I. A Bit About the Past

I first set foot in India about a third of a century ago. In those days one could, and I did, come overland through the Middle East and Western Asia – across Turkey, Iran, Afghanistan, and over the Khyber Pass into Peshawar, Pakistan and, finally, on into Amritsar, the Punjab. The relative quiet and harsh beauty of that journey, following the ancient caravan route, began after the autumnal equinox, continued through many days of lengthening shadows, and ended in India, shortly after the winter solstice. I was awestruck at seeing the great fortresses that Alexander the Great’s army built in places like Herat and the giant Buddhas at Bamian. This convergence of East and West, millennia of comings and goings, brought green eyes and red hair to Central Asia and exported Buddhism from its country of origin to these eerily beautiful valleys in the shadows of the Hindu Kush. For a kid who had never been on an airplane until setting out for France as the place of embarkation for this adventure, it was fantastic – something my overactive imagination could never have contrived. Each day brought new experiences; sights, smells, tastes, and sounds that were different in some elemental ways from than anything I had experienced previously. Sometimes there was just a deep sense of peace and satisfaction; at other times my traveling companions and I were in grave danger. Ah, to be young and foolish, and totally open to learning and experience! Those are stories for another day; ones that I hope to tell to my grandchildren some time far in the future.

I will remember that first day in India all the days of my life. Amritsar was beautiful, but so very intense; so very noisy and busy. What stark contrast to the silence of Afghanistan, whose beautiful people would maintain a more Western sense of distance and whose past only whispered through the many subtle reminders that had been left behind across those millennia. On that first day, I did not fall in love with this place that Mark Twain said is “the One land that all men desire to see, and having seen once, by even a glimpse, would not give that glimpse for all the shows of all the rest of the globe combined.” The show was overwhelming! Over the decades I have learned that India also is a land of subtlety; but its past also shouts, indeed screams, into the present and on into the future.

In my office at the University of South Carolina, there is a picture (actually, a 19th century lithograph) of the Taj Mahal that was presented to me by my wife, Jane. It is hung on the wall behind my desk among various diplomas, degrees, and awards. When my daughter, Christine, saw it there just after I moved in and before she went back to school in New York and I left for India, she intimated it did not belong there. Before I could say a word, Jane told Christine that were it not for India, I would not be who or where I am. So true; and I might add why.

So, this will be a continuing story of why I wound up here, how I fell in love with the place, how I see India connecting to my life in South Carolina and the people I am committed to serving back home, and how I am using this sabbatical experience to pay back the very many people who have enriched my life and have boosted me up so that I can see things that I otherwise could never have even imagined.