How often have you heard it said that a song or a taste had taken someone back to remembering a place of his or her past? In most cases, many find that this may be the only way to actualize the precious memories of previous lives for, during prolonged absences, places tend to physically change and become unrecognizable.
I recently posted an article about Basel, Switzerland, in which I intimated that there are two cities I’ve become emotionally attached to. I can now reveal that the other is Mysore, India. It may serve to note that I spent only a short time in each initially. Yet, I had the opportunity to visit both again after decades had passed… and neither seemed to have changed all that much in the meantime.
In my junior year at college, I participated in the Central Pennsylvania Consortium’s ‘study abroad’ program. There were about a dozen of us from various colleges, most (but not exclusively) in Pennsylvania. Our destination was Mysore University in Mysore, South India.
We were all excited to be going. The Beatles, particularly George Harrison, had made India into a high-priority destination for us. Then, after landing in Delhi, the fun began. India simply overwhelmed us. The heat, the dust, the sights, the sounds, the tastes, the smells all conspired to overload our circuits. Though we stayed in one of the better hotels - close to Connaught Circle, the most westernized part of the city - our minds and bodies balked at what we faced. We continued to hear stories about Westerners going off to India with the best of intentions and leaving again on very the next flight out. We might have done the same had we felt well enough to organize two thoughts or more.
Some of us managed a trip to Agra to see the Taj Mahal. On the way, we stopped at Fathepur Sikri. Eventually, we headed south by train to Mysore, our new Indian home. By the time we were settled in at the Manasagangotri dorms, most of us were already feeling much better – physically, at least. We were given bicycles to tool around town with and told to remember to keep to the left-hand side of the road. It wasn’t so much of a problem; back in those days as there wasn’t much traffic anyway.
Mysore was an absolutely lovely, gentle South Indian town. It is where the Maharajas of Mysore – the Wodeyar dynasty - made their home. Accordingly, there are several magnificent palaces in town. The city lies at the foot of distinctive Chamundi Hill, which seen from a distance, at night, looks like it is draped with a sparkling pearl necklace, the illusion the streetlights along the road that leads up to the summit artfully maintains. A ride or climb (there are steps) to the top affords one a lovely view of the town below. There is also the Chamundeshwari Temple, a huge statue of Nandi, the bull, and another of the demon Mahishasura after which Mysore was named.
Famed South Indian writer, R.K. Narayan, lived much of the productive part of his life in Mysore. He wrote almost exclusively about Malgudi. Anyone reading his novels, who might have spent any time at all in Mysore, will easily make the connection between Malgudi and Mysore. They are one and the same. Narayan writes in English - not in Kannada, the language spoken Karnataka (State) – but writes as an English speaker in Mysore would speak. It gives his prose a deceptive simplicity.
It was British author, Graham Greene, who discovered Narayan and introduced his prose to Western audiences. To me, his genius is two-fold: First, he managed to capture the essence of Mysore with words (just as a smell or taste is capable of reconstituting a past life); and second, his observations in a philosophical/metaphysical sense, are nothing short of profound. I’m thinking primarily of his novel entitled, “The English Teacher” which some say is his most autobiographical effort. In it, he explores the here as it relates to the beyond. He is said to have been a modest man, often seen in the English Literature Department at Mysore University as guest, coach and observer.
Peter Koelliker; pkoelliker8@yahoo.com
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