There are many communities in India. One of them is the Mali community, the lowest caste that received initiation from Gandhi, and since then it feels sacred. They are engaged in agriculture, growing wheat and vegetables, animists who have connected with Hinduism. They live on the slopes of the hill, making terraces of crops and where the river has carved a path, they plant rice. For construction and fire, they cut down trees and although they have received explanations about forest conservation, they do not plant new trees and slowly the area becomes arid and grassy.
The women there are beautiful and the colors of the fabrics are moving. One of the powerful women we met is the shaman of the Baiga tribe. She hasn't cut her hair since she was a child and her hair, which is usually tied around her head, reaches the floor. She wears many bracelets on her hands and ankles, she has gold earrings and in ceremonies in which she blesses the tribe for abundance and health she opens her hair. She is a blessing to us too. There is something nice about meeting a shamanic woman, a force of feminine power. It is special because we are in a village somewhere in the mountains of eastern India, in a one-room house made of mud bricks. The shaman stands before us with a huge smile that embraces the whole world, and a heart that sees the good.
Each tribal group has its own market day, where they meet with other tribesmen, sipping the wine they make from the fruit of the trees. At several places along the way we met women who were gathering the fruit of the trees and sorting the harvest. Men, women and children, all sipping from the drink with a dried ornamental gourd serving as a cup. Everyone comes to the market, even tribesmen who cannot be approached on normal days, an opportunity for us to see them. Huge nose rings, numerous earrings, tattoos, various metal hair ornaments, each group and its appearance, some graceful and others aggressive.
We bought grapes, bananas, and vegetables at the market and drove to the host house in the jungle, a few hours' drive away. In India, the calculation is about an hour for every 50 kilometers, regardless of the vehicle or the weather conditions. This proves itself to be true every time. We drove to meet Sunny and his family in Bhurmadao. Sunny and his wife came from the tribes and set up a host house in the jungle that supports the girls of the tribes. Sunny says that they decided not to have biological children of their own, and preferred to adopt 11 children from the Gond tribe. Out of a desire to help the tribes they came from, they donate a significant portion of the income from the host house, which is a kind of roadside hotel in the middle of the jungle, to a school for girls where they learn to read and write, as well as sewing, and when they finish school, this will allow them to earn a living.
The lodge sits at the entrance to the jungle, and Sunny, who serves us dinner with some young people, tells us stories about life in the tribe. In the small kitchen, the fire is lit by wood and all the food is made by the skilled hands of the tribal women who manage to provide delicious meals and a variety of vegetable delicacies. In 2019, Sunny and his wife, Deepti, won a certificate of appreciation from the state and first place in all of India for running a "homestay" - a family guesthouse that contributes to the well-being of the community.
In Sunny's yard, the metalsmiths sit and sculpt with wax threads, and then at night, they burn them and turn them into metal sculptures that are for sale to travelers. Most of the tourists here come from India itself, city dwellers who come to experience life in nature. Entire families from the tribes come to do service work at the site for the duration of the tourist season, and then they return to the villages until after the monsoon season.
At Sunny's house, we met guests from his family, silver and goldsmiths, merchants who pass by and sell the jewelry to the tribal women. They said that the tribal women buy the jewelry as a kind of insurance for hard times. Anklets and necklaces, large necklaces and earrings. Each tribe and its ornaments, which are essentially the family's savings bank. When the monsoons are late and agriculture does not yield enough, the women pawn the gold, and with the money they buy seeds and food to survive, until the fields yield and they can redeem the jewelry. It turns out that the women not only do all the work, they are the hands and brains of the tribe, carrying both the family and the tribe's economy on their shoulders and backs.
One evening we joined the women of the tribe in the kitchen, and asked them to teach us how to make something delicious. They showed us how to use lentil flour, which is one of the most active products there, and mixed with butter and water to make delicious dishes. This flour is used for everything. For types of dough, a local bread product, as a batter to wrap fried eggplant slices, and for puri, a type of fried dough that is puffed up into a kind of thin and delicious pouch. We were amazed at the ability to get so much out of so little, but that's probably the secret of modesty. When we cut our salad, they watched. For them, a salad is sliced vegetables. We chopped and mixed, and it seems that the women of the tribe also learned something new. Not sure for themselves, but maybe for the tourists who will come after us.
The journey is almost over. Master Maguni Jana's dance class dances for the gods and goddesses in the village of Baliya, and the master, known throughout India, plays and shapes the movements along with a drummer who sets the rhythm. An entire performance of girls in decorated clothes welcomes us on the roof of the house. There are also boys who dance, but they appear separately. The daily training, the impressive flexibility and the hand movements typical of Indian dance are eye-catching. The goal is to dance in the temple before the gods.
On the way, a large statue of Ganesha, the elephant-headed god, stands proudly. Ganesha is always seen with one broken thorn. Why broken? The reason is to remind us that creativity solves problems. And this is the story: When the monk Valmiki heard the cry of a crane when it was hit by hunters, he let out a curse. Then he felt very sorry, and asked himself how he had come to curse, because he was busy with penance and prayers, and a curse could deteriorate his spiritual status and cause him to lose the rights he had earned in sacred service. So he retracted the curse, and turned it into a song. The god Rama, who heard it, was very impressed, and asked Valmiki to write in poetic rhymes his history, how Rama, who is the incarnation of the god Vishnu, goes into exile in the forest with his wife Sita and his brother, Lakshmana. Sita is kidnapped by the demon king, and from here begins a plot that unfolds the relationships between the various characters, a story about love and justice, about intrigue and the ways of fate, about the status of women, honor, morality, and leadership.
Valmiki began writing. It is said that he did so through inspiration given to him by Ganesha. He wrote quickly and ran out of ink, so Ganesha broke a piece of a reed and used it to continue writing. The statue shows Ganesha with a broken reed and he is holding the broken one in his hand. I like Ganesha because he is a kind of Mercury or Hermes, who brings blessings and joy, protects travelers and artisans. In Hinduism, he is one of the beloved gods and on his holiday, many dye their hair orange. Ganesha is the son of the god Shiva and the goddess Parvati, and it is said that when Parvati went to bathe, she asked her son to guard the door so that no one would peek at her. Father Shiva arrived after a long time, saw a young man near his wife's bath and beheaded him. Parvati was very angry and immediately sent him to bring a new head for her son. With no other solution, Shiva brought the head of an elephant. In addition to being the protector of beginnings and journeys, the guardian of artisans and the helper of success, Ganesha also represents wisdom, knowledge, intuition, learning and logic. Ganesha's best friend is a mouse on which he rides, which teaches that size does not matter.
We chose to spend the last few days of our trip in Goa. On the way, we met the eunuchs, the hijras, men in women's clothing, who are extremely loud and who hang around cars at intersections, asking for money, mainly from male drivers. A surprising sight after weeks of monks and tribesmen, but the city, like any city, brings its own surprises.
In Goa we enjoyed a quality hotel with a swimming pool, not far from the beach. A few days of relaxation and shopping, and good food, a few days of a comfortable bed, air conditioning and a nice pool before returning home. I'm not strong on doing nothing, even though it's an Italian commandment to enjoy doing nothing, but Goa is nice even if you just stroll along the shopping street and the beach, and if you really want to, you can go to the nearby villages. Every day I collected the leftovers from our meals and gave them to the dogs. I discovered that they eat everything. Later I also pampered the cows, I learned from the shop owners who feed them that they love bread and cookies.
I traveled to the village of Seristal in South Goa and arrived at a very magnificent temple with intricate wood carvings. A Hindu temple dedicated to Mallikarjuna, who is considered an incarnation of Shiva. This is one of the oldest temples in Goa and is located in a natural area, a valley surrounded by mountains. In the hall next to the temple, a wedding was held and I allowed myself to be a guest in the first part, which was a kind of canopy, where a cloth was placed between the couple and after the blessings, the cloth was taken down and the groom put gold jewelry on the excited bride.
Until we arrived in Goa, we had never been to shopping malls or places with shops, only to tribal markets where they mainly sold vegetables and a few products that were suitable for the local people. At this point, Goa seemed like a kingdom of cheap and cute shopping, with Indian clothing stores, massage rooms for the feet and the whole body, and pleasant seawater whose temperature doesn't drop even early in the morning. I walked along the beach, collected special shells, and discovered that they lower a net into the water there to clean the sea, and the people from this town come and collect the fish that are caught in the net. The many crows perch on the unfortunate crabs that have been caught, and the whole thing is a celebration for the locals.
A month has passed. It went by quickly in India, and the days in Goa were a calm end to an exciting journey that will probably take time to internalize all the magical experiences and sights. All that remains is to pack the memories, collect the experiences, stuff everything into a suitcase, and return to Israel happily, until the next journey.