Living under the Bilva Tree
Arrival at the Guesthouse
It was 4:00 am in the morning and dark. The rickshaw driver took me down a small road. It was a new area I had not explored before. He called the guesthouse manager who suddenly appeared from nowhere it seemed. Being tired from an overnight bus ride I was about ready to accept anything. The place did not look too convincing in the dark.
In the daytime the area was quite charming. The guesthouse was located off the main road tucked away between huge coconut trees. It was a jungle out there with monkeys, peacocks, chipmunks and of course dogs. It was lovely in the morning to wake up to the sound of peacocks rather than traffic noise; and above all it had a wonderful silent energy from the nearby Arunachala Mountain.
Living Under the Bilva Tree
The guesthouse where I stayed was getting renovated. Eventually I was moved out to a wonderful nearby garden house. The garden house was amidst a well taken care of garden consisting of blooming bushes and trees.
The living room was spacious and had plenty of window ledge space to spread my notes and other papers. In one corner was a spacious cabinet that had an open shelf perfect to place my deity statues and pictures for my morning aarati – light ritual. The kitchen had a fridge and a gas stove. Last was the spacious toilet/bathroom area with an Indian style toilet, a porcelain covered hole in the tiled floor with a water tank at the wall and a spray shower hose for the ‘Indian douche’ of ones backside. There was plenty of room for washing laundry and a hot water boiler for bucket shower.
I felt richly blessed. From the garden house I stepped into the beautiful garden with bushes of red hibiscus, yellow trumpet vine, and white champa bushes. There were also trees. Under one of them were round ‘balls’ with a very hard shell that could only be cracked by the strong teeth of those chipmunks that occupied the garden along with the occasional monkeys, peacock and two dogs who belonged to the household. I inquired what the round balls were and was told that they are from the big bilva tree right there. I looked up and got chills. The branches of the bilva tree reached far over the roof of the garden house to where my bed was inside. I was literally sleeping under a bilva tree! Let me mention here that the 3-part bilva leaves are the favorite offering to Lord Shiva during puja. Needless to say this was my favorite place to live.
One day it so happened that a rat decided to show up inside the living room of the garden house, so I packed up my things and moved back into the guesthouse; my room was finished being renovated anyways.
(C) Udaysree Nithyananda 2015: Book ‘Living at Arunachala’
