2012: The year it was.....

The day looks quite sullen at work. My office people are mostly on leave because of New Year, Christmas and winter vacation. Their absence makes the office look like one of the deserted islands. Since morning, I have spent spades of time in the pantry…just sipping coffee, then soup and sometimes hot water.


They said the world will end in Dec 2012, nothing happened. I do not know whether to be happy about this or be sad. The year is definitely not ending at right time. It would have been okay if the world vanished and we never had to come across the heinous crimes committed by our own people. I thought so many times, there were so many arguments which raced in my heart and there is so much disgust for the mankind that is waiting to erupt from the volcano of my heart. This world is such a sickening place to be today…

The Indian brave heart passes away after going through so much pain and anguish. Her body suffered so many bruises, she survived so much abuse and yet she had the will to live. We, towards the end of every year, have so proudly been affirming and acknowledging the emancipation of women and the shoulder to shoulder growth of females. It seems this liberation has become the yoke around her neck.

I am not happy at the way I am seeing the dawn of 2013. I’m angry and disgusted, and in this rather restricted pallet it is impossible to instill hope. It usually takes one incident to galvanize people but now with the series of brutal acts – one more grisly than the other… I wonder how long it will take to gain sanity again. Probable never… maybe by now we have trained ourselves to shrug and take everything in our stride…

A prodigal friend

Few days back I felt awful about something. There was a very good friend of mine who turned into one of those blighted characters who do nothing but devastate. I noticed that long back but after a hearty conversation with a close pal I realized how despicable he has become. Somehow learning and accepting the ‘forgive and forget’ story has been very difficult for me. I have never been able to bring my head round to this idea of first forgiving the contemptible act and then forgetting that.


My prodigal friend does it again. He has always been this dissolute. He would do things utterly wasteful and take it for granted that he will be forgiven. I have often given forgiveness a thought and have tried to implement. But here in this situation I think I will pass. I thought and re-thought, groaned inwardly and even made mincemeats of my principles. I knew, not forgiving this person will later lather me in my own guilt. But I was ready to take chances. My head felt heavy. Every good memory with this friend played slideshow in my heart. I have to do it – I thought. I have to throw this person out of my life and for good.

After my much contemplated arguments and theories settled, I felt him as a yoke around my neck. So I decided I am going to cleanse my mind and heart of his misdoing or whatever. I felt my burning temples caused by my incensed mind go frantic. If I have decided to snip any further contact with this person I should let him know. I can’t just be angry at his obnoxious behavior and then when we cross path sometimes later, he shouldn’t expect any exchange of pleasantries. So I wrote to him stating how thoughtless his actions were, how hollow his ideas are about me and how much of a thankless job he has done as a friend. After writing to him, I felt very light. My circumscribed thoughts ran all over and patted my back for letting go of my anger and letting go of an ugly scar.

I wish he also trims his bloated existence on others and gets a worthy life. Isn’t goodness supposed to spread through osmosis?

Poster child of poverty under a new lens

This is only with reference to a wretched assignment I am doing at work. The assignment aims at capturing all the heart-wrenching tales of marginal farmers across India. So much so, that after reading few case lets and later developing them to stories I behaved in a frenzied manner. In the primrose path of my life, (at least that is what I think) I had a winter of discontent.

The story is not from a Prakash Jha movie or any Oscar nominated flick. It is a true tale of ruefulness, helplessness and a destitute life:

Resident of a tribal village Banjara Tola, situated few blocks away from Mandla district, Madhya Pradesh, Kanhaiya Shivsam turned 80 years old this year. Like most of the gonds in village, Kanhaiya was also a farmer by profession. After getting one leg diseased and amputated in 1982, Kanhaiya has spent rest of his life on crutches. He stayed in the village with his wife, son and daughter. His tragic life got worse many years back when an unknown disease took a toll on his wife and son’s life. 

Kanhaiya outside his house

Kanhaiya had spent all his savings on his daughter’s marriage but his son-in-law deserted her only after two months of marriage without any reason. Trapped in this forbidding cycle, his 40 years old daughter, Amavati has been taking care of him. Amavati expressed her sadness on the fact that she is uneducated and cannot provide any substantial assistance. She asserts “thak jate hai kam karte karte, ab to makan bhi girta hai, isko sudharne wala bhi koi nahi hai. Dada bhi akele hai, bimar rehte hai, bahar kaam karne bhi nahi jaa sakte, davayi goli ke liye bhi paisa nahi hai.” (I get tired after taking care of the house, nursing my father and working in the field. Our house has become weak and we do not have enough money to repair it. My father is old, alone and weak. We do not even have money to buy medicine also.)

Kanhaiya and his daughter live in a non-electrified house made of mud. The only certain source of income for family is the handicapped pension of Kanhaiya which amounts to Rs. 200 per month. He is supposed to collect the pension amount from a place which is 6 kilometers away. Unable to do so, his friends help him in collecting the amount for Rs. 50. His BPL card is also outdated for the last 2 years.

All of a sudden I realized the India I know is so much different from what the facts and figures say about it. It blatantly shouts that we live side by side with spirits of the nether world, the poltergeists of dead rivers, dry wells, bald mountains and denuded forests; the ghosts of 2,50,000 debt-ridden farmers who have killed themselves, and of the 800 million who have been impoverished and dispossessed to make way for us. And who survive on less than twenty rupees a day.

(Un)Usual evening

He sat with her at the edge of the roof stone. There was no ambience, no well-lit décor, sans color and luminosity the mood appeared gall and wormwood. The breeze hit him heavy while her wind-whipped hair flickered like shadow of fire. Their conscious moves intermittently moved like the rolling ball in hollow tunnel. Their muscles flexed and expressions changed like puffs of vapor. The moment passed by like the tedious walk in a long and droughty corridor.

She should have told him everything before he found all about her. He was pained more than he could cry and whimper. He was after all the wrongly shot hog. He was burning in wrath, anguish and distress. The blood curdling silence grew in there but an eddying mumble rubbed him the wrong way. She admitted to all with downcast eyes showing packed remorse. Nevertheless, that was not enough. He wanted her to feel the same pain and anguish his heart bore.

I could use some of my time for watching television today because yesterday I worked hard to finish an obscure assignment. Work from home sometimes just thumps on your brains, its doubling mirth. And yeah you get to work double than your desk. Sigh! I had watched a lot of TV series already. Grey’s anatomy was featuring on the TV since morning. It was so recurrent that I thought I have got ensnared in a time loop. It has never entertained me like other series so I thought to flip channels when I came across a scene from some Hindi soap which looked interesting (partially). The above description was something I was watching while nibbling each morsel of my lunch. I wanted to understand why so and so (actually a whooping %) of women of our country watches these daily soaps. The above was shown in some good 20 minutes. Those 20 minutes were the longest, I swear. I didn’t know what expressions should have been right for the usual soap scenes; canned gaiety? A raucous guffaw?? Or may be just bare giggles…

Sweet little things

While walking on the side tracks of my office glancing on beds of shoe flowers and chrysanthemums I felt happy. It reminded me of the small garden we had in Dhanbad. My mom would plant all kinds of flowers and grandpa would tell me how those flowers were essential. He always had fondness for beli or Bella flowers in English. He said they are smaller but never pettier. They had the most amazing smell I ever sniffed. I would often pick them and keep it in my hand thinking that someday the beautiful whiff of the flower will transfer to me. It is strange how very small things leave a mark and how big things fade in oblivion!

***

Today while having my evening cup of coffee, a pantry guy offered me his hand-made ginger tea. I do not like tea. I hate the after taste, tea leaves in my mouth so I avoid it as much as I can. But this time I asked him to pour me a full cup for I was touched by the way he was considerate. It has been ages since people asked you for a cup of tea because they were making one for themselves.

No subject..duh!

Sometimes you get up with a heavy head and sullen mood. You wander aimlessly in your head and are clueless about what went wrong. I came to office with the same feeling today. While I was getting ready to work I tried engrossing myself when my cooking and cleaning maid were chit-chatting. She made me a nice cup of black tea and upon sipping that I tried reasoning if I wanted to bunk work today. I took my tea out in the balcony and shifted my glance towards the grim silhouette of huge rock on the ground. The thought of deforestation and soil erosion started amassing when I instructed my mind to disperse the inapt realm of thoughts. I got in a rickshaw and after few miles realized that its meter was broken. The upholstery of the vehicle was a depressing grey color… I looked at the dry and parched way which was blowing dust. Any hint of rain seems to have evaporated from Mumbai. The wretched thought itself started annoying me. I reached my office, sat at my desk and accidently thronged my finger to the table, such that my already (painfully) split nail got re-hurt. My boss told me about some meeting we will have EOD and I started thinking about the crowded rail-platform I will venture into after work. The dreadful push and jostle amidst the thronging crowd started jolting me. My stomach started squelching and head started to hurt again. I wanted to feel happy but my workstation looked like a deserted lighthouse after tsunami. My office buddies are mostly on trips (personal as well as official) so I didn’t have any interesting thread/exchange of conversation since morning. My lunch, lauki added insult to injury. I wanted to get home, slip into my comfortable pair of pajamas, sip on a cup of hot chocolate, watch a horror/psycho-thriller and lie on my couch till my back would hurt. Sigh! My outlook reminder popped up prompting me to finish off something which I will have to bring along in the meeting. And life becomes such a bitch sometimes.

With all the weirder chain of events, I called my husband… He lightened my mood by his friskily playful vibes and became a bright spot in my cave-gloom day. Such is life!

when the cookie crumbles

Office is such a wondrous place to meet so many kinds. Every day event can be a long Rupert Brooke poem. Today, I had deliberately kept a bowl of coconut cookies on my work-desk. This bowl of creamy white cookies enticed horde of self-proclaimed dieticians. When I bought the cookies I knew they were baked and no oil/butter was used (I trust the listed ingredients). But soon after someone pointed out that this eatable is fattening, will raise my cholesterol and eventually I will turn obese I lost my appetite for the little things. Honestly, my cookies were nothing like the oily snack that looks like objects glazed with wax. It was a simple snack which is supposed to be sweet and helps you a lot in an activity called as writing and binging. There was also some choco-chip cookies which I wanted to have … I think I should lose myself in the dulcet darkness of chocolate cookies only when the terrifying diet-conscious people are away!

And so it goes...

I have started falling in love with Mumbai. The place has a spirit…it has a lackadaisical pulse, an unnerving energy…  a rambunctious joy it hurls on you every time you need a loving embrace to get going.

The afternoon is sweltering today; I am so much waiting for the rain. The weather is humid and hot. Not that I don’t know humidity is good for your skin, it makes you sweat and look like you washed your face in moonlight.

My balcony has a view unlike the other houses in Mumbai. Looks like I used clout to get a place which has three balconies and an unobstructed view from each. It is wonderful to sit there and watch the wonderful evening light bending and pirouetting everything in gentle caress. The plants in my balcony swarm to make striking shrubbery. From the pots, money plants sprung like green liana of smoke and a small rose bud is the only nib point of red in the vista. When that warm breeze ossifies in me, I feel it melting on my fingertips.

Sometimes I feel I get to think a lot, which makes me weak in the knees and I feel like I have been wrung out. But hasn’t someone said, “There’s a joy in delirium only mad men know.” 

Today it looks like a sloshy cloud has come down and given this city a big hug!

The Debate

Gamin Console scene:

The assassin then leaped upon the shaft, his torn jacket brandishing a pistol. Adam and Hui were startled by the footage caught on security camera. Tonight the security system, so systematically laid was impossible for an overrun. They felt helpless at once because they could see more than they and things at a greater distance, not by virtue of any sharpness of sight on their part but because they were carried high at the security base. They fished out the devices to throw signal for the intrusion and possible assault.

Adam: I wish it were real. Gaming is fun; the surreal experience makes you feel like you have outgrown your inept image and have become real heroes who can save this world

Hui almost sheepishly: Yeah! You are the superhero who saves the world

Adam displaying mock anger: Had it not been you, we would have lifted level five well ahead in time. And if I am not the savior, then is it the Chinese ace next to me? (mockingly points at Hui)

Hui: That was racist… Doesn’t help much when you agree we are part of same melting pot. We came from one and will vanish in unison.

Adam: I don’t see any affirmative nods here. (Pun in voice)

Well, why are we physically, anatomically and morphologically so disparate?

Hui: I don’t see much difference. We have not grown tails in Japan, horns in Africa, Furs in USA or wings in India. We are still same. The color of skin, features etc are nothing but geographical adaptation. We are basically still analogous.

Adam: There was Darwin, then Huxley then many more. How do you believe what is true? We may come from one and vanish in one, and then what is the purpose? Doesn’t it sound sadistic? Somebody created us, let us free to fool around and then will destroy us. Isn’t it similar to our games, where we terminate lives? This is so lame.

Hui: We might as well know. But as they say, if the camel once get his nose in the tent his body soon follows. Why does everyone who had a hint of afterlife and et al vanished soon after they hit rock bottom…. Buddha? Jesus?

Adam: I am perplexed… Hasn’t Huxley defended Darwin and won by saying these lines?

To twice slay the slain,

By dint of the Brain,

Is but labor in vain,

Unproductive of gain,

Hui: How would I know? I have my beliefs and I stick to them. I don’t ask you to agree but to ponder.

Adam: Gaming is easier. Let’s hit the button.

And so these men

Disputed loud and long,

Each in his own opinion

Exceeding stiff and strong,

Though each was partly in the right

And all were in the wrong

Tête-à-Tête

Is it fun to be stimulating and discursive?

Do you believe that Moses parted the Red sea?

Do you need intelligent reactions from your listener when you say/write literature whipped with rhetorical phrases, sarcasm, irony and paradox?

Do you think sitting next to a forlorn window, thinking about the things that bothered you and writing them using dark metaphors can be called poetry? 

Do you think all of us have tad bit of misanthrope in us?

*************

I remember during the heydays of my blog, I would think of something in divine manifestation and write a huge blog to fit that somewhere nonchalantly... it felt good, back then. people reading something spawned from your creative wings and even with few adulation I would chuckle.

I wonder how Salman Rushdie would have felt when his work was not only condemned and disparaged but was also banned after it was claimed that the novel's portrayal of the prophet Muhammad insulted Islam. When we talk about literature, Salman Rushdie is not just a yardstick for awe-inspiring but is also a magnificent author who has made others grow their standards of writing. I am not anti-religion but I fail to understand why expressing opinion on religion becomes a punishable banality. 

It is disappointing that a free country which asks us to express our opinions gets touchy about a mere publication on God of small things. Seemingly when it was written on the sand with a twig : He who has not sinned, let him cast the first stone was taken way too fatally !



 

Drugging its way to hall of fame

Remember those mundane valentine’s days at school when the only way to celebrate it was to listen to ‘top most romantic hits’ “I will always love you”. Or do you remember the growing up years listening to Beatles, Doors, Bee Gees, etc? Elvis Presley? Jim Morrison? Back then, Valentine’s day was dreamily sitting by your window, ear plugged with “My love is your love”& “Could I have this kiss forever”!

I was going through an article on ’27 club’ by wikipedia. This is supposedly about a curse stating that most musicians who touch the famed chords of success meet with tragic pre-mature deaths. Whitney Houston’s death has brought fore the similar deaths at the altar of drugs. As supporting evidences, they quote death of Kurt Cobain from Nirvana, Jimi Hendrix, Presley, Jim Morrison, Tommy Bolin from Deep Purple etc.

Is the lethal trail of drug overuse mandatory when you reach at the top? Or is the top really so lonely that they find respite in giving themselves pain and taking their life away? Why is there severe drug dependency at the top?  

My generation people, love-filled or lovelorn listened to Whitney Houston. She made it so quixotic and dreamy. She was the voice I heard when I read books by Jane Austen and Charlotte Brontë. 

RIP  Whitney Houston

new year and more....

So the New Year begins. A year which is erroneously called as an end to mankind… well I really do not know, if I should stick to my resolution of losing a few kilos, when the motivation is so tepid.

Okay, here I am phenomenally distracted yet again! I thought I shall put up agglomeration of random thoughts, probably better sculpted this time. But my distraction is so chronic now. I think I have been so busy setting my house and habitually checking if things are in order that my distraction comes to my brain like a blizzard in full throttle.

Talking about the new year, I had also thought I would buy fewer clothes now. This is not a resolution but a conscious effort to keep my wardrobe growing like the burgeoning population. I felt a lot of clothes are too expensive, short or incongruent with my lifestyle. When we moved in to this new place, I noticed all kind of clothes I would seldom wear…or maybe ‘will not wear ever’. Some were in sequins, some netted, others jazzy, and so on.

Right now I’m sitting on a cane chair, comfortably cushioned. I look through the balcony trinkets of clouds giving way to an evening. There are huge black rocks formed due to shattering and breaking of mountains. This would have prevented growth of the swatches of grass. The houses built on the hilly terrain looks like the you are maneuvering a huge tray full of cups, saucers, spoons and sugar cubes…. clattering with each other… And the night comes along