By tierneybb
ZZAPP!! With a violent buzz like a miniature thunder clap my eyes jerk up from my work to the window, where the waiter has pinned a fat fly under some sort of electronic tennis racket, and apparently, fried it. While I've never seen such an odd device for pest control that's not what's so jarring, nor the noise disturbing the ambient pulse of music: This is the fist time I have seen a bug killed in public since starting my study abroad. Other than my own furtive swatting when away from prying eyes, I haven't seen any bugs intentionally killed. All sentient beings, even bugs, are part of the chaotic cycle of samsara, and thus good Buddhists and Hindus are not supposed to kill them, and doing so around them is considered insensitive. I've heard a rumor that H.H. the Dalai Lama once disputed the cognizance of mosquitos, that they weren't really sentient and could probably be safely swatted, but I didn't have the guts to test this in public (and prefer to avoid the awkward wipe-off of the guts of insects). Even a cockroach making a steady climb up grandmother's back was knocked off and gently carried to a window.
At the Rumtek Monastery, seat of the Karmapa Lama and center of the Karma Kagyu in exile, we wandered into one of the smaller shrine rooms tucked away to the wrathful deities and were confronted with the most bizarre image (which unfortunately must remain remembered and imagined as it is incredibly disrespectful to take pictures of shrines). A mounted tiger head over the entrance gaped as we entered a room with the walls painted black, the iconography all done in an equivalence of chiaroscuro, and animal skins and wrapped weapons hung from the ceiling. Before the statues of the wrathful figures shrouded in darkness the shrine was clean and attended with offerings like all the others I had seen, but most unusually coated in an undulating layer of cockroaches bathing themselves in the butter lamp light. But luckily that sight is an abnormality, maybe it's because they don't wage war on the insects, driving them to develop better survival instincts, but the bugs here are smaller, milder, and less of a nuisance, so not killing them hasn't been a problem.
India this week has been amazing. After a short flight to the border we got in a jeep convoy and drove up to the (mildly, US standards) remote villages in south Sikkim. Though we only stayed two nights I quickly bonded with my family as they rushed to make dinner for us after our arrival at 10pm after over 8 hours of driving. The next morning we got up early and were rushed out to "the machine, the traditional machine" for juicing mel, local crabapples. The machine itself was comprised of two giant tree trunks, sectioned ad fit to act as a giant mortal and pestle with a draining basin and long arm extended out so two people could turn the pestle as a third crouched below the arm and kept inserting and clearing the fruit as juice as extracted. An hour of manual labor before breakfast isn't something I'm used to, and the toddler who kept sitting on the arm like it was a swing as I pushed it didn't make the work easier, but it was strangely enjoyable. Giggling with our homestay sisters over the snap of apples as they released their juice, a male relative looked on in interest at this white girl working in the field, his outfit made comical with large yellow gumboots and a red neckerchief. After a breakfast of.. well dinner: rice, dhal, squash, and pumpkin seed spice, we got to go swinging. Swinging in Nepal and here in Sikkim (where Nepalese culture dominates) swinging is an all ages, both genders activity, and it's not uncommon to see a middle-aged serious man step up for his turn to swing by standing on the "seat" suspended 20 feet below the crossing of four giant bamboo stalks.
That night the village hosted a cultural event for our benefit, it started off with a traditional song about the sadness of a bride in leaving her home (a topic dealt with often here in folklore, and modern literature is a prominent outlet for critique of arranged and underage marriages) with dancers in full Nepali saris who balanced fat oil lamps on their head through the entire dance. After this local show came the one we had arranged for: a healing trance from a Tamang "jumping" Jhakri shaman. One of the students was selected (I think his cough was starting to annoy the director more than anything else, my overexcited application was denied.. boo) and he began the long process of entering trance with his two assistants, using only a shrine and ritual musical instruments to call forth the spirits. While he was preparing himself the students sat in watchful silence, I for one am fascinated by shamanistic and other forms of community medicine, but the local crowd was less respectful. We had, unfortunately, tread on some social and political soft ground. The families we were staying with were Nepali, and Hindu, but we has invited a practitioner of a minority group and religion to perform what we were taking as a serious healing, during the Hindu festival of Dashain. The jeers and mimics among the crowd were quiet, but distracting. While the shaman was still able to complete the diagnosis and puja necessary, the air of the gathering was not devoted to healing, and one particularly pretentious Brahmin I had been forced to talk to earlier tried telling me that "some people" thought these Tibetan things were so primitive and ridiculous, I said I didn't understand him but loved the rich offerings of Tamang culture. He's one of two such Brahmins I have encountered thus far, and apart from his distinct resemblance to Frankenstein he was blatantly offensive in even the blandest conversation, unfortunately so was the lecturer we had on the Nepali caste system: he was quite bias toward his own noble caste placement and disparaging towards the majority of Nepali people. I can only hope they are the minority of Brahmins, and that other Nepalis of all castes are starting to be less sculpted by this antiquated and limiting system. But for now the polotics of both the caste system and the recognition of minority group rights is very much an omnipresent factor in every presentation of culture both here in Sikkim and back in Kathmandu.
Here in Gangtok, the capital of Sikkim we have the most amazing accommodations. I spent a good amount of time jumping on the bed, and everybody has been stuffed beyond their limits at the buffet (specifically the magical refilling ice cream bowl station, I don't even like the flavor but the novelty and luxury of it more than make up for such trivial concerns). Visiting the institute of Tibetology here we got to walk around the library full of pecha from all four schools and I reveled in my favorite smells of old books and wood. That evening we went to a local bookstore for a scholar's presentation, and I almost felt as at home as in Busboys and Poets, as we got to engage with local youth and intellectuals. The bookstore owner pulled out a digital rangefinder to take a picture of the event and got a shot of my face staring in recognition of a fellow old camera fiend, we talked shop forever. This city on a hill is spread out and lacks most of the hallmarks of a capital, but it's nice that way. The streets are spread out in a sprawl of switchbacks, the city is in no way on a grid, and between clumps of buildings pockets of pristine forest still dominate the hill.