Bless You!

  I shouldn't be facetious, he's probably a saint or something but he caught my eye in the street of the marble carvers where I spent some time with a shopkeeper of marble artefacts, huge lingams, little Krishnas, goddesses and gods.  He gave me a catalogue of his recent show in Mumbai where he sold his own carvings of large yoga poses in black marble and other more modern pieces than he sells in his shop. The latter are his bread and butter and he said they are made by artisans who have no imagination, can do beautiful repetitive carving, can't or won't use their imagination and are happy to earn enough to keep them alive and feed their family and will never do anything to take them out of this comfort zone.  Ashok Gaur has won over 28 prizes for his works and one of his latest pieces was of the deceased wife of a man who wanted her commemorated as a woman who helped people and whom he now wanted lifted up to the gods.  It took several days  to build the 16' high marble plinth using cranes - all locking pieces - leaving space to surround the statue  and to have a small fountain pouring out of her hand.  I then spent the next 3 hours with two cousins who took me to their joint family home (10 children and 25 adults in the house!) to  meet their mother and sister-in-law.  I had such a delightful time and didn't notice the bundle of blankets in the corner contained a body until another one was laid beside it - father and then a grandson napping.  The father had sung and played his harmonium and tabla at a religious 'do' last night so was absolutely flat out.  Of course I had to look at 3 more beautifully made albums of stunning wedding photographs - this family are Brahmin, obviously fairly well off for they not only had a white horse for the groom to ride on but he was accompanied by camels and elephants too and the wedding was a 4 day affair as well as the ring ceremony one month beforehand.  It was an arranged wedding but they were allowed to talk to one another beforehand.  Mother was sitting on the floor recycling an old saree into a mattress cover on her hand driven sewing machine when we arrived.  She made everyone a delicious lunch of chapattis and liquid vegetable stew which we ate sitting on the floor with newspaper under the dishes for it is easy to drop food when you are dipping bits of chapattis into liquid. I finished up in a room up the street where an uncle showed me lots of paintings done by foot and mouth artists - they work/live in an ashram and are supported by the family who take their work to the public to sell.  Met up with the jeweller and father too for a chat - will sleep well tonight.  Oh and there is a Khrishna festival 80k from here tomorrow and the Jaipur Pink City main street was part of the route for people from the villages who are making the pigrimage.  Every few yards people were offering foods and water to the pilgrims and it will be the villagers en route who will be providing shelter and food overnight.  Pilgrims will shower in the forest before setting off again in the morning to make it to the temple and then return by buses that will be laid on for free.  The donors for all this earn religious merit...

P.S.  This is Sai Baba