A Call to myself !!

So, so you think you can tell
Heaven from Hell,
Blue skys from pain.
Can you tell a green field
From a cold steel rail?
A smile from a veil?
Do you think you can tell?

And did they get you to trade
Your heros for ghosts?
Hot ashes for trees?
Hot air for a cool breeze?
Cold comfort for change?
And did you exchange
A walk on part in the war
For a lead role in a cage?

How I wish, how I wish you were here.
We're just two lost souls
Swimming in a fish bowl,
Year after year,
Running over the same old ground.
What have we found?
The same old fears.
Wish you were here

- Roger Waters and David Gilmour ( Pink Floyd )

This is a shout out, a call to myself. As usual Pink Floyd is responsible !
And now that I have put it up , I wish you were here.... my question mark ??

Implosion everyday

For all the positivism surrounding the festivals of India, there is some unfathomable negative hysteria too when it comes to certain festivals among them. Primary in that is Ganesh Chaturthi. Suketu Mehta in his epic Maximum City describes the maddening crowds that line up the Mumbai streets when the Ganesha idol immersion processions are held. He describes the communal tensions that seep through and over these processions when they pass through sensitive areas of the city. There is a deep underlying unrest that is brewing inside these so called ‘celebrations’.

Ganesh Chaturthi festival is celebrated across the country with various pandals erected with Ganesha idols. Each locality will form groups and will have a pandal in that locality. People flock to these pandals to catch a glimpse of the idols and pray to the Elephant God. But I have found this to be a very nauseous affair from childhood. Always wonder how the clay idol, erected in the nearest plot of the locality with Bollywood music blaring through the speakers, can be seen as a place where God is supposed to reside. The idea of divinity just does not fit in there. Most of these pandals play Hindi film music except during the Aarti. That in itself is a spoiler for me. Is this an occasion to play DJ to the locality? Devotional music is not the criteria for divinity, but then its far better an option than blaring “Munni” songs !!! The ambience is an integral part of the concentration that is built up while we pray.

The processions are marked by drunk men dancing an ugly dance around the idol. What is worse is the equally joyful participation of young boys whose age ranges from 5-14 years. These boys also emulate their elders who are doing the ugly gyrations and in turn make ugly frowns and display even more uglier expressions akin to some item girl number. The music is of bad quality, loud and utterly disturbing. It disturbs each and every area’s peace while it snakes it way to the designated immersion lake. Not even a thought is spared by those Hindu fanatics, for the patients lying in the hospitals lining the streets. Even yesterday I found a huge procession standing in front of the Hosmat Hospital gate and playing loud noisy songs. Is it an act of God? This? Shameful !

The Hindu-brotherhood calls that are on show during the fund-raising for the festival pandal, is very similar to the politicians who come asking for votes during elections. The very humble neighbor suddenly espouses the Hindu propaganda, the ‘we-have-to-preserve-indian-culture’ jingoism and various others pseudo causes. It amazes me how people suddenly change into a different personality and lose all logic and sense of civility while taking part in this group activity. It being a group phenomenon is the only reason that the devil inside of each men, justifies each act of violence and incivility.

The motives can be various, behind this phenomenon of erecting pandals during the festival. Some say it’s a way of generating easy money for the organizers. Some say it’s a way of bringing together the community or the locality. Some say it’s a way of breaking the monotony of our daily grind and involving in some charity activity. All can be true. But please do not expect me to believe that this is a spiritual activity. To me it is not. There is no devotion in this.

Devotion is in the eyes of the lady who goes to the market and searches for her Ganesha idol, brings it home with care, places it in her house’s puja room and lovingly decorates the idol with flowers, vermillion and other things used in hindu ceremonies. Devotion is in the hearts of the householders who, for those few days, wake up early and finish their morning ablutions, gather in the puja room with the family members to offer prayers and offerings to the lord. Devotion is in the laughter and goodwill that pervades through the house those few days. Devotion is in the simple yet tasty food that is prepared for the lord and the family and the neighbors. Devotion is in the visitors who come to pray to the idol and indulge in community chatter extolling the virtues of the festival. Devotion is in the slow care with which the idol is removed from the house and taken in the house-vehicle to the nearest lake for immersion.

Devotion is in the quiet that returns to the house soon after the immersion ceremony when the members of the family sit and reflect on the divinity that surrounded their humble abode for those few days and Devotion is in the moist eyes of the lady when she looks at the Puja room and misses her cute little elephant god !

A Rant

“Now, that is a smart move by Harper Collins”, I remarked. It definitely did catch my attention, the fact that the publishers/PR agency of the author had distributed the extract along with the newspapers.

A booklet slid out from one of the pages of the Newspaper the other morning and picking it up I thought it was a book about some locality in Calcutta. Saraswati Park it said. Mind went back to Anandnagar from the City of Joy, Dominique Lapierre 1985 epic novel about Calcutta and its economically backward section of the society. Anyways, turned out it was a booklet that had an extract from the new novel by Anjali Joseph called Saraswati Park and no, this was not about Calcutta but it was about Mumbai. A book with that kind of a boring, ‘down-market’, ‘un-intellectual and cryptic’ title – would have definitely escaped the attention of any random book buyer at the Crosswords and Landmarks of our country. But with this act of distributing the extract along with the newspapers, it was made as a book that would have a recall whenever one of the subscribers walked in to a book shop. Even better, some would have liked the extract and would have ended up buying the book.

That brings me to the woeful feeling I get whenever I have to step into a Crossword or a Landmark on a Saturday or a Sunday. The crowds in these book shops are actually a joke if you ask me. A closer look at the buying behavior of these bums will tell you that they are not there to buy any book but just to browse through the store. Most of them enter just to convince themselves that they too are intelligent people who read. They invariably would go around the store, look at some books, read the cover, place the book back and then continue meting out the same treatement to a dozen books. Then they walk up to the magazine rack and pick up an ‘Outlook’ or a ‘Business Today’ and make their way out of the shop. What a waste ! These folks are just people who are in the mall to roam around and hang out. But they feel its their duty to pay a visit to the book shop and invariably the book shop on a Sunday is full of such floaters. That is one of the reasons that I do not like going to buy books on these days. I prefer weekdays. That way you will have some quiet time to browse through the selection of books and maybe even end up looking at a fresh stock of books since the shop would have refreshed their stock after the weekend bonanza sale.

I know this because I go to the mall to catch a movie and my friends then make their way into the book shop in the mall. As if they have some title to pick up from the shop. But in most cases they either end up with nothing in their hands or a magazine like I described above. This quite funnily works in a different way too, since when these people see a crowd inside the book shop, they too end up visiting the store as they too want to be among the intelligentsia and not the ‘roam-around-the-mall’ crowd, so frequent on Sundays and Saturday evenings. The people who I used to meet in the store on Sundays were so poor in the knowledge of the books and authors, that I used to feel a bit let down. What with once a guy describing Chetan Bhagat as a Pulitzer Prize winner ! (with all due respect to his style). All this has built a firm repulsion towards visiting or even being 100 mtr. near to a bookshop on a weekend.

It's maybe hypocritical !

Swallowed in the Sea

The rain had ceased pouring. As the breeze went silent and the whiff of salty air brushed the underside of my eye-lashes, there fell a droplet on to my arm. I wondered for a while before I realized that it was just a teardrop that the wind took out of my eyes. I just could manage a wry smile, that, at least Mother Nature was considerate enough to wipe off my tears, if not my own mother. No, before you think that I was in some pain, let me tell you I was not in any sort of pain, hurt, sadness and sort of similar emotions that draw out the salty droplets out of our faces. My eyes welled up in helplessness and in unfathomable despair. Now despair is quite different from sadness or frustration.


The greens on the balcony were darker than the ones outside the balcony and somehow I thought maybe it’s quite true to what goes on inside us – there is more darker shade of everything when its inside of us, till the time we let it out. As soon as its let out there is the natural ‘white’ that makes your thought brighter, lighter and more cheerful. So it was natural that I thought I had to let out my thoughts, lest they take on a darker hue inside the depths of my heart. I need to bring it out and make them brighter. So here goes the story –


Had it not been a cliché, I wouldn’t have realized – but then it was indeed love at first sight. For a girl of my age, I was pretty much desensitized to the idea of even liking a boy. But then this boy was different from all the boys I had seen before and had come to abhor. I saw him perched up there on my grandmom’s left side of the hips, his head slightly tilted to his left and legs flaying in the air. He had black, round eyes and lovely black hair. His forehead had a sandalwood paste mark, a gold chain around his neck, wore a sleeveless top and white shorts. As soon as he saw me, he smiled and lifted his hand towards me and remarked, “Mol? Mol?” Oh yes, I fell in him love with him that very instant and ran towards him, grabbed him with my arms and planted an affectionate kiss on his cute cheek. A surge of affection engulfed me and I could not decipher what was the more stronger feeling wafting silently through my body – the motherly instincts or the sisterly craving. Yes, my brother, my cute little Achu had arrive that morning with my grandmother. She and my mom enjoyed my tryst with ‘siblingism' ;-)


I took him around the house and showed him the house. But I guess he was not interested much in that. All that he did was sit there and munch on to his shirt and look at me and grand mom and then again at me and then at my mom and then again grandmom. I could sense that he was looking at our grandmom for gaining a sense of security that she was there while he took a guided tour of the house. But what I couldn’t figure out was why he was looking at my mom in the same way!!! Well, not that she was his mother. Not that she stayed with him before or took care of him before.!!! He was her brother’s son and she was seeing him for the first time after they met when he was born. Grandmom had come down with Achu to spend a few days with us. This way we could have the mirth and laughter of a child in the house filled with adults.


His arrival changed things around for us. Before him, the usual silence of the house was broken only with the cacophony of the Idea Star Singer aspirants. Now we had a singer of a totally different caliber in our midst. Just that he was not going to ever sing paeans in praise of Bharathapuzha or lip Kaithapuram’s soulful lyrics just like our Vidyashankar or Sreenath of the music competition did. No, this guy was different. He could not floor any maiden with his smooth talk. But he could bring a smile to my face with the sweet, tender invocation every morning. Every morning he would see me sleeping in my room and come over to my bedside, put his cute little hand over my shoulder and coo, “Mol, wake, Mol wake !!!” ( Little One Wake up) How could a girl not go all weak in the knees when such a cute little bundle of joy was waking you up every morning with the sweetest rendering of the Malayalam word “Mol”. I admitted to my mom that I liked him calling me “Mol” better than she. She just laughed.


Slowly everything in my house started revolving around him. I and my dad shifted into one room for the night and Achu, grandma and mom slept together in my room. He was naughty and kept on doing some mischief or the other which at first was cute, but then slowly it started getting on to me. I mean he just wouldn’t listen to anyone even if you rolled your eyes and gave him the angry stare. If he wants to topple the plate on the table, he will do it no matter how many times you scold him. He will spit out the food, no matter how many times you plead, beg, cajole, and scold him to have just one morsel. But to my chagrin my mom finds all this very cute and keeps on pampering him. I like a responsible adult taking care of the child scold him whenever required and also at the same time shower my love on him. Then why can’t my mom and grandmom also do the same. Why do they have to turn a blind eye to all that he does?


I am the only daughter of my parents but I have never been selfish with sharing my possessions with anyone, be it my cousins or my friends. I have always wished I had a sibling and always wished I had someone to share my things with. I am that sort. But then why was I getting a bit unnerved with the attention that he was getting from everyone. His feet never touch the ground, can you believe it??? Always is perched upon my mother or grandmother or my dad. Now aren’t kids supposed to run around the house? Whatever happened to “Happy Feet” and stuff? I took good care of him and kept a close watch on him lest he get into some kind of trouble. The other day he ran away to the balcony and was standing near the ledge trying to look at the view below the 8th floor. I saw him going and followed and caught hold of him before he fell off from the gap between the railings in the balcony. Now where were the ever-loving mom and grand mom when he was getting into trouble? It was me who saved him. And yet it was not noticed by anyone. How I craved for some appreciation that day. I wanted mom to tell me that I was a good girl and that I took good care of my baby brother.


Being the only daughter maybe I took many things for granted. The attention, the love, the appreciation on doing something well etc. Now when all of this was being diverted (as per me), to another person, I was getting jittery. No, I was not jealous. I was not becoming possessive of my parents’ attention or love. Far from that. I was just wanting my share as well. That’s all. Maybe my mom forgot that I too was there at home after my months of rotting in the college hostel. With my hair open, I wanted to sit near my mother’s feet and rest my head on her knees. Her fingers running through my hair and touching my scalp, the warmth of her touch percolating through the pores of my scalp and entering the unknown recesses of my mind and smoothening the frayed nerves. I wanted to have my customary 5 pm tea with her , sit there with our cups and talk about just anything under the sun – my hostel life, my grades, her embroidery, her classes, her friends’, my dad, our house back home, our neighbours, the new Mamooty movie, the Star singers, the Manasaputris of Mallu soaps, so on and so forth. I miss those bonding sessions with my mother and those silent and yet satisfying dinners with my dad sitting next to me and eating silently. I love feeding Achu and he tugs at my bosom whenever I am feeding him and again a surge of motherly affection overcomes me. I can never thank him enough for making me feel like this each time he comes to me. I bite at him because he is so irresistible and so yummy and yet as soon as he wriggles out of my arms, I get this tinge of anger. Anger at having lost him for a moment and anger at him for going to my mom and dad for attention that he gets a bit too often to my liking.


I feel my space has been invaded and yet ironically I want to share my same space with him. how do I explain this feeling? I love him and yet fear that he is loved too much !! I want him and yet feel he is wanted too much. All visitors to my family fuss over him and give in to his whims and fancies. I find it too difficult to keep a frown away anymore and pour out my woes at night to my beloved and all he can offer is a laugh. That insensitive bugger thinks am jealous. When will guys understand that we girls get jealous only of other girls! Achu speaks to him on the phone and calls him “Maman”!!! Oh how sweet ! I wrap my arms around Achu and plant a wet kiss on his cheeks. He runs away in disgust banging the phone on the bed. So I get back to my guy and pour out my woes at being jilted even by that kid. Anyways he offers me some nice words which would have sounded corny any other day. Now that I was not getting anything of that sort from my mom, grandmom or dad, these cheesy dialogues from the guy were lapped up in delight. But then it still could not take away the feeling of despair at having to hang up the phone, ‘cuz Achu happened to wake up crying at midnight. Lights come on in the house and suddenly nobody notices that I am sitting on the couch in the living room at such a late hour.


Days pass by and so do nights. My holidays are soon going to end but I do not see an end to the situation at home. I somehow hate the prospect of going back to hostel and yet staying at home seems more irritating with all this paraphernalia. How I crave for that nook of silence, that unhurried pace of household chores, the careless abandon of ‘not being responsible’. I want Achu and his delightful presence and yet I want him to disappear at my own will. I want the sound of his laughter to waft through the house and yet want the silent air to come and kiss my cheeks with affection. What is going through my mind and heart, I can’t explain but all I can say is that it’s not jealousy but its uneasy. As I stand here in the balcony of my house I wonder if bringing this all out will make me feel brighter and lighter. The breeze brings with it the travails and tribulations of the turbulent seas of the Arabian and the same turbulence percolates from my insides to maybe form a confluence of such emotions. Maybe the sea is turbulent ‘cuz of all this. God only knows ! and God only knows and yet keeps silent ! But I know that Achu is the best thing to have happened to me for a long long time and it gladdens my heart at the same time that when I finally go back to my hostel and am taking my slow walk back after class, the one thing that I would mutter to myself is, “Achu ma, how I wish you were there to welcome me when I get back. Yes darling brother, I MISS YOU LOTS :-)

(I tried out this piece in first person with a female protagonist. Hope you find this story/article/piece interesting. love, Anup )

temptations strong...

It just amazing how I have grown to love the rains… its lashing, pouring cats and dogs and lions and elephant – this evening in Bangalore….. oooohhhh lovely oh lovely… a hot cup of Yellow Label tea, Bean bag comfort, my balcony covered with glass windows, one broad pane open, a potted plant flaying its flimsy branches thankful for the water – I sit and watch this caressing wonder of the rains and the winds.

Elton John… listening to him after a long long time… he is a good company and is setting up the occasion I must tell you…. Wish I was not so alone in this huge house…. All guys gone out for the weekend and I am still here…. Maybe I am turning to my blog because of that… this is not an article, or an observational essay or something like that… this is just a declaration of my feelings at this moment, for want of company or someone to talk to…. Hmmmm….ok continuing my flow of thoughts…. Maybe I should grab a book or something… but the light is too weak and I don’t want to put on the tubelights inside the house… like the natural light to read….

Earlier on the thunder and lightning was so bad that I was almost scared. Went to the terrace and closed all the doors and windows of the private terrace. They were making a racket.. that’s when I got those huge drops on my body… didn’t feel that great… but suddenly the winds came on and the big drops seem to have broken up into millions of ‘shower-drops’. And suddenly I enjoyed being there on top of the building in my shorts only and having the full force of the rains on to my body… felt the adrenaline rush when I climbed up the tank and stood there watching the view, with thunder and lightening in the foreground…. Wwwwwwooooohooooo awesome….. got totally wet to my lungs and then climbed down gingerly….. wheeeeee….. now sitting in the bean bag after drying myself and with this hot cuppa, I feel wonderful..

Wonder how good it would have been, if… if ever…. ….. ……

Paaaaaahhhhh….. anyways if , the ifs and buts were pots and pans, all we would have had is lots of noise. Hmmmm…. We always say how good it is here and then say it would have been better if… arrre leave it brother… no point…. Just enjoy the tea and get back to your reading…. Or just sleep off on the bean bag….aaaaahhhh now that’s a thought… never among the ones to sleep much in the day, its tempting today just to close my eyes and lie here on the bean bag…. Maybe keep this laptop away, let the soft music flow, and close my eyes… aaahhh, closing of the eyes… that moment when the two eyelashes meet….. that amazing instant… oh…. Tempting… here I come oh sleep… take me too with you !!

Airplanes

Mightily impressed with the lyrics of a new song called Airplanes....check it out, especiall the airplanes' analogy to shooting stars !! wow !! :-)

Can we pretend that airplanes in the night sky are like shooting stars?
I could really use a wish right now, wish right now, wish right now
Can we pretend that airplanes in the night sky are like shooting stars?
I could really use a wish right now, wish right now, wish right now


Yeah, I could use a dream or a genie or a wish
To go back to a place much simpler than this
Cause after all the partying, the smashin' and crashin'
And all the glips and the glam and the fashion
And all the pandemonium and all the madness
There comes a time where you fade to the blackness
And when you starin' at that phone in your lap
And you hopin' but them people never call you back
But that's just how the story unfolds
You get another hand soon after you fold
And when your plans unravel in the sand
What would you wish for if you had one chance

So airplane, airplane sorry I'm late
I'm on my way so don't close that gate
If I don't make that, then I switch my flight
And I'll be right back at it by the end of the night

Can we pretend that airplanes in the night sky are like shooting stars?
I could really use a wish right now, wish right now, wish right now

Somebody take me back to the days
Before this was a job
Before I got payed
Before it ever matter what I had in my bank
Yeah, back when I was tryin' to get a tip at Subway
And back when I was rappin' for the hell of it
But now a days we rappin' in state relevant
I'm guessin' that if we can make some wishes outta airplanes, then
maybe oh maybe I'd go back to the days
Before the politics that we called a rap game
And back when ain't nobody listened to my mix tape
And back before I tried to cover up my slang
But this is for Decatur what's up Bobby Ray
So can I get a wish, to end the politics
And get back to the music that started this shit
So here I stand and then again I say
I'm hopin' we can make some wishes outta airplanes

Can we pretend that airplanes in the night sky are like shooting stars?
I could really use a wish right now, wish right now, wish right now

- Lyrics by Jeremy Dussolliet & Tim Sommers

Limca

In love with the Limca Ads that run on TV. Wow ! Wow ! Wow !
Such a nice jingle, such creativity, such a soothing ad....
Just stands out in the clutter..

First it was Sushma Reddy splashing about on the roads with a lovely jingle,
then its this one with Hrishitaa Bhatt....they changed the lyrics and the jingle too slightly... and yet it works...
here s the new one
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rdcLg35QMs0

anyways the ladies are not the main thing.. its the ad itself.
I just love it love it love it !!!

Hope and some salt !!

Soon, my heart will be prised out, but I still will have a connoisseur's appreciation for living !!:-) I hope ! Just.

under construction

Am seething after reading the civial aviation minister Praful Patel's comments after the pilots death.... next post on it... as soon as i get time in office today.

praful patel's juvenile statement - pilots died projecting india's avaiation superpower status.... seriously??? yuck !!!

and why must the show go on.its abused statement... sometimes its nice to pause and not let the show go on...lets not get into rhetoric


.... wait... i will elaborate.... shortly....

X & Y

Trying hard to speak,
And fighting with my weak hand,
Driven to distraction,
So part of the plan.

When something is broken
And you try to fix it,
Trying to repair it,
Anyway you can.

I dive in at the deep end,
You become my best friend,
I wanna love you but I don't know if I can

I know something is broken,
And I'm trying to fix it,
Trying to repair it,
Anyway I can.

- Coldplay :-)

Juhu

Just a bit of imagination.... is all that one needs. To make their world beautiful. A world of color and toothy smiles... a world of exxagerated gestures and gentle kisses blown into the air....of characters who defy gravity and conventional judgements...
Oh it's all a bit silly. But then we hope it is so. Imagination begins with a bit of silliness, eh? ;-)

oh it's magical, i tell you honey.... it's the most wonderful world... it's light - soft, supple and yet so bright.... :-)

Oh I can't tell you more for that would just take away the surprises....if you would come with me, we could go there together... oh ya I think now I know the way.... but all I ask of you is some Belief. Yes my beloved, just believe. Just look into my eyes and believe !!! :-)

And we shall see a wonderful other side, together :-)

Mightily, mightily impressed with One Republic's 'Secrets'. Strange kind of a song but then what powerful arrangement !!! Just sweeps me away in its juvenile power !!

Presentations !!

hey, just realised why am smiling so much suddenly after some uninspired performance at work. I suddenly got an instruction from my boss, " Anup, can you help me with a presentation ?" That was like music to my ears !! I have a job where I have never made any major presentations or worked on any. Somehow in HCL there is no presentation culture. And being in the junior cadre I was never the one who made presentations. To add to that I never got to present apart from some internal trainings that I did for the other teams.

So here I am realizing that what I always wanted to do in corporate world, is this. Present my ideas, my way, and thats what excites me..... I have a way of doing presentations which I think is pretty good ( atleast my B-school thought so). So now I know what i have been missing from my work....

Now that I am at a good position in the company, I expect more such presentations, and more such exciting work ! BRING IT ON BROTHER !!

New year post

Hey, I almost forgot that my last post was a 'not-so-nice' one. Can't have such a post adorning my blog so lets take inspiration from my Guru Mr. Deepak Gupta and post this beauty by Emily Dickenson. Deepak sir sent this to us yesterday as part of his Monday Morning mail to us.... So here it is, the first post of the new year dedicated to him and his joie de vivre

life


If I can stop one heart from breaking,
I shall not live in vain;
If I can ease one life the aching,
Or cool one pain,
Or help one fainting robin
Unto his nest again,
I shall not live in vain.


emily dickinson