Mother Teresa's nuns pray for JFK Jr.

[sarwar]

Mother Teresa's nuns pray for
JFK Jr.


AP News Service


CALCUTTA, India (AP) _ Mother
Teresa's order of nuns held special
prayers Tuesday for John F. Kennedy Jr.,
as friends recalled his three-month
sojourn in India as a shaggy-haired
college student.

Kennedy visited the Missionaries of Charity at its Calcutta
headquarters during a trip to India in 1983 to research a
thesis on Indian democracy for his undergraduate studies.

``We are praying for him. We are praying to the Lord so
that he may grant peace and comfort to the members of
the bereaved family,'' said Sister Nirmala, who became
head of the order shortly before Mother Teresa's death in
1997.

The Times of India said Kennedy spent much of his visit to
the country in a low-grade New Delhi hotel in the
Paharganj district, which specializes in cheap
accommodation and clothing stores for backpackers.

``He seemed to revel in being rebellious. Which explains his
insistence on wearing the same jeans for weeks, not
shaving and keeping his hair long,'' said Vishu Bandhu
Gupta, the Indian bureaucrat who looked after him,
according to the Times.

Kennedy avoided the staff of the U.S. Embassy until his
mother, Jacqueline Kennedy Onassis, joined him. She
reportedly was horrified when she saw her son, took him
to a luxury hotel, and persuaded him to wear a suit, the
Times said.

[durango]

JFK Junior's 60 quiet days in Paharganj

By Vinay Tewari

NEW DELHI: John F Kennedy Jr, who disappeared into the deep
blues in his light plane off Martha's Vineyard in the US over the
weekend, had spent 60 quiet days in anonymity in the dingy bylanes
of Delhi's Paharganj in 1982, holed up in a hotel without a phone -
unshaven, unwashed and clad in a pair of battered jeans.

But what brought the son of America's most loved President here?
What made him scour the little lanes and bylanes around Lodhi
Colony, Parliament Street and Connaught Place with just Rs 150 in
his pocket to see through a day?

``He was required to submit a project paper on the functioning of
Indian democracy as part of his undergraduate studies at Brown
University. He wanted complete anonymity... as he realised he
could experience real Indian vibrancy only by melting in the
crowd,'' says bureaucrat Vishv Bandhu Gupta, who opened up the
world of India for him along with Tony Jesudasan, then working for
the US embassy here.

But that was just his stated objective. JFK Jr had other ideas.
Keen to shake off the regimented lifestyle of a ``royal'', always
under the glare of arc lights, he forbade the embassy to keep in
touch with him. And insisted he would choose a hotel all by
himself. He did... a non-descript Shivalik Lodge in dingy (by 1983
standards) Paharganj, which does not even exist now in its original
form.

``He seemed to revel in being rebellious. Which explains his
insistence on wearing the same jeans for weeks, not shaving and
keeping his hair long. In fact, he brought just three sets of clothes
with him,'' recalls Mr Gupta.

Which also explains why JFK Jr always travelled in rickety
autorickshaws, making an exception only twice by travelling in Mr
Gupta's old Fiat car. But when protocol demanded, he couldn't
refuse breakfast invitations from Prime Minister Indira Gandhi and
President Giani Zail Singh - both of which turned out to be
thoroughly eventful.

``He came out of Rashtrapati Bhavan perspiring heavily. He told
me and Jesu, Gianiji took him in a bearhug and wouldn't leave him
for 20 minutes. Perhaps, he misunderstood the Indian style of being
affectionate,'' Mr Gupta says. Later, having greedily imbibed the
intimate details of Indian democracy, he questioned Ms Gandhi on
several embarrassing points - the need to impose the Emergency,
corruption, poverty and the Punjab problem.

But his freedom was shortlived. His mother - Jacqueline
Kennedy-Onassis - the only person JFK Jr would obey, was
scheduled to arrive in Delhi for her onward journey to Jaipur to
visit Maharani Gayatri Devi. Days later, a horrified Jacqueline
arrived to see her son resembling a near-alien. The mother in her
took over. He was ordered a thorough wash in the Taj Hotel,
asked to don a suit and forbidden to even look towards Shivalik
Lodge.

He may have grown up for the world. For Jacqueline, he remained
the three-year-old boy who swung his tiny right arm to salute his
father's passing casket. That was 1963. Now history repeats itself
in 1999.