A WALK IN THE PARALLEL UNIVERSE (Part 4 of 4)

It took only a few minutes to arrive at Saji’s home; a simple brick bungalow with a tile roof, a granite floor and a typical local garden consisting of decades-old palm trees planted in a dry grass-covered ground.
Most Kerala families make a little extra money by harvesting the coconuts and produce home-made coconut oil that gets collected by a local coconut-oil factory. I was introduced to her husband and children and offered a glass of cold water from the fridge. A little later an elaborate dinner was served. Half of the dishes were brought in by neighbours and nearby living family members. They were obviously warned about my arrival by word of mouth, and requested to prepare some food for me. An hour later I told Saji I felt exhausted and really wanted to go back to my hut on Papanasam Cliff. A rickshaw was arranged to pick me up and deliver me back to my home.

The next day the anesthetics had worn off and my foot had swollen to the size of a coconut. It was impossible for me to stand on it, let alone walk on it. My foot didn’t even fit into my sandal. Some friendly locals soon offered me to pick me up at my hut and take me on their scooters over the footpath to nearby eateries, or pick up food for me and deliver it to my home. The next evening I had someone drive me to the little dhaba of my friend Manesh on North Cliff, as I needed to confer with him. He had both a guesthouse and eatery. While I was sipping from my masala tea and talking about reserving 8 rooms in his guesthouse for some friends who were expected to arrive in a few weeks, I told Manesh about my recent experiences; my dream about a young man called Steven from Sydney, Australia, who somehow fell unconscious and tumbled off the cliff, the next afternoon’s strange vision of a sleeping dog and falling coconuts, the strange manifestation of circles in the red volcanic gravel near the helipad, and the real-live encounter of an injured young man called Steven from Sydney who had indeed fallen off the cliff.
“Yes,” Manesh reacted. “I know. I saw that happening.”
“You did?”
“Yes. It was about 11 o’clock in the evening and I had closed my dhaba and turned off the lights. I took a chair outside and sat there in the dark enjoying the beautiful moon and the stars and the lights at the sea’s horizon of all the fishermen’s boats. It had been a busy day and I wanted to wind down, relax in the darkness with my own thoughts. I was smoking a beedi and I saw this guy with blond hair walking on the footpath on the cliff. He stood still, about 50 yards from my dhaba, staring out at sea and the moon. I thought he was enjoying the darkness and silence of the night and take in the view, relaxing. Though it was fairly dark, the moon was bright enough for me to see he was a westerner, as the moon shone some light on his blond hair. After a minute or 10 his head suddenly tilted backwards. He went down on his knees and suddenly tumbled forward off the cliff. I thought: holy cow what is happening to that man! I rushed to the cliff’s edge and shouted at the man who had landed some 30 metres below me on the rocks. He appeared to be dead. Who would survive a fall from such a height? I saw some fishermen sitting around a little bonfire a little further down the beach so I shouted at them that a man had fallen off the cliff. I ran back to my dhaba to get my big Magnum flashlight, ran back to the cliff’s edge and guided the fishermen with my light to the place where the man had landed on the rocks near surf. The fishermen picked him up and took him away. They had to carry the guy all the way to Beach Road and I assumed they put the poor fellow in a taxi or auto-rickshaw and had him sent to a hospital. I hope he didn’t die.”
I took my last sip of my masala chai. “Well, I met him the next day, Manesh. He had been released from hospital with a broken leg and lots of injuries. I couldn’t believe he was walking on crutches from Beach Road up the cliff towards the helipad. I guess he was going back to his guestroom.”
“You had only seen him in your dream. You never met before, right?”
“Han-ji, that is correct,” I answered.
“Did he explain to you why he had fallen off the cliff?” Manesh asked.
“Yes, he thought someone had knocked him on the head and pushed him off the cliff for some reason, but I had a premonition and told him he had a ruptured artery in his brain which had made him fall unconscious. I told him he should be examined by a neurologist in Thiruvananthapuram. I put him in a taxi and send him to the KMI. However, I had only received this information in a dream, so I couldn’t be completely sure. But with you as a witness I can now be completely sure that Steven wasn’t a victim of a crime but that he indeed had suffered an aneurism.”
I put my empty glass down on the plastic tablecloth. I stared at Manesh and then looked out at the dark horizon of the Arabian Sea. For some unknown reason no fishermen were out at sea today.
“Life is never dull, Manesh,” I said, contemplating.
“It surely isn’t, Madam.”
“You know, people always expect me to have some sort of enlightening or paranormal experience in Dharamsala in the Himalayas, as that is where the Dalai Lama lives, but I rarely do so. I don’t know why. I appear to have more unusual spiritual experiences here in Varkala. There is something special about this beach. Perhaps this place will be turned in a ghastly tourist place within a few years or so, but I wonder if the holiness of this blessed beach will ever be affected by it. I wonder whether the gods will be angry, whether the local spirits will leave Papanasam Cliff and go somewhere else.” I looked at Manesh. “What do you think, Manesh-ji? Will tourism ever affect the holiness of this special place?”
Manesh frowned. “I do not know, Madam-ji. I do not know. I hope not, but only time can tell whether we will be losing the holy energy that has blessed Papanasam Cliff and Varkala Beach for thousands of years.”
Manesh and I both remained silent and stared at the sea’s dark horizon.