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To begin with I remember this girl and that small boy who was always dressed up like a
girl. I played a lot with the girl, we ran and ran and laughed a lot. We were probably of
the same age and we were living in a valley, there were lots of hills around. We ran along
the streams and then there was this bridge over a stream, we used to go below the bridge
and play. One day we were running around completely naked, splashing water in the
stream which was rather shallow. All this never made any sense then but still it was a
carefree life with great fun and there were no demands or desires whatsoever.
Once while running around the lanes on the small hillocks that were closer to us we
encountered a not very old man strolling around in a pyjama-kurta and a jacket. He gazed
at us intensely and then gave a broad smile, just patted our heads and went on.
Then there was this large banyan tree where lots and lots people used to come and make a
lot of noise. When we went there these people would catch us, cuddle us, kiss us and
there was a lot of laughter.
I used to go to a hall where other children came as well. A dark, bald man in a white
lungi and shirt used to take us to the banks of small streams and tell
us to gather pebbles of different shapes. A fat lady was in charge
of serving food to us in a dining hall that was behind our house.
Large groups of us children we were taken to the top of a hill and made to watch the
sunset in complete silence, here sometimes I again saw the same pleasant looking not so
old man whom we had met on the hillocks, his silence appeared quite different and he
was unusually calm. I remember once the girl and I managed to enter a big hall where a
lot of people were listening to the same man who was talking softly on a platform. We
were very restless; we began fidgeting, giggling and creating quite a commotion. I just
ran towards the man on the platform and stood looking at him, the girl poking me from
behind made me laugh. The audience was distracted, the talk disturbed and there was this
Englishman in the front row who glared at us annoyedly. Just then quite suddenly the
man caught hold of me and sat me up in his lap, I became absolutely still, calm and quiet,
he then continued with his talk.
I very distinctly remember that python in the cage and the rabbits next door and how the
python swallowed one of the rabbits by wriggling through a hole between the cages. I
also remember how the villagers had brought the python tied to a large pole which was
held by two of them at the two ends.
Now the random memories:
1. Moonlight dinners in large numbers
2. Travel by moon light in bullock carts
3. Village festivals and fairs with decorated cattle
4. Seeing jaggery being made
5. Peeping in the dancing huts
6. The injured boy being carried on Diwali day
I have two distinct memories of injuries; one was of my head hitting the tap below which
I was bathing. The second injury I remember is of a metal cot falling on the tips of my
fingers causing cuts over there. The scars of these injuries are still there on my body, the
memory of the event is also there but there is no memory of the pain.
I can now add much more information about then from what my parents told me.The
place was Rishi Valley School in Madanapally district, Andhra Pradesh in India, where
my father was working as Music teacher. The girl friend was Rekha, the daughter of a
lady next door who worked in the school. The calm, not so old man whom we
encountered, was J.Krishnamurti, the banyan tree was in fact a famous theatre in the
school. The bald man in lungi was one Mr,Raju, the fat lady who conducted food services
was one Rama bai. The evening activity on the hillock was called ‘Asthachal’; the
Englishman who got annoyed was Gordon Pearce, the then principal of the school.
What were the most remarkable features about this period? First of all, I did not know at
all who or where I was, nor who my parents were. I did not know that there was
something called birth and death. I had no body awareness at all, because I did know
what or when I ate, or that there was pain when I was injured. The only two things that I
very clearly remember are that either ‘I was’ or ‘I was not’ a state of knowing (‘I am’)
and not knowing (‘I am not’). I had no sense of time at all nor did I know of the waking,
deep sleep or dream states or that there was anything such as daily routine or the cycle of
morning, afternoon, evening and night.
Above all, which is the most outstanding feature of this state was the total absence of any
verbalization in the form of the spoken word or language. There may have been some
stray words in Marathi, my mother tongue, English or Telugu, but I have no memory of
them at all and it can hardly be called a genuine meaningful linguistic expression. The
states of knowing (‘I am’) or not-knowing (‘I am not’) were completely non-verbal and
they occurred quite spontaneously without myhaving any control over them, the question
of volition did not occur at all. These two states may also be said to be those of ignorance
(not-knowing) and knowledge (knowing)

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