Travel Reference
In-Depth Information
hair stood dutifully at their mothers' sides, learning the ropes of
barter they'd soon be climbing themselves for men their parents
would select, probably without consulting them. Boys whose smiles
took up half their faces played tag, weaving among the stalls,
screaming out utterly carefree laughter. A turbaned man with a
moustache like buffalo horns strolled by, dragging a sad, moth-
eaten dancing bear muzzled and leashed. The man looked
dangerous; the bear had big black tears hanging rigid in the corners
of its eyes.
There were no yogis in sight.
I asked a vendor about Yogi Ramsuratkumar. The vendor tried
very hard to sell me a copper saucepan, coming down to a price so
reasonable I would have bought it had I not pictured myself lugging
it around India for years. I reminded him I had asked about the
yogi, not the saucepan. The man sighed, knowing he'd done his
best. He pointed across the dusty lane. 'Yogi is there,' he said.
'Where?' I saw nothing.
'There only. You see . . .'
I walked across to what appeared to be a vacant stall. On a bench
in the shadows sat a powerfully built man, perhaps in his late sixties
- it was hard to tell - with a huge, greying beard. His dirty robes had
something of ancient Rome about them. He was flapping a circular
fan of some sort of dried leaf attached to a wooden handle, powerfully,
urgently, as if the heat really bothered him. His hand moved in a
blur below his face. A large, soiled rag worn bandanna-style was
drenched in perspiration.
'Yogi Ramsuratkumar?' I asked, suddenly nervous.
He looked up with bright eyes that were full of an impish
amusement, smiling and nodding his head.
'Oh!' he kept repeating. 'Oh!' He stood, putting the fan aside and
grasping both my hands like some dotty old uncle I hadn't visited
in years. 'Oh! You have come!'
I confessed it was true.
'From where?' he asked, an odd intelligence entering his voice
and eyes. His English was excellent, and, judging by the pale skin
and the accent, he was certainly not from these parts, not a
Southerner. His body, too, was different: large-boned, with sizeable
