a question of faith

Ever since I remember I have had this fascination for the Haji Ali Dargah off Worli sea face. The setting of the Shrine is perfect. It is around a kilometer off the mainland. The sea face is a very busy Mumbai arterial road. I remember passing through this place many times when I was a kid. Whenever we had to go to town we would pass by Worli and I would put my head out to see and admire the shrine.

Here is the satellite image. The little white thing out in the sea is the shrine.

My parents were largely secular. I remember whenever we came to Mumbai in the vacations from Dubai, we would have one scheduled visit to Haji Ali. So as a kid I have been there quite a few times. But after we shifted back to Mumbai for some reason it fell off our ‘to visit’ spots. I must have hardly been there once or twice since. When I was dating Jasmine I remember asking her if she had ever been there. She said that she had never been there as it was a Muslim place of worship. That’s when I first thought of it as a Muslim place. The dargah is largely Sufi which meant that its appeal would largely be open to both faiths. But I also guess it would be a question of faith and exposure. After having stayed in Dubai, I guess my family would be obviously more open to the Muslim faith. But then Jasmine also stayed close to a Muslim dominated locality. But would that have meant bringing them closer or further widening of the divide? I don’t know. It could cut both ways. Like next to Jasmine’s building was a Muslim dominated building. The problem would arise during Bakri Id. This is when they would have goats in the compound a couple of days prior to the Id and the same would be sacrificed on Id. This would happen in the open. Most vegetarians would find this highly disgusting and unbearable. Possibly this would further divide ‘us’ from ‘them’. The Moharram mourning with self-flagellation is also something that is a point of misunderstanding. But if I were to put on the opposite cap – I don’t think the Muslims would understand the 7 day fasting that Jains do or the fact that Jains don’t eat onions and garlic and other stuff that grows underground. In fact I guess the biggest grouse that anyone can have of Jains is that on religious grounds they are holier than thou and in business they just are complete blood suckers.

But this is not a blog about disparity. This is about plurality and the open embrace of Sufism. So when a friend from UK came to Mumbai and requested to see the shrine I was more than happy to her around. As timeline would have it, we only had a morning slot free. Which meant a visit to Haji Ali at 6 am. You can only go there during low tide as high tide submerges the half km entry path. 6 am is also a good thing as it meant availability of parking. In that area there is absolutely no parking available. I wonder where the pilgrims park their car during normal hours. I would guess the availability of parking would tempt many more pilgrims that what the shrine currently gets.

6 am also meant that the path was relatively free of all the beggars that normally dot the sides. No crowd to jostle with and a peacefull prayer time for my friend. When I walked to the shrine and when I walked in, I was somehow feeling a bit ‘nothing’. I don’t know. A bit let down in some sorts. Let down that I felt nearly nothing. I was expecting to feel nostalgic at the least, or even possibly feel a vibe or some thing. I was left unimaginably cold to the whole thing. Watching the Mumbai skyline also had no effect on me. Possibly the tide was way too low. A higher tide would have made for a dramatic scene with the waves lashing. But hell it was a really cold trip. Walk in walk out.

Dam me and my realism on god values. I see it nothing but an interesting monument. As of now at least I have nothing to ask from him or him to ask from god on my behalf. I think every time that this robs me of the magic that a more religious person might have felt. And this stuff is what I teach Jispa. That a temple is just a monument. God can solve your issues. You don’t need to pray to God for anything. So forget me and Jasmine, even Jispa won’t feel that magic. I felt that faith as a child growing up. It was there till about I was 21. Even after that I went through the motions till I stopped on day on the banks of the Ganga. Now it’s a cold nothingness. I am not really complaining but I wonder if that is an important part of life skills that I have not passed on. I wonder.

finders keepers

Last weekend Jispa had her trials to represent the city for the state meet. Jispa has been training pretty hard over the last one year. This is when she and her coach started to seriously set their eyes on qualifying. She has had some amazing improvements in timings over the year. But she has been unable to br4eak into the top three. Her coach is also realistic about it. He told us that it was pretty difficult as Jispa seriously started only a year back. The other kids had been at it much longer. But his immediate priority was a top six finish at this meet. Jispa managed that in the 50mtrs butterfly (fifth place) and the 50 mtrs free (fourth place). The top 6 go to Pune next month for the state meet. Her coach feels that the exposure and the confidence gained will be good.

The tournaments are held with an age bracket of two years being bunched together. At their age two years is a lot of difference. So in the under 11 category someone aged 10 has little chance of winning. Everyone talks about the disadvantage year and the advantage year. The year gone by was an advantage year for Jispa, and the one coming up is a disadvantage year. Next year she would participate with little chance of winning anything. Her coach was telling Jasmine that Jispa has a lot of potential. He said if she can be so fast with such horrible strokes, just imagine how fast she would be if her strokes is corrected. After June is the off season and this year is her disadvantage year. So the coach will now have time to correct the strokes and movement. I want to go and tell him. He is talking about preparing for the state meet two years hence.  Pretty deep stuff. Stuff that we had no insight into until you go through with it yourself. I am looking forward for the state meet. I want to see what it’s like. How are the facilities and the arrangements? How do swimmers across the state stack up against the Mumbai lads. How they come, what they do and how they behave.

I noticed an interesting things at the meet on Sunday. As Jispa and her contemporaries lined up at the starters block, I saw something that struck me. All the kids at the whistle took the block with a small ritual. They touched their hearts or they touched their heads or made a cross or something. They all looked for divine inspiration. Some supernatural force to come and assist them or mere blessings before the BIG race. Jispa merely took the starters block with no such ritual. We haven’t taught her God Rituals. Now I don’t know if this is a good thing or a bad thing. Definitely I was not going to teach her empty prayer or stupid rituals which have no meaning but at the same time, what I have robbed her of, is an external focus. Something that can help you when you are all alone. I don’t go to temples at all and I don’t recite any prayer, but in times of extreme situations, I do have my conversations. Something that I tell him, come dude, get me through this shit. Or thanks dude, nice one. Or its testing but I will be back, just give me strength to weather this one. I assume this is there because as a child I did believe in God. Today I grow up to question common belief and faith. Shit cannot happen to me just because I don’t pray or good cannot come because I do so. But sometimes, when the going is tough an external voice to talk to in private may be a good thing.  As of now Jispa doesn’t have this God figure in her mind. At least that’s what I think. But instead she has herself to talk to. I have spoken to her about what she thinks. Like the time when the results for the Hindi elocution was to be announced. She talks to herself. I think that internal belief is possibly better than a God belief.

Jispa willy-nilly has become a test case. Not out of my wanting it to become. But it is an interesting study on what a human do would if he were not brought up on a religious diet. What would you do if your dad actively questioned religious belief and God, your mom didn’t teach you to pray but at the same time your grannies took you to the temple? How would you have your conversations? I guess she will rely on her instinct as a human more than her instinct as a religious person. So she will take the starting block stand as a human being free from man constructed beliefs. She will I assume talk to herself. Look at an internally locus of control, an internal voice to guide her. A voice that is not borne by faith taught or not borne out of a faith in opposition to faith taught (like me), but a natural voice that human will have. That I think will be her God. And I hope and Pray that she finds it useful for her and holds her good stead. I Pray I have not robbed her of something important and eternal, but that I have given her something natural, inborn and lasting. I hope she finds her own GOD. Finders keepers.