Sai Baba, You’re So Fine…

…You’re So Fine You Blow My Mind! Sai Baba! Sai Baba!
Hello all, from Hempi, uh, I mean, Hampi. Can you tell that there are a lot of hippies here, by my Freudian slip? I arrived here after my flight from the Valley of Peace, as Sai Baba’s ashram at Puttaparti is called (though I did find it rather odd that there were six guards, armed with machine guns, in the aforementioned V.O.P.).

Quite an experience, Sai’s place. About 20,000 devotees from around the globe live at Puttaparti. It looks like a university/wedding cake covered in hot pink and blue acrylic nail polish.

Quite happily, I found that Sai, too, is not for me. I attended darshan, and he stood just two feet in front of me! Wow! All five-foot-one of him (or six foot three, including hair), and he, being perhaps the world’s most unphotogenic being, looked like a very tanned, very short, Gabe Kaplan after a horrible fright.

Did I feel his Divine Grace cleansing me? Did I see his dark brown eyes turn to blue (his most common miracle after pulling diamonds from the air)? No. His image is slapped onto nightlights, picture frames, rings, boxes etc. Somehow, I just don’t think the Buddha or Jesus would have really approved of their tour merchandise being hawked as such. I bet they wouldn’t have even had any, huh?

See, my problem with Sai is that he says he is God. In his philosophy, all are one, all is god. I can see that; I like to think of us as all part of God’s imagination. But Sai says that he gives us pain to teach us, and disease to make us grow closer to him. I might be paraphrasing a bit, but this is a direct quote: “My walking among you is a gift, yearned for by the gods of highest heaven, and you are receiving this grace, so be grateful.”

I thought I was the only one who felt like that! As for the devotees, they were an international bunch. People wore scarves of their country, like Up With People crossed with the Flanders family from The Simpsons: Bolivia, Russia, Paraguay, Sweden, USA, Tonga – but they were basically the same westerners who were at Amma’s. You know, people who’ve changed their western names to their true spiritual names, like “Karmachameleon” and “Toopoopedtoparty”.

And if one more person greeted or yelled at me with “Sai Ram!” I was going to snap. The repeated chorus of “Sai Ram!” is used to say, “Hey, stupid! Outta my way!” or “Hello” or “You’re stepping on my foot.” I wouldn’t return the greeting, as I don’t believe Sai is Ram (God). Maybe that’s why I “just didn’t fit in” with their little spiritual party. Maybe I’m too cynical. Maybe I tend to see gullibility where I should see devout faith. Maybe, maybe, maybe – I just didn’t see God.

Yes, a lot of amazing work is being done to help thousands of people (schools, hospitals, housing), but being philanthropic doesn’t make one god. Godlike, maybe. God, no. Anyway, Hampi is really pretty: 400-year-old ruins in a surreal boulder-strewn landscape. From there, I head to Gokarna (a beach) before Goa to Mumbai, where I can arrange my flight home. Seems my flexible flight is flexible if you don’t want any changes.

P.S.: A few menu favorites I left off: Worm Apple Pie (probably true), skinned milk, Fried Steam, Fruit Salad with Crud. Mmmmmmmmmmmmmm.