THE first time Michael McColly set foot inside a religious temple other than a church was at the mosque in the Senegalese farming village he lived in as a Peace Corps volunteer
Feeling His Way on Sacred Ground
By MICHAEL McCOLLY
Published: March 7, 2004
THE first time I set foot inside a religious temple other than a church was at the mosque in the Senegalese farming village I lived in as a Peace Corps volunteer. It was nothing more than a mud-brick structure no bigger than my parent's garage with a corrugated tin roof and a log fence around it to keep animals out.
The only thing that distinguished it as a mosque was a small gold-painted crescent on an iron rod that came up from what I guess was the minaret - simply a chimney where a villager could call the faithful to prayer.
I can't remember the circumstances now; this was in the early 80's. Perhaps it wasn't even a Muslim holy day, but the day the rains finally returned after the nine-month dry season. That night I was swept up in the excitement of the villagers and didn't want to exclude myself simply because I was not a believer. So when the Koranic teacher of the village invited me inside, I didn't give it a second thought.
I took off my shoes and figured I could just stand at the back and watch. But when the village imam saw me enter, he ordered me up front with the elders.
I was flattered. I had been there six months, and it hadn't been easy. I had little to show for my work except a vegetable garden that produced a meager crop for the women who labored on it.
I looked behind me at the rows of men lined up in their long gowns, and suddenly I felt terribly out of place in my Izod shirt and tie dye pants. The teacher signaled for me to hold my hands out as if receiving something, and then before I knew it, out boomed the voice of the imam: "Allah u Akbar," and down everyone went. I knew I had no business being there.
And so while they were prostrate, I slipped to the back row, stumbling over a doorway cluttered with plastic sandals, and tried to get out. But when I opened the tin door a villager was entering, and he was so happy to see me there, I didn't have the heart to leave. I hunched in the back until prayers were over, too embarrassed even to watch.
For years that awkward memory has haunted me in my travels into other cultures. Even though many cultures have become tolerant, if not eager, to attract the spiritually curious, I still feel uneasy entering sacred sites.
Of course, I know enough to wear the appropriate dress and keep my camera inside my pack. But if I do enter, I am always torn as to what to do.
Do you pretend it's a kind of museum and study everything, including the worshipers, as if they are actors in a play? Or do you dare close your eyes and allow the knees to shake and the spine to shudder from the vibrations of the faithful?
Some years ago, I traveled in southern Mexico, visiting a small town outside of San Cristóbal de las Casas that was home to descendents of the Maya. And as I got out of my minibus, I felt like a conquistador on a horse, as en masse we white giants tromped through town to this beautiful light-blue church on a hill.
It was the day after Christmas and the floor of the church was strewn with pine needles. There were no pews. And for a few coins, a wrinkled old woman the size of a child lighted homemade candles and chanted incantations to protect you from the Diablo. Above in the four corners, the Maya gods looked down in disdain while we milled about with our mouths open.
On my first visit to India, I quickly became dizzy circling the ancient temples to Shiva and Vishnu, enthralled with each mythological scene sculptured in stone. Finally, I got up the nerve to venture inside. I watched the worshipers buy their strings of marigolds, then followed them.
They bowed and placed their flowers on a black soapstone phallus in honor of Shiva. But that was too public, so I tiptoed off into an alcove and dropped my flowers at the base of a shrine to Ganesh. Inspired, I decided to drop a few coins on a tray for the Brahmin priest seated not far away, as did the worshipers. He offered me a small banana, waved a puff of incense over me, then touched my forehead, and out I went into the streets, glowing.
No one noticed - that is, until I met with some of my Indian friends, who broke out in laughter when they saw the scarlet dot of puja marking my third eye. Embarrassed, I tried to rub it off, but it only turned my forehead the color of my face.
Then a couple of years ago, I visited a monastery north of Bangkok. That day I'd hoped to see several more temples and catch a bus back to Bangkok, but as usual, my ambitions did not fit reality and it was already late afternoon. I didn't even know how I would make it back to the main road to catch my bus.
Staring at my guidebook, an old woman began talking to me in Thai. I smiled like an idiot and looked around for help, but there was no one but a couple and their little daughter standing next to a taxi.
I realized they were related when the taxi driver opened the door and asked, "Go to Bangkok, in car?" Initially I thought, "No way, and get scammed for a hundred dollars?" But how could I deny a smiling grandmother and her family who'd come to a monastery to make a donation to the AIDS hospital there?
On the road, struggling to communicate, I said something about the "beautiful temples," only meaning that there were many around there, but the taxi driver thought I wanted to see them. A half-hour later, we were in front of the ruins of the famous monkey temple in Lop Buri.
And that was just the beginning. Before he dropped me back at my hotel in Bangkok late that night, we had stopped at not one but two other Buddhist temples. Inside the second one, he turned to me and put his hands together, then pointed to the tarnished gold Buddha on his throne and together we bowed.
Last year, after 20 years, I finally made it back to that village in Senegal. Arriving without any notice, I entered my old compound of thatch huts and cement-block houses, fearful that I'd been long forgotten. But they recognized me and I was greeted like the prodigal son.
Walking around the village with the chief, a 16-year-old when I left, we passed the mosque, and like the rest of the village and much of the country, it had sadly deteriorated. Throughout the day, scores of villagers passed through the chief's compound to greet me, and as they did I heard the name Allah invoked again and again, as they gave thanks for the health of my family, for my Peace Corps colleagues and for bringing me back.
That night back at my hotel in Kaolack, I could barely sleep. I drifted in and out of a semiconscious state, seeing hands come toward me and hearing the villagers call me by my Senegalese name. And more than once, I caught myself sitting up in bed and reaching out as if they were still there.
MICHAEL McCOLLY is writing a memoir based on his travels through several countries affected by the AIDS epidemic.
