I
have been meaning to write about my time with Naveen, a Jain fellow I met at
the Ayurvedic clinic...but haven’t blogged in weeks!
The
same day I went to the Arogya Bharti Ayurvedic clinic, I knew I had another
interview in the evening and returned to the guest-house to rest up. Later that
day I was hustling up the street to catch a rickshaw back to the Pink City and
I heard someone hollering behind me. I took notice but certainly didn’t expect
it was directed at me…I soon turned a bit and noticed a fellow running towards
me. He asked “do you know me?” with a smile and I remembered it was Naveen the
Jain fellow from the clinic. I asked if everything was okay and if we had in
fact made a plan to meet the next evening or if I was mistaken, and he told me
he wanted to give me a book on Jain philosophy. It was a very sweet gesture and
I can’t say I’ve had a respondent so eager that they came to find me at my
place of accomodation!
Heading to a respondent’s apartment
in the Pink City I walked down one of the narrow side-streets and saw a monkey
on a ledge and stopped to take a picture. Behind me a fellow said “only in the
junior countries would you see that!” and a fellow chewing paan was smiling
over the moment. He asked me what I was doing and I told him I was a researcher
from Canada looking at religion and health and we chatted for a bit. Seeing an
opportunity, I pulled out a business card and asked him if he would want to do
an interview and he slowly beamed with his whole body, putting out his arms and
twisting the hands and saying “of course!” and we planned to get in touch and
he said we could meet sometime in his office nearby. A happy chance encounter!
Eventually I got to the barber shop I was told to ask for directions, and a
fellow led me straight to the building I was looking for. Two floors up was my
next interviewee looking down, and I found my way upstairs through a narrow
darkened stairwell. I was greeted by Surendra, a middle-aged Jain philosopher-poet,
and he brought me into his study. He had me wait and as I sat I took in the
room…a younger fellow was on a chair exercising his leg, two desks with
computers, a huge mattress with cushions for sitting and relaxing, books in all
the walls. I have always really enjoyed the Indian building-habit of
incorporating bookshelves right into the concrete of walls. Surendra returned
and we both sat on the mattress. I always have high-hopes that I can
successfully sit crossed-legged during interviews but after a couple I have
realized that it is awkward for me with my computer and my back starts to hurt.
Halfway through this interview I used one of the cushions to prop up against
the wall, which helped. Surendra was an engaged, light-hearted and lively
informant, but we ran out of time after the questionnaire before the
open-interview so we planned a second meeting…but after we stopped we continued
having a lengthy chat full of rich detail, which I am always happy for. We
should be meeting again this week.
The next day Naveen came to the
guest-house for our interview, and he was a half-hour early. I wasn’t surprised
and wasn’t quite ready but pulled myself together as he checked in at the desk
(which I found a bit strange that he had to do in the middle of the
afternoon…we were going to the rooftop restaurant anyway). This was the first
time someone came to me for an interview…usually I go out of my way to meet
people on their turf, according to their wishes. It was pretty clear he wanted
to go into my room but I wasn’t quite ready for that, so we went to the
rooftop. Since this interview I have gotten over it, and have had an interview
in my room since some people find this preferable due to the privacy. We
started off and I was introducing the interview and Naveen interrupted me and
said “before we start I want to her everything you know so I don’t overlap.” I
could immediately tell he wanted to be in charge but I wasn’t about to give him
a lengthy bio or lecture and, a bit sternly, said that that would take a long
time since I have been in Asian studies for more than 20 years and have been
preparing this research project for more than 4 years, more than 6 if we
include all of my grad studies. He was unswayed so I also mentioned some of
what I have done in my research so far, such as my work on Jain and Buddhist pre-mortem
death rituals. That he seemed to get and was apparently satisfied and we
started. After a couple of questions into the questionnaire Naveen asked me if
I wanted to know about pranic
healing, to which I said sure and this led to a very long lecture. After an
hour and forty minutes of Naveen talking we had gotten through 4 questions in
the questionnaire, the whole questionnaire having about 120 questions and the
open-interview about 30 (some with multiple parts). I don’t begrudge all the
detail because he is a very well read on Jainism and Ayurveda, and thus one of
my most exert Jain informants, but I couldn’t help feeling that I had lost
control of the interview by giving him free reign. I was determined to be in
the driving seat for our next interview since we agreed to meet again the next
day. We ran out of time in the first session because he had to get home for
dinner and asked me to come along. I was a bit hesitant, not wanting to
intrude, but he insisted and I rolled with it…and I was touched by the offer. Naveen
is equal parts of intensity and endearing sincerity, and we had a great chat
amidst the terrible (and anomalous, apparently) evening traffic on the way to
his relative’s place. We arrived at a neighbourhood and he pointed out the
local Jain temple, dedicated to the first Tirthankara of this age Lord Rishabha.
We entered an apartment complex and into an elevator, those horrifying types
with the metal-gate…and no lights inside. We arrived to an apartment full of
women of various ages, the oldest was Naveen’s mother and in her 80s. Most
spoke no English so I spent most of the time just watching, and answering the
occasional question through Naveen. He and I sat on (rather, sunk into) a couch
and the TV had a naked Jain monk lecturing from a wooden lotus lectern.
Naveen’s mother was deeply involved, and when Naveen and I were chatting I am
pretty sure she waved her hand at us to keep it down! Another older female
relative even clapped at one point during the lecture. I find Indian religious
programming truly fascinating and one of the common elements of televised
lectures are frequent shots of the audience reacting. What I also find
interesting is that Indian religious figures often holler at the audience,
usually clipping the microphone which is already full of reverb. Maybe it is a
Hindi lecturing habit to give it with gusto…and the audience really gets revved
up! Especially with Jainism, which so strongly emphasizes mental pacification,
I find the yelling a paradox. In the Buddhist monastic code there are precepts
that advise speech to be soft and even, so that when seated a person seated 2
people next to you can barely hear you. The logic is to be moderate in both the
volume and number of words, so as to not disturb others’ or your own mind. The
next lecturer, another Jain monk, was yelling even louder!! So much so that one
of the women turned the TV off…perhaps for my sake but I can’t be sure. I was
really taken by it. I haven’t seen enough televised lectures in Hindi by
Buddhist monks to see if they yell also, but Hindu and Jain religious teachers
seem to have very passionate delivery, and the listeners clearly love it.
Naveen went to take his mother upstairs, and I was sat down for dinner after
being directed to the bathroom to wash my hands. I noticed the faucet had a
small piece of cloth wrapped around it. This is common in Jain places since
water is seen as a living entity and cannot be drunk without being strained
first, so that one does not breach non-violence by drinking something that is
alive. I have seen this before and have contemplated it a lot, in that even the
act of turning on the water and passing it through a strainer technically
(according to the Jain view) kills the water-beings (both the water as a living
thing and the microscopic beings that live within it). I suppose since drinking
is almost unavoidable, unless one is fasting unto death, and it is seen as more
important to not INGEST living things and less important that straining water
is a killing of sorts. I found it awkward to be seated without Naveen, but his
cousin-brother was there and we were served sweet and savoury pakoras
(deep-fried balls) with green chutney (sauce). They giggled when I put the
sweet pakora in the chutney, but I really do love sauce…as do Indians. There
were also some sweet slices of a type of dessert that tasted like halva, made
from sesame. The women kept placing food on my plate every time something was
depleted, and even when I protested! This reminded me very much of being in
Gujurat when I was a monk and where the family would watch me eat and fill my
plate constantly before taking any food
themselves…which I find very awkward. Perhaps taboo, I kept asking when the
women would eat and they said they need to serve the food hot and they will eat
after. It certainly was delicious, full of lively Hindi conversation between
them, and peppered with some translated interaction between us. The whole
family were very sweet. After Naveen and I sunk back into the couch…I almost
fell off and the youngest of the women, a teacher, brought a chair for me and I
said it was okay. Naveen, his cousin-brother and I chatted, and soon Naveen’s
son came and was pressured into eating too despite his protests. He was on his
way to a wedding and Naveen said he could give me a lift. We took our leave,
and I expressed my gratitude to the family as best I could. In the car Naveen’s
son and I chatted and despite some language barriers he was able to tell me
that he is always impressed when people come from afar to study Jainism, and
that one particular Jain monk showed him the importance of studying the
tradition in a historical context. It was a very intimate and enjoyable evening
with an adorable Jain family!
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