Dirty Blessings

It is so dirty. Brown muddy water washing up the stone river bank. Piles of rubbish consolidated as if a naturally formed spit. I watch as men fully submerge themselves. One stands water waist high and begins salutations. Another man rolls up his lungi as he sits on the stone floor, water lapping at his soapy legs. He scrubs and rubs himself dirtily clean. A man wearing a white shirt framed by a brown suit moves his brief case into his left hand and awkwardly tries to roll up the bottom of this trousers. He steps gingerly into the river. Careful not to loose his balance he leans forwards, places his right hand under the water, scoops out a blessing and pours it over his head. Brown muddy water sticks to the front of his shirt which in turn sticks to his skin. The act seems to have enthused his enthusiasm and he begins to repeat it – torn between trying to bless himself and keep his suit clean. Immediately next to the steps leading down to the river is a open air massage parlor – skinny men, wearing nothing but lungi's work from dawn to dusk. Their office is a collapsible table underneath the railway bridge. Their view is men washing in the dirty water – or the Holy flow of the Hooghly River, depending on your perspective. Their trade is as ancient as the ayurvedic principles which they practice. Forty five minutes costs forty rupees.

At the edge of the steps is a small Hindu shrine. It is covered by an equally small corrugated tin roof which is held in place by two aging wooden planks. My flip flops stick to the muddy concrete – fliiiiiiiip floooooop as they are sucked by the floor and then released by my stride. I extract my feet and sit on the back of the shrine and lean my back ever so lightly against the wall. To my side there is a cat and mouse game between a rat and some crows. The crows have dug out a dead rat from the rubbish which they are feasting on. A live rat is jumping around – each four of its scratchy paws off the mud at the same time. Jump! For a few seconds each minute the live rat manages to latch its jaws to the flesh of the dead rat, but it is outnumbered and soon the crows hop it away. Hop! Jump! Hop! The battle for the dead flesh continues. Eventually the rat scurries back into the rubbish spit, tail trailing behind it. The dead rat is divided and devoured quickly by sharp beaks and hopping claws.

I look at the tree in front of me. Although it is not really a tree – at least not a whole one. It is a concrete block with a mass of mud on top, out of which reaches the branches of a tree. Around the outside of the concrete is a fire place, framed with white tiles showing coloured pictures of Shiva. But in the center there is no fire – just what looks like a fat belly. I tuck my feet under my legs and breathe the air out of my lungs and the tension out of my muscles. Relax.

I am watching the brown water lap towards me. There is a clay pot which is momentarily lifted like a boat, before gravity reclaims it. It captures my attention and yet it is tiny compared to the mass of water which flows in front of me. The river is so wide. The other bank grows into a silhouette as the remaining sun's light is too weak to fight the thick clouds. I imagine the flow of water. The body of its oneness as it runs towards the ocean. Fresh dirty water soon to be filled with salt and purified as it drops into the enormous mass waiting for it. The ocean is amazing. Watching the river makes me miss it. I feel its rhythm, even here, in the middle of this filthy city, as it pulls the liquid released by the monsoon clouds towards it; as it calls the rains from the Himalayas. I relax even more.

My legs feel comfortable and I feel invisible. Sitted on the shrine people respect my silence. I lower my eyes away from the boats chugging upstream, and focus back on the lapping brown water. Moving and yet stationary, licking the concrete sand. I listen. I hear the movements of the bathers and the prayers around me. Men walk by fliiiiiiip flooooooop before squatting and peeeeeeeeeing into the rubbish and then fliiiiiiip floooooooping back to the edge of the water and then splassssh - pluuuuunge. The rat has been joined by more comrades and is now even bolder as together they scurry about, jumping and digging. Suddenly I feel vibrations. They shake the shrine underneath me, and the wall touches my back. The vibrations grow into a sound and soon a train is passing overhead. Chug Chugggga Chug Chugggga Chug Chuggggga it shakes.

I feel at peace. My eyelids lowered, the lapping water calming me, my visibility blurred. The fading light camouflages the concrete roots of the tree. It now appears to be a mighty tree drinking from the Holy Hooghly River.

The natural in the middle of the urban, as the river of life cleanses and feeds and then calms a surprised spinning woman.