A WALK THROUGH MEMORY LANE PART 1

My late father who hailed from Karaikudi/ Sivagangai district in India ventured in the years of travel on foot, horsecart, bullock cart unaware of the dangers and uncertainties in a foreign land, not knowing when would be his next meal if there was one, what was in store for him, where would he sleep, etc, arrived in Burma to keep accounts in Rangoon. Many years later saw himself in Ceylon, Singapore and finally Malaya. He sailed the ocean that separated then Malaya and the Indian sub-continent often on the S.S. Rajula, The State of Madras, and M.V. Chidambaram, ships that have gone out of service since then except for the Chidambaram that caught fire 500km off the Malabar coast of India on Feb 12, 1985. She was carrying 702 passengers and a crew of 186 then. "The stricken liner was a heart-rending sight when she finally limped into Madras harbor with bodies floating on her water-logged deck. The toll was 34 dead with 13 Malaysians among them. It proved to be her demise, too, and the once majestic Chidambaram was sent to the breakers and ended up as scrap in Mumbai", wrote A. Shukor Rahman in the NST.

My father was an accountant and a money lender in the days when there was little access for the commoner to gain the sympathy of the banks to grant him a personal loan. Coming to a moneylender, very few questions are asked. Ummadevi Suppiah writes in her paper, "History of Moneylending During British Era: A Case Study of Chettiars as the Major Money Lenders", that,

Chettiars were the major moneylenders during the era of British from the late nineteenth century until Independence of Federation of Malaya in 1957. Chettiars, a Tamil speaking business caste from South India migrated to Straits Settlements during the nineteenth century to make fortune in trade. Gradually, their long tradition and experiences as indigenous banking caste and trade on open market created opportunities for them to involve in the money transactions in the Straits Settlements. Lack of credit and bank facilities made the local and foreign traders at the the Straits Settlements to rely on the Chettiar agents.

The role of Chettiars became more prominent after the late nineteenth century onwards due to the development of commercial economy such as rubber and tin under British laissez faire policy in the Malay states. Yet, neither banking nor British credit facilities could cater/accommodate the fast growing commercial economy in Malay states. Thus, the local and Asian capitalists relied on loans from Chettiar for their investments to open up thick virgin jungles for rubber cultivation and tin mining. Large capital and liberal lending methods resulted Chettiars being known as leading money lenders in the Malay States. Through moneylending activities, Chettiars also played other roles in the socioeconomy development of Malaya.

However, borrowing became rife especially among the small capitalists (farmers, tin miners and petty traders) and low income civil servants during the recession period and reached alarming stage whereby the British realized the need to curb money lending activities of Chettiars. Thus, British implemented laws and administrative regulations which were later on proof to be unsuccessful until World War II. After the Japanese occupation, British became more tactful towards Chettiars until more stringent law was enforced to control money lending activities in Malaya. Apparently, The Moneylenders Bill, 1951 was the first of its kind/legislation and created greater dissatisfactions among the Chettiar moneylenders which they foresee as the end for their money lending activities in Malaya.

Our ancestors seemed to have such courage and determination that we seem to lack now. We want a comfy environment and a comfortable job, pushing pens. Even in times of difficulty, we want to be selective and choosy over jobs. Seeing the current trend of thought, Agathiyar asked a devotee who had lost his job after his company shifted its production unit to a neighboring country to make a choice, either he wanted to abide by his wishes and desire of an ideal career or take up what comes his way? The devotee settled to take up what comes his way. He is today reemployed.

I have to thank my father for taking the great risk of venturing to a new land and making it his home. This is a wonderful country, a country that Agathiyar calls Sukra (Venus) Bumi, or Bhoga Naadu, where milk and honey flows. As we are the seeds of our ancestors, all their acts of Dharma or Charity and the merits that they earned is showered on the generations to come. Hence we are leaving a good life as an outcome of their compassion towards all of God's creation. Taking on gurus be it in this life or the past adds on further to these merits, enhancing the soul in the form of gaining soul power or Atma Balam. The guru comes with his whole lineage, an added strength and boosts to us. And with our own part and efforts towards showing compassion to others, and devotion towards the guru and God, we are well equipped to take on a journey of self-discovery and leaving behind a name for ourselves, the ancestors and the Guru Parambara. Besides that the generations to come shall look up towards us.

Taking the skills I gathered doing presentations for the office department, I ventured to learn to animate my presentations to stand above the rest of the presentations. Indeed I managed to capture the attention of the participants through these visuals and videos till a department head told me not to be a showoff. But it did not deter me from learning and improving my work further. All this knowledge brought me to start the website indianheartbeat on several established and existing domains that were free of charge in the nineties. I began to gather all the artwork of mine that was in storage collecting dust, scan and digitized them and uploaded them to these numerous websites. This included my favorite old songs too that rarely were aired by the radio stations. I used to spent hours in the record shops flipping through the LPs and Eps and had them recorded into audio cassettes. After my maiden pilgrimage to India, I posted my experiences on my website. This was the years prior to blogging. With the advent of blogs, I joined the bandwagon as blogging was relatively simpler and easier than hosting a website. As I continued my journey in seeking and getting to know the Siddhas better, this blog began to carry more posts about them and the numerous miracles they performed in the physical world around us, I named it Siddha Heartbeat. These writings then began to capture the attention of readers as I began to receive emails from its readers. That is the story of the emergence of this blog.

But I haven't shared the internal journey that took place simultaneously, for the sole reason that I thought it was rather personal. Even the Nadi readings I had since 2002, was only posted on YouTube in October of 2015, after much contemplation.

The reason is not wanting to give a wrong impression of being boastful of our achievements or giving the impression that we were the chosen ones and god's child. Taking from Tavayogi, he never shared much except to stop for a casual line as we go on with our work. He never spoke about himself, his past and his gurus. I had his first talk about his guru Chitramuthu Adigal and his Paramaguru Jeganathar recorded during his visit to the Arul Oli Mandram in Ipoh during his visit to Malaysia in 2008.

The funny part was that while we were gathered at the Sri Jeganathar Sivalayam in Tapah in 2016, the head of the temple passed on an audio Cd to Tavayogi and told him that it carried the history of Jeganathar as narrated by a Swamiji. Tavayogi asked him to play the Cd. We were all surprised to hear Tavayogi speak. It was Tavayogi's speech at the Arul Oli Mandram that we recorded that came back to us in the form of a Cd for sale! Ridiculous right? Tavayogi never divulged much giving only scanty and brief statements about himself or about the mysteries that shroud the Siddha world. When once he felt he was revealing too much about the Jeeva Nadi of Agathiyar in his possession in an interview he pulled the brakes.

The temple has gone through renovations and new installations made losing its originality. History has to be preserved and not disturbed, manipulated or added on. We have seen this happen too often both in the West and the  East. Tavayogi lamented to me as we stood at the entrance of a cave at Kutralam hills. "See son, this is "Agathiyar's Cave." But they have named it "Avvai's Cave." People fail to understand that they have an obligation to preserve the historic, artistic and architectural interest of any monument or place for the sake of generations to come so that they shall not be misled by what they see later.

We were rather surprised to see a documentary on how the French take all the trouble to preserve even the charred timber roof trusses and every single bit of information was documented on the famed 800-year-old cathedral Notre Dame where a fire destroyed its spire and roof, on April 15, 2019. See https://www.architecturaldigest.com/story/notre-dame-fire-melted-scaffolding.

Similarly, another 600-year-old structure, Japan's Shuri castle that was burned down on 31 October 2019, saw a second resurrection when public from all over the world sent in their photos of the building that they captured while on tour, which was then digitized and assembled together to recreate an image of the building before the fire, right down to its details, replicated in the precise image of its prior appearance. The wooden castle, built 500 years ago, was almost completely destroyed during World War Two. The castle was extensively restored and reopened as a national park in 1992.