Ganesha Goes to Lunch
Lissa Coffey
Every culture has stories that are passed down from generation to generation. Myths, fables, and tales are one way that we are taught lessons, and preserve tradition. I have found a delightful book called “Ganesha Goes to Lunch.” Author Kamla K. Kapur has assembled a collection of classic Indian myths that reflect both the mystery and the magic of this beautiful country. Besides the title story, the book includes such gems as “How Brahma Created the Dream,” “The Toad Who Didn’t Croak,” “From the Eyes of Stars,” and “The Snake Who Lost His Hiss.” Here’s an excerpt from her preface:
“Life is infinitely more marvelous than our day-to-day business and work, money and illness, family and bosses would make it seem. It is precisely the function of myth to thrust us out of the quotidian into the miraculous. One lives life more deeply, with greater peace and joy, when one lives with the enigmas that permeate it. These stories warp our minds, and allow us a perspective on life, on its incredible, enmeshing, magic web of Maya, and the dreamlike nature of our experience on this planet. These myths are reminders from spaceless eternity of the stuff of which our bodies, minds, souls, and spirits are made. They wake us up, and help us live with, and within, the mystery that is the matrix of our being.”
Ganesha Goes to Lunch: Classics from Mystic India