Vintage Columbus Circle 59th Street Subway Sign

Meet me next to the glazed red wheelbarrow at Columbus Circle, she said, mimicking William Carlos Williams ...

Notice the symbol for the now defunct 9 line

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Random Building Façade, New York City

E 16th Street between 5th Avenue and Union Square, 2011 

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God is in Everything in Richmond Hill

Interior of Sikh Temple, Richmond Hill, Queens

Visiting the Sikh Temple in Queens, I am reminded that God is in everything. Why is that a potentially uncomfortable statement?
         Standing next to his uncle in the kitchen of the Govinda Café in Richmond Hill, Claude slices sandwiches into triangular pieces while explaining why the deities, Krishna and his brother Balarama, are not on display today. “They’re being painted. Their eyes,” he says, pointing to the temple room where clearly the curtain has been drawn. Steve explains to me that when the deities are being prepared no one is allowed to look upon them except their caretakers. Hare Krishna devotees believe that the statues of the deities on display in their temples are manifestations of the God himself. This concept makes me a little uncomfortable. I am used to images and statues in churches and in a holy place. In Greek Orthodox Christianity, icons, or images of the saints and God are venerated as physical portals into the divine. To pray to the icon is to pray through a window peering into the divine. The Hare Krishna devotees feel their holy places are graced by divinity itself. Not only that, but they offer food to the deities every day. “Krishna eats first,” one devotee explains, “then we wash our hands and eat.”
  Claude smiles as he finishes up preparing the sandwiches. All the food prepared in the café is vegetarian. To eat meat is a profanity against Krishna. God is in the food. God is in the strawberry flavored chai. God is in the people around us. The panentheism the devotees profess is dogmatic. To think of anything in the material world as not made of God is tantamount to heresy. “God is in everything,” Claude says, smiling again, “even in the prasadam” (the name for the food offered to the gods). I buy an iced Snapple for two dollars.
   Steve tells me he wants to take me to the Sikh temple two blocks away. We say our goodbyes to Claude and his uncle, disappointed that we can not see the deities. Claude says to us, “You go to the Sikh temple. It’s dirty.” Later I ask why the Sikh temple is considered dirty. Steve explains to me that the Sikhs are a syncretic faith combining both elements of Hinduism and Islam. The women do not cut their hair. Nor do the men. And some do not bathe as frequently as is customary in the West. The Sikh are from the Punjab region of India. Their language is Sanskrit. It does not have the same lilt as Hindi; as I am used to hearing Claude and Sham speak two blocks away. I am struck by Claude’s discriminatory remark but assume it is only natural to want to criticize a faith that is so similar to your own but marked by different customs. It is similar to the attitude of Protestant Christians and Catholic Christians or Hasidim and Orthodoxy in Judaism.
       Passing in front of the “Punjabi Bride” shop, the colors of the dresses tell a story of attention to imagery. The Sikh seem to marry the imagistic imagination of Hinduism with the cold monotheism of Islam. While the women’s dresses are colorful and bombastic, the interior of the Baba Makham Shah Lubana Sikh temple (or gurdwaras, as it is known here) is blue and muted. In front of the temple portico, men discuss with each other in their own tongue; I am not privy to what they say. Loudspeakers mounted onto the outside walls project the religious chant being sung inside. Steve and I take off our shoes before entering the temple. “Cover your head with a bandanna,” Steve tells me, “You can’t go into the temple with your head bared.”
       I take my shoes off and place them in a cubby hole. Men, women, and children come in to take off their shoes. No one bothers the other. A man sits next to me slowly taking off his shoes. I notice no one stares at me. I am immediately aware that I am not seen as an outsider. In fact, no one asks me why I am here or whether or not I believe. The temple is open twenty-four hours a day. The poor and homeless often come to seek shelter and food. Seated behind the Sikh holy book, men take turns reading from the sacred texts non-stop, day and night. I follow Steve's lead. Bowing to the book, I think of my own love for books and wonder if it is the same thing. I do not worship the physical book, but merely its contents. And even then, I am trained to be critical of what I read, and never take anything as absolute truth. Again, I feel out of place, but no one reads my mind nor do they ask me of my convictions.
        Steve says hello to those he knows and introduces me as his friend the philosopher. I stand up and Steve suggests I partake of cereal food given to me by a Sikh holy man. The sweet cereal paste is moist and delicious. I thank him and he nods. Mothers sit with their children in the temple area. One smacks her child on the behind gently so he won’t roam the temple area. Older men sit with each other and listen to the readings uttered in monotonous glory. Younger adolescents with turbans but wearing Westernized T-shirts and shorts enter the temple and sit. The space is peaceful. The word that comes to mind is non-judgmental. Although I read about a recent brawl in front of the temple only a few weeks ago, today, there is no hint of animosity or discontent. What the people do here everyday is interwoven into the fabric of their everyday life. The holy man serving me the cereal paste most likely has a job, maybe it is an electrician or building contractor. He dedicates time to serve God in this temple. Steve and I sit in silence for one minute. At the most. Getting antsy, we both get up to be served prasadam. 
        Entering the serving area adjacent to the temple space, a few dozen Sikh eat prasadam. Portraits of Sikh gurus adorn the walls. One is decapitated and holds his own head. Another is a photography. A more recent holy man. A gentle West Indian from Guyana serves Steve and I. He speaks to me in Hindi. I say I do not understand. He then speaks to me in broken English. “I go to the Krishna temple too. But I come here.” Steve tells me he recognizes him from the Hare Krishna Temple. I ask him if it is okay that I eat the prasadam even though I am not an adherent of Sikhism. “God is in everything,” he says simply. That seems a simple enough answer. There is no hint of proselytizing. The Sikh have carved out a space for themselves in a small pocket of New York City adjacent to the A train in Richmond Hill, Queens. I sense a strong familial bond between the people. Outsiders are not a threat because amongst themselves there is a strong sense of communal identity. The caste system already dictates the place of people in society. There is no equivocation about one’s place in the world. Ostensibly, everyone is aware of their place. Any tension or anxiety about who they are and what they espouse as belief is not present in these believers. The melody of the chant echoes through the serving room. The male voice is quite beautiful, sung with his whole body. 
       As I eat the prasadam: the dahl, the sappu, the biryani rice, I recollect the fact that I have not eaten meat for a week since hanging out with Steve. Am I becoming a believer again? To me, Krishna is a concept. God is a difficult concept. Krishna, Vishnu, Jesus, Balarama. All ways to articulate a concept that is abstract and hard to grasp. I can relate to the need to arrive at a temple like the one I sit in today. But I do not feel the conviction to go beyond God as a concept that is difficult to reason. Maybe impossible. For many here maybe there is no need to go beyond belief. To sit at the podium in the center of the temple and chant holy songs is as natural as combing the lice out of your son’s matted hair, or rising early to water your garden before the sun’s heat becomes too intense. One thing I envy is the eagerness I experience here. There is no apparent worry about the “why” or the “how.” 
       By 10:00 PM the temple becomes crowded. A young man with his hair bundled into his headdress sings to himself. A more urban male play fights with his buddy in the lobby. Two young women dust the benches in the portico. Two older men read the news. Steve and I wash our hands again. I drink warm brown chai. It is hot to my lips. My stomach is sated. I yearn for something. But I do not quite know. I know I do not have the faith to believe. But I envy belief. I envy faith. Steve drives me to the train station. “Roselli,” he says, “You were not out of place in the temple. You didn’t look anxious at all. Some people I take there are anxious at first. Not you.” I smile and suggest that I have traveled a bit so I am used to differences in culture. But, I say, it is also because the Sikh temple is inviting and the people kind.

Would you like to read more? Fetch Greig Roselli's book of essays, Things I Shouldn't Have Said (And Other Faux Pas) for more good writing, dammit.  

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photo credits: steve e.

Guest Blogger: Pensacola Palette 2011

Summer Sunbathers at Pensacola Beach in Florida

Now that summer is upon us, Americans hit the beaches en masse. To commemorate the start of summer, allow me to publish this piece I received from an anonymous blogger in Pensacola, Florida:

The True Colors of Freedom

I find it interesting that once people held true to the claim that at the end of the horizon the world just dropped off. Worldly travel and exploration was stifled from fear of falling off, losing everything. Fear of falling and failing in life is the deadliest and at the same time most universal of all fears. When people face their fears, the world is a more free place to live. I don’t mean freedom in the “free for all” sense; I’m talking about the freedom that brings about peace, the kind that tears away at discrimination and prejudgment. 

I experienced true freedom this weekend. A group of friends and I took a trip to Pensacola for the Memorial Day weekend. We were among thousands of others who set up tents along the beach. Some spaces were more elaborate than others. One site even had a professional DJ, with disco balls and all. We had a nice canopy tent and some chairs. In the American sense, we were middle class. Our arrangement was nothing elaborate but we had everything we would ever need or want: salmon and turkey sandwiches, vodka and lemonade,  beer, and towels. We decorated the side of our tent with groovy flags with an image of Louisiana, our home state. Now that I think about it, everyone had a flag of some sort posted at their site. 

Two of our girlfriends embraced freedom by putting beach friendly pasties on their breasts and were topless while on the beach. They said they would have never done that if everyone around them was straight. Not only was it Memorial Day; it was Gay Pride. They were a hit--everyone loved them. Passersby's asked if they could take pictures of them. Our friends agreed as long as their faces wouldn’t be in the pictures. Everyone was free. When people are truly free, they can truly trust. Isn’t that what Memorial Day is all about? 

Like the freedom of the early teen girl standing next to the anti-gay protesters who were shouting in front of one of the bars. The protesters reminded me of the demon figures at Mardi Gras. The girl next to these protesters reminded me of the little girl on Little Miss Sunshine. In the middle of men holding banners with scriptures on them and forcing patrons to read their tracks, this girl gently made her peaceful voice heard: “We love you, gays. Be free to be you...” She was with an adult who was holding a rainbow flag. Maybe it was her uncle, a friend or a parent. She spoke with gentleness and love that only comes from a free spot in one’s heart. 

Our second night out was spent at Patty’s Irish Pub. We played darts: only $2 for 2 hours. We drank beer and ate pizza. At around 10 PM, the bartender made a courteous announcement not to play any jukebox songs because karaoke was about to commence. The karaoke singers were awesome--so much so, we did not want to ruin their night by trying to sing "Bad Romance" by Lady GaGa. We heard songs like “Brown Eyed Girl” and “I Love This Bar”. Our first night and our second nights out had something in common – diversity. I love the country I live in because of the people. For the most part people in America embrace true freedom, not at the cost of others but out of a sense of love of self, sister, and brother. This is what I remember on Memorial Day – thank you for all of us who stand for the true colors of freedom.

Thank you to an anonymous guest blogger for letting me post this piece.

© 2011 Stones of Erasmus

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The 181st Street IRT Subway Station in New York City

The station entrance to the IRT Broadway Line in New York

At the 181st Street station on the number 1 local, I see a man humping the platform floor. Two ladies clad in business dress call the police. The police, on arriving at the primal scene inquire, "Sir, will you get the fuck up?"

Detail of the New York City Subway Map

A flock of pigeons flies through the tunnel space. The police carry Onan away. More than one hundred feet below the surface of the street, flanêurs ascend and descend via one of four aesthetically displeasing metallic elevators, brought to life today only by the Dominican men who enter with me listing their accomplishments. “Can you believe it?” one asks. “No, to be honest, I can’t. That’s a brave man. That one. That’s a brave man.” The accomplishments are lost to me. All I know are the sounds. The pleasure in their voices was being.

     The elevator brings us to ground level; the men go quietly; we hurry out to the street. My destination is the Fort Washington Branch of the New York City Public Library. I want to write in a quiet space. To escape the noise. The factotum at the circulation desk points me to an especially quiet place in the back of the library. The patrons are a mix of young teens freshly evicted from the diurnal school duty and retired folks who read newspapers and mind their own business. The Fort Washington Library, like many of the libraries in New York, was a Carnegie gift. It is not my first visit to this particular branch. I remember my last visit here last summer. It is queer to have summer memories during winter. I remember the building that sits atop the tunnel entrance onto the George Washington Bridge. It reminds me of a battered housewife. The rumble of cars and trucks come to the surface of the street with a persistent violence. This is the ugliest building in all of Manhattan. I remember walking past it last summer, while shirtless boys on St. Nicholas Avenue played in the opened fire hydrant. Langston Hughes comes to mind. He was a flanêur of urban American streets. He wrote poetry about memories. About dreams. About IRT trains:

Sometimes a crumb falls
From the tables of joy
Sometimes a bone
Is flung
To some people
Love is given
To others
Only heaven.

Would you like to read more? Fetch Greig Roselli's book of essays, Things I Shouldn't Have Said (And Other Faux Pas) for more good writing, dammit.  

A Station Entrance to the 181st Street IRT Station on the New York City Subway Broadway Line

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Why One Should Not Teach Roman Numerals to Satmar Hasidic Jewish Boys

On that time I taught a lesson on Roman Numerals to a classroom of Satmar Hasidic children in Brooklyn.

image credit: Greig Roselli

The Romans Dominated Israel Two Thousand Years Ago, but What Does that Have to Do with Teaching Roman Numerals? 
    The boys enjoyed the lesson on Roman Numerals. After forty minutes, the class was decoding X, XCC, MDC, MMXI, and MCMXCVIII.
     Feeling accomplished, Mr. Roselli slept well that night, having been liberated from the usual anxiety that comes from an unsuccessful teaching day at the Yeshiva. Unruly boys and orthodox rules made the Satmar school in Brooklyn a world within a world. Mr. Roselli knew a bad day at the Yeshiva. His first day, he wrote the lower case letter "t" on the board, and since it too much resembles the cruciform shape, was outrightly chastised by his pupils. "The 't'! The 't'! The 't'!" they cried in unison.
     Coming down the stairs, Mr. Roselli exclaimed to another secular teacher who also taught Math, "They crucified me."  The co-teacher said simply, "They didn't tell you not to do that on the first day's meeting?"
There were other incidents (and other things you should not teach). 
     For example, we were not allowed to individually single out the kids. "Don't count the kids," Rabbi Teitelbaum said. "No counting." Check. "No short sleeve shirts." Check. "No bible stories." No religion. "No politics. No women. No sex. Just teach the curriculum." Check.
     It felt like an especial feat to teach class Roman Numerals without a flop-ending. Shlomo, leaving class, said, "Thank you, teacher."
     Arriving at school on the following afternoon, however, the actions of the previous day of teaching bore its inclement outcome.
Called into Mr. Schermerhorn's Office
     "Roselli," said Mr. Schermerhorn from inside his nondescript office next to the teachers' mailboxes. He was an unnecessarily stern and brittle man who appeared to have had clocked too many hours in the New York City Public School system. His hair was a fragile grey "Come to my office for a minute, won't you?"
     Feeling the worst after having felt so proud, Mr. Roselli let himself into Mr. Schemerhorn's office.

Here is the Gist of the Conversation With the Yeshiva's Assistant Principle:

"What were you teaching your class yesterday?"
"Roman Numerals."
"Roman Numerals?"
"Yes, Roman Numerals."

"We don't pay you to teach off the curriculum, Roselli. We pay you to teach the book. Nothing more nothing less. Don't get too creative or we'll get parents calling."

"But, Roman Numeral are in the book, Mr. Schemerhorn."

"Do you want me to receive a call from a parent asking why their son is learning Roman Numerals?"

I didn't answer. Schermerhorn was not a Satmar. It was easy to tell. Schermerhorn was a man without joy. The Satmars are normally a joyous bunch. Despite their strict religious rules.

"We pay you to teach the curriculum. I don't want to have to explain to a parent or to  Rabbi Teitelbaum. Are we clear?" 

"Yes. Don't teach Roman Numerals."

"Right." 

"And turn in your lesson plans on time."

"OK."

"We want a good teacher better and a better teacher best." 

"That's true." 

"Is that all?" 

"Yes, that's all Roselli. Get to class."

Feeling Dejected Who Are You To Turn To?
After school that day feeling puzzled and slightly dejected, Mr. Roselli asked his co-teacher, "Are we not allowed to teach Roman Numerals to the kids?"

"I've never heard that one." 

"Schermerhorn just told me not to." 

"Did he tell you not teach off the official curriculum?"

"Yeah, he did. And he gave me that better good best teacher shtick."

"Maybe because the Romans tortured enslaved the Jews? Haven't you read about Roman imperialism?"

"Yeah, maybe that is it."

"Wouldn't it been funny if Schermerhorn had said, 'Roselli. Stop torturing the kids with Roman Numerals. I want you teaching them the cardinal numbers, not the Roman numbers.' That would have been fucking hilarious, don't you think?"

"Yeah what if he had said, 'Roselli, since we pay you to teach the curriculum, goddammit, I want you —' and at this point, he bangs a ruler on the desk -- "to teach the goddamn curriculum.'"

"Yes, Mr. Schemerhorn, of course!"

***

If you liked this story, read more from the book Things I Shouldn't Have Said and Other Faux Pas.

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