********************
Pandu, Who Was A Boy

March 2004
********************

Of all the stories Pandu's mother told him on lonely nights his favorite concerned
the journey of a poor Sudra farmer who set his eyes far from his village and after
travelling a great distance over many years, returned to his home, a prince rich
beyond compare. If you heard the woman tell the tale you, too, would smile.

Imagining and reliving his mother's story, Pandu would dream of himself trekking
with the nomads through the neverending deserts and battling with the thieves and
murderers and would picture a beautiful wife, who loved him not for his money, but
for his love for her. He would ask his mother to tell this story many times in the
evenings, when the night came upon their small mud-brick home with a terrible silence
and dark. And there were plenty nights such as these, for Pandu's father had left
the family when the boy was six, inexplicably and suddenly, and since then, he and
his mother were poor and it was seldom indeed when Pandu went to bed with a contented
belly. But his mother's stories, told as she sat by his bedside with shining eyes,
made him forget the emptiness in the pit of his belly.

After his father left, Pandu tried very hard to be the man of the home, helping his
mother in the garden and with the daily chores. He strove to be a good son in all
things, especially dedicating himself to school lessons. In school Pandu was best
of friends with a boy named Rabi, who was near him in age. Rabi's father was a respected
musician and an elder of the panchayat, or village council. Although Pandu was quicker
at learning mathematics and could memorize more of the Mahabharata, the schoolmaster
praised Rabi. Pandu did not understand why the teacher seemed to note, with approval,
Rabi's lesser achievements, and ignore his own...but he was young and did not wonder
too much about these things.

The two boys were great friends and natural leaders of the village children. After
lessons they always played in the forest together with the other children, sometimes
devising athletic competitions, sometimes making up wildly imaginative adventures
for the children to act out. They, plus a bold girl named Reena, who was very pretty,
announced what the adventure would be each day.

Once, they had decided to hold a footrace. The youngest boys stood in a clearing
in the forest to mark the starting point and the finishing point. The distance was
perhaps 200 paces. Rabi was quick, but Pandu could fly: he had reached the finish
line ten paces ahead of his best friend and far ahead the other boys. But Pandu noticed
with curiosity that, instead of being cheered, everyone seemed suddenly to lose interest
in the race; a few spoke out that footraces were dull and they should make up a good
adventure instead. In youth, though, we are carefree, and the boy did not think too
deeply about these things.

A few days later, however, Pandu's mother had taken him aside. "It would be best
if Rabi won footraces, Pandu," she had said. The boy did not understand why his mother
would say this, but he knew her life was hard now, trying to coax enough food from
the mean garden for the two of them, and he dearly wanted to make his mother happy.
The next time the children held a footrace it was Rabi who won. Pandu finished behind
him by about ten paces. The children cheered and hoisted Rabi onto their shoulders
and carried him in a kingly procession back to the village.

One day after lessons Reena, Pandu and Rabi had ventured out by themselves. They
had travelled deep into the forest, deeper than they'd ever gone, playing hide and
seek. The afternoon had begun to wane. At one point it was Pandu's turn seek out
his two hiding companions. He had spied the sash of Reena's sari, poking out from
a clump of bamboo shoots, hallooed in victorious discovery, and Reena's carefree
laugh had met his exclamation as she jumped up and dashed away. They had darted through
the forest until Pandu's fast feet brought him astride her. He flung his arms around
her waist and they both tumbled to the forest floor, laughing and out of breath.
When their laughs had receded into blissful smiles they called out for Rabi. Their
calls had been met by silence. They had searched and called out and their increasing
disquietude touched the moments of unreplied monologue with a feel of terrible eons.
Just when worry was turning into real fear, the two had finally heard their comrade's
answer from a nearby clearing. Rabi's voice had seemed strange and strained. When
Reena and Pandu came upon the clearing they had seen Rabi standing in the midst,
looking down at the huddled body of a small dog. In his hand Rabi grasped a thick
bamboo shoot. A hint of red colored the end of the weapon. Rabi's eyes were wild.
And he panted, spent, exhilarated.

Word of this got to the schoolmaster. He took Rabi and Pandu to him and reprimanded
them harshly. "Do you not remember my teachings of Ahinsa, that you must practice
respect for all living things? Do you forget the lesson of the Jain priests who even
cover their mouths with cloths so as to avoid accidentally killing an insect by breathing
it in?" the schoolmaster glared at Pandu. To educate the boy about the dog's suffering,
the schoolmaster took Pandu and, although he said it hurt him to do it, gave the
boy a beating. Afterward this happening often made Pandu wonder about the thinking
of his schoolteacher. Pandu wondered what kind of a man it is who teaches one thing
but in his actions does something very different. But these were hard questions.

Pandu wondered at these things and asked his mother. He asked her, then, why it was
Rabi who should win footraces? Why had he been whipped when it was Rabi who had done
the vicious deed? At length the woman said, "Because Rabi's father is Rabindranath,
the great musician and zamindar, and your father...well, he is your father, Pandu."

The boy tried very hard then, but could not remember his father, who had disappeared
so long ago. In his thoughts the boy made up a game that was just his own: he would
pretend that perhaps he was special, the most special person in the world, because
perhaps he, unlike anyone else, had no father. Perhaps he had only a mother, and
this somehow gave him a special power. It was part of this mysterious power that
he could run fast and could memorize the Mahabharata so easily. This is what Pandu
daydreamed.

Seasons passed. Pandu grew and soon he had arrived at the place where boys become
men.

It was harvest time and, as was the custom in Pandu's village, a great feast would
be given after the first harvest of the year. The day would be filled with music
making and traditional dances and after everyone had eaten their fill of the feast
the new members of the panchayat would be announced. Rabi's father, the respected
musician, fluted on the bansuri a propitious raga that everyone praised very much.
The women, wearing bright-colored saris, performed a series of traditional dances.
This year Reena took her place alongside the women in dance, and everyone said that
she was the prettiest and the best dancer. After these performances everyone sat
at feast-tables that had been placed in the center of the village and ate their fill.
(Pandu perhaps appreciated this part more than did the other villagers, for this
year Indra had visited infrequently and his mother's garden had produced only a meager
yield). Naan had been baked by the widow Parvati; a short, red-faced man, Ganesa,
had brought shahi egg-curry; the singer Sarasvati, who had a great spinach garden,
had cooked three pots of her palak paneer. At the feast-tables Pandu sat next to
Rabi and on his other side sat Reena, who wore a new sari of light white and a lotus
blossom in her hair.

Rabi's father stood up, tumid with his imperious air of self-importance. Conversations
died. In his sonorous voice full of sound and power, he gave a speech about the village
and the role of the panchayat and the great honor and responsibility that went with
being a village leader. This year the council had chosen to add one new member. They
had chosen Rabi, son of Rabindranath.

But during his speaking the usually rhythmic, staid voice of the wealthy musician
had perceptibly faltered for the briefest moment.  The villagers looked at Rabindranath,
wondering. His eyes were fixed beyond the crowd and sought at something behind them.
One by one heads of those assembled turned to look. In the waxing afternoon shadows
of a clump of eucalyptus trees stood a figure, a tall, skeletal shape that resembled
a man and leaned unmoving upon a slender staff. He wore a simple flowing dhoti, his
head turbaned and his face thus partially hidden. In the darkness he was inscrutable,
and he was darkness, but for a glint of metal that hung like a medallion from his
neck.

Rabindranath's brow had darkened as if in recognition, but no sooner had his voice
hesitated than the great musician recovered his imposing rhythm and assuredness and
his controlling voice gradually lured back the faces of the curious crowd. Only the
very old ones in the village took a long time to turn back to Rabindranath, and when
they did their faces bore the vestigial marks of some dim thing remembered.

When Rabindranath had concluded his overwrought encomium everyone praised and congratulated
Rabi, and there was more feasting and dancing. Rabi made a public request that Reena
perform the Bharata natyam, a traditional solo dance, for this important occasion.
Standing in the midst of the crowd, Rabi looked down at his boyhood friend, reeking
with justification, and Pandu's face smiled back, but something felt broken inside
him.

Pandu hesitated . . . then abruptly stood up from his seat and made to leave, without
excuse. Reena, though caught up in her dance, saw him. Their eyes met briefly; hers
seemed to ask, "Why should you demonstrate this disrespect toward your friend at
such an important moment, this honored moment?" But Pandu walked away, nor did he
look back.

Pandu found himself heading toward the spot in the forest where the dark figure had
stood leaning upon his staff; he winded a path deep and deeper into the sweet smelling
forest of eucalyptus, cassia and oak. As the light of day dimmed and the forest became
sheathed in dusk he wandered, without plan, and thought a great many thoughts. Thus
the boy was led toward a searing despondency and finally, as he stood on the edge
of a steep precipice, he contemplated something very serious indeed.

Poised at this place Pandu's mind chanced to recall one of the stories his mother
had told him. She had spoken of a people, in another land, who believed that when
one died one's Atman did not come back as another creature. Instead of being reborn
as a horse or a fly, a man retained in death his living human form and dwelled in
a perfect place called ‘heaven.' There in that place all things were fair: there
was no distinction between the Sudras and the Vaiyshas, between the Brahmins and
the Kshatriyas, and there were a great many servant girls to wait upon you. You were
never hungry, never thirsty, for there were fields of food and rivers of milk and
honey.

Pandu passed into a clearing. He watched the mixing light of dying day and a growing
moonlight play upon the parched ground of his earth, the ground of his home, the
ground upon which lay all he had known. "Shiva!" Pandu imprecated. "Shiva, destroyer
and re-creator, god of final mercy, show me this paradise called Heaven. Discover
it to me, if only for a moment's time. Show me this place that I might know there
is a just place, a kind place, a place where life means something and makes sense."
If Shiva would let him glimpse Heaven, perhaps he could return to the village and
bear the poorness of his home and the ignorance of his people.  When he had offered
up this plea, Pandu looked into the dull sky for a time, for a long time, then turned
away in the darkness.

Walking back, he wiped a drop of moisture from his cheek.

*  *  *  *

When Pandu returned to his mother's mud-brick home that evening he saw, before he
entered, that a darkred fire burnt the hearth. He sensed something strange, yet familiar.
He stepped inside. At the table sat his mother; beside her stood the terrible figure
that had leaned at the periphery of the forest earlier that day.  Here he had a closer
view of the figure. It was indeed a human man, with skin that was dark and worn and
gave the appearance of very old age . . .  but, too, the man's fierce-black eyes
were hard like stone and alive like hot fire. It was a frightening face to Pandu,
but he stood firm, even though those eyes reminded him of the wild stare of the insane
shaman that wandered tortuously through their village from time to time. He tore
his eyes away from the figure and turned to look at his mother. Her face was deep,
inscrutable.

"This is your father, Pandu," she said.

She paused— not in hesitation, but with a solemn weight that left no room for questions.
"Tomorrow morning you will go with him where he will take you. Now go to bed and
to sleep, Pandu."

All the emotion that you can imagine would come to a young boy --a boy fast becoming
a young man-- when he hears that before him stands his estranged father, came to
Pandu now. He wanted to ask his mother why she spoke this way, so abrupt, so hard,
without a note of explanation. He wanted to know, if indeed this was his father,
why the man had forsaken his family, where he had travelled, why he now returned.
Pandu looked in his mother's eyes and saw a dark stare. It silenced him – at least
outwardly – and he obeyed his mother's command. He cast his eyes upon the ground,
away from the awful figure, and went to his bed.

For a long time Pandu could not sleep. And when sleep finally came, Pandu dreamed
a strange dream. In this dream Pandu was sleeping but was wakened by a voice, calling
his name. He went out of his mother's mud-brick home and followed the calling voice
for many years until finally, in the middle of an eternal desert, he confronted a
solitary being blocking an invisible road. This being spoke only words of silence
and in motionlessness caused the world to rotate beneath him. The two began to wrestle
in the desert sand and they wrestled for three days. But the being could not prevail
against Pandu and the boy would not release his grip. Pandu spoke, "Being, I shan't
let go of until you tell me the name of the place called Heaven."

Immediately and instantly Pandu found himself in a lush garden and heard the sound
of a babbling brook nearby and felt the cool dawn's breeze upon his cheek. Looking
around the garden he saw many women carrying platters of food. Past the garden upon
the horizon he saw many palaces a thousand times more splendorous than the most splendid
he'd ever imagined, construed of precious stones and of ivory. And among them he
saw his palace...

But as quickly as it had appeared this place vanished and Pandu was left standing,
alone, in the midst of the eternal desert. And Pandu had to wonder if all he had
witnessed, if this avatar with whom he had struggled was only what they call a mirage
– or was no more than a struggle within himself. In his dream, Pandu decided that
Heaven was nothing but a bedtime story that mothers in faraway lands told their sons
so they might bear going to bed without supper, bear losing footraces they should
have won. He had to spend the rest of the night travelling for years through the
immanent desert to discover his way home.

In the early of the morning, before the village awoke, Pandu rose up and went out.
He could find his mother nowhere, but standing at the edge of the forest, waiting,
was the dark figure whom his mother had called Pandu's father. The boy came forward.

"If you are my father or if you are not," Pandu said, "I will follow you, for my
mother has commanded me to do this thing."

Without a word the figure turned and began walking, and Pandu knew he must follow.
They walked through the village. No one was yet awake and the light of a dawn just
approached. The two walked for hours through the forest, in living silence, Pandu
filled with many questions, but thinking it better not to ask them. They hiked into
a place unfamiliar to the boy. When they had reached the base of a small mountain
the figure turned and looked at the boy wildly. The figure's eyes again reminded
Pandu of the wild eyes of the wandering shaman of the village.

"Pandu, I have brought you here because we are going to ascend this mountain. Have
you ever come to this mountain?" asked the figure. His voice was gruff, but it was
soft.

"From the village you can see this mountain...but though it is not so very far, I
have never come here."

"It will take us a long and hard time to climb the mountain, and it will be sunset
by the time we reach the summit. Do you know why I am leading you, Pandu?"

"No, father --if indeed you are him-- I don't. But I follow you."  Pandu didn't think
he should ask the figure why.

"When one journeys—" the figure paused; it seemed he smiled, "whether it be over
many miles or just within a small village—he is looking for something, Pandu. And
it is always the same thing he is looking for."

Pandu was terrified, but could not flee. "I have brought you to this mountain, and
we are going to climb it. It will take us all day to reach the summit and when the
sun sets on the horizon we will have reached the summit. When we reach the top, Pandu,
I will lay my hands upon you and kill you."

These words fell to the ground and echoed against silence. The young boy saw that
his body trembled; he felt the buzz of blood in his ears and had to hold himself
up against a tree.

After a moment, Pandu asked a question. But when the question left him, he wondered
at the meaning of the question he had chosen to ask. Pandu had not asked why this
should happen; the youth had said "What will happen then?"

Pandu thought the figure smiled when he spoke, "Rabindranath might say that you will
come back as a horse or a fly, or as a human, reborn in another life, as according
to how you lived this one. Others would say you will go to a place called heaven
where you will live, as you are, more or less, for All Time."

"And what do you say, father?" asked Pandu bravely.

"When your friend Rabi beat that dog to death, what do you think happened to the
dog?"

"My teacher says that it went through Samsara and has become re-incarnated."

"But you, what do you think of that life?"

Pandu paused. "I think . . . I think it stopped being a dog and will never be that
dog again. If it comes back as a fly or a child it will still not be the dog. Whatever
comes next, I think, the dog Rabi killed is gone."

The figure nodded. "We will now begin to climb the mountain. Follow me." The man,
though by all appearances emaciated and weak, turned and walked quickly and Pandu
had to take many quick steps to keep pace. It was only after he had begun following
the figure that he wondered at why he was following. For if he knew that this person
meant to kill him, why didn't he run away? Or why didn't he take a rock and attack
the figure? Inexplicably, his knowledge of what the summit of the mount held for
him did not alter his footsteps.

The morning progressed. After hours of climbing Pandu's face and arms gleamed with
perspiration. He could hear the figure in front of him laboring, stertorous in his
breathing. Yet the figure didn't slow his pace. Then, suddenly, the figure stopped
still. He turned to Pandu and said that they would rest here for a moment. The figure
was breathing hard and looked more pale than the dark figure Pandu had seen the previous
night. As for Pandu, he was thirsty and his feet hurt him terribly. They both looked
upward to the top of the mountain. Pandu wondered what the figure was thinking. The
figure spoke.

"Pandu, your mother used to tell you a story about a Brahmin and a mountain, didn't
she?"

Pandu nodded.

"Tell me that story, Pandu. Tell me of the Foolish Brahmin and the mountain."

Pandu paused. He had never told the story, only listened it and imagined it. "Well,
as mother tells it, there was this young Brahmin priest who had studied very diligently
and was determined to become enlightened. So one day, against the will of his teachers,
he went to the wilderness to live by himself and to find this enlightenment. Well,
he wandered for a long time, thinking over all he had been taught. He fasted for
days at a time; he spent all night meditating; he purified himself by floggings with
a bamboo rod. Which hurt very much. But he did not find enlightenment. Even after
the floggings. Finally his wandering brought him to the base of a steep mountain.
At the base of the mountain was a large boulder. The Brahmin found he could only
with the greatest effort move the boulder.

"At this point an idea struck the Brahmin. He compared the difficulty of attaining
enlightenment with the act of pushing the boulder to the top of the mountain. Well,
the Brahmin decided that if he could push the boulder to the very top of the mountain,
he would reach enlightenment. So the Brahmin began to push the boulder up the side
of the mountain. The steepness of the mountain made this very difficult and each
time the boulder would eventually become too heavy and would roll back down to the
base of the mountain. Sometimes the Brahmin got only a few paces up the hillside
before the boulder slipped. Other times he came very near the top indeed; nevertheless,
the Brahmin spent forty years, the rest of his lifetime, attempting this endeavor,
and when he died, he had not pushed the rock to the summit.

"Thus, my mother would finish, even very wise men can do silly things. Do not become
so absorbed in your task that you forget what it is you set out to do. That is the
story my mother told." Pandu finished.

"Pandu," said the figure, after the youth had stopped speaking. His voice had a new
sound to it, a softness that made Pandu think of the way his mother spoke to him.
"What if I told you that the Brahmin knew, when he began his effort, that he would
never be able to push the boulder to the top? If that, then why do you think he persisted?
What's the ending of the story then, Pandu?"

The young man paused, wrinkled his forehead in thought. He looked up the hillside
before them. "Well, the Brahmin knew that he would not achieve his goal; this was
his realization. His enlightenment was that achieving the goal was not the point,
but attempting it, attempting the absurd, the impossible, to continue living in an
absurd world. That was a noble endeavor."

The figure's dark face stayed upon Pandu for a time, and the figure looked as if
he were contemplating something. He made a noise that sounded like humming, and were
it not for the fact that he knew he was about to die, Pandu might have laughed at
it. But abruptly the figure stood and turned once again to the terrifying summit.
Pandu's weary legs followed, somehow.

Morning became midday and midday passed into afternoon. The men's pace had slowed
considerably, from physical exhaustion. Yet, Pandu pressed forward with as much effort
as he could muster. He knew his death was coming sooner each step.

The figure then paused for a second time, and sat down upon a nearby ledge. Pandu
collapsed to sit down on the ground, exhausted.

"Pandu," the figure said, a second time. "Tell me a story. Tell me your favorite
story from those your mother tells.

"A poor Sudra farmer was tired of his life in the tiny village," began Pandu. "He
hated working his small land every harvest season only to suffer his crops ravaged
by locusts, then frozen by the winter cold; all his effort left him only hungry—
and only alive. So the poor farmer made a great decision. He would leave his small
village to seek something better. If he could see a better place, where there was
enough food and there was justice, perhaps then he could return and live out his
life as a farmer. The farmer thus departed and travelled far, across neverending
deserts that were worse than the parched land of his village. Although he had left
behind poor and unthinking people, he encountered along the way far worse characters,
murderers and thieves who only spared his life when they discovered he had no money.

"Years passed and the village forgot about the farmer who had left. But one day,
while they were tending their poor crops as usual, they heard a noise. One by one
the heads of the villagers turned to look and saw a man riding in on an elephant
and with a servant on each side. The poor Sudra farmer had returned and he had with
him the wealth of the world: magnificent jewels and ornate and precious metals. All
the villagers praised the boldness of this traveller and made him prince. He married
the most beautiful girl there and was consulted by everyone for they respected his
great wisdom full of the knowledge of the world. That is my favorite story," Pandu
concluded.

Once again, the figure looked at Pandu and, after a time, said, "Pandu, what if I
told you that the farmer returned on the elephant and with jewels and wisdom of the
world, but nobody of his village took note? There jewels did not provide food, and
what the farmer knew about thieves and the world did not matter for simple farmers.
What then, is the ending?"

Pandu paused again. He noticed that the sun was nearing the horizon and saw that
they were not so far from the summit of the mountain. He noticed that his body still
trembled. Pandu began, hesitantly, "Well, the farmer, who had seen great things and
learned that there were places far greater than his little village came home, but
all his wisdom did not matter. His gold chains and jewels were worthless here. When
the farmer realized this, he fell to the ground and wept. A gold chain, a medallion,
that hung about his neck rolled off and into the dust of the earth. The farmer lost
his mind and wandered through the village, and then wandered in the wilderness, babbling
wordless nothingnesses to no one. He spent the rest of eternity doing this."

The figure sighed and hummed and once again stood up and cast his eyes tremulously
toward the summit. The two figures began to walk, began to make the final ascent.
Behind them were cast long, grotesque shadows down the decline of the mountain.

*  *  *  *

It is the season of harvest and, as is the custom here, it is a day of feasting and
celebration. There is music making, dancing, a cornucopia of food, and today the
new members of the panchayat are to be announced. The respected musician, Rabi, sings
a solo piece. His wife then dances alongside the other wives. People say that she
is as pretty as the young girls and still the best dancer of the village.

Rabi rises, of imperious mien, and the villagers are borne over into silence. Rabi
speaks of the fortune of the village this past year in having a bumper crop, and
that it is now more important than ever to consider the future of the village and
how it is changing. Those who must make the decisions for the village bear a great
burden. This year the panchayat has elected to add one new member. They have chosen
Rabi's son.

Congratulations and more singing fill the central gathering square, echoing against
the mud-brick walls of the buildings, even to the periphery of the village.

Inside one of the buildings, here, on the edge of the community sits a solitary figure.
He has a long, sallow face, ingrained deeply with years. Upon his chest hangs a medallion,
which might be a representation of the Evil Eye or perhaps the outline of a fish.
He chews betel nut and darkred drops of spittle drip from his mouth from time to
time. He sits laconically, eyes wandering amongst suppurated cracks of the baked
mud ground, his silence punctuated by occasional mutterings – betwixt grunts, moans,
cackles, perhaps, if you listen closely, you might hear something like "Stories,
stories she spoke to me" or "Climb a mountain, push a rock, ha!" – the mutterings,
certainly, of an insane man.