“Ehh! Dirty! Why don’t you use some good quality toothpaste and a tooth brush. Don’t you feel bad to put that stick into your mouth. That powder’s color is so bad. I can’t understand why your parents can’t live life properly. They don’t have any less money compared to their friends and they are educated too. This is terribly old and rotten mentality.”, My friend who came to visit my home reacted looking at my grandson using a homemade tooth powder and a need branch to brush his teeth. I was sitting there and smiling. He tried to pour all his frustration on my grandson who was not sure about what this old man talking but did not react and continued brushing his teeth.
He is my very very old friend. I settled in a small village near Vadodara after I decided to take rest from ‘work for earning’ after my kids found themselves capable enough to handle rest of their life without my financial help. I had started farming for my own satisfaction and consumption. Navneel decided to stay with me and help me in my work. He helps me maintaining couple of cows for our daily dairy needs. We are a 8 member family. Me, my wife, Navneel, his wife, our grandson and 3 cows. Don’t tell this number to anybody. If the trees around my house hear this they will feel bad. We both planted almost 5 dozens of trees for our medicinal, environmental and fruit needs. I started farming rice but Navneel introduced vegetables farming as well as medicinal plants. My friend came to visit me and he was flipping out since he saw we doing all these. He thinks I spoiled my sons career and blames me for loss of a great engineer to this mankind.
I tried to convince him that the most vital engineering knowledge is understanding the existing engineering and appreciating it. The engineering or technology that our body uses, our natures practices and society practices. The seamless coordination between various organs of our body, various elements of nature and between human and other animals throughout the day is the first subject to understand before deviating towards something else. This can not be learnt by staying away from it or ignoring it. You can’t practice or research any of these in ‘closed un-suffocating suffocated rooms’ aka ‘Air-conditioned rooms’.
My friend responded, :That’s okay but don’t you find this place dirty and you are making your kids practice some dirty habits.”
I asked, “Why do you mean by Dirty?”
“Dirty! Mud, dust etc.all around your house. See the branch your grandson was chewing. There must be so many germs on it. “
I could not stop laughing. Not because he was saying something funny but because I could recall my definition of dirty when I was young. That was very similar to his definition. Anything that does not look good was considered as dirty and anything that does not come out of a packet is considered as full of germs.
“This is not the fault of people like us to get this kind of understanding for dirty.It is the lack of propagation of knowledge about holistic science. For example, if I tell you all people of XYZ country are bad because there were 3 terrorists caught from that country or If I tell you ABC country is dangerous because in one city of 300 cities that country has had a bomb blast, do you thinking I am making sense and talking intelligently. No! That way you may miss to know lakhs of great people living in XYZ country and thousands of beautiful cities in ABC country. Similarly, mud which looks dirty can cure many disease but you think its dirty because some illiterate scientist showed you some germs using his microscope and forgot to show you the good germs in it. Similarly, you assume the branch of neem tree is dirty enough to chew because there are germs in it but you are not aware about the great qualities of that branch. This is nothing but ignorance. Modern ‘visual’ Science is not matured enough to give you a holistic view. I mentioned visual because you believe something when you visualize it.”, I explained.
He was bit unsure whether to believe me or not but he really loved the smell of the breakfast that my daughter in law brought. He was looking for a spoon and my daughter in law looked at me. I said, “You will not get one here. Use your hand.”. He was bit upset with my blatant refusal. I said, “Feel the food. Love the food then food will become your friend. Like the food by touch, smell, taste and look and then eat it to get maximum out of it.”. He did ot argue with me much and started eating and appreciated my daughter in law.
We friends recalled our young age activities and he complained that I have changed a lot. Although he agreed that his stay here is more pleasurable compared to his city home only because of the freshness in everything but passed a comment while living, “Tu to Buddha ho Gaya’.
Namaste!!
-Stray Dog
Life as Sakti 