Axx Ithaki...

Sunburst over Ithaki...what a glorious welcome to the island at journey's end!

© Priya Tuli

When does an impulse turn into a passion? At what point does the change-over happen? I find the lines are often blurred; there is much in common between the two. Both involve following your heart. Your soul. The voices in your head. Often, the beat of a different drummer. You just HAVE to do it. There are no options, no choices. It's the only thing.

It might start with a thought, a sound, a colour, a smell...the trigger could be anything. Quietly, in the darkest recesses of your mind, it grows to monstrous proportions, unnoticed, over the years. Till one fine day it suddenly leaps up screaming, and engulfs you completely. You thrash around, powerless to resist. It sucks you in, chews you up and spits you out, and you pick yourself up and go after it. There is nothing else you can do. And so, a passion is born.

It was a bit like that with the poem.

Ithaki.
Magical journey of mythic proportions. Of ships and storms and high seas, of Cyclops and Laistrygonians, of challenges and discoveries and victories. And above all, of passion. For the journey of a lifetime...the journey of life.

It first touched me when I was 21, a poem shared by a friend over a revolting cup of coffee at the university cafeteria. I hastily scrawled it on the fly-leaf of a course-book, ripped out the page to keep it safe, and promptly lost sight of it.

Ah, but already it had seeded itself, unbidden and unmarked. When I re-discovered it nearly 15 years later, it seemed like an old friend...the words familiar but still new, as if read for the first time. Still with the power to bring a gleam to my eye, a rush of adrenalin surging through my corpus, and this pure impulse to GO! nownownow!! The meaning remained the same, yet the meaning had changed, with all that had passed in the years between.

I seemed closer now, further along on this journey of life, with 'Ithaki' almost within reach...but it would be another 8 years before I would actually get there. For one, I still didn't know that the island really existed. I truly believed it was just another Greek myth, like the countless others I had devoured during my schooldays, fascinated by all the complex relationships and fantastic tales...(those were the days before Dr Seuss and Harry Potter and Lemony Snicket, remember, all we had was good ol' Jabberwocky!)

Then, almost a quarter century (!) from the time I first discovered the poem, I found out that the island DOES exist, it is NOT just another myth about Odysseus and Penelope...and that's when it grabbed me by the throat. There really IS an Ithaki!! And I simply HAD to go there!!!

The voices in my head shouted out like a Greek chorus gone mad: GO GO GO!!! NOW NOW NOW!!! Butbutbut I was broke, and out of work...how would I do this? The voices just grew louder. (They talk to me all the time, it's when they shout I sit up and take notice!)

So...yes. I finally made it to Ithaki in 2001. And then again, in June 2004. And what was it like, this island home of Ulysses? Did it live up to its promise, was it worthy of the myths? I'd rather let the poem speak to you, as it spoke to me. And so, the journey continues...

Vathy, Ithaki...idyllic mythicalislandhome of Ulysses

© Priya Tuli

ITHAKA
When you set out for Ithaka
Ask that your way be long,
full of adventure, full of instruction.
The Laistrygonians and the Cyclops
Angry Posiedon - do not fear them :
such as these you will never find
as long as your thought is lofty, as long as a rare
emotion touch your spirit and your body...
...you will not meet them
unless you carry them in your soul,
unless your soul could raise them up before you.

Ask that your way be long.
At many a summer dawn to enter
- with what gratitude, what joy -
ports seen for the first time
to stop at Phoenician trading centres...
...to visit Egyptian cities,
to gather stores of knowledge from the learned.

Have Ithaka always in mind.
Your arrival there is what you are destined for.
But don't in the least hurry the journey.
Better it last for years,
so that when you reach the island you are old,
rich with all that you have gained on the way,
not expecting Ithaka to give you wealth.
Ithaka gave you the splendid journey
Without her you would not have set out.
She hasn't anything else to give you.

And if you find her poor, Ithaka hasn't deceived you.
So wise have you become, of such experience,
that already you'll have understood
what these Ithakas mean.
-Kavafis

Factoid: In English, it's Ithaka; in Greek, it's Ithaki. In English it's Ahh, in Greek, it's Axx!