And when it rained in old Quetta…
“The rain surrounded the cabin…with a whole world of meaning, of secrecy, or rumor. Think of it: all that speech pouring down, selling nothing, judging nobody, drenching the thick mulch of dead leaves, soaking the trees, filling the gullies and crannies of the wood with water, washing out the places where men have stripped the hillside. Nobody started it, nobody is going to stop it. It will talk as long as it wants, the rain. As long as it talks I am going to listen.”
Thomas Merton
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“You will get wet!…You will catch a cold!...It’s cold outside in this pouring rain… Are you mad? …You have got to be crazy to go out in this weather and do so without an umbrella!” And, so on. These are some of the things they say to me whenever I decide to go out for a walk or for a run in the rain. And almost always, I respond with, “I’ll be OK. I am from Quetta. I am not mad or crazy at all. It’s just that you don’t understand what rain means to me, to someone born and raised in Quetta.”
Like most people of the time, we grew up in an old style tin-roofed house in Hussainabad, Quetta. Up until late 1970s and early 1980s, these houses could be seen everywhere in Quetta. I think they were called “ 7 type houses”. If I am not wrong, the structures became part of the landscape of Quetta after the devastatingly “great” earthquake of 1935 when the city was almost razed to the ground. When it was rebuilt, the rationale for the new materials used in the construction of the structures and especially for the use of the tin based alloy (metal) sheets for roofing was, obviously, their lightweight nature. Although it made sense from the perspective of safety in the event of another calamity, the corrugated metal sheets were not the best choice when it came to insulation, especially against the biting cold in cruel Quetta winters and against the scorching heat in the usually dry summers. But there was one thing about that metal roofing that has endeared it forever to this Quettawal: the almost magical sound---the sheer music---that it produced every time it rained in the old tin-town. Just like the ambrosial smell of the parched earth after it got wet with the first few drops---unique, to be experienced nowhere else in the world, believe me---the sound of the rain drops hitting the metal, starting with a “ting” here and a “tang” there and picking up a rhythmic pace, first slowly and gradually and finally building up into what resembled the beat, roll and rumble of drums that seemed to be emanating from some heavenly percussions festival, was nothing if not inspiring, if not “divine”.
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| A 7-type house in old Quetta |
But there was something about those old 7-type houses themselves, and it was not just their tin-roofs that always became the venue for the ecstatic entertainment scripted, directed and produced by nature itself. There was something about those structures that even now, particularly now, forces one to reflect. Like many other things then, they were inconvenient in many ways, some of which I have already mentioned above. But then we need to understand that convenience was not a principial dogma of a die-for-kill-for worldly cult with irreparably propagandized, thoroughly narcotized and numbed followers who nowadays disregard and sacrifice every other value and virtue at its modern altar. Just observe how our lives have become impoverished in many significant ways as everything has increasingly become “convenient”, "comfortable", "easy" and “efficient”. The ever multiplying modern gadgets and technologies---the tricknologies of distraction, disorientation and eventually of destruction---brazenly encroach, trespass and trample on human dignity and commit subtle acts of vandalism to desacralize, colonize and devour our inner worlds as they rapidly make us slavishly dependent on them. They are like permanent filters between us and reality. They now mediate most, if not all, of our authentic experiences of the world. And we surrender to them happily, only because they are “convenient” and “efficient” and “practical” etc. This irony seems to fall flat on many, especially young, people these days.
If anything, the old 7-type structures were a reflection of the values of those who built them and lived in them. Those values and virtues, in turn, were the acknowledgement, the affirmation, of the transient nature of this world, of life itself. They were, therefore, the affirmation of Truth/Haqq. Or in other words, there was an acute awareness of the distinction between permanence and transience, between what is Eternal and Essential and what is a mere accident of time and place. For example, in the old times, a village or a town could be destroyed and rebuilt several times over without leaving any destructive ecological footprints. Apart from their ecologically sustainable nature, that in itself was a profound commentary on the impermanent nature of this world and everything in it: earth to earth, ashes to ashes and dust to dust.
They were built with “soft” and humble material (often mud and straw, or wood) because our hearts were soft then, because of genuine human humility viz-a-viz the Absolute. That same humility that was the result of a correct understanding of our fitrah (our primordial nature) and that required that people see their short time here in this world as a moment, see themselves as beings merely “passing through” and not here forever, as created guests who are here to be “tested” by their Creator and Lord, and not as lords themselves. Nowadays, the concrete structures, the brick-mortar-and-steel houses “built to last”, are a reflection of our concretized, hardened hearts. They are monuments to our modern egos, erected with the sole purpose of appeasing and praising the inner idols, the pseudo deities to whom all we obediently genuflect. After all, our living spaces, our houses and homes, are a reflection of who we are and what we cherish and value. They are the embodiments of what we think and know of our origin and end, what we think of ourselves and what we think of others. Just like inside, so like outside, as the old saying goes.
Back to rain. In the old days, rain in Quetta always brought with itself a change in mood, an atmosphere of festival for all ages, from the very young to the old. The young would rush out in the open, play in the rain and get soaked to the bones. Just as the land was always dry and thirsty waiting to be quenched, so were the people of Quetta, waiting and praying for the blessing that came in the form of rain. The falling water from above was nothing if not a blessing, a “rehmat”. In fact, this particular element, water, is one of the most potent symbols used in world literature, especially in sacred scriptures, and nowhere else more frequently and more eloquently than in the mother of all books, the Holy Quran. The Quran compares water, rain in particular, as “life-bestowing Grace”, as “Mercy”, as “Knowledge” (Gnosis/Hikma) and so on. Because rain falls from above, there is in it the element of verticality meaning that “it symbolizes vertical enlightenment coming down directly from Heaven” (F. Schuon). Just like Revelation (wahi) is sent down as an act of Mercy, rain also symbolizes that Mercy. There is a beautiful remark of the great Muslim sage (hakim) Al-Ghazali on the Quranic verse “He sendeth down water from heaven, so that valleys are in flood with it, each according to its capacity" (XIII: 17). Commented the great scholar: “The commentaries tell us that the water is Gnosis (hikma) and that the valleys are Hearts.”
One of the greatest Muslim scholars of twentieth century, Martin Lings (Abu Bakr Siraj al Din) has a very profound chapter on the symbolism of water in the Holy Quran in his book titled Symbolism and Archetype. I can’t resist quoting in some length from that chapter. He writes,
“In the Qur’an the ideas of Mercy and water—in particular rain—are in a sense inseparable. With them must be included the idea of Revelation, (tanzīl), which means literally "a sending down." The Revelation and the rain are both "sent down" by the All-Merciful, and both are described throughout the Qur’an as "Mercy," and both are spoken of as "life-giving." So close is the connection of ideas that rain might even be said to be an integral part of the Revelation which it prolongs, as it were, in order that by penetrating the material world the Divine Mercy may reach the uttermost confines of creation; and to perform the rite of ablution is to identify oneself, in the world of matter, with this wave of Mercy, and to return with it as it ebbs back towards the Principle, for purification is a return to our origins. Nor is Islam—literally "submission"—other than non-resistance to the pull of the current of this ebbing wave.” (Martin Lings)
In the Quetta of old days, although not everyone could comprehend the depth and breadth of the meaning of this sacred element that is a symbol for Mercy and Hikma, among other divine attributes, sent down upon the creation from above like a Revelation, let alone express it like great scholars, everybody could intuit some aspect of the Heavenly Grace and Blessing “each according to his/her capacity”. And that intuition also got expressed accordingly. Rain was a blessing, as I have said. Water, rain, also purifies. This symbol and function of rain, as purifier, is also well understood across cultures and religions. Just as in Islam, so in the old Japanese religion of Shintoism, it has a particular significance. But apart from all these profound metaphysical meanings, rain is also fun and merrymaking. In the old days in Quetta, rain was chai, pakora and samosa. Rain was long walks with friends. Rain was the reason for good company, for conversation and for meaningful time with family and relatives, and so on. I wonder how things are nowadays.
I started this post with an observation of the trappist monk Thomas Merton. Let me end with another of his equally insightful observation. Says Merton,
"Let me say this before rain becomes a utility that they can plan and distribute for money. By ‘they’ I mean the people who cannot understand that rain is a festival, who do not appreciate its gratuity, who think that what has no price has no value, that what cannot be sold is not real, so that the only way to make something actual is to place it on the market. The time will come when they will sell you even the rain. At the moment it is still free, and I am in it. I celebrate its gratuity and its meaninglessness.” (Thomas Merton)
