Things of beauty

I was very blessed - I had an eye for beauty in all its shapes and guises for a very young age - I guess as a result of being a permanent appendage on my mother and Desmond. I went where they went, read the same books and was not so much introduced to beauty as surrounded with it in its all its physical form and metaphysical forms.

There were always beautiful people around and art and sculpture and silk. I accepted beauty as a mundanity - it was part of my childhood just as much as the bustees and refugees were.

The most beautiful man I ever saw was Lennie Dorje on a trip to Bhutan, when he arrived as we sat round a fire pi - he was dressed all in red and carried pistol at his side. ( This was only a short time since his brother Jigme had been assassinated. I was all of 9 or 10 and something inside me went WOW! His beauty was tempered be the threat of danger that surrounded him and although I was sent to bed early I know they stayed up into the night drinking and playing cards. I think you could say that glamour had entered my life and I loved it.

Tahctzung or Tiger's Nest is must see adventure if you are a visitor to Bhutan and we were duly taken part way by donkeys and climbing on foot. The monastery is high over the Pairo valley and when we visited it was a tranquil place. Desmond found an old lama whose window framed the most perfect view for meditation, a valley, mountains and a river. It was inspirational and to this day I have only to close my eyes to see it. It was beautiful.

I suppose I was about 14 when the penny dropped that I was not beautiful, at least not on the outside - it was hard for awhile but I tried to beautiful on the inside to make up for it. I suppose that was when I realised that I had been given a great gift; not being beautiful myself I could treasure it in others. I'll tonight with a little Leonard Cohen at the Chelsea Hotel - both he and Janis Joplin forgot their beauty was in there music, their voices and their poetry of song.

Friends, Romans and Countrymen

Desmond had decided to have a roof party with dancing and singing and laughter followed by some slides he had found of his first trip to Bhutan, back in the days when there was no road. He was one of the only joutnalists escorting Nehru's daughter, Indira Gandhi on her official visit there.

We had to wait for the night sky so everyone was talking and drinking when suddenly, spontaneously a friends of Desla and my mother jumped up on one of the service pipes that crisscrossed the roof of Minto Park. It took awhile for people to stop talking and that made it all the more real.

His voice rang out, "Friends, Romans, Countrymen, lend my you ears" and he gave the speech with such passion and belief  that we were no longer on a hot roof top in West Bengal but transported to Shakespeare's Rome and the anger and the fury at the death of Caesar. For me it was an awakening - to Shakespeare who I promptly went off and read cover to cover, skimming the bits I could not understand but loving the language that I could.

Dean Gaspar was his name - another renaissance man, he could paint, draw, act and write. He was exciting and wicked - so much so that his parties were ones that I was never allowed to go to. He was another of the men who set me free with books - no question was too trivial and I adored him as some form of exotic uncle.

I have never seen Mark Antony played better and he gave me the greatest gift anyone can give an impressionable child - Shakespeare.

After he had finished we sat in the dark illuminated dimly by candles and watched as Desmond took us to another place and another time when the way into Bhutan was on foot and the journey took days not hours, It was a night of magic lantern slides and an all too brief glimpse of a man who, in different circumstances, would have ranked with the Richardsons, Oliviers and Gielguds. But my Calcutta was like that - always roses blooming from unexpected places. He did achieve celluloid immortality appearing in Attenborough's Gandhi and doing so very well.

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Too much and too much agaain

Do you ever have that feeling when there is so much to say that you clam up completely because it all seems impossible to get out. Sometimes writing this is a bit like that - I go through my day thinking, oh that would be good, or remembering something and thinking that should go in. Then I open up the blessed Mac and all those thoughts elude me.

I've now got three half finished blogs in edit mode - either not good enough or simply rambles without any point or real meaning to them, Two of them are, I think fixable and you may see them soon.

Most of you know by now that this is the skeletal embryo of a book - one that moves between now and then so that the tension inherent in the now informs the pathos and nostalgia of the then. Darling Dubby emailed this morning and said, "At last my Joanna begins to bud;" and oddly enough I think I do.

When I was small the aunties, along with the Kalimpong Homes, organised a dance festival in the gardens of the homes - they were very keen that the Tibetan children placed at the strict Presbyterian mercy  of Dr. Graham's inheritors  might forget their heritage. The children all performed charming Tibetan folk dances waving their overlong pink sleeves rhythmically with their singing and gentle body movement.

There was sudden pandemonium as down the hillside came a procession of horsemen, wild Khampas all, though dispossessed of home and their culture - the procession shone a light into a time gone be. The King of LIng, for it  was he leading was greeted most reverently with white scarves and led to the VIP seats at the front.

His arrival was for the monks from the gompa to start. All the dancers were masked, masks made with reverence over the centuries to the same pattern and each dancer became more that a man as he danced. There was the story of Guru Rinpoche fighting the the black hats and their tantric shamanisn, the use of the animals to prove his enlightenment.

Those monks that were the deer leapt and twirled in a way that would have made Nijinsky weep with envy. And then, just as we all needed a break - the clowns with their red devil faces would come out and taunt the pretty girls, who gave back what they got with interest. It was joyous and a glimpse into another world and time   that was fast disappearing.

Some five years my parents and I were invited to the Setchu dances in Pairo, Bhutan. No fresh faced children here - this was one of the great Bhutanese lamaseries and this year was more special than most for a giant thanka(religious painting on cloth), was to be hung from the roof of the gompa. There were only four such thankas in existence: one in Lhasa, one in Gyantse, one in Leh and this one in Pario and thus this was a day of high religion and joy to the people of the Paro valley.

We sat behind a carved wooden screen with the Queen, Ashi Kesang, her two daughters, the Crown Prince and his two tutors, Major Cann and Michael Airies (who later became fellow of Oriental Studies at Oxford and married Aang San Syu Ke. Plus the usual rat tag mob of Desmond, Mum, my sister, me, the ubiquitous Tibetan entourage and the (assumedly CIA) American Consul and his wife and daughter. One the first day the Thanka was lowered and it was huge, depicting the great wheel with the Buddha in the centre. Pilgrims had come from all over Bhutan to see it and help toward their enlightenment.

The dances were, if anything even more stunning - higher leaps performed in slow motion with only the discordant note of cymbals and drums played to keep away the evil spirits. This seemed to me to be magic that I was watching not men and I was transported to another world, time place. Whatever fascination I have with religion now comes from those days of watching not just the lamas dancing but the reverent people, young and old to whom it meant so much to see all of this as if the gods themselves danced before them.

I was very, very  privileged.

PS At this point I would love to show you photographs and videos of mine but my sister has custody and those of you who follow me regularly know that means no chance. So apart from the picture of me everything else is courtesy of Google image search.

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My Mother the Spy

Me and Mum

There are many very normal and average appearing people who actually are spies. Think of Smiley. There are of course those who do indeed perpetuate the stereotype. My mother fell into neither category and yet was viewed with deep suspicion for three or four years by the Indian Government as a spy. Our phones were tapped and she was shadowed all over Calcutta.

It all culminated in the Alipore police station where she was held for twelve hours in one room with Desmond in another and they were repeatedly and furiously questioned about US and UK involvement in the Free Tibetan Army: in the case of Mum she was accused of leaking highly secret military information to the UK government. Desmond's lists of charges went back to his time with the Gurkhas. He was accused of misinforming Indira Gandhi when he accompanied her to Bhutan.

As far as those of us at home were concerned: Mum had gone shopping and Des was at work. It was only at two o'clock when Mum's driver, George turned up almost in tears, "It is Maaam and Desmond, they have been taken to the thana. I have only just been allowed to come - tell Sahib I think it is bad" The phone lines went into meltdown between Lord Sinha Road, father's office, Minto Park, Desmond's flat, and Ho Chi Minh Sarani (the Yanks had their consulate there too - a municipal joke) to the British High Commission.

After a really terrifying few hours they came home both had a huge whisky and tried to explain or understand what they had done. Dad was livid with Mum, as much with worry and fear. Desmond, who had angina, looked grey. The laughs and jokes of the trip to Sikkim a few short weeks before seemed to have a heavy echo. For all any of us knew we could have been on the next flight out leaving Mum and Desmond in gaol awaiting trial. It was real and scary.

Anyone less like Mata Hari, (on the right here) would be hard to find, whilst thinking that she superbly discreet and able to extract anything form anyone with a flick of her eye and puff on her cigarette holder; the truth was she was charming, could be devastatingly attractive, was wonderful company and a great conversationalist. Major assets for any women but a femme fatale she was not.

But, and here's the thing, certain events in the 60s that she and Desmond were involved in could be viewed by those with suspicious minds as deeply murky.

Now this part of the story involves a little discretion from me. One of the characters if not still alive has children who know nothing of this so the of the remainder of this he will be simply known as the General. Also the American and English diplomats will only be known as their nicknames, microphone for the American and Mr. G for the Brit. The French don't come into this but you know their names already. And the Russians, they had their own spies and paranoia. Although an upside of all of this for my father was that he became the Eastern Bloc doctor for a couple of years. Completely of the subject, that was how I saw the Bolshoi from the front row of the stalls - twice.

Why were they thought to be spies? In Desmond's case it was not strictly true but he certainly was the go to man for information on the peoples and politics of the mountain kingdoms. Every new 'Cultural Attache' would invite him to dinner, cocktail parties etc etc with the aim of making sure their communication lines were open. The microphone went out of his way to woo Desla, even the magic US passport was dangled at one stage. The British expected rather more for considerably less, a couple of scotches and some 'papers' that he could us to travel with to see his family in the UK. MY theory, and it will never be proved one way or another was that his emotional loyalty was to the hill people and anything that could go some way to righting the terrible wrongs of the Chinese invasion of Tibet should be done. And if that meant being jolly with two of the biggest bores ever to walk the planet, then he would be and did so. In so many ways they should have listened to him rather than simply using his connections to set up whatever it was they were. i know, not from Desmond or my mother, that the American army were still training young Tibetans in guerrilla tactics as late as 1972.

This next part is hard because I am revealing the clay feet of my idol. I am sure that as you have read this you have been aware that my father appears rarely and when he does so normally in a fury. Much of what you are reading is written as I understood things then. I knew that theirs was not a happy marriage and I knew my mother adored Desmond. Because Desmond's sexual inclinations were very clear and normal to me at an early age I knew there was never any physical relationship between them and I assume my father did too. I know that from the time I was about eight they had separate rooms but as a child this does not seem odd.

When we started going to Kalimpong it was for holidays, to escape the heat and laugh with the aunties and we would all go, Mum, Dad, Janie and me. Latterly though my father would excuse himself too much work, sick patients that needed him. And then KalimpongNathu La,

This otherworldly break in the mountain chain was one of the ways it was felt most likely the Chinese would come sweeping down into India. A high ranking General had been put in charge to oversee troop deployment and prepare should the worst happen. This is not some panicked thinking by a government seeing reds under the beds. This was at the height of Vietnam, Laus, Cambodia. The whole of the near and far East could fall like dominoes to a Communist super power that made Stalinism look cosy, still does. So the General has a very important, very top secret job.

Enter my mother, Joyla, just about to become forty, unhappily married, in love with one of the queens of the East and must have felt unwanted and undesirable. She met the General, of course he knew the aunties, and that was as they say that. For a year they had a glorious physical full on affair. She acted as hostess at mess dinners. He drove all over the mountainsides in his jeep and they would return with her cheeks glowing and her eyes sparkling like black jet beads. Auntie Vicky explained. "You see dear, you have your little friend Tenzing and you go out to play. Your mother needs someone to play with too sometimes, let her have her fun. You will understand one day. " Because Auntie Vickie was wise and my auntie I accepted it. Mum had a friend.

Desla didn't. He arrived full of icy anger. They fought bitterly. Doors were slammed and it seemed all was past repair. She was going to dinner at the Mess that night and came and me kissed goodnight, always smelling of Madame Rochas or Chanel No.5. I can't remember what she was wearing but her eyes were very bright, as if she had been crying. "I think we might go home tomorrow," she said and gave me hug like always. And, like always, "Night night Dumsy, I love you." and the reply,"Not as much as I love you." And then her high heeled shoes clicking down the stairs. As I lay in the firelit bedroom I heard Desmond's door open. And I crept out of bed to listen.

There was some mumbling, and laughing and then I heard clearly, "Enjoy it now Joyla but it can't be forever. But darling I do understand." Then there was noise and I scuttled back into bed.

I suppose rationally, between them, they had managed to make themselves look suspicious. Not long after this was the interrogation day and the verdict passed along from the secret police - no more visa for sensitive areas for either of them, ever again. No Kalimpong, no Sikkim, no Bhutan. Exile from the mountains that hurt far, far more than the loss of a lover.



It was July and very, very hot. Desmond phoned and asked if we would like to go on a picnic. Lovely, we would be at Minto Park in about an hour. Should we bring anything? No, just but be prepared for a lot of walking.

 We went up in the lift to the eighth floor where we were greeted by a sign asking us to dress in the appropriate garments and shoes, these where mountaineering jackets and boots. Above us flew hundreds of prayers flags and in front of us, on the eighth floor of Minto Park, overlooking Bowanipur Cemetery) was a base camp! Two tents, a rubber ground mat, sleeping bags to sit on and a camping gas stove in the middle boiling water merrily away. Also spread around handily were a couple of bear skins in case we got cold. It was 102 outside.

He cane and gave us those wonderful bear hugs. "So Joy, if we can't go to the mountains: then they come here to us."

And on that they did. And we never once felt anything but high in the thin cold air.

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High in Thin Cold Air

DESMOND DOIG

I heard this story from both sides: Desla's and my mother's. Her version was that she was visiting a friend at the Harrington Nursing Home, in Calcutta. She was coming down the stairs and saw this man talking to Joyce the matron. She knew who he was - had read all his articles, had just finished the book he had written with Ed Hillary, 'High in the Thin Cold Air'. Desmond was in fact visiting a friend Bhanu Bannerjee who had lost some toes in the expedition to frost bite. She told that she knew she had to meet this man, and she flew down the stairs and acting somewhat like a Take That fan, grasped his hand and told him how much she liked his work and admired him. She said he looked a little disconcerted but said, "You must come and have coffee sometime." He then made his farewells and left. The next morning she arrived at his flat, very early, for coffee. He had been asleep, naked, and came to the door clasping the fur of blue bare to cover his modesty.  From that moment on they were soulmates.

Desla told me the same story from his perspective. He said he had never seen anybody more alive in the moment than my mother that day at the Harrington. He was wary of memsahibs and so was polite but thought she would count having met him as enough. Memsahibs did not turn up for coffee at 9.30 and not blink an eye at a naked befurred mountaineer. She, however, did. He said that Joy was her name and the way she lived. Pure Joy.

For many, many years Calcutta thought they were lovers. I know I fought some strong battles with arrogant little expat schoolboys who thought to make fun of it. I certainly hit one. They were, of course, not. Desmond was not really a ladies man. Much to my mother's disappointment. She tried. Many times. As they grew older however she was happy to simply have his love. He said to me that if he had ever wanted a woman it would have been her.

Such a love story. So I grew up with a second father. A man of wit and intelligence, great charm, great talent. He was an artist, a journalist, a mountaineer and, when I did a google search last night, the term that kept coming up was 'renaissance man'. Perhaps one of the last.

Please understand that my father, although a little confused, was a good friend of Desmond's and there was never really any jealousy. The only time he put his foot down was with the release of 'Sergeant Pepper'. Desla had a party, a hippy party where we all dressed in bright florals and danced madly to 'Lucy in the Sky With Diamonds'. One of my father's pals was there, a very proper man Pierson Surita, and we pretended to take LSD by popping prettily decorated aspirin in our  mouths. Pierson went straight to my father the next day and there was a fuss. But it was so funny - I remember the two of doubled over with laughter - thrilled at their own wickedness. At that time my mother didn't drink and I don't think I ever remember Desla having a drink. They were, as they said, "high on life".

There is too much to say in a blog: days on the river when the West Bengal government gave him a boat to go up river and sketch the old houses of the Raj, days in Kalimpong where a picnic would become an adventure, stories would be told. In Bhutan telling me about the Dzong in Pairo, climbing up to Taksung and finding an old lama who had sat for most of his life gazing at the perfect view for meditation. Parties, dancing - my mother and he doing the 'Calcutta Grind' at the Grand Hotel. As I am writing this my eyes are filled with tears: it was a golden time.

I could go on and on - the Statesman, the sketches,, 'An Artist's Impression, the founding of the Junior Statesman - India's first youth magazine. He was a remarkable, special and deeply loved man. When he died it was announced on the Free Tibet radio station. He was a mountain man and one of those golden people who are only given to us for a short time.

I had a dream about two years after the death of my mother where she came to me and told how happy she was, she and Desmond. But they rather thought they might return to us in a few years, there was more living to be done. I'm waiting.