Field Notes from the Wild Gardens
By Alpana Jain
Pursuing Professorship Role, Writer, Teacher
Jaipur, India
A Cost Accountant by profession, a mountain trekker by passion, an avid yoga practitioner, a cultural arts performer & teacher. After holding numerous managerial positions in the corporate world, now carries on the family tradition of imparting music to students in Mumbai & other cities across the world.
Introduction by Venkat
Human capacities are unlimited intrinsically, be it in courage, love, compassion, intelligence, creativity or contentment. However, they are realized and expressible only at a heightened state of awareness. To reach such a state of awareness demands the rigor of growth. Growth in nature as well as in humans happens best in a state of protection, isolation, darkness, and silence – just like the developing chick inside the egg, the chrysalis before butterfly and the practice champions do for the Olympics. The walls that we raise between family members, between homes and between societies do perform the necessary function for our growth but they are then to be discarded after the growth as we outgrow the need for the walls. When this system of protective isolation is not used for the purpose of growth but as a bed of luxury, the walls become the source of evils leading to weakness, conflict, separation and delusion. Needless to say, we are witness to both the boon as well as bane of these walls. Such a framework of layers of restriction in freedom to attain unbridled freedom of oneness with the universe is certainly complex to comprehend.
Nature, the raw and wild one is an epitome of the expression of that intrinsic freedom, unrestrained and defiant – come what may. Ms. Alpana comes from that edge of wilderness in this beautifully expressive article. The ideas and deeper insights from her writing are refined and bring the subtleties to the fore. Grateful for this contribution from her which is of great value in essence as well as dialogue.
Field Notes from the Wild Gardens
As a child, I was very fond of Enid Blyton’s fairytales particularly the ones set in gorgeous mysterious wild gardens that were a cozy settlement of fairies and angels. Botanically, unlike a regular kind, nature is given the full command in a wild garden, to thrive and prosper, in a laissez faire approach. It’s based on a conceptual mix of anarchic ‘wildness’ and self-crafted nature’s ‘rules’. Even now, these gardens hold a power on me. I stroll for hours inside almost as if following a distant nostalgic voice, which however today has a new relevance to me. As a student of Political Science, I find these wild gardens, pertinent to worldwide philosophies especially the one mentioned in a certain Chapter 11 of my International Relations book titled – ‘Beyond the Borders’. Into the bargain, a wild garden just might be a right fit as an introductory illustration on the book cover.
How so?
One common element to both the garden and theory I believe, is an appreciation of diversity. A wild garden is full of unexpected new members growing in dependence of each other, in the smallest of otherwise undistinguished corners, blossoming in assiduous harmony and surprising visitors in every season on the horizon. Walking all the way through, if you catch a view of the walls and trellis of the gardens you may find they are decked with the quotidian paper flowers, commonly called Bougainvillea. Offhandedly passed by, they are nothing ordinary as usually reckoned. This unsuspected Cinderella inadvertently grows in almost every backyard of India. In my view she is a rather hushed pronouncement of defiance.
Defiance?
The British first brought the flower into India, which means its non-native species, a preposterous certitude not just to me but also to the Bougainvillea in my neighborhood when I told her so. Not native yet such a familiar sight! Interestingly, Bougainvillea was first collected in Brazil and travelled to permanently settle in Europe, Australia, Asia, Africa and where not. Despite her origin she became a non-native – native to Indians, so much so that most associate these flowers with home.
Home for Nature
To think of it, nature intended to mean that when it comes to matters of belongingness, there is no opposite to the word home.
Is there one you can think of? Surely none. What is of nature, shall find home, where there is acceptance and love. And in return, on one sunny-happenstance morning, these old loving places will surely find new colors owing to a Bougainvillea which shall bloom slowly but surely — in a magenta or white, mauve or pinks, yellow and scarlet red and maybe even in purple. There shall be a generous shower of colors, on grounds of a little attention, a little care and pure acceptance. Nature has for eternity defied man-made borders, concepts of nationality and lateralism, often sending forth her stealthy messages to us on a busy street littered with pink flowers on the sidewalks. Doubtlessly, where there is love there is home.
The walls though
Like the Ancient Greek kingdoms, modern civilizations are enclosed within high walls that beget a sense of separation, segregation and inclusion and exclusion. Even so how triumphant is a Bougainvillea vine! Demurely blossoming right over the concrete, living its philosophy, defying what walls represent with a coupe de maître.
Much of a muchness
To say the least, these enclosed wild gardens, down our neighborhoods are the archetype of Internationalism, a philosophy resting on principles of world community, valued identity and sharing, whether a common planet or a backyard. I end now with words to memorialize love –
yatra visham bhavati ekanidam
– a motto Rabindranath Tagore, a thorough Internationalist, gave to his newfound Vishwa Bharti University.
It means-
‘Where the world meets in one nest’
He envisioned a place of social inclusion, universal understanding and acceptance. Most of us may not have visited there but….
Perchance surely
A wild garden?
By Alpana Jain
Pursuing Professorship Role, Writer, Teacher
Jaipur, India