Paul, Paris.
Bathed with images of mystical India, I embarked on an Air India flight to Bombay, filled with mixed feelings of excitement and anxiousness. Almost everyone I had come across in France prior to my departure warned me about the dangers I would come across: Most gave me little more than a week before my fate would come across a deadly illness or a fatal snake bite!
I didn’t know Maya when we shared, without knowing at the time, the same flight between Bombay (or should I say Mumbai) and Bangalore that early morning of March 2001. She was returning from a visit to Nandan in Oxford, where he had sustained injuries from a cricket match. Maya had flown all the way to England to bring him her support. If I had known Maya’s cartoons, I would have known that the flight to my final destination on “Indian Scarelines” was my first real threat!
I did experience striking stomach ache after ordering number 76 on the menu - “The Spicy Rice Special” on my arrival at Airlines Hotel in Bangalore. Yet again, if had known Maya’s cartoons at the time, I would have known that eating at Airlines was nothing as dangerous as sleeping in a lodge near Veerapan’s headquarters in Bandipur a few months later. I can still picture one of her cartoons in which the now deceased bandit is wearing a necklace of human skulls and holds a sign which mentioned “Demands: Treat People Nicely”!
On March 31, my birthday, Maya was diagnosed with cancer. I had only just met Deepa and her family and I hardly knew them at that point. Gradually, I got closer to the Kamath family. In what I believe was a very short time, I came to see them as my Indian family. I guess I got a little too close: In a few months, I was living full-time at Nandadeep and started to feel quite at ease… In fact, I can recall Maya being a little upset when I started moving furniture to my convenience in the lower ground where I had settled in!
I got to know Maya more intimately through Deepa. She dedicated all her time to her Mum during the months that followed. Through her love – tremendous, remarkable love – for Maya, I discovered a very special human being, who, without knowing, has opened some paths for which I am forever grateful. For one of them, it is thanks to Maya - and Deepa - that I attended a course on self-development at Parivarthan training centre.
The sudden death of Maya on 26 October 2001 devastated me to a point that, as I write these lines, I still have difficulties understanding why it affected me so much. I have tried to answer this question many, many times. Yet, the more I search, the more I have come to terms with leaving this question unanswered.
Five years later, Maya’s work still echoes in many aspects of my every day life. Every day comes with its package of news - domestic, international, political – through the papers, TV, Internet… how many times have I wished to enforce my “Right to Informationlessness!” she pictured this so well in one of her cartoons…
The storm is over and the Parisian sky is clear. The full moon is out. I see Maya. I feel protection from Above.
Bathed with images of mystical India, I embarked on an Air India flight to Bombay, filled with mixed feelings of excitement and anxiousness. Almost everyone I had come across in France prior to my departure warned me about the dangers I would come across: Most gave me little more than a week before my fate would come across a deadly illness or a fatal snake bite!
I didn’t know Maya when we shared, without knowing at the time, the same flight between Bombay (or should I say Mumbai) and Bangalore that early morning of March 2001. She was returning from a visit to Nandan in Oxford, where he had sustained injuries from a cricket match. Maya had flown all the way to England to bring him her support. If I had known Maya’s cartoons, I would have known that the flight to my final destination on “Indian Scarelines” was my first real threat!
I did experience striking stomach ache after ordering number 76 on the menu - “The Spicy Rice Special” on my arrival at Airlines Hotel in Bangalore. Yet again, if had known Maya’s cartoons at the time, I would have known that eating at Airlines was nothing as dangerous as sleeping in a lodge near Veerapan’s headquarters in Bandipur a few months later. I can still picture one of her cartoons in which the now deceased bandit is wearing a necklace of human skulls and holds a sign which mentioned “Demands: Treat People Nicely”!
On March 31, my birthday, Maya was diagnosed with cancer. I had only just met Deepa and her family and I hardly knew them at that point. Gradually, I got closer to the Kamath family. In what I believe was a very short time, I came to see them as my Indian family. I guess I got a little too close: In a few months, I was living full-time at Nandadeep and started to feel quite at ease… In fact, I can recall Maya being a little upset when I started moving furniture to my convenience in the lower ground where I had settled in!
I got to know Maya more intimately through Deepa. She dedicated all her time to her Mum during the months that followed. Through her love – tremendous, remarkable love – for Maya, I discovered a very special human being, who, without knowing, has opened some paths for which I am forever grateful. For one of them, it is thanks to Maya - and Deepa - that I attended a course on self-development at Parivarthan training centre.
The sudden death of Maya on 26 October 2001 devastated me to a point that, as I write these lines, I still have difficulties understanding why it affected me so much. I have tried to answer this question many, many times. Yet, the more I search, the more I have come to terms with leaving this question unanswered.
Five years later, Maya’s work still echoes in many aspects of my every day life. Every day comes with its package of news - domestic, international, political – through the papers, TV, Internet… how many times have I wished to enforce my “Right to Informationlessness!” she pictured this so well in one of her cartoons…
The storm is over and the Parisian sky is clear. The full moon is out. I see Maya. I feel protection from Above.
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