A Spiritual Tour at ‘Vivekananda Retreat’

First Published in Valley India Times, September, 2012

“Work unto death-I am with you, and when I am gone, my spirit will work with you.”  These words of Swami Vivekananda bear testimony to the tremendous influence his extraordinary personality and teachings had on people all over the world during his life time and 110 years later.

While I and my husband were planning a vacation to New York last month, the first thing that crossed my mind was to Google information about the place where Swami Vivekananda , the first person who brought the message of Vedanta to the West, had stayed in New York during his first two visits to the US.  We came across two such ashrams.  The first was ‘Vivekananda Cottage’ in Thousand Island Park on Wellesley Island where he had stayed for seven weeks in the summer of 1895 to teach Vedanta.  The second was ‘Vivekananda Retreat’ in Ridgley, located in the beautiful Hudson River valley  in Stone Ridge ,owned by his friends Mr. and Mrs. Francis Leggett, where he had stayed three times during his two visits to in 1895 and in 1899.  The first two times were in 1895- both short visits of about ten days each while the third one was from August 28 to November 7 in 1899.  Mr. and Mrs. Legget had invited him over to this beautiful estate for rest and rejuvenation when he was exhausted from his strenuous schedule of lectures, classes and touring. Indeed those ten weeks were rare even for Swamiji, as never before in the West he had spent so long a time vacationing in one place.

‘Vivekananda Retreat’ was only two hours’ drive from Jersey City where we were staying with our friends, so we decided to begin our three day-vacation to New York with a trip to the Retreat.  Following the website specifications for notification in advance about the visit, I had called and emailed to the minister in -charge about our proposed visit on 26^th of July with a request to arrange for a volunteer to give us a tour of the ‘Retreat’.  We rented a car and around noon left our friends’ home for Ridgley at Stone Ridge.  Leaving behind the city crowd of freeway in around one and a quarter hour, we soon found ourselves driving through enormous grass lands and the lush green trees lined up on both sides of the road embracing each other preparing our minds for the serenity we were about to embrace soon.  Encompassed by the tranquil serenity of Mother Nature, we were still relishing the warmth of Her blessings that we didn’t realize when our GPS announced ‘arriving at Vivekananda Retreat, Ridgley’.  Spotting the huge sign “Vivekananda Retreat” at the gate of 82 acres of vast expansive pristine estate, I almost woke up from a trance “Oh, we are already there.”  We drove in and pulled over at the first house we sighted.  I already knew from the website that there was no front desk, so we walked in and settling on one of the cane chairs in the patio, called up the In-charge whom I had already notified about our visit.  She then directed us to come to the ‘Manor House’ and ring the bell where the Ashram volunteer Shivani would give us tour of the house.

A five-minute walk took us to the ‘Manor House’.  We pressed the bell, and a woman, probably in her sixties, dressed in a loose white top and grey jeans opened the door and graciously greeted us with a smile. She did not seem to be a person of Indian origin.  Her first question to us was “How much do you know about Swamiji?”  On being told that we were Swami Vivekananda’s devotees and were eager to experience the place that was frequently blessed by Swamiji’s physical presence, Shivani began her tour from the green couch located right at the entrance of the small sitting room where we stood.  Glancing at the sacred green couch, adorned with Swamiji’s picture in the center, Shivani said this was the couch on which Swamiji used to take “undisturbed naps in the quiet afternoons, “lying at full length on the green couch in the Hall [Maud Stumm wrote], sound asleep like a tired child.”  Since this is more than hundred years old and sacred, nobody is allowed to sit on it.  She then pointed at the fire place and told us that this sofa was originally located there during Swamiji’s time.  In the sitting room, she also showed us the table where sat a picture of Swamiji with his hosts Mr. and Mrs. Legget and his brother Monks; the picture was taken in the porch on the left side of the house in the fall of 1899.

From the sitting room, Shivani walked us to the large dining hall on the side that housed a huge dining table, the same table where Swamiji used to eat his meals.  Pointing at the last chair in the farthest corner, she said “This is where he always used to sit.  The chair may not be the same because these might have been switched around while cleaning, but this is the spot where he always preferred to sit for meals.”  Leaning slightly at the black marble mantelpiece, Shivani narrated us an interesting story of Swamiji as to how he was always at a liberty to excuse himself for a walk, and the only way to hold him was to offer him ice cream [Miss Stumm] “that would turn him back instantly, and he would sink into his place with a smile of expectancy and pure delight seldom seen on the face of anybody over sixteen.”

From the dining hall, Shivani walked us back again to the sitting room from where we had started and directed us to come upstairs to show us Swamiji’s room.  Here we were required to take off our shoes.  As we were going up the blue, white-flowered carpeted stair case, Shivani’s words “These stairs have experienced Swamiji’s footsteps number of times.” transformed that simple climbing into a divine experience.  An enormous portrait of Swamiji stood at the mid-point of the staircase in all its glory, permeating an aura of his brilliant and majestic presence all around.  We bowed our heads in obeisance and climbed up.  On the second floor, Shivani first walked us to Mr. Legget’s bedroom to the left, and then to Mrs. Legget’s bedroom through a common bathroom saying that in those days, husband and wife used to sleep in different bedrooms.  Then she walked us to Swamiji’s room, and narrating a charming story about Swamiji and Swami Turiyannanada who also stayed there for some time, Shivani told us that ‘once Mrs. Leggett  found Swami Turiyananda’s mattress and bedding on the floor of his room.  When asked, if something was wrong with the bed, he assured her that the bed was fine, but he could not bring himself to sleep on the same level with Swamiji’, so he had put the mattress on the floor.’  Such was the devotion of Swamiji’s fellow disciples who revered him like their Guru.

Soon after, Shivani gave us a tour of the remaining two small bedrooms and walked us back downstairs where she led us to the other three small sitting rooms used respectively as a library, a book store, and a shrine where morning meditation and artis are performed.  We then came out and Shivani pointed to the two houses, one on each side of the ‘Manor House’, where male retreatants stay for days and weeks to perform spiritual practices, and the other (where we went in first and made a phone call) where women retreatants stay. Pointing to the path that led from the house, Shivani remarked, “Swamiji used to take solitary early morning walks around the expansive grounds; he would pass the Casino (now houses women retreatants), and meet a road that led across an open field.  At the end of this road was a huge spreading oak tree where Swamiji would meditate regularly, so the tree came to be known as “Swami’s Oak.”

Then she walked us back to the main house to show us the wide open porch where he would sit for long hours reading or giving spiritual talks to his hosts, the Leggets and other friends.  As we stood enchanted by the picturesque view of the long stretch of field and hills, we heard Shivani telling us, “The huge trees around were saplings in Swamiji’s time, so he used to get unobstructed view of this greenery from his bed room window.”

Truly, the tranquil pristine surroundings mingled with Shivani’s stories of Swamiji’s stays at the Ridgely transported us to those times.  My reverie was interrupted by Shivani’s words informing us that she would like for us to excuse her as she needed to attend to other chores.  So we walked back to the house, thanked her for this incredibly transporting ‘tour’.  Before heading back, we spent some time meditating in the shrine, and then before driving back home, a couple of minutes near ‘Swamiji’ Oak’.

This 30-40 minute tour of ‘Vivekananda Retreat’ given by Shivani, ( a dedicated volunteer of French origin), and the time spent at the shrine was truly an ethereal experience- an everlasting nourishment for the mind and the soul.  The entire estate seemed to be so surcharged with his spiritual powers that I wondered, if listening about Swamiji’s stories at the ‘Retreat’, continues to enrapture spiritual seekers 110 years after his Maha Samadhi, what impact, what magic it would have cast on the people who were blessed to be in direct touch with him and had the opportunity to hear him talk about God.

I would like to wrap up my reflections with Swamiji’s inspiring words uttered during his stay at Ridgley, later quoted and framed in one of the small bedrooms on the second floor.

“What do I care if Mahomet was a good man, or Buddha!  Does that alter my own goodness or evil?  Let us be good for our own sake on our own responsibility!  Not because somebody way back there was good!’-Swami Vivekananda

Quick Facts:

Address:                        Vivekananda Retreat, Ridgley

101 Legget Road, Stone Ridge, NY 12484

Phone:                                  (845) 687-4574

Timings:                        The retreat is open to day visitors from 9am until 7pm.

For more details:                    Contact:  gitaprana@ridgely.org

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American English vs. British English

First published in Valley India Times,October, 2012

American English vs. British English

When the US athletes and other personnel embarked on their Olympics journey in London, they had a perception that communication in another English speaking country would be a piece of cake.  Their notions, however, were dispelled when they discovered that certain words and phrases in British English were absolutely different from those in American English.  This got me thinking, “Didn’t I share similar perceptions before I moved to the United States at the beginning of this century?” Sure, I did.

Growing up in the post-colonial India of the late fifties, I was taught British English accepted by Indians in their own way.  Pursuing my Masters in English literature and later a Ph.D from the universities in India was a pretty easy journey for me.  Therefore, with two decades of teaching experience as an English teacher under my belt, when I decided to move to the US, an English speaking country, I never anticipated it would pose any other challenge except that of accent.

However, a couple of days in the US were enough to dissipate my notions as well.  The days rolled into weeks, and weeks passed into months, while many unfamiliar but interesting American English terms and phrases were unfolded to me at every step of the way.  Being a part of English Department in two community colleges and high schools provided me opportunities to learn more about the differences between American and British English in all areas, namely, usage, grammar, and spelling.  This experience motivated me to embark on this fascinating venture of looking at some of these dissimilarities between British English and American English. Let’ us take a look and have fun.

As an educator, daily interactions with students and teachers revealed to me a number of different terms/ expressions in the area of education.  I learned it early on that they have ‘lunch break’ in American schools as opposed to ‘recess’ in Indian schools.  Soon I learned that American students ‘turn in’ their papers, while Indian students ‘submit’ them; they ‘check in’ and ‘check out’ the books from the library, while their Indian counterparts ‘issue’ and ‘return’ them; American students earn ‘points’ while Indian students earn ‘marks’ for their assignments.  Moreover, American students are marked ‘tardy’ when they show up late to the class, while Indian students are marked ‘late’.  The teachers here ‘grade’ student papers, while their Indian counterparts ‘check’ them, and at the end of the term, teachers in the US post students ‘scores or grades’ while Indian teachers announce ‘results’.

Another interesting observation I made was that here in the US, post graduate universities and colleges are called graduate schools e.g. B-Schools, Law Schools, and Medical Schools where as in India schools are institutions that provide education up to grade 12 only.  During my recent trip to India, when people asked me what I was doing after quitting teaching, I told them that I now help B-school applicants with their essays and resumes.  At this, they gave me a perplexed look and asked, “What B-schools?  You said you quit teaching?”

During my initial semesters as an Adjunct instructor at the community colleges here, my knowledge of grammar received a tremendous jolt a couple of times.  For the last four decades, it had been ingrained in my mind that the relative pronoun ‘that’ is used for inanimate objects while ‘who’ is used for livings beings.  So I was baffled when I noticed students using ‘that’ for human beings, and thus, in my opinion, treating things and human beings alike.  In the beginning, I would penalize them for referring to people as ‘that’ in their writing assignments, but when I noticed this usage in e-mail communication within the English department, I gave in and kind of reconciled to this non- discrimination between living and non-living beings.  I even discussed this with my Indian colleague at a community college, and she said that she still enforced the use of ‘who’ on her students by docking them for using ‘that’ for living beings.

Another grammar usage that glared me in the face was the use of ‘practise’ and ‘defense’ both as a verb and as a noun which required me to unlearn my previous knowledge of these words i.e. ‘practise’ and ‘defense’ as verbs and ‘practice’ and ‘defence’ as nouns.  I distinctly recall the day when, as a new instructor, I first showed my syllabus to the chairperson of the community college, and the only suggestion he had for me was to spell the word ‘defence’ right by replacing ‘c’ with an ‘s’.  ‘This is British English’, he remarked.  Since then, I have never dared to use ‘c’ in my ‘defense’.

 

Furthermore, I noticed that the past tense and past participle form of certain verbs differ from those in British English.  Some verbs such as learn, burn, dream, smell, spell, lean, spoil ended in ‘d’ or ‘ed’ in their past and past participle forms e.g. learned, burned, dreamed, smelled, spelled etc., whereas in British English , and by default in Indian English, all these verbs ended in a ‘t’ in their past and past participle forms e.g. learnt, dreamt, burnt etc.  Furthermore, the use of ‘gotten’ as the past participle form of the verb ‘get’ is considered obsolete in British English, but it is popularly used in American English.  In addition, I learned here that comma is used before ‘and’ while listing some items in a sentence.  In India, we never used a comma before the conjunction ‘and’.

Also, I noticed that the prepositions are used a little differently in American English.  We never needed the assistance of a preposition when we met someone, and would simply say ‘I met him/her’, but in America, we add a preposition ‘with’ when we meet ‘with’ somebody.  Likewise, in India we always ‘talked to’ people, while here we ‘talk with’ people.  Furthermore, if we had not seen some one for a long time, we would say ‘I have not seen you for a long time or years/ months’, but here we say, ‘I have not seen you in a long time.’

In addition to prepositions, I also found the use of some adverbs and verbs a little bit different from what I was accustomed to.  For example, to express our fondness for something, instead of saying I like it ‘very much’; we would say I like ‘a whole lot’ in American English.  Instead of referring to ‘many’ people on the streets, we refer to ‘a lot of ‘people here.  The parents here ‘raise’ their children, unlike their counterparts in India and England who ‘bring up’ their kids.  It was interesting to note that in American English, the phrase ‘to bring up’ means ‘to mention’.  Here we ‘turn on and turn off’ the fans and lights which we ‘switch on and switch off’ in India.  Also, we ‘move’ to another house here, whereas, in India we ‘shift’ to a new house.

Some other terms that are used differently here from those in England and India are ‘soda’ for ‘cold drink’, ‘elevator’ for ‘lift’, ‘business card’ for ‘visiting cards’, ‘last name’ for ‘surname’, ‘cupcakes’ for ‘fairy cakes’, ‘flash light’ for ‘torch’, ‘drugstore’ for ‘chemist’, and ‘flash drive’ for ‘thumb drive’.  A couple of  other examples are ‘front desk’ for ‘reception’, ‘assistance’ for ‘checkpoint’, ‘garbage or  trash’ for ‘litter’, ‘restrooms’ for ‘toilets’, ‘exit’ for ‘way out’, ‘signal’ for ‘indicator’, ‘hood’ for ‘bonnet’, ‘gas’ for ’petrol , ‘apartment’ for ‘flat’, and ‘first floor’ for ‘ground floor’, to name just a few.

The dissimilarities are not limited to grammar and usage, but are also prevalent in spellings.  I had to unlearn some spellings that I had been so accustomed to for years.  To cite some examples, it took me some time to get used to dropping certain alphabets from words such as ‘u’ from ‘colour’ and ‘honour’ and ‘l’ from ‘jeweller’ and ‘traveller’, and spell the bank ‘cheque’ as a verb ‘check’.  Also, ‘center’ and ‘theater’ are American spelling, and ‘centre’ and ‘theatre’ are their British equivalents.

I am sure the above comparative study is just a snapshot, and there must be many more expressions in British and American English that could be cited as evidences of their distinctive flavor which I am not even familiar with.  Nevertheless, whatever form of English we speak – Indian English, British English, American English, or a fine medley of all three, our language is an expression of our ideas and thoughts.  Our language and our accent, I believe, is a reflection of who we are.  It is a stamp of our identity, a mirror of the culture we were born into and the culture we have now adopted.  So we should use it as a tool to celebrate our identity, while having fun with its distinct usage in various parts of the world.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

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With Hope for a ‘Safe’ New Year

First published in Valley India Times, Janauary , 2013

My husband returns home from work on a Friday afternoon wearing an expression of shocked grief instead of his usual relaxed one, “There is a bad news,” he says and before I ask him, he speaks out, “There was a mass shooting at an elementary school in Connecticut.”  “Another one……..little kids?”  That’s all I could utter, feeling my heart stuck in my throat.  In shocked disbelief, I turn the TV on and with bated breath we listen to another horrific, senseless, and unthinkable act of violence.

One after another, we have been through these ghastly acts of mass shootings perpetrated by lunatics who use guns as their tools to vent out their mindless hatred on innocent people.  A lunatic prepares himself for days, enters a movie theater and randomly opens fire on the vulnerable audience enjoying first show of their favorite movie in a movie theater in Colorado, leaving 12 dead.  What is his purpose?  What wrong those people have done to him?  A couple of days later, another deranged individual steps into a place of worship in Wisconsin and goes on a shooting spree to target the people sitting in a prayer, killing six of them. It is hard to even imagine how can a man slaughter people whose heads are bent in prayer?  We have not yet healed from this horrific incident, and we hear about another insane individual shooting three people dead in a shopping mall in Oregon.  Did those people imagine that their holiday shopping would cost them their lives?

We are still groping in the dark searching answers to these questions about these senseless tragedies that come in quick succession of each other, and barely three days later, have we witnessed another one – the most horrific of all of them.  This sinister tragedy of unspeakable terms is perpetrated on little children in the age groups of five to ten years leaving 20 kids and 6 adults dead.  Why?  The whole world is asking why?  These little kids had their whole lives in front of them that were mercilessly and mindlessly snapped by a sick individual.  These tiny kids had only celebrated their 5or 6 birthdays and, as President Obama stated in his emotional address to the nation, they were meant to celebrate many more birthdays, graduations, and had to get married and have kids of their own. Sadly, this didn’t happen because one person with a morbidly sick mentality heads out to the elementary school and begins hunting down little kids.  What must have been going on in the mind of this person when he planned this or, for that matter, when he carried out this gruesome act?

After each such tragedy, we hold long discussions, analyze the situation, interview the people related to the victims or the killer, mourn the death of innocent souls and say our prayers.  But all this analysis of the situation will not bring back to life those people who were slaughtered mindlessly.  It will not help those people who have lost their loved ones.  It’s high time we go to the root cause of the problem and take action.  Let’s stop handing guns to people who use them as toys to play with other people’s lives.  True, gun control is a controversial issue, but we need to do something about it to stop empowering these mentally deranged people to put an abrupt end to innocent lives.

Let us pray for the families, let us pray for the parents who lost their kids, and let us hope that the New Year brings in a hope for a safe environment for our little kids, for they are the building blocks of the nation’s future.  We would be happy, only if we feel safe.  Amen!!

 

 

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Education Matters- India vs. the US

This article was first published in the February , 2013 issue of Valley India Times .

Like many other teachers of Indian origin who prefer to remain in the field of education when they move to the US, I, too, opted to remain an educator after I immigrated to the US with two decades of teaching experience in India.  This experience, however, brought in demanding challenges, revelations, and surprises resulting in an immensely steep learning curve.  Full time high school teaching unfolded so many other aspects of the education system which I could not perceive as a substitute teacher in high schools and as an adjunct in community colleges.  I found the American public system vastly different from Indian education system in many different ways: the availability of resources to the students, methods of instruction, grading system, student behavior, student teacher relationship, and the teacher evaluation system.

First, the teaching methods and the environment in US schools offer a sharp contrast to those in India.  The method of classroom instruction in India is mainly text-book based and lecture-based.  The teaching aids available to the teachers are black board and chalk, as the access to computers is limited to only one period in a day.  Students are expected to follow the lectures and complete tons of homework all by themselves, leading them to cram tremendous amount of information by heart.  On the contrary, in the American public schools (counterparts of government schools in India) the students are taught with a variety of teaching aids, multi-media, visual and audio aids.  The class rooms are fully equipped with all the electronic gadgets e.g. CD player, computers, TV, VCR, over- head projector, and so on.  I heartily appreciate the availability of myriad resources that make learning fun for the students; however, I was pained to see that a majority of students fail to value the facilities served to them on a platter, e.g. computers, books, dictionaries, educational audio CD’s, projector system in each classroom for showing relevant videos, and PPT’s etc.

Any discussion of educational resources in American public schools would be incomplete without mentioning counselors, the deans, school security, and the Special Education teachers.  In the public schools where I worked, each student is assigned a counselor who takes care of his/her academic and emotional needs.  These counselors help them with their selection of courses, and also act as bridges between the students/ their teachers and parents.  On the other hand, the concept of counselors is still alien to Indian schools.  Likewise, the dean of students, school security staff, and the police (yes, one police car and a cop was always present at the campus) also help maintain discipline in the American public schools campuses that discourage students from sneaking out of the campus.  In Indian schools, on the contrary, there was no such deterrent that could prevent students from cutting classes or sneaking out of schools.

Furthermore, the slow learners in American Public schools are provided a trained certified special- education teacher, whose job is to assist the subject teacher through inclusion methods.  In my last year at the high school, I was assigned to teach 11^th grade inclusion classes and was surprised to come across some special education students with a reading level of a third grader.  I was informed that this kind of situation was an obvious outcome of a federal law that outlaws failing special education students.  It was distressing to see that this law prevented a majority of them from taking ownership of their own learning because they knew that it was their lawful right to graduate high school.  It is worth mentioning here that kids with physical disabilities are provided special education and care in public schools here which is indeed commendable.  Unfortunately, in India, the concept of inclusion education is restricted mainly to kids with physical disability only, and very few schools provide special assistance to kids with disabilities.  There are definitely slow learners in each class in India too, but they are provided special attention and guidance by the teachers instead of special privileges to pass.

The grading system in American public schools differs from that in Indian government schools.  Here the students with an F grade are conveniently promoted to the next grade, and all they need to do is to pass that course before graduating high school.  To cite an example, my Junior English (11^th grade) class comprised of some 12^th grade students who had not passed their freshman English (9^th grade), Sophomore English (10^th grade), Junior English (11^th grade), and also (senior) 12^th grade English class.  It pained me to see these ‘seniors’ fooling around instead of putting in extra hours to pass all of their four English courses.  When the teachers enforced that it was their last chance to pass, they would quip nonchalantly, “I can do summer course”.  Thus, the cycle of postponing ‘learning’ extends beyond four years of high school, summer course being their last chance to pass the required courses for graduation.  Undoubtedly, this system of providing numerous chances to the students makes them lazy and prevents them from taking ownership of their education.  On the contrary, India’s education system requires students to pass all their subjects (courses) to get through their class, failing which they lose one school year.  I believe that one of the factors that keeps Indian kids motivated to push harder is the fear of losing one academic year.

The most significant factor that distinguishes Indian public schools from their American counterparts is student behavior and student teacher relationship.   Unlike India where students stand up and wish the teacher ‘good morning’ when she/he steps into the class, American kids are not trained to greet the teacher.  Instead, the teacher is expected to greet them at the door when they enter the class.  You should consider yourself fortunate if they respond to your greetings.

Greeting the teacher, however, becomes a non-issue when confronted with grossly disruptive and disrespectful student behavior.  I still recall some of my 10^th and 11^th grade c students who would do everything they could to prevent me from teaching and to stop other students from learning.  In fact, most of the kids under 16 are required by law to be in the classroom and not by their own will.  Therefore, their sole motive (which they often admit upfront) is to disrupt the classroom teaching by resorting to various methods: laughing out loudly, disrupting those who are paying attention, using a cell phone, arguing with the teacher unnecessarily, and asking for permission for restroom in the middle of instruction.  Dealing with these kids not only takes away classroom instruction time but also after-school time (e-mailing to their counselors, calling their parents, writing referrals to the dean etc.). It is distressing that a handful of these kids sometimes eat up most of the productive class time which the teachers owe to the well- behaved and motivated kids.

Lastly, the teacher evaluation system in the American Public schools is in no way comparable to that of Indian government schools.  In India, teachers who are hired once by a school district are hired forever.  They are the ‘permanent’ teachers, and no amount of inefficiency on their part can jeopardize their jobs.  On the contrary, in the US public schools, administrators and department chairs are required by the State to conduct teacher evaluations by observing their class once during the semester.  Even though the evaluation system is designed to help teachers to improve their teaching abilities, these evaluations are largely based on personal prejudices instead of state standards, often labeling the most ineffective teachers as competent and the most dedicated ones as incompetent.

Thus, my two-decade long experience as an English teacher in India’s central schools and government schools and a decade’s experience in the American public schools and community colleges have endowed me with an insider’s perspective into the education system of both the countries.  It is my understanding that both the systems have their positive and negative points and a middle path between the two would work best for the interest of students and teachers.  In order to make the American public school students accountable for their learning, we need to raise the bar for them and set higher expectations from them.  Also, American public school system fails to provide the teachers the support they deserve, forcing one third of public school teachers quit their profession in the first three years of their career.  Therefore, teacher salaries should be increased to retain teachers in this profession.  Also, teachers should be evaluated by their students and students’ test scores and not by the prejudiced administrators.  Similarly, more resources should be made available to the students in Indian public schools, and teacher evaluation system should be introduced to enhance teaching- learning experience.  Education is the building block of a nation’s future; therefore, every step should be taken to make it an intellectually stimulating and rewarding experience for both students and their educators.  Most importantly, our schools should provide a safe learning environment to everyone at the school campus.

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Key West- Hemingway’s Town

First published in The Valley India Times , March 2013

A majority of people would refer to Key West as the southernmost town of the US or a town known for exciting water sports and activities, and rightly so. I, however, would remember it as home to one of the greatest writers of all times,  a Nobel Prize winner, Earnest Hemingway, because this is exactly for what we drove 233 miles from West Palm Beach to Key West in February last year.  The drive was picturesque with palm trees lined up on both sides of the road and small and big pools and lakes every couple of miles.  We hit Miami in about 70 minutes and then Key Largo in about 30 minutes.  From Key Largo, we drove on US 1 with sea on both sides of the road- a sight that is a virtual treat to the eyes and soul.  Weaving our way through the Ocean, we pulled over at the small town of Key West in about two hours.

We checked at the Tourist Center about the location of the Earnest Hemingway’s museum, and a five minutes’ drive took us to the massive 162 years old house, located at 907 Whitehead Street, nestled in the heart of Old Town, Key West.  The house museum was crowded with Hemingway fans from all over the world, and there was a queue at the ticket booth at the gate.  We had to wait in the line for 10 minutes to get admission tickets worth $ 12.30 each.

There were four guides and each of them took turns to give the visitors a 30-minutes guided tour.  The guided tours go about every half hour and give interesting insights into the writer’s life.  Our guide told us that Hemingway lived in this house from 1931 to 1940 and produced 70 percent of his writing work here.  In 1931, his second wife Pauline’s rich uncle Gus Pfeiffer bought this house for $8000 as a wedding present for them.  The guide started off with the room on the first floor where the wall showcased a picture of Hemingway with the Cuban fisherman with boat in the backdrop.  This old man, who spoke only Spanish, was Hemingway’s oldest friend, and he shared with him stories of his adventures in the sea which inspired Hemingway to create the plot of one of the greatest classics of American Literature-The Old Man and the Sea.

As we followed the guide from one room to another, we were shown the exquisite antique furniture that they had brought from Spain.  The bedroom had an 18^th century bed that his first wife had bought; the headboard of this bed is said to be 500 years old.  Hemingway’s pictures at different periods of his life along, from cradle to grave, pictures of all of his 4 wives adorned the walls of the rooms. The guide made a special mention of the expensive chandeliers and told us that when the house was being rebuilt, Pauline got all the fans replaced with 17^th century European chandeliers.  The trophy mounts and skins were souvenirs of Hemingway’s African safaris and hunting expeditions out west.  From the second floor of house, one could get the best view of the ‘Light House’ across the street that has also figured in Hemingway’s stories.

The building where Hemingway had his writing studio was originally a carriage house; he put his studio on the second floor.  The black metaled staircase that took us to the writing studio was narrow and a little scary to climb on.  It was in this studio that he worked on Death in the Afternoon, Green Hills of Africa, To Have and Have Not, For Whom the Bell Tolls, and many of his most-famous short stories, such as “The Snows of Kilimanjaro” and “The Short, Happy Life of Francis Macomber”.  His writing studio is well preserved, and his royal typewriter is where it was in his times.  Hemmingway was an extremely disciplined writer who diligently wrote 300-700 words every day.  The secluded writing studio seemed to offer him the peace and solitude that a writer so urgently needs.  The author’s presence can still be felt in his studio.

On the first floor of the writing studio is the bookstall where his books and other souvenirs pertaining to his life and career are available for purchase.  By the side of the book stall is a swimming pool, which was gifted by his wife Pauline. She spent $20,000 to have the deep pool built for her husband, while he was away as a Spanish Civil War correspondent in 1938.  This was the first swimming pool in Key West; it is filled from a saltwater well in the old smokehouse.

Another unique feature of the house without which the story of Hemingway museum would be incomplete is the cats that were seen in and around the house.  Hemingway and his wife loved cats.  The guide told us that there were in all 46 cats, most of them are six-toed.  Cats normally have five front toes and four back toes.  About half of the cats at the museum have the physical polydactyl trait but they all carry the polydactyl gene in their DNA, which means that the ones that have four and five toes can still mother or father six-toed kittens.  Most cats have extra toes on their front feet and sometimes on their back feet as well. Sometimes it looks as if they are wearing mittens because they appear to have a thumb on their paw.  Ernest Hemingway was given a white six-toed cat by a ship’s captain and some of the cats who live on the museum grounds today are descendants of that original cat, named Snowball.  These cats are so accustomed to the visitors all day long that they don’t bother anyone.  There are houses for them and also a cat cemetery around the property.

The guide’s lively narrations brought to life this genius of a writer’s prolific work and his not so perfect life.  That such a distinguished writer would finish his life at the age of 61 when he was still at the height of his creative genius seems hard to believe.  His father shot himself to death when he was only 20, and his uncles and aunts also committed suicides, so it seemed to be running in his bloodline.  The question still lingered in my mind-“Why did a prolific writer finish his life in this manner.”  A writer owes his life to his readers.  ‘If only he had lived longer, he would have produced many more valuable works of art for his readers to savor’, I thought.

After the guided tour ended, we spent more than an hour strolling around the pristine property.  The grounds of the house are maintained as a garden, and there are many nooks and corners around the house where one could sit and relax and breathe in the sheer charm of the place. Undoubtedly, this is an ideal spot for artistic expression.  Tall trees of all kinds that almost envelop the house appear to be the guardians of this cultural heritage.  Being physically present at a place where some of the immortal works of art were produced is definitely a gratifying experience which you don’t want to miss.  If you are an admirer of Hemingway, I would highly recommend you include this in your itinerary when plan your trip to Key West.

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