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