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One tends to describe their pilgrimage to the holy land in a positive light, often as a life-changing experience, during a time of struggle, and often being described as fulfilling. Fast forward to 15-year-old me who is still haunted by the events that occurred before my once pure eyes. While Hindus, among other religious groups in India, perceive pilgrimages as highly meritorious, they are not considered essential to spiritual welfare. Furthermore, the geography of pilgrimage sites themselves, covering sacred land, mark the extension of Hindu civilization itself. Five years succeeding my near-death death experience, I was overdue for an explanation regarding the purpose of my journey, which was eventually answered in the wise words of my mother as being 'to receive blessings.'
I'm inclined to believe that this trip was a form of kidnapping, no consent forms, no waivers, no parent's signatures, nothing: but I found myself in the back of a stranger's car in the heart of New Delhi; home to diverse arts, a rich history and a melting pot of cultures. As well as homelessness. Sleeping perilously on a ledge 30 feet above a violently streaming river were stacks upon stacks of people. However, with Indian society only appearing to associate a human's worth with the labor they provide, these people, weak from the brutality of their everyday lives, may not be eligible. This was my first true exposure to inequality but this was soon to become an everyday occurrence.
We owe an awful lot to the acquaintance of my Nani in Punjab, our driver who shared emotional moments of his life with us while also acting as my mother and my therapist. We were then given more to cry over when we arrived at the Mehandipur Balaji Temple, situated in the state of Rajasthan. Since shoes were removed before entering, I found the aspect of shoe stealing particularly amusing. That was until we became victims of such a heinous crime ourselves. But there was nothing that the local markets hadn't capitalized on, soon supplying us with appropriate footwear. After surviving three minutes in the queue, we encountered our first possessed person, or rather they encountered us as they charged towards us at full speed. They then landed face-first on the floor, before swiftly getting up and marching forward as though heading off to war. Other possessions seemed to be based on dancing, some on hostility, and others on pure grief. They acted as a source of entertainment as I could see right through them; a fasade and nothing more.
I recall my faith in humanity being restored as those who were vulnerable were collectively made a priority. Although considering I was with my non-verbal, autistic brother and elderly Nani, it was safe to say we were all in a state of fatigue. Expecting to enter the inner part of the temple within three hours, five hours later we had made it. However, the anxiety I felt was as though I was chained to a cattle fence - of too little voltage to kill but just enough to make me overwhelmingly uncomfortable. Crawling my way out and narrowly escaping the flames that were one push away from engulfing me, I recollect the swarms of mothers that surrounded me, in a state of concern that was certainly evident when they did not attempt to offer any aid.
It was when I returned home that the contrast between the vivid scenes of climate, pollution, and social hierarchy that I had witnessed became a shocking contrast to my environment. I mentally teleport to India as old memories that were once sepia become colored again with the smell of cigarette smoke penetrating the window. It is such discourses of privilege that have been the topic of conversation on multiple grounds and have also become increasingly apparent in my own life. Like many, my childhood was molded by the media I was surrounded with, from Disney Channel to BBC News bulletins. However, as soon as anything too graphic was aired on the news, it was switched off in a heartbeat, sheltering me from the world that extended beyond my suburban neighborhood. At the age of nine, I was introduced to several basic concepts surrounding feminism, racism, and homophobia even though I unknowingly encountered them with my own biases.
Notably, the key factor of discovery during the journey had been the homelessness epidemic. A phenomenon that is derived from a class system, something which Britain is far too familiar with. In present days, the lack of discussion has manifested as taboos, which causes those who have a better socioeconomic standpoint to fail to see their privilege. Implementing these discussions into my future, I have the benefit of hindsight and hope to continue to use this to point out the blatant classism in our society.
A significant amount of priests had made appearances within the temple, swarmed by vulnerable people dropping every last penny to receive an answer that would sustain them for life, serving them with a purpose. Through marketing advertisements, priests and gurus specifically prey on low-income families who lack financial stability, portraying their work as 'the solution' masked with falsification and deception. These actions intensify once their target market is secured instilling these people with false hope for a brighter future. However, the harsh reality entails a continuous spiral, not just physically but mentally filling the priests' pockets with every ounce of hope in an attempt to validate their existence. As someone who's surrounded by participants in this epidemic, the line between it being a general interest and an obsession is blurry and this is when we collectively have to intervene in this behavior.
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