Travels in Oman: What Modernity Hasn't Touched, Part I

The Royal Sultanate of Oman, where we traveled in December, has been voted the world's most improved country in the last 40 years as well as the world's cleanest country, beating out lick-the-asphalt Singapore. This peaceful Gulf country of 3 million people has jumped straight from medieval times into the 21st century. The catalyst, of course, was the discovery of oil in the 1960s and its judicious use ever since the coup that brought the still-ruling benevolent dictator Sultan Qaboos in the 1970s. The capital, Muscat, is white and gleaming, full of attractive modern architecture, with a picturesque corniche that looks out on the modern port filled with giant cruise ships and the Sultan's own two yachts. The roads would be the envy of any American city, the outskirts of town resemble New Jersey strip malls, and the public spaces are laid out with fountains and teeming with flowers.

What interested us the most, however, was the remnants of the old, which are fortunately quite strong in this tiny, proud country. The well-educated, English-speaking men and women of this country dress conservatively and traditionally and favor the former Omani #1 export--dates of many varieties above any Western sweet. Muscat, as well as the rest of the country, is full of old castles (sixteenth- to seventeeth century) that used to be the strongholds of warring Omani tribes. And right in the middle of town is the very colorful old fish market where the locals buy the catch of the day (the rest largely goes to Oman's richer and less traditional cousin, Dubai). These aquatics were so irresistible that we just could not resist snapping away.

Travels in Sri Lanka: Trincomalee's Indian Feel

We came to Trincomalee, a port town on the east coast of Sri Lanka, to lie on one of its sandy, relatively unpopulated beaches, and snorkel. While our former travels had taken us only to Sinhalese Buddhist-majority sites (in general, this group makes up 70% 0f the Sri Lankan population), Trincomalee is mostly Hindu Tamil and was the site of much fighting during the Tamil War that only ended two years ago.

While the place does not bear visible marks of those battles, we were told there is a significant incursion of the Buddhist religion, with giant Buddhas being put up right next to Hindu shrines.

We visited Koneswaram Temple, the site of an ancient Shiva Lingam temple built on the spot where Rawana (the legendary demon king of Lanka)'s palace stood and thus one of the most holy places in the Hindu tradition. When the Portuguese invaded Sri Lanka in the early 17th century (their century-long incursion was ended by the Dutch), they destroyed the whole temple and threw it the sea, building a fort on the remains. The science fiction diver Arthur C. Clarke, who also happened to be one of the earliest scuba divers and spent most of his life in Sri Lanka, found the lingam in the sea near the coast on one of his dives in the 1950s and brought it up. Since then, a modern temple has been built to house the lingam, and the place is now the site of pilgrimage.

However, the Sinhalese built a huge, concrete Buddha right next to the temple, just to show the Hindu minority what's what. (The Sinhalese claim that the ancient temple was actually Buddhist, not Hindu). Incidentally, Sri Lanka is the only country in the world we could think of that has a truly militant and violent form of Buddhist worship.

And here, on this holy Hindu spot, was our re-introduction to India: instead of the pensive Buddhist shrines, the hustle, the bustle, the dirt all again, the coconut husks, and the crazy colors.

Travels in Sri Lanka: Polonnaruwa's Ancient Civilization

The last of our visits to Sri Lanka's ancient sites took us to Polonnaruwa, a royal capital from the 10th to the 12th centuries which housed both a Buddhist Sinhalese dynasty and a South Indian Chola dynasty when the latter briefly conquered Sri Lanka.

Younger than Anuradhapura, Sigiriya, or Dambulla, Polonnaruwa has plenty of architectural details preserved which make it easier to imagine which this place would have looked like. There are moonstones--the name for stone thresholds decorated with animal figurines that show an Indian influence (bottom picture), great columned halls, shrines, and brick multistoried circular structures housing Buddha figures.

The most striking images, however, are of the Buddhas in what is called the Gal Vihara and is considered to be the height of Sinhalese sculpture in Sri Lanka. Shown here is the reclining Buddha entering into nirvana, his head leaving a charming, palpable indentation on his stone pillow, and imposing standing and sitting Buddhas wearing sorrowful expressions. All are cut from the same slab of granite, which enhances the impression of the group as a real ensemble, a Buddha family. And all leave one feeling as if their emotions are real--as if one, too, would like to comfort or fall asleep next to them. Such was the skill of the Sri Lankan artisans, as little known as they are in the wider world.

Travels in Sri Lanka: The Wildlife

No description necessary: these are the creatures that, no less than the few but wonderful architectural sites, make verdant, chill Sri Lanka a fascinating country: the monitor lizards, the stick insects, the various macaques and langurs, and the elephants whose hundred-some gathering we had the chance to witness.

Travels in Sri Lanka: Sigiriya and Dambulla: Courtly Ladies, Sleeping Buddhas

Still in Sri Lanka's Cultural Triangle, we reached the city of Sigiriya, another site of an ancient civilization that scholars can't date with much precision, but think was at the time of King Kasappa who ruled in the 5th century.

Going up on a steep rock adorned with lion's paws, we come across a ledge, inside which is hidden a site of wonder: delicate frescoes of courtly ladies bearing fruit, their half-naked bodies sensuous, their expressions self-contained and enigmatic. The colors are very well preserved, unlike the famous Ajanta Cave outside Mumbai, dating back to the same time, which the Sigiriya frescoes are said to emulate. No one quite knows who these ladies are supposed to be: apsaras (celestial dancers), King Kasappa's concubines, or aspects of the goddess Tara, a female form of the Buddha--in proof of this last point, their faces are remarkably similar.

And, at the nearby town of Dambulla, another enigmatic place: the Royal Rock Temple, which features several caves filled with Buddhas in various poses, dating back from the 1st century as a place of worship but with paintings and statues updated in the 18th and 19th. The most impressive of these is a true sleeping chamber, dark and low-ceilinged, with one colorful reclining Buddha looking particularly cosy on his pillow. As with the Buddhist portions of Ellora and Ajanta in India, these serene images draw you in and make you want to stay in their quiet, comfortable darkness.

But the less serene inhabitants of Sri Lanka await...

Travels in Sri Lanka: Anuradhapura, the City of Stupas

From Kandy, we went traipsing (or rather, driving along Sri Lanka's surprisingly clean and well-laid roads lined with Western supermarkets) to the "cultural triangle" comprising several of the country's ancient civilizations. The first was Anuradhapura, the capital of the country from the 4th to the 11th centuries and the site of a powerful and devout Buddhist community. It was both a ritual and an administrative center, but most of what seems to be left now is the ritual--above all its imposing stupas (Buddhist shrines which may contain relics). Since these stupas are not a site of prayer, their beauty is more in the sheer size of these structures, their tightly laid bricks a testimony to the labor of thousands.

Other highlights of this visit were a 4th-century statue of a meditating Samaddhi Buddha, said to have kept Jawaharlal Nehru cool and collected (via postcard image viewing) during his multiple jail visits.

And there was the original bodhi tree which grew from a cutting of the one in Bodhgaya--the place in India where the Buddha is said to have received his enlightenment. It's the oldest authenticated tree on the planet, dating back at least 2000 years, yes did not look a day older than any of the others to our untrained eyes. Strewn with multi-colored prayer flags, the leafy bodhi is attended by many monks peacefully strolling on the premises.

The hustle and bustle of India had left us completely by this point in our Buddhist induction--perhaps it is no surprise that this peaceful, serene religion died out in our adopted country almost entirely, despite originating here.

Yet, as elsewhere in Sri Lanka, due to its checkered Buddhist/sometimes Hindu history, Anuradhapura contains a rock temple with striking carvings from the 4th-5th centuries that are in typical Indian style--one of these was the man with the horse pictured here.