Eastern Journeys

These inscriptions on the Shikumen houses in Shanghai’s Siming village intrigued the Shanghai Daily journalist to probe further,and he discovered a delightful journey that has culturally connected China and India for nearly a century. “The locality where I found the plaques was also where Rabindranath lived during his visit to China in the 1920s. Though the house he lived in was later brought down to make way for a massive flyover,the wall remains and makes a special mention of his friendship with Chinese poet Xu Zhimo whose house he stayed in,” says Mukherjee,the maker of a documentary Gurudev: a Journey to the East. Later,Mukherjee visited libraries,read many Chinese blogs and met the locals with the intention of writing an article for his newspaper or to make a music video. But the information he got was so overwhelming that he decided to make a film.

The documentary was first screened in May this year at the Indian pavilion of the World Expo held in Shanghai,to mark the poet’s 150th birth anniversary. While the highlight of the occasion was the unveiling of Tagore’s bust by President Pratibha Patil,the documentary received a warm response and was later screened at many events in China and abroad.

The film was recently screened in Mumbai at the Observer Research Foundation,Colaba,as part of the foundation’s initiative,Forum for India China Citizens Dialogue. “Bivash’s film shatters many myths about the Chinese perception of India and Indian culture. Tagore’s influence is still present there and translations of his works are plentiful,” says Sudheendra Kulkarni,chairman ORF,Mumbai.

Mukherjee’s film captures a similar tale as he interviews Wu Yan,the 91-year-old translator of Tagore’s works who,during his days as a translator,would get up at 4 am and translate just one paragraph and would spend the rest of the day contemplating it. Mukherjee says,“When I went to China ten years ago,most of the Chinese I met had not even seen an Indian. Things have changed now,but dialogue between the citizens of the two nations is must. We have many fears about China,but perhaps there is not much to be afraid of.”