Ten Days in the Hampi Archaeological Site

February 2007

 

It was our friend Bangalore Mavis who told us about Hampi, a very old archaeological site in the middle of southern India, just west and a little bit north of Bangalore,  near Hospet, which was where our train from Bangalore landed.  Hampi is almost unknown outside of India, or even in India, so few tourists go – which makes it just the kind of place we like.  

 

We spent ten days in Hampi, living in a room we rented from one of the families that live in the small town that is right in the archaeological site – many of its buildings are either made of old slabs and stones, or are themselves ruins.  The one bank there, at which we were, much to our surprise, able to cash travelers cheques, was, both inside and out, a crumbling ruin. 

 

The Hampi site is huge – over 16 square miles, with over 1600 monuments.  These are mostly Hindu temples, shrines, halls and royal or sacred complexes, some of which date back to the 10^th century, although most were built between 1336 and 1570.  In the 14^th century Hampi was the capital of the Vijayanagara Empire, and was a prosperous and grand city on the banks of the Tungabhadra River.  By 1500 it was the world’s second largest trading city, after Beijing.  Traders from all around India and from Europe and Persia visited the city, some calling it the ‘most beautiful city’ in the world.  

 

 Market or bazaar area with wide road

The site is in a fairly open, and somewhat hilly area with large granite boulders.  The site is divided into three main zones: the sacred centre, the royal centre and the rest of the metropolitan area.  The sacred centre, along the river, contains the oldest temples.  The royal centre contains many ruined temples from the Vijayanagara empire.  It also contains the broad roads – broad enough to accommodate two chariots, the huge water tanks and associated aqueducts, and several market areas or bazaars.  

In the ten days we were there, every day heading out on foot to explore a different area, we still did not see anywhere near all of the temples, ancient villages, temples, shrines, palaces and bazaars that are contained within the site.  

The huge elephant stables

Vitalla Temple

Lotus Mahal

Inside the Lotus Mahal

Apart from being awed by the sheer scope and scale of Hampi, I was constantly struck by the skill and artistry of the thousands of sandstone sculptures that adorned almost all of the buildings, both inside and out.  These exquisite sculptures and reliefs were mostly of Hindu gods, goddesses and lesser deities, but also included common people, animals, plants, flowers and complex geometric designs.  At times it was overwhelming.  In places like this I often think about the culture in which we live today, the civic architecture, the ‘monuments’ we have created, and the terrible paucity of artistic works associated with them.  What will our ‘ruins’ look like, even 100 years from now, let alone 500.  The works of the Hampi builders and artisans has not only stood the test of time, but has done so with truly incredible beauty and grace.

Probably the best known and most visited monument in Hampi is the Garuda stone chariot.  The detail in this huge sculpture is wonderful.  I could imagine it thundering down the Hampi boulevards, drawn by elephants, a Vijayanagara prince urging them on.

There I am, just visible between the two elephants - I'm there to show the size of this sculpture.

One day, as we sat by the river that runs through the ruins, watching the towns-people and Indian pilgrims bathing, and the women washing their brightly coloured saris and clothes, I noticed that one of the washing rocks was in fact a piece of a larger relief sculpture of Hanuman, the monkey god.  At home, this piece would be in a museum.  Here it’s just a part of the women’s everyday life, a place to slap the wet laundry. 

 

Bird-watching in Hampi

 

One of Hampi’s unexpected charms, at least for us, was its ample and diverse bird life.  One afternoon as we sat drinking chai at a little café by the river (it sounds romantic until you factor in the dirty tables and cutlery, the greasy cups, the excruciatingly slow service – even for India – and the persistent swarm of flies), we spied several turquoise-winged killdeers, bright green parrots, white egrets, yellow, blue and green bee-eaters, eagles, cormorants and several other equally colourful kinds of birds we didn’t recognize.  

 

The parrots especially loved the ruins, making nests in the cracks and crannies between the layers of rock.  We also spotted a couple of owls in the ruins, and both saw and smelled hundreds, if not thousands, of bats in the darker recesses and rooms of the ruins.  In addition to being both colourful and lively, which the ruins of course were not, many of the birds were sweetly tuneful, and we were able, because of the paucity of tourists, to hear and enjoy their songs.

 

 

For more information about the Hampi archaeological site go to:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hampi

 

For more photos of the ruins at Hampi go to:

https://www.tourism-of-india.com/blog/best-places-to-visit-in-hampi/

 

For more information about the Vijayanagara Empire go to:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vijayanagara_Empire

 

My Hampi Hair Cut

February 2007

Different sign; same idea

It was in Hampi that I decided it was time to get my hair tamed, and so when we spied a barber shop sign that claimed “ladies hair cuts here,” we stopped.  The shop was situated within the old bazaar, alongside an old temple.  It was a proverbial “hole in the wall,” but the wall was hundreds of years old and, like the rest of the ruins in Hampi, made of plaster-covered bricks and mortar.  Like all shops, it was open-fronted, so easy to look into.  

 

Inside was an impossibly old barber chair facing a large rust and dirt-spotted mirror.  Under the mirror was a countertop covered with dust, and a sad assortment of old chipped and broken hairdressing paraphernalia.  We stood and watched, fascinated, as a young boy, maybe 12 or 13 years old, gave a flamboyant head massage to a youngish foreign tourist.  I was wondering if he was also the barber, and feeling rather more dubious about having my hair cut, although the massage looked great.  

 

A short while later an older man appeared – clearly the barber.  He insisted that he could cut my hair, and despite some misgivings, I decided that my hair grows fast enough to hide even the worst of cuts within a few weeks (which turned out to be a good thing!).  So I sat down, and tried to explain to the barber what I wanted – for him to cut about one inch off everywhere, following the original cut.  I think the only words he knew in English were “yes, yes madam” and “two hundred rupees.”  

 

Well, you can imagine what I got.  I sat there, my scalp crawling, as the barber repeatedly dragged the biggest, blackest, dirtiest comb I have ever seen, through my hair, cutting it with what looked like kitchen utility scissors.  I could feel how dull they were; they sort of tore and cut at the same time.  He kept cutting and tearing until a magazine seller from across the road, who I guess was watching the whole thing, came over and insisted that he stop.  “Madam looking like man!” he warned.  At that point my hair was about two inches long all over.  

But there was some evening up and trimming around the ears yet to do.  I let him trim a bit, but firmly declined having the hair over my ears cut like a man’s, so he was at a bit of a loss, and just left it as it was.  

 

By the time he was “finished,” the cut looked like a Mohawk.  The hair on the top of my head was spiking straight up like the bristles of a floor brush.  All I needed was some green and purple dye to complete the punk look.  Unfortunately he didn’t have any.  

 

When he asked if I would like a massage, I said I’d like one from the young boy, who smiled broadly at the compliment.  But of course the barber’s ego wouldn’t allow that, so he did it himself.  While it was certainly adequate, it wasn’t nearly as fun as the one I’d watched.  

One month later, my hair had grown another inch or more, so I was just beginning to look human again when the 'Holi' holiday happened and I was liberally doused in purple dye. 

Our 'bag lady' Mavis - the Queen of Bangalore

February 2007

Our travels over the past month have been, literally, “in ruins.”  While many if not most of the ruins do include the ubiquitous Hindu temples, in the last month we have also been treated to an assortment of palaces, forts, ancient cities, mosques and caves – a most welcome change of visual diet.  We made a quick trip back to Bangalore to drop a big heavy bag of “souvenirs” and books that we had collected before heading north.  

Finding somewhere to leave our bag proved more difficult than we had expected – again, expectation leading to disappointment!  The hotel where we were staying, and where we will again stay prior to our flight home, flatly refused to even consider storing our bag.  Furthermore, the maximum length of time a bag may be stored at a bus or train station turns out to be not a month, as we had read in our trusty “Lonely Planet” guidebook, but a week.  We needed six weeks.  What to do…?

 

Feeling a little desperate (the bag is so big and heavy that travelling with it seemed a most daunting and unpleasant prospect, and we were keen to get out of Bangalore, which is a big and dirty city with few attractions), we set off on a search for possible baggage storage sites.  We considered shops – what could we buy that would be valuable enough that a shop-keeper would agree to store our bag for 6 weeks?   At one point we spied a YMCA, and thought that that might be a possibility, or that someone there might at least be able to point us in the right direction.  But no.  No storage, no information, no help.  

 

Carrying on down the street, we came upon the YWCA.  It looked a little more likely.  We passed through its big wrought-iron gates and into a large packed dirt playing field, which appeared to belong to an adjacent school.  At the far edge of the field were two very old houses, and seated infront of the smaller of the two houses, in the shade of a big old tree, were two women, one of whom looked at least as old as the houses and the tree.  We approached, and asked after the manager of the YWCA. 

 

The younger of the two women responded by introducing the older woman, a very slight but sinewy gal in a well-worn and stained matron’s dress, as Mrs. Mavis Ramsbotham, the President of the Bangalore YWCA.   She very proudly pointed out that Mavis was 95 years old, and had been the President of the Bangalore YWCA for 50 years.  Mavis laughed, and invited us to join them for tea.

 

Tea was served by Maureen, the principal of the school, which had in fact been started by Mavis many years ago, and expanded in increments, building by building, floor by floor, and staff member by staff member to its present size of over 1000 students from grades K to 8.  As Mavis talked about the school it was clear that she had a real soft spot for the children, and loved them as her own.  She has over the years provided special care and financial assistance to many of them, for sicknesses and surgeries and for a range of family issues and problems such as are common in India.   She literally lives to give, and loves to give.  The kids call her “auntie.”  She also loves her “girls,” who come from all over India, and abroad, to visit or work in Bangalore, and who stay at the Y for varying periods of time.  One of them has been there long enough that she is using the Y to teach piano lessons.

 

Mavis, Maureen and Maureen’s mother, who was living with Maureen and her daughter in the smaller of the two houses, told us about the school and how it was run, including how it was managing to continue to conduct all classes in English, despite a government ruling that all schools would now teach only in Malayalam, the state’s “official” language.  As far as they were concerned, this would only put their students at a disadvantage when it came to living and working in India, where the only common language in a country of well over 50 different languages and 100s of dialects is English, and where increasingly the language of commerce and business is also English.  

 

So they had found a way around the ruling, and for the moment were determined to ignore it.  This is the most common response by the people of India to all government rulings and laws that they don’t agree with or can’t be bothered to adhere to.  In a country as big as India, the likelihood of getting caught for “breaking the law” is slim to none, unless the crime is murder, in which case slightly more effort might be expended to catch the guilty party.

 

Mavis and Maureen’s mother told us stories of their lives in India.  Mavis was white, her family having emigrated from England during the British Raj.  Maureen’s mother appeared to be of mixed parentage, but her mother tongue was English, and she spoke very little of any of the Indian languages.  Mavis, on the other hand, seemed very fluent in Malayalam, and said she also spoke fair Hindi.  She dealt rapidly and decisively with the several interruptions by various employees, twisting her tongue around the multi-syllabic Malayalam words with no difficulty or hesitation.  She had lived in many different parts of India, and remembered them well.  When we told her of our travel plans, she knew exactly where we were going, and was able to suggest specific places that we should make sure to see.  She even knew which railway stations along our route had “retiring rooms” where we could stay.  She was a storehouse of information and anecdote, a wonderful warm-hearted woman who, at age 95, was clearly still the most central, active and indispensable member of the Bangalore YWCA.

YWCA Mavis - our Bangalore 'bag lady'

When we told Mavis of our problem in finding a place to store our bag, she immediately offered to keep it for us at the YWCA.  Maureen was doubtful, concerned about the security of the bag with the number of people constantly coming and going.  But Mavis quickly resolved that concern by stating that she would keep the bag in her room, under her bed.  It would be entirely safe there, she pointed out, because she kept her two beloved dogs in her room, and they would let no one enter it, especially if she was not there.  

 

We were dubious that she would have enough room under her bed, but she insisted she did, and asked us to help her up so we could go with her to see both her room, and the Y.  We helped her up and, each of us with an arm under her elbow, walked with her to the Y building and up the stairs.  She was slow but steady on her feet, and really needed only minor assistance, in the form of steadying, when climbing the stairs.  She apologized to us for needing our help to walk, commenting that her loss of strength in her legs and hips was the only health problem she had, but she regretted the extent to which it slowed her down and made her dependent on others.  WOW!

 

The Y building itself was a massive old brick and mortar building with high ceilings and many rooms.  It was chock full of antique furnishings of every imaginable kind, including two pianos.  There was an impressive row of floral arrangements, all dried and mostly in baskets, still covered with cellophane wrapping, with notes of thanks and good wishes to Mavis.  There were many old framed photographs, including a formal one of Mavis as a younger woman, possibly at the time she became President of the Bangalore YWCA.  In one corner was an antique toy baby carriage and dolly which Mavis said were hers as a child.  In the carriage with the dolly was a Minnie Mouse doll someone had given her more recently.  They made an incongruous couple.  

 

The entire place had the feel of the 1920’s or 30’s.  There were no mod-cons at all, although there were electric lights and fans, clearly a later addition, as the wires ran exposed along the walls and ceilings.  The “kitchen” was a huge dark room with a variety of old free-standing armoirs that were locked, and a few shelves on which were arrayed a few bits of crockery and some pots and pans.  There was what looked like a stone counter-top, but I didn’t see a sink.  There was definitely nothing remotely like a fridge or stove.  Likely there was a gas ring or fire pit outside, along with a tap and some wash buckets.  When we asked what was in the locked armoirs, Mavis told us they contained the linens for the house.

 

There were maybe five or six “bedrooms” in the Y building, all of which had their own bathroom.  Mavis’ room was quite spacious, but was crammed full with the stuff of a long and rich lifetime.  Every surface and cupboard was filled with dolls and knick-knacks (Mavis collects dolls), all covered with a liberal coating of dust.  

 

We met the two dogs, one old, one young, both of which had been rescued by Mavis from the street.  While the younger one appeared in fairly good shape, the older one was dirty and smelly, with sore-looking patches of irritated skin on its back and legs.  Mavis said that when she got this dog its legs were paralysed.  She took it to the vet and had it treated.  Now it could walk, albeit a little stiffly, but she said it wouldn’t let anyone, even her, treat it in any way.  It did like to be patted, which I did without much enthusiasm, knowing I would afterward have to be careful not to touch anything until I had a chance to wash my hands.

 

Peeking under Mavis’ bed we saw that there was, in fact, a small space where we could stow our bag, and after making sure again that it would be no trouble for Mavis, we agreed to bring our bag over the next morning.  Indeed, Mavis absolutely INSISTED that we do so. 

 

Our visit with Mavis, Maureen and Maureen’s mother is but one of the many “stories” we will remember from this trip – a little glimpse into the heart of India, and the heart of one remarkable Indian woman. 

Here’s to Mavis – may she continue to live a long and feisty life! 

Hampi: Living in an Archaeological Site

February 2007 

In addition to being a major archaeological site, Hampi is home to many, mostly Hindu, families. Many families have a room or two that they rent out to the few tourists who come to Hampi.  (Hampi is not well-known outside of India.  It was our friend Bangalore Mavis who told us about it.)  We rented a room from one of the families and lived alongside locals, for ten days.

Hampi’s “residential” streets, which are all of them except the one main street in town, which runs straight towards the temple, are narrow and made of packed dirt.  There are gutters, which act as sewers, on both sides.  There are no sidewalks.  The plaster-covered brick and mortar houses are built right up to the street edge.  There are no “front yards.”   The majority of traffic on the roads is pedestrian and bicycle, however motorcycles do hurtle through them, and the odd car creeps through. 

What struck us most was the extent to which the villagers’ lives are lived in the streets.  Because the houses are small, and the families are large, the streets are a natural place for gathering, relaxing and visiting with neighbours.  Also because the houses do not have kitchens or indoor stoves, most cooking and dishwashing is done in the streets.  

So there are always a number of people on the streets, mostly women and small children who are not yet in school.  There are also girls of all ages, who for whatever reasons are not in school (many rural Indian girls tend not to go to school after grade 6 or so).  There are also always a number of adolescent boys hanging about, either unemployed or employed but not working too hard, old men, and middle-aged men who manage to find lots of reasons why they need to be at home for a few hours, or the day, rather than at work.  Added to this there are of course the dogs, cows, and monkeys roaming about looking for tasty morsels.  So there is a constant hub-bub in the streets, and always something to watch.  

Many Hampi men are involved in tourist-oriented activities like rickshaw driving or shop-keeping. While some of the women are also involved in tourist-oriented activities, such as cooking for some of the “restaurants,” or sewing colourful garments to sell, most of them are kept busy all day with the everyday household chores of cooking, cleaning, clothes-washing and child-minding.  Most cooking is done over small fires, for which the fuel must first be collected (small sticks and twigs) or made (dried water-buffalo dung patties); grains and spices must be ground by hand, rice separated from chaff by hand, and water collected in urns from communal taps, when they are running; all floors are washed every day, and all street-front areas are swept and sprinkled with water at least once a day to keep the dust down; and all clothes are taken down to the river to be beaten and slapped against the rocks before being spread out on the river bank or hung on bushes or trees to dry.   

Most women have several small children to look after, including at least one at the breast, and at least one boy who MUST, according to Hindu religion and tradition, be waited on hand and foot.  Hindu women must also, again according to religion and tradition, treat their husband AS IF HE WERE A GOD, waiting on him hand and foot as well.  So the women of Hampi have little time for themselves, let alone for non-household related activities. 

 

We watched men come and go, sharing a cigarette or a joke.  We watched women going about their endless cycle of daily chores.  We watched children playing with sticks and tires, with stones, with old plastic bags, or with the snot from their noses.  We watched very young children out and about on the streets doing errands, looking after even younger children, carrying babies around.  

 

We watched children and adults alike going about their daily ablutions - brushing their teeth with their fingers, and spitting in the streets, combing their hair, picking the nits from one another’s heads.  We watched them urinating and defecating in the streets, against walls and alongside the gutters.  We watched them endlessly sweeping the accumulated debris from around their doorsteps out into the street, and we watched as the wind and the traffic of human feet tracked it all back in again. 

 

We also noticed just how much Indians love to talk, to engage in lively and often circular discourses, to argue and gesticulate, and to yell.  They are a distinctly exuberant and noisy people.  The most commonly used words are “anh,” a sort of nasalised “ah,” which means “yes” or “ok,” and “nanh,” which means no.  “Hey!” is also liberally used to say hello or to get someone’s attention.  It is usually yelled, more and more loudly, until the person whose attention they’re trying to get finally figures out that it’s them that’s wanted.  

 

The haute-voice street “conversations” begin around 5 in the morning, when many Indians start their days, and end around midnight, when the last of the youths finally give up and go to bed too.  In between midnight and 5 am there will be the odd “hey,”  and sometimes we would hear babies crying, but night times are usually, thankfully, fairly quiet.   

 

We watched and listened to all of this with the awful certainty that however much India may be “developing,” and however rich some Indians may be becoming, it will be a very long time indeed before rural Indians’ lives change at all.  If nothing else, the sheer weight of numbers – one BILLION people, 800,000,000 or more of them who live rurally – dictates that “progress” will be slow to reach most of India.

Hampi was the first place I saw large numbers of people sleeping “in the rough.”  While we’d seen lots of people sleeping on the floors of bus and train stations, and a good number on the sidewalks and in the parks of most towns, we’d never seen so many on the streets.  Some had moved their charpoys (metal-framed beds with metal or rope mesh platforms, covered with thin coconut husk fibre mattresses or ragged rugs) out onto the street, possibly to be cooler, or because there is not enough room for everyone in the house, or for privacy, or most likely of all to try to avoid all manner of biting insects which are in the houses because most of the animals, including dogs, chickens, goats and even cows, wander freely in and out of the houses at all times of the day and night. 

 

Some of the people were likely homeless, lying directly on the ground.  On one night I saw two very little children bedded down, fast asleep on the ground, right IN the road.  Although Hampi is small enough that there is very little traffic, and mercifully no loud and smelly diesel buses, the traffic that is on the streets tends to be young boys on motorcycles and in rickshaws, who of course drive only at break-neck speeds, heedless of others.  At night they often drive without headlights (saving the bulbs, or maybe the lights aren't working?), and I know I could not rely on them to avoid a couple of small children sleeping in the road.   

 

Temple Courtyard Corpses

 

The courtyard of the main temple in Hampi town was also filled, on most nights, with these sleeping “mummies.”  This is customary in India, where pilgrims flock en masse to the most sacred temples, using their holidays to fulfil their religious duties or dreams.  One often sees hundreds of pilgrims camping in the temple courtyards.  Groups of (mostly) men, or whole families, including grandparents, aunts, uncles and cousins (blood or religious) put down their sheets, mats or rugs, if they have them, to establish their little space in the melee of dozens of other similar impromptu camping spots.  Some build little fires for cooking.  Others rely on the free food handed out by most temples in the evening.  Many beg. 

 

At night they wrap themselves like corpses, enshrouded from head to toe in blankets, sheets or shawls, often no more than rags, and lie down on the paving blocks or packed earth to sleep.  Dogs, monkeys, goats and cows roam freely throughout the area, stepping over and around the bodies, scavenging for whatever scraps they can find. 

 

Most temples have water taps, meant for drinking and for ritual cleansing before entering the temple.  These become the focus for morning ablutions, which in India include tooth-brushing and mouth and throat washing, a peculiarly Indian habit, accompanied by disgustingly loud hawking, vomiting and spitting.  They are also the place where the women wash dishes and clean their children’s faces, hands and bottoms.  

 

The entrance to many large temples is therefore often very colourful and lively, but not necessarily very inviting, and certainly not “spiritual.”

 

Temple monkey mafia

 

The main temple in Hampi was “home” to a tribe of monkeys who were always there at prayer times, keeping a sharp eye out for any scraps they might be able to pilfer.  Indians offer rice, sugar and bananas to their gods, one of which is, of course, Hanuman the monkey god.  So monkeys, birds and chipmunks tend to do quite well at temples, and often set up home there.  At Hampi, the monkeys were a scruffy, brazen lot, rather like a monkey Mafioso.  Some of the males were huge, with great open gashes on their arms from recent fights.  They would glare and growl at one another, and at humans who happened to be in the “wrong place.”  They made a habit of rifling through unattended bags, and would go so far as to try to steal bags from tourists as they were walking through the temple.  Just in terms of their sheer numbers, which were in the hundreds, it was clear that they, not the humans, or the gods, were the ones who were in real control of the temple.

 

The elephants' bath

 

No temple is complete without an elephant, and there were a couple of them at the temple in Hampi.  Unlike some of the elephants in India, these ones seemed to have a pretty nice life – they weren’t working hauling heavy loads or giving endless rides to tourists.  Mostly they hung out in the temple, eating bananas and looking, well, big and majestic.  They were taken for baths in the river on a fairly regular basis, and one day we went along with them to watch.  Their majouts used cut coconut husks to scrape their skin.  The elephants appeared to enjoy this – likely all sorts of biting insects were removed along with accumulated dirt.  It was interesting to see the relationship between the majouts and the elephants during the bath: the elephants stood quiety while their skins were scraped, then the mahouts stepped back, and the elephant dipped its trunk in the water, gathered up a goodly amount, and gave itself a nice shower.  

Ooty’s Toda Village

February 2007 

This morning we were at the Regency Villa – a very grand old royal estate, once owned by one of the Maharajas, and now a very opulent, and of course expensive, hotel.  As beautiful as the villa was, we felt we needed to go somewhere with a little more natural beauty and a little less artifice.  We decided on the botanical gardens, a large (44 acres) site with a good variety of tropical and sub-tropical plants and trees.  Due to the season (end of winter), the gardens were not at their best: very little was in bloom, and dead broom branches had been liberally used to shade the newly transplanted flower beds, so they looked rather bleak.  Nevertheless, the paths through the gardens were pleasant, and despite the mid-day heat we decided to climb to the top of the garden, some 500 feet or so up.  

About 3/4 of the way up the path we spied another beautifully renovated villa, the gates to which were firmly closed.  A couple of workmen-cum-guards were on their way out, so we asked them who lived in the villa.  "Ah, this is vacation house of Governor of Tamil Nadu [a state in India].  Entry prohibited.  Not coming in here."  Another leafy road led up the hill from the villa.  "And where does that road go?" we asked.  "It is going to the house of the Chief of Police."  Of course.  India's many politicians, chiefs and inspectors generally live very well, and very well removed from the poverty and squalor of those they lead, regulate and inspect.  We have decided that if we come back in another life to India, we want to come as Inspectors.  I think I would like to be a tea stall inspector.  I don't think there are enough of those here now, 

 

Effectively – and happily – prevented from visiting another villa, we back-tracked a little, then carried on up a much steeper part of the hill, on a narrow dirt path.  We came across a sign, roughly painted with the words ‘Toda Village’, and an arrow pointing upwards. We assumed the ‘Toda Village’ was some sort of replica (Indians love replicas).  We carried on to the top of the hill where we came upon a low cement wall with a small opening in it, beside which was scrawled, in faded white letters ‘Toda Village.’  

 

The Toda are one of the original tribal people of Southern India.  Although their numbers were decimated by disease (smallpox) following colonization by the British, the Toda are making a comeback of sorts, and now number around 2000.  Toda people worship the buffalo, and maintain large herds of the animals.  They do not slaughter them, but use them for milk.  Their temples are actually dairies, and their priests are buffalo tenders (and dairymen).

 

We had read about the Todas and had heard about ‘Toda tours’, where groups of tourists pile into mini-buses and are taken by guides into Toda villages to see ‘real Toda life.’  As we don't fancy that kind of tourism, we had decided to make do with post-card images and replicas.  But as we climbed the stairs up over the wall what we found on the other side was in fact a real Toda village!  

 

The village was on the top of a little mountain (or a big hill).  Directly in front of us was a large unfenced grassy area well-grazed by the 8-12 buffalo roaming about freely.  (There were likely more in other areas.)  Three or four women sat in a circle around a small heap of white and red fabrics, doing the needlework they are known for.  They were all traditionally dressed in black, white and red skirts and shawls.  

 

A middle-aged man in regular (ie. western) cotton pants and shirt approached us and asked if we would like to see the temple.  We said we would, and he walked with us over to the centre of the grassy area, to a spot overlooking a broad valley, and several terraced and cultivated hillsides.  Then he pointed to a large, round excavation, around 10 feet deep, in the centre of which was a plain mud hut with a rounded palm-thatch roof.  It looked a little bit like an enormous loaf of bread.  It was a very humble ‘temple.’  

 

The only opening in the temple was on one end - a rectangular opening about 2 feet wide and 3 feet high, which was covered by a wooden door.  Around the opening there were some black painted symbols which our guide told us were for the sun, moon and buffalo.  Apart from these decorations, there was no indication of any religious or ceremonial significance.  And it certainly did not look like a dairy, but what do we know?  The temple looked exactly like the photos of ‘traditional Toda houses’ we had seen.

 

We sat on the grassy bank chatting in Hinglish with our new friend and guide.  He told us that 20 families lived here in this village.  We saw several men and women carrying baskets of buffalo dung on their heads, towards a nearby terraced slope.  "We grow our own food, and food to sell.  We sell food at market."  We remarked on the beautiful setting of the village, and he told us that it was all protected land, including the adjacent farmlands, specifically for the Toda people. We were glad to hear that, and hope that with this protection the Toda people will be able to maintain their unique lifestyle.  We were equally glad to see, just before we left, several Toda children as they came running up the hill and through the gate on their way home from school.  In many areas of India kids are not sent to school, but instead tend animals or work in the fields.  Evidently the Toda, in Ooty at least, are aware of the value of education for their kids.

 

Shortly after we arrived, an old man wrapped in a shawl shuffled slowly towards us, and said "Namaste."  Our friend introduced him as the "village elder," or chief, and the keeper of the temple.  He chatted with us for a bit, asking where we were from and telling us a little about the temple, his people and the buffalo.  He emphasized that they did not eat the buffalo, but used only the milk.  We asked if there were any baby buffalo, as we saw none, and he said yes, there was one that we could see.  With that our friend got up and walked us over to a mud-hut shed, the door of which was securely wired shut.  

 

Undoing the wires and opening the door, he showed us a little calf that stumbled up, trying to adjust to the light, and picked its way over the debris-littered floor towards the door.  It didn't look like much of a life for a "sacred animal," but then again none of the sacred animals in India seem to fare too well.  I gathered that they were weaning this calf from its mother, and I couldn't help but feel sorry for it, all alone in the dark all day.

 

We were about to take our leave when our friend asked us if we would like to see a Toda house.  There was only one traditional house in the village.  The rest were what looked like government issue plastered adobe or brick structures, all joined together to form a small compound around a central courtyard.  They were painted blue and white, and looked much like the little houses we see often here - very basic, but better than nothing.  Likely they have one or maybe two rooms for sleeping, and a larger room for sitting, food preparation, storage, and eating.  There are no kitchens as such, and almost all of the cooking is done out of doors, over small open fires.  And of course there are no bathrooms, indeed no indoor plumbing at all.  There are generally central water pipe stands with make-shift and often leaky faucets, from which everyone fills their water containers, buckets and bottles, and around which they brush their teeth, bathe, and do their laundry.  There might be a central latrine, or the people may just use the open fields around them.  These arrangements are typical throughout India, and are indeed a step up from how many people here live.

 

As we approached the traditional house it was difficult to tell if it was a sort of museum, or if it was inhabited.  Like the temple, it had no windows, and there was no sign of life.  The small low doorway was open, but the inside was pitch-black.  Our friend motioned for us to go in.  So we crouched down and crawled through the doorway.  And there, in the dim light of a smoky little fire, were an old woman, who was sitting on the dirt floor feeding small sticks onto the fire, and an even older man, who was sitting on a narrow raised platform - the bed - on one side of the hut.  The smoke from the fire filled the room, making it even harder to see, and uncomfortable to breathe.  The old man coughed several times, and our eyes stung.  Doug and I sat beside the old man on the hard blanket-covered dais - there was no mattress or layer of reeds to soften the mud, just a few woven blankets.  Our ‘guide’ crouched outside the door - there was literally no room for him to come in.  He introduced the old man as his grandfather, and the old man's rheumy eyes lit up as he flashed us a gap-toothed smile.  His wife offered us tea, but we declined, uncertain where the water supply came from, and whether the woman would boil it for sufficiently long to ensure we didn't get sick.

We sat for a while, just taking it all in and making very small talk with the old man and woman.  There were no windows in the hut.  There was no furniture, and nothing on the walls.  But behind the old woman, against the far wall, were some shelves on which were neatly arranged more silver-coloured pots, pans, plates, bowls and cups than two people could possibly use.  Looking around, I noticed more pots and pans on the floor and on another shelf just over the fire.  What were they all for?  Did the Toda store their wealth in the form of pots and pans like the Hindu women store their wealth in gold jewelry?  Or was this hut a place for communal feasts (hard to imagine, it was so small).  We didn't ask, so we'll never know.  

We did, at the younger man's suggestion, and with the happy assent of the old man and woman, take a couple of photographs.  In preparation, the old man stood up and wrapped his red and white shawl more ceremoniously around his shoulders.  The woman shifted her position and wiped her sooty forehead with the end of her shawl.  They both smiled, which is unusual here.  Unfortunately the photos were partially obscured by the veil of smoke and the overall darkness.  Nevertheless, the old man and woman were very pleased to see them, smiling and pointing at their images in the little LCD display window of the camera - an incongruous, but welcome piece of technology in this rude little hut.  We said our thank-yous and good-byes and crawled back out into the dazzling sunlight, taking a few very deep and very welcome gulps of fresh air.  

 

As we walked back down the hill through the botanical gardens we couldn't help but compare the two ‘homes’ we had seen today - a Majaraja's opulent palace and a Toda's rude hut.  According to the old adage, both of these homes were the ‘castles’ of the men who call them ‘home.’  But how incredibly far apart these men's castles are!  How can we reconcile, or even hold at one time in our limited consciousness, such disparate realities?  The gulf between rich and poor is always and everywhere this wide, this completely unbridgeable, and unfathomable.  It has almost nothing to do with an individual's merit or measure, and almost everything to do with the accident of one's birth, and the unfolding of destiny.  It is a sobering thought and one that can't help but make us grateful, again, for what we have.  For our lives, for our families, for our home, and for the truly great country that we live in. We are indeed so very very fortunate. 

 

 

For more information on the Toda people go to: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Toda_people