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feel City of whirling dervishes
feel He took his wallet
out from his pocket, counted some small denomination currency notes, tucked
them in his shirt’s pocket and put the wallet on his computer table. The
next moment, he opened a drawer, picked up an age-old Nokia 3310 mobile phone
and inserted a sim card in it. A little while ago, I had
seen him remove the same sim from his expensive touch-screen cell, apparently
to fix some problem. But soon I realised the whole exercise was for some
other reason. He was going to the nearby market to buy some groceries, and
wanted to carry minimum money and valuables which he could offer to dacoits
if they crossed paths with him. Going empty-handed is risky and may result in
beating and injuries at the hands of interceptors. This person — a Sindhi
journalist friend of mine — was my host during my recent trip to Karachi
and lived in the old Garden area right next to the zoo. Presumably, the area
earned name due to its proximity to the Karachi Zoological Garden and is also
known as Gandhi Gardens. Having shared my travel
plans with my friend well in advance, I had to accept his offer to stay at
his place for at least half the duration of my stay. The way he pleaded his
case, as if my stay there would make the place a historic monument, made me
commit right away. It was Sindhi hospitality at its best, and I felt
duty-bound to accede to his request. Though I have travelled to
Karachi a couple of times, this was my first chance to live in the old
Karachi, get a feel of being a part of the flats’ community non-existent in
Lahore, dine out along the footpaths in the areas notorious for gang-wars,
walk briskly in dingy streets in high-risk zones without looking back, and
above all return home unscathed. The mode of transportation
was a motorbike, as my friend uses it for the ease of movement it entails and
obviously its affordability. Once when our side of the road got choked, we
both got off it and lifted it to cross over to the other side of the
foot-high median and found a safe exit. The traffic mess we left behind took
three hours to clear. I also experienced meeting
people which were much different from those who I had come across in the past
visits. These were more concerned about your provincial, linguistic and
religious origins than your financial and social standing and I even
overheard some of them referring to me as “Punjabi” in their side-talks.
No doubt in a mega city where people come from all over, one has to fight for
his share. And what else than an association with a group — ethnic or
linguistic — can ensure this? One thing that is worth
mentioning here is that people in Karachi have learnt to live with fears and
ward off threats. They are so used to acts of robberies and street crime that
a sudden appearance of dacoits does not perturb them anymore and they
immediately start handing over their possessions to them in a mechanical
manner. “If you find yourself in a similar situation don’t make the
slightest of moves on your own. Do what they ask you to,” came the advice
from a friend of my friend who was robbed of his mobile phone and wallet on a
footpath. A week ago, he was
approached by a person who put his arm around his neck and they walked
together on footpath for a good five minutes as if they were fast friends.
Hardly anybody could notice that he was being robbed throughout this
leisurely walk and an armed man was following them. Anyhow, despite all such
risks and threats, the Old Karachi is a thriving place full of life and
activity and experiences which I had missed in my earlier visits. It was fun
to walk on congested footpaths and face a motorbike running towards you or a
push-cart hit your leg. To cross main roads with vehicles of all types coming
at you was no less adventurous. One concludes most vehicle drivers are colour
blind as no traffic signal, red, yellow or green, can bring them to a hault. A speedy transit through
the dreaded Lyari Town was also an exhilarating experience. Another novelty for me was
that my friend used to call someone to know the situation in the area he
intended to visit. “Halaat kaisay hain…Aur traffic kaisee hai,” was the
most-asked question. One of the best mutton karahis I have ever had was
served to me at a restaurant in Patel Para, a stronghold of Pashtuns, most of
who are associated with transport business. We also had to take a friendly
clearance before visiting the area. It was on my way back I was
told that a visitor to the area can expect anything from a hand grenade
attack to indiscriminate firing, but only on a bad day. It’s on the way to
the Gurumandir Chowk which was a centre of lawless activity on May 12, 2007,
when a newspaper/TV office came under armed attack. By the way, hand grenades
have replaced botal bumb, a type of Molotov cocktail formed of a breakable
glass bottle containing an inflammable substance, which was used to put
vehicles and properties on fire. High-rise flats are one of
the safest places to live and the higher you go the safer you feel. The main
entrance to the flats where I had my stay remains locked and a resident had
to give a ring minutes before reaching the place. A brief wait before the
door opens makes one vulnerable to a dacoity especially at night. Small grocery, milk and
yogurt shops in insecure areas give the look of prison cells with iron grills
installed to block entry of unwanted personnel. Remnants of similar grills
once used to guard cash counters in banks, they save shopkeepers from
snatchings. A plus point this time was
that Garden area was at a 15 minutes drive from Saddar which houses both
Zainab Market — a shopper’s heaven — and Burns Road — an eating
paradise. I have been to these places earlier but this time this friend of
mine was on my side. The best haggler I have seen in years, he helped me save
almost half the amount I could have spent in his absence. Seafood Biryani at Burns
Road was another discovery, attributed also to my friend-cum-guide, which
makes me want to visit these areas again regardless of the risks involved.
City of whirling dervishes I first heard about
Konya from Rumi’s poetry during my teenage. I read about it a bit more when
I visited Tabriz as an adult and developed a fascination for Shams Tabriz and
his relationship with Rumi. So, when my friend
suggested we go to Konya during our Turkey sojourn, I said why not and we
ended up in the city of whirling dervishes.
There are many stories surrounding the birth of the city. According to
a Roman myth, when Perseus killed a dragon that had been wreaking havoc in
the nearby area, the people set up a stone obelisk with an icon of Perseus
engraved in it, which gave the city its name Iconium or Ikonyum. The Muslim myth is about
two dervishes who were teleporting from far away. During their flight over
Anatolia region, one of them asked the other, “Shall I land?” (“Konayim
mi?”). The other responded, “Sure, land” (“Kon ya!”) They landed,
found the city and that is how it got its name — Konya. The archeological reality
predates both the myths. The ruins of Catal Huyuk show that the region was
inhabited as early as Neolithic Period — around 7000 BC making it one of
the oldest sites in the world. Konya was the last stop on
our itinerary. We took an overnight bus from Kushadasi to Konya and were
pleasantly surprised on arrival — after the mind-numbing heat of Istanbul,
Seljuk, Izmir and Kushadasi, Konya at the altitude of over 1000 meters above
the sea level was pleasant. It is quite different from
the other Turkish cities we had seen and the Islamic identity of its people
is more visible here. Women are seen in more conservative clothing, there are
mosques and public wuzu (ablution) places everywhere. The pace of life is
much slower and one gets the feeling of being in a different country —
perhaps also in a different era. The biggest reason for
visiting Konya was to pay tribute to Rumi and attend the weekly Sama that is
performed every Saturday in Konya in what can be called the world’s biggest
whirling dervish hall. We had been told by our
travel agent that visitors must buy a 50 Turkish Lira ticket to attend the
festival. After reaching the venue, Mevlâna Cultural Centre, we spent the
entire day in anxiety, wondering how we will get the tickets or how much will
it cost — but to our surprise there was no entry ticket and whosoever goes
in first gets the front seat. The ceremony started with
recitation of the Quranic verses and durood and then moved on to excerpts
from Rumi’s masnavis on which the dervishes whirled. In the jam-packed
hall, there were people from all the continents. It started slowly but it
later picked up the pace and kept the audience captivated.
It was only when the music stopped that we realised a good 90-minutes
had passed. The origin of Sama is
credited to Maulana Rumi, who one day heard the hammering of the gold beater
working in the local market and heard the zikr (Zikr of the Almighty) and
kalma in the hammering of the people beating the gold. So spellbound in
happiness was Maulana Rumi that he just stretched out both of his arms and
started spinning in a circle and that is how the practice of Sama and the
Mevlevi order were born. The annual Urs of Maulana
Rumi, or Mevlana Festival as the Turkish people like to call it, falls in
December. It runs for two weeks and ends on December 17, Rumi’s death
anniversary. Those who want to attend it need to make plans much earlier as
more than a million people visit Konya during the festival fortnight. They
also need to be prepared for very cold winters and snowfall during that
period. Before we attended the
ceremony, we spent the day visiting the beautiful Seljuq era mosques and
Maualna Rumi’s shrine. Rumi’s Shrine is distinctive with the rose gardens
surrounding it and the turquoise minaret atop the mausoleum. I was quite
surprised to see a ticket booth at the entrance of the shrine as shrines are
considered holy places that are open to all, but found that after the fall of
the Ottoman Empire, the Turkish government turned mausoleum and the dargah,
where dervish disciples used to live, into a museum. It is now called Mevlana
Museum, hence the entry ticket. The main hall of the tomb
with graves of Maulana Rumi, his father, his son and many other contemporary
dervishes is a majestic building with high ceilings, silver calligraphy and
beautiful wood carving. There is a smaller Tilavet Room next to the main hall
that is home to some of the most beautiful, rare and precious examples of
Quranic Ottoman calligraphy. It is said that Koran was continuously recited
and chanted in the tilavat room before the shrine was turned into a museum. The dervishes chambers are
turned into museum, and house some of the rarest specimens of Mevlevi order.
Some of the rooms display clothes and musical instruments that are used in
performance of a Sama such as the mevlana dress, the cymbal, the tambourine,
small hand operated drums, the rebab, and the flute, played once by Maulana
Rumi himself. Then there were beautiful lamps, reading and writing desks,
Maulana Rumi’s dervish clothes, and two specimens of masnavis written by
Rumi. Besides Rumi, pilgrims to
Konya also get to visit the shrine of Shams Tabriz, the shrine of Sadreduddin
Konevi and the shrine of Yusuf Atesh-Baz Vali. I was quite surprised to see
Shams Tabriz’s tomb inside the shrine because I have seen his tomb in
Tabriz (Iran). I later found out that Shams Tabriz has multiple tombs in
Tabriz, Konya, Nigde, Hoy and Multan. The one in Konya is called Shams’
post. Food, like the rest of
Turkey mostly consists of salads and meat. The local specialty of Konya is
tanduri mutton and iskandar kebabs. Both dishes are served on the bed of
local naans. Konya is also quite famous for Turkey’s carpet trade and
locally made carpets and rugs can be purchased at much cheaper prices than in
Istanbul. As we had to head back home
the very next day, we caught an early morning flight out of Konya and could
not see the ruins of the Catal Huyuk which I do regret. After all one does
not get to be in the vicinity of places that are about 9000 years old. Those
visiting Konya should mark at least half a day to visit the ancient ruins.
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