I
retired from the IAEA (Vienna) in 2006 after having worked there for nine
years. Prior to this, I spent seven
years in India, six months in Beijing, China, four years in New York, USA,
twelve years in Laxenburg near Vienna, Austria, one year in London, UK, five
years in Paris, France and one year in Geneva, Switzerland. I now live in Vienna, Austria, right at the
shores of the river Danube.
I
can truly say I got around quite a bit in this lifetime. I’m not the tourist type, though. When I go somewhere I like to stay for a
while. Once I had attained the
interesting age of 18, I had a constant need to leave everything behind and
start afresh: new country, new language, new job, new friends, everything new
and exciting. For a while, at
least. Then, after perhaps three or four
years, I got the itch again to move on.
I seemed to thrive on what many others are afraid of: complete and
irreversible change. Today I know I was meant
to be that way: had I not been, I’d never gone to India…
In this blog I want to
tell about my seven years in India.
I want to draw attention to what I discovered there. It
turned out to be the most amazing and thrilling but also the most difficult
time of my life. I had never intended to
go to India. As strange as it may sound:
I was called. Someone called me most
forcefully and I couldn’t do anything other than go. On my way there, I found that everything was
most lovingly arranged and skillfully orchestrated. An invisible red carpet seemed to have been
laid out all the way from New York to Bombay, where I landed one month after my
44th birthday. I can safely
say that I am not a religious person. I
never was. I was also not a seeker of
spiritual truth and it had clearly not been my own choice to land there. But the past year had been one of strange
visions and coincidences, spiritual revelations and meaningful dreams; as if a
gentle hand was leading me on into an entirely new direction. The result was: I became interested – so
interested that I most willingly dropped everything I had been interested in so
far. Today I know I was chosen,
hand-picked, so to say (to this day I haven’t quite figured out why), to lead a
spiritual life in India.
Many
may have heard by now of SAI BABA of
Puttaparthi. He died recently – well, He
left His physical body. The first thing
you learn in India is: no one ever dies.
According to Hindu and also Buddhist belief we leave our body once our
ordained time and experience as a “person” comes to an end; eventually we get a new body and all starts
all over again. At the time I was 44 and it was clearly Him who had called me. And so I arrived at His ashram called “Prashanti Nilayam”, where hundreds of
spiritual seekers were milling around or sitting for long hours in the hot
afternoon sun to wait for Bhagawan Sri
Sathya Sai Baba to show himself. To
my surprise, and although I had never exchanged a word with Sai Baba, He had
been expecting me: I received a room of my own at His ashram shortly after I
arrived (a miracle in itself considering the long list of applicants…) After
I had settled in I couldn’t help but notice that I wasn’t among those to whom
Sai Baba paid any attention. In fact, He
ignored me during the next three long years and would pass me as if I was thin
air….. Needless to say that I was heart-broken. There had to be a reason for
this, and there was.
But
before I give away the reason, let me explain something important:
Bhagawan
Sri Sathya Sai Baba is an AVATAR (a “real” one, not the blue movie figure). ‘Avatar’ means ‘descended from above’, an embodiment of the Divine, a divine
incarnation; light in human form,GOD in
human form. Sri Sathya Sai Baba claimed
to be just that. He also claimed that
all of us are just that: Divinity itself in human bodies. But due to Maya, the divine illusion, we have
forgotten who we really are. We take
ourselves to be these finite bodies, born to die eventually, and we believe
that this colorful show we call life is our reality. Sathya Sai Baba, however,
knew exactly who He is and who we really are and He had come among us to remind
us of this fact and help us to find our way out of our dilemma, the illusion. It was His mission and He had come well
equipped. In order to show us who He
really is, the avatar shows us miracles, deeds we humans are unable to do. He likes to materialize things with a mere
wave of His right hand. He causes holy
ash to appear, or sweets or jewelry, which He presents to His “children” in
order to make them realize WHO is there among them. And yes, He can heal us if our karma allows
it. Breathtaking, really. It is one thing to hear about those
materializations and something entirely different to actually watch them happen. Like Jesus Christ two-thousand years ago, who
made lame people get up and walk, and turned plain water into wine to make
people aware that He was divine and no ordinary human. So Sathya Sai Baba was doing nothing else,
and that might be one of the reasons why hundreds had already been flooding His
ashram when I arrived. Many of them came
because of some problems or health afflictions – as these seem a necessary
incentive for people to board a plane to India and seek help. Actually, 50% of Baba’s devotees used to be “foreigners”.
So
why am I writing all this, now that Sri Sathya Sai Baba has left His physical body
and the ashram in Puttaparthi has become a place for pilgrimage to His shrine? Well, here comes the surprise:
There
is not only one avatar on this planet, but several. (It is believed among some
visionaries that there are currently eleven avatars on Earth, most of which do
not give away the secret and prefer to do their work unknown to mankind) This means
we are never really alone. GOD always
makes sure to be among us in person when the times are tough. And as they are rarely easy, He always makes
sure to come, sometimes in one human form, sometimes in several. My biggest surprise, therefore, while I was
in India, was this discovery. And
suddenly, the same power that had brought me to India made sure to take me where
I had been supposed to go all along: to the ashram of the then relatively
unknown Bhagawan Sri Bala Sai Baba
in Kurnool, not far away….
The
first thing He did was to explain to me why Sathya Sai Baba had never once
spoken to me during the three years of my stay there. No, it hadn’t been my fault; I had done
nothing wrong. Had He spoken to me, a
special bond would have been established which would have made it very
difficult for me to ever leave Prashanti Nilayam. But I was destined to leave. These three
years with Sathya Sai Baba had been an important preparation. At Sri
Nilayam in Kurnool, my new home,
I was no longer ‘ignored’. Bala Sai Baba was not so overrun by
devotees as yet (most avatars prefer to
remain ‘unknown’ for a while until the right time comes for them to make
themselves known and accessible to the crowds) and I now had a wonderful time
among only a handful of devotees. We sat
in joyful circles in the garden with Bala Sai Baba among us. He entertained us
with His wonderful sense of humor and gave us plenty of proof of His divinity
and unconditional love.
I
really think everyone on this planet should know about this discovery: WE ARE NOT ALONE. There is someone who cares and gives the love
of one-thousand mothers, regardless whether we consider ourselves worthy of
such a love, or not. Just like Sathya
Sai Baba, Bala Sai Baba knows all
about us. This is one of the ‘instruments’ or powers with which a full avatar
is equipped for His job on Earth. He is always
there for us at one of his two ashrams and gracefully shows us all the miracles
we need to see so that we can believe in the great wonder of DIVINITY. As an avatar, He is above all religions and
available to all: Bhagawan Sri Bala Sai
Baba, who, with all His great divine power, lives humbly among us just like
an ordinary (very charismatic) human being.
For
those who wish to know more about my seven years of unique experiences with
both avatars: I have written a book from a diary I kept for many years,
entitled
‘THE HEART OF THE MELON’
The
book can be obtained from www.lulu.com or from www.amazon.com
EXCERPT
FROM ‘THE HEART OF THE MELON’
Chapter 26: Rings….and
hooks
The next morning two new guests arrived
from Germany. It was a middle aged
couple displaying the somewhat condescending and self-important behavior of
people used to a life among the upper class, where it is a fashion to classify
everyone according to their spending power.
Swimming pools, fast cars and super-expensive designer clothes are the
criteria after which they label and categorize others. The man had been manager of a major airline
for many years; he was retired now and he and his wife had just been spending a
holiday in Sri Lanka, where they had a house with a swimming pool. Having meanwhile got used to the simpler way
of life in India, I found their behavior rather ridiculous and totally out of
place. They were strutting around in
their assumed roles as embodiments of eternal success and were acting as if
everything in their lives was totally under their own control and the
protection of their insurance policies.
About Baba they had heard from one of His devotees in Germany and had
decided on their way back home that it would perhaps do no harm to have a look
at such a holy man and witness one or two miracles in order to have something
to talk about in their illustrious circles of well-off friends. What actually thrilled them most was the fact
that Baba materialized rings for His devotees.
They spent half die afternoon admiring the rings that Baba had
materialized for Srino so far – five or six – since Srino was crazy about
jewelry and couldn’t get enough of it.
He wore one ring on almost every finger and felt always very flattered
when people admired them, which also allowed him to demonstrate the importance
he obviously had for Baba. As Srino had
his own taxi business and even permission to park his taxis on the ashram
premises, he was thrilled about any new acquaintance with wealthy Germans who
were, in his eyes, not only potential customers but also providers of items he
wanted from the west. Like most Indians
Srino was also under the widespread illusion that all foreigners were rich and
had nothing else to do but worry about what electronic items or newest
photographic gadgets he might want from their country, and would bring to him,
naturally free of charge.
After darshan – Baba had talked to the
German man shortly in the mandir – the two visitors went out for dinner, the
woman wearing a low-cut beach dress that was totally out of place at a small
South Indian town where not even prostitutes would dare to show off their bosom
or legs in such a fashion. I was
wondering whether she didn’t know any better - she must have noticed that she
was the only one running around like that – or whether it was done
deliberately. In the morning she had
worn shorts to walk around in town and must have caused some amazement among
the Indian population. This was
definitely not good for the reputation of Baba’s ashram. I decided to inform Rama Rao in his position
of ashram manager and let him talk to them rather, since they would probably
not even listen to someone as unimportant as me. Srino had offered to take them around in his
taxi and as soon as they had gone Baba appeared on His roof, asked a few
questions about these newcomers and then decided to come down. He was in the mood for moving around and
allowed us to join Him for some rounds in the garden. It was not really all that much fun to do
rounds with Baba because of Berta and Karl fighting for the places right next
to Him, and although Karl had joined us much later he managed to push others
out of the way and after only half a round he was in front. Baba pretended not to notice any of this and
the rest of us trotted behind them with quite a bit of resentment over so much
selfish behavior. After about eight or
nine brisk rounds, Baba decided to sit in the well lit area in front of the
mandir door. He sat down on the steps
and we formed the usual circle in front of Him.
We had not sat for very long when the two visitors arrived. They were naturally pleased to see Baba among
us and were promptly invited by Him to join our get-together. After going upstairs to get their sitting
cushions – this time the woman had even enough sense to change her dress – they
came down again and we had the opportunity to watch Baba play not only the
perfect host but also His role as dignified avatar exactly the way these people
were bound to expect it. He was charming
and polite and His jokes were refined and perfectly suited for the
occasion. As they seemed to have no
spiritual interest of any kind and the evening was therefore wasted in
superficial small talk, Baba ended the session earlier than expected and went
into mother’s house without allowing us this time to accompany Him to the small
gate. It was a Saturday evening, an
occasion when we usually sat until two a.m. since Rama Rao, who was also the
manager of a nearby branch of the Syndicate Bank, did not have to go to work
and used to sleep in on Sunday mornings.
Baba had been bored with these people, obviously.
The next morning the visitors had hardly
left the ashram to take their breakfast at the one and only expensive hotel
available in town, seemingly better suited to their needs than Annapoorna’s
idlis, when Baba came down into the garden rather early. But what a surprise: He looked quite different
from the perfectly groomed avatar of last night. His hair was uncombed and stood around His
head in a wild fashion. He was unshaved
and wore a pink gown that He must have pulled out from the bottom of His
dirty-laundry basket. It was crushed all
over and covered with many stains in the front.
He had even somehow managed to gather some black dirt under His
fingernails. After inquiring about the
whereabouts of our illustrious visitors Baba sent Berta into mother’s house to
ask for the newspaper. It was promptly
brought but Baba did not read it. He
spread several pages on the sandy ground in front of the mandir door and lay
down on it, obviously trying His best to resemble someone living under a
bridge. We were all very surprised but
nobody said anything about it. Baba was
up to something, that much was clear. As
soon as Baba was stretched out comfortably on His newspaper, He told Berta to
go and ask Annapoorna to make coffee for everyone. The coffee came and Annapoorna and her two
daughters were invited to join us as well.
Next Chinakka and the boys came by, followed by the little teddy bear
dog that naturally ended up on Baba’s newspaper and started chewing it up and
ripping it into pieces. Annapoorna ran
for more coffee and they all sat down with us as well. It as a lovely Sunday morning, Baba was playing
‘clochard’ and everyone seemed welcome to join His play. Suddenly the little dog toddled into the
middle of our circle and started to vomit.
It was the most ghastly and foul smelling stuff that I had ever
experienced coming out of such a small dog and within seconds a cloud of fat
blue-green flies were attracted and descended upon us in order to sit on that
horror. Everyone jumped to their feet
and stood at a little distance, holding scarves or sari ends in front of their
faces to protect themselves from the terrible stench, except Baba and
myself. I was so fascinated by this
unexpected change of scene that I remained where I was. Baba did not move either. He was still lying there, covering His nose
with part of His gown and His eyes were sparkling with joy. At this exact moment the German visitors
arrived. They stopped at a little
distance, their faces one big expression of utter astonishment and shock. Somehow they couldn’t quite believe what they
were experiencing: Baba in the most
neglected state anyone had ever seen Him in, lying on what was left from His
newspaper after the dog had been at it; newspaper bits about everywhere and
something dreadful smelling like the devil in the center, with blue-green flies
hovering over the whole scene. While they
stood and stared Baba sat up, still holding His gown in front of His face. His smile underneath must have been
angel-like.
“Today is Sunday and I
haven’t even washed my face!” He announced gaily. And then, as if suddenly remembering His duty
as a perfect host, He asked these two flabbergasted people with the most
innocent of looks: “Would you like a cup of coffee?”
It had been some kind of a shock
treatment, I suppose, to crush the superficial shell these two were used to
walking around in. Baba had gone through
all these preparations and had orchestrated His little play with perfect timing
in order to help them understand what they were doing to themselves. And it worked, although I never quite
understood how. When Baba came down in
the evening, perfectly shaved, groomed and dressed as usual in one of His
neatly ironed silk gowns, they both behaved in a much humbler way. Only in the beginning and more out of a
longstanding habit the man resumed his artificial snobbishness and when he
asked Baba:”Is it alright to sit there?” Baba answered, “It’s damn
alright!” After that he gave it up,
sensing finally that he had met someone it was useless to try and impress with
his aristocratic manners. This time they
even came up with something they mistook for a spiritual question. They wanted to know how Baba could
materialize all these rings. But Baba
was not going to be tricked into demonstrating it for them, as they had
probably secretly hoped. They went back
to Germany without any such trophies but rather with a priceless experience of
a much more helpful and sobering kind.
Contact
in India: (Tel. 0091/9885126557)
Ashram
in Kurnool Ashram in Hyderabad
Sri
Bala Sai Nilayam, Kurnool 518001, A.P.
Sri Bala Sai Nilayam, Domalaguda No.1-2-59 South India
Gagan Mahal Colony, Hyderabad 500029, AP
