With my trademark promptness, I am back for another little update. This time it is about Mahakala puja (the last day thereof).
As you may recall, I got back to Tashi Jong at about 11.30pm. The conch shells marking the start of the day's puja were going already (the day's puja started before the day itself). The puja hall had been lavishly decorated inside, and the outside was festooned with multi-coloured lights (with a slightly Indian sense of tackiness). The monks came in, including the Khamtrul Rinpoche and the Dorzong Rinpoche, and began their puja. There was nothing, at this point, out of the ordinary (though the rinpoches don't come to every puja) - there was the usual mix of horns and drums and cymbals and the odd bit of chanting too.
A few of the monks who had been involved in setting up the decorations and preparing various things for the puja were excused from taking part. I hung around, watched the puja and talked with them for a while. I also got to watch some of the behind the scenes work taking place - such as the making of the tormas. Tormas are sort of dough sculptures (made with the same stuff as the life-lengthening zitrills that I mentioned some time ago, I think) and then decorated with dyed butter. They make a lot of sculptures, including one very impressively detailed one depicting the god Mahakala.
As you might expect, I also spent a bit of time seeing what was happening at the kitchens, just to keep in the know about whatever food was coming our way.
Mike turned up at about 2am, accompanied by Loz (the British gapper from Bhuntar, near Manali and Kullu). His monastery is the lineage and sect as ours (Drukpa Kargyud) and the founder began his studies at Tashi Jong, so the two monasteries have a very close connection.
They watched the proceedings for a little bit, before going to sleep. Having just had a 6 hour bus ride (during which they had no seats, and stood about half the way), they were understandably tired. I stayed awake a little longer and got to see, around 4am I think, a special section of the puja, which many of the villagers came up to see (many of them prostrated themselves into arthritis as well - their devotion is incredible).
In this section of the puja, some of the monks - armed with drums - formed a circle around the open area of the puja hall where the sand mandala had been created, and where the tormas and altar stood as well. They circled round this area, stopping at for the rinpoche to mount a low platform at each of the four compass points and for some mantras to be chanted. This went on for a little while, whilst we normal folk watched through the windows (and took photos - especially the Taiwanese visitors). I was beginning to feel the strain of not haing slept for so long, and found myself, with the help of chanting and drums, falling asleep a few times. But I fended off sleep for now.
There was, at some point either before or after this section of the puja, some food going (meat and various veg) which I obviously got a bit of. Eventually, at around 5.20am, I decided to call it a night - as it were - and get a little bit of sleep.
Loz got a proper tour of the monastery in the morning (well, we showed him around a little bit) and, after lunch, we watched the lama dances.
Just as with the black hat dance from so many posts ago, a marquee was put up to shade the dancers and the rinpoche from the sun. Also, as this dance was more important and had more spectators, a few smaller ones were put up for us, and, thankfully, chairs were brought out too.
Parts of the lama dance were the same as the black hat dance, but there were a lot of sections that were new (and a lot of new characters too). Apart from the circle of dancers that was the same as the black hat dance (to the idle spectator), there was also a group of four little lamas in skeletal costumes who came out and did some very quick dancing with lots of spinning. There was also a group of lamas dressed in more elaborate dress and with various animal (and other, more weird and scary, creatures) masks on - the head of whom appeared to be the one dressed in a deer. An important part of his dance was with a knife, stabbing into a box of some sort. I later found out that inside there is, apparently, some sort of model that represents all the bad things of the past, and all the obstacles that lie in our way, and that the stabbing is, obviously, meant to help defeat those obstacles.
The whole dance went on for a good few hours and was well worth seeing. At one point, for the first time in more than a month or two, the heavens opened and we had some rain. The whole atmosphere was really good, and the rain quite welcome. It helped reduce the soporiphic effect of the sun.
That took up the afternoon; the rest of the day was spent doing something, but I don't really remember much of importance. We had dinner down at Davat's restaurant, before returning for the closing ceremony around midnight.
To fill in some time before that, we played a few game of snooker. On the way out, we were invited to join the people outside the shop next to the snooker hall. They were sitting around a fire and were equipped with a half emptied bottle of 8am whiskey. The gathering was a strange one - the Tibetan shop owner, a Tibetan-American school teacher of about 60, an Irish guy called Oliver and the 9 or 10 year old Indian kid who helps out in the shop. They also invited another friend along (who came with more alcohol) to join the party. With this being our monastery and all, there was no way we could join in drinking; when Oliver began making a joint (telling us that "life is good"), we again had to refuse his kind offers. We spent a while with this very strange group, listening to the teacher telling us about his daughter's problems with crystal meth (she's over it now, though) and how he has given up smoking cannabis (before accepting the offer of a smoke from Oliver's joint).
Whilst they got steadily drunk, and more, the closing ceremony got steadily nearer. Not wishing to miss it, we eventually left them and went up to the main square outside the temple. The monks were lined up there, with the tormas, and were chanting various things. Meanwhile a bunch of the local kids (by which I mean those in their 20s), with some of the monks who aren't in the school and are only loosely connected with the monastery (such as our friend Ngawang Palzang who works at the incense factory) leading them, were setting off a load of firecrackers and fireworks.
This being our first, but not last, encounter with Indians and fireworks, we were a little perturbed by them setting off pretty loud firecrackers right next to you, and throwing firecrackers at each other. Not to mention that they set off small spinning fountains on the ground so that they throw out sparks in all directions - and then they play in the firework, jumping over and stamping on the sparks it sends out. It was fairly nuts, at least for us.
Eventually the procession began and they carried the tormas ceremonially down to the school playing field. A pyre had been set up there in preparation for burning all the tormas. The monks formed a large semi-circle on the playing field and began chanting again (accompanied by the drums, horns, etc.). The whole atmosphere had this sort of secret cult feel to it, enhanced by the fact that it was midnight. They then started burning the tormas, increasing further this secret cult aspect of it all.
The only thing that detracted from this was that the people with the fireworks were still going. Now, however, they had added rockets to their arsenal. In England, you plant the rocket in the ground, light the fuse with care from as far away as you can, then run. In India, you hold the rocket in your hand and light the fuse with a lighter, holding on until it launches. Pretty crazy really. When the main Mahakala torma was added to the flames of the pyre, a huge string of firecrackers and a load of other rockets and explosions were all set off together to celebrate it. The chanting faded away against the noise of the fireworks.
And after all that fun, everyone went to sleep, including us. Next episode, when it finally appears, should cover Divali and maybe the Indian wedding as well. Until then, goodbye, and sorry for being so useless at keeping you up to date!
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