up again with a dear old

school friend in far off America was a rare and moving

moment of revival indeed in life... It was a blessing

of Vedic character too, for, the "chamaka-prashna"

line of "na'mitram cha may..!", for quite some strange

reason, began to ring ceaselessly in my ears... It did

not stop until long after I'd wound up my first tour

of America and set sail home...

 

**********

 

More miracles of friendship were to follow!

 

Motoring down an American interstate into Connecticut

with my old friend, Nawaz, I found myself eagerly

looking forward to meeting with -- miracle of

miracles! -- yet another old school-mate of ours

residing now in the "divya-dEsam" of "U-conn". It was

at the invitation of this other friend, in fact, that

we, both Nawaz and I, were headed that way. We were

journeying to a grand class re-union in America -- 3

friends from Chennai who hadn't met in more than 30

years!

 

His name -- Narasimhan Srinivasan... He and I, I

instantly recalled, had been the only two

SriVaishnavite boys in the whole of that class of '72

way back in the Catholic Missionary school we'd

studied together... "Hans" (as Narasim(han) was being

called by everybody in America) was now (tenured)

Associate Professor of Marketing at "UConn". How he

had changed indeed! His lectures and published papers,

Nawaz later told me, were now legend in academic

circles. He had attained some kind of near

'campus-guru' status amongst his students. But by God,

Nawaz said to me, though transformed in America into

"Hans", Narasimhan remained still the same old fellow

we'd known in our school days... a jolly good friend,

a true "mitra:"...

 

*************

 

As I now look back upon the moment of my re-union with

two good friends whom I'd all but forgotten for 30

years -- but brought together again by sheer, blessed

accident, in far-off America, on the sacred grounds of

a great American temple of learning, a "divya-dEsam"

of sorts -- what can I say about such a moment except

that it seemed somehow God pre-ordained.

 

As Nawaz drove me through America past the cities of

Hartford and Yale and into the snow-swept county of

Glastonbury, heading towards "U-Conn", the familiar

chant of the "chamakam" kept ringing silently in my

ears --

 

"na'mitram cha may...."

 

(to be continued)

 

Regards,

 

dAsan,

Sudarshan

 

 

 

 

 

______________________

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[Guest guest]

Dear respected U.Ve. Sudharshan swami:

 

I have not forgotten you and following all your

articles appear in Tiruvengadam group. I also feel

like your Muslim friend whenever I read your articles.

Though we knew each other only electronically I

consider you as though a have known you for a long

time.

 

I reciprocate your thoughts on "na' mirtram cha me"

quoted from chamakam. At the present time when there

is so much animosity between Hindus and Muslims, your

article should open the eyes of srivaishnavas, nay all

human beings, as to how an ardent srivaishnavite and a

Muslim can experience the friendship after the lapse

of 30 years. Probably you followed the example of

Baghavan Ramanuja in creating a sannadhi for nachiyar

in Srirangam. I would have very much liked to meet

you, but I am about 50 miles from Chicago and could

not make a trip to New Jersey. Since you mentioned

about divya desam of learnings, I hope you did not

miss to visit Pomona temple in NY State from where

Oppiliappan Sadagopaswami is contributing lot of

articles on Srivaishnava philosophy. That temple looks

really like Srirangam temple. (America Sriranga

divyadesam.)

 

I am sure the readers will enjoy immensely your

articles on your VISTA to USA combining the pearls of

wisdom of yours and Upanishads. May Lord Narayana and

all gurus bless you with prosperous and healthy life

so that we can benefit from your writings.

 

Adiyaen N.S. Rajagopalan