I never saw MJ moonwalk till news channels filled the piece on TV after his death. Never is an exaggeration. May be a glimpse of the amazing feat once or twice, but that's all. I always used to get saddened every time his face flicked on TV, was splashed in the newspapers...
'What has he done to himself??? Why is he like he is?' I remember wondering with a disapproving shrug. Yes, I had read about the many surgeries, but I still couldn't fathom why someone, especially someone as high as him, on such a pedestal of fame, was plagued with a dissatisfaction of the superficial kind, being obsessed with 'how i look' instead of may be 'how / what / why i am'...
Pouring over the photos, the only time he looks alive and kicking to me is as a kid, a part of Jackson 5, then may be till the 70s. That's when his skin looks fed with real blood, real emotions, love or hate. Proceed to the era of white face with red lips — the star value is there, the life force is missing.
How plastic surgery changed his face
I read this article that state's what a mess MJ had become when he died and it sent a whole lot of gloom down me. One little lesson I learn from the moonwalking giant's life and death is to be comfortable in your skin. Otherwise, no matter what giant you become, you may end up pained and plastic.
Looking good is important. But feeling good is much more crucial. And feeling good should not lean too much on one's looks...
Friday, July 03, 2009
Wednesday, June 17, 2009
Few quirky, lovely poems and how poetry can breathe free in face of censorship
It's strange how you read what you do. Looking back, I realise that my appetite to read and my choice was directed by a series of coincidences — due to statements made by the way, interesting blurbs, names referred persistently by disconnected sources...
It was through one such convoluted reading spree, that I got curious about Allen Ginsberg. Having read Jack Kerouac's On the road, and having finally decided that I wanted to read more of him, I began surfing the net for beat writers. A series of web links enlightened me about people like Ken Casey, beat weirdos like Neal Cassady and Allen Ginsberg. Ginsberg rang a bell for some reason.
After a very long time, in Ginsberg I have found a poet I quite enjoy. Here's an except from A Supermarket in California:
In my hungry fatigue, and shopping for images, I went into the neon fruit
supermarket, dreaming of your enumerations!
What peaches and what penumbras! Whole families shopping at night! Aisles
full of husbands! Wives in the avocados, babies in the tomatoes! --- and you,
Garcia Lorca, what were you doing down by the watermelons?
I saw you, Walt Whitman, childless, lonely old grubber, poking among the
meats in the refrigerator and eyeing the grocery boys.
I heard you asking questions of each: Who killed the pork chops? What price
bananas? Are you my Angel?
Ginsberg has that typical focussed link between him and his words — he seems to obliterate everything else. There's no room for explanation, he doesn't bother to cut out ambiguity and his thoughts flow unrefined and unmanipulated. That Ginsberg saw Whitman in the supermarket may be due to the psychedelic drugs beat writers indulged in to get 'poetic visions'. But the fantasy has been written crisply, with a sense of real time and humour.
I tried to see how many figures of speech I can find in the lines and here's what I got...
In my hungry fatigue
Metaphor, Personification: Fatigue given the animate quality of being hungry
Whole families shopping at night! Aisles full of husbands- Hyperbole
Wives in the avocados, Babies in the tomatos- Is this Assonance? (the sound of avocadoes and tomatoes)
And you, Garcia Lorca- Apostrophe
I saw you, Walt Whitman..... Apostrophe
...and eyeing the grocery boys- Perhaps hinting at Whitman's (debated) homosexuality
Who killed the pork chops?
Synechdoche: Pork chops mean pigs
Personification: The idea that pork chops can be killed...
Another racy poem is Velocity of Money. An excerpt:
Now everybody’s atheist like me, nothing’s sacred
buy and sell your grandmother, eat up old age homes,
Peddle babies on the street, pretty boys for sale on Times Square -
You can shoot heroin, I can sniff cocaine
Reasons why I liked this:
1) Brevity: Thoughts are short and crisp, the flow is quick.
2) Vivid imagery- Peddle babies on the street, pretty boys for sale...
3) Conflict- While he says everyone is an atheist like him, there's a pinch of regret in the statement, nothing's sacred.
4) The poem is full of metaphor, including the title...
5) The economy Ginsberg complains of is all the more relevant today...
Other (tad lengthy poem) that caught my attention was September on Jessore Road.
Jessore Road is near the airport and stretches all the way to the Bangladesh border. That it had caught Ginsberg's fancy made me curious about the poem. Here are the lines that touched me the most:
Where are our tears? Who weeps for the pain?
Where can these families go in the rain?
Jessore Road's children close their big eyes
Where will we sleep when Our Father dies?
This site has 48 poems written by Ginsberg.
Some other refreshing poems come from D H Lawrence.
The ones I particularly enjoyed are Lies about love
We are a liars, because
the truth of yesterday becomes a lie tomorrow,
whereas letters are fixed,
and we live by the letter of truth.
The love I feel for my friend, this year,
is different from the love I felt last year.
If it were not so, it would be a lie.
Yet we reiterate love! love! love!
as if it were a coin with a fixed value
instead of a flower that dies, and opens a different bud.
Good Husbands Make Unhappy Wives
Good husbands make unhappy wives
so do bad husbands, just as often;
but the unhappiness of a wife with a good husband
is much more devastating
than the unhappiness of a wife with a bad husband.
I love these poems for the bold, sweeping statements Lawrence has made.
Such a non-committal, nonconformist streak is the reason I like the medium of poems. Here, writers can seize their right to speak their minds off without bothering to leave trails of explanations and footnotes. This kind of freedom of creativity — that includes the acceptance of the ambiguous and the abstract — is accorded to no other medium.
A reason why poets may evade the 'scanner' is perhaps because no one ( or certainly not many)takes a poet quite seriously. Poems are passed off as art, and given the belief that 'all art is useless' the controlling mechanism doesn't quite bother to eye it with such zeal as they try to keep a tab on journalists..
In this context, let me quote some paragraphs George Orwell has written in his essay, The Prevention of Literature:
..It follows that the atmosphere of totalitarianism is deadly to any kind of prose writer, though a poet, at any rate a lyric poet, might possible find it breathable..
..There is a whole series of converging reasons why it is somewhat easier for a poet, than for a prose writer to feel at home in an authoritarian society. To begin with, bureaucrats and other 'practical' men usually despise the poet too deeply to be much interested in what he is saying. Secondly, what the poet is saying — that is, what his poem 'means' if translated into prose — is relatively unimportant even to himself. The thought contained in a poem is simple, and is no more the primary purpose of a picture. A poem is an arrangement of sounds and association, as painting is an arrangement of brush marks. For short snatches indeed, as in the refrain of a song, poetry can even dispense with meaning altogether. It is therefore fairly easy for a poet to keep away from dangerous subjects and avoid uttering heresies: and even when he does utter them, they may escape notice. But above all, good verse, unlike good prose, is not necessarily an individual product.. (Here, Orwell cites examples of ballads)
.. And the destruction of intellectual liberty cripples the journalist, the sociological writer, the historian, the novelist, the critic and the poet, in that order..
While Orwell has written the essay with the thrust being on prose, the above words show that the position of a poet is relatively safe.
It was through one such convoluted reading spree, that I got curious about Allen Ginsberg. Having read Jack Kerouac's On the road, and having finally decided that I wanted to read more of him, I began surfing the net for beat writers. A series of web links enlightened me about people like Ken Casey, beat weirdos like Neal Cassady and Allen Ginsberg. Ginsberg rang a bell for some reason.
After a very long time, in Ginsberg I have found a poet I quite enjoy. Here's an except from A Supermarket in California:
In my hungry fatigue, and shopping for images, I went into the neon fruit
supermarket, dreaming of your enumerations!
What peaches and what penumbras! Whole families shopping at night! Aisles
full of husbands! Wives in the avocados, babies in the tomatoes! --- and you,
Garcia Lorca, what were you doing down by the watermelons?
I saw you, Walt Whitman, childless, lonely old grubber, poking among the
meats in the refrigerator and eyeing the grocery boys.
I heard you asking questions of each: Who killed the pork chops? What price
bananas? Are you my Angel?
Ginsberg has that typical focussed link between him and his words — he seems to obliterate everything else. There's no room for explanation, he doesn't bother to cut out ambiguity and his thoughts flow unrefined and unmanipulated. That Ginsberg saw Whitman in the supermarket may be due to the psychedelic drugs beat writers indulged in to get 'poetic visions'. But the fantasy has been written crisply, with a sense of real time and humour.
I tried to see how many figures of speech I can find in the lines and here's what I got...
In my hungry fatigue
Metaphor, Personification: Fatigue given the animate quality of being hungry
Whole families shopping at night! Aisles full of husbands- Hyperbole
Wives in the avocados, Babies in the tomatos- Is this Assonance? (the sound of avocadoes and tomatoes)
And you, Garcia Lorca- Apostrophe
I saw you, Walt Whitman..... Apostrophe
...and eyeing the grocery boys- Perhaps hinting at Whitman's (debated) homosexuality
Who killed the pork chops?
Synechdoche: Pork chops mean pigs
Personification: The idea that pork chops can be killed...
Another racy poem is Velocity of Money. An excerpt:
Now everybody’s atheist like me, nothing’s sacred
buy and sell your grandmother, eat up old age homes,
Peddle babies on the street, pretty boys for sale on Times Square -
You can shoot heroin, I can sniff cocaine
Reasons why I liked this:
1) Brevity: Thoughts are short and crisp, the flow is quick.
2) Vivid imagery- Peddle babies on the street, pretty boys for sale...
3) Conflict- While he says everyone is an atheist like him, there's a pinch of regret in the statement, nothing's sacred.
4) The poem is full of metaphor, including the title...
5) The economy Ginsberg complains of is all the more relevant today...
Other (tad lengthy poem) that caught my attention was September on Jessore Road.
Jessore Road is near the airport and stretches all the way to the Bangladesh border. That it had caught Ginsberg's fancy made me curious about the poem. Here are the lines that touched me the most:
Where are our tears? Who weeps for the pain?
Where can these families go in the rain?
Jessore Road's children close their big eyes
Where will we sleep when Our Father dies?
This site has 48 poems written by Ginsberg.
Some other refreshing poems come from D H Lawrence.
The ones I particularly enjoyed are Lies about love
We are a liars, because
the truth of yesterday becomes a lie tomorrow,
whereas letters are fixed,
and we live by the letter of truth.
The love I feel for my friend, this year,
is different from the love I felt last year.
If it were not so, it would be a lie.
Yet we reiterate love! love! love!
as if it were a coin with a fixed value
instead of a flower that dies, and opens a different bud.
Good Husbands Make Unhappy Wives
Good husbands make unhappy wives
so do bad husbands, just as often;
but the unhappiness of a wife with a good husband
is much more devastating
than the unhappiness of a wife with a bad husband.
I love these poems for the bold, sweeping statements Lawrence has made.
Such a non-committal, nonconformist streak is the reason I like the medium of poems. Here, writers can seize their right to speak their minds off without bothering to leave trails of explanations and footnotes. This kind of freedom of creativity — that includes the acceptance of the ambiguous and the abstract — is accorded to no other medium.
A reason why poets may evade the 'scanner' is perhaps because no one ( or certainly not many)takes a poet quite seriously. Poems are passed off as art, and given the belief that 'all art is useless' the controlling mechanism doesn't quite bother to eye it with such zeal as they try to keep a tab on journalists..
In this context, let me quote some paragraphs George Orwell has written in his essay, The Prevention of Literature:
..It follows that the atmosphere of totalitarianism is deadly to any kind of prose writer, though a poet, at any rate a lyric poet, might possible find it breathable..
..There is a whole series of converging reasons why it is somewhat easier for a poet, than for a prose writer to feel at home in an authoritarian society. To begin with, bureaucrats and other 'practical' men usually despise the poet too deeply to be much interested in what he is saying. Secondly, what the poet is saying — that is, what his poem 'means' if translated into prose — is relatively unimportant even to himself. The thought contained in a poem is simple, and is no more the primary purpose of a picture. A poem is an arrangement of sounds and association, as painting is an arrangement of brush marks. For short snatches indeed, as in the refrain of a song, poetry can even dispense with meaning altogether. It is therefore fairly easy for a poet to keep away from dangerous subjects and avoid uttering heresies: and even when he does utter them, they may escape notice. But above all, good verse, unlike good prose, is not necessarily an individual product.. (Here, Orwell cites examples of ballads)
.. And the destruction of intellectual liberty cripples the journalist, the sociological writer, the historian, the novelist, the critic and the poet, in that order..
While Orwell has written the essay with the thrust being on prose, the above words show that the position of a poet is relatively safe.
Tuesday, June 02, 2009
Of Brainvita, drawings and home
Though I checked my blog very frequently, a somewhat moody mindset kept me from writing anything. This also explains why comments remained unmoderated for quite a while. In between my no-write phase, I noticed my blog had jumped a page rank and now stands at a presentable 4. :) All in all, it's time to fill in here again...
My trip back home was good, but this time I realized with an errie finality that now my mind is quite settled here in Kolkata. More so than the touchy topic of choosing one of the two cities, it's about getting used to a particular lifestyle. I have become too used to my independent existence here and a little departure from routine, from my seclusion in the quiet afternoon hours makes me go very edgy.
I talked for long hours with my sister and tagged along with her to the many malls that have insanely cropped up in the city. In a few years, it seems malls will be within a hopping distance of everything and anything.
Aaji had kept aside a lot of precious little nothings for me to take away. So, I came back with a splendid wooden Brainvita plate designed on order. I always managed to leave one marble every single time (i regret i was just too lazy to use my 'genius' elsewhere) and the stall-owner at a school fair shooed me away after I won four Kit-Kats in a row...
She had also kept aside two drawing books. There were some incomplete drawings, one of which sis absolutely loved. I took out the book today and started completing the drawing. It's still not done, but looks cheerful.
How wonderful it would be if we could resume all things after such a silent, forgotten break?
My trip back home was good, but this time I realized with an errie finality that now my mind is quite settled here in Kolkata. More so than the touchy topic of choosing one of the two cities, it's about getting used to a particular lifestyle. I have become too used to my independent existence here and a little departure from routine, from my seclusion in the quiet afternoon hours makes me go very edgy.
I talked for long hours with my sister and tagged along with her to the many malls that have insanely cropped up in the city. In a few years, it seems malls will be within a hopping distance of everything and anything.
Aaji had kept aside a lot of precious little nothings for me to take away. So, I came back with a splendid wooden Brainvita plate designed on order. I always managed to leave one marble every single time (i regret i was just too lazy to use my 'genius' elsewhere) and the stall-owner at a school fair shooed me away after I won four Kit-Kats in a row...
She had also kept aside two drawing books. There were some incomplete drawings, one of which sis absolutely loved. I took out the book today and started completing the drawing. It's still not done, but looks cheerful.
How wonderful it would be if we could resume all things after such a silent, forgotten break?
Saturday, May 16, 2009
And I am thrilled...
This drawing I had done quite some days back, when I was pessimistic, a wee bit cynic and quite confused.. I have never thought of consciously making myself aware about politics, but by the virtue of the place I live now, talks, discussions and reading a large number of political stories by the virtue of my profession, I was quite more in touch with the happenings — and the speculations — than I have been all my life. (Otherwise I used to skip news on politics quite conveniently)
I still have no clear political ideology.
I love Modi for the change of face Gujarat has seen and I grudge him for what happened in 2002. I hate BJP and its allies like RSS, VHP for giving a fundamentalist slur to a religion as free and beautiful as Hinduism. I think Congress could have done a lot more than it has done, given the kind of trust people had (and continue to have in spite of many odds) in the party...
Initially, in West Bengal, the Left seemed to me an unusually principled, organized party — perhaps the only one that had such a clear set of dos and don't, so to say, a clear-cut party line... Trinamool seemed hopeless as an Opposition, with Mamata's shrill, often extremely illogical arguments.
But over a period of time, I was stumped by the single-minded allegiance pledged to the CPM by hoards and hoards of people. Something seemed grossly wrong. I was not ready to believe that such collective masses could be so in tune with the ideologies... A spin-yarn seemed to be working somewhere, and quite strongly at that.
Singur and Nandigram served to show people just to what extent the Left front takes itself to be superior to everything else. Highhandedness seemed at its peak in that period. Mamata Banerjee, for all her shrill, illogical rallies, had touched a cord somewhere. May be I could not relate to her but some people, who were disillusioned with the trust they put in the other fold time and again leading to nil, could. After 32 years of rule, people perhaps suddenly realized they need a change. May be they even felt they have been fooled by the hammer and the sickle... (It's a different thing that Mamata has given Singur the slip all throughout her campaign. The last she went there was in February)
As I see the projected results: Left 15, Trinamool 19, Congress 7, BJP 1 (at 11.46 am) I am thrilled, jubilant. Time for change...
It is quite possible the choice could turn out grossly wrong... Some people I know are of the opinion that come Mamata and industries will plummet, there would be a full-stop to any sensible development. But then, going by the things I have seen in the three years of my exposure here, it seemed the Left front was banking on all the development in its 32 years' tenure on Singur, Nayachar and Nandigram...
The choice may be wrong. But give me my right to choose. Perhaps, the people of Bengal took a chance this time. I love them for that.
And yes, the next time there's an election, I am reaching home in time. I am now hooked to the fascinating dance of Indian democracy.
Related post: The Good Governance
Tuesday, May 12, 2009
And that's where I come from...
Under the car was a baby cobra
Coiled with a hood of beauty and shine...
Alarming woofs of my playful, silly dogs
Made him rush to that garden of mine...
Leave him in peace and away you go
My little naughty ones,
You need not be with creatures divine, not just yet.
And away you go dear baby with no fear
Waiting is your mother with siblings nine..
He then slithered somewhere far away...
With my gentle push and a touch.
Happy were silly dogs, so was the baby cobra
These are the real pleasures of mine...
-Baba-12-05-2009
Dear Gauri,
Last night, a baby cobra of about 20 inches length came and
thrilled all of us. His hood was very cute, hardly measuring about
1.5" in width....
Some six months back, Lali* had cornered a six-inch baby cobra. I had pushed it away with a mug full of water to let him to go, as a
stick would have injured him....
Of late, i have realized one thing...all babies, living beings should be
nurtured equally, loved and protected with care.
Baba
*Lali is one of our four pet stray dogs
Wednesday, May 06, 2009
Lonely dark night...
This lonely dark night knows no God.
The church looks spooky,
temple sad; mosque uninviting.
This night has no religion;
It's just you and me.
The church looks spooky,
temple sad; mosque uninviting.
This night has no religion;
It's just you and me.
Wednesday, April 29, 2009
His Eyes
He was then fifteen. He was a silent boy, thoughtful; and the quietness in his deep grey eyes seemed to me like a promise of warmth and understanding I had never known. There was a tightness in my chest, because it hurt to be shut out from the world of simple kindness he lived in. I sat there, opposite him, and said to myself that I had known him all my life and yet until this moment had never understood what he was. I looked at those extra-ordinarily clear eyes, that were like water over grey pebbles, I gazed and gazed, until he gave me a slow direct look which showed he knew I had been staring. It was like a warning, as if a door had been shut.
- Doris Lessing,
Flavours of exile.
- Doris Lessing,
Flavours of exile.
Thursday, April 23, 2009
Tuesday, April 21, 2009
The Good Governance
As India plunges into nationwide Lok Sabha and Assembly polls this month, my small standing in the country, as her citizen, has suddenly become a hot topic. Why? Because I can vote and suddenly, I am in demand.
But like me, many others who stay away from their hometown and won't be able to make it in time to vote, will lose their chance. Then, many others will stay away for no party seems just right. Then again, many will vote not for a just candidate, but for the caste he belongs to.
Good governance. That's what we want at the end of this mad rat race.
BJP has a huge flipside because of the hardline, anti-minority image it has created for itself. It banks on the good governance bit though.
However, a good governance cannot be reached till a country is plagued time and again with separatist agenda. It cannot be reached till churches are attacked, Muslims and Sikhs are killed in riots and girls are beaten up, told what they should do or wear. It cannot be achieved till a political party decides what suits Hindutva and what does not.
Good governance cannot be achieved till we allow religion and caste to come out of our homes and entangle with everything and anything. There should be a demarcating line between your religion and your being a good citizen. Till we continue to mix the two to dangerous outcomes, we and our future generation won't be in a comfortable state of existence.
Good governance cannot also be reached till we keep on banking on reservation status instead of merit and intellect. Yes, good governance cannot be achieved by the carrot of reservation, when basic primary education is muddled with lax teaching policies, fatal corporal punishments and finding rats in mid-day meals. On the same lines, good governance cannot be achieved by finding an easy way out, by patronising health biscuits to do away with the responsibility of cooking a hygienic mid-day meal.
Good governance cannot be brought on sentimentality and emotions. Politicians are cunning, corrupt, divisive. And so, junta should be shrewd, opportunistic and manipulative to ultimately get what it wants. And wants should be prioritized well.
Good governance needs to start from the way down. It has been a long, tiresome wait. We are still waiting...
But like me, many others who stay away from their hometown and won't be able to make it in time to vote, will lose their chance. Then, many others will stay away for no party seems just right. Then again, many will vote not for a just candidate, but for the caste he belongs to.
Good governance. That's what we want at the end of this mad rat race.
BJP has a huge flipside because of the hardline, anti-minority image it has created for itself. It banks on the good governance bit though.
However, a good governance cannot be reached till a country is plagued time and again with separatist agenda. It cannot be reached till churches are attacked, Muslims and Sikhs are killed in riots and girls are beaten up, told what they should do or wear. It cannot be achieved till a political party decides what suits Hindutva and what does not.
Good governance cannot be achieved till we allow religion and caste to come out of our homes and entangle with everything and anything. There should be a demarcating line between your religion and your being a good citizen. Till we continue to mix the two to dangerous outcomes, we and our future generation won't be in a comfortable state of existence.
Good governance cannot also be reached till we keep on banking on reservation status instead of merit and intellect. Yes, good governance cannot be achieved by the carrot of reservation, when basic primary education is muddled with lax teaching policies, fatal corporal punishments and finding rats in mid-day meals. On the same lines, good governance cannot be achieved by finding an easy way out, by patronising health biscuits to do away with the responsibility of cooking a hygienic mid-day meal.
Good governance cannot be brought on sentimentality and emotions. Politicians are cunning, corrupt, divisive. And so, junta should be shrewd, opportunistic and manipulative to ultimately get what it wants. And wants should be prioritized well.
Good governance needs to start from the way down. It has been a long, tiresome wait. We are still waiting...
Thursday, April 16, 2009
Tuesday, April 07, 2009
Of maids and earrings
Has it ever happened to you? That nagging guilt. You cannot find a costly earring, or think some cash is missing from your wallet. Zoooppp--- you lose no second in doubting the maid. In a second, guilt envelopes you. It makes you feel low and mean. And yet, doubt stands by stubbornly. You are crushed with two opposite, very strong emotions. The maid comes and goes and you eye her each moment, guiltily, stealthily, nervously. You think you are a bitch to do what you are doing and yet you can't decide whether to doubt, feel guilty or ask. What adds to the trouble is that you are no great sharp head yourself. You must have lost the earring or spent the cash on a glass of cold drink. You spend the rest of the day brooding over the loss. More so, you spend the rest of the day over loss of faith and plunge into complicated realms of morality. The next day, you try to ease your guilt by asking the maid to leave the clothes and just do the dishes. A bigger pile to wash the next day, you fool.
Or has it ever occurred to you that you are being used just like the rag she uses to mop the floor? You don't follow her about the house, watch her every move or nag her every other minute to wipe this corner or that. You believe she will do her work well and fair and don't interfere. And then you discover dusty corners, dishes not done well. You tell her gently to do things right and she doesn't reply back. She never does. She simply does what she feels like in one hour dot and leaves just as lazily and she came. And every few months a big tragedy falls on her house and you find yourself handing away one extra advance payment after the other. The work remains just as mediocre. Why should you ask work in return of help, you ask yourself. But why not, a more practical, slightly dark side instantly quips. Yes, why not. You are again down with two conflicting thoughts and end up feeling a perfect fool.
And scene no. 1 has many possible answers. After a fortnight, you find the earring from a forgotten box in the safe. Or, your maid comes wearing it absentmindedly and either owns up when you ask (if you ask) or cooks up a fabulous story that can put David Dhawan to shame...
Or has it ever occurred to you that you are being used just like the rag she uses to mop the floor? You don't follow her about the house, watch her every move or nag her every other minute to wipe this corner or that. You believe she will do her work well and fair and don't interfere. And then you discover dusty corners, dishes not done well. You tell her gently to do things right and she doesn't reply back. She never does. She simply does what she feels like in one hour dot and leaves just as lazily and she came. And every few months a big tragedy falls on her house and you find yourself handing away one extra advance payment after the other. The work remains just as mediocre. Why should you ask work in return of help, you ask yourself. But why not, a more practical, slightly dark side instantly quips. Yes, why not. You are again down with two conflicting thoughts and end up feeling a perfect fool.
And scene no. 1 has many possible answers. After a fortnight, you find the earring from a forgotten box in the safe. Or, your maid comes wearing it absentmindedly and either owns up when you ask (if you ask) or cooks up a fabulous story that can put David Dhawan to shame...
Thursday, April 02, 2009
Simple steps to happiness
Created with Admarket's flickrSLiDR.
How less they demand. And how much they give back...
My mother's love for gardens was instrumental in making us shift from a flat right in the city, to a house on the outskirts. She nurtured rose beds and creepers that gave huge orange flowers. She grew bhindi (ladies fingers) and brinjals and we were trusted with the task to collect them. The bhindis grew so much that we began gifting neighbours and family with the produce. After a time, we complained of 'garden fresh bhindi' she thrust down our throat in every possible form. Bhindi stir fried, bhindi with vegetables, bhindi with kadhi. Bhindi, bhindi, bhindi.
Those were the days when our garden had gone mad with a sudden flush of fertility. Everything grew and bloomed and blossomed. The Sona (Kanchan or Bauhinia purpurea) she planted all those years back is now a tree and covers the lawn with bright pink petals every winter.
When I moved here in Kolkata, I had a faint image of the kind of house I wanted. I wanted to recreate Ahmedabad in the small space I had. I bought lots of plants, only to realize I was either duped with bad cuts or the good ones just died due to watering too scant or too much.
When I set my eyes on this Adenium plant in the nursery, I knew I wanted it. It was costly and after some haggling, with both the nurserywala and my husband, I got it home. It has stuck. We have made some emergency visits to the nurserywala when the leaves turned soggy in winter. It was left in his care for a fortnight. This plant tends to go a little weak when it rains a lot or in cold. The nurserywala had told me told water it once a week. And so I did, only to realize that the plump obese stem (from which it gets its scientific name Adenium obesum) was shrinking away.
A person selling manure shook his head in disapproval when I told him this. "Water it daily, you understand. With this hot weather, how can you feed it just once a week." And he put some packets in my hand with precise instructions. That was about four months back. The leaves had developed some worrying spots then. I was keeping my fingers crossed after the medicine, manure and plenty of water routine. Last year, the flowers were great too, but now, they seem to have a new life. This year the bloom has been extravagant...
Click here to read the description.
Saturday, March 21, 2009
Belief and Technique for Modern Prose
Jack Kerouac is a writer I got to know of through various blogs. I came across his name on the profiles of many bloggers and finally bought myself a copy of On the Road. I am half way through the book, but for some reason, it is not the kind I finish reading in one go (like Persepolis or Broken April)...
I wouldn't quite keep On the Road in my list of favourites, for the escapades seem too random and directionless. Yes, the writing is racy — and my reserve may be simply because of a totally different culture — the 'beat generation' that I can't quite readily digest.
Nevertheless, I found these 30 points listed by him very interesting:
Belief and Technique for Modern Prose, a list of thirty "essentials."
1. Scribbled secret notebooks, and wild typewritten pages, for your own joy
2. Submissive to everything, open, listening
3. Try never get drunk outside your own house
4. Be in love with your life
5. Something that you feel will find its own form
6. Be crazy dumbsaint of the mind
7. Blow as deep as you want to blow
8. Write what you want bottomless from bottom of the mind
9. The unspeakable visions of the individual
10. No time for poetry but exactly what is
11. Visionary tics shivering in the chest
12. In tranced fixation dreaming upon object before you
13. Remove literary, grammatical and syntactical inhibition
14. Like Proust be an old teahead of time
15. Telling the true story of the world in interior monolog
16. The jewel center of interest is the eye within the eye
17. Write in recollection and amazement for yrself
18. Work from pithy middle eye out, swimming in language sea
19. Accept loss forever
20. Believe in the holy contour of life
21. Struggle to sketch the flow that already exists intact in mind
22. Don't think of words when you stop but to see picture better
23. Keep track of every day the date emblazoned in yr morning
24. No fear or shame in the dignity of yr experience, language & knowledge
25. Write for the world to read and see yr exact pictures of it
26. Bookmovie is the movie in words, the visual American form
27. In praise of Character in the Bleak inhuman Loneliness
28. Composing wild, undisciplined, pure, coming in from under, crazier the better
29. You're a Genius all the time
30. Writer-Director of Earthly movies Sponsored & Angeled in Heaven
I wouldn't quite keep On the Road in my list of favourites, for the escapades seem too random and directionless. Yes, the writing is racy — and my reserve may be simply because of a totally different culture — the 'beat generation' that I can't quite readily digest.
Nevertheless, I found these 30 points listed by him very interesting:
Belief and Technique for Modern Prose, a list of thirty "essentials."
1. Scribbled secret notebooks, and wild typewritten pages, for your own joy
2. Submissive to everything, open, listening
3. Try never get drunk outside your own house
4. Be in love with your life
5. Something that you feel will find its own form
6. Be crazy dumbsaint of the mind
7. Blow as deep as you want to blow
8. Write what you want bottomless from bottom of the mind
9. The unspeakable visions of the individual
10. No time for poetry but exactly what is
11. Visionary tics shivering in the chest
12. In tranced fixation dreaming upon object before you
13. Remove literary, grammatical and syntactical inhibition
14. Like Proust be an old teahead of time
15. Telling the true story of the world in interior monolog
16. The jewel center of interest is the eye within the eye
17. Write in recollection and amazement for yrself
18. Work from pithy middle eye out, swimming in language sea
19. Accept loss forever
20. Believe in the holy contour of life
21. Struggle to sketch the flow that already exists intact in mind
22. Don't think of words when you stop but to see picture better
23. Keep track of every day the date emblazoned in yr morning
24. No fear or shame in the dignity of yr experience, language & knowledge
25. Write for the world to read and see yr exact pictures of it
26. Bookmovie is the movie in words, the visual American form
27. In praise of Character in the Bleak inhuman Loneliness
28. Composing wild, undisciplined, pure, coming in from under, crazier the better
29. You're a Genius all the time
30. Writer-Director of Earthly movies Sponsored & Angeled in Heaven
Wednesday, March 11, 2009
Holi...
For more than three years now, I have been away from home during all the major festivals. I sorely miss the festivities in Ahmedabad, especially Navratri and Uttrayan. Diwali, which always used to be a quiet, foodie affair, doesn't even make its presence felt here in Kolkata. There, we had a good 20 day holiday in school and college, here it's only one day of Kali Puja.
On my way back home just now, I passed by holi pyres at almost all the crossroads. Most fires were dying down, one or two were still ablaze. I remembered the story of Prahlad and how he embraced the Holika chanting the name of God. How the ant changed to God himself and saved him.
We used to offer raw green mangoes in the flames, also coconuts and dhaani (popcorn) after the usual pradakshina. "Don't eat the mangoes before Holi, you will catch your throat," warned Indiraben everytime. And then, when the flames died out, I remember scouting for roasted coconuts with other kids once. I don't have very pleasant memories of the mad colour play, except for the very first time in our new colony. I must have been seven or eight then. But it's the evening fire a day before dhuleti that has always been very special.
Those dying fires in the middle of the night made me want to rush back home and listen from aaji the stories of victory of good over evil and all such things.
On my way back home just now, I passed by holi pyres at almost all the crossroads. Most fires were dying down, one or two were still ablaze. I remembered the story of Prahlad and how he embraced the Holika chanting the name of God. How the ant changed to God himself and saved him.
We used to offer raw green mangoes in the flames, also coconuts and dhaani (popcorn) after the usual pradakshina. "Don't eat the mangoes before Holi, you will catch your throat," warned Indiraben everytime. And then, when the flames died out, I remember scouting for roasted coconuts with other kids once. I don't have very pleasant memories of the mad colour play, except for the very first time in our new colony. I must have been seven or eight then. But it's the evening fire a day before dhuleti that has always been very special.
Those dying fires in the middle of the night made me want to rush back home and listen from aaji the stories of victory of good over evil and all such things.
Saturday, February 21, 2009
Some necklaces I made
Created with Admarket's flickrSLiDR.
I got hooked to making jewellery sometime in FY, college. Then I used the wires, threads and beads I got from Matcheswala (a store in Ahmedabad)and made a huge batch of earrings and necklaces.. Even held an impromptu exhibition and sale. That was a wonderful day, friends came over at the small house, we had a party of sorts and some sale :). The major turning point for my jewellery-making compulsion was a trip to Ajmer and and the Pushkar fair... There, to my joy, were many sellers squatted on the road, selling all kinds of beads. My sister and cousins had a tough time dragging me from the footpaths, for I used to squat by almost all the roadside sellers, haggle a lot and as I am choosy when it comes to beads, hop from one seller to another to get just the kind...
Cut back to Ahmedabad. On the secluded university road, sat a beadwala. He mainly had those square beads with letters written on them (they were a rage then). You could get him to make keychains or necklaces with names out of those... He also had some other nice beads and on one day, when I had a lot of time on hands, I sat there and asked him to show all the variety he had... I was thoroughly impressed and at once wanted all those... Somehow, I don't know how, I managed to cajole him into selling me his entire collection and there I was-- with bags of beads(many which I have used in the necklaces shown here)...At the time he sold off his stuff, he was planning to quit what he called a 'measly means of income' and get into something quick and risky... We chatted for a long time, and he was hell bent on giving it all up and running away somewhere. His name was Raj and I sometimes wonder where and how he is...
My interest in making my own jewellery has since then led me to markets in Hyderabad, to a Mumbai wholesale market and to the little-known narrow lanes of Kolkata. Now, my necklaces are far more finished than the FY days. (Matcheswala wires used to rust after 7-8 months!) I am not sure if all these details about beads and jewellery interest you... In college, Minal used to tease me and mimic 'Bhaiyya, aapke paas koi beads hai?" everytime she saw me, knowing my compulsive obsession with looking for new beads at handicrafts fairs... So that's how it goes...
I feel I am lucky to have chanced by a desire to make something and thankful for the day when I thought, "Damn, this jewellery is too expensive, even I can make it!" and started my bead-hunt... I am sure it's a passion that's going to last a lifetime...
You can read the short description of each necklace here
Do tell me how you liked the stuff...
Monday, February 09, 2009
Dev D
I wanted to see this film ever since I read TOI had given it 5 stars. Unprecedented!
Dev D is entertaining, sad, funny, contemporary, bold. It's witty, vulgar and charming. It's demanding, for the film cannot be described without using far too many adjectives.
The thing that amused me was that I found Paro more slutty than Chanda.
Chanda, the prostitute has an icy dignity about herself, a mysterious shield that keeps her happy in spite of being pained, focused in spite of having reasons to destroy herself. And she has the sweetest smile I have seen in ages. Her business she handles with thorough professionalism — the multi-lingual sex talk was impressive...
Kalki Koechlin must be congratulated for a wonderful debut.
The film had a nauseating aura of sorrow laced with humour, of the pangs of urban life. From MMS scandals, to BMW road rage, to drugs and booze, to sex trade, everything that we know in third person through newspapers comes alive on the screen in a manner sensitive and well-thought over.
We ran to buy the tickets of Luck By Chance as soon as Dev D ended. Seeing two films back to back momentarily helped ease the impact of Dev D. But when I slept the two films over, the next morning Dev D came out a sure winner.
In comparison, Luck By Chance is a typically entertaining, a quite predictable film.
Dev D is snappy, unpredictable and immensely relevant. It's a smart film, it's wholesomely entertaining. Don't go with your parents to see it though, you might have to fake blushes when you are really enjoying a dirty dialogue.
PS: I think it deserves the 5 stars. What do you think?
Dev D is entertaining, sad, funny, contemporary, bold. It's witty, vulgar and charming. It's demanding, for the film cannot be described without using far too many adjectives.
The thing that amused me was that I found Paro more slutty than Chanda.
Chanda, the prostitute has an icy dignity about herself, a mysterious shield that keeps her happy in spite of being pained, focused in spite of having reasons to destroy herself. And she has the sweetest smile I have seen in ages. Her business she handles with thorough professionalism — the multi-lingual sex talk was impressive...
Kalki Koechlin must be congratulated for a wonderful debut.
The film had a nauseating aura of sorrow laced with humour, of the pangs of urban life. From MMS scandals, to BMW road rage, to drugs and booze, to sex trade, everything that we know in third person through newspapers comes alive on the screen in a manner sensitive and well-thought over.
We ran to buy the tickets of Luck By Chance as soon as Dev D ended. Seeing two films back to back momentarily helped ease the impact of Dev D. But when I slept the two films over, the next morning Dev D came out a sure winner.
In comparison, Luck By Chance is a typically entertaining, a quite predictable film.
Dev D is snappy, unpredictable and immensely relevant. It's a smart film, it's wholesomely entertaining. Don't go with your parents to see it though, you might have to fake blushes when you are really enjoying a dirty dialogue.
PS: I think it deserves the 5 stars. What do you think?
Thursday, February 05, 2009
Wednesday, February 04, 2009
Enraged and tired, Borivali commuters finally protest
Angry commuters at Borivali station in Mumbai have blocked all trains on the station for more than four hours now. Harried rush from one platform to the other due to last minute diversion of local trains had already irked them no bounds and a sudden cancellation of a local at 9.10 am on Wednesday was a trigger. They demand more trains and better management. (A report)
Their fury was piling up, after gross mismanagement and discomfort when extra train platforms were added. As the news goes, their trouble started in August. This article, Railway woes for Borivali residents, throws light on what is behind the impromptu fury.
From what angry protestors say and the TOI report, this is what enrages the Mumbai commuter:
1) The railways needed more platforms to run more trains from Borivali
2) With no space available, they extended the platform number 1
3) Platform number 7 and 8 were introduced.
4) There is no exit point on platform no 8
5) So, Commuters who get off at platform 8 have to walk for at least 10 minutes to get out on the road.
6) Trains schedules are frequently and suddenly changed
7) Commuters complain that often a train supposed to come at platform number 1 is suddenly diverted to platform 8, they have to walk a good kilometre
8) Crowd of more than one or two trains gathers at platforms, making the walk slow and tedious.
9) Many miss their trains thus.
The fact that railways wanted to increase trains and so introduced new platforms is a silver lining. It is possible for a system as massive as the Indian railways to come across some glitches— after all, local trains do their bit in accomplishing the 'Six Sigma' services of Mumbai dabbawalas, as with being the chosen mode of transport for millions of Mumbai residents. But if inconvenience becomes the order of the day, a protest as this, is a natural consequence.
I remember reading somewhere on a blog, a writing so emotional and candid, about an incident on a Mumbai local. I don't even remember if it was a post or a comment, but someone had talked about a girl who sold rubber bands and earrings in the local . With an infant tucked to her, she was negotiating the crowd to sell her stuff.
Someone was haggling a lot and she, otherwise quiet and aloof, suddenly ran up a temper. "Saala do rupiye ke liye chik chik karta hai, mat khareedo."
The blogger apparently asked her something and she replied, 'Maa mar gayee, ab se ise leke aana padega".
And then I have heard there are women who have their kitty parties, haldi-kunkoo on the train. Who cut vegetables for the evening meal on the train. Who get up at four in the morning to cook for the family before boarding a train at six. I always linked Mumbai with its crazy fast life and local trains. This news somehow brought all these unrelated things I have heard or read about the trains.
The first time I was to board a local, I was quite scared. My cousin was like, "Gauritai, don't worry, you simply have to be there and ensure there's a crowd behind you. The mob will push you in and the mob will push you out."
Their fury was piling up, after gross mismanagement and discomfort when extra train platforms were added. As the news goes, their trouble started in August. This article, Railway woes for Borivali residents, throws light on what is behind the impromptu fury.
From what angry protestors say and the TOI report, this is what enrages the Mumbai commuter:
1) The railways needed more platforms to run more trains from Borivali
2) With no space available, they extended the platform number 1
3) Platform number 7 and 8 were introduced.
4) There is no exit point on platform no 8
5) So, Commuters who get off at platform 8 have to walk for at least 10 minutes to get out on the road.
6) Trains schedules are frequently and suddenly changed
7) Commuters complain that often a train supposed to come at platform number 1 is suddenly diverted to platform 8, they have to walk a good kilometre
8) Crowd of more than one or two trains gathers at platforms, making the walk slow and tedious.
9) Many miss their trains thus.
The fact that railways wanted to increase trains and so introduced new platforms is a silver lining. It is possible for a system as massive as the Indian railways to come across some glitches— after all, local trains do their bit in accomplishing the 'Six Sigma' services of Mumbai dabbawalas, as with being the chosen mode of transport for millions of Mumbai residents. But if inconvenience becomes the order of the day, a protest as this, is a natural consequence.
***
I remember reading somewhere on a blog, a writing so emotional and candid, about an incident on a Mumbai local. I don't even remember if it was a post or a comment, but someone had talked about a girl who sold rubber bands and earrings in the local . With an infant tucked to her, she was negotiating the crowd to sell her stuff.
Someone was haggling a lot and she, otherwise quiet and aloof, suddenly ran up a temper. "Saala do rupiye ke liye chik chik karta hai, mat khareedo."
The blogger apparently asked her something and she replied, 'Maa mar gayee, ab se ise leke aana padega".
And then I have heard there are women who have their kitty parties, haldi-kunkoo on the train. Who cut vegetables for the evening meal on the train. Who get up at four in the morning to cook for the family before boarding a train at six. I always linked Mumbai with its crazy fast life and local trains. This news somehow brought all these unrelated things I have heard or read about the trains.
The first time I was to board a local, I was quite scared. My cousin was like, "Gauritai, don't worry, you simply have to be there and ensure there's a crowd behind you. The mob will push you in and the mob will push you out."
Friday, January 30, 2009
The shoeflower that blossomed two days too late
I wanted this flower to blossom before parents left for Mumbai. But like the innumerable things I want that evade me, this was not to be. It bloomed today, exactly two days later than it was supposed to.
Supposed to? Anyways... It would have been really nice if it had blossomed two days before, so that I would have proved that I do indeed water my plants and the nurserywala does not manage to cheat me each single time.
Coming to think of it, Shoe flower is such an inapt name for a flower as lovely as this. Anyone knows why is it called so?
Mummy's lovebird birds now have three chicks. When I told someone this, he said I make the birds sound like mammals. The new female lovebird I got is as crazy as she can get. She has her seeds swinging upside down from the jhula. She pecks the male innumerable times when he silently eats his food and works up a frenzy when he chooses to ignore her. She bit me real hard when I was putting her in the cage and thank God for the napkin I use to handle the birds. The earlier pair, whom I miss so often, would lie as quiet as babies just out of shower, and open their mouths at the sight of the dropper to take their vitamin.
Monday, January 26, 2009
A rose by any other name
What if I were born in a suburban Mumbai family of someone called Vilalat Khan? Would my life have been the same if I had grown up as Zaheera? In today's 'MNS' times, I am afraid, if it were so, I might as well have been called to prove my allegiance to the nation I was born in, worse, to the city I grew up in and loved as my own. Far-fetched scenarios. Far-fetched-- but plausible and scary.
The latest bit of bossing from the MNS brigade has led to the change of name of a sweet-shop in Mumbai. From Karachi, it has now morphed to Jai Shri Krishna.
What's in a name?
In a name, is the right to sound as you want to, to reflect what you have chosen to associate with, and with that choice, many thoughts, many ideas are linked. When you are asked to change this, you are asked to give up your right to identity. The owner may have buckled down under pressure, and made a conscious, personal choice. But as a person sitting miles away, this change sounds yet another horror-tale of limited democracy, limited choice and a life that is dictated by fear and politics.
If politicians today have reduced patriotism to such a simplistic notion, if patriotism could be so superficially proven, lord save India.
Here are the two reports on the basis of which this post was developed:
MNS goes after 'Pak' sigh boards
Karachi Sweets to turn Jai Shri Krishna
Is your life now governed by fear of goons who vandalise store and maim people who they declare 'outsiders'? Is fear and prejudice that you want to give your children in legacy? Has the judicial mechanism of this country gone so feeble that people who voice such separatist ideas roam free and have the audacity to make such demands time and again?
Happy Republic Day...
The latest bit of bossing from the MNS brigade has led to the change of name of a sweet-shop in Mumbai. From Karachi, it has now morphed to Jai Shri Krishna.
What's in a name?
In a name, is the right to sound as you want to, to reflect what you have chosen to associate with, and with that choice, many thoughts, many ideas are linked. When you are asked to change this, you are asked to give up your right to identity. The owner may have buckled down under pressure, and made a conscious, personal choice. But as a person sitting miles away, this change sounds yet another horror-tale of limited democracy, limited choice and a life that is dictated by fear and politics.
If politicians today have reduced patriotism to such a simplistic notion, if patriotism could be so superficially proven, lord save India.
Here are the two reports on the basis of which this post was developed:
MNS goes after 'Pak' sigh boards
Karachi Sweets to turn Jai Shri Krishna
Is your life now governed by fear of goons who vandalise store and maim people who they declare 'outsiders'? Is fear and prejudice that you want to give your children in legacy? Has the judicial mechanism of this country gone so feeble that people who voice such separatist ideas roam free and have the audacity to make such demands time and again?
Happy Republic Day...
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