Sikhs

ne summer,when I was sixteen, I met a boy named Suayle on Cape Cod. He was nineteen. We became close and stayed in touch. Just before my eighteenth birthday, Suayle called to say he had good news. “I’ve figured out what I want to do with my life.” I could hear his smile through the phone. “I’m going to be a servant of God. I’m joining the Twelve Tribes .”

I didn’t believe him. Suayle had always hated religion - “Too many rules and restraints for a bunch of superstitious bullshit.” Would Suayle be living with a bunch of religious Bible-thumpers? You bet. The Twelve Tribes’s pitch was:
We follow the Messiah,

… Our love for Him is expressed in our daily care for each other…We believe and follow the teachings of the Bible, in a very real and practical way. We believe God is good and just, and will judge all men according to their deeds…

A year later, I visited Suayle at one of the Tribes' houses in Hyannis, Massachusetts .He'd become a different person . I was on the wrong path, he told me . I dressed too flashy,:I wore too much jewelry,he said. I told him he’d forgotten all the people he loved. He said his family was with the Twelve Tribes now. He talked about the Salvation of Man. He told me women were put on this earth to serve – that their place was at home, with the kids. He told me to accept Jesus into my heart.

I haven’t seen Suayle since. In early October of this year, I was driving down Route 63 in Leverett, Massachusetts. I noticed a painted yellow sign nearly hidden in the forest. “Guru Ram Das Ashram”,it said. I turned left, pulled into the Ashram’s parking lot, and parked my Volvo next to two others. I followed a gravel driveway towards a house set on a small hill. The glow of white Christmas lights came from a long window on the second floor. In the side yard, I spied three or four turban-wearing children playing a game. They ran away when they saw me.

I pulled open the front screen door and entered a tiny porch lined with shelves of shoes. A child had written “Sat Nam” in red crayon on a piece of paper and then taped it to the door. Above the sign was another: “Remove Shoes. Yoga Students please ring bell.” I pushed the white button hanging to the left of the door. Within a few seconds, a tall man who appeared to be in his early forties greeted me. He wore a large turban, a full blond beard with a thick grey streak down the center, a long white dress over tight-fitting white pants, and one white sock. He smiled broadly. “And who might you be looking for?” he asked in a booming voice. I tried to make mine as strong. “I was just driving by and saw the sign. I was wondering what this place was-” “Well, come in!” I removed my shoes and entered.

He was well over six feet tall, with tanned skin, firm muscles and a thick gut. Half-limping, favoring his sockless foot, he led me upstairs and into a large room with a blue carpet. The Christmas lights I saw as I walked up the driveway stretched across the left wall. “One thing I’ll say before you wonder about it, is the reason I’ve only got one sock on is because I hurt my toe and have ointment on it. So if anyone told you that the people over here wear one sock for some religious reason – it’s not true.” He chuckled. “And let me know if I start rambling. I just had four cups of black tea.”

“Trust me, I don’t mind. Thank you for talking to me,” I said.

“Well, I love telling people about this lifestyle",he said. " It’s so misunderstood. You know, when I was in New Mexico we would wash our turbans and hang them out to dry every morning. Well-we’d be out there in the sun, one person on each end of the turbans, fanning them out…” He moved his arms in long sweeping motions .. .."and people driving by would think it was some kind of a Sun Salutation.” We both laughed.

He led me over to four low rows of built-in bookshelves in the front corner of the room, and fingered some of the pamphlets resting on the top shelf. “So, in this house we practice Sikhism and Kundalini Yoga. Sikhs believe that women are superior.” He turned his eyes away from the leaflets to consider me. “For one, women have more nerve stimulation in the optic nerve, which stretches around the pituitary gland in the sixth chakra, or energy center.” He lifted his right hand and made a circle with his index finger behind his head. I imagined a bundle of strings circling a lima bean. “I’m actually setting up a workshop now with another woman who lives here, Dharma Kaur. We want to teach Kundalini Yoga to people around the area, and make them understand that yoga can end terrorism. We want to empower women and make the world peaceful.”

Later, I did some research of my own. Sikhs do believe that women are more ‘in tune’ with their “ third eye” (the space just above and between the eyes), associated with the sixth chakra. This " third eye" is the ‘spiritual counterpart’ to the second chakra. The two work off each other. The second chakra serves a woman’s reproductive organs, but not a man’s – his are in the first chakra .

“Well! No point in us standing while I chat your ear off. Let’s sit.” The man pointed to the blue floor. I sat down, cross-legged, and put my coat next to me. He sat a couple of feet across from me. Grimacing with discomfort, he reached into his pocket, removed a pair of swimming goggles, and placed them on the floor next to him.

“Everyone in this Ashram is here for Yoga,” he began, ignoring the goggles.

“You were in New Mexico, already doing yoga though, right? Why come here?” I asked. He ran his hand down his long beard, curled his lips, and took a breath.

“I came to teach the power of Kundalini Yoga to college communities. The Pioneer Valley is perfect – lots of unmarried, free-thinking women. We want to give them tools so instead of joining ‘the man’s world’, they transform it to a human world.”

“What got you into all this stuff in the first place?”

“Well, while I was in college, I lived at home with my folks. And one time I lost a bag of marijuana in my house and was terrified they would find it. So for days, I prayed really hard and promised a new loyalty to God if He would get me out of it.

“One of my Psychology professors had gotten me into Kundalini Yoga, but when I went to class that week, I was still frantic. The yoga instructor had me stare at my third eye point, and use the Breath of Fire . So I’m doing this,” He sucked in air through his nose and blew it out quickly, with both arms out, fists clenched, thumbs up. “And the feeling was so familiar. Then it hit me! It was the same feeling I had when praying so hard after losing my pot! These people figured out the science of the spiritual experience, and recreated it through physical exercise. No need for religion or dogmas – Kundalini Yoga was all anyone would ever need. That was the beginning for me.”

“Did you find your pot?”

“Yes, I did. Good question!”

Before I left, that day, I learned his name. “Suhdub Saarung Singh Kalsa. You can call me Sarab Sarong, if that’s easier. Try saying it.” It took me two tries to get it right. I told him my name, to which he replied, “Ah, an easy one to say. Good to meet you, Nicole. Feel free to come by tomorrow for Sunday Service at 11:30. And Tuesday, you should check out Dharma Kaur’s yoga class at 6:30.” Before converting to Sikhism in 1977, Sarab Sarong went by the name Marty. His father had named him after Marty Marion, the third baseman for the St. Louis Cardinals. Marty changed his name as part of Sikh tradition: Sikhs rename themselves to mark their emancipation from the roles imposed by castes, and to leave their old world behind. Sarab Sarong told me that no one at the Ashram discusses their original names. They like to focus on their lives as Sikhs, he explained.

Guru Ram Das, for whom the Leverett Ashram is named, was the fourth of ten Sikh Gurus (all male) who lived between the early 1400s and the mid 1700s. He was known for dressing as a beggar and wandering, at night,through the city where he lived, washing the feet of the homeless with his long beard. He earned recognition as a healer. His teachings used Hindu references in order to relay an all-inclusive message. Guru Ram Das created the first concept of a daily routine for Sikhs. This included waking up early and meditating on God’s name (called Sadhana). Guru Ram Das promised that if this was done, “All misdeeds and faults are washed away”.

This schedule was perpetuated in the United States after 1968, when a Sikh teacher, Yogi Bhajan, came to spread Guru Ram Das’s teachings. Bhajan was the first to introduce Sikhism, Kundalini Yoga, and White Tantra Yoga to this country. He linked Sikhism inseparably to the practice of Kundalini Yoga. Because of Bhajan, Guru Ram Das is the most revered Guru among American Sikhs. As Bhajan traveled the country teaching yoga, he set up Ashrams and named each one after his master, Guru Ram Das.

Sunday service at the Leverett Ashram starts around noon, but if you ask, you will be told 11:30. The Sikhs make jokes that the guests always arrive before the members. The second time I went, I showed up a little after eleven, while breakfast was still being made and the men were tuning their instruments. A woman answered the door in a flurry as she ran downstairs. I stuttered twice explaining who I was and why I was there – “and I know I’m early, but I thought I could help you guys get ready or something…” “You can go upstairs, I’m sure they could use you in the kitchen,” she shrugged.

“Okay, thanks.” I half-jogged upstairs and entered the kitchen. A man I recognized from the week before was standing over a simmering pot, stirring yogurt. He looked up when I came in. “Oh, hello, I don’t remember your name.”

“Nicole. I was wondering if you needed any help.”

He walked over and shook my hand. He was older and shorter than Sarab Sarong, but dressed the same. His beard was black with bright silver streaks in it. Wrinkles creased his brow and cheeks. “You must be an angel! The food’s almost ready, but you’re more than welcome to get started on the dishes.”

As I finished drying the clean dishes, the woman who had greeted me at the front door came into the kitchen to let me know that the service was about to start. I followed her into the room with the blue carpet. I seated myself on the right side (boys on left, girls on right), then remembered that I had to wash my feet. I stood back up and walked over to the basin of water. Ronan, a young boy of about seven or eight who lives at the Ashram, was sitting next to the basin, holding a pitcher of water. I recognized him as one of the children playing in the side yard the first time I visited the Ashram.

“Put your feet in - I’ll show you what to do.” I dipped my right foot gingerly into the cold water. Ronan held my foot in one hand and poured water over it. His forehead was creased as he concentrated. When he was done, he turned his head up to look at me. His brown eyes were huge. “Okay, next foot!” I offered my left foot to him and he washed it for me; then he grabbed a white towel and carefully dried both of my feet. “Okay, all done! “Don’t forget your headwrap,” His dark blue turban was immaculately tied around his head. “Oh yeah, thanks.” I felt foolish and returned to the kitchen to have someone tie a cloth around my head.

I came back into the room, just as people were bowing in front of the 4000-paged holy book, called the Sri Guru Granth Sahib . It was in the far right corner of the room beneath a small, tented canopy. A golden bowl was in front of it, and after everyone bowed, they dropped a dollar or two into the bowl. I followed suit, awkwardly kneeling and touching my forehead to the carpet. I felt self-conscious and out of place. When I stood back up, I scanned the room, checking for disapproving glances. Everyone was smiling at me.
During the service that day, I noticed that many of the chants and prayers invoked "God". Sometimes the prayers thanked God, sometimes they beseeched God. The prayers confused the Roman Catholic in me. After the service, I mentioned this to Sarab Sarong as I followed him into the breakfast room.

“ You told me that God is in here,” I pointed at my head, “and that there’s no distinction between me and God.”

“Well, you are God,” Sarab Sarong replied, wide-eyed.

“Yeah. I was wondering why, in your chants and prayers, you pray to God. My perception of God is as a solid entity – like an old man on a throne in heaven.” The room we had entered had a long table set up along the wall. Heaping plates of food were in every spot. Sarab Sarong and I sat down next to each other. We began to eat.

“Its’ just a way of jazzing up the prayers",he said." I mean, you may as well pray to Guru Nicole while you’re doing it, but we say God to keep it straight.” He looked up from his food. A smear of yogurt clung to his long beard. “When we say ‘God’, we’re just using a common word to address our Selves. God is only a way of describing Sat Nam – higher truth.” He wiped the yogurt away.

“So then, in the Sikh religion-“

“No, don’t think of it as a religion.”

“But it is a religion.”

“Well, I don’t consider myself a part of any religion. If you ask me,” Sarab Sarong said loudly, “what I believe in, I’ll tell you I don’t believe in anything.” He paused, chewed twice, looked straight at me. “I believe that when you die, that’s not it. And that’s all I believe.” He shrugged his shoulders and turned his eyes towards the ceiling.

I wasn’t going to get anything else out of Sarab Sarong, so,after I went home, I did some research about the Sikh faith . I learned that ‘Sikh’ is derived from the Sanskrit word ‘sisya’, meaning ‘disciple’. In Punjabi, the word Sikh derives from a verb which means, “to learn”. Sikhism was founded by Guru Nanak (the first of the ten Gurus) in the late 1400s. Nanak preached that his guru was the Shabad, or “mystical sound” that is “both heard and unheard, that reverberates throughout creation… heard in the recitation of God’s name, a practice which enables the mind to recognize the sublime…” The Ashram holds a yoga class on Tuesday nights .It's held in the Ashram’s big, blue-carpeted room. The Sri Guru Granth Sahib is shielded by the changing screens. Six or seven young women-- students from other colleges in the Valley-- usually come to the class Dharma Kaur seats herself in front of the screens, in “easy pose” (cross-legged). She is a tiny woman, perhaps five feet tall. Her face, untouched by make-up, is graced with the gentle crows’ feet and soft, faint smile lines. Her brown eyes are steady and strong. The turban she wears seems gargantuan on top of her frame. Always in loose dress, she seems even smaller as she sits at the head of the class.

She smiles at us from under her huge turban. Her twinkling eyes scan the room. Then she begins : “Focus on the tip of your nose. Now when you do this, keep your eyes mostly closed and relax. After a few minutes, you’ll probably start to get a headache and it may burn behind your eyes. But I promise you, if you hold that, and keep with it, the pain will pass and you’ll feel really good. Your pituitary gland will be stimulated.”

Seated in “easy pose”, we put our arms straight out in front of us, palms facing each other. Keeping wrists touching, our fingers and hands fanned outwards. I felt the stretch in my wrist. “In only eleven minutes, you will feel your true personality come out. We’ll chant Sat Nam, which is ‘the truth’. So Sat Nam, Sat Nam, Sat Nam, Wahe Guru; which is just exalting the word. It’s like celebrating the truth. So we’re going to draw the truth out of our subconscious. In eleven minutes! Who else can offer that?” The class giggled, nervously. “Okay. Use your breath.”

We began. I rolled both my eyes, inwards. With my arms in my field of vision, it was difficult to stay focused on my nose. I closed my eyes to a squint. “Sat Nam, Sat Nam, Sat Nam,” hesitant at first. “Sat Nam, Sat Nam, Sat Nam, Wahe Guru.” A loud breath in through the nose. The only sound in the room is the air rushing up our nostrils.
“Sat Nam, Sat Nam, Sat Nam, Sat Nam, Sat Nam, Sat Nam, Wahe Guru” Our voices gain strength.

“Sat Nam, Sat Nam, Sat Nam, Sat Nam, Sat Nam, Sat Nam, Wahe Guru”
“This is your clarity,” Dharma Kaur says. I feel a streak of pain through my arms. I break my inward gaze and glance at the painting of Guru Ram Das on the far wall. The little fat guru smiles at me. I repeat the chant.

“Sat Nam, Sat Nam, Sat Nam, Sat Nam, Sat Nam, Sat Nam, Wahe Guru”
“This is you recognizing habits that do not help you,” she prompts us.

“Sat Nam, Sat Nam, Sat Nam, Sat Nam, Sat Nam, Sat Nam, Wahe Guru”
“This is you breaking through.” My arms ache. But my eyes, now adjusted to the misfortune of unclear sight, feel no pain.

“Sat Nam, Sat Nam, Sat Nam, Sat Nam, Sat Nam, Sat Nam, Wahe Guru”
“This is the end of your habits controlling you.”

“Sat Nam, Sat Nam, Sat Nam, Sat Nam, Sat Nam, Sat Nam, Wahe Guru”

“Sat Nam, Sat Nam, Sat Nam, Sat Nam, Sat Nam, Sat Nam, Wahe Guru”

Before the class, Dharma Kaur had spoken to me about the kids she taught at a private school in the area – “ADHD kids, I mean real ADHD kids, who do somersaults in their chairs because they can’t pay attention”. I'd imagined her taking them through yoga exercises to help center them. Sat Nam wasn't part of the curriculum that she was expected to teach, but: “These kids are so tight,” she said to me, “that when we started, they couldn’t even get their legs into ‘easy pose.’ Now they’re more relaxed, and so well behaved that I’ve been able to get through everything on the curriculum, and still have tons of leftover time in class. And their retention of information has improved.”

“Sat Nam, Sat Nam, Sat Nam, Sat Nam, Sat Nam, Sat Nam, Wahe Guru”

“This is you forming only habits that are beneficial to you.”

“Sat Nam, Sat Nam, Sat Nam, Sat Nam, Sat Nam, Sat Nam, Wahe Guru”

“This is your true personality.” The pain in my arms that a moment ago was excruciating subsides. I feel dizzy.

“Sat Nam, Sat Nam, Sat Nam, Sat Nam, Sat Nam, Sat Nam, Wahe Guru”
“Stay with it, you’ve only got one minute left. Excellent. Breathe.” The sound of all of us inhaling engulfed the room.

“Sat Nam, Sat Nam, Sat Nam, Sat Nam, Sat Nam, Sat Nam, Wahe Guru” I can’t tell if I am the only person in the room. I can’t hear anyone else chanting. The dizziness is intense. I feel lightheaded. The pain in my arms returns. I have a moment of extreme self-consciousness. I try to focus.

“Sat Nam, Sat Nam, Sat Nam, Sat Nam, Sat Nam, Sat Nam, Wahe Guru”
“Sat Nam, Sat Nam, Sat Nam, Sat Nam, Sat Nam, Sat Nam, Wahe Guru”

“Last one.”

“Sat Nam, Sat Nam, Sat Nam, Sat Nam, Sat Nam, Sat Nam, Wahe Guru” We were almost shouting, trying to will the words out of us.

“Breathe in…”
Inhale.

“Breathe out.”

“Mmmmmmmmmmmmmmm.” A collective moan.

“And rest your arms, shake them out.” I was no longer dizzy. I felt clear. I took a
another deep breath, mindful of the air rushing in and out of my lungs . I remembered a story Dharma Kaur had once told me about her first yoga experience. “I had done a lot of drugs, and was a heavy smoker. It was real bad – like to the point where when I played basketball, I’d be coughing up blood on the court. The first time I did yoga, I could actually feel my lungs opening.”

She had us remain in “easy pose” and put our palms together, prayer-like, in front of our hearts. She began to chant, asking us to join in when we are ready. Our eyes close. We sit in silence for what seems like a few minutes: I lost all sense of time. “May the longtime sun shine upon you, all love surround you.” I opened one eye to peek around the room. The glow of Christmas lights strung along the side wall gives everyone’s face a faint yellowish glow. Dharma Kaur’s young daughter, Kara, had come into the room sometime in the last few moments and had sat down next to her mom. She wasn't wearing the turban I'd seen her in , on Sundays. Gorgeous, thick blonde hair fell in waves past her waist. I closed my eye,again.

“All love surround you…And may the true light within you…guide your way on, guide your way on… Sat Nam. Sat Nam, Sat Nam.”

“It’s funny,” Sarab Sarong told me and Dharma Kaur one night over dinner at the Ashram, “how all of our attraction to Sikhism and Kundalini Yoga has a lot to do with fate. Like we were all meant to end up here – even you, Nicole, you were fated to show up on our doorstep that night.” I looked up from my food. Both he and Dharma Kaur were looking at me and nodding. She joined in – “It’s strange, but about a year before I had met any Sikhs, I just started wearing all white all the time. I didn’t know why, there was no real reason. I just got into white. And then, of course, when I became a Sikh,” she pointed to herself and at Sarab Sarong, “I learned that Sikhs wear white all the time.”

When Dharma Kaur said that, I immediately thought of my friend, A’nna, and myself : during our senior year in high school, we'd also had a phase of wearing only white. I thought of my arrival at the Ashram; now,,I was sitting ,in the Ashram's kitchen,talking with two Sikhs I hadn’t known a month earlier. Was it all only a coincidence? All my housemates back at school had begun to joke about me being converted. I felt my pulse quicken.

On my car ride home that night, though, I thought of another friend of mine: she wore green all the time. "Green??'",I thought. That's when I realized: it meant nothing. I calmed down-- considerably.

“What about the swords?",I asked Sarab Sarong "I heard Sikhs are supposed to wear a sword.”

“Well,” Sarab Sarong replied, “my two sons-”

“You have two sons?” I interrupted. “You never told me that.”

“Oh, yeah, they’re going to be twenty next week – they’re twins.”

“Where are they?”

“In Punjab. In India.” I looked at him, dumbfounded. “Yeah, they speak Punjabi,” Sarab Sarong continued, “and they both wear full swords.”

“So it is practiced in India.”

“Oh yeah. I also used to wear a sword here, in the US.”

“You did?”

“Yeah. But you can’t even imagine how many times the police got called. Like I’m really gonna do anything! Don’t you think I might hide it?”

“Maybe you’re just crazy enough to not hide it and walk around with a sword,” I joked.
“Yeah. Well, now all I wear is this.” He pulled out from under his dress a long silver necklace,strung with what looked like plastic Mardi Gras beads. Two tiny swords, each an inch long,hung from the necklace.

Sarab Sarong explained. “The sword repels negative energy.” He looked satisfied with the explanation. I wasn’t, and neither was Dharma Kaur. “Well,” she interjected, “it also means that we will fight to the death for righteousness. It symbolizes the righting of injustice. It goes hand in hand with prayer and meditation. It also means that we are not a passive people.” I’ll say. In 1984, Prime Minister Indira Gandhi ordered an assault on Sikh secessionists in the Punjab. A group of armed Sikh militants took refuge in The Golden Temple. Indian Army forces nearly destroyed the place. Within a year, Prime Minister Gandhi was shot to death by her two, Sikh bodyguards as she walked in the garden of her residence.

Someone knocked on the door of my apartment on campus – a sure sign whoever it was , wasn't from Hampshire. I opened the door: Sarab Sarong stood in the entranceway. He wore a pair of white sneakers, faded blue jeans, a T-shirt, and a large white turban. I began to laugh: not only was it strange to have him on my turf, but --to see him in regular clothes and a turban--- made me chuckle as I greeted him.

He had come to drop off some advertising fliers for the Kundalini Yoga workshop he and Dharma Kaur are preparing to give. He took a moment to show me his artwork : pink, yellow, and green designs drawn with highlighter to attract the eye. I invited him to come in; he took a seat next to me in the living room. Music blasted out of the stereo. “This has got to be Frank Zappa,” Sarab Sarong said, “am I right?”

“You are,” I said.

Sarob Sarong began to rant. “You think about how far we’ve come in the last few thousands of years", he said." from living in caves to Socrates. What have we done since Socrates? Nothing. Our music’s just gotten weirder.” He looked up at the ceiling. “But what is anybody saying in the songs? Just love songs with cheap lyrics – ‘I love you/you left me/I’m depressed’."

“Well, Zappa is good."

“That’s true",he said." And Jimi Hendrix is a pretty far-out guy. And I think Kurt Cobain had some interesting things to say. But outside of that, I don’t know.”

I asked him about the fliers. “Hampshire kids seem perfect for this Kundalini Yoga stuff,” he answered. “They seem like they’d be pretty receptive, just from the kids I saw as I walked over here from my car. I’d like to come by and do yoga with your class sometime.”

“Well, we’ve got a guest speaker this week, but maybe another time you can.”

“After this week, I’m leaving, but we could do it sometime in January maybe.”

“You’re leaving? Since when?”

“Nobody practices yoga during Christmas season. They’re all busy. But it’ll start back up again in January, with New Year’s resolutions.” I laughed. He wa probably right.

After he left, I looked more carefully at his fliers. One said, “RELAXING MEN ABOUT INTIMACY: Making SEX Sacred. An In Depth One Day Kundalini Yoga Workshop for Women & Men (You’re gonna LOVE the homework!) " I pick up another one. “KUNDALINI YOGA WILL END TERRORISM!”,it said.In the all the time I spent talking and praying and meditating and practicing yoga with the people of the Leverett Ashram, they never pushed RELIGION on me. Instead, what they talked about--- all the time-- was broader,grander. More humane: detachment from earthly possessions; pure, indiscriminate love; renouncing unhealthy habits; clarity of mind. Sarab Sarong and Dharma Kaur wanted to expand the minds of college-aged women so they could affect the world in powerful, feminine ways. Their belief that feminine energy could end war wasn't original, nor was it exclusive to Sikhs. But it was a risky thing to "preach" , especially in a world full of fear,on the edge of war. They were trying to be living, breathing forms of one of Yogi Bhajan’s mantras: “Do something that will live forever."

Sat Nam.