A Taste of Life by Mahesh Bhatt

Author:Mahesh Bhatt [Bhatt, Mahesh]
Language: eng
Format: epub
ISBN: 9789351182474
Publisher: Penguin Books Ltd
Published: 2009-06-07T18:30:00+00:00

5 March 2007, Vallecrosia

I’m having dinner with Pervez Musharraf. It is such an honour to discuss world issues with the leader of Pakistan. I realize that this would not be possible without U.G.; I must thank him. But U.G. is dead, something tells me. A terrible feeling of finality shakes me out of sleep. It is 5 a.m. Another day has begun. The dream compels me to talk to Moorty. I need someone to share this dreadful feeling with. Moorty listens to my emotional ramblings with the tranquillity of a jnani, an enlightened being. He then tells me how he feels when he comes face to face with the thought of U.G.’s possible end. At the end of the discussion, the only thing I am left with is the burden of unexpressed gratitude towards U.G. ‘If you feel I have done for you all that you think I have done and made you what you are today, then go and do to others what I have done to you,’ he once said to me on one of our hundreds of car rides through the crowded streets of Mumbai. I guess the only way to shed this burden of gratitude is to ignite in people what has been ignited in oneself by this extraordinary man. ‘This U.G. will leave many “saints” behind. Saints serve society more than sages do. The reflection of life is better than life,’ he said to me as we watched a glorious sun set on the Palavakkam beach in Chennai. I don’t know why, sitting here in Italy, as I watch the dawn break, I’m taken back to that particular moment.

‘Oh, what’s happening?’ greets U.G. as soon as I enter the room. It is 6.50 a.m. and the room is full of people. The predominant sound in the room is of the clock ticking. Bulbul, his daughter, suddenly gets up and touches his feet. Having done that, she calls him Dakshinamurti and pleads with him to allow her to give him a bath. She is exasperated, saying if he does not yield, she will bring the water and pour it over him right where he is. As a new day breaks outside his cottage, U.G. leans back and stretching himself on the couch, says, ‘Turn off the light!’

I get up to fix myself a cup of coffee. He looks at me and as I begin to slip out of the door he raises his hand and waves a hello, or maybe a goodbye. He looks frail, but very gentle. As I step out of the dark room into the bright sunlight, I realize that this image will stick in my memory forever.

I talk to Lisa about my nightmare and this immense burden of gratitude that I feel. ‘You look different,’ she says.

‘Explain that,’ I ask.

‘You look lighter,’ she replies and gazes at my face affectionately.

It is strange that she should say this to me because as I walked up to U.G.’s cave, I felt as if I had shed an old skin.

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