The Travel Essay

There is a difference in the air. It is fresh, with the faint smell of a burning field. The harvest is just over and there are fields, brown in places, burnt black in others. In amongst the brown there are fields of green speckled with little yellow flowers. Then there are the spinach, potato, cauliflower and cane fields, as far as the eye can see. There is a lush fertility to this land. In the distance, buffaloes are being led to the village pond. The rains have come and gone. Winter will soon set in. The nights are already cool and the days are filled with a light haze of smoke and fog. This, is the Punjab.

In among the fields there are little villages, each with a Gurdwara with white walls and a yellow flag flapping from the top of the onion-like dome. There is no lack of industry. Everyone seems to be at work, the women and the men, in the fields or in little workshops that dot each village. There are tractors and combines that jostle for space on the crowded roads. Driving is more than just a hazard, it is an adventure in staying alive. The occasional folly of a driver can be seen on the side of the road, a mystery as to whether the occupants survived.

When the sky is clear it is a pale blue, with little or no clouds. And in the distance, the green of the fields stretches to meet the sky. So this is India’s bread basket. And it is no wonder. There is a sense of pride in work and in prayer; children walking home from school in the late afternoon; farmers tending their fields; and womenfolk sharing in the chores. But there is also a sense of joy, and of peace, in the faces of the old men sitting under the peepul tree, engrossed in a game of cards or just whiling away the late hours.

But the cities are different. They are dusty with a life of their own. The streets are crowded with scooters, bicycles, cars, and pedestrians. There are shops carrying clothes of all colours and hues, slippers and shoes, stainless steel pots and pans, and bicycles; streets thronged with turbanned men and women draped in clothes of rich, earthy, colours. The men, tall, bearded, lean and well built; the women, faces finely chiselled and of striking beauty. The smells of rotting rubbish, of cooking, of incense; the constant sounds of honking; and the sight of bewildered policemen, long canes in hand, lend a surreal quality to street life. But this is rural India, with the flavour of the Punjab.

The area around the Golden Temple is a Kiplingesque dream. There are shops selling incense, flowers, clothes, sweets and all manner of wondrous things. Amid this cacophony of people and traffic, there is an elephant, painted in religious colours, being led by a group of saffron clothed sadhus. There are people everywhere. There are holy men; there are the martial, Nihang Sikhs, with their blue turbans, swords and spears; there are the devout with their yellow turbans; and there are thousands others, just ordinary folk, all coming to pray in this holiest of shrines. There is a constant traffic of people streaming out from the temple grounds and another going in. The colours melt into one another as men and women find their way up the steps into the gateway leading to the outer sanctum. Inside, steps lead down to the pool of nectar – Amritsar – in which stands the golden temple.

The marbled walkway and the buildings that surround the pool are spotless. There is a civic pride in keeping this holy place clean. Cleanliness and godliness have come together here. Right in the middle of the pool stands the golden temple, the Harmandir Sahib. Here the holy book is kept and recited. A long queue of the devout, offerings in hand, wait patiently in the noonday sun in a line stretching across the causeway leading to the inner sanctum. There is a method in this holy procession. People are let into the sanctum in batches, and as one group melts into the doorway, having shared half their offering with the temple, another is let in. In this well rehearsed manner, all, the rich and the poor, the well and the infirm, the young and the old, get to see the holy book being recited. There is a sense of equality here while the soothing sounds of the harmonium and the chant of holy songs waft across the pool, resonating around the outer sanctum, awakening the spirit.

The marble walls of the outer sanctum are carved with the names of the different Indian regiments that have donated to the rebuilding of the temple. Yes, there is a pain here. In 1984, Mrs Gandhi sent in the troops to clear the temple of the militants she had herself unwittingly created. The resulting military adventurism led to hundreds being killed and left the historical temple and its surroundings badly damaged. In a conciliatory gesture, the Indian Government rebuilt the destroyed buildings and the military gave its share. There are many who felt that other ways of disabling the militants should have been tried. But the spiritual damage had been done. A central and historical place of worship, such as the Golden Temple, has an irreplaceable place in the hearts of the devout. It cannot simply be rebuilt when it has been wantonly desecrated. It is the same emotion that arises among Buddhists and others about the destruction of the Bamiyan statues by the Taliban in Afghanistan. There is a wound not easily repaired. Maybe in a hundred years, the antiquity of the place may give it back its strength of spirituality. But the Golden Temple manages to overcome this by the sheer numbers of people who visit, lending their energy, in a show of the determination of the human spirit.

The road from Amritsar to Jullundur is heavily laden with traffic. Buses have standing room only and sway at full speed, horns blaring. The danger, as always, is the Indian driver. The only rule on Indian roads is that there are no rules. The road crosses the Beas river, passing through the town of the same name. This is a river of joy, and a river of shame, for the Punjab. The Beas waters the Punjab and makes the land cultivable. It also hides the shame of Partition when peasants and farmers, Muslims, Sikhs and Hindus, killed each other in a violent frenzy, leaving the swollen bodies to float down the river. The now placid waters hide that shame, washed away in the sorrows of time.

The road then cuts through verdant farmland. On either side of the road fields of corn, cane and potatoes lend their colour to the unbroken vista. Then, just outside Jullundur, there is industry. There are factories and industrial plants. The road widens, there are traffic lights, and there is an American style diner. The car park is almost full, with uniformed guards directing traffic to the available lots. Yes, this is the Punjab where, it is said, every family has at least one member living in the US and yes, this is an American style eatery although it is Punjabi food that is served. There are American Sikhs everywhere, some with turbans, many without, and all dressed in jeans; the women speaking in an American twang mixed with Punjabi words. There is a mist blown by giant fans to cool the seats outside. And unusually for India, the toilets are spotlessly clean. This is where the returning Punjabis seek their sustenance. For them the humble Indian village eatery is now off limits; stomachs accustomed to US habits simply cannot handle the culinary challenge of the Indian village or town.

So this is the Punjab, a mix of the old and of the new. There are villages where life goes on as it has in the past, and there are cities where Mr Kipling would still feel at home, and then there are the amenities that America has introduced. Speaking with a twang or not, the Punjabi, however, remains true to his roots, for in the end he still comes to pray at the pool of nectar. And not many Americans can claim that pride. Who would have thought that America would come this far, east?