excerpted from the print magazine…
When I was eight, I left a large stack of Superman and Richie Rich comic books in India and came back home with an armful of Krishna, Siva and Ganesh comic books instead. This was not the result of a Divine trade or any spiritual curiosity on my part. For the past four weeks while my parents, younger brother and I visited family and friends, I was a one-man comic book expedition, seeking out and buying comic books in each city, town and village. Now flying west over the Atlantic, I was returning home instead with holy consolation prizes.
I was familiar with these new comic book characters: they posed beatific on my parents’ altar as statues and portraits, and were referred to singularly as “God.” During visits to the Hindu temple, I would follow the lead of the adults: chanting, praying and prostrating myself in front of life-sized icons who looked powerful and colourful, smiled knowingly, but never seemed to do anything. They meant a lot to my parents and their friends, while for me and my crew of grade two, our pantheon was made up of Superman, Batman, Spider-Man and the Hulk…
