Maddy Brunelle
November 8, 2011
It was a long night at work and I just wanted to go home, but when the usual party of ten came and sat down to eat. I was not pleased, but I knew I had to serve them like always. A man whose name I could not recall with long hair and a robe approached me.
The man asked,” Why are you still here.”
I replied, “I am all done with classes and I am only here for two more visiting days.”
He said, “What have you been doing here?”
I replied, “I am studying abroad here in India trying to make ends meet by working in this restaurant.”
The man introduced himself as Siddhartha and began telling me how much he wanted to go to America and see what it had to offer. I decided I wanted to take him to my hometown in order to show him where I grew up. After his party was done eating I asked him if he wanted to come to America with me and see the wonderful sights. I saw his reaction and I knew he wanted to go join me.
Siddhartha, Siddhartha, where are you? When I looked up at the passenger side of the car, he was standing their ready to go to the airport with me. The plane ride was very long and knowing we were about to get jet leg I started coming up with ideas on how to get rid of it. My first thought was going to the gym but I was not sure if Siddhartha would want to go to a loud place right off of the bat. Therefore, I thought of my favorite quiet and peaceful place where I had gone growing up. This place was located in my town of South Hadley, it was called Skinner Mountain, at the top there was a summit house.
When driving up to the road to start hiking up skinner, Siddhartha was surprised. He could not believe all of the fall foliage. The red, orange, green, and even yellow leaves amazed him. The air was warm on this fall day with the trees swaying in the background for noise. “Along these paths and other paths did he learn to travel? He lost himself a thousand times and for days on end he dwelt in non-being. But although the paths took him away from self; in the end they always led back to it” (15). When we reached the top of the mountain, the view took Siddhartha’s breath away. The sounds of nature and of birds chirping were relaxing for him. It was now his time to sit on the rock and look out at the world and meditate. “Siddhartha reflected deeply as he went on his way. He realized that he was no longer a youth; he was now a man” (37). It was because of this hike that his mind set got changed, he got to see the way things really were and how much different the world can be in other places.
After hiking, it was dinner time, and we needed to get some food. Instead of going out to dinner, we went to my house and had my parents cook for us. After dinner, we were very tired so we all watched television and then finally got to sleep in my own bed. It was the best feeling I had ever felt.
In the morning, I told Siddhartha that we needed to take it easy I had a big event planned for the night. When three in the afternoon came around, Siddhartha and I got dressed and ready to go out. We went to my family’s restaurant called Dockside. It is a family owned business for almost 50 years. My grandfather and his brother built this establishment with their own two hands. The restaurant is older and has hard wooden walls that surround the dining room and bar area. The tables are marble-like hard round tables surrounded by black plastic chairs. As Siddhartha and I walked through the doors of the restaurant, it was chaos. How many people could we jam into this place? Siddhartha was taken back by the smell and wanted to start drinking to enjoy the fun. There were people dancing and drinking, but most of all having the best time of their lives. Sometimes during the fall, my dad would hire bands to come in and play music in the dining room. Tonight was the best musician we had ever gotten. Scotty McCreery was in the front of the room singing on the microphone. He was my all-time favorite country singer. In a water tower town everybody waves, church doors are the only thing that's open on Sundays, word travels fast, and wheels turn slow.
We sat at a table and started talking to each other about our lives and how much fun I was having here. Siddhartha on the other hand was remembering when Kamala told him,” that he was never servile to the merchant, but compelled him to treat him as an equal and even more than his equal “(66). The idea of having my family own a business brought back some strong feelings for Siddhartha because he thought of the time when he was in business with Kamaswami. He got really upset and started to cry, I couldn't believe how sensitive he is. My father came over and began to talk to him.
My father said, “Working at a restaurant impacts all of our lives because we are all involved in giving respect and politeness to all customers.”
Siddhartha began to open up, he replied, “Kamawsmwai never treated as anything less than him, because I was a valuable person.”
He was starting to understand the compromises you have to make while running a business. "I felt knowledge and the unity of the world to circulate in me like my own blood, but I also felt compelled to leave the Buddha and the great knowledge."(96) Siddhartha started to tell me about why he got so sensitive and emotional when we were talking. I started to tell him how things changed and that if it were not for my grandfather, than this restaurant would have never been built. My grandfather worked very hard and got a lot of help from friends to start this restaurant. I told Siddhartha this story and it made him realize that not all of our choices we make are right ones but in the end they will always work out. Siddhartha started to get tired and so I suggested that he may want to go to bed soon because in the morning, he had an early flight home to India.
As he was boarding the plane in the morning, I started to think about the time we spent together. Overall, I tend to believe that Siddhartha loved being at the Summit house because it was more suitable to his life in India. It reassembles peace and quiet and a sense of the self there. There is no one else up there to judge you or your beliefs. I really enjoyed my time with him and if he ever comes back here again I have already thought of more places I would love to take him.
