12/6-12/10 Rishikesh. Brijwasi Palace. Start of long lingering chest cold resulting from frigid overnight ride without any warm clothes in a smoky second class sleeping car. Bought a useful wool loohi shawl in Rishikesh. Sewed wool nightcap.
12/11 Shimla. Yisi, Tibetan refugee boy traveling alone on bus to Bhagsu Road, McLeodganj, Upper Dharamsala..
12/12-1/6 Dharamsala, Himachal Pradesh. Green Hotel (Tennor, Tashi), Yellow Hotel, Himalaya Hotel (Sitaro Kumar), Zelnon Kagyeling Ningmapa Tibetan Monastery (Nyingtar), Tse-Chok-Ling Tibetan Monastery (Tsering, Dorjee, Daniel German), Sarika beggar girl, Akash chai boy helping his Nepalese mother.
1/11/05 Notarized new will at United States Consulate
1/18 -2/16 Bodh Gaya, Bihar state. Wat Neranjarawas on east (far) bank of dry Niranjana River wash. Temple under construction for scheduled dedication next March. Young monk in charge Chanyut offered me use of an empty room attached to the garage. Bought an Indian Airlines ticket Gaya to Bangkok for Wednesday 2/16. Until then passing time visiting monasteries and sitting on bank of the wash under some bamboo stalks and a small palm tree. Visited Sujata shrine and Kusa Grass shrine (guide Rohit Kumar), and finally got to sit under the Maha Bodhi Tree. After two weeks moved from garage back to the Bodh Gaya side of the bridge in the Pachatti neighborhood, to the Deep Guest House (Hotel).
Attached are two scanned photos of this tree, one of the south side and one of the north side. The lofty Mahabodhi temple face on the left of the north photo is on the east side of the tree. It is recorded that the Buddha sat facing this eastern direction under this tree. Of course the temple was not there at that time and the Buddha would have seen the dawn approaching from the east after a full moon night. Behind the innermost stone railing enclosing the north, west and south sides of the tree, and more exactly between the tree and the Mahabodhi temple face, there is a small shrine not easily seen in the photos. It commemorates the supposed exact spot of the Buddha's seat. Based on my own wilderness experience of sitting under trees in bright sunlight or moonlight I would agree on his seat probably lying to the north or to the east side of the tree in calm moon shadow.
Dungasiri hill of austerities with Maha Kala cave, almost visited on last day but turned around on motorcycle with Dinesh, too far and gas tank on empty. Previous day Dinesh showed me his family house and potato field in Ratibiha village north of Korean monastery north of Wat Neranjarawas. McCloud cafe changed name to Yokohama Cafe; morning black tea and butter toast; Ajay, Dinesh, Virendra, Andres and the Japanese Geisha Lady. Deep Guest House, Rangit, Eske, rooftop laundry and watching street below. Sonam at Burmese Monastery next door. Root Institute one night stay but too far away, expensive and isolated behind high wall. Little Buddha free movie, imaginative staging of battle against Mara as children watched from cover of tree.. Niranjana dry riverbed, women collecting cattle dung and shaping patties by hand to dry. Mohammad Cafe, Tibetan noodle soup. Hard boiled eggs in plaza. Amul butter and bread. Middle Way bookshop, Crichton and Dickens: David Copperfield. Indian Airlines office at Royal Residency Hotel, agent Rajhans. Beggar children with twisted limbs and metal bowls. Dalai Lama walked down street among thronging crowds of Tibetans, but a few weeks later the cafes deserted and dismantled overnight. Several visits to Maha Bodhi Tree, all kinds of visitors. A leaf fell in front of me, picked it up and carried it away in my eyeglass case. Internet access here often interrupted by power failures and glacial transfer rates.
Dinesh, one of a few handsome young men hanging around the Yokohama Cafe, who claimed to be the manager, wore his hair neatly trimmed around ears and neck but longish on top, combed forward and shaped with a scented gel. He had a faded layer of fingernail polish on two fingers; he just laughed when I asked him why. He owned a costly motorcycle. I did not understand why the cafe had a four-page menu but could serve nothing more than Chinese chow mein, toast or tea, and yet somehow earn enough income to support several waiters who would show up some days, other days not. I began to understand more when I realized that the smiling Japanese Geisha Lady dressed in flowing saris was being taken to visit clients by her pimp on the back of a motorcycle. I understood even more when I learned that the closed room between the dining hall and the primitive kitchen was actually a furnished bedroom without windows. Finally, on my last day, when Dinesh had promised to take me to Dungasiri Mountain on his motorcycle early before the midday winds and the heat, he asked me to wait for an hour while he took care of a "customer". The boys must have been amused to have fooled me so long. But I did not want to be thinking about Dinesh and his customer so I walked over to the Maha Bodhi temple, abandoning our plans. Then one of his young friends came after me on a motorcycle and asked if I wasn't going to the Maha Kala Cave? I said no. To my surprise, after an hour or two Dinesh himself came looking for me and found me sitting alone on a bench. He urged me to climb on his bike behind him. I held his waist with both hands but not too tightly as he drove his motorcycle over bad roads and hazardous traffic up the Niranjana Wash towards Dungasiri, but after about ten minutes when I realized how far we would have to go, how late in the day and without helmets, and without gas in the tank (he said there was enough but the needle was flat on empty), and uncomfortable holding his waist lightly but unwilling to grip more firmly, I asked him to stop. So we turned around and came back and he dropped me off at Wat Neranjarawas at my request where I gave him a modest payment. Later I wished I had given more because our encounter was memorable for what was not said and done as for what was.
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