A Conversation With The Teacher

Back at the Marina Hotel our tourist life proceeds, usually beginning with an English tea and toast breakfast in the hotel cafeteria. For about $20. Canadian per night we dine amidst brass fittings and the ministrations of white-coated waiters. This is far too expensive for us however and using our tour books we begin the search for more reasonably priced accommodation. Soon we find what we are looking for, not too far distant from Connaught Circle, a hostel that also serves meals and with a room large enough for our family.

We are on the top floor with access to the rooftop and from here we can look out on the looming and burgeoning architecture of New Delhi complete with Western-style high rise office towers built largely without the use of the high tech machinery so common in North America. The hand constructed scaffolding on such a structure comes straight out of Gulliver's Travels. Whole families camp out at the construction site while the work is going on and it's not uncommon to see very young children playing, or even tied up near construction sights while their parents work.

We are able to have a hot shower here and then walk out onto the roof to dry in the sun. The children sometimes walk up here naked and in the early mornings the sounds of bells, conches and voices chanting from the nearby temples reach us and wake us peacefully.

This early morning devotional activity in India is a wonder to experience. Even many businesses spend a part of the morning garlanding their altars with marigold and incense and offering up prayers for the day. Flower sellers are everywhere and walking into the bazaars is a little like walking into church although if you go down to the more Westernized areas where business is being conducted this feeling is rapidly diminishing.

Our second or third day at this hostel however, brings with it a rude awakening. We have noticed that the room is damp and chilly, especially early mornings. When we change our bedding, we find that the underside of our mattress is crawling with bugs seeking the moisture there. Fortunately we have met an English traveler who has just returned from a place called Colva Beach in Goa and we have already made up our minds to depart for the warmer, southerly parts of the coast. Goa sounds just right and so begins the frustrating ritual of trying to purchase train tickets.

There is a saying that the only thing in India that is on time is the trains. Perhaps, in order to keep this inheritance from the British Raj running so smoothly, this is why there is so much red tape around catching them. Or maybe they are simply trying to keep impatient travelers away, for it takes the patience of a saint to wait in the queues to buy a ticket. After two hours of trying to find the right terminal and another three hours waiting in assorted lineups, we finally have tickets in hand. We will travel to Bombay and from there take a ferry overnight to Panjim, Goa's main seaport.

The day before we leave we decide to visit Ali Moosa once more. We intend to tell him we will be gone for a month and to bring he and his wife a parting gift of some kind. This time we find a real taxi to take us, that is one with four wheels. However, the driver takes a long, roundabout route and it is obvious, since we can see his meter running, that he is going to soak us.

Unfortunately for him, his taxi breaks down en route far away from the bazaar and with the meter already reading twice the fare. He demands payment then and there and when we ask how we will get to our destination he shrugs as though it's not his problem. Karen refuses to pay. A street-side shouting match ensues witnessed by three or four individuals quietly waiting for a bus.

One of these, a middle aged man dressed in western-style shirt and slacks steps into the fray asking both us and the driver what is going on. The driver yells back his side of the story but is obviously in the wrong. After Karen explains, our intercessor all but begins beating the cab driver over the head with his newspaper. He hails us another cab and threatens to call the police if the cabby doesn't leave us alone.

We stop in a small market along the route and purchase a brass tea tray to give to Ali Moosa and his wife as a gift. We arrive at the bazaar and request a passer-by to guide us to the house of Ali Moosa since we will never remember the way. He does so smilingly but refuses our proffered tip. Ali Moosa is home and very glad to see us.

Once again we are in for a whole afternoon of conversation and supper with his family. This time there are three or four children running around but I don't know who they belong to. They seem quite comfortable coming and going without any adults paying particular attention to them. There is that sense of extended family or community in this area, a safe feeling. Washing is hung on the line that drapes across the courtyard and there is brisk domestic feel to the afternoon.

When supper is finished and the dishes cleared away we are seated in the main room preparing for a little after-dinner tea and talk. Ali Moosa has lighted a cigarette, when there is a knock at the door. A group of young men enter and there is an immediate shift of energy in the room. The feeling is palpable. From what was a friendly familial gathering, something much more formal has suddenly developed.

Ali Moosa asks the young men to be seated but does not introduce us. He immediately shifts into a different gear. His demeanor becomes more paternal, even authoritarian. He takes charge. Our visit it appears has coincided with an evening sohbet, in sufi terminology, or conversation with the teacher. These young men are students of the sufi way who have come for their regular meeting. What impresses me in retrospect was that Ali Moosa did not suggest or hint that we leave, knowing this was coming, nor did he tell us beforehand.

The conversation we were having before the newcomers arrived is now knit seamlessly into the sohbet. Ali Moosa speaks mostly in English although he says a few words to the young men in another language, from time to time as though clarifying thoughts that might be difficult to comprehend in English. "These young men are dacoits, or thieves" he explains. "They have all been in much trouble. And this young man" he gestures toward one of them in particular, "has committed many crimes and murders."

This is a somewhat chilling revelation and I look toward the man in question. He is probably in his mid-twenties, dark-skinned and very handsome with a scar across his forehead. I am aware he has been observing us throughout this exchange. He returns my look evenly, betraying no emotion but there is a hint of pride in his look, as though he recognizes himself as a dangerous and tough customer. In that moment I feel I can even detect some humor in his glance although what I am feeling, a mixture of shock and apprehension, colors everything. I have had similar encounters with strangers in closed rooms on my travels and they have not always turned out fortunately.

"The police have come here several times", Ali Moosa continues, "asking me why I am allowing these dangerous young men to come here. I tell them that this is a Sufi center and that no one is turned away, no matter what they have done in their life. They don't understand that it is not my business to judge them but to help them."

Ali Moosa's look is measured but despite the seriousness in his voice I see that shining forehead, that strength dwelling in the eyes that reminds me of photos of Inayat Khan. "They have decided to change their life." he says, looking at both us and them with an equal measure of intensity. What he is saying is clearly meant not only for them but for us too. "When a person decides to change his life, then God forgives everything they have done. Only they must really change."

" When a man is young he works only hard enough to make enough money to satisfy his own pleasure. That is enough for him. But when he marries and has a family, everything changes. Now the work he did before does not provide enough money to satisfy his pleasure as before and feed his family at the same time. He must decide what to do. Either give up his pleasures or cause his family to suffer."

There is silence in the room as Ali Moosa takes another draught of his cigarette. "When you change your life," he continues, "you must change your habits entirely. You can't hang around with the same people who will pull you down. And you must also be careful with those you feel you can trust."

"Suppose you have decided to quit smoking" he says. "But here we are all gathered in this room together for a good purpose and we are all friends and you trust me. So, when I offer you a cigarette, even though you have decided to quit, you accept. Just this once. You are wrong. When you decide to change, you must change inwardly. No more smoking, period. Otherwise your resolve to change is weakened when you accept my cigarette, even though I am your friend and you trust me."

As he speaks, my mind goes over my own problems, my ongoing difficulty to find a way to provide for my family. All my life I have been a musician and have been somehow able to provide for myself but now I have two children. Must I give up my music and that whole way of life? I know the answer. If my family is suffering, the answer is yes.

Soon the meeting is at an end and all parties depart for home. Before we leave we present Ali Moosa and Margaret with the brass tray we bought for them. They accept it graciously but even as we give it I sense they may never use it personally. I feel that everything that happens here is an offering to the greater good of the community as a whole.

Ali Moosa walks us to the cab stand in the darkness and speaks to a Sikh cabby, a young man in a scarlet red turban, telling him where we want to go. He asks us to return to see him when we come back from Goa and reiterates his offer to put us up at his house. Then we are gone. To our surprise, when depositing us at our hotel, the cab driver refuses to accept his fare.