The Seeker (5 page)

Max entered the cold bus, his eyes swollen and heavy. It was 4 a.m. but six or seven people were already inside the bus, their heads resting on the metal bar of the seats in front of them. Max looked around for a seat. Most were broken with steel columns jutting out of their back frames. He found one with a thin cushion and settled into it. Freezing, he huddled against his backpack and fell into a deep, dreamless sleep.

The engine’s roar shook him awake. Broad daylight. They were negotiating a steep uphill curve. The outside tires of the bus were merely an inch away from the thousand-foot valley below and the dirt road was crumbling around them. It seemed wiser to keep his eyes shut, so he slept again.

Max’s head banged against the ceiling. The bus groaned to a halt. Two large boulders lay in their narrow path. He rubbed his head and stepped out to join the four men pushing the boulders aside.

“Did they just fall?” he asked in English.

A man nodded. “One minute back.”

Max looked at the giant rocks and weathered trees on the mountains above. No barrier separated them from the road. If the boulders had slipped just seconds later, they would have pushed the bus into the valley below. Every moment on the road was an exercise in surrender.

Max helped the men roll the boulders off the road. Back in the bus, the fifteen or so locals making the journey with Max greeted him with excitement. Two boys, seven or eight years old, wearing imitation Gap sweatshirts gave him high-fives. A woman with a rough, cheerful face joked about his six-foot-six-inch frame on the tiny seat. Another woman wearing a red sweater over a bright yellow saree offered him apples. A kind-faced man in a hip-length coat with a mandarin collar gave him water. The questions started again. No foreigner ever came in winters. Why was he here? Where was his wife? Did he want a guru? Why was he so tall? The engine roared to life again, filling the bus with an oily smell. The locals left him alone and busied themselves in praying for safety. They folded their hands and closed their eyes every time the bus navigated a treacherous turn. Max stared at the calm, silent face of the driver and slept again, dreaming of burning black bodies with shiny white bones.

The boys woke him up a few hours later. They pointed excitedly to a sign saying ‘Danger. Accident Zone’ in bold black letters.

“Death point, death point, death point, death point,” they sang.

The woman who had offered him apples pointed to a curve ahead where a bus had overturned the previous month he learned. Soon, Max found out why. When they turned, the outside front wheel of the bus flew out from under it and was suspended in air for a few seconds. Max’s heart stopped. They were heading straight down the valley, into the swirling, angry Ganges far below.

The driver rotated the wheel furiously.

Max hugged his knees tight, preparing to barrel himself out of the tiny window.

The bus landed on solid ground again.

Everyone clapped spontaneously. Max’s heart pounded. The air filled with audible sighs of relief. Only the kids looked disappointed.

“Why doesn’t the government make the road wider?” asked Max when the bus moved at a steady pace again.

“No government here. God takes care of roads in the Himalayas,” said a woman.

They reached Uttarkashi twelve hours after they had left Rishikesh, a mere five hours later than expected, despite the rough roads. Max congratulated the driver on his skill. He wanted a photograph with Max and Max gladly obliged.

“Any bus to Gangotri?”

The driver shook his head. “No, no, never this season. Never.”

A stocky Indian man wearing a small ponytail and earrings who had been sitting quietly in the front of the bus came up to him. “I can drop you to Bhatwari village in my jeep if you’d like. It’s twenty miles ahead on the way to Gangotri,” he said.

Max shook his hands. “That’ll be great,” he said. “Thank you.”

Max helped the man carry one of his two suitcases back to his jeep in a parking lot next to the bus stand. They put the suitcases and Max’s backpack in the back of the weathered jeep and Max joined the man in the front.

The road became narrower from the Uttarkashi bus stand. They crossed a low-lying cement bridge inches above the river. The river bank was lined with debris: bricks, concrete, truck tires, engine parts, and tree branches.

“A cloud burst here five months ago,” said the man. “Seven days of nonstop rain. People, houses, trucks, all taken by the river. Some people haven’t even been found yet.”

The roaring, angry river below them was so close Max could touch it. Any moment now, the river could rise and drown them like it had drowned hundreds of others. Or the weak bridge could break. How fragile this body, this life was. The jeep lurched. Max held on tight, feeling a renewed sense of purpose for his journey. They crossed the bridge.

A twenty-foot tall iron statue of an Indian god with long, matted hair, sculpted muscles, and a trident in his hand stood incongruously on the riverside.

“Pilot Baba’s ashram,” said the man, pointing to a cluster of white houses scattered next to the statue. “If you want, you can stay here until the winter ends.”

“Is he a guru?”

“Everyone is a guru in India,” said the man witheringly. “Pilot Baba was just a regular pilot in the Indian Air Force. His helicopter crashed here and he had some sort of spiritual realization—perhaps that there is more money to be made in this racket than in flying planes. So he became a guru.”

Max laughed. “How did he find disciples?”

“No shortage of foreigners touring exotic India,” he said. “Pilot Baba teaches that man loses his ego during orgasm so there is plenty of sex here. Westerners love it. Spiritual McDonald’s.”

As if on cue, a dreadlocked white guy in just a T-shirt and shorts emerged from one of the houses. He shut his eyes and spread out his arms melodramatically in the frigid air. Max’s face went hot with embarrassment. Was there really no difference between him and these eighteen-year-old hippies? He strengthened his resolve to keep pushing forward until he found a real guru.

“Do you want to get off here?” asked the man, slowing down his jeep.

“I’ll pass,” said Max. “There is a man further up in Bhojbasa I want to visit.”

“The roads are closed beyond Bhatwari,” said the man.

“I’ll take my chances,” said Max.

They took a steep turn and the statue and houses disappeared from view.

Max’s companion raised his index finger. “One percent maximum,” he said. “Only one percent of these yogis at most are genuine and most of them live way on the top of the mountains where you are going. Out here and below in Rishikesh, searching for God has become a joke.”

Max nodded. “A man with human flesh in his hands offered to be my guru this morning,” he said.

“Covered in ash? Near a cremation pyre?”

“Yes, exactly,” he said.

“An
Aghori Baba
. They eat animal carcasses and human remains to show their love for even the most repulsive of God’s creations,” said the man. “They look scary but are pretty harmless.”

“And the men with painted faces and red marks?”

“Lord Shiva’s devotees,” said the man. “If I smoked as much hashish as them, even I’d see God everywhere.”

So many teachers, so many belief systems, yet none inspired confidence. Why wasn’t the path to the most fundamental of human quests clearer?

“What do you believe in?” said Max.

The man adjusted his ponytail. “My father was a priest in a temple here,” he said. “I believed in Lord Krishna, his God, until my father got buried in a landslide while conducting a puja, a worship ceremony for the Lord. After that, I left the Himalayas to work in Delhi. Now I come back only to visit my crazy family. Man is far more reliable than God. He rewards you with a paycheck instead of a landslide when you work for him.”

The jeep’s floor shook with a loud clunk. Max held on to his seat tightly. The man changed the gear nonchalantly and the jeep resumed its smooth motion. They took a turn into a flat valley. In the distance, a colossal tower of ice arose high above the mist, glittering in the fading light of the evening sun. Max inhaled sharply at his first full view of the mountains ahead.

“Is that where Gangotri is?” he asked.

The man laughed. “Yes, Gangotri is at the bottom of that mountain,” he said. “That’s why all roads are closed beyond here.”

The road ahead was covered in snow as were the withered trees on either side. The Ganges whispering below them suddenly fell silent, throttled by the heavy chunks of ice floating in its waters. Did the yogis hike up from this point? If they could figure out a way, couldn’t he? He ran marathons in less than three hours, he hiked steep mountains, his diet was predominantly salads and fruits, he’d never been fitter, healthier, more prepared.

“There must be a way, perhaps on foot,” said Max.

The man shook his head. “Not until March or April.” He took a turn and stopped ahead of a cluster of huts. “Bhatwari village,” he said pointing to the huts. “Ask around there. Someone will know when the road opens again. Perhaps you can even stay in the village for a few months. Who knows, you may even become a guru yourself? This place does that to people.”

Max shook his hands. “Thank you for the ride,” he said. He took out his backpack from the jeep and came back to the driver’s window. “Can I pay you?”

The man folded his hands and lowered his head in a mock bow. “No, no, great guruji. Just bless my family so they are absolved of my sins.”

Max laughed. “Please let me. I know how hard it was to get here.”

The man waved his hands. “I was coming this way anyway. My family lives in Pilot Baba’s ashram. I told you they are crazy.”

He turned around and left.

Max trudged through the packed ice to the village, the chill cutting through his bones despite his heavy overcoat.

A group of men and women huddled around a fire in front of a small, open-air roadside restaurant. Next to it, a bare hut sold cigarettes and biscuits. Opposite it, there were more wooden houses with tin roofs. The village ended there.

Max knocked at the door of a house with a peeling sign that said ‘Bright Hotel.’

The tall, lean proprietor’s eyes widened at his request for accommodation. He showed Max a dark, musty room which had obviously not seen visitors in months. There was no water or electricity in the freezing room but the owner made up for it with thick piles of blankets and two buckets of hot water. Max’s mood lifted. He had a bucket shower, snuggled into the blankets and slept a little less restlessly now that he could at least see his destination one week after leaving New York City.

Early the next morning, Max walked to the open-air restaurant with his backpack. He sat on a long wooden bench in front of the cooking area, huddled close to the warm stove, and watched the cook make Indian bread. The sun rose between the white, angular peaks of the mountains. Ruddy faces appeared on the streets outside, greeting each other, smiling in their thick, colorful clothes. The air filled with the fragrance of bread and milky tea. Max’s spirits lifted. The lone taxi owner in the village had refused to drive him further up, but at least Max had made it to the Himalayas.

“Where are you from?”

Max turned around. Two Indian boys, early twenties, all cheerful, impish grins and messy hair, sat at the table next to him.

“New York,” said Max.

“Awesome,” said the taller, more confident looking one in perfect English. “I’m Omkara. I’m going to Cincinnati in three months.”

“Cincinnati is a dump. It’s nothing like New York,” said the other boy, short and squat with a half-Oriental, half-Indian face. “I’m Shiva, by the way.”

“I’m Max,” he said. “You are going to study? University of Cincinnati?”

Omkara nodded. “Fucking yeah. To study chemistry. I’m breaking bad. The shit I cook up in Cinci is going to be the bomb,” he said. He paused. “You’ve seen
Breaking Bad
, the TV show, right?”

Max shook his head.

“Dude, what kind of American are you? Everyone has seen Breaking Bad,” said Omkara. “You are tall, by the way, freaky tall. What brings you here? No foreigner comes here in winter. The Himalayas let no Yankees in December.”

Omkara asked the cook to make him an
aloo paratha
, an Indian bread stuffed with potatoes. “And make one for Uncle Sam also,” he said. He turned to Max. “The parathas here are the bomb.”

“Are you guys from the area?” said Max.

Shiva nodded. “My village is close to here.”

“We go to engineering college in Rishikesh but drove up last night to take a break,” said Omkara. “Two months left for graduation yet they persist in teaching bullshit, pretending like they are some great American university or something.”

Max stared at their black motorcycle jackets and thick biker gloves.

“You came up that road from Rishikesh on motorcycles? Not a chance,” he said.

The boys laughed. “We ride motorcycles better than we walk. That’s all we’ve done for four years in college. Up, down, up, down. Otherwise living in Rishikesh is more boring than watching you drink tea,” said Omkara.

“As boring as Cincinnati,” said Shiva.

“But how can you drive up that road at night? There isn’t a single streetlight,” said Max.

“We’ve done it a million times. It’s better. Roads are empty then. There are so many jerks driving in India that your chances are much better against the night than against another idiot driver,” said Omkara.

The parathas arrived. Max tore the hot bread into pieces and wolfed it down, the spicy potatoes warming him up.

“You eat like an Indian,” said Omkara.

Max laughed.

Omkara removed his black gloves and kept them on the table. A crazy idea struck Max.

“Can you ride up to Gangotri?” he said.

Omkara looked up. “Of course. We can go anywhere,” he said.

“Like right now?”

They nodded.

“But why would anyone go up there now?” said Omkara. “You can’t even get a cup of tea there. And the view is the same. Here, there, everywhere, just mountains and snow, what’s there to see? It’s not like we have girlfriends to show pretty scenery to.”

“Can you drive me up there now?” said Max impulsively.

Omkara stopped eating. He looked at Shiva, then turned to Max.

“I knew you were crazy when I saw you smiling by the stove,” said Omkara.

“Why do you want to go up?” said Shiva. “There is no one there now.”

Omkara answered for Max. “That’s why, dude, that’s why. Americans love their space and me time and all that mindfulness stuff. You are a tribal. You won’t understand,” he said. “Let’s go, dude, we are up for it. Fucking yeah. What else will we do here all day?”

Shiva shrugged. “You can ride behind me so you have more space.”

Fucking yeah. This was really happening. He was going to Gangotri and later he’d hike up to Bhojbasa where the Brazilian doctor lived. A shiver of anticipation went up Max’s spine.

“You’ll have to get rid of more than half of that crap though,” said Omkara, pointing to Max’s backpack after they finished eating. “Else you’ll both topple over in the first valley.”

Max hesitated. Every item in the bag was necessary. Knowing he would be hiking, he had scrutinized everything he had put in.

Omkara walked over and picked up the backpack. “What’s in it, Uncle Sam? No way you’ll need all this stuff in a hundred years,” he said.

The three of them went through his backpack. Out went the Yoga manual and the Buddha biography he had picked up in Heathrow, the diary, the pens, two hiking pants, three T-shirts, sandals, shorts, swimming trunks, thin socks, malaria pills, a small lock, everything that didn’t serve the purpose of keeping the body warm in the cold.

“There, that’s a decent backpack,” said Omkara.

It was half its original size.

Omkara picked up Max’s swimming trunks from the discard pile. He danced around, waving them in the air.

“I’m going swimming in the Himalayas, bitch,” he sang. “I’m divin’, I’m pimpin’ in the snow, bitch.”

Max shifted in his chair and tried to smile.

Omkara put the trunks down. “Did you think you’d swim with the yogis in the frozen Ganges?” he said.

“Are the yogis still up there?” asked Max, half interested, half wanting to change the subject.

Shiva set his tea cup down. “They are much higher up than Gangotri but don’t disturb them if you go near their caves,” said Shiva.

“Why?”

“Yogis are very powerful,” said Shiva. “If you disturb their meditation just for taking a picture or out of curiosity, they may curse you. And a yogi’s curse lasts for seven generations in a family.”

“Don’t listen to his superstitious bullshit. I told you, he is a tribal,” said Omkara. “Go give the rest of your stuff to someone to keep safe before we head out.”

“I don’t need it anymore.” Max looked at the books and clothes. He felt lighter and freer. He asked the cook to take anything he wanted and give the rest away.

Omkara came over to Max and high-fived him. “You are crazy, dude, mad. That’s why we like you,” he said. “We are crazy too.
Paagals.
All of us.”

Max followed them to a shed behind the hotel. His pulse quickened on seeing the weathered black motorcycles with their low seats and wide engines. Royal Enfield Bullet. He’d never heard of the brand. Not that he knew anything about motorcycles except that they were the least safe way to get anywhere even on shiny American highways leave alone the nearly nonexistent road ahead.

“Don’t worry. We’ll be fine,” said Shiva, perhaps sensing his nervousness. He gave Max a knee and hip protector, an open-faced helmet, black glasses, and a balaclava to keep his head warm.

“See this stuff?” said Omkara, pressing his boots against the large spikes in Shiva’s motorcycle tire. “Anti-slip studs made in Norway. We bought them in a black market in Delhi. Fancy, eh? India shining.”

They mounted the motorcycles and roared away past the hotel, up the narrow, icy asphalt road, toward one of the highest villages in the Himalayas. Max held Shiva tight, squeezing his eyes shut, then daring himself to open them as Shiva skidded and turned, pulled the choke and pushed the throttle, dodging boulders and pinecones strewn over the potholed concrete road. All around them was a deep, silent ocean of white—pine trees blanketed with snow on one side, the frozen Ganges on the other, wispy fog in the valleys beyond, and a thick cover of clouds covering the early morning sun above. Sweat poured down the back of Shiva’s neck under the helmet despite the cold breeze. Steering the motorcycle over the slipping, gravelly ice was hard work, especially with Max’s two hundred and ten pound–frame behind him.

They stopped an hour into the ride in the middle of a silent valley. Bright purple flowers grew unexpectedly amidst the snow-covered trees. They parked their motorcycles on a dry patch next to the cliffs. Shiva and Max sat down on a boulder on the roadside while Omkara screwed a spike into his motorcycle tire with a small drill.

“So why are you really going up to Gangotri?” asked Shiva, pouring Max a cup of hot tea from the thermos he had kept inside his jacket.

His voice was a shout in the miles of silence around them.

Max took a sip of the spicy milk tea. A pleasant burning sensation seeped down his throat. “I’m going to hike up to Bhojbasa to meet a yogi,” he said.

“Why?” asked Shiva.

Max told him about his unexpected meeting with Viveka and his subsequent quest to find the Brazilian doctor. As Max spoke, the uneasiness he had felt since coming to India slipped away. Somewhere deep down, he knew he’d been right in coming here. He’d been living a shadow of a life. The dots were connecting themselves. If he kept pushing forward, he would penetrate the mystery of pain, suffering and death.

“It sounds awesome,” said Omkara, who seemed to have heard every word Max had said despite looking completely absorbed with the motorcycle tire.

“What does?” said Max.

Omkara walked over to them. “Your life in New York,” he said. He sat down next to Shiva on the boulder. “How did your father die?”

Max was learning not to be surprised when people casually asked him deeply personal questions in India.

“He worked in a garment factory in the Bronx. His lungs collapsed,” said Max. He paused, thinking of the one time he had accompanied his father to the hot, dark warehouse in Kingsbridge where he worked. The windows were painted black, the doors shut tight. His father, taller than anyone around, was moving boxes, sweating and coughing yet joking with short, dark men stooped over machine stations. “I was five years old so I don’t remember much. My mother said he was a good man. He didn’t drink much and was good with numbers.”

“You did well to go to Harvard,” said Shiva. “Your mother must have been proud.”

Max’s eyes watered suddenly. His mother had made Sophia and him practice their English in front of the mirror every night so they wouldn’t pick up her heavy accent. She herself had learned to speak English fluently over the years but never learned to write in it. Each month at Harvard, he’d receive an envelope with a smudged ten-dollar bill from her. He had never refused her money even though his tuition was covered by financial aid and his expenses by his busing and dishwashing job at the dining hall. She had wanted to keep feeling useful to him. Max took a giant sip of tea from the thermos cup to stop his voice from cracking.

“I still don’t get it though. What are you really looking for?” asked Shiva.

Max hesitated. “Spiritual enlightenment, I guess.”

“What does that mean?”

“I don’t know. I’ve just started reading books like
The Yoga Sutras of Patanjali
,” said Max. “It says there is just one energy in the universe. Everything, everyone are just forms of it. When you get enlightened, you see that oneness everywhere, in everything. You realize that a human body, any body for that matter, is just a temporary vessel for that energy to express itself so the body’s birth or death is inconsequential.”

“But what’s the point of knowing all this?” said Shiva.

“Have you seen anyone die?” said Max.

“My grandfather,” said Shiva.

“Did you see him take his last breath?”

Shiva shook his head.

“When I was five, the kids in my building locked a girl up in a car one night. I saw her blue face pressing against the car’s window the next day,” said Max. “A couple of days later, my father died in front of me. I’ve never forgotten either one. It’s strange to see someone die. One moment, they are breathing and moving, next moment their bodies are heavy and solid, like stone. Their spirit is gone. It feels random, not like any kind of master plan. So the idea that you can reach some kind of a psychological whole with a permanent energy even if your body withers away gives more meaning to life though I’m not sure I buy it quite yet.”

Max rubbed his cold, stiff neck and put his balaclava back on.

“You are on the right track,” said Shiva unexpectedly.

Omkara walked over to his motorcycle. “You are a fool to come here chasing these yogis,” he said. “They are all frauds.”

“Don’t say that. Are you crazy? Take that back or you will be cursed, fucker,” said Shiva.

Omkara kicked his motorcycle to a start and mounted it. Roaring forward, he raised his middle finger. He swerved dangerously. For one heart-stopping moment, Max thought he’d careen off the cliff but Omkara put his hand down and balanced himself easily. The yogis’ curses didn’t seem to have hit their target. Omkara raised his middle finger again.

“This is what I think of your yogis,” he shouted, zooming ahead.

Max and Shiva got up from the boulder and walked over to their motorcycle.

“Ignore him. He’s a city boy from Delhi, he hasn’t seen any real yogis,” said Shiva.

They followed Omkara, quickly catching up with him. The road turned steeper. The motorcycle de-accelerated and swerved, then steadied again under Shiva’s able handling. Soon, the asphalt ended and a gravelly dirt road began. For the next hour, Max concentrated on moving his body in sync with Shiva as he leaned right and left, forward and back, using the weight of his body to help navigate the sharp hair-pin bends.

They stopped outside a small closed roadside restaurant half-way to Gangotri two hours later. The restaurant’s tin roof had caved in from the thick deposits of ice on it and its door was blocked by a six-foot tall block of snow. No one seemed to have entered it for months. They spread a tarpaulin from Omkara’s motorcycle saddlebag on the restaurant steps.

“How do the yogis get up to Gangotri in winter?” asked Max.

“They just walk through the mountains,” said Shiva.

Max stared at the blank white mountains surrounding him. He’d never be able to find his way to the guesthouse without a trail.