“Is this really a true story, Daddy?”

As we were pulling away from his school on our bicycles I said to Owain I was going to tell him a true story on our ride home through the forest.

What’s it’s about Daddy?

It’s about a man called Mr Mike.

Who is he Daddy? Do you know him?

Yes, I do. We’ve been friends for as long as I can remember. The story is about something that happened to him a long time ago, when he was a young man. Mr Mike was a traveller then and had gone on a trip to India. One day he was going about in the north of the country when he decided to visit a small place not many people even now have heard of, Rishikesh. It sits in the foothills of the Himalayas, the greatest mountain range on earth, and works like a magnet on the monks without monasteries—sannyasins they’re called. They wander up and down the country, walking from village to village and town to town, most often staying in temples, where they’re fed and given a bed for the night. Some of these holy men want to meditate without being disturbed by all the distracting business going on in the world, which is why they can often be seen passing through Rishikesh on their way up into the Himalayas. As they travel in these high places and pass through tribal villages in secluded valleys they might be looking out for a suitable cave where they can live and meditate in seclusion. The sannyasins shut themselves away for years on end and some of them never go back down the Rishikesh road because they like meditating so much they never want to leave the quietness and isolation they’ve found. Well, all around Rishikesh itself are people who are a bit like the sannyasins in that they want to meditate too but they don’t want to get cold bottoms sitting in a freezing cave high up in the mountains; they prefer to stay down in the foothills where they can meditate every day without it being too uncomfortable. These kind of meditators live and work in places called ashrams.

Mr Mike was very curious about what the inside of an ashram looked like so he picked one out at random and stepped inside to see what he could see. He was very surprised to be greeted with smiles and open arms by Mr Suresh, the manager of this particular ashram. The reason for the warm greeting was that Mr Suresh thought Mr Mike was the first of the expected English visitors, due to arrive any minute, so naturally he thought he was one of them.

But Mr Mike said, “I am from England but I’m not, I mean… I was just wandering by and thought I’d, you know, pop in. I’m sorry, but I’m not who you think I am.”

Of course Mr Suresh was crestfallen when Mr Mike explained who he wasn’t. But the kindly ashram manager was very polite and tried not to show too much disappointment; he invited Mr Mike to stay and have some tea and pass the time of day for a little while. While they were drinking their chai—which is Hindustani for ‘tea’—and chatting he asked Mr Mike what his qualifications were. In India, asking someone this question means you want to know what the person’s educational qualifications are, what important exams they’ve passed; it’s a very common question to be asked on a first meeting because it gives people some idea of your status.

“Qualifications? I’m sorry, I don’t have any, none at all.”

Mr Suresh must have thought Mr Mike was a low class kind of person because only poor people and outcasts have no qualifications. But as I said, he was very polite:

“Never mind, it is not important,” said Mr Suresh, “but please, what is your job?”

“I’m a chef,” said Mr Mike.

“Chef? What kind of job is that?”

“Cook,” Mr Mike explained.

“A cook! You are a cook? Jai Guru Dev!” exclaimed Mr Suresh, joining his palms together and bowing his head. “We are blessed by your presence in our humble ashram! We are so lucky to meet you!” This was strange behaviour: in India the job of cook is a low class occupation; which you would think would have confirmed Mr Mike’s insignificant status. As you can imagine, the ashram manager’s reaction was perplexing: why would knowing he worked in a restaurant kitchen make him so happy? Mr Suresh explained:

“Dear Mr Mike, as I have told you we have some important Western guests arriving very soon and we are extremely worried because we are experiencing a sticky problem: we have no idea what kind of food these people eat. Our cook is Hindu and knows only how to prepare curry, samosas, parathas, chapatis, that kind of thing, vegetarian only and nothing else! We are afraid our guests will be unhappy if we cannot provide suitable food for them. But now you are come! It is our sincere hope you will consider…”

It took only a moment for Mr Mike to realise what Mr Suresh wanted: “You mean, you’d like me to cook for your foreign guests?”

“Yes, that is correct, precisely right,” replied Mr Suresh.

This was an astonishing turn of events, but being the adventurous person I know him to be, Mr Mike took no time at all to make up his mind: “OK, why not?” he replied.

Mr Suresh was understandably very pleased: literally at the very last moment, he’d solved his unsolvable problem. The Western guests arrived the following day, accompanied by the guru in charge of the ashram. He’d been travelling in Europe and had attracted a lot of attention to himself: he’d appeared on TV and been in lots of newspapers and magazines because he’d been teaching rock ‘n roll musicians a simple meditation technique he had devised which promised the experience of bliss to whoever practiced it. Anyway, Mr Mike was helping the ashram’s cook get acquainted with the kind of food the imminent guests would eat when he heard a commotion outside: “Must be them,” he thought; he should go out and introduce himself and perhaps get some idea of what kind of food they’d like to see on the menu; he washed his hands, dried them on a cloth then made his way out to the courtyard, and froze: who should be standing there, right in front of him, but the greatest rock ‘n roll band in the world: John, Paul, George and Ringo!

The Beatles? Is this really a true story Daddy?

I promise, it is. It really was the Beatles and they had come to Rishikesh to learn how to do Transcendental Meditation with the world famous meditation teacher, Maharishi Mahesh Yogi.

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