Cartwheels in a Sari (6 page)

We learned every bump and turn. With my eyes closed, I could tell if we had reached New Rochelle simply by the buzz of the worn roadway, or if we had passed Co-Op City by the sound of the tires rolling over the metal plates in the drawbridge. Over the years, we marveled as the landscape around us turned into suburbia, as the toll fares increased, as lanes closed and reopened for paving and repaving, and as on-ramps and off-ramps sprouted endlessly while malls and con-dos appeared, replacing woody lots. We knew all the side roads—if there was an accident on I 95, we found the twisty streets that released us onto the Merritt Parkway. With the aid of the car's static radio used only for the purpose of receiving traffic updates, we triumphantly navigated our way for Guru's blessings each night and safely back home again.

“Brothers and Sisters.”

Girish, a tall man with puffy bags beneath his eyes like half doughnuts, stood with his back to Guru's altar, facing the disciples at the front of the church. A writer and scholar on world religions, Girish belonged to one of America's wealthiest families.

“As you know, lately, at every meditation, Guru makes alterations to our so-called spiritual practice.”

This was highly unusual. Normally, before Guru arrived at the church we were meant to be silent, attempting to raise our consciousness to be more receptive to Guru's presence. Announcements were made at the end of the night. I had a feeling this was not meant to be happening. I sat on the orange shag carpet beside my mother, pleating the end of my sari as a fabric fan to create a breeze.

“Many times Guru claimed he was not leading a religion but a ‘spiritual path.’ But this church that we now occupy is an apt symbol of what the Aum Center has become.” Girish paused, scanning the pews. As usual, the church was hot and crowded.

When I checked my parents’ reactions, both were absolutely still.

“The meditation group that now only some of you original members recall has been corrupted into an organization with its own iconography, rituals, rules, and holy books.”

At this, rumbles occurred from the back of the church. Sounds of people shifting and getting up whisked to the front.

“With the expanding list of controlling rules, such as his ban on all marriages”—Girish looked back and forth between the men and women, instigating a response—”avoiding any non-Guru-related social interaction with the opposite sex,
restricting socializing solely to other disciples—this includes giving up connections to family members who are not disciples—are now enforced laws. Mandatory attendance at meetings, required daily meditations, songs, and chants.” At the last one, he added extra emphasis and shrugged his shoulders. “Didn't we join this group as an alternative to the formal dogma of religion?”

“Sit down!” A shout came from the far back of the women's side.

I turned but couldn't see who it was that had decided enough was enough. It started an avalanche.

“Girish, be quiet!”

“We won't hear you anymore!”

“Someone, get him out of here!”

With new energy, he spoke louder.

“I ask you, Brothers and Sisters, is true spirituality bound by dogma? Doesn't the true spiritual search require self-guidance?”

Three male disciples surrounded him and nudged him toward the aisle in an effort to remove him.

As he passed by me and headed to the back, with a bellowing voice he said, “The Buddha said to question everything the Master says is truth and find your own tru …”

And he was gone.

My father, in his official capacity as Guru's attorney, followed him out. The entire church throbbed with outrage. Nothing like this had ever occurred before. If disciples had concerns, they kept them to themselves; Guru was never questioned, certainly not in public. My mother put her arm around me, pulling me into her and rubbing my neck with her thumb. Confrontation in general scared me, let alone a
shouting spectacle at a meditation. The sacred space felt altered, and its shock hit me suddenly. The changes Girish had raged about had no meaning to me. What did I care or understand if Guru enacted radical policy reversals from arranging “divine marriages,” as he did for my mother and father, to a permanent ban on marriage? So what if seekers either married before joining or remained forever single? No one, and certainly not my parents, explained to me its permanent impact, that it meant my future destiny was to be a nun. I suppose, even if they had, at the time, I would have found it a wonderfully exciting adventure, a way to remain forever attached only to Guru.

Looking back, however, Girish was right. By the mid-seventies, everything had changed, even the name of our group. Originally called the Aum Center, Guru renamed it the Sri Chinmoy Center, the first of many programs, objects, places, and awards he named in his own honor. The fact that we no longer met for official meditations in Guru's house, and now went to the church, was another enormous change that happened overnight.

Only days earlier, in the long car ride home from Bayside, when my parents assumed Ketan and I were sleeping, I overheard my father break his own law of maintaining meditative silence in the car to discuss the events that had led to the sudden move to the church. The New York meditations used to be held inside Guru's home, and Guru's neighbors, from their front stoops, gawked at the smiling throng who filed into the blue house each night. My father spoke about one neighbor in particular, a petite married woman a few years older than Guru, who lived directly across the street. Curious about the Indian man, the woman began having neighborly
chats with Guru. Charmed by Guru's attention, she decided to attend meditations and soon became a regular fixture at Guru's house. Her husband, a no-nonsense laborer unimpressed by the flocks of what he considered young hippies crowding into the house across the street, began questioning his wife as to what she was doing at a black man's house. When other neighbors confided to him that they had spotted his wife, alone, tiptoeing in and out of the Indian's house in the middle of the night, rumors of an affair seemed confirmed. The husband had had enough.

My mother had turned around, to ensure that we were both sleeping, before my father continued. I squeezed my eyes shut and leaned against Ketan's snoring body. My parents had already lost me. We all went to Guru's house. What was the problem?

A call was received by the Queens Building Department, my father continued, that the house was being utilized as a church in a neighborhood not zoned for religious buildings. Building inspectors arrived unexpectedly late one afternoon and, seeing the rows of chairs in the living room, issued a stern warning. Guru would not be able to hold meditations inside his house anymore. The disgruntled husband was ready to go public with allegations of the affair. Guru was furious. He gathered a few disciples, explaining that the Supreme, at times, commands that instead of using compassion, he should use justice.

Sure enough, the Supreme had bestowed his benevolent justice and the police were called the next day because the neighbor's house had been pelted by stones in the middle of the night. When my father described the shattered glass that littered the sidewalks, I felt disturbed. Stones were dangerous,
and the fact that stones were thrown right across the street from Guru's home, made me scared that Guru could have gotten hurt. I wanted to interrupt my father and ask how we could always protect Guru, but then I remembered that I wasn't supposed to have heard any of what he was saying.

Shortly afterward, the neighbor's house went up for sale, the church was bought, and Guru created the Guards, a group of close male disciples chosen to serve as personal bodyguards for Guru. This news gave me great relief.

These guards—the same ones who had ushered Girish from the church—now escorted Guru to and from events, standing on patrol near his throne, preventing anyone from approaching Guru without being personally summoned. To make their duties official, Guru had them wear uniforms— white pants with a Guru-blue stripe down the side, a white shirt, Guru-blue tie, and a numbered badge. They were given a ranking and their badges were a reflection of their order. Guru was a strong believer in rank and order. His insistence on rating people seemed to be a throwback to the traditional caste system of his native India. Many times Guru proudly proclaimed that his own family was Kshatriya, the warrior caste, an esteemed rank, which naturally elevated him over those unfortunate enough to be born into lower castes. By assigning rank and order and creating his own caste system within the Center, Guru fostered a competitive struggle between disciples. Close watch was kept on disciples’ rankings, which provided built-in incentives for those eagerly aspiring to improve their status, and provided Guru with plenty of leverage to demote or promote disciples at his pleasure.

My father, always in the forefront, was given the rank of guard number three, a position of considerable honor. Ketan
decided that when he was old enough, he hoped he, too, could wear the proud uniform and stand on patrol.

Hours later, Guru finally arrived at the church after having been filled in by the head guard about the evening's events. As Guru entered through his private side door in a green dhoti, he walked with a slight limp, as though the earlier episode had already lodged within him as a physical attack.

“Though many of you are here, very few are true disciples,” Guru said.

Tension filled the hall. Disciples from both the men's and women's sides shifted.

“Dear ones,” Guru said. “True disciples never doubt their guru.”

Some folded their hands tighter, while others searched for a notebook and pencil to write down every precious word.

“To make the fastest progress, you need one hundred percent faith in your guru. I am giving you messages from the Highest Supreme,” Guru said with closed eyes. “True disciples do not doubt their guru. Doubt is poison. It leads to the destruction of your spiritual life. Faith, unconditional faith, must be present to be a true disciple. Anyone who doubts is not a real disciple.”

Not only his words but the energy driving the words seemed tired, as though the disciples’ failures caused a leak inside him. He was lagging, flat, disappointed in a physical manner.

I wanted to run to the stage and climb his throne, shouting that I was sorry. I would try harder. I should have tackled Girish and made him stop. No one could hurt or doubt Guru. I then thought of my own secret fear of the Guru-bust, and I
swore I would be better and worship it, too. I would make alterations to my spiritual life. I would amend my errors. Then my progress would make Guru happy. I had noticed that Guru was happy when we did what he asked us to do. I'd listen, I promised. I'd do anything.

After a long meditation and the
prasad,
an item of blessed food distributed by Guru that traditionally followed a session of meditation, in an instant, Guru lifted the sorrowful air, and magically transformed himself into a storyteller.

With a gleam in his eye, Guru coyly teased, “Now, I have barked at you all. Is anyone interested in hearing some rubbish tales? Absolute rubbish tales?”

“Yes, Guru,” we shouted back, with my voice the loudest.

Of course we were interested, how could we not be? These were stories about Guru's childhood—the fact that he even had a childhood gave me hope. His past seemed remote and vague, except for the rare occasions when he re-created it for us.

Instantly, Guru's posture changed. Slouching his shoulders, he tucked one leg upon his throne, and rested his arm on his knee. His voice cleared of the low and often raspy tone that accompanied his first words after a prolonged period of silence. He now spoke quickly as his sentences finished with exclamation marks.

Guru's childhood was a realm of adventure and innocence. In Guru's remembrances, he was usually involved in some type of trouble or mischief, and then, just as easily, slipped out of it without a scratch. From stealing sweets meant for the family shrine to climbing the mango tree to gorge himself on its fruit, Guru was intent on exploring options and testing limits. Guru's status as a young troublemaker
was lovingly accepted and sanctioned. Though his birth name was Chinmoy, his nickname was Madal, which meant “noisemaker,” and that was the name that he carried until he arrived in America. Then he took the special honorarium reserved for holy men and women and renamed himself Sri Chinmoy. It was Sri Chinmoy whom I had known my whole life, but it was Madal whom I was most curious about. The idea that Guru had a prior life—involving siblings, parents, scoldings, and trouble—was fascinating.

Tonight, as always when Guru recounted his tales, time evaporated. In the middle of one story, he veered off toward another anecdote and then another until an hour later, as though finally noticing that he somehow had taken an alternate route, he stopped, asking how he had gotten there. I did not mind, sitting enraptured, as his stories blurred from one episode into the next. Guru often repeated stories, and I recognized his favorites, which quickly became my favorites, too: Guru's survival from the overcrowded commuter ferry that sank; Guru's face-to-face encounter with a tiger in the dark forests of Bengal; Guru's near rescue by his family servant, after standing too close behind an imam's machete poised to sacrifice a goat. As Guru spun his childhood reminiscences, he was relaxed and happy, as if he wished to be back in a time before he was responsible for the salvation of souls and his only responsibility was keeping monkeys from snatching away the fruit he would carry home to his mother.

What we knew about Guru's family we learned from his stories. Guru's father worked as a train inspector for a railway line that ran from Chittagong to Assam and later founded a bank. Guru's mother stayed home to raise their seven children. Even though he was an orphan when he was only twelve
years old—his father passed away when Guru was only eleven, and his mother died the following year—their loss seemed raw, as if their absence still left a hollow space inside a holy man filled with God.

“Oi,” Guru finally said, as if waking from his own sweet spell. “Oi. I have talked too much. Let us go, dear ones,” and with that the meditation was over. The book of his childhood was tightly closed, and, as always, I greedily wished he had shared more.