Next on the agenda was the capitol city of Bangalore, where they stayed overnight before going on to Mysore. Four full days of driving transported Hilde, Walter, and Fritzi to the exquisite City of Palaces with all its glory, including southern Indian colors, spices, heat, and a very nice government guesthouse.
The guesthouse had been built between a reservoir and a public park on a gated estate, with plenty of trees to provide enough shade to cool down fatigued travelers after the day’s heat on the road. The building itself had been constructed during the colonial period, with colonnades along two sides in well-maintained, elegant colors of ivory. As they toured the property with a friendly manager, they found out that all the rooms were currently vacant. Walter and Hilde looked at each other, and then Hilde said they would like to rent a room for a couple of nights. Large beds made out of hardwood with bedposts included full mosquito netting, clean sheets, and ceiling fans. The opportunity was irresistible to the travelers, also because of the nominal nightly rate.
The couple spent the night between thick cotton sheets on top of large, soft pillows and enjoyed relaxed morning lovemaking with each other. Walter and Hilde fed the dog and then prepared their breakfast in the camper, but ate it while sitting on the veranda in front of their room.
As they were about to finish their porridge, the housekeeper, or aya, walked around the corner of the building. Leading an old man with a white beard and turban by the hand toward them, she apologized for the interruption. The aya introduced Baba, the deaf-mute seer or clairvoyant who could convey a significant message through notations on a piece of paper. When the partners agreed to a reading, Baba took Hilde’s right hand, touched it lightly between both of his hands, and then let go of it again. He then did the same with Walter’s left hand. After that, he scribbled a few words on a small piece of notebook paper and showed it to Hilde.
The notes specified the following predictions for the couple: while driving back to a house, Hilde would become pregnant; she would live until the age of eight-six, and Walter would stay alive until eighty-eight. Everybody giggled and smiled, and then Baba left with a few rupees.
With Fritzi on a leash, the couple walked into town to discover the charms of this elevated city and see talents such as weaving, sandalwood carving, and bronze work. Mysore had also been the cultural capital of Karnataka. Besides the impressive Mysore Palace, or Ambavilas Palace, the amazing and most exciting part for Walter once again happened by merely walking down a street and experiencing the people in their local clothing rich in color, the vibrant life, and the enormous amount of traffic on the streets.
During their peaceful stay in Mysore’s government guesthouse, Hilde and Walter appreciated the exotic environment and historical magnificence of Mysore and at the same time planned the immediate future. In her notes, Hilde had discovered an entry related to tea. Nilgiri black tea kind grew not far away in the hills of the Nilgiris District in the state of Tamil Nadu. The teammates bid farewell to the few employees of the guesthouse and hit the road again.
By the end of the day, the Volkswagen started to climb into higher elevations, where at some point the Germans spotted their first tea plantation with immaculately trimmed and meticulously placed tea plants. Dark-green, shiny leaves spread a sense of health and abundance. After securing shelter under trees in a plantation, Walter, Hilde, and Fritzi took a long walk. In the local grocery store, they obtained fresh vegetables that Hilde cooked in a satisfying rice dish using local spices.
During the night, everybody relished the cool air of the area, where the highest point reached eighty-six hundred feet. Two Englishmen had discovered the mountainous region, also called Blue Mountains, only in the beginning of the eighteenth century after previous attempts had failed to discover “the existence of a tableland possessing a European climate,” according to the online encyclopedia Wikipedia. Grateful to have made the detour into the much cooler and wetter climate than the surrounding plains, the two stocked up on black tea, drinking water, rice, and additional fresh vegetables, to prepare for a lengthy stretch along the coast in the state of Kerala.
When the companions arrived in the city of Kollam at the banks of the Astamudi Lake on the Arabian Sea, three full days had elapsed. It felt good to see water again, which this particular Kerala region had plenty. The Kerala Backwaters, a chain of brackish lagoons, as well as lakes ran parallel to the coast, interconnected for 105 kilometers.
Because of the high humidity and large number of mosquitoes, the friends did not linger. They continued on to the capital city of the state, Trivandrum, an ancient city dating back to 1000 BC. Spending a few nights near the famous Kovalam Beach fulfilled their wish to be by the sea, though it did not match Colva Beach in Goa, because of dark-colored sand and shallow waters that stretched for hundreds of yards into the sea. Walter and Hilde visited the notable Sree Padmanabhaswamy Temple where the Laksha Deepam Festival was celebrated every sixth year, most recently the year before they had arrived. Once again, the stopover in this town enriched and educated the visitors, who also appreciated the local cuisine of Kerala with its multiple uses of the coconut, which grew plentifully throughout the area. For thousands of years, the state had been visited by foreign sailors and tradespeople who had left their mark in an adapted version as a blend of indigenous and foreign dishes.
The voyagers nurtured the idea of going all the way to Ceylon (now Sri Lanka). They heard about a train and ferry connection over the Gulf of Mannar, between the Bay of Bengal and the Laccadive Sea. To find out if it would be possible, they left Trivandrum in their bus to cross the border into Tamil Nadu, using a route that curled around the southernmost tip of the subcontinent. In two days, they made it to the island of Pamban and the town of Rameshwaram, which was connected by a long bridge to the continent. The town also offered the only land/water connection from India to the island of Ceylon.
A couple of events happened after their arrival in Rameshwaram, the only town on Pamban Island, which Hindus consider one of the holiest places in India. The two had no difficulty locating the perfect parking spot for them—across the terminus railway station, which linked major cities in the north with this part of the country. The area adjacent to the station opened onto a marketplace with various shops and restaurants. The hedge where Walter arranged the bus provided cover on the sliding-door side against curious onlookers, securing some privacy on this very public spot.
When Hilde returned from a walk, she smiled and said, “We could go to Ceylon in three or five days. There are seats available, but they do not ship any vehicles.”
Later that day Walter and Hilde booked their spaces for the first departure, in three days. They walked through Rameshwaram and caught first glimpse of the famous Ramanathaswamy Temple. While passing through a residential area, they realized that the attention they caused within the local population did not really justify the walk. About thirty people, most of them children, accumulated around them in a nonthreatening way. In front of a building, a man who appeared to be trying to help in the situation addressed them in English.
“Why don’t you step in here for a moment,” he said, pointing to a house with a wooden entrance gate.
Walter, Hilde, and dog followed the man inside, to the small courtyard of a two-story building. Several people sat on chairs and benches, and the man introduced his family members to them. He asked questions about where they came from and how their trip through his country was. The Germans also mentioned where they wanted to go and that their bus was parked at the train station. When the host revealed that his name was Chakshan, the visitors introduced themselves and Fritzi. Fresh, sweet chai from the kitchen arrived. The tête-à-tête continued for some time as everybody became friendlier. Chakshan explained that he worked for the local branch of a bank. He also said he wanted to visit them at their Volkswagen because he fancied showing them something.
When the guests asked, “What do you want to show us?” he replied, “You will see.” Walter found it odd that he did not smile.
As a matter of fact, he never smiled. Thus, all four returned to the bus; interestingly enough nobody gathered around or followed them anymore. Chakshan took the front passenger seat while Hilde sat on the bench in the back, keeping Fritzi under control.
Again, Walter asked, “Where are we going?”
The host again replied only, “You will see.”
They left the houses and huts of Rameshwaram behind. A straight road led through sand dunes with an occasional glimpse of the sea, sometimes on the right side, other times on the left.
Walter thought, What am I doing here, driving through nowhere with a stranger, leaving this perfect parking spot behind? I do not understand why even bother.
Once the road ended in sand, with water extending to the horizon on the left and right, Chakshan got out of the bus and said, “Let’s walk,” then started walking on the sand.
The Germans tried to keep up with him, the wind blowing from all directions, Walter’s trepidations intensifying.
When he looked at Hilde’s face, he could not find any assurance whatsoever and almost said, “Stop now,” just when the man said, “This is it. You will not find it anywhere else. Two oceans joining together right here.”
Yet again, the man did not smile. Silently the party walked back to the Volkswagen, where Hilde took the driver’s seat and drove back to Chakshan’s house. Before they said good-bye to each other, the man offered that his new friends could leave the bus in his courtyard while they went to Ceylon. The tourists accepted the offer and told him that they would drop it off the next day.
Before the excursion kicked off and the train to Colombo left the station, Walter obtained an oval packet wrapped in newspaper and secured with white, thin strings. Inside was fish curry he had bought from a vendor on the platform. In a sudden rush to make it to the train, the couple had forgotten to get provisions for the night. Hilde, the lucky one, had avoided making the same mistake. Walter already felt hungry when they sat in a packed compartment waiting for the train to depart. He tolerated the feeling for a few hours. Then he cut the strings, carefully opened the packaging, and used his fingers, as the Indians did, to gobble the rice with thick, brown paste, which included small parts of mackerels, fish bones, and god knows what. Fatigue made him fall asleep for some moments, despite the uncomfortably hard seat, as the train advanced through the night.
The rest of Walter’s trip to Ceylon stayed in a hazy sphere of his memory. He developed acute symptoms of diarrhea, sweating, and high temperature, and remembered that wherever they went, the food had been prepared with coconut oil. He could not eat or smell this type of oil anymore, but all available food appeared to be saturated with it. Throughout their visit on the large island, he felt sick. He stayed in hotel rooms in bed or lay between trees in the shadows near a beach, unable to move or enjoy the opportunity to discover Ceylon. The environment appeared to be steamier and hotter than southern India. The couple took buses and visited beautiful beaches in all colors of sand with lush vegetation and barely any tourists in sight. Hilde tried whatever possible to help Walter in this situation.
When they returned to Rameshwaram, they faced a big surprise. Masi Maha Sivarathiri festival was in full swing, and thousands of pilgrims swept the small town. After they retrieved their mobile home, it became a challenge to move to the spot where they had stayed before. The whole area had been taken over by families or groups of people who arrived to celebrate and perform rituals during the very important Hindu festival. Walter managed to insert the yellow bus between worshippers. Focused on the religious reasons for their presence in the park, nobody objected or even looked at the bus or the foreigners. Once Walter found the spot at the hedge and everybody got settled, it turned out to be a happening comparable to an outdoor rock-and-roll festival. Since Walter still felt somewhat under the weather, he rested in the shade of trees or in the bus while Indian music sounded from every direction for twenty-four hours a day. On the exact day of the festival, the attendees flocked toward the Ramanathaswamy Temple, where the situation became frenzied. People got hurt from the force of the masses.
After the festival’s climax, matters calmed down, and people left town again. Walter, who began to feel better, and Hilde discussed the next step of their journey: to the ancient and prestigious city of Madurai.
In Madurai, the very lively, active Meenakshi Temple offered an opportunity to enter deep into its labyrinthine inside. The complex housed fourteen magnificent Gopurams, or towers, including two golden Gopurams for the main deities that were elaborately sculpted and painted. When the pair entered, they moved along with the perpetual flow of visitors through the passages and hallways. Neither knew where to turn or aim at. The air turned hotter and more humid; the faint available light originated exclusively from candles and oil burners. For the unaccustomed observer, the atmosphere within the labyrinth of walkways emitted an undertone of extraordinary obscurity—especially because it seemed as if nobody moved to a specific final destination point. Here and there were a few additional lights, a reddish-colored paint spot on a stone or on the wall, a nook where nobody entered, and then suddenly an orifice, where it became unmistakably obvious that this was it.
The three-foot-high, rounded rock was coated with everything imaginable in regards to temple offerings. Mostly red liquids and oils as well as white matter were splashed all over it. Walter stood still, looking at it, and then had the intense impression that a particular spot on the stone was pulsating. It became a very strong sensation that did not pass but lingered. People pushed and moved in front of him, he could feel the excitement increasing inside the cavernous hall, and then Hilde took his hand and they moved on.
Madurai at that time presented all that a globetrotter may have wanted to see, purchase, touch, observe, investigate, and experience in the course of a visit. The city, more than twenty-five hundred years old, the cultural center of Tamil Nadu, was referred to as the Athens of the East. Walter and Hilde took it all in to the fullest and then boarded the Volkswagen camping bus with Fritzi and continued their journey via Tiruchirappalli to Pondicherry, a trip of more than three hundred kilometers.
They knew from reports about Sri Aurobindo and the Mother in relation to a place near Pondicherry called Auroville. Both of them had read magazine articles that described Auroville as an attempt to build a new type of alternative city, a spiritual community where everybody would be welcomed. Neither of them had had direct experience with or connections to spiritual organizations of any kind before, but something about this place attracted them powerfully. Of course, they knew that Sri Aurobindo had passed away a long time ago, in 1950, but not the Mother, who had founded the experimental universal township. When they arrived in Auroville, they learned that the Mother had died about three months earlier. Hilde and Walter visited her casket, covered with flowers.
The city’s administration organized guided tours in Auroville and Pondicherry to introduce various enterprises that belonged to and worked for the Sri Aurobindo Society. A weaving mill, a paper mill, and a wood-processing factory had up to five hundred employees each. Smaller businesses sold jewelry, paper products, and clothing, as well as fabrics. It appeared as if the Aurobindo Auroville organization was the largest employer in the city. Pondicherry’s history included a period when the French and Dutch had fought each other for the territory, and when the British took over the country, they permitted the French to keep their settlements. It took decades until Pondicherry could be integrated into the Indian republic. This period left a remarkable French flair in the town, which had two sides—the French quarter and the Indian quarter, White Town and Black Town.
Walter and Hilde were very interested in Auroville, and it was easy to be admitted and introduced to a group of residents in the experimental area. Walter admired the architecture of the already-completed structures, as well as the planned and under-construction buildings. Hilde and he connected with a French couple of their age with two kids who lived in a wooden structure with a lot of light, as well as a pleasant breeze that blew through it. They talked to them for a long time about how they came to move there, how it was to live there, and whether it would be possible to join the group. The French pair introduced them to other people and walked them through the developed part of the complex. The foundation and the drawings of the Matrimandir, the future central point and place of meditation in the community, seemed from another world. Most of all, Walter was so touched by the charisma of the residents that he wanted to stay there himself. The obvious peace they seemed to enjoy inside themselves reflected in their eyes and demeanors. He wanted the same experience.
When the visitors asked the administrative office person about a potential long-term stay within the Ashram, the conversation turned to what they had brought with them to India: the yellow camping bus. Auroville’s organization would not be willing or able to pay the import tax. That answered all questions Walter and Hilde might have had at that time.
With some sadness, but also knowing about this peace in humans, the two prepared their departure for the next day. Walter visited the bookstore in Pondicherry and bought a hardcover version of Sri Aurobindo’s book Synthesis of Yoga, his principle work on integral yoga, and The Mother, a brief but important devotional and metaphysical essay.
Since they were on the same coast as the neighboring city of Madras, Walter and Hilde went there to have closer look. With its loud colors and noises, millions of people hustling, and the temperature and humidity rising by the day, it did not feel like a place to hang around.
After deliberating their location, the time of the year, and distances to cover, they in effect said, “So long, southern India, until next time.”
Crossing three states to reach New Delhi again involved more than two thousand kilometers. The couple had not been in Agra yet, and included this must-see location in their travel plans. The two drivers exchanged responsibilities at the wheel, and their patient dog that had grown quite a bit and looked more and more like an Afghan Baluchi, stayed in the back of the bus. They covered the distance in less than two weeks, very glad to reach and roll into the place where one of the most famous buildings of the world had been erected in the sixteenth century.
To catch sight of the Taj Mahal actually in real life turned it into reality, which meant for Walter it lost a tad of its ethereal image relayed in pictures. The monument was awesome, majestic, and beautiful to look at, with an extreme amount of detailed work beyond description. A large number of Indian and international tourists moved through the hallways, down into the tombs where the two lovers Shah Jahan and Mumtaz Mahal had been laid to rest. Hilde and Walter found it astonishing to observe this symbol of love in its dimensions and profoundness.
Within half a day of driving from Agra, the convenient park area in New Delhi, where they had stopped before, received them back. The Germans shared the large area only with one other mobile home. When Walter and Hilde woke up the next morning, they noticed freshness in the air before sunrise—which had not occurred during the previous visit. It served as notice that the seasons changed slightly in this part of the world. During the day, the temperatures rose back to everlasting sizzling. They used the opportunity to rest after the long trip from Madras and went into town a few times to enjoy a good cup of coffee and find souvenirs to take home for friends.
One lazy afternoon, during the hottest part of the day, when they were resting inside the bus with all doors open, Walter, who had smoked a joint of black Nepalese, laid in the pop-up top cot with his eyes closed. Suddenly he felt a breeze coming through the mosquito-net window at the top and realized he was not lying in the cot alone. Recently Walter had begun reading the paperback he had bought in Pondicherry, a thin book about the Mother with additional advice from her in meditations and prayers. Lying in the cot now, he became aware of the Mother looking at him closely at that moment. Very gently and cherishing, a silent communication happened between her and Walter, leaving him in a state of bliss, as well as with the knowledge that he needed to continue his studies of the literature from Auroville. It was a very intimate experience that Walter did not mention to Hilde.