by Smith, Skye
"Because you would 'ave been put in jail?"
"Because the Serbs thought it was done by one of the fathers, you know, with an AK47. Sure they were angry and they threatened the town, but they never did anything. They accepted that a father had the right. If I had admitted to it, the entire mission would have been blown. I broke rule number one."
"But your outfit knew? Yes? They must have punished you to hide their praise."
"They knew. They sent me home to a psych ward for the rest of my stint, then put me on a disability pension. I've been sort of drifting and staying away from violence ever since. For fifteen years I did pretty good, and then you two came along."
"Sorry."
"No, I mean thanks," he said. "If I do nothing else with my life, I've justified my room and board on this earth. A dozen of the bad guys dead. Seventy girls rescued. That's why I have to go to Nepal. I just got involved again, and I have a new rule number one. I'm on the moms' and kids' side. Everyone else can get stuffed."
"That should be an easy rule to keep. I mean, isn't that what all the charities say?"
"Saying something to raise money, and doing something with that money are two different things," he said. "My mom went through the Canadian residential school system run by the church. What charities say, and what they do are different, believe me, very different."
"What's this residential school system. I don't get it," said Marique.
"It was Canada's version of cultural genocide," he replied. "Abduct all the native kids and force them to act white. It didn't work as well as passing out infected blankets. Anyway, I don't want to talk about that."
* * * * *
The next day, while savouring tea and toast and a boiled egg served in old-world elegance by a waiter in white, they checked the road atlas and chose to use a longer highway that ran along the foothills of the Himalayas. It was a pleasant drive, less fraught with fast moving trucks, and slow moving bicycles that other highways. They bypassed Chandrigarh and kept going until they hit the last village before the highway started a steep climb.
They stopped at a likely place for clean food. By the time they had eaten, Will had talked to the locals about the three different routes they could take into the mountains. Trouble was, it was close to sunset. They found the Indian equivalent of a motel, where they could park the van safely right outside the door of their room. It wasn't just that none of them wanted to drive the treacherous roads of the Himalayas in the dark, but also that none of them wanted to miss the scenery.
This time Maya slept in the van so that they wouldn't have to unpack it. Besides, that gave the couple a chance to practice Marique's newly learned tantric positions. In the morning she had to drag them both out of a the wreckage of the bed. They both looked like cats that had eaten the canary, like with the smugness of the well made and well played and well come.
They had planned to use the highway that rose out of the town up to the ridge of the first foothills. Mind you, the foothills of the Himalayas were higher than most mountain ranges in America. The truckers Will had talked to last night had told them that once you were way up on the ridge, the driving was easy, and the views fantastic.
The truckers they talked to over breakfast had more recent information. A mud slide had blocked the highway through the high and majestic Kulu valley, so they would have to take another highway. One that ran northwest along a lake created by a damn in a low valley. It was scenic enough, but they did not see snow-capped peaks until they turned north again and started to climb onto the next ridge.
If ever there was a highway to test the nerves of a driver it was this one. Up, up, up they climbed through hairpins that always seemed to have a big truck coming down as they went up. The sound of screeching truck brakes never let you forget that the horrible smell was burning brake linings.
Finally they reached the spine of the high ridge they had been climbing up to, and they pulled over at the first chance they got. Beyond them to the north, north west and north east were the peaks of the high Himalayas. Their parking place was an obvious place for an enterprising local woman to set up a tea stall, and they drank cup after cup of the best tea ever served with a non-stop, breath-taking view.
In two places the torturous road was blocked by slides and the traffic alternated using a partially dug out track across each slide. At one point the track sloped so steeply towards the three thousand foot cliff at the edge of the road, that the women elected to muddy their cross trainers and walk instead of ride.
Due to all the delays caused by the slides, it was dark before they took a hotel room in Dharamsala. It was a wonderful old hotel, something left over from the colonial age, and they were assured that their room faced the mountain view. They had to accept that on faith because for the last half hour they had been pushing fog and mist through the darkness.
Maya felt relieved to be here, like a long-time quest resolved. She dug to the bottom of her suitcase and found the two cards she would need in the morning. The one given to her just a few days ago at Deekshabhoomi in Nagpur, and the one given to her six months ago by a Buddhist monk in Vancouver.
The hotel manager was a retired Gurkha soldier, and he gladly drew her a map of how to get to the addresses on both cards while they waited for their dinner. The main part of their dinner was a huge bowl of freshly boiled tiny new potatoes smothered in butter, which tasted like the best desert ever, after a month of eating rice. The girls stole tasty morsels of Will's sizzling yak steak and ate most of the roasted vegetables that came with it.
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MAYA'S AURA - Goa to Nepal by Skye Smith
Chapter 13 - Dharamsala, India
The real ornament of woman is her character, her purity. - Mahatma Gandhi
The old woman hobbled up to where Maya had been sitting waiting for a half an hour. It had been explained to her that Mrs. Liete, or rather Dr. Liete was now retired from her medical practice, and since retiring had devoted herself to research and translation. Translation from Sanskrit, of course, because this building was a library of ancient Tibetan documents.
Maya stood and helped to lower old Mrs. Liete into the seat. The first words the old woman spoke were "what is your language" in four European tongues. "American," she replied which received a knowing nod. The woman returned Maya's card to her, the card that had brought her up from the moldering stacks of parchment and paper. "I have come to find out about my aura."
The old woman nodded with understanding. Maya offered to demonstrate her aura, but this woman waved the offer with a flick of two bony and ancient fingers. Instead she said something in a strange language, possibly one of the Hindu languages. "I'm sorry, I don't understand."
"Then Sanskrit is not one of your languages," said the old woman in a voice barely stronger than a breath. "It will be difficult for me to guide you if you cannot translate Sanskrit words. You have been sent here by an abbot from Vancouver to research auras in our Sanskrit library. Most of it has yet to be translated into English. He would have known that."
"Is no one here already researching auras? I could help them to understand what they are translating."
"A good plan," breathed the woman, "except for one flaw. It is still winter here. Researchers come here later in the year to escape the heat of the plains."
"Could you help me? Please."
"Dear one, I am a medical researcher now. I was a physician. I am searching the scripts for the insight of the ancient healers. I must continue with my own research. Lives depend upon it."
"That is one of the things I want to find out about. I think my aura heals people. I need to find out how it works. How to make it work better, faster, easier. What works and what doesn't. What to do and what not to do. Especially what not to do, for my aura has already killed men." She quickly added "psychopaths." At this word the old woman looked at the young girl with fresh curiosity.
"Well then, perhaps I will ask you for a demonstration after all," she said
in a brighter voice.
"Okay, but not here. Like, we need somewhere private, women only."
"Then help me to my feet. I have a retirement room at my disposal."
"Umm, are there any other women around who are interested in healing? I mean, like if I am demonstrating anyway, why not to more than just you?"
The old woman signaled for the young woman at the reception desk to come to her and then spoke to her, and the young woman hurried away with a swish of the stiff fabrics of her Tibetan woman's smock.
* * * * *
The young Tibetan woman poked the charcoal braziers to encourage more heat from them and then took the young ferengi woman by the hand and led her close to them. The ferengi was still nude from the waist up, and she was shivering and her teeth were chattering, but it was not all from the cold draft in this room.
The young girl had worked her magic on three different women and she was visibly tired from it. She helped Maya on with her shirt and took her own ski jacket off and put it around the ferengi’s shoulders. She poured a cup of roast barley tea and floated some butter in it and handed it to Maya. Even if she didn't drink it, the cup would warm her hands.
The old woman asked her to gather some chairs around the brazier and she did so, before she went to help walk the three sick women back to their dormitory. The ferengi woman had magic in her hands and she could not wait to tell the story to the other ailing women in the dormitory.
The door clicked shut after the patients had left. The old woman sat in the chair next to Maya and extended her bony hands towards the brazier to soak up the heat. "Your gift allows you not only to find the dis-ease inside bodies, but also lessens the pain and swelling. It is too early to say if there was a healing effect, but these two abilities by them selves are important."
"There is healing, though sometimes it takes many treatments to see a difference." replied Maya weakly. "I have been told two theories about how my aura heals. One is that it strengthens the good to fight the bad. It helps the body's own cells to identify and then fight the sickness. The other is that it directly identifies and then attacks the bad. It finds the cells of the sickness, and then halts their life force."
"Interesting," the old woman, with the skepticism of an old physician who had been exhausted by a lifetime of fighting sickness. "Which do you believe?"
"Both of them. I sense that all these things are happening, but don't ask me to explain it further than that. I came to you for the explanations."
"I thank you for the demonstrations. Your gift is truly wondrous. As for helping you to understand it, I have spent too much time with you already. I personally have neither the time nor the resources to help you in this."
"But ... what are you saying? That I have a wondrous healing power and that like, so what, you don't care?"
"Please try to understand my problem, the world's problem. It is one of logistics. You dear, can heal one person at a time. In the time it takes you to treat one person, a hundred, a thousand, a hundred thousand sicken on this earth.
My work now is to translate the thoughts of the ancients. If from them, I discover just one herb, just one root, just one mix of insect juices, that cures a major illness, then it can be mass produced and be used to heal millions. Where should I spend my time? Helping you to heal one person at a time, or helping the world to heal a million at a time?"
Maya was feeling like it was getting to be too much. She was tired and cold, and now feeling overwhelmed with the need for some understanding. She spoke almost tearfully, querulously, like an overwrought child.
"But, please, at least give me some guidance. You have seen the effects of my aura, felt the effects. Tell me something, anything that may be useful to me. Anything." She took a deep breath that might have been a sob.
"So be it. One thing. I watched you concentrate your aura through your palms. A palm is still a clumsy size. Have you ever tried to concentrate it through a finger?" The old woman held up one of her bony fingers. "Now will you walk with me to the reception area? Your time here is finished."
They walked arm in arm. She gave the ski jacket back to the woman at reception, and before the old woman could walk away, she produced the other card. The one from the abbot in Nagapur, in both English and Tibetan.
"Can either of you tell me anything of this? I have the address marked on my map, but I have no idea what to expect."
The old woman looked at the card and at the map, and chatted to the receptionist. She then walked away. The receptionist spoke in her strangely-accented English. "This is the name of an ascetic, a holy man, a hermit. He lives at that address in the winter, but by now will have gone back to his cave."
She pulled out a scrap of paper and wrote something on it. "In the village there are guides for hire who will take you here. It is at least an overnight trek there and back. You will need a guide. You will need warm clothes and a sleeping bag."
"His cave. He lives in a cave?"
"He is the keeper of the eternal flame. It is a holy cave. A place where the faithful go to pray. Some of them even crawl there to pray. Show that paper to a guide. They will provide for everything you will need on the journey."
* * * * *
Back at the hotel it looked like Will and the Gurkha manager had not moved all day. They were still sitting on the same window seat watching the ever changing view across the mountains. When she had left five hours ago they had been swapping army stories, and they were still doing so.
She showed the manager her scrap of paper and asked him to recommend a guide. A wide smile grew into the corners of his wide face. "My son will be your guide. It will stop him from moping about. He has been in a sour mood since he was told he must grow two more inches before he can join my old regiment."
"I was told it will be at least one overnight, so I will need warm clothing and a sleeping bag."
"Of course, of course. This will be provided. On what morning do you wish to leave?"
"I'm coming too," said Will. "Marique can wait for us at the hotel, but I must go with you."
"Why?" asked Maya.
"Because," replied Will.
She shrugged. She knew Will would have his reasons, and they would be sound. "For both of us. Can we start tomorrow?"
"Of course, of course." The manager lost his smile and looked a bit worried. "First I must find my son. He must start preparing immediately."
The manager rushed off, and was replaced by Marique on the window seat. "What a difference. These mountain people are so different from the people of the plains. People stare at me, yes, but they do not stop and stare, and they do not surround me and stare. And when they do stop, it is to practice their English."
"You had a good time shopping then?" asked Will.
"I had a good time walking around but I did not buy anything except for a snack. It is such a relief to be able to walk around by myself and not feel threatened by the 'ustlers. What I mean is, you know, there are 'ustlers, but all you need do is wag your finger at them to say no, and they stop their 'ustle."
"So they are polite hustlers. What a concept."
"They are different. Everyone is different from down on the plains. Like night and day. They talk to you eye to eye, one to one, like equals. And the smiles. Did I mention the smiles? Smiles come easily to the faces, like they are used to smiling, like they smile a lot."
"So you won't mind staying here at the hotel and watching out for our stuff while Maya and I go on a short trek deeper into the mountains?"
Marique looked back and forth between her two friends, and then nodded. "Okay. I will wait 'ere. I will read the newspapers and watch TV. 'ow long?"
"Say three days. The manager has gone to ask his son to guide us. We won't know anything for sure until we have a guide."
* * * * *
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MAYA'S AURA - Goa to Nepal by Skye Smith
Chapter 14 - The Eternal Flame
Imitation is the sincerest flattery. - Mahatma Gandhi
> Their guide was about sixteen and about five foot six. They had said no to having porters as well as a guide. Will refused on principal. If Maya didn't want to carry a pack, then he would carry her stuff. Besides, they didn't need camping gear because there were a sprinkle of houses along the trail that offered dry roofs to pilgrims.
The path they took followed a ridge to begin with, but then dropped and then climbed. The guide chattered and practiced his English between puffs on his fags, which he smoked no matter how steep the trail or how high the pass.
Maya had less trouble with the steep climbs, some of them more like staircases hewn from stone, than did Will. He was lifting his own sturdy weight plus his pack up each of the steps, whereas Maya was fit and light and twenty years younger.
By dark they were still three hard hours from the cave, so they begged a roof for the night at a house beside an old-fashioned water mill. It was the house of the miller, and he was proud of his still functioning stone grinding wheels.
The guide and the miller laughed at the ferengi’s taking all day to get only this far on the trek. The miller's children walked the same distance each morning to go to school and did it in less than two hours.
That night they were thankful they were not camping in a porter's tent because the gusts of cold winds down the mountain slope ripped at the prayer flags and shook the dust from the heavy slate tiles that formed the roof over their heads.
Unfortunately they were carrying mummy sleeping bags, which could not be zipped together to create one double bag, so Maya could not snuggle with Will to keep warm. She once again blessed the silk sleeping bag liner that Marique had forced her to buy. It made even the rented mummy bag seem luxurious.
It had surprised Will that none of their rented cold weather gear, not the ski jackets, the vests, nor the sleeping bags, were down filled. In the arctic everything was down. The locals here preferred modern synthetic fills over down, just like they preferred foam mattresses and pillows to those stuffed with natural fibers.