by Tahir Shah
The next trick was austere by any standards. An ordinary light-bulb was materialized from nowhere by Hafiz Jan. Placing it in a handkerchief, the Pashtun crushed it with his right foot. He handed me a banana, which I ate. He ate one, too, then placed a shard of glass on his tongue and began to chew. Then it was my turn. Positioning a jagged piece of glass in my mouth, I began to munch.
My father looked on in disbelief, overwhelmed that his son had been taught to eat glass and relish it. The shock quickly turned to anger, but he suppressed his rage for fear of insulting the visitor. The tiny fragments of glass, which get embedded in the banana, pass easily through the body. Hafiz Jan had taught me to always use clear light-bulbs, as the opaque ones contain poisonous mercury oxide.
Moving swiftly along, the Pashtun got ready to perform the piece de resistance. It was a brave decision. He lit a large beeswax church candle, placed before our stage. Its wick was at the audience’s eye level. Then, pulling a fistful of dust from beneath his shirt, he murmured a magic phrase, and hurled the fine powder at the candle. Covering his eyes with the end of his turban, Hafiz Jan winced with pleasure as a golden fireball rocketed sideways towards my family and their associates.
The conjuror had not anticipated the remarkable force of the combustion. He had been more used to igniting powdered camphor outside. As the spectators rubbed at their singed hair and blackened faces, I wondered what to say. Silence seemed safest.
Hafiz Jan was up at dawn the next day. I could hear him moving uneasily about the landing on tiptoe. By seven o’ clock the tea chest was packed with his possessions. Padded with the horsehair mattress, the half-filled bottles of poison sloshed about as the crate was hauled downstairs.
The front door was pulled inwards once again. The great Pashtun lifted me by the cheeks and smiled somberly.
“Now that the well-shaft – that vile tunnel to Hell – is covered over,” he said, “I ought to be on my way. I must return to the mausoleum, it's there that I belong. Jan Fishan,” he said softly, “will be waiting for me.”
As Hafiz Jan, son of Mohammed ibn Maqbul, prepared to retrace his wayward route back to northern India, I made my own pledge. One day – although I did not know when – I would seek him out, and continue with my magical pupillage.
TWO
Snake-Jugglers and Liposuction
Almost twenty years had passed since the inimitable Hafiz Jan had blasted the vast fireball at my family. Despite reliving the performance over and over in a recurring nightmare, my interest in conjuring had never waned. The vanilla odor of liquid storax still haunted my olfactory nerve. The idea of chewing glass caused my pulse to race. And the deep, secret longing to study illusion was always there. But the spark to rekindle my motivation was wanting.
That spark arrived late one night in an ill-lit, smoky flat somewhere in west London. A roomful of supposed friends jabbered on about their sensible cars, their sensible jobs, and their sensible plans for a sensible future. Theirs was a world of ruched curtains, floral print wallpaper, asparagus souffle and French cuff shirts.
Such preoccupations were at odds with my own. I yearned to rediscover the thrill of spontaneity, once fostered so intensely by Hafiz Jan’s magic. I longed for adventure, for discovery and wonder. The idea of a secure, planned future was severely disturbing.
My sensible friends swiveled to face me. Would I at last buy a sensible pad, with ruched curtains and florid wallpaper? Could I be counted on to fall into line? Why didn’t I take up golf, or learn to dish up an asparagus souffle once in a while? Surely the time had come to get some decent shirts with proper French cuffs?
Swilling their port, the inquisition awaited my answer. I mulled over my position. Why should I adopt their bourgeois lifestyle? Their materialistic trappings were nothing but illusion. The blood-red port whirled about like one of Hafiz Jan’s precious chemicals. Illusion … Hafiz Jan … my mind set to work. Why not escape? Why not leave all this behind, and embark on a great adventure?
“You can keep your sensible cars, clothes, and prim little houses!” I bellowed. “I'm off to India to become a magician!”
* * * *
Hotel foyers across the Indian capital were resounding with restless anticipation. Throngs of visitors were pouring into the city, all in a state of high excitement. They swanned about greeting long-lost friends, laughing, weeping, embracing triumphantly. I wondered what was going on. Then, at one large hotel, I noticed an impressive daffodil yellow banner, slung like a washing-line between a pair of chandeliers. It read: “ALL INDIAN ASTROLOGERS’ CONFERENCE.”
The event which had drawn seers from all corners of India, explained why every hotel bed in New Delhi was full. Palmists and horoscope-readers brushed shoulders with numerologists and tarotists. Crystal-gazers, face-readers, and dream diviners – they had come to swap secrets, to tell tales, and to be seen.
Pushing my way out past the bustle of crystal balls, dog-eared tarot cards and hand-reading charts, I waited for an auto-rickshaw. Mediums were still arriving in droves, many weighed down with phrenological busts and new-fangled fortune-telling machines.
All the hotels on my list were full to bursting with astrologers. Where would I find a spare bed? Then I had an idea. When a rickshaw pulled up, I told its driver to hasten to the most misfortunate, accursed establishment in the city. Such unlucky lodgings would surely ward away the superstitious astrologers. Without questioning my request, the driver rubbed his hands together and headed north to the Old City.
With the vehicle charged up to full speed, we careened through Old Delhi’s back-streets, swerving to miss incense-sellers and sacred cows. Past the colossal Jami'a Masjid and noble Red Fort. Left down Chandni Chowk, fabled Silver Bazaar of Shah Jehan. An abrupt left again into Dariba Kalan – “Street of the Incomparable Pearl” – where jalebis boil like lobsters in foaming oil-filled urns. Reining in his rickshaw, the driver wrenched its handlebars sharply to the right. A moment later we were skidding to a halt in the Kinari Bazaar.
A small, quiet market, Kinari peddles wedding brocades, tinsel, and garlands fashioned from rupee notes. An air of jubilation surrounded all the stalls. The bazaar was packed with happy people.
Tapping the driver on the shoulder, I asked him if this spirited lane was home to the damnedest, most ill-fated hotel in all of Delhi. The driver pulled his coarse blanket tighter about him and nodded earnestly. Then, cringing as low as he could, he pointed upwards.
Looming over on the south side of the bazaar stood the dilapidated Hostel. A rusting signboard publicized its unfittingly optimistic name, “Hotel Bliss”. Its walls were caked in lizard-green slime, its windows broken, and its corrugated iron roof pocked with holes. A curse of doom and catastrophe hung over the place like a death-cloud. It was the sort of place whose door is marked by a bloody cross in times of plague. But there was no door. As I took in the features of the wretched shelter, a chill surged down my spine. The rickshaw driver, who appeared anxious to leave, unloaded my bags. I handed over the fare. Then I presented him with a large tip. He had done himself proud.
The shock of the building’s exterior continued inside. The ground floor, which was well below street level, was two feet under water, presumably the result of a leaking pipe. I waded through the flood. A vomit-strewn staircase led to the reception desk, which had been relocated to the third floor. Cautioning myself to be bold, I ascended the steps. The hostel’s walls were soot-black, scorched by fire. The rotting floorboards were as soft as wet clay; the stench of drowned, decomposing rats was suffocating.
Lolling back in a wicker chair, the manager picked his teeth with a neem stick. His closely cropped hair was seal-brown; his eyes were wily and foreboding. I introduced myself, declaring I’d heard of the residence’s fine reputation. The man carved the neem twig between the gap in his front teeth. He could tell I was lying, for he knew as well as I that the hotel had no reputation at all.
“Are there any astrologers here?” I asked cordially.
; “No one here,” came the reply.
“Do you have a room for a few days?”
“Why not?”
Hotel Bliss, with its less than charming aura and rising tide, encouraged its patrons to spend their days off the premises. After a vile night spent in room two, even a lunatic would have satisfied a craving for self-punishment. In the dead of night, the rats which had survived the flood could be heard nibbling cockroaches in the dank corridor outside my room. Bedbugs swarmed about the prison-issue blankets, relishing their banquet of foreign blood.
The manger had lied when reporting that his hostel was empty. From the cubicle opposite mine came the intermittent, echoing groans of a heroin addict. As I tiptoed past the unfortunate’s room, preparing to breach the floodwaters, I pondered whether the entire place was a dope fiend’s den.
Were it not for the cheery atmosphere of the Kinari Bazaar, I would have abandoned Hotel Bliss right away. The street provided a welcome distraction from the reality of room two. Its fabulous stalls brimmed with colorful ornaments. At one were piles of cherry-red plastic bunting, coconuts and panniers of rose petals. Another offered heaps of pink balloons fashioned in the form of Ganesha, the elephant god. Sandalwood incense smoldered in burners, warding away the flies. Rich brocades and glass bangles, sachets of mehendi, henna powder and silver tinsel glowed in the bright December sunlight.
Behind the bustling Chandni Chowk, adjacent to the Jain Bird Hospital, I rested at an open-air tea stall to watch the world go by. A glass of sweet chai-i-sabs, green tea, was poured and placed before me by the young waiter. Sipping the refreshing drink, I focused on the Old City’s teeming blend of life. Cyclists and auto-rickshaws raced ahead, swooping through the traffic like eagles. A group of women tottered past, baskets of fish on their heads. A blind leper led by an infant appealed for alms. Hawkers came and went: touting ball-point pens and gingham dishcloths; crepe-paper party hats and bundles of fenugreek.
As I requested a second glass of chai-i-sabs, a middle-aged Western woman approached the tea stall. A full-length red fox fur protected her from the winter cold; a patterned Gucci scarf was tied over the confection of bleached-blonde curls. She sat on a chair across from me. Her complexion was anemic, her face tired and wan. I wondered what a well-dressed woman was doing at the type of low tea stall I like to frequent.
Without waiting for her order, the waiter – who seemed to recognize the woman – poured a glass of tea and set it before her. I straightened my back and tried to appear respectable. Without looking at me, the lady struck up a conversation.
“I come here every Friday,” she said in a strong, unfamiliar accent. “You see, I adore to hear the Muslim call to prayer. We do not have it in Moskva. It is so romantic. I adore it … you hear me? I adore it!”
Pulling a packet of imported American cigarettes from her purse, she lit one. Then, waving her hands through the smoke with exaggerated movements, she told me why she had come to the subcontinent.
Her native land had, I learned, a limited supply of surgeons, private hospitals and human livers. India, on the other hand, has many skilled surgeons, several exclusive hospitals, and best of all, an unending supply of livers.
“Finding a nice fresh leever is a problem in Russia,” she intoned darkly.
“Is that so?”
“A juicy, tender leever is a wonderful thing,” she continued, licking her lips like a hungry borzoi.
Forced to agree that we take our livers for granted, I hoped that we might move on to a less morbid topic. But the Russian had more to say. She lit another cigarette, filled her capacious lungs to bursting point with dense smoke, and exhaled.
“You see,” she hissed, “we Russians drink too much. That is the problem. Too much vodkaSubcontinent and not enough leevers!” The Muscovite chuckled at her joke, rubbing a smear of lipstick from her glass. “I am waiting for my new leever now,” she seethed, glancing at her watch. She said it in such a way that I half-expected a man to turn up right then with a polystyrene carton marked “Fresh Liver”.
I wondered what luckless person would have their organ hacked out on the Russian’s account. In India, the body parts business is thriving. That very morning, The Hindustan Times had carried a typical story. Days before his beloved sister’s wedding, a young man in southern India had committed suicide. Beside his body, a note was found in the boy’s handwriting. It asked for his organs to be sold, to pay for his sister’s dowry. But even if the organs were to be traded, there was no hope. Without refrigeration, donor organs spoil within hours of death.
Eyes, livers, kidneys, even hearts and lungs, are transplanted in New Delhi’s private hospitals – nicknamed the “body parts bazaar”. Attracted by the prospect of no waiting lists, and inexpensive treatment, more foreigners than ever are traveling to India for transplants. They arrive drawn and ill. When they leave they quite literally take a part of India with them.
The Muscovite opened her purse a crack, removed a Chanel lipstick, and coated her lips with fire-engine red. The silver stick moved easily around the perimeter of her mouth. As it painted her lips, it reminded me of a supposedly true story – possibly an urban legend – when the subcontinent fought back.
A woman from Chicago had some time to spare while in Karachi, in neighboring Pakistan. Rather overweight after too many heavy tandoori meals, she had considered taking up a new dieting regime. As she rambled through Karachi’s crowded streets, a billboard caught her eye. It publicized the services of a local cosmetic surgeon.
More eager than ever to shed a few pounds, she entered the building and apprehended a surgeon. Could he remove some extraneous fat through liposuction? The physician seemed uneasy for a moment. But then, shrugging his shoulders, raising his palms in the air, and smiling broadly, he replied, “Why not?”
A modest fee was agreed and the woman arranged to return for the operation the next day.
Insisting that a full general anesthetic was necessary for a procedure of this kind, the surgeon scrubbed up and went to work. Some hours later, as the effect of the anesthetic wore off, the American patient began to revive. Sensation gradually returned to her fingers. As it did so, she reached out to touch her new fat-free thighs. Were they as slim-line and elegant as she hoped? It was then that her distress began.
Even the most proficient physicians, she thought to herself, have to bandage a patient’s thighs after removing fat through liposuction. The woman tried to whisper her concern to the nurse. Then the full horror of her new condition became apparent. Her lips were missing.
Although baffled as to why a woman with pretty lips would want them surgically removed – lip-o-sucked away – the doctor had agreed to perform the strange operation, if only to make the foreign patient happy. To him, sucking away the lips must have seemed like the latest in American chic. Distraught at her loss, the woman claimed that without lips, her gums dried out and insects flew into her mouth. Robbed of even the weakest smile, she returned to Chicago, lipless and in considerable pain.
I decided not to share the tale with the Russian. Instead, I wished her luck with the second-hand Indian liver, and wandered back through Chandni Chowk to the odious Hotel Bliss.
* * * *
Next day, before the stalls of Kinari Bazaar had opened their shutters to the light; I took my bags and waded from the hotel. Outside, the residents of the street were performing their ablutions and bathing at the standpipe. The scents of soap and hair oil were heavy in the air.
Down a passage off the back-street, behind a booth selling aromatic herbs, a wizened figure was making ready to perform. Emaciated and lame, with cataracts that had stolen his sight many years before, the man stretched his arms before him. His fingers were bent with arthritis, their skin creased with wrinkles. Lifting the cover from a cool stone jar, he removed a heaving mass of entwined miniature vipers. As the infant reptiles squirmed about, coiling with displeasure, the serpent-handler paused to drink three mugs of water. Then, tilting back his head and opening his mouth
very wide, he swallowed the snakes one by one like ribbons of emerald licorice.
The veteran performer rubbed at his blind eyes, scratched his nose, and coughed. As he did so, a helix of five twisting regurgitated snakes, interwoven like mangrove roots, spewed anxiously from his mouth.
The tiny serpents were returned to the jar. Then a second, larger container was opened. Three adolescent pit vipers were jerked from their rest. Propping himself against the low wall, the blind serpent-handler began to toss the reptiles up into the air, juggling them. The two-foot snakes rotated silently. As gravity snatched them earthward, each was caught by the head and hurled up again.
Indifferent to the spectacle, the residents of the lane continued with their chores, without turning. In the twisting alleyways of Old Delhi, Amjed the blind snake-juggler hardly merited a second glance.
Juggling snakes, murmured the ancient when he had finished his routine, is no easy task. Decades of practice are vital to cultivate the skill. But alas, time is an ingredient that novices inevitably lack – most drop dead during the first weeks of practice. Die-hard snake-jugglers like Amjed frown on those who sap the venom from their serpents. Milking instills an alarmingly carefree attitude which is incompatible with the career. Amjed rubbed his fingertips together in reflection. Juggling snakes, he agreed remorsefully, is a dying art.
With the straps of my two cases cutting into my shoulders, I marched out from the Kinari Bazaar towards the Red Fort. By late morning I was aboard a bus bound for Ghaziabad – first stop en route to my reunion with Hafiz Jan.
The vehicle pushed eastwards, across the border into Uttar Pradesh. I took time to think about Hafiz Jan: that black fleece of beard, the eagle’s beak, and those gigantic hands. The Pashtun had made a deep impression upon me. Whether it was his features, his dress, or his bearing that had affected me most, I was not certain. Now, after almost two decades, I was to be with him again.
As we left the outermost suburbs of Delhi, the auto-rickshaws died away. Instead, a stream of tangerine-colored Ashok Leyland trucks shot past in the other direction. In an endless caravan of merchandize, they heaved sugar cane and calico, water melons and live chickens towards the capital.