Golden Girl (11 page)

‘Toto, I’ve a feeling we’re not in Kansas any more. We must be over the rainbow!’ I said as an elephant strolled by, its face and trunk painted in blue chalky patterns,
followed soon after by a camel, then a family of white boars.

Pia took a photo on her camera to send back home, then we followed Vanya past a market where women in brightly coloured saris sat in the middle of a pile of open sacks selling fruits,
vegetables, spices and herbs. In contrast to the tranquil atmosphere back at our all-white hotel, the town was bursting with life and colour. Some people wore traditional Indian dress, some modern
dress, many were tourists in shorts, sarongs and T-shirts. But, as I’d noticed the day before, all life was present as we made our way through the narrow streets lined with open kiosks and
stalls. Seated women made garlands from heaps of yellow and orange flowers, old men rested on the pavement, children watched passers-by. Most shops seemed to be geared up for tourists, selling
bags, shoes, scarves, tie-dyed bedspreads and clothing, prints of Krishna, goddesses, demons, monkey gods and elephant gods, stone carvings, jewellery and wooden toys. Many of the stallholders
beckoned us to ‘come and look’ but Vanya ushered us on. I also noticed a number of people begging, sitting with their hands outstretched, a bowl in front of them, some old, some only
children, running alongside the tourists and tugging at their arms. It made me feel uncomfortable and I wished I could do something to help.

We managed to persuade Vanya to stop at a kiosk selling pashminas. ‘Let me demonstrate how you can tell if a shawl is genuine,’ said the young stallholder as he held up a ring in one
hand then carefully began to thread a large maroon shawl through it. To our amazement, it flowed through the ring like it was the finest silk. As we moved on, I looked over to see a stall selling
samosas. ‘I’m going to get one,’ I said to Pia. ‘Want one?’

Vanya held up his hand. ‘Not a good idea,’ he said. ‘Only eat from places you know how the food has been prepared.’ He indicated his stomach then pulled a face as if he
was ill. We got the message but the smell was so enticing that I bought one anyway. ‘It looks fresh,’ I said as a smiling Indian man put it in a bag for me. ‘I’ll have it
later,’ I said.

Pia fanned her face. ‘I’m too hot to eat anything, especially anything spicy.’

Vanya shrugged. ‘Don’t blame me,’ he said as we continued on our way.

‘Have you noticed that loads of the signs and posters are in English?’ I said as I pointed to a poster advertising a train journey.

‘That’s because the British were in India for so long,’ Pia said. ‘From 1612 until 1947. I read about it in one of JJ’s books.’

‘Clever clogs. You’re always so good at remembering dates. I need to read up on it all too. It makes it come to life being here, though, doesn’t it? Rather than something you
just read.’

Pia nodded. ‘Which is why we have to make the most of the time we have out here and not spend it all stuck back at the hotel studying.’

‘Exactly,’ I agreed, wishing that we’d had longer to browse the stalls before going to the guru convention. I wanted to buy presents for Dad, Gran, Aunt Maddie and Charlie and
I still had to buy a birthday present for JJ. But Vanya was a man on a mission and that mission was to get us to the Lewises, leaving us no choice but to hurry along beside him.

‘India has such a distinct smell,’ I said as we glimpsed the temple ahead of us. ‘How would you describe it?’

Pia sniffed the air. ‘A mix of . . . spices, dust, petrol and baked earth.’

I noticed a cow that was looking at an ice-cream stall with interest. ‘And dung, that’s definitely mixed in somewhere. There’s an animal smell. There are so many oxen
around.’

‘And goats,’ said Pia as she almost fell over one that scurried past.

We went up some steps to an entrance flanked by two life-size stone elephants, then we were at the steps leading to the Jagdish Temple. I could see the Lewises standing in the crowd, amongst a
large number of holy men, some in orange robes, some in white, some wearing hardly anything and others looking like they were covered in flour, their faces painted orange, red or blue.

‘They look like they’ve been to a kid’s party,’ said Pia as we passed one man whose bald head was painted white, with a red stripe down his forehead to his nose and
orange cheeks. Around his neck he wore about thirty beaded necklaces. Pia suddenly giggled and nudged me. I looked to my left where there was a bearded man standing totally naked apart from a
string of beads around his neck.

‘It’s a look,’ I said. ‘Not one that I think will catch on in England though. Bit too cold.’

‘Thank God,’ said Pia, averting her eyes.

‘Wow. This place is amazing,’ I said as I took in where we were.

The three-storey temple was stunning, with hundreds of tiny images of gods, goddesses, elephants, dancing girls, musicians, horses and horsemen carved into its pillars.

JJ came forward to meet us. ‘The elephants are a symbol of prosperity,’ he said, ‘the horsemen of power.’

‘Why do so many of the carvings have the faces cut out?’ I asked when I noticed that lots of the carvings were headless.

‘The Moghuls defaced them when they were persecuting the Hindus, because they were of Hindu gods,’ said JJ.

I nodded like I knew what he meant and once again wished I’d read up more on India before coming here. I hated feeling so ignorant.

‘It must have taken years to carve all these,’ said Pia as we stared at the intricate carvings that seemed to go on forever.

As Pia took photos of the pillars, I noticed that some Indian people were staring at the Lewises with the same interest as we had in the holy men.

‘People are staring at you,’ I whispered to JJ. ‘They must know your dad is Jefferson Lewis.’

‘Ah, there’s a reason for the looks and it’s not because of Dad,’ said JJ as we made our way over to Alisha and their mum. ‘We get stared at here because of our
skin colour. They don’t see many Afro-Americans so we’re a novelty to them.’

‘Bit rude,’ I said. One group were actually pointing. They weren’t trying to be discreet at all and were openly studying JJ as if he was an alien.

He shrugged. ‘You get used to it,’ he said. ‘Now they’re staring at you, too.’

I glanced over and, sure enough, the group were now staring at Pia and me as if they’d never seen anyone like us before in their lives.

‘Probably your blue eyes,’ said JJ. ‘The usual eye colour here is brown.’

‘There’s a lot to get used to here,’ I said. ‘Not just the elephants in the street but I’ve noticed loads of beggars, some of them children.’

Alisha nodded. ‘I know. It’s upsetting, isn’t it?’

I nodded back but didn’t say much more. I found the extremes of total luxury and abject poverty hard to get my head around, both here and back in the UK. It didn’t make sense that
some people had so much and others had so little.

JJ took my hand. ‘It’s a strange world, isn’t it?’ he said. ‘Like, our family lives in the most amazing places and we have an extraordinary lifestyle that allows us
to travel to places like this, while some people have nothing.’

‘That’s exactly what I was just thinking,’ I said.

JJ squeezed my hand. ‘That’s why we get on. I like that you see what’s going on around you on every level. You get the extremes, the contrast in lifestyles.’

‘I do and I wish I could do something to help,’ I said.

‘Me too,’ JJ agreed. ‘It’s hard to know where to start sometimes, though, isn’t it? Mom and Dad give a lot to charity, and they both agree that it’s important
to give something back if you’re earning a lot. Like, Mom’s donations have helped build a school in the north of India, but sometimes she gets a bit freaked out by the number of
requests for help we get. Some from organisations, some from individuals – everyone has their story and so many are in need, but we can’t give to everyone.’

‘I went to a Christmas dinner for the homeless back in London last December,’ I said. ‘My Aunt Maddie helped organise it. When I learnt what had happened to some of them, it
really changed the way I saw them, so I completely get what you’re saying. Everyone has their story. But how do you decide who to give to and who not?’

‘Mom has an assistant in LA who deals with all of that. She helps her decide but there are days when both of them get upset. We haven’t enough to help everyone and some of the cases
are pretty distressing.’

What he said made me think. I sometimes gave some coins to the beggars in London but with my small amount of pocket money, I often felt that there was little I could do to address the imbalance
of wealth – and here was JJ whose family were loaded and he felt the same. I was glad to hear that his family helped, though, it made me feel closer to him and less guilty about the amazing
luxury we were experiencing travelling with them.

On the next set of steps, Indian women were sitting and making garlands of gold and red flowers for people going into the temple. Mrs Lewis dropped some coins into a basket and gave us each a
necklace of flowers to wear.

‘This place is awesome,’ said Pia as we reached a large brass statue of a half man, half eagle.

To our left, a holy man with white dreadlocks, naked from the waist up, was smoking a pipe. I wrinkled my nose.

JJ sniffed the air. ‘Hashish,’ he said. ‘So the spiritual high isn’t totally natural after all!’

Alisha took a look around at the crowd of tourists and assorted holy men, some dressed, some not, and grimaced. ‘This is so not what I expected. It’s like Crazyville up
here.’

‘I told you so, sis,’ said JJ, then turned to me. ‘She really thought we’d be going to some cool LA spa type place where you could buy a bottle of secret elixir or sit in
some elegant air-conditioned room and get enlightened as easily as switching on a lightbulb.’

Alisha frowned. ‘Apparently there’s a guru on every street corner here. How are you supposed to know which ones are genuine?’

‘Just look around you, Alisha,’ said JJ, and he indicated the many Westerners in the crowd who were dressed in Indian clothes. ‘All these people are here to find out which guru
is the real thing. So many seekers on a quest. All looking for answers to the big questions.’

Alisha spotted Prasad at the back of the temple and her face lit up. ‘Ah, talking of the real thing . . . see you later, guys.’

‘Don’t go too far,’ Mrs Lewis warned, then she saw Prasad. ‘Stay with him.’

Alisha gave her mother a thumbs-up and disappeared into the crowd.

‘Do you want me to follow?’ asked Vanya.

Mrs Lewis shook her head. ‘I’ll keep an eye out for her and maybe you can check on her every now and then too.’

Vanya nodded. Poor Alisha, she wasn’t going to get time alone with Prasad, either.

Me, JJ and Pia set off to explore the temple, with Mrs Lewis and Vanya not far behind us. If I’d thought I was on another planet before in Udaipur town, as we went from room to room in the
temple I felt like I was in another universe. It was bizarre. In one area, there was a holy man with his right arm held up in the air.

‘Apparently he’s kept it up like that for four years,’ JJ told us.

‘Why?’ asked Pia.

‘Something about overcoming the physical restraints of the body,’ said JJ. ‘I read about it in a leaflet back at the hotel.’

‘But surely we were meant to use our arms,’ said Pia. ‘So not using them is like going against God. Or like someone cooking a really nice dinner and then their guest saying,
“No, ta, I’m going to put it in the bin to show that I don’t need to eat it”.’

‘I guess, but each to his own,’ said JJ. ‘There are some holy men who stand on one leg for years, and others who fast for months on end. And one man rolled himself all the way
to a religious festival, miles and miles away.’

‘Rolled?’ I asked.

JJ nodded. ‘Yeah, he made his body into a roly-poly wheel type thing.’

‘Why didn’t he just get a bus?’ asked Pia.

JJ shrugged.

‘And this helps you get enlightened?’ I asked. ‘Because I don’t think Alisha’s going to want to do anything like stand on one leg for a year . . . There has to be
an easier way. And seriously, what’s with all the naked guys?’

‘Apparently it’s the highest form of renunciation,’ JJ replied. ‘By their nakedness, they’re showing that they want nothing of this material world. No rags, no
clothes.’

I supposed that kind of made sense, though it was still a bit disconcerting seeing so many beardy naked guys wandering about, however holy they were.

Just then, a group of young Westerners in orange dhotis passed behind us chanting, ‘Hare Krishna, Hare Rama.’ I couldn’t help but smile watching them, they seemed so happy,
grinning their heads off and banging their bells and drums like they’d just had the best news ever. I noticed that they had a little tuft of hair at the back of their shaved heads.

‘What’s that all about?’ I asked JJ. ‘Did they miss a bit?’

‘I heard that they leave it like that so God can pull them up to heaven when he’s ready,’ said JJ.

‘Ouch,’ I said. ‘Bet that would hurt.’

We turned a corner to see a group of people lining up.

‘What’s the queue for?’ Pia asked a young blonde girl who was waiting in line.

She pointed to a poster of an elderly Indian lady. ‘We’re waiting to be hugged,’ she said.

‘OK . . .’ said Pia, but she didn’t pursue it. The girl had an intense look about her, her eyes slightly glazed, and I got the feeling that Pia didn’t want to get pulled
in.

‘Fancy a hug?’ asked JJ.

‘From you,’ I said. ‘Not from some old lady I don’t know.’

‘
I’ll
give you a hug,’ said Pia and clasped me to her. ‘Feel anything?’

I laughed. ‘Yes. A small and very hot English girl. Now get off!’

JJ pulled me over to look at a poster outside a small tent in the corner advertising a laughing workshop. ‘Hey, let’s check this out,’ he said. ‘I could do with a
laugh.’

We filed into the tent with a few other people. I turned to check if Mrs Lewis was going to join us and saw that Alisha and Prasad were with her. Alisha pulled a face to let me know that the
whole convention wasn’t her thing. I indicated the workshop poster and Alisha glanced at it then shook her head, so I turned back and joined Pia and JJ.