THE LONELY TEMPLES OF THATTA,PAKISTAN

11-06-2002, 10:35 AM

From: arya

[Author's note. Saw this long ago and things may
have changed, for the better or for worse.
I might include this in a book].

THE LONELY TEMPLES OF THATTA

Now I write this to create a more academic, even
artistic perspective on the two nations living side
by side across the Sindhu which not so long ago
were one country.

If you travel up from Karachi along the Indian Ocean,
towards the north, about 70 miles out you hit a sort of
a low slung plateau to the east of the road which runs
alongside for some 30 or so miles.

Turn off the road onto any of the several unpaved ways
and stop when you come to any small village. Ask if
this is the right way to see Ram Raja in his Cave. Ignore
the odd glances if you are talking to a latter day refugee
who came over from India in 1947, or his brood.

If you are talking to a born Sindhi, and know some dialect,
you will be greeted with smiles, and will have adopted a guide
for the time you remain there.

The man will plant himself in your vehicle, which had better be
an SUV or a Jeep or truck, and all will jaunt and tumble to
a hilly crop some 2000 foot and a maybe a dozen miles
in girth, which is entirely overgrown with small fir like
evergreens about 12 foot, much like the ones on the foot
hills.

You arrive at the base of the place and decant and get some
really good chai boiled in raw milk and sweetened with "gur",
molasses, accompanied by fresh hot parathas Sindhi style
and raw balls of butter which was drawn that morning and is
sold by the Gypsies of the Banjaran caste, Shudras even in
this land, greet you. Best feed well because there is little to
eat o drink where you are going.

Now you rise and place your life in the hands of Bhalu, who
takes you, all smiles and wise eyes and wizened skin and
a large turban, into the brush.

After some few hundred feet the overgrowth closes the
skyline and you are walking in the twilight zone, and
beginning to have second thoughts about the whole
expedition.

Bhalu stops, undoes the turban and wipes his face, because
it also does duty as a towel, You do the same with your
kerchief, if you have one, which is soon soggy because
there is great humidity here.

Bhalu says we should all stick close and hold onto some
part of the other in front, maybe a belt or something,
"Because there are side passage built in the cave by the
Pandavas of old who did not like unannounced visitors,
and the place is maybe 2000 years old, and has been
continuously built upon all these centuries, from the
innermost sanctorum some 200 foot deep, to the entrance."

You quietly divide the stats by 2 because everyone knows
the hyperbole of rural Sindh, but you still end up with
1000 years and 100 foot in earth's marrow.

Bhalu without further ado turns and you follow and on
a moments notice you are in an ancient cave cut out
of living rock centuries ago. What is remarkable is the
height of the passageway, about 16 foot, and 12 wide.
And also that the structure is hewn from a sort of ,marble
like stone with streaks and strata, when everything else for
hundreds of miles around is compacted shale.

Bhalu trudges silently, you follow and see the light dim,
and curse yourself for not having brought a torch.

Phushhhhh! And a flush of light tells you Bhalu has
ignited a linseed flare which must have been in place
before. And you consider kissing Bhalu but don't because
he might misunderstand.

Now you begin a trek which lasts an incredible 20 minutes
or so, in the very bowels of earth. The walls are painted over
by frescos by hands long dead, and the moving light makes
the men and women on the wall dance and accompany you,
but silently, for there is no other sound except the fluff fluff
of your feet in powderlike earth underfoot.

It becomes cold and very quite and very remote, and the
people of earth could be on another planet.

Bhalu takes an abrupt turn to the right and every one follows
and all are standing in a large square chamber about
40 foot across, with a domed ceiling rising to some 60 feet.

In the center is Raja Ram, all of 6 foot of polished marble,
though you could have sworn it was from molten gold
alloyed with an as yet undiscovered metal, or that he is
alive and will walk off the podium and say Hi.

He is lifelike with cloth at shoulder and his bow standing
by his side, with the other with a sling of arrows with
actual metal tips.

It strikes you that he is not corroded if indeed of some
part metal, and you think of Asoka's pillar and hold
your peace.

It also strikes you that he is quite clean and presentable
and maybe Bhalu gave him a ritual bath, and is really
a Brahmin disguised as a Moslem Sindhi.

At which point he explains that the place does not allow
any rust or decay at this level under the earth, and he
was shown the place by his grandfather, who must have
come to discover it when the Hindus went away to India.

You venture to pray or touch or marvel as the fancy
strikes you. If so inclines you may raffle through the
offerings of old at his feet and still find some coin with
the mark of Akbar who had a mint in the city, or an
earlier Hindu Raja who struck his own coins.

The eyes are striking, and every aspect seems to have
a color, or maybe it is the light of the flare, and he seems to
watch your every move and turn as you turn.

There is a dark door to the far side, and Bhalu says best
not go there, there is danger there, and you don't like
the way your heart jumps and you want to return but
are afraid to say so.

Time stands still, life stands still, only Raja Ram and
Bhalu remain, the main players in this drama of the
oddest sort.

In time you find yourself settling down to the slow
slow slow beat of the earth, and almost forget about
the earth and all it's frantic cares above.

Maybe that's how the priests got rid of invaders who
wandered into the shrine, paced them out and shoved them
through the dark door in the forbidden wall!

Bhalu suddenly turns and walks to the alcove and out
the chamber and you realize you will be the last to leave,
O God let me not be left behind! and you grab onto the
man in front who has done the same to the one ahead
and as you are almost out of the place you turn for a last look
and see Ram standing there, alone, unworshipped, with
nothing like prasad to eat, no shower of lights, no
incense, no sandal paste, no kum kum mark, no Siyaji, no
Maruti, no vannars, no sena, alone alone alone, under tons of
earth which may one day cave in on him burying him alive..

When you finally break into the sunlight above you are nearly
blinded!

When you settle down, you drive back, and reach the little
shop for a meal and chai and the sweet dish of the land,
fresh "malai" seeded with khas seed and embroidered
with roasted caraway seed, and your head is in a swirl.

You bid goodbye to Bhalu, who says don't stop till
you reach the main city, bad characters come out
in the dark onto the highway and loot and kidnap.

You arrive back into Karachi and in due course fly
out to wherever you came from, maybe to JFK.

And the whole things seems a dream.

Till someone writes of it on Nukkad.

Arya.