EVERYONE SEEMS TO HAVE GROWN more used to being on the train. The table in the lounge is the center of the universe around which we gather every day for breakfast, lunch, and supper, and where we talk about life and our hopes for the future. Hilal is now installed in the same carriage as us; she shares our meals, uses my bathroom to take her daily shower, practices obsessively, and takes less and less part in discussions.
Today we’re talking about the shamans of Lake Baikal, our next stop. Yao explains that he would really like me to meet one of them.
“We’ll see,” I say, which translates as “I’m not really interested.”
However, I don’t think he’ll be discouraged so easily. One of the best-known principles in martial arts is that of nonresistance. Good fighters use their opponent’s energy and turn it back on them. So the more I waste my energy on words, the less convinced I will be of what I’m saying and the easier it will be to get the better of me.
“I’ve been thinking about our conversation before we arrived in Novosibirsk,” my editor says. “You said that the Aleph was a point that existed outside of us, but that when people really love each other, they can locate that point wherever they want. The shamans believe that they are endowed with special powers and that only they can see such visions.”
“If we’re talking about the magical Tradition, the answer is yes, the Aleph is outside of us. If we’re talking about the human tradition, people who are in love can, at certain very special moments, experience the Whole. In real life, we tend to see ourselves as separate beings, but the Universe is only one thing, one soul. However, to invoke the Aleph, something very powerful has to happen: a huge orgasm, a terrible loss, the climax of a great conflict, a moment of ecstasy when confronted by something of rare beauty.”
“Well, there’s no shortage of conflicts,” says Hilal. “We’re surrounded by them, even in this carriage.”
Having been quiet for some time, she seems to have gone back to the beginning of the journey and to be intent on stirring up a situation that has already been resolved. She won the battle and wants to demonstrate her newly acquired power. My editor knows that these words are aimed at her.
“Conflicts are for undiscerning souls,” she replies, making a generalization that nonetheless hits its intended target. “The world is divided into those who understand me and those who don’t. In the case of the latter, I simply leave them to torment themselves trying to gain my sympathy.”
“That’s funny,” says Hilal, “I’m just the same. I’ve always been that way, and I’ve always got where I wanted to get, one example being that now I’m sleeping in a berth in this carriage.”
Yao gets up. He obviously isn’t in the mood for this kind of conversation.
My publisher looks at me. What does he expect me to do? Take sides?
“You don’t know what you’re talking about,” says the editor, looking straight at Hilal now. “I always thought I was prepared for everything until my son was born, and then the world seemed to fall in on me. I felt weak and insignificant and incapable of protecting him. Only children believe they’re capable of everything. They’re trusting and fearless, so they believe in their own power and get exactly what they want. When children grow up, they start to realize that they’re not as powerful as they thought and that they need other people in order to survive. Then the child begins to love and to hope his love will be requited; as life goes on, he develops an ever greater need to be loved in return, even if that means having to give up his power. We all end up where we are now: grown-ups doing everything we can to be accepted and loved.”
Yao has returned, balancing a tray bearing tea and five mugs.
“That’s why I asked about the Aleph and love,” my editor goes on. “I wasn’t talking about love between a man and a woman. Sometimes, when I watched my son sleeping, I could see everything that was happening in the world: the place he had come from, the places he would go to, the trials he would have to face to achieve what I dreamed he would achieve. He grew up, and I loved him just as much, but the Aleph disappeared.”
Yes, she had understood the Aleph. Her words are followed by a respectful silence. Hilal is completely disarmed.
“I’m lost,” she says. “It feels as if the reasons I had for getting where I am now have completely disappeared. I could get out at the next station, go back to Ekaterinburg, devote the rest of my life to the violin, and continue to understand nothing. On the day of my death, I will ask: what was I doing there?”
I touch her arm.
“Come with me.”
I was about to get up and take her to the Aleph, to remind her why she had decided to cross Asia by train. I was prepared to accept whatever decision she might make. I thought of the homeopathic doctor whom I had never seen again after our joint return to a past life; perhaps it would be the same with Hilal.
“Just a moment,” Yao says.
He asks us all to sit down again, distributes the mugs, and places the teapot in the center of the table.
“When I lived in Japan, I learned the beauty of simple things. And the simplest and most sophisticated thing I experienced was drinking tea. I got up just now in order to repeat the experience and to explain that despite all our conflicts, all our difficulties, all our meanness and generosity, we can still love the simple things in life. The samurai used to leave their swords outside before going into a house, sitting down in the correct posture, and taking part in an elaborate tea ceremony. During that time, they could forget all about war and devote themselves to worshipping beauty. Let’s do that now.”
He fills each mug with tea. We wait in silence.
“I went to fetch the tea because I saw two samurai ready to do battle, but when I returned, the honorable warriors had been replaced by two souls who understood each other with no need for soothing tea. Let us drink together anyway. Let us concentrate all our efforts on achieving Perfection through the imperfect gestures of everyday life. True wisdom means respecting the simple things we do, for they can take us where we need to go.”
We respectfully drink the tea that Yao has poured for us. Now that I have been forgiven, I can savor the taste of the young leaves before they were picked by calloused hands, dried, and made into a drink that creates harmony all around. None of us is in a hurry; as we travel on, we are constantly destroying and rebuilding ourselves and who we are.
When we have finished, I again invite Hilal to follow me. She deserves to know the full story and to decide for herself.
WE ARE IN THE VESTIBULE between carriages. A man of about my age is talking to a woman who is standing precisely where the Aleph is. Given the special energy of that place, they might stay there for some time.
We wait for a while. A third person arrives, lights a cigarette, and joins the other two.
Hilal makes as if to go back into the lounge. “This is
I ask her to stay where she is. We can wait.
“Why were you so aggressive, when she obviously wanted to make peace?” I ask.
“I don’t know. I’m lost. Every time we stop, every day that passes, I feel more and more lost. I thought I had such a need to light that fire on the mountain, to be by your side, to help you fulfill some mission unknown to me. I thought that she would react the way she did and do everything possible to stop that from happening. And I prayed for the strength to overcome all obstacles, to accept the consequences, to be humiliated, insulted, rejected, and despised, and all in the name of a love I never thought could exist but which does exist. And I’ve come very close to achieving that. I now sleep in the berth next to yours, which is empty because God decided that the person who was going to occupy it would drop out at the last moment. She didn’t make that decision; it came from on high, I’m sure of that. Now, though, for the first time since I got on this train bound for the Pacific coast, I suddenly have no desire to carry on.”
Another person arrives and joins the group. He comes armed with three cans of beer. It looks like their conversation is going to last quite a long time.
“I know what you mean. You think you’ve reached the end, but you haven’t. And you’re quite right that you need to understand why you’re here. You came to forgive me, and I want to show you why. However, words kill, and only through direct experience will you understand everything—or rather, only then will
