First days in India

(To fully appreciate the following content, I suggest viewing it on a desktop computer)

Hi dear,

I'm sorry that it has taken me a few weeks to write to you, but I have been feeling lost since I arrived in India. I honestly don't know what I'm doing here. You should see the room from which I'm writing to you; it's like a cave, it doesn't even have windows. I'm staying in a town called Tiruvannamalai, and it's hard to describe. There are a lot of people, a lot of smells, cows, honks, temples, and a lot of everything happening all the time, simultaneously. I hope I can soon start to see the beauty of this place, but right now, I'm overwhelmed. I guess this is what they refer to when they talk about “cultural shock” This room, as uncomfortable as it is, has the only few square meters in this town where I feel some sort of peace. It might be a cave, but it's my bat cave.

What's more disorienting is how much importance people place on their beliefs and religion. Now I start to understand why they call this a temple city. It feels like everything has some mysterious religious meaning behind it that I can't comprehend. I'm talking about people drinking dirty milk that comes out of temples, people walking barefoot all day long, business owners smashing fruits at the entrance to their shops... I'm so far from even starting to understand what's going on. And these are not special celebrations; these are things I see every day while I'm walking around wearing thick jeans and fancy shoes. Yeah, guess what? My luggage went missing, so I'm wearing the same clothes I was wearing when I left the Swedish winter. I can't even hide my discomfort. It's so obvious that I don't fit in here.

It's not only the locals who devote their life to the spiritual world. Tiruvannamalai also happens to be the place where Ramana Maharshi spent most of his life. He is a renowned Indian sage who achieved enlightenment while being on a mountain located at the center of this town. There's an ashram (a big building) dedicated to him that attracts spiritual seekers from all over who come to meditate here. Yesterday, at a chai shop on the street, I met one of them, Steve, a yoga teacher from Germany. He is tall, fit, and wears loose and simple clothes. He has that glassy look in his eyes that only spiritual people have. You know the look I'm talking about. I asked him what brought him to India, to which he responded that he heard the calling from the mountain, Arunachala, so he quit his job and came here. I don't get it - did the mountain send him an email or something?

"From which tradition do you come?" he asked me. I had never been asked that question before, but something told me that talking about the traditional Argentinean dances I learned as a kid in school won't cut it. I didn't want him to notice that I have no clue what I'm doing here, so I said, "I come from the Zen tradition," hoping that the fact that I'm now bald, and most Buddhists seem to be bald, would make my alibi more legit. He seemed to believe me, my secret identity is safe.

I wish I could be like Steve. He's charming; he walks the streets completely relaxed. He has had mystical experiences, and what´s most important: he fits in. He knows what he's doing here. I wish I had a cool and supernatural explanation, but I've simply come here to visit Garima, an old friend. That's it. If there's anything similar to a mantra that I repeat continuously inside my head, it's "What the hell am I doing here?" Does that even count as a mantra?

Knowing that most foreigners who come here are not ordinary tourists makes me feel even more out of place. So today, I'm walking the streets, more moody than usual. On top of that, I'm frustrated because I have been out for several hours and haven't gotten any decent photos. I'm heading back to my cave when I see an old man sitting inside a bus stop wearing a rainbow knitted hat. I grab my camera, turn it on, but as I get closer, I choke. So I continue walking even more frustrated than before. Suddenly I stop. "No David, you will go back, and you will either get a photo or a rejection, but you are not leaving this situation empty-handed." I say to myself.

“Hi, I really like your hat. Can I take a photo of you?" He laughs, agrees, and poses for a photo. It's not a good shot, so I continue talking to him. He looks like any other sadhu living on the streets, but I notice that his accent is not Indian, so I ask him where he is from. “I'm from the US. I never thought I would end up living in Tiruvannamalai," he says. "I can definitely relate to that! Do you mind if I sit next to you?” I reply. He then proceeds to tell me the whole story of how he got here. His wife came to India in the '70s. While traveling, she met a mystic called Yogi Ramsuratkumar and became his student. After a few months here, she sent back a letter and a photo. "I remember I was sitting inside a Starbucks in California when I opened the envelope. When I read her words and saw that photo, I started crying." Out of a knitted pouch that was hanging around his neck, he takes a small ziplock plastic bag. He opens it and shows me the same photo that his wife sent him more than 40 years ago. He pauses for a moment, looking at the photo, and then continues. "It's one of the few photos that exist of Yogi Ramsuratkumar. When I first saw him, it was like seeing my father. All I wanted to do was to come to India and meet him. It was like a seed that started growing inside of me."

My mood has already changed; I'm having a great time talking with him! He emanates joy and is eager to share all of his story. "I couldn't travel immediately. I used to be an actor and a stunt double. I was working in plays and in several movies in Hollywood when I got that letter," he says. “You were a Hollywood actor, really!?” I ask surprised. I’m not sure if he is messing around with me. He's very charismatic and has already been telling me some jokes, so I wouldn't be surprised if he is just testing me. “Yes, I wasn't a celebrity, but I did some movies. I even got a small role in the Superman movies." A quick Google search reveals that he didn't have “a small role”, he wasn't just any stuntman, he played the role of Superman.

“Gus Gorman: Hey, man!
Lorelei: That's his last name. He likes to be called Superman.”
- quote from the movie Superman III (1983)

I'm speechless. Out of all the people that I could have asked for a portrait, and trust me, there are a lot of portrait-worthy people here, I'm sitting at a dirty bus stop talking with Superman. "What about you?" he asks, as if I would have anything to say that is nearly as cool as what he just told me. “What brings you to India?”. I start talking about my friend Garima and my desire to improve as a travel photographer. But, as if he were able to see through me with his X-ray vision, he interrupts me and asks me again, "What are you really doing here?" I confess that lately I've been feeling quite lost. Unlike most people, I don't feel that the mountain has called me or anything like that. I used to be interested in spirituality, but not anymore. I just happened to be here. "Maybe the mountain brought you here. Maybe it planted a seed inside your heart a long time ago, and you just didn't notice it."

There is something in the way he says it that makes me look within. I begin tracing back the events that brought me here. It's true that I came to visit Garima, but we actually met randomly six years ago at an airport. We became friends through emails and calls, and I could have visited her earlier when she wasn't living in Tiruvannamalai. I decided to come now because, well, to be honest, I didn't plan to come now. I was in Argentina when I received an unexpected call from my friends in Sweden. They were planning to renovate their house and needed some help. "Do you have plans for tomorrow? Would you like to come to Sweden?" I agreed to visit them for a month and ended up staying three. One dinner, I told them how Garima and I met, and they said, "Wow! I love stories of people who meet randomly. You should definitely go visit her. Don't worry about the flight tickets; we can take care of that. You've helped us more than what we agreed." Just a few weeks before leaving Sweden, I met a guy who was selling a lens I'd always wanted at a ridiculous price, so I bought it. That very same lens is the one I'm now holding in my hands while photographing Superman.

"Maybe you're right, and the mountain did start calling me a few years ago," I say still doubting. He says nothing, he just smiles like a kid who just knocked the first piece of a domino puzzle without asking for permission. We say goodbye, and as I'm walking back to my room, I start wondering, "What if all these small coincidences were the mountain's way of calling me?" I wouldn't have paid attention to mystical experiences; I don't even know what they look like. But put a nice camera with a 28-75mm lens in my hands, plane tickets in my pocket, and one of my best friends to receive me, and you definitely have my attention.

Unlike Steve or many other spiritual seekers who come to Tiruvannamalai, I still have a hard time believing that I've been called by the mountain but after a super nice conversation with a stranger, my focus has changed. I have been too obsessed trying to figure out what I'm doing here without first realizing that "I'm here." Several years ago, I dreamed about traveling far away to be a travel photographer, and now, thanks to the love and support of friends and family, I'm here. Call them coincidences, God's will, or whatever you want to call it, but somehow at this specific point in my life all the pieces of the puzzle have fit together, and I have ended up here. Now, I have the opportunity and the privilege to spend the following months in a very unique place, working on my photography. This is a gift and I don't want to take for granted. I still don't know exactly what I am doing here or what will come out of this experience, but I’m starting to think that maybe it’s ok not to know.

“A Higher Power is leading you. Be led by the same.
The Higher Power knows what to do and how to do it. Trust it.”
― Ramana Maharshi

PS: While I was staying with my friends in Sweden, there was a cup I used almost daily. Guess what it looks like?