town criers

Slow to react, we all are. In all our worries about passing exams, getting home on time, not burning the milk, paying the phone bill on the last day, filling petrol before the bike breaks down, finding a home, finding peers, asking boss for leave, not getting fleeced by the automen, watching soaps to see if the vamp gets her way, and oh so many mini-paranoias, we are only taken aback by a tsunami.
Not shocked, terrified, or anxious. Just taken aback. Dazed.

I was going to blog of how I ran from the huge wave in Mahabalipuram rushing to swallow the town, but I heard too many people say, "I almost died, you know… I'm ok now. And I'm all ready to party on New Year's".
I'll desist from telling my tale. I don't want to be another tourist with a digital camera, capturing a capsized boat with the naked orphan bawling next to it. I'll let the ones who know speak.
*****

This morning…

Me: Did the tsunami affect some more slums last night?
Automan Raja: There are no slums left, ma… See how everyone's on the streets…
Me: Is your house ok?
R: Mine was a brick house. One full wall crashed down on Sunday morning. I'm wearing my brother's shirt. I'm left with nothing but my life.
Me: Oh. Your family…
R: Thank god, ma. They're all alive. We are living in this school here (points to it as we pass by).
Me: The government is giving some compensation, no?
R: Yes, yes… Rs.2000, rice, and clothes. Oh, to get that stupid Rs.2000, the kind of nonsense I had to go through… No queue, nothing. They'll throw it and we have to catch. Everyone was stamping on each other, grabbing whatever they could. It was like they were feeding wolves.
Me: Umm… Rs.2000? For how long?
R (Laughs): Till another tsunami strikes!
Me: …
R: That's all, kannu. That's all they'll give us. But Jayalalithaa has asked for more funds. I hear so many people are donating money and medicines. But where? I haven't got anything… I don't know where it all goes. We can't say politicians take rice away! They might sit there on their asses doing nothing, but I think we poor people are the ones really stealing away from each other.
Me: How can you say that?!
R: Because everyone's afraid they're going to die now. If I sit dry and safe in a big house far away from the sea, I might feel sympathy. But right now, I want my family to be alive. I don't care if the guy in Nagapattinam dies.
<<>>
Me: Do you get food regularly?
R: They bring food to us everyday. Some sambar rice in packets. They bring it in the kuppathotti lorry (garbage lorry). The food stinks, but we have to eat, no? All the kids have been vomiting since 4 days.
<<>>
Me: I'll get off at Santhome church.
R: Santhome? It's near Marina, I hope you know. Be careful, ma… Don't go near the beach. If something happens to you, your parents will not be able to bear it.
Me: I thought you didn't care…
R (grins): What to do? Stupid human feelings…
*****

This morning at home…

Me: Your daughter didn't come with you today?
Maid Chellamma: No, she's gone to my old house near Besant Nagar beach. It's all broken.
Me: Who stays there now? Is it your own house?
C: What you are asking me such idiotic questions? As if I'll have my own house! I'm a maid!
Me: So? My maid in Bangalore has a house…
C: Are her children earning?
Me: Yes.
C: So there. Mine is still in school.
Me: Ok, anyway… did the people living in your old house get money from the government?
C: Yes. They got Rs.100, 3 kg rice, one sari and one lungi.
Me: Rs.100?! Per head?
C: Oho. If it's per head, will you be happy?
Me: No, even that is not enough. Unless it's per head per day till you find a new place to stay in.
C: Aaaha. Sure. The government will give like that. It's actually Rs.2000 per family. But the real house owner comes after the government officers have gone, and take the money away. They give us Rs.100.
Me: It makes some sense. I mean, he only has to rebuild the house no?
C: Ok fine then. Shouldn't they have some provision for the tenants also? Does it mean that just because I stay on rent, I can die?
Me: Come on, Chellamma, don't be dramatic…
C: Tell me… how many people like you--students and young working people--live on rent? If some earthquake happened and your house crashed with all your possessions inside, will you say "Paavam, the owner will have to reconstruct"? You might find a new place to rent, but what about your belongings?
Me: They should have separate compensation for the tenants...
C: Are you even listening? I said those people got just Rs.100 to wipe their ass with.
Me: What about private people helping?
C: Yes, thank god for that. So many are surviving only because of that. But I think much of the contributions are not reaching us. Ok one help I want... Will you ask people to give their help to credible organisations? Or they can come and help us directly. We won't bite and eat them up.

dear santa,

I’d like a quill, some ink and crispy yellowish paper. I’d like a hat to wear with a tilt.
I’d like to sit at an old old mahogany table by the wide window and draw the wispy cream curtains billowing in the breeze. I’d like to pretend that the sudden brightlight hit my eye and squint. Squint and go on to yawn. Squint, yawn, and go on to stretch. I’d moan too, as all good stretchers must.
I’d like to lean back on the chair, and stare out the window. No green fields and unending landscape for me, please. I’d like a crowded market street with yelling and bustling around, and more squinting under the unpityingly wounding sunlight. Oh, if I forgot to mention, I’d like noontime. When the greeeeen of a watermelon and the rrrred of a tomato would beam out competitively next to each other. I’d like to see people laughing and squabbling about thr price of lemons. I'd like to think I can smell the musty, aging pile of books homing silverfish. And yearn to brush the white dust off the ill-tempered bookseller’s hair.
I’d like to sit with my bare feet crossed up on the table, crook an elbow, and prop my head on a palm. I’d like to sit there like that, with droopy eyes under the brim of my hat, staring at the quill and paper. They can wait till I nap.
I’d like to close my eyes to the buzz of a hot and busy day outside.
I’d like to buy some inspiration off the shelf.

Goodily yours,
ro

sunshine again

"I've spoilt myself living in Bangalore," I thought, one zany day, "Let me treat myself to some Chennai."
So here I am, in the city of wide roads, little smartypant kids who know every Rajnikant, Vivek and Vijay dialogue,
shockingly gutter-mouthed motorists,
wisecracking automen telling their passengers "petrol rate yeri pochu ma…" (petrol rates have risen) just when papers announce that there will be no price hike,
music and film festivals that turn into 'tamizh vazhga' (long live tamil) fiestas,
lording of The Hindu, lording of amma,
Sun TV, set-top box, HUGE movie hoardings,
super kaapi,
jasmine and oil smelling hair,
winding flyovers, in-city buses with scrawny college boys dancing on top,
women who don't hesitate to grab dirty old men by their collar and throw them out of moving buses,
wise men who scramble away from the women's seats,
disappearing monuments,
the exultant "tamizh thaana?!" on discovering tamilians from other States,
Koovam, Spencers mall,
begging mafia, water mafia, sand mafia… oh, there's just so much!

Aside: Somehow, the word 'Chennai' has just no effect. So official, it sounds. So I will say Madras. Colonial? So be it.

I turn a deep maroon to say that all it took to ease into the city, and sweat along was the end of my Bangalore prepaid SIM card. Come new Madras number, and I've said my last "tata!" to Kempegowda. Shame. Shame upon me.
The last two days have been spent house hunting... Before I actually got on the task, I figured I'd see a real estate ad in the papers, make an appointment to meet the landlord/landlady, see the place, fall in love with it, and instantly go curtain shopping. Leave alone home accessories, I haven't still found one piece of floor I would like to step on everyday after work. And a wart-sporting, steel-scale-holding budget witch follows me around, rapping me in the knuckles every time my eyes light up at a wonderful, but annoyingly expensive house.
I now realise I should've kissed the walls and doors of my home in Bangalore a lot more. Sigh. I hear the new décor trend is to paint your walls white and then keep them unclean enough so they turn other shades. That way, there is even a surprise element to it all.
Now, in the search for my new home, I've walked into snail shells, brothels, palaces, convent dormitories, prisons, religious conversion centres, and nice homely little houses. But what I cannot believe is the number of people who've appointed themselves my real estate agents. From friends to aunts, colleagues to Vasantha Bhavan (VBs- a south indian fast food restaurant near office) waiters & cashiers, neighbours to shopkeepers… everyone's in on it.
I walk into VBs for coffee and "You got it-a?" has replaced "Hello, ma". We all pour over the classifieds, laughing over every ad that says, "24 hours water supply" and "fixed rent 3000/- negotiable". After all, during eight months of college, I only ate every meal there and translated complex demands like "no skin in coffee, please" and "I have strands of hair in my sambar" into tamil.
But what has now bound me to them for life are their offers to let me stay in their houses if I didn't find a suitable accommodation. ("My house is always open for you, ma... but it might be little humble for you..." Humble?!! I don't see anybody offering to let me stay in his 8 bedroom house...)
The kannadiga manager first tripped over himself with joy when he found I knew Kannada. After that, he refused to speak in any other language, and kept announcing our Indiranagar connection to all the waiters as they nodded with interest sufficient enough to keep their jobs.
Hmmm... maybe moving wasn't such a bad idea after all. The Madras grin is as beamy as Bangalore's anyway. The only addition is the squint in the sun-tortured eye. All else is happily warm. So things couldn't be brighter.

joy shmoy...

It doesn’t help to call yourself a happy person, you know. It seems so out of tune with the rest of the world. Take reactions to sticky situations, for example. Initially, it ain’t sticky to me because I know things can’t be dreary and difficult all the time. And there’s always ice cream and comic strips even when things seem down. But someone else will think me mad. Cold even. “Who tries to be happy all the time?” they’ll say. “Tsk tsk” or “Bah!” they’ll say.
But in all the tears and burning eyes, I am thrilled when I hear someone sing while riding on the cycle. And I giggle when someone from the bus shoots a stream of red pan juice on a biker’s sparkly white shirt and realizing what he’s in for, quickly ducks before the biker can spot him. I still have mind space to be enraged about my company suddenly replacing the smiley old pot-bellied watchmen with strapping young things not bothering to find out people’s names, and standing ram-rod straight just all the time; never a “hello”, never a “tiffin over?” When I smell freshly ground coffee, eat yummy breakfast, and go to work everyday sure that I can walk up to the second floor before the elevator groans it’s way up there, I’m content. Tell me a few bad jokes, and I’ll sleep happy that I’m funnier than everyone in the world.
As if these things are important, people tell me. If your own life is all messed up, how dare you not be worried about it? Or be worried about it by yourself? How can you run away from the problem by thinking of the time in the future when the problem will be long forgotten? How can you not want to share it with someone who’s dying to help?
I want to talk about it, I too need help. But admitting that is admitting that there is a low in my life. And I count no lows, right?
DAMMIT, sometimes, I tire of all the lying to myself.

habba time!

It's the second year of Bangalore Habba (= festival), and people are already planning their lives around the Odissi at 7:00 p.m., the kannada plays at 6:00 p.m. and the classical Indian music all day. What about work? Come on, this is Bangalore...
And the shows are all free of cost.
Ah. This city spoils us all....

Amit Heri, Ranjith Barot and Keith Peters at Bangalore Habba 2003


Vani Ganapathi last year


Dr. Suma Sudhindra, with 8 Veenas and a 12 member Indian percussion ensemble

rhyme and season

Incredible how every autorickshaw zipping in the rain had people stealing indulgent kisses through chattering teeth. Large trees stood over expensive cars, and hurriedly parked lunas, watching a frail woman straightening the urgently wrapped polythene bag on her husband’s balding head.
A leaf broke off from its home twig to ride the wind and found unabashed snorty laughter from a little boy as it hit his father splat! on his mustached face.
A girl in dripping wet jeans and t-shirt hugged her bag closer to her chest and carefully crossed the street, moving deliberately farther away from the hooting adolescent boys at the chai shop (which was still open and doing roaring business). Still, she tossed her soaked hair and sucked her tummy in, in case they were looking.
She passed the formally dressed man leading his very corporate looking female colleague to the very dry, spic-and-span restaurant on the other side of the road. The security guard quickly dumped his chai cup, paid the chaiwala and brought the hotel umbrella towards the prospective guests.
They all watched the crazy, barefooted, scrawny boys scramble out of their blue tent on the footpath, take off their hand-me-down shirts, swing them in the air and run into the puddles with loud screams.
“Rine, rine, go aaaye!! Gumaage aaanaaye!!” they yelled tunelessly.

Why the world didn’t screech to a stunned stop is beyond me.

must i quote gerald durrell?

Family get-togethers are always chaotic.
No, no, chaotic is way too timid a word. Rowdy is more like it. Proud grandparents (the hosts), loud aunts, eager mums, reticent dads, a nerdy nephew disgusted about being the only boy around, giggly nieces, newborns wailing in the background and sussuing like clockwork, teens reenacting scenes from F.RI.E.N.D.S and still watching the reruns, young adults learning to be experts at diverting attention just when conversation deliberately reels to “that handsome CA boy who came to dinner yesterday”— put them all under one roof, and you have ear-splitting gossip, tons of bitten-back retorts, and food abundance.
And visitors. Yes, more people who’ve seen you “when you were soooo smaaall” (said with hand describing a tiny dashund sized person very close to the ground). “How you’ve grown! Children grow up so fast these days…” (Bitten back retort: I promise I tried to stay that size so we could’ve avoided this conversation).
I tried telling one obscure uncle I didn’t remember him, and threw myself into his nostalgic abyss for a very long hour. He promptly went and fetched the photo album in which, he, dressed in tight bell-bottoms and a large collared printed shirt, was planting several sloppy kisses on my eight-month-old tummy. “You always laughed when I did that,” he said dreamily, pointing to my very petrified-looking baby-face in the photograph.
Some people can never read expressions. Even if you stick your tongue out at them, they’ll offer you a tongue-cleaner.
Then you have the TV-starer. This is one person (usually male and over 40) who, poor thing, has the remote control stuck in his hand, and is seemingly hearing impaired (assumed since you have no way to tell if the volume control is jammed). As all the women gather around the dining table or in the bedroom, filling gossip gaps, and men stick it out in the living room, itching to trade tittle-tattle too but forced by habit to discuss Jayendra Saraswati, this lone ranger doesn’t take his eyes off the TV.
“Please eat lunch…” grandmom will gently urge him. To keep her heart, he’ll walk like a zombie to the table, fill his plate and plonk himself back on the TV-facing sofa. Of course, by the time he does this, a cousin would’ve swooped in and tuned into ET, but his hay-day would last only for a couple of minutes. The disgruntled cousin must automatically return the power-staff when the TV-starer returns with his plate. It’s a phenomenon, this TV-watching. I for one truly look up to such perseverant estrangement (though not the potbelly. They always have a potbelly)
Strangely, all the economy you’re taught throughout the year is flung right out of the window in a houseful situation. Everyone wants to pay for everything. A bill has to just arrive and it’s a race to who fishes the wallet out first. My granddad, to many people’s apparent annoyance and secret delight, has perfected the art of footing the bill. When that heart-beat-stopper bill is delivered in a leather bound folder (we eat at places that can afford leather only when more than one set of parents is at the dinner table), his hand sweeps it right off the table, while his “lovvvely assistant” grandma holds the fort by bringing up a contentious issue like the will, or granddad’s suddenly failing health. (Yes, they’re utterly shameless) Before you know what hit you, the waiter has left with the money. Granddad attributes his swiftness to years of hoodwinking smugglers as a Customs official. I attribute it to his years of handling ready cash instead of credit cards...
Hmmm... It was three absolutely tiring, glorious days with people you’ve grown up with, noticing how last year’s teenage mustache has turned into a cool French beard, laughing about that kitten we thought was going to die of bum-cancer when it menstruated, remembering the green backyard that had now given space to the guest house (we unanimously hate it, btw), sighing sympathetically about the terrible clothes your aunt never fails buys for you….
The best part? I got a family photo out of all this. Not some stupid formal one with stiff smiles and height order. But one that is asymmetric, chaotic and slashed with laugh-lines. Patience was only a small price to pay.

straight turrrn maadi

Footpath, rocky terrain, and mud tracks… nothing stops the Bangalorean from taking the route that would make sure he gets to his destination at least a minute early. At a traffic signal, impatient pizza, courier and death delivery boys fidget with their keys, visibly debating if it’s worth it to switch off the engine. You can see all necks straining to see ahead, to find an inch of space where the two-wheeler can squeeze itself. Horns will blare, voices will curse (“Thu! Nin magne! Nin thathan road-a?!”, “Haiyyo … Evarigella yaaru licence kotro, rama…” and a girl on a kinetic will add, “ExCuuuuse me! Uncle! Can you PLEEEASE move your BIKE?!” and go home to tell her roomies how she lost her cool and “blasted some idiot on the road”).
Then, a two-wheeler rider of great initiative will change all. He will lead all mankind out of this dark, smoky, suffocating agony. Only this chosen one will notice the vantage point — a clean entry spot onto the pavement. He will maneuver his bike deftly, riding along hawkers, pedestrians and parked cycles. And that will get him right in front of the cars, autos, lorries, buses and slow-witted bikes. Not to worry, the traffic cop won’t chase him. After all, it’s nothing out of the ordinary…. Plus, as this brave traffic warrior leads his motor vehicle on to the footpath, at least 15 other bikes would’ve followed suit. Yes. Even if there’s a maddening jam on the road, traffic flows freely on the footpath and adjacent roadless by-lanes. —“Adjust maadi” at it’s best.
But there are some places where alternative routes are avoided like plague. The one I notice everyday is near a road that leads into Ulsoor market. The market is always, always bursting at its seams with people, vegetable vendors, banana stumps, beggars, temple-goers, flower sellers, night-idli makers, auto-men smoking beedis, marwadi pawn shops, parked Safaris and Sumos… All the world comes together in this one pavement-less road, and despite the desperate need to squeeze into all spaces, and find every damn side-road, all the world avoids the adjacent notorious Hijra Street.
Hijra Street is near the now demolished Begum Mahal, where a rich muslim woman is said to have lived. She encouraged and trained dancers who lived in little houses near the Mahal. Many of these performers were hijras and they too lived nearby, reassured by the security and compassion the Begum extended them. Now the Begum and her Mahal are gone, but a large hijra community still lives there, regularly greasing the palms of cops and corporation authorities that relentlessly try to evict them.
Apart from the regular auto-drivers who park near this street and of course, the General Stores owner at the entrance, only a few women riders venture into Hijra Street. The rest of the city, with all its impatience and aggressive road behaviour, is an uneasy, petrified, almost idiotic group of oldies. This time, the term “oldies” has nothing to do with age, of course.

dance the body music

Lokua Kanza isn’t wearing a madly colourful Afro shirt. Neither is his hair long, braided and stacky. When you ask him about it, he throws his head back and laughs, his gummy smile surprisingly ugly. “I think so, Indian want Osibisa from all African people!” The smile gets uglier. “You listen my song, and say if I African or French. And please don’t say I sound American. You kill my soul.”
And soul he has loads of. His voice seems to come from inside my own head. Crystal clear. Gliding over drum beats. Not even remotely anything but African. Swahili, Lingala, French… none of which I understand. But my hands ache from applauding so much and I’m tired of pretending to be a critiquing connoisseur instead of a grinny fool exploding with happiness at his ‘Mbiffe’ and ‘Salle’.
I quite like him. And he reminded me of Osibisa.

Osibisa had performed in India as one of the first international bands long before I was even born. But the only trip my mind took on hearing 'Osibisa' was to Diwali.
After two days of revelling with tappaas (crackers), sur-sur-bhatthi (sparklers) and 100-walas, we used to sweep up all the half-exploded-crackers in a pile, and throw in some bijilis. It was our very own bonfire. And it was always higher and hotter than the bonfires on any other lanes in the locality. As it crackled and spit sparks out at us, we pranced around it, chanting “Osibisa… osibisa”, the ‘Osi’ powerful and the ‘bisa’ in a whisper. No one questioned what the hell we were saying. We had no clue it was the name of a band that defined world music. It just sounded tribal enough to use in a victory dance for Diwali.
Come to think of it, it’s almost scary how much this city has absorbed.

blush pale blue

The price seemed reasonable, location
Indifferent. The landlady swore she lived
Off premises. Nothing remained
But self-confession. “Madam,” I warned,
“I hate a wasted journey—I am African.”
Silence. Silenced transmission of
Pressurized good-breeding. Voice, when it came,
Lipstick coated, long gold-rolled
Cigarette-holder pipped. Caught I was foully.
“HOW DARK?”… I had not misheard… “ARE YOU LIGHT
OR VERY DARK?” Stench
Of rancid breath of public hide-and-speak.
Red booth. Red pillar-box. Red double-tiered
Omnibus squelching tar. It was real! Shamed
By ill-mannered silence, surrender
Pushed dumbfounded to beg simplification.
Considerate she was, varying the emphasis—
“ARE YOU DARK? OR VERY LIGHT?” Revelation came.
“You mean—like plain or milk chocolate?”
Her assnt was clinical, crushing in its light
Impersonality. Rapidly, wave-length adjusted,
I chose. “West African sepia”—and as an afterthought,
“Down in my passport.” Silence for spectroscopic
Flight of fancy, till truthfulness clanged her accent
Hard on the mouthpiece. “WHAT’S THAT?” conceding
“DON’T KNOW WHAT THAT IS.” “Like brunette.”
“THAT’S DARK ISN’T IT?” “Not altogether.
Facially, I’m brunette, but, madam, you should see
The rest of me. Palm of my hand, soles of my feet
Are a peroxide blond. Friction, caused
Foolishly, madam, by sitting down, has turned
My bottom raven black—One moment, madam!”—sensing
Her receiver rearing on the thunderclap
About my ears—“Madam,” I pleaded, “wouldn’t you rather
See for yourself?”

(1962)
--Telephone Conversation, Wole Soyinka (b.1934)

lingui-stuck

Gadaf Khan: "Jee haan, hamare mein guggu... goobe... Khabristan mein, hunse jhaad mein kuntkandi, murda henage tinkandu badko jaanvar." (Guggu= owl in kannada. Goobe= owl in Shivajinagar Urdu. Definition of an owl- In graveyard, sitting on Tamarind tree, eating dead body, and thus living creature)
Shetty: "Idemi? Vipareetam aipoya..." (What this is? (in telugu) Bizaare (kannada) it became (Malayalam))
-- Saabara Kathe, by T.P. Kailasam, who wrote all his works in a kichdi version of Kannada.

"None could use Kannada with all its nuances like Kailasam did, and his mother tongue, incidentally, was Tamil. One could hardly contain one's laughter when one overheard a retake of Kailasam's character in the neighbourhood medical shop.
There was this little Muslim girl asking: "Maamo, maamo, ammange bedhi hogaya kate, maatre dee maamo." (Maamo, mummy got loose motion, give tablet, maamo)
And guess what the Shetty had to ask in his own brand of Urduised Kannada? "Nungne ka, cheepne ka?" (nung = swallow in kannada. cheep= sip in kannada)

And this one was heard at a local bus stand: "Bisil mein khadku khadku sust aagaya so" (In heat standing standing, tired came off)
Kailsam, in one of his short poems, 'Uptodate Sakhi: Tanna Gelatiyarige', writes about our proclivity to use generous doses of English in our daily conversation.
"Yeni garden-u bahala silly, nodalu not a rose or lily, waste of time-u walking illi..." (What this garden is verrry silly, to see not a rose or lily, waste of time to walk here)
And this one: "Mane coxtown-u, manushya hen-pecked-u" (this will be lost in translation, so i'm not trying)
So, when you hear a Tamil shopkeeper say: "Adondu bandu 25 roobaayi", you know it is a transliteration from the original Tamil "Aduvandu iruvattanj roobai". Not to forget "Maga Ganabathi" for Maha Ganapathi and "Cunnikamba Road" for Cunningham Road. When you hear phrases with extensive use of plurals such as "Talegalella novu" or "Saana bedhigalu agtaite" you know for sure it is the Telugu influence on Kannada. "

---Excerpt from Deepa Ganesh's article in The Hindu, on Oct. 30, 2003, on the eve of Kannada Rajyotsava, with my translation inputs

Maybe Kannada is dying a fast death, at least in Bangalore for sure. And as one of my friends put it, "Even distortion is part of a language's evolution, if it means better communication".
But every time someone says "Straight hogi, Left togoli, Adjust maadkoli", an image of a man (with 'Kannada' written in the jalebi script on his forehead) bleeding to death pops in my head. Simultaneously, I stomp my foot on the ground about the kichdi language being so Bangalore that I ought to be holding on to it. "Suryange torcha?" or "Nangey fitting madthiyaa?" never fails to make someone laugh. Or surely get the message.
So maybe I'm a non-kannadiga getting all thrilled listening to "Huttidhare kannada naadal hutta beku!" (If you're born, it must be in Kannada land). But I also flare up when someone who isn't familiar with Tamil, curses people in Chennai for not being cosmopolitan enough to speak in any other language. I mean, why must they? They've never had the need to.
Unlike Tamil, Kannada never had a major language movement. If it did, it was never political. It was always anti-tamil and anti-askers-of-Kaveri-water. I've also sung "Endindigoo nee Kannadavaagiru" (Be a Kannadiga forever) a thousand times in Rajyotsava competitions, my heart swelling with pride when I actually show off the 'Tipu Sultan', 'Kuvempu', 'Kempegowda' biographies (written in Kannada) they gave as prizes. I know how insecure kannadigas must feel if they need to be jingoistic enough to stone theatres playing non-kannada movies. But even today, 'Sen Tamizh, pon Tamizh vazhga' (Long live golden/pure tamizh) makes me nod.
Come to think of it, two homes are better than one. And two native languages, even if at loggerheads, are better than one.

As a kid, I burst into laughter everytime I fell . I think I much prefer comedy to drama.

glee, glide, no glum

There should be a teashop at every parking lot in town. Not a bistro or café (said with overplayed contempt and head toss), but a chai shop.
Peshal (special) tea, lemon tea, saada tea: Sighs in little plastic cups. You can’t hold it stylishly with an elite pinky stuck up in the air. You can’t caress it with both hands, like you can your daily coffee mug. You can’t place it on a table and sip from like a straw. You can’t pour it down your throat, without touching your lip, like from a steel glass. You have no option here, tea lover. The frail little plastic cup must be held gingerly, with index finger and thumb, shifted from right hand to left with a “tsss!” when the heat singes skin. And oh, how the heart wrenches when a few drops of the cherished wee bit of chai fall on the footpath…
The empty-plot-turned-parking-lot is very convenient for this chai wala. He sits in an old red and blue Taj Mahal counter behind a mossy wall that rises up to his waist. No tea stains on his vest, mind you. Or the pungent smell of old milk. He looks like he just stepped out of a bath all the time.
“Lemon tea, saar,” I tell him, and show a ‘V’ sign with my fingers. He beams at me like I said I loved him (I do, truly) and repeats authoritatively to his assistant who’s well hidden behind the tea flasks: “Yeradu lemon tea, maydimege” (two lemon teas for madam). All I can see is two hands swish-swashing around the flasks, slicing a lemon, and clapping with a finishing flourish.
“Red-ready”, his boss mumbles and beams at me again. By now, I know that I’m not the only recipient of his super beam, as I hear more tea buyers around loftily declare that the chai wala “really likes me”. One college girl even said, “Why is he smiling at me like thaaat, ya? Creepy fellow…” Hand over that tea girl, it ain’t for the pompous.
We take our lemon tea and sip it quietly, holding the little cup in the only way we can/must. A whiff of tingly citrus freshness. I watch the steam waft its way up, warming my nose. Every sip takes its time… stroking awake each taste bud, carelessly, idly.
One little plastic cup of glee. Gingerly fondled two days ago. Lounging in my mind still.

to breathe again...

The yelling crowd stomped about my brain enough. they dispersed. defeated by synergic effects of pots and pots of heavenly tea, rain slapping leaves against a window, a familiar face from a far away land, rediscovery of wonderfully intermingling lives, stories repeatedly told and each time, embellished and enjoyed tirelessly.
thank goodness for aimless conversation.

floats

Beginnings and middles, I wallow in. Not so much, ends.
Flashes of clear skies, crooked eyebrows, and conversation fight for space with acquiescence. It's noisy. And I’ve never liked crowds. Especially ones where I’m jostled out of happy balance. Makes me unsure of which nearby walker I should grab onto to stay on my feet.
Left to me, I'd embalm continuities. And sack (also sock) the ones who draw thick drapes on sunshine. Haven't they heard of ventilation?

chromium fest

It's all about bananas it seems. Trucks careening with six to eight foot banana stem propped up on their sides; little boys riding bicycles with two foot banana leaves balanced on their handle bar; shop fronts adorned with ugly purple banana flowers.
It's Ayudha puja. I wake up and walk out on to the road. Every year, it's the same scene. Exactly the same. Every vehicle in every house will be out on the road, from huge weekend getaway car to tricycle of a three-year-old's imaginary friend. They'd be showered and scrubbed, dusted and buffed. I remember even picking at tyre grooves to scrape out dried dung and unknowingly crushed bugs. Foot mats, seat covers, engine rags… all washed (till at least half the grease transfers into your nails) and hung out to dry.
One kid per house is appointed to run to the flower market to buy garlands. The younger you were, the cuter your wide-eyes would look as you stumbled through "Uncle, vondhu haara kodi. Mummy kaas kottidhaare." (Uncle, gimme one garland. Mummy has given money). It always worked. We always got some extra flowers and a festive grin for our cuteness. It's an art I had perfected. Sigh. But age caught up with me. '
Now some smart-alecky boys strut confidently to the old flower man (now with more grey chest hair peeping out of his vest and more irate about the inflation), and haggle for half the price. Who will tell these "street smart" boys that those cynical assumptions about the world being out to swindle the innocents does NOT include this toothless smiler?
Another bygone pleasure was this neighbour aunty, who for years, had brought out her TVS Champ and walked around it, thoughtfully rubbing her imaginary stubble, as if figuring out where to begin cleaning. The bike ALWAYS looked like it had been through every mori (drain), thorny shrub, kuppathotti (garbage bin) and stagnant-lake-with-stinky-green-film-on-it (moss?).
After the preliminary up-down, aunty would go find rags, buckets, polishing creams, hose-pipes, brooms (to sweep away the sand dunes that would keep forming magically under the bike), toothbrushes (for those hard to reach places), drumsticks, detergent and used tea bags (donno why).
For the mega clean-up, she'd lift up her sari, Rajnikanth style. To egg her on, we'd cleverly give zhup-zhup sound effects. Then yell, "Cleaniiiiiiiing…. auntyyyyyyyy!!!" while excitedly jumping all over the place. Thinking of it now, I don't know why she laughed merrily at us. Cleaning aunty?! Oh god! I wouldn't be flattered.
But a good 4-5 hours and loyal cheerleading later, it would be like the heaven shone upon goodness. Chromium spangled us to blindness. And the vanilla milkshake after a long day's work (we cleaned our cycles and gave our tonsils to cleaning aunty, didn't we?) ensured that we remained, forever, cleaning aunty's little helpers. But aunty's gone abroad to her sons now. Wonder who screams their lungs out for her there.
Until some years ago, I hated only one thing about the day. That my bicycle could never crush the lemons-under-the-tyres in one powerful go. So in 8th std., I cheated. I cut the lemon a little. Just enough for it to give under the cycle-wheel. Now... I'm old enough to own a bike that can crush an elephant. Ahem. Ok fine. Can crush a melon? FINE! Can crush a lemon without kitchen aid.
I know these things seem exciting only in hindsight. On Friday, when I'll have to handle three dirty bikes all on my own, I won't enjoy it... Dad's impeccable logic: The one car I clean is equivalent to three bikes…. (Last year it was two bikes. I never liked progressive math). I will crib and whine about cuts and bruises on my hands as I try to reach never-touched-before motor parts. But I'm going to make redeeming vanilla milkshake this time. (resolute head shake) For the whole street.
Ok for my family.

whet thought

seen: a wannabe-river stream of light brown rainwater gurgling beside the footpath. burbling, swishing, swashing, gushing.
and a severely empty aquafina bottle floating along.

reddy!

A recent survey discovered that Bangalore’s ‘pothole density’ is less than 5 potholes per km. "That is lower than many other cities, so don’t you dare complain about roller-coaster rides and your irrational fear of mass spondilitis!"
But I cruise through these inane little reports knowing my brand new (and shiny red) Pep will glide over any damn pothole. Of course, I’m not allowed to subject it to experimental or purely self-aggrandizing ill treatment just for kicks till I make 1000 km. So I do an insipid 30 kmph, frequently being jolted out of my skin and shamed to unbathed nakedness when an impatient old kinetic Honda honks, discovers some plastic still covering the body armour, and HAHAs pompously. His assumption: new bike = new rider = LL = worthy only of treatment meted out to cyclists (also unfair, btw). And that means footpath-scraping. I bite down scathing remarks about his chappal still flashing its price tag, because, well, I’m the bigger person on the newer bike. With cheaper, more handsome chappals from a guy who sutured Gabbar Singh’s shoes. (Yes, it matters)
You know the unsettling quiet brought on by blocked ears? When you feel like screaming "I’m too young to not be able to eavesdrop anymore!!"… only, you can’t hear yourself scream. And turning a deaf ear to your own voice is just wounding. After years of zipping around in a joyously noisy oldest model Scooty, disquieting silence is what I experience today on the Pep (the slick new Scooty). I almost panicked. Why can’t I hear metallic clanging?! Why can’t I hear put-putting as I pause at the traffic signal?! Why can’t I hear a sickly wheeze when I accelerate?! "Well honey, I’m new, two strokes more than my thatha, and you just paid a bomb for me," the Pep seems to murmur.
So now I won’t try my best to hear an assuring all’s well clang. I will set my sights on the red zzzzzzziip I’ll be on the road instead of the green horse wagon. I just sold nostalgia for new paint. and I christen her Reddy.

rainman

There’s much angst about icy cold raindroplets on a warm neck as people run under shops for cover. Strangers don’t really talk to one another. Words just fill spaces, and conversation begins over the din of the rain, like quick comments uttered over a standing ovation, to the person nearby.
"Five days of cricket, and not a single drop. It should’ve rained this madly then. We wouldn’t have had to see India lose that horribly."
"Yes, yes. It was another kind of wash out, no?" (laughs at his own joke. First guy politely chuckles along)
"See now, KEB will say ‘male saar. So power cut’. Half a reason they need for power cut."
"Yes, yes. All these IT companies will have current, though. One day they don’t write a program means the world will end, no?"
"My son is in Infosys. He says they have UPS. That's why there is power."
"Oh. Infosys is very good company. They have ethics, morals. Not like Wipro and all."
"My son-in-law, who works in Wipro…"
"(very quickly) Of course, your son-in-law must surely be a gem. But every company will have crooks. That doesn’t mean there won’t be good people."
"What sir, these days government is only criminal. Why look at private fellows?"
"Yes, yes. Thank god Lok Ayukta is there in our Bengloor to catch these dirrrty officials. They forget that being government servants means they are our servants also."
"Who is whose servant saar these days? The maid in my house wears brand new sarees everyday, has TV, fridge and VCD player also. She told my wife that day that her daughter will not do housework like her. See what ego they have these days?!"
"Like that she said? Che che! Why not ask you to clean her house? Hahahahaa!"
First guy’s cell phone rings. He answers it in tamil: "Yennappa? Andha cheque paas aacha?". He looks heavenward, sees the rain has let up, jumps over a puddle and goes away. The other man looks at the first guy go, sighs and walks into the shop and sits at the counter.
I’ve decided. That shop is going to be my permanent rain-stop. Little tellable tales are born there.

reeverse

On Sunday ended the irony of a flying son of Krypton having to sit paralysed in a wheelchair.
Christopher Reeves, 52, died yesterday. But no Deathtrap, this.



There is a theory that Superman was timed with the immigrant worries in america... :) never underestimate the power of popular culture, aye?

Haloscan commenting and trackback have been added to this blog.

discordant refrain

I wish she’d sing a song. Hum a tune, so the mind would flit mindlessly along. So follies could be sung about and forgotten. Flaws romanticized like for a rock star, or dead friend.
I wish she wouldn’t watch the tick of the clock so. Instead, smile at the faces it seemed to make.
I wish all the gibberish I garbled would make her giggle, till tears rolled down her eyes, as she repeated the babble in keywords, in a voice squeaky from the laughter, between intakes of air, between chuckles.
I wish she’d swing the kitchen rag at me in mock violence, and quickly ask me to wash my face to wipe off the "germs".
When I fall asleep open-mouthed, she now forgets to put a raisin in there, and say, "See… the goat has gone No.2 in the cave. Close the door." But yes, she still remembers to let me lounge in bed till 8 a.m. because I worked on a report till 3 a.m. I love how she offers to make me coffee before listing the day’s chores out.
But I wish she’d turn off the silencing radio, and go falsetto as she dressed for work, as her man turned another page of the newspaper and sang tenor from the bathroom. They’d ignore that I was trying to speak into the phone over the din, and urge me to croon along. "Let’s make a family song that we can sing to each other if we were lost in a Kumbh mela…" she would suggest. And we’d grin to teethy glory.
I wish she'd sing a song of lyrical errors, sweet because overridden by tune.
I wish she’d unfurrow her eyebrows. Pace less. And laugh. More.

thus is laid down

Is there a world where doing anything only when you feel like it is considered heroic and free-spirited? How come "I’m not in a mood" is an invalid excuse? I'd like a word with the mandate maker. Unless he/she is not in a mood.

"love your suit.."

how the movie manages to unsettle over and over is beyond me.

rings a bell..

"Blase"... that's a common word, right? I have run an indifferent (pssst! Can I use blase over here?) eye over it millions of times. In a sentence, running along with other words. Hardly worth a second glance. It's as grey as any five-letter word. Too tiny to qualify a pause in reading, even to pick up a dictionary to find out what it exactly means as a lone word, without the supporting cast. Oh I thought I knew "blase" like the back of my hand. But when someone popped "blase" at me as a stand-alone, I sweated it.
It was like the new girl in the blue sweater in that large group of friends. We all had a fantastic time together... how we gelled! But what was her name again? I don't think I asked. We all did make a great bunch, and the girl made for great company, with a witty remark at every cue. We should do this again sometime, we say earnestly; we shake hands, happy to have known each other so well in so quick a time. But when I see her the at the stationery shop standing within familiar-handshake distance of me, we shuffle our feet. Peripheral vision (thanks to shifty eyes) takes over full time. Then I leave there, telling myself why I found her fun in the first place. She didn't even say hi.
... This analogy is courtesy English teacher, III std., C section. She thought words were people. She thought we had to know the "personality" of the word to understand it as it stood away from its peers. She was batty. I totally loved her.

world view

To whom are you speaking? To Yassin? He wasn't deaf. He became deaf. He doesn't realise this. He's surprised that nothing makes a sound anymore... Just imagine. You are a child, Yassin... It would be idiotic to try and tell you it was deafness. You don't hear, you don't understand. You don't think it's you who can't hear. People have lost their voices; stones have lost their sound. The world is silent. So then, why are people moving their mouths?

-Atiq Rahimi (Earth and Ashes)

lazy lucky

ah yes, metaphoric it sure was. Poetic even, for the joy in the unsaid.
Waking up to the reddish sun streaming in, squinting into half-shut eyes. Sigh to happily doze again, coz there ain’t nowhere to go.
The dumb lambada from outside the door… it begins to flow in with sleepy breathing. I grin at having nothing to do. And grin wider at walking slow among rushing madness around. All they say is- that's bombay. live with it. Does no one know that you can take the local earlier and enjoy the ride? I didn't, for one. I was told.
One minute ambles into the next, all a muddle. Whizzzzzzzzz... that one-bus locality. The house of green and red. That one little chair. Only one there was, thank heavens. Talk of presidents and cartoons. That much laughing should be lethal. But wait, was it laughs, or inside smiles? Then beams. or snorts. Sleep and sloth, but strangely, no yawns. Panic only when a snug snuggle slips away.
I may have bottled the warmth. And the singing mosquito that only one song sung. mmm... How lazy can bliss be?

toot! toot!

A train ride of closed minds.
Of astonishingly self-congratulatory tones.
Of loud unashamed hypocritical proclamations.
Of being the only protesting female voice amongst many baritones that insisted that golden were the days when rajasthani women walked miles balancing 4 pots of precious water on their head. "Guardians of culture", they called them, and were disgusted that the working taps they had installed in a few villages now were "killing tradition".
As I returned from Bombay (Mumbai’s is an insipid compromise of a name), as usual, I hoped that the train driver falls sick and does not arrive, thereby causing the journey to be happily cancelled (juvenile idiocy that stems from childhood prayers that Dad doesn’t turn up to pick me up after school, so I could explore that nearby park all by myself).
But as luck would have it, the signal turned green, last minute bye-byes turned frantic and teary, the stationmaster’s white uniform whizzed past, and the platform disappeared into green shrubs and incomplete railway tracks stuck up in defiance in the air. As if on cue, everyone in the compartment checked his/her bags, smiled weakly at a neighbour who seemed most likely to nod/grin in response. The perfunctory "where are you going?" and "why had you been to Bombay?" later, common ground was found and conversation shaped up over numerous cups of watery chai and kaapi.
A very young girl sat by the window; a hindi Amar Chitra Katha comic book lay open on her lap, but her eyes kept dreamily scanning the world outside the window. The two army men who sat by me tried to keep their erect sitting position, their hands neatly folded across their chest. But when everyone began taking off their chappals and slouching into easy-to-day-dream poses, they gave in too.
A pot-bellied middle-aged man sat by the young girl (who was being brought back from her in-laws home), noticing disapprovingly how she had scrunched up her saree so she could squat. "Must be her father," I thought. She caught his look too, and decided she’d change into more modest jeans and a shirt- she was going to her own home anyway.
As she left the coupe, her father began contemplatively, "Who wears sarees these days… It’s all western culture. We are slaves of USA…" Hmm… where have I heard THAT before? Of course, the desi man dishing it out was bursting out of his wrinkle-free pants and casual-formal shirt.
But this was the peg the old muslim man (who, hearteningly, was in crisp white dhoti-kurta with old pan stains and some tell-tale beedi seared holes near the seam) was waiting for: "Saree hi aurathon ki shaan hoti hai. Hamare zamaane mein ladkiyan saare gaon ki shaan hothi thi. Jab ek ladki maike chod jaathi thi, tho saara gaon rota tha… wo thi un dinon ki bath… aaj kal kaun kambakhth apne padosi ka naam jaantha hai?"
16 hours of tearing apart social change, bad-mouthing Pakistan ("their population is just as big as our fauj, so we can crush them like little dirty ants"), spitting on "cowherd" Laloo, playing up pristine Vajpayee, one-upmanship philanthropy stories (though every beggar who came around was shooed off rudely), occasional singing of "mere desh ki dharti" and "aye mere watan ke logon"....
I who choke up when Chaurasia plays the Jaya He of the anthem, suprised myself at how many uncontrollable giggling fits I had to muffle.
A software engineer (who lay on his tummy on the upper berth, sticking his head out from one side, and playing the perfect Shakuni catalyst to the whole debate), made sure that every time the passionate exchange dwindled or got repetitive, he came up with gems like "But aren’t the women of today equal to the mardh?",
"How can one wear a dhoti to work if one is a software engineer?",
"Uncle, this is the computer & Internet age!"
and the crown— "How come your daughters can go to a dhandia function at midnight, but cannot go to the disco at the same time?". (wah! wah! just doesn’t cover it)

A train journey of political speeches. I'm moved to laughs. My vote is in.

when an elephant rode on a mouse

After tossing and turning restlessly in bed for a whole night, I finally made my decision. I would not drown the clay Ganesha in a bucket of water in the backyard. The reason, of course, was my mother’s winning argument: "We already have only 2 decent buckets in the house. If Ganesha sits in one bucket for a week, then how to wash clothes??"
So I checked the newspaper for alternatives they might have for ecologically concerned, but bucket-deficient people who had a Ganesha idol to dunk. Ulsoor Lake** was mentioned as one such solution. Images of shorts-clad jawans wiping sweat and green goo off their body while cleaning up the stinky, hyacinth filled, silted lake a year ago flashed in my mind. But I read on: "An area would be clearly separated from the main lake and will be set aside exclusively for immersing the Ganesha idols."
And so, the lake it had to be. Rather, the tank-in-corner-of-lake-generously-alloted-for-marrying-religion-and-ecology it had to be. So the idol securely placed in the leg-space of my Scooty, I rode my way to the said tank. All the while, I was painfully balancing my legs in the air (thanks to amma’s "Don’t keep your feet anywhere near the idol!"). I’m still amazed at how everyone on the road had the same reaction to my antics:
Absent looking around to find where the loud metallic clanging was coming from >> Realisation that it’s my bike >> Double take on seeing my bike gymnastics >> Idiotic, self-satisfied grin >> Ganesha idol noticed >> Instant look of forgiveness
Now, as soon as I parked my bike near the lake, a young man walked towards me.
I noticed that his pants were wet knee-down. I nodded and stepped aside.
He touched his hand to his lip, then to his chest, closing his eyes and breathing in deeply. Then he lifted my Ganesha, faced it frontwards, stuck it to his chest, and walked towards the tank.
I scurried after him.
At the edge of the tank, he paused and gave me a brief, blank look.
I subtlely touched my handbag.
He turned away from me, and walked into the tank. He went upto a point where the water level was such that his pants wouldn’t get wetter. Now he turned toward me, but looked skyward. Dip, dip, dip. Thrice. Then he floated the idol away.
I looked into my bag and fished out a 10 rupee note. He took the money and went back to the parking lot. We hadn’t spoken even once.
I looked around. A middle-aged brahmin man, dry as a bone, his face purple, and his strained veins popping in a V-shape in the middle of his forehead, was hysterically yelling at a little boy (also wet knee-down) in tamil: "You are not supposed to touch Ganapati till we reach the edge of the tank! Who asked you to take it from me here itself?? Now I have to do puja from beginning, you dirty idiot!!"
He swung his hand violently towards the boy’s face.
I turned away. But I heard the sharp sound of hand on cheek.
I walked quickly towards where some more men wet knee-down were having silent conversations with more people bringing Ganeshas on bikes.
....
**The municipal corporation has put these little ads on street lamps all over town, that applaud Bangalore for being ‘The City of Gardens’, ‘The City of Lakes’, ‘…IT’, ‘…Pubs’, ‘…Parks’, ‘…Kempegowda’(courtier who planned the city). Although I love Bengloor with all my heart, I must confess that the corporation is a big fat liar. But I must say, they’re clever with colours. The City of Gardens board is green, the lakes board is blue, and the Kempegowda board is golden yellow- to signify royalty, of course.

Winner: big, green, ugly

Always thought Puss in Boots was a british kitty. Hmmm... Then he did some heart-wrenching dilated pupils, ogre butt-licking, shaking his boot-y and even ricky martin. umm, isn't he puerto rican?. Oh well, as long as they didn't plug a Spanish mole on PIB's face, get him to wear low-cut shirts, grunt-sing and litter with a tennis player/model.
This Zorro-cat was loved! I can't wait for more Shreks, donkeys, evil fairy godmothers and fairy-tale mishaps. These should be documented. It's time bedtime stories were jazzed up!

weakend lite

It was unsettling to see an astonishingly still lake. I even dropped a leaf on it to see if it floated in some particular direction. (but no needle-- learning from The Edge... that hopkins, alec baldwin bear movie)
How-come-it-doesn’t-sound-like-noise cries of monkeys and birds. Tents are pitched on the lakeside, complete with teakwood cots, shampoo and coat hanger (!). A Shikari Shambu hat is handed to you and a lantern is shoved into your hands (no electricity. You’re supposed to grope your way around to the attached bathroom).
But there was the random angry elephant that gave us the spine tingling thrills with earsplitting trumpeting as it crashed down trees right in our jeep’s path, leaving us stranded there for hours. And running around with 8 wild kids (not wild= mowgli wild, but just regular city kids going crazy in the shock of discovering open space and a water body that’s not a bath tub)… err… point was: Running around with 8 wild kids will guarantee that at least 3 will fall “accidentally” into the lake and splash around there. Until a panic-stricken boatman runs down madly gesturing them to get out because… ulp… CROCODILES are there!!!!!!! Mad clambering out later, nervous giggles fill the air as we dismiss the boatman as an old fool believing in tall tales. But no one ever ventures for a swim after that.
A thorough city-bred, I sigh and moan and rave about a liberating weekend in the jungle. “The city pushed me to the brink,” (said with an appropriately dramatic tired tone, hair-clutching and leg stretching) “I needed to get out.”
Bunkum.
Ask anybody in the city.
Mad rushes must be kept alive, missed lunches must be whined about and smoke-induced chest congestion must be taken to the hospital where the wait makes you read 1996’s “current affairs” in a dettol sprayed magazine.
The rain must be braved with a blue plastic cover copiously protecting the head, all just to make sure the bus isn’t missed. Arguments with automen must have “anecdote” written all over them and while laughing over it with friends, it must be cocktailed with the neighbour’s automan experience that was unfairly funnier than your own.
Page 3 faces must be trashed over tea (and the disgust is probably real too) but on coming face to face with one, embarrassingly garbled sentences must spew forth. Potholes and fly-over projects that never take off must be complained about to every person who is even remotely associated with the press—“As a journalist, you MUST take up this issue” over and over and over again. Theatre-owners must go on strike and pirated CD fellows must get all pricey and charge triple.
Cubbon park must be visited by an old greying couple quietly taking a morning walk, by 2 mummys catching up on each other’s lives over their kids’ “mummy! See! Lizard!” and “mummy! I want bhelpuri!”, and by those who want to just stretch that wonderful day out, but can’t think of a wallet-friendly place.
I’m an old city fool.

sign up..

Is cynicism a good thing? As an occasional cynic, I nod from ceiling to floor.
Does it impede unbridled happiness? Why no. A scoff, a cough-like "ha!", a crossing-of-hands and a mental rolling-with-dry-laughter makes my day.
There's an all day, every day triumph because I don’t expect to find the gold locket in the packet of chips anyway. A whooping thrill when a leaf hits me in the face because, well, that means the leaves are still around. Calm nod to the lorry driver I’ve just missed being killed by, since I don’t hope that he’ll stay on the right side of the road, and anyway, I’m alive. Oh, am I by any chance, seeing the bright side? Thought to ponder, but no. By assuming to be only met by the dark side, any non-dark side is a happy bonus. But when the bonus comes, I don’t think the taxman will come with his axe.
Someone defines a cynic as a person who has taken off his/her rose tinted glasses and crushed them to the ground, thereby improving vision considerably. (audience: wry laugh) I never wore rose tinted glasses. Or even those sickly yellow tinted ones. (Yellow is beautiful only in aging books too brittle to be held. And when it’s a submarine). Therefore, dumb definition thrown in bin.
Cynicism's there because it's easy. To shake the analysis out of things, to bypass the post-mortem and to start with nil. That way, anything can only be an addition.

Rather be sittin' just forgettin' it
-Moby

...

every calculatingly avoided puddle must come right under the wheel in a loud thump-splash. The predictability of it is almost wonderful...

railway trackback

One-stop station of moments waiting to happen....

Mission: Get to Counter-9 and book train tickets
Obstacle in path: Rickety ladder with bamboo extensions, from which hang paint buckets. Painters already on top of the ladder, so moving ladder out of the way is, well, out of question.
Gnawing thought (as a result of repeatedly justified fears about cosmic conspiracies regarding ticket availability): Dammit! Does walking under a ladder HAVE to bring bad luck? And is bad luck = not getting tickets? Is just forgetting about the tickets and going back to work an option?
Steely resolve: Will get tickets. Will walk under ladder.
Just then, I see an old man in a navy blue safari suit clutching a fat bunch of ticket forms. His hand is placed strategically on pant pocket, where (hopefully) an unstolen, but well-noticed-by-all wallet sits. He mutters a silent prayer, sighs deeply, and zips to Counter-9 under the ladder. On the way, he dramatically ducks, as if all the buckets of paint are standing poised to splash and thud right on his head. But he gets tickets!!
Emboldened, I too travel under cursed ladder. Waiting list 260. "No chance, madam." Proof 57 of cosmic conspiracy.
….

What’s with the urge to always drink coffee at the railway station and mix the sugar with the clever straw+stirrer? Everyone who passes by the coffee vendor visibly debates the purchase of a beverage. A lot of feet shuffling, hand crossing & uncrossing later, 9 out of 10 people eventually buy the coffee/tea/instant soup. It's wonderful to lose to your mind (as opposed to losing your mind, of course)
….

Madness at the railway ticket reservation counter. A distinct smell of limestone. Grey figures bustle about in paint-splashed shorts, their dull brown skin hidden under layers of whitewash. For me, they smell of the nostril-tickling freshness of walking into a newly painted house, of glistening things, clean things, of moving in.
But when they breathe in their own enamel smell, it must be no more than a reminder of another patch to be painted over.

....
Autorickshaw-wallahs and policemen sharing a lewd joke outside the station. Damsel in distress (read non-kannada speaking girl alighted from First Class Two tier AC compartment of train, who can’t find an auto to take her home) arrives at the scene. Cop's face hardens, he straightens up and orders the auto-guy to take her home. The girl is all gratitude.
The cop winks at auto-man in the brief moment before the auto takes off. Knowing nods exchanged. Ah, jobs well carried out.

Guilt fangs

The rock band had to be photographed. They held their guitars and grimaced in mock passion, the music supposedly too high-pitched and satanic to be humanly audible. This is ridiculous, I said. You’re not actually playing, and you’re standing next to some stunted shrubs and faking musical ecstasy for the photograph. ANYBODY can see that you are not plugged in! But yes, you... mr.drummer, you’re quite the man. Holding up the sticks, your face registering eye-popping, jaw-dropping shock that your drum kit suddenly vanished into thin air, and looking thrilled that now you have only your god-given instrument to play with, is totally rib-tickling. Ha ha. I could laugh till all my teeth fall out.
"Oh alright," band leader said, bizarrely under the impression that I was being sarcastic. "We’ll move elsewhere."
So scene 2: near next bunch of shrubs. The photographer asks them to seem friendly, and pretend to be normal. It has to be explained that accosting the keyboardist is not normal, and that a college rock band doesn't need to look like they have rocks in their heads.
As voice levels go up, the watchman (let’s call him W) walks up to us (I cringe to say "us") and points to a signboard on the grass. In tamil, he says, "Can’t you read the board? It’s written that you can’t take photo! Hut! Hut! Shoo, go away…"
We all look the board: "No smoking. Please don’t sit on grass." The idiot band members laugh that W is pretending to be literate.
I tell W that we’re from the press, but he doesn’t care. "You can ask permission from manager," he says and starts walking towards a door. I ask the photographer and the screw-loose bunch to hold on till I go do some begging in the manager’s office.
The manager doesn’t let me say a word, but shows me every surveillance camera that’s installed in the building. "Boss has told us not to let photos be taken. If you still do it, this man will lose his job," the manager says, pointing to W. Maybe he’s exaggerating, I think. But what if he isn’t?
I go back to the scene of crime. I report my findings and suggest that we take snaps in a place where we won’t end up getting somebody fired. The band vocalist grinningly says, "Too late. W has already lost his job, then."
Huh?
"We took the photos when you took W inside," the drummer says, proud about his new-found defiant streak. High-fives are all over the place. W doesn’t understand what’s happening. As we all leave, he tells me, "Thanks ma, you understand no?"
I look at the drummer and vocalist now lifting their collars and doing the school-boy "yesss!!". I wonder where I can find a loaded gun.

Game theory yet again

Parking-lot guy Anand was staring at the number plates of all the two-wheelers lined up.
I have been told never to trust the intentions of someone who dares to charge 50 paise extra from poverty-stricken earning professionals (who are most probably parking there to make their way to buy the latest cell phone with a cannot-do-without camera). Plus, hindi movies have taught me that plucking off a number plate from an innocent bike and planting it on a hit-and-run vehicle driven by a criminal (who will also disguise himself astonishingly well with a paste-on moustache) was as easy as turning a roti on the pan.
So I squinted suspiciously at Anand, as if by letting less light-play in my vision, Anand's evil ploy will suddenly be apparent to me. Hmm… our prime suspect is mumbling something.
I know I'm onto something. I decide to move in. To buy time, I pretend I can't find my key. Anand is used to such carelessness. He probably thinks I don't deserve a bike. I have him fooled THIS time… haha!
Ok I am now close enough to hear him softly chanting something. Every 3 seconds, he rolls his eyes upwards, and his fingers wiggle a little. I move closer, acting like I'm tightening the screws on my helmet vizer. Anand's right thumb is moving quickly, placing a light touch on each section of his fingers. His lips are only slightly apart, still mumbling.
My eagle-eyes zoom in to his fingers again. The pieces of the puzzle begin to fall into place. Uniform. School. Homework. Number blocks. Fingers. Counting. Add. Subtract. Maths.
Anand spends his workday turning boring vehicle registration numbers into complex maths puzzles. "Timepass, may-dam (madam)" he tells me. So do numbers with more than 4 digits freak him out? After letting out a shockingly shrill ultrasonic laugh, he says the only thing that confuses him is the TN (Tamil Nadu) registration.
The tamilian in me reacts with an indignant "OYE!!" together with imagined angry lungi lifting action (sure to scare people shitless), while Bangalorean in me grins conspiringly at Anand. I don't think Anand cares how I react. He's more interested in (6623*3475) + KA03.

the decisive moment

kkk

"To take photographs means to recognize - simultaneously and within a fraction of a second - both the fact itself and the rigorous organization of visually perceived forms that give it meaning. It is putting one's head, one's eye and one's heart on the same axis.....
"The photograph itself doesn't interest me. I want only to capture a minute part of reality....
-Henri Cartier-Bresson (1908-2004)

Push & pull

Every time I’m asked to write about celebrity suicides, one-day makeovers,
talent hunts that will further breed more TV soap kings and queens who go to sleep dressed in wedding clothes & makeup,
campus lingo (I challenge the world to write 800 sensible words on the cultural milieu that spawned "wassup?!"),
a party that must be talk-of-town because a model did an unfortunate Janet Jackson,
what people wear this monsoon (oh who CARES!! just remember to take the jerkin/ raincoat/ umbrella) or other such events that must be chronicled for our grandchildren, I make an explosive mental speech about trashy articles in papers. But bravado takes new meanings as I very articulately stick my lower lip out at my boss, and say the words that reflect the makings of a great revolutionary: "But… but whyyyyy?"
I cannot tell a lie- the pink slip stalks me even in my sleep (well-dressed women walk up to me in busy dream streets and hand me pink files)! So I decide to be a con-artist. Tongue firmly in cheek, I sprinkle synthetic saccharine on every word I write, squeeze every bit of sarcasm into the article and pride myself on not having sold my soul. Then the fashion designer I poked fun at calls me up to say: "Thanks a lot, my girl. We need more write-ups like the one you did. We should lunch sometime…" Oh no! How did I get on HIS side?!! (And how do these people manage to make meals into verbs? "We must tea after we lunch" Ha! English pundits will cringe. I merely grin)
Food too, I hear, has gotten fashionable. As I sit at a 5-star dinner table pretending to be interested in how the miniscule one-spoonful portion of chocolate mousse must be plonked in the centre of a laaarge plate, with a "whiff of" this and a "sprinkling of" that, my fork is ready to take off. (Food Inspector’s orders: Spoons to be prohibited in restaurants where la-di-da is served in greater proportions than yummm…). All the while, my tummy holds a rumbling monologue...
Yet I keep my job. Well, there are perks. Like the occasional interview with madcaps whose endearingly irrational & less talked of lives make more sense than the many gold-plated (or platinum-plated, as trends would have us believe) worlds of the poised. Ok maybe I do love my job...

Making (up) news...

Who doth wield the pen?

Headstart point to cynicism.
Courtesy: a car driver and a college graduate. Both brilliant, sighed-out and anonymous. Both ghost writers to glitzier names.
What it must feel like to pen famous words, but to stop short of inking one's name with a proud flourish... To have no claim to the paeans & sighs it spawns, to master a smile of imposed contentment.
Does a ghost writer never wonder what his tombstone will say? Did he live at all? Maybe he doesn't even care what is etched on stone... Happily living in with dark humour. And why not? It serves the morning coffee and pokes fun at the distracting stomach rumble.
My neighbour panics when he sees his name missing in the telephone directory. "It's like I don't exist!" he worries. Anonymity is the pits. More abysmal when your entire life disappears into another's bejeweled and award-winning name.
Speak of ethics to the ghost writer and you will be spit on. There is no depression there, no talk of faceless glory. Just street logic.
Car driver laughs: "You know the background dancers in film songs who are much better than the hero/heroine and still go unnoticed? They are called 'atmosphere'. They get paid one meal and go home happily unfamous. I'm also atmosphere. Just with two left feet."
One point to dry humour. Draw.

Q&A

Question: Today's a rainy day. Would you like to...
(a) Grab some chai, breathe slow & smile as the steam from the cup warms your cold nose-tip?
(b) Think up rain-description lines that haven't already become damp sqids?
(c) Mentally list all rain songs from 'November rain' to 'Rain ise falling chama cham cham'?
(d) Wear pullovers, gloves and monkey-caps and fake some shivering & shuddering pretending you're in kashmir?
(e) Call home to spin a yarn that you'll be late because you're stuck in the rain, when all you want is to long detain that obscure sojourn.
(f) Take off your shoes and stare at the shrivelled up, pale and impeccably clean toes and remember the bygone days of liesurely taken baths (when there was time to do the Liril song in the shower/waterfall every morning)?
(g) Not worry about the washed clothes getting wet outside?
(h) Catch dad to make tiny paper boats that must most definitely not sink?
(i) Play lagori with your neighbours and make sure you jumped into puddles just to be rugged and dirty when you went back home?
(j) Pray like crazy that the power goes off just so you could hear the "yaaaaaaaaayy"emanate from every house in your lane?
(k) Tease a rich kid for having an emergency light when you had candles that are definitely more fun?
Answer: All of the above. Pretty pleeeeeez....

Appidi podu, podu, podu...

All that hysterical yelling and screeching was cruelly jolting me awake. Whyyyyy this utter disregard for my dreamworld?! Ok, whose vocal chords were so touched?!!
It turns out that my maid (who shall henceforth be referred to decently as Janaki) was making her presence felt. No, she doesn’t live with us like in some more prosperous homes.
… (Aside)
I had once heard a silver-spoon-still-in-mouth-at-16-years-of-age friend drawl, "Bahaduuuuur, paani lao" from a bedroom right next to the kitchen, where all the water she needed to drink was. 12-year-old Bahadur would stumble over himself to bring a glass of water placed neatly on a little sliver tray (probably kept in the drawer marked ‘Water Trays’ in the ahead-of-the-times modular kitchen). He wouldn’t ever take his eyes off the floor, except maybe to look at how much Tendulkar had scored. My friend would set the half finished glass of water aside, and after 10 minutes, when she reached for it again, it wouldn’t be there. Bahadur. As invisible as can be. Just doing his work and blending back into the walls.
...
And here was Janaki bringing the roof down with her bellowing.
At that decibel level, it was hard to make out what she was so happy about. Some glasses of water were handed to her, a chair softly slipped under her legs and a little prodding of her knees to get her to sit down. (all the while, I was playing Distracter Uncompare, making eye contact with Janaki. Believe me, it isn’t so easy when the subject is non-stationary).
Once she sat down, she brought out this bundle of what looked like cake, and said, "Happy Barthaday!!" with some remnants of the high pitch.
WHAT?? Oh no. Had I forgotten my mother’s birthday?? What a shameless, ungrateful, cold, compassionless daughter I was!!
Just as I was mentally scripting the most eloquent apology speech, amma said very sweetly, "Happy birthday to you, Janaki." And the girl who was just unabashedly calling upon the whole neighbourhood with her hysterics was now blushing a deep maroon.
It turns out that it indeed was Janaki’s 19th birthday. And she had been reminding me about it incessantly only for the last three days. Major guilt trip. Quick salvaging required.
In about 10 minutes, her little cake was beautifully redecorated with some powdered sugar, some chocolate syrup and 19 birthday candles (On finding those still lying around, amma threw a look at dad, her expression triumphantly saying, "So NOW look how things we don’t EVER throw away come in handy..")
We all sang "Happy bird-day toooo youuu" very tunefully (it’s a family of AIR singers, you see…), with some classical intonations and Janaki cut the cake amid applause (ok. Not applause. Clapping by 3 sets of hands. Technicalities!)

Me: So what are you going to do today?
Janaki: I will see Gilli with my friends. (For those you thought "huh?", Gilli is the super-duper-hit tamil movie starring dappankoothu-doing Vijay. Will explain dappankoothu another day)
Me: Oh, which theatre?
Janaki: Che! Theatre?! We will bring CD… (Shove THAT in the face of the chaps on TV who say ‘Don’t buy pirated tapes. Watch movies in the theatre.")
Me: Ok, you want holiday… ?
This digging of grave, which meant her being stuck with all the housework, could not be tolerated by amma. She shot some 15 arrows (of all types shown in DD’s Mahabharath) at me with one sharp look. I shut up and turned my attention back to Janaki.
She was so thrilled about her barthaday. And amma was especially happy to see her madness. She had seen Janaki sell her gold earrings to pay her brother’s school fees some days ago. Amma had decided to do something about it. Something that involved going back to that pawnbroker when Janaki wasn’t around.
The best part of the morning? Listening to Janaki go about her work singing "appidi podu, podu, podu..." (also a tamil song starring Vijay) and finishing off every line with "happy bird-day"(remixed version).
 
Disclaimer: This is not an attempt to weave a heart-rending sad tale for a short story telling competition. It's the truth, the whole truth, and nothing but the truth, so help me god.  :) 

Hero power, go get it!

Sweep, sweep.
"Excuse me..."
"Maydem, so early to aapees (office)?"
(smile, sigh) "Work is there, Leela"
I wait for her to do her job. It's her time now. 8 am.
Slosh, slosh. Swob to right... Thud! hello, wall right. Swob to leffffft... Thud! cringe, wall left. Swob, swob.
Destination: Cubicle, stage right.
Obstacle: Industriously cleaned floor that looks wet enough to bring anyone down.
Aha! Dry patch! Maybe I'll walk quickly over that... My right foot lifts gingerly, with presumptious subtlely...
Damn. Too late. Leela's got that one too. Small-time predicament now becomes insurmountable challenge.
The wet floor expands menacingly, laughing a hollow laugh, daring me to sully its shiny cleanliness.
Ok. That's it. It's time for... SUUUUPER-RO! Ban-ban-pauuuuunnnnn... dan-DAN! dinchak, dinchak, dinchank, dinchak...
and her faithful (and situation-specific) side-kick, Greeeeeeen swivel chair!!! dinchak, dinchank, dinchak...
Super-Ro's extensible hands reach for G-chair's back. Leela swings her mop in extreeeeme slow motion, and drops of dettoled water slice through the air...
Super-Ro must think fast.
Once the mop touches the floor, sloshing will kill all chance of walkability.
A world that will never walk again. WILL Super-Ro be able to stop that???
dinchak, dinchank, dinchak...
Ohhh, Super-Ro's in bigger trouble. Her right foot won't get off the ground! Is gravity an enemy too? Or worse, is it some villanous gooey chewing gum from the pavement???
dinchak, dinchank, dinchak...
Super-Ro overcomes the first enemy. Chewing gums will never DARE to come in her way again!
The floor still scoffs at Super-Ro's heroic feat....
Super-Ro jumps onto G-chair, holds on to the arms (the chair's arms. Super-Ro gets 6 arms only in Episode-3. Pay attention), holds her breath (now you know what her superpower is) aaaaand ZOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOM....
dinchak, dinchank, dinchak, dinchak.... Super-Ro zzzips past the walls, papers fly, pens topple over, lights are blinded. She charges, unstoppable, towards her super-computer all the way at the end of the hall.
She reaches her super-cubicle. Stands up victoriously. The walls only have ears, so they don't applaud.
But does SUUUUper-Ro care? She is already on her way to crush another enemy of the world- the water purifier.
dinchak, dinchank, dinchak...
So don't forget to tune in again... Saaaame Ro time, saaaame Ro channel....
 
(Brought on by a whole lifetime of promises courtesy Boost, Viva, Milo, Bournvita and Glucon-D)

fret & fume...

Is it hypocrisy to hate fake atmosphere (example, airconditioned office) and fake trees (example, plastic ones) but absolutely love fake goods (ribok, nyki, Levyies, music CDs burnt at a friend's place) just because i can have it cheap? ohhh... where are my ideals?!

bus blues

Have mercy, been waitin' for the bus all day.
I got my brown paper bag and my take-home pay.

Have mercy, old bus be packed up tight.
Well, I'm glad just to get on and home tonight.

Right on, that bus done got me back.
Well, I'll be ridin' on the bus till I Cadillac.

-Billy Gibbons & Dusty Hill

!!!!!!!

it's probably time to panic when you look up at the sky, feel the first pure drops of rain in your eyes and think to youself, "well, that's two drops the water conservation department missed."

Snap open

My grandma hated photographers. She thought the camera lens sucked all the years of your life away. And the flash was supposesd to be an instant skin-tanning agent. So when my dad turned paprazzi for me-the-2-year-old, her trust in the world ended.
"Can't you just remember that she ate mud cake with pebbles for cherries? Do you have to take a (gasp)photo? Oh, and the toothless yawn is not soooo important to be 'file photo'. So the sun is shining on her drool... so what?"
But there was no stopping my dad. Ok, maybe running for the camera when i swallowed dettol instead of cough syrup reduced his chances of getting a Father's day card, but it was still very, errr.. fatherly(?). And since he doesn't read this blog, i can bravely tell the world that he is the best cross-dresser any 3-year-old could laugh at! It induced my first rolling with guffaw-ter.
If there was a yucky Farex meal to be stuffed down my throat, there he was, telepathically willing me to stick my tongue out and put the bib to good use. I still maintain that it was common disdain for the photographer in my dad that brought my mother and his a lot closer.
"She will think the lens is your face," said my mom to my dad. (Yes. She attempted humour sometimes.) But I didn't care how my dad's face was... after all, he chased a stray dog around to drill it into my obstinate head that he (the dog, not my dad) was not a horse. He also made me believe that, just by standing behind the handlebar of the lambretta scooter, and doing "bruuuum... bruum..." sounds with my mouth, I could reach the end of the road. Yaya, it's all in the photo albums.
Considering the number of battles that raged on about the camera, there must be blood on each snap of me trying to grab an imaginary fly. And did I care? Nooo... all I knew was that my dad made me a filmstar.

hi-buy

Department stores unnerve me. What’s with the extreme organisation and clean-freakiness? Walking through one is like walking a tight rope.. or worse, taking a guarded trip in between the lines of a neatly printed sheet while the ink is still wet. Every thing is predetermined and there are fixed directions for every turn I take. A bar of soap can never hide unnoticed among jars of jam. Even if they both are fruity.
There are trolleys that are supposed to help you get about, but you always end up paying more attention to where the little wheels are taking off to than the shopping list. And you end up running into one of the towering shelves. Before you know it, nappies (why do they always keep them on the highest shelf?) and toilet paper rolls are raining on your head. Pink goes your face. Then red. Then maroon. Till the numbness of your hand turns into something tingly that pushes you to instantaneous action (=stupidity).
You try to single-handedly undo your mess, all the time praying to every god you suddenly realise you are devoted to… "oh, let me be invisible, let me be invisible…" But... "Excuse me mam! You can leave that. Sigh (deep one). We’ll attend to it. Sigh (deeper). It’s our job. Sigh. Sigh. Sigh." Purrrrple goes your face. Profuse apologies. Search for the trolley that some kid has found interesting enough to ride in. (ya, NOW it glides like a swan in water…) Quickly finish shopping. Get free pepsi 1.5 litres that is, according to McKinsey’s 45685795th point-of-sale survey, the biggest motivating factor to get you to spend More! More! More! on house supplies.
Standing in between two rows of shelves is, to put it simply, like being in the climax scene of a movie about treasure hunting in the haunted pyramids of Egypt. The last insignificant guy (who is usually the funniest and the most scared, so movie-goers know right from the beginning that he’s going to die) always gets stuck in between walls that are moving towards each other. Well, as I peer into a label, trying to pronounce the vowel-less term for that whitish gooey paste they mix in pasta (so I can knowingly drop the name while lunching with high-profile acquaintances I’ll meet on board the ship I buy soon), I get the same feeling of the world closing in on me. Some call it claustrophobia. Hah! Try mind-numbing, mouth-drying, blood-vessel-popping fear of overspending.(McKinsey must not hear of this)
What’s the best buyer experience then? Hmmm…
Seen the mayhem at a discount store that has a season sale? That.
Been thrilled at spotting a perfect red T-shirt among the pile of “Pick any three. Rs.100 only!” to soon realise that your house can wear it? That.
Searching for a second/third hand unrusted windshield wiper for your car in Chandni Chawk, Shivajinagar, Bangalore, while expertly dodging an arrow of pan juice fired at your foot. That.
Experiencing deep-felt satisfaction on discovering that a super chappal you bought for Rs.150 on the road is being sold for Rs.2999.99 becoz the store manager wears a tie. That.
Not knowing where the soap or jam is in the provision store and using that as a pretext to kick up a conversation with the shopkeeper. THAT.

cerebrum.. cere...well... um....

Brain-Section 1 convincing Sec.2 that it's a writer's block.
Brain-Sec.3 scoffs at the vain attempt to justify torpidity.
Brain-Sec.4 makes a list of all luxuries that will vanish along with the job.
Brain-Sec.5 shamelessly writes a blog entry.

Say aaah...

Don’t we love to see the line of qualifications following a doctor’s name? Little brackets announcing that the doc’s MD is not from any local college, but from London, Yankee land or Timbuktu… It's a great source of amusement to ask the doc about his experiences practising in Australia. “Being among Kangaroos was a medically enriching experience. And patients there are so refined.” (said with far-away look in eyes)
Oh, note to myself: Next time I see a doctor for pneumonia, I must remember to clean my swollen nose and wear my best dress.
Maybe it’ll be easier if docs just put up a poster spelling out the code of conduct for patients:
“Thou might be itchy, but thou shalt not scratch. Thou might have sinusitis, but thou shalt wipe your leaky nose only with a silk hanky (with monogram). Thou might have a sore throat, but thou shalt address the doc only in the loveliest baritone. And thou shalt leave thine wallet with the receptionist on thy way out. What is thou going to with an empty wallet anyway?”
I have only once dared to venture into a clinically clean, swanky hospital in pyjamas. Though the berating looks I received have scarred me for life, I still prefer it to a half-heartedly stitched up hospital gown that doesn’t leave anything carnal to the imagination. (Why do you think in-patients lie down so much? The stupid back-bearing outfit manages to foil all your plans of running away from the hospital.)
You might excuse a doc’s bizarre idea of what constitutes clothing, considering that he has to remember so much Latin. But hey, one man’s doc is another man’s poison.

the neuter vrroom

There's a motorbike made exclusively for women. Its called black barbie. Ahem. Liking neither nomenclature nor idea behind the exclusivity.
But why should i feel thrilled when i see a woman in salwar-kameez zip past me on on a mobike? I should think it normal, shouldn't i? Aren't i supposed to be worldly?
Damn, forget it... i rode an RD350 some hours ago. So I've kicked ass of enough advertisers who sell bikes as 'Definitely male'. And it was fun riding pillion too. Whether I'm holding the handle-bar or carrier, its just about getting some place, after all.

all for me?

give and take has to be a myth. how can it be real when take-take-take feels sooooo good? unless give means "give me"

celling my soul... not!

i fought hard and strong. honour mattered, nothing else. so people who had them were accessible. i refused to scrunch up my eyes staring at a little green screen (i know they have 'moonlight' and 'bluelight' now. they're imprisoning too).
push-button age. Picking up a cell meant surrendering wonderful day-dreaming. Filling up every unoccupied moment with snakes and bricks. My answer to "whats your currency?" always brought on exasperated sighs. i hear its not "the rupee" anymore. and i always wondered why people said "i HAVE roaming".. like the ability to walk around joblessly was a possession.
i wanted to stay uninfected. news about tariffs and SIMS were arduously blocked out.
nowwwwwwww i bow my head in shame, holding a nokia 3310 in my hand, understanding what pre-activated and recharged means.
but i hereby take this oath:
i will not pace while talking on the cell, just becoz its a 'mobile phone'. i will not dedicate all lunch conversations to 'how to get the cheapest connection'. i will not let something 1/1000th my size rule me.

kitne aadmi the?

did he really make shoes for gabbar singh? 'Little corner' he calls his shop. 'Fida' he calls himself. sitting in a seedy, wet, overly-mirrored (he said he was in a reflective mood) carton-sized store, surrounded by chappals that mirza ghalib, jahangir, allabaksh of shivajinagar, pooja tandon from vogue fashion designing institute and some penniless shoppers with honest faces would venture to buy. a "14-year-old" boy helps you try on some pairs... you get gingery sugarcane juice (Kempfort, take a hike!)... and the bestest part: unbelievable conversation!!
"oh,these kolhapuris chappals are fully hand-made... hamara (note the royal collective pronoun) export ka business hai. tamil nadu, hyderabad, mumbai, we export everywhere. you know, sholay? haaan... you know gabbar singh's shoes? abhi dikhatha hoon. (rummages in chappal pile at his feet and fishes out a huuuuge shoe, face beaming with pride of possession) we made this. (pause for effect) if you want, we can get it custom-made for your size."
i do some basanti bits, and he does some "arey oh saamba!". before we get to the "jab thak hai jaan... mai nachoongi" part, i quickly change the subject. who is that person shaking mohammed ali's hand in that framed photo? What?? YOU, MR.FIDA?? What?? You've met madonna and micheal jackson? some people just have aalll the luck.
i say this with deeply felt guilt: the conversation got me the chappal for half the rate. but i came back home with more gyan about how married life weakens your hair follicles & how a squint makes you lucky. wonder how i can wear-out my footwear faster...

ticket to heaven

this neighbour of mine passes by the little ganesha temple everyday on his bike on the way to work. unfailingly, he slows down his bajaj scooter, takes a quick peek inside the temple, takes aim & throws a red hibiscus with postman accuracy at the feet of the shrine. As his right hand comes back to the handlebar, his left does a quick salaam, and briefly touches his lips as he mumbles some half-word prayer. Both hands back on the handlebar, he vroooooooms off. All this in barely 5-6 seconds. If that shrine had sight, it couldn’t have seen anything more than a road-runnerish blur.
When I put on my best I’m-in-awe-of-you face and asked this neighbour about his deftness, he said, “You should try to think of god all the time. You’ll get moksha.”
Believe me, I tried. (Hey, I want a shot at moksha too) But the handlebar wobbles and the lip-brush ends up as a hard sock on my nose. Plus, I have to stop a few streets later to wear my helmet. The mini-prayer sounds like a word you can’t utter in church. (I’m assuming same rules apply for ganesha too) About the hibiscus, I don’t think stealing from the neighbour’s garden is the right way to go. Those little flower girls in front of the temple giggle at my antics. One cheeky one whispered that I was trying to get into the circus.
Oh maybe I’ll just burn in hell.

shootout at high noon

Bigtime showdown by boss at lunch. A real-life Western.

Dressed in black, white-hat (boss) casually strolls into the small town cafe. The stranger's entry is greeted by malevolent stares from a seedy group of bar flies. His presence is challenged in a prolonged attempt at provocation. A classic confrontation. Black hatted badguy steps up (me)
Says Black-hat: Lets take this outside
(spits out the slowest burning cigarette stub in history)

They step out. Out= Old West's ghost town, abandoned by miners.
Goodguy slowly approaches badguy out in the dusty street. Their hands are held in exaggerated ready gunfighter poses as they bow-leggedly stomp towards each other from opposite ends of town.

A mouth organ goes buan-buuaaaann baun-baun in the background. Soft drum roll.

Badguy squints as Goodguy Sheriff's badge catches a ray of sunlight and shines into badguy's eyes.

Sheriff goodguy: This town aint big enough for the two of us, kid.
Badguy: Draw, Sheriff.

The two stop advancing, pause for a few seconds to allow the music to set a climactic mood.
Camera focuses on badguy from in between sheriff's legs. Sheriff clicks the spurs of his worn-out dusty cowboy shoes. Frame moves on to his hands. His palm is poised at his waist-belt that cradles the gun. Fingers wiggle in slow deliberation.
Now Badguy does the same wiggling, but his gun somehow looks like it was meant to play unfair.

A bullet suddenly cuts through the silence. Someone falls. We see only the bored faces of bystanders chewing reeds of straw. So who killed who? Did the goodguy win?

Next frame. Zoom to the armpit of badguy. There's a hole in his jacket. You gasp as you realize that he narrowly missed having his arms blown off. It's the code of the West. A man has to stand up for what's right, and a good cowboy knows when to be merciful. Zoom in on Goodguy sheriff's face. He grins unbearably, baring his tobacco soiled teeth.

Trackback to real life. It really plays like any old Western film. The good guys and the bad guys are clearly defined. There are themes of honor and courage at play. And the key scene is a man to man showdown.
And boy! did that happen... Me back from boss's cubicle, trying to hide my amused grin. Little does she know what a perfect John Wayne she makes.

like shrugging it off helps...
just makes me more aware of how i never had to do that before.
slacking is the word. but how easily it can be justified as "taking it easy"
urgent! damage control ambulance required!
but the more the "i'll show THEM!", the more the no-show.
worry is the word. but i like the variant "on my toes"
i lie well to myself. (right hand shakes left)

shiva thaandavam

small, dingy room. bedsheets and forgotten coffee cups strewn around. unnamed tapes and Cds that you want to steal. among them is a bearded giant who owns rhythm. he talks of tunes and the impossibility of their death. listen, he says, and tunes his mridangam. dhong-dhong. thuk-thuk. dheem. TA! dheem.
i yawn. he doesn't care. he plays.
eyes tightly closed. little gleaming beads of sweat taking flight as the head moves violently. a mental world of dancing shiva, wild hair and ashen face. whether i believe in that form of divinity or not, the sound i hear is absorbing.
he smiles at the end of it all. anoor anantha krishna sharma.
shivu, the giant calls himself. close.

daddy kewl

I have a deadline to meet. One of my parents is going to claim his due on Sunday. What do you give a man who thinks watching a telugu movie song without the volume on is fun?
“here pa, a book!” “books are for people who have time”
“pa, here, you’ve always wanted a white shirt” “clothes… does it really matter how I look? I’m dashing even in a lungi”
“how would you like a pair of sneakers?” “To sneak off to a hill station for a second honeymoon with your middle aged mom, I suppose?”
“ok, what if I buy you a tape of ghazals? (not CD. To avoid the “are you kidding me? I’m not a dj!” (?))” “Sounds good, but are you sure you want me hear a bunch of songs about women and wine?”
“pa, what about a free hair cut with your regular barber?” “hmmm… I’ll try colouring the first row of grey hair blue” Errr… No way!
Oh, maybe I’ll just not remember father’s day. Will postpone the sarcasm-invite for his birthday.
Hmmm...funny how dad-day is on son-day