Faithful

Ram Jivan was not feeling good at all. In fact, if he knew the phrase, we would’ve said he was feeling ‘goddamned awful’. His head was throbbing, his heart palpitating and his thoughts atrophying. He didn’t want to think and he couldn’t stop thinking. Alone in his one room living quarters, he felt downright miserable. There was no one to discuss his confusions with; his wife was at the village and his uncle’s son was an idiot. Not that his wife being here would’ve been much good. The two of them didn’t quite talk the way his mistress and master did. Ouch. That reference didn’t help. He didn’t want to think about his employers. He couldn’t stop thinking about his employers.

It had been three years since Ram Jivan had been employed by the mistress to drive her tiny tall-boy. From then till now, Ram Jivan had been a part of all of mistress’ experiences and episodes, accidents and achievements. When she graduated from the tall boy to a bigger sedan, provided by the organization she worked in, for Ram Jivan it had been ‘their’ acquisition. Proudly polishing the bright red vehicle in the office parking lot, Ram Jivan had good naturedly taken the teasing heaped upon by the other drivers and office boys. He’d been a tad embarrassed by mistress’ choice of colour – bright red was so extravagant – but quickly even that became a matter of pride. Nobody could miss the arrival of the vehicle, and Ram Jivan in his simple way always felt that it was the impressive presence of the car that had given them the prized slot in the parking lot, right in front, where only the top three or four cars were allowed. It had never occurred to him that the grade and quality of the car did not do the trick; it was the grade and quality of the person who owned it.

From hospital duty when mistress’s mother fell dangerously ill, to wild late night parties where Ram Jivan insisted on staying on, in the heat or the cold, just to ensure that mistress got home safe and sound, this faithful servant had been there like a watch dog through it all. He had, over the years, acquired a silent, self proclaimed stake in the family’s highs and lows. It did not matter what they said or thought, for him, their happiness was of supreme importance. When mistress finally decided to tie the knot with that wonderful gentleman who’d visit ever so often, Ram Jivan was sure nobody was happier than him. The fact that mistress was getting on in her years, and was refusing to ‘settle down’ had been bothering him no small amount. He’d silently shared in her mother’s anxieties, aggressively defended her when she came up in local domestic help gossip, and tried in his timid way to nudge her thoughts in the direction of matrimony. Ram Jivan today was convinced, even if nobody else was, that his little machinations had served a great deal in helping mistress make up her mind.

Damn. It was exactly this sense of ownership and emotional possession that made Ram Jivan so bitter today. His sense of outrage was heightened by the fact that his feelings just didn’t seem to matter. Because, although he didn’t know it, for Ram Jivan, his mistress’ world had become a microcosm of the world at large. If everything was all right in that one, everything was all right everywhere. When mistress did something to shake that balance, Ram Jivan went into a tizzy. He simply could not deal with it. He got headaches, belly aches, heart aches. A few times, when he’d attempted to bare his heart to the mistress, he had not been exactly rebuffed; she was gentle but firm. He had not exactly been encouraged. He knew his place. He was the driver, taken very good care of, paid handsomely and treated wonderfully. But he was not an equal. ‘I disagree’, ‘I disapprove’ and ‘I dislike’ were not part of his vocabulary with his employer.

As his mobile rang shrill in the tiny room, Ram Jivan snapped out of his reverie with a start. Ouch. It was already 10a.m. and he had not even started the fifteen minute walk to mistress' house. He had to report at ten past ten, and this was mistress' reminder call. He wouldn't take it. He couldn't start his day with her razor sharp voice and her ghost like ability to percieve where he was, even through the phone. His gasped 'nearly there madam, just around the corner' would be greeted with her whiplash 'you haven't even left home yet, Ram Jivan,' and he'd wilt. He'd have to start jogging right away, and pretend that he'd not heard the phone. She wouldn't fall for it though. And it was so unfair, considering that the entire delay was caused in the first place by these blasted thoughts of her.

Ram Jivan was all of twenty three. Not more than a lad when he started work, his initial three months with mistress had been extremely embarrassing. He’d drive, but she’d park for him. He’d drive, but she’d reverse for him. Still raw and untrained at the wheel, he had been the butt of jokes from parking attendants, mechanics and drivers. But mistress patiently saw him through those green years – well, not patiently perhaps. His ears would singe with the burning criticism and mistress’ brand of caustic sarcasm. But something about her made him stick on. He noticed that she spoke like that to everyone, and he never got a sense of class difference. It appeared to him that the entire world seemed stupid to his mistress, and he just happened to be one such person in the line of her vision. She could reduce grown men to tears and not even realize that she had. He not only learnt to deftly dodge her temper, he began to hotly defend it when others complained. Even Ram Jivan could not say what gave him this sense of fierce and possessive loyalty – perhaps it was generations of feudal culture, socio genetically sowed into him, or maybe it was the security of the job, in spite of the ghastly hours and unpredictable schedule. Whatever it was, Ram Jivan was here to stay.

Here to stay, and mind his own business. Well, at least that was the way Medha viewed it. She found her driver adorable and exasperating at the same time. While his body language betrayed volumes, his lips would gurgle inarticulate monosyllables. It was impossible to make him say a word when he chose to be silent, and that would infuriate Medha. What's with this guy, she'd exclaim to herself. One tadpole of a driver whom she'd groomed and trained, literally brought up and civilized, and here he was, giving her attitude.

Medha shook off her exasperation, and her eyes off the rear view mirror, through which she could see Ram Jivan's glum countenance. Psshaaah. She had enough to brood about, without allowing menials, even well meaning ones, to get under her skin.

Medha's normally excel sheet like brain was going into a tailspin these days. Little did driver and mistress know how similar their mindsets were, that hers was in as much of a turmoil as his. She glanced up furtively again into the rear view. Was this a good time to change course? She smiled grimly at the unintended pun in her head. Change the course of what? Her car? Her life?

Forget it. Get on with work first. This was no time to get distracted. Medha got off at the office entrance and sent the car back for her husband, who was going in late today. She flipped open her mobile to re-read a message from last night, for the nth time. The palpitation started, as did the slight tremble in her limbs. She snapped her cellphone shut and attempted to do the same with her wandering mind.

Some time in the afternoon Medha's phone beeped again. The message was simple, and devastating. "One shouldn't have to beg for coffee". Medha felt as though she'd choke. This was far out. This was movie dialogue and B grade scripts. This couldn't be her life. A thirty something working executive, ambitious, married, 'settled' was the word. This was insane.

The next fifteen minutes passed in a blur. 3 people came to discuss work with her and she could pay no attention. Her husband called and she wouldn't answer. Nothing worked. The visual focus of things around her changed. Some things stood out in sharp relief, while others receded into a blur. Medha shouldered her bag and stepped out of the office. Her reply sms was terse and equally simple. "Coming".

'Ram Jivan, South Park shopping mall please.' Did she imagine it, or did Ram Jivan's fingers clench over the steering wheel? What nonsense. This was just pure guilt. But why should she be guilty? She wasn't doing anything wrong. And Ram Jivan was hardly somebody she owed explanations to, about why she was setting off to a mall in the middle of a working day.

By the time she was at the familiar table at the cafe, Medha's celebrated composure was nowhere in sight. She couldn't figure if the tremor, the giddiness, the breathlessness was pleasurable or painful. She knew she wouldn't be able to stand. Her knees, as she'd identified the feeling in those countless trashy novels of adolescence, were wobbly! Yikes. She hated this reaction. She hated the fact that there was no source. Every impact should have a source. How can you deal with a reaction if there is no action to correct; change an effect when you can't identify the cause? This was the closest to 'being' as she had ever come. A pure state of being, with no state of doing, or undoing.... She didn't have a problem. She didn't know what to solve.

'Hi'.

Damn. Funny feelings. Coordinates: middle of tummy, top left. Shifting in whorls. The knees weren't exactly cooperating. The breathing had decided to join in the fun and games and take a merry go round ride up and down her wind pipe. She wanted to slap every separate part of her anatomy and force them to behave.

Medha couldn't look. She forced herself to. A cascade of emotions poured through her like paint, and she felt the fumes rise to her eyes. This was incredible. This was idiotic. 'Hi'.

Nikhil smiled. She decided it was him she really wanted to slap. That same smug smile, like he knew exactly what was going on, and blast it, that same darting vulnerable look around the eyes. How did they do it? How did they hold up these cliches like neon signs around their faces and prove everytime that the cliches were for real, and were fleeting?

Medha couldn't believe she was actually here. Why was she sharing a table and an hour with a man who had pretty much brought every stereotype of men to life? Why was she here to hear the same pleasant sounding rubbish every self help book warned against? Why did she fall for drivel like 'one shouldn't have to beg for coffee?' Why, when her own husband was not a chip of that old block, was not like anyone she'd ever met before, was not likely to make stereotypes come to life, was not about to behave like an overgrown jerk in search of mommy and mallika sherawat rolled into one.

Medha stayed on.

Several floors down in the basement parking lot, Ram Jivan was fuming.

He had spotted Nikhil's self driven 4 wheel drive swing into the complex. His baleful gaze had followed Nikhil's form as it pushed through the glass doors, went to the bank of elevators and got swallowed into a crowd entering the one going up to the 3rd floor. When Nikhil had hesitated for a fraction of a second next to a florist near the elevators, Ram Jivan had wanted to throw something big and heavy at him. But whether it was those waves of antipathy, or something else, Nikhil change his mind and went on up empty handed.

Ram Jivan decided that he did not like Nikhil. That he did not like any of this.

He had not realised he was actually gnashing his teeth, jaws clenched, when his cellphone rang. He sprang up in alarm. Was mistress already done? Should he get the car out? Would he have to grin at that dolt when he picked madam up, if he escorted her? Why couldn't he just stare out of the window deadpan like most other drivers did? But no, madam would give him tension on that too later. Might as well be polite and ....

Ram Jivan started; the phone was still ringing. When he looked at the screen his heart sank. Damn. It was sir. Obviously he must be looking for madam.... shit shit shit.

Ram Jivan answered with a pant as though he'd come running to his phone. "Haanji, namaste!"

"Ram Jivan, where's Medha? Why is her phone switched off? Its never switched off. Is she ok?"

A wave of relief and joy flooded over Ram Jivan. Here it was. His solution handed to him on a platter. "She's at the South Park mall sir. I'm here with her."

"At the mall??? At 3 in the afternoon on a working day? And has her battery gone, do you know? Do you have a spare charger for her?"

Ram Jivan's heart was melting for this good, kind, caring man; his righteous indignation progressively taking wing at the same time.... "I don't know sir, we should be back in the office soon. Maybe she has come to shop for something...."

"Ok tell her to call me the moment she gets into the car. If her phone isn't working, give me a missed call from yours, I'll call back..."

The conversation was ending. Ram Jivan could rapidly see the window of opportunity close. He broke into a sweat. How to say it, what to do... a random comment would be taken amiss. He could not just arbitrarily offer information that was not solicited; both sir and madam hated that... but in another few seconds sir would hang up....

Ram Jivan's normally dull wit suddenly sprang to life with the sparkle of moral light. He had it. Just in the nick of time, he had it.

"O that won't be necessary sir. After all, even if madam's phone is off, she can call you from Nikhil sir's phone I'm sure".

There was a pause.

"Nikhil? He's there too?"

Ram Jivan could hear the bugles of triumph, the drums of victory beating in the background. He was being crowned the king of goodness in heaven, and all was well with the world. His duty as the ever faithful had been done.

"Yes sir, I saw him enter the mall 5 minutes after madam. Oh, but then maybe he has come alone and maybe they won't even meet, and then maybe I will have to give you a missed call after all whenever...."

"Ya ok ok." click.

Ram Jivan stopped blabbering midway through his ramble. He smiled.

Oblivious to his machinations, far above, 2 people were huddled in an intense and charged conversation. They weren't touching, but somehow they had a sheen around them that seemed almost electric in its crackle. No waiter came near them, no wandering sales girl stopped to make her pitch. They had a big Do Not Disturb aura all over.

"I don't know what I want Medha. Except that I want you. I know this is crazy and I have nothing to offer. But I can't help it"

"I can't help it??? Who do you think you are, Clark Gable in Gone With the Wind?? Its 'beyond my control' and all that jazz? You remember I hope, that it's you who walked..."

"I know... I just want you. I need to hold you. I could go for you right here..."

Medha gulped and allowed the sudden flip flop plunge in her stomach to complete its routine. Quelling the urge to grab Nikhil by his hand and drag him straight back to his studio apartment, she breathed deep. They were silent while she allowed the lust fumes in her head to die down. Looking at Nikhil didn't help. It genuinely was Clarke Gable from Gone with the Wind. It was beyond their control. This unshakeable, unbreakable chemistry that wove its rope around them, and had for the 8 years they'd known each other. 2 to recognise it, 3 to fight it, 1 to give in to it, and 2 to recover from its tortured, terrible impact. Like being in a car crash and enjoying it. Like standing in the middle of a storm and relishing it. What made people enjoy destruction? What made people give in to the dark?

Medha shook her head. This scan of the last 8 years helped her focus. It had been a long journey from those horribly lonely, tear streaked, self worth devastated, body hungry, mind wandering years, towards finding good health again. She couldn't let herself get there again... or could she? She looked up. Nikhil was devouring her face with what she called his 'hungry eyes'. You always touch me with your eyes, she'd tell him. You don't look, you make physical contact.

"I know, I know, I don't want to mess anything up in your life.... its not like I could ever give you half the happiness you have today... I don't want to disturb anything... but damn it, I can't handle this no entry sign. Sorry, pun unitended" Nikhil grinned wrily.

"Wow. So this is not even about 'leave everything and come with me Medha', is it? It doesn't even have the honor of an abduction, the respectability of flight with another man? This is not a french novel. This is just plain and simple seedy infidelity you are looking for. Without having to take responsibility for another person's life, society, or even feelings."

"Why the sarcasm? Why do you always cut me down like this? What have I done? Don't you want me too?"

"Of course I do. I never could stop. But this shit has to, somewhere. I'm getting late. Unlike you, fancy book critic, I have a job to do..."

"Right."

By the time Medha stormed out of the mall, she was furious. And unfortunately, very turned on. Sex with Nikhil was like a drug. You wanted it so badly that the anticipation was almost crippling. But she was determined to kick the habit. Go cold turkey if need be. Home is where she needed to be right now. For grounding. For morality. For goodness.

For good.

"I'll wait for you at the apartment tonight." A voice warm-breath whispered into her loose hair, "With wine and pasta. And some music I picked up recently". Medha jumped out of her skin. But before she could retort, Nikhil had walked away towards his cherry coloured 4 wheel. Even the sight of that damn car could turn Medha into jelly. They had barely ever managed to get into the car and roll up the window before reaching, fevered, for each other... how mad, how dangerous, how insane those days were....

Medha called Ram Jivan and went back to work. Her resolution lasted with the sun. Her phone remained silent, except for one quick call to her husband and some garbled excuse about needing a midday break. She never really could lie to him point blank. Honesty was his corner stone, his identity. A half truth was what she managed at best.

When the sun set and the office boy came to draw the curtains in her cabin, she waved him away. Pushing back her chair, she stretched and purred, the afternoon's sensuality still lending a wine like langour to her limbs. She stood at the window and watched the city lights come on, and smiled. Just the thought of being with him made her so heavy-limbed and fluid... what would happen if she actually went...

His room came into her mind in sharp relief. Zonal, mood lighting, plush rugs, the smell of incense that Nikhil so loved, and books and manuscripts everywhere. Hard bound, paper back, recent works, classics, thumbed through, brand new... intoxicating, that smell....

And along with it came crashing other images. Medha alone in that room and no Nikhil in sight. Medha crying outside that door, drunk at 2a.m. and neighbours popping out, but no Nikhil. Medha calling the house when Nikhil switched off his phone, and hearing that phone echo unanswered in that empty hall.... Medha buying a new rug for the house only to hear a caustic 'trying to be my wife?'. Medha waiting and Medha hoping. Medha hopeless and still waiting. And finally, Medha not waiting anymore...

Shaking her head, confused, sad, hurt, Medha left office. Her past was tumbling into her present, and her heart was feeling fragile. Compared to the robust tremulousness of the afternoon, this stillness was fragile. She felt the tears prick at the back of her eyes. The whole thing was sad. The investment of emotions were sad, the letting go of dreams were sad, the waylaying of life on the pathway of ideas was sad. It was a futile world, this one of the heart, and whether you destroyed it or nurtured it, at the end of the day, something was left sad somewhere.

"Lets go home Ram Jivan" Medha uttered those words like a talisman. What would she go home and tell her husband? Should she go home at all? Or should she give in to the tempest that had never even yielded driftwood?

Ram Jivan observed his mistress through the rear view. She looked so sad. He felt awful. He wished he dared entertain her with some story, bring up some funny anecdote, like he did at times when she was grim and frowning after work. But this was different. He couldn't break that silence, it was too full...

Suddenly Medha felt the entire world tailspin and her heart get completely entangled with her thoughts.... nothing was working. Nothing was making sense. She needed a compass and north was missing.

"Ram Jivan...." she hesitated...

"Jee?"

"Uh... not home.... Apsara Apartments first.... just for a little bit" she almost whimpered out that last sentence like a pleading child...

Ram Jivan shut his eyes in despair for one furtive second. Apsara Apartments. Cherry coloured 4 wheel drive in the basement. Ever since Ram Jivan had joined mistress' service she had gone there only a few times, but he knew who stayed there, alright.

He decided it was time to get brazen. "Apsara Apartments? So late madam? This is the same place we used to go to, a few years back, no? And last 2 weeks you've asked me to drive by the same place about 3 times? Same place you want to go?"

Medha sighed. This was no good. She would go home and send him off first, and maybe drive out later herself. After dinner. After a chat with her husband.... a chat? About what? How could she hold up her tattered flag of petty conversation in front of his brilliant white mast of honesty? Discuss work? Her break at the mall?

"Never mind, lets go home" she instructed her driver, and settled back into her seat, a wave of terrible exhaustion passing over her.

Ram Jivan relaxed. One day at a time, he thought.

When Medha walked in home, her husband was surfing the net. He looked up briefly and smiled. Coffee? He asked, as usual.

Guilt. She felt. Not so usual. Not for anything tangible. Not for any wrong done. Simply for an adultery considered. Were trecherous thoughts more harmful, or deeds? Did a thought through in detail indiscretion, that had never happened, matter more in the final book of Right and Wrong, or a senseless, thoughtless, real trespass? Which one notched higher on the moral crime graph? If she got terribly drunk one night and kissed a stranger at a party, would that be worse? Or were these betraying, adulterous thoughts worse?

"Thanks baby" she sighed, settling down into the couch. "I'm not hungry tonight, so go ahead have your high calorie food".

Her husband grinned. And with a flourish pulled out a bowl of rich gooey cheese sauce pasta from behind him. "Already doing that".

Pasta? Sure, now there would be wine too. And maybe hubby darling too had bought new music. How charming. What a plethora of choice. Utterly delightful.

The entire macabre humour of the scene helped her make up her mind. The world was amoral. Life was amoral. Feelings too, were beyond ethics. What the heck. She'd go. She'd take advantage of this amazing man, who'd never ask. She'd totally trample his trust and then decide what to do with the debris later. She'd never tell him. She'd live this double life, as many husbands had done, over years, and not feel guilty about it. Loving him, desiring Nikhil, committing to both in her strange twisted sense of loyalty...

"I'm going out" she was about to say, but she was interrupted. "What were you doing at South Park mall today in the afternoon exactly? What was all that about a midday break? You have a recreation centre in office too."

"Uh... so? I felt like going there. I'm the boss. I can go anywhere. Who's gonna ask me at office? Look, I need to step out for a ...."

"Did you meet Nikhil?"

Medha's lungs collapsed. She was grateful that her husband normally didn't pay much attention to nuances of the face, because hers must've looked like a panchnaama.

"Nikhil?" she managed.

"Yeah, Ram Jivan said he saw Nikhil entering the mall after you. Was wondering if you ran into him while you were there?"

"Uh... no. I didn't. I window shopped, had a coffee, came back. Wish I'd known, would've invited him for a coffee too..."

"Why?"

"What do you mean, why?"

"I thought that man hurt you terribly. Made you lose your entire sense of self? Why would you invite him to join you for coffee on a nice afternoon sneak away from work?"

Medha looked up. Her husband was looking at her intently. His tone was casual but his body was arrested. His eyes sparking.

"Cmon Medha, you deserve a break when you want it, you know."

Was he talking about the afternoon? Or was he talking about something else? What an incredible man, Medha thought. She put down her bag, nodding slowly. "Yeah, I guess you're right. We are all entitled to enjoy our breaks to the fullest".

The next morning, when the doorbell rang, Medha felt too lazy to go downstairs. Her night had been fuzzy and warm, and loving. She decided to check from the balcony first.

"Car keys madam" Ram Jivan beamed up, a sword of sunlight splitting his face into two halves.

Half innocent, half wicked, thought Medha, staring down at him in exasperation, in affection, in wonder. She flung down the keys and went back to the bedroom.

"You know sweetie", she murmured, nuzzling into her husband's neck, "in a progressively individualistic world, where family, society and community have ceased to matter, its funny where the face of ethic can pop up. Odd, where we can suddenly get our moral bearing, our faith from."

"I know." Her husband said. "Now stop being profound while behaving like a dachshund".

You've Got New Post

'Why is there no new post on your blog?' Best friend asked.

'Because I'm happy. I can't write when I'm happy.'

Best friend wore a curiously best friend expression, managing to blend relief with curiosity with perplexity with amusement.

'I honestly can't. Today I felt like writing after a long time because I just saw Parzania and I was disturbed. But the feeling passed because I'm largely happy.'

Best friend wanted to know more. So I supplied. About husband and life and togetherness and balance and things falling harmoniously into place.

Best friend smiled and said, 'for those reasons, I'm more than willing to accept absence on the blog'.

An ex boyfriend and almost ex friend had once told me: for the sake of poetry, you always need to be heartbroken. Your being happy would be a great disservice to the world.

Very flattering it was. Made me feel quite like the raven haired, wild eyed beauty I always fancied being. Ah. The me I've wished to be.

Happiness is largely a deadening emotion. It makes much of habit, a big deal of consistency, a huge fuss over stability, and can well lose imagination en route. The tremulous beauty of sadness is fertile ground. It breeds thoughts that seek wings of expression. Happiness has no such desire. It sings itself to sleep with a smile on the lips and is more than content with conversation, beer and a pay cheque. Good sex helps. Good conversation helps even more.

Sadness can make much of a muchness and therefore help you 'live life larger than life' as a film maker friend says to me about his own. Not about sadness that is, just about his own life. But it applies equally to the emotion so I borrow, conscientiously. Conscience can screw the rhythm of writing.

My husband can't watch Parzania at 2:55p.m. tomorrow because he has to visit his daughter. His daughter who isn't mine. His weekend sojourns to his ex wife's house makes us miss many saturday and sunday things. The fact that EPL is on, on Saturday nights, puts paid to evening plans as well. So I catch up with friends. And get my weekly alcohol fix in the process, since I try and avoid drinking too often when with hubby. He kicked booze almost 2 years ago after his liver threatened to pack up, so I try and avoid putting temptation his way.

But such weekends notwithstanding, I must shamefacedly confess, I am happy. My husband loves me and displays his caring in a zillion different ways. He cooks for me and kids with me. He makes plans with me and messes up plans with me. He musses up my schedule, my hair, my thinking, and grins delightfully at the end of each mussing up. I love it. I love him. And ignore the muse. I am happy in a dumb cow like way. I fight the weight that happiness insists on heaping on me. I gym. I hum. I humdrum.

I don't write enough. I don't care.

Happiness is a bloody bad thing. I wish it upon everyone who's had the curse of imagination preying upon their expression. When you let go of the word, the paint, the musical note, the dance step, the charcoal, the pencil, the stage, the spotlight, what you're left with is that which you were searching for through all these idioms and mediums. That fat, boring, complacent thing called Happiness.

The Flowers

It always seemed so inadequate, this giving of a coin or two, as a bribe to the conscience, at the crossing. And so, in desperate hate at one’s impotence, Shyama would increase the amount every once in a while. She was one of the first to switch to five rupee coins while most people just handed out 50p or Re. 1. She was also the first to convert to ten rupee notes while the rest of the city was still catching up with her fiver generosity. To some extent, Shyama pretty much was a large contributor to the phenomenon of the Rising Market Rate of the Delhi Crossing Beggar.

Then Shyama read a very thought provoking article in a leading daily. And she was amazed at how the secret guilt of being financially secure, was not a secret at all. The writer had been through the same pangs, and had attempted to assuage the same guilt with the same rising currency denomination. It was not a unique trait at all; on the contrary, it was an urban malaise.

Shyama had been both fascinated and upset by the article. There was something respectable about a secretly harboured emotion, however crippling it was. The ‘deferred’ quality of newsprint, as Vikram Seth would’ve put it, suddenly took away her sense of identity. She didn’t want to share in a malaise. She had to reinvent this act of ‘giving at the crossings’ till she could rightfully reclaim it as uniquely her own.

The idea actually came to her by accident. One of the beggar kids once spied Shyama’s lunch box, lovingly packed by her mother, on the seat next to her. Still prattling his whining litany as if by rote, and shaking his palm desultorily at the window, the kid had given himself away by his eyes. Riveted, gleaming, hungry, hopeful, hopeless, charmed, imagining, fascinated, hypnotized eyes; glued to the lunch box. Shyama knew then that not one morsel from that would go down her throat too well. So she opened the lunch box and emptied out its contents into the suddenly alive palms. And another set that materialized next to it, as they are often wont to do at India’s big and small crossings.

This episode, blossoming into a regular occurrence at random crossings across the city, and kept fiercely secret from mom who continued to pack the food lovingly, not knowing that it never reached the tummy it was meant for, gradually burgeoned into a solution in Shyama’s head. The head, that was still searching for some unique identity in that 30 second act at the crossing, to brand it with some personal stamp, slowly woke to a theme. The theme was: kids and candy.

Another small incident helped cement the idea. This happened at a busy Mumbai crossing, somewhere in Andheri west. Because Shyama was in an auto rickshaw, and there were several cars around her, the beggars were giving her less than optimum attention. A few half hearted arms and palms, whines and whispers had materialized by the rickshaw grills, and had disappeared as rapidly. Those who traveled in auto rickshaws did not pay. They were chasing the racing meter in their minds, and the small change had already been swallowed up in their imagination. The beggars knew that.

Left in relative peace, Shyama had been able to observe the phenomenon she normally went through herself, from a slight distance, (if, what exists between any two vehicles on any Mumbai road can be termed ‘distance’). Apart from the regular array of women with babies, men with no arms, and kids in rags, there was this little girl trying to sell off a bunch of red balloons. While Shyama watched, the little girl went from window to car window, knocking, scraping, begging, pointing at her balloons, and Shyama suddenly realized with a little jolt, that the girl did not really want to achieve a sale. As the lights changed, the little kid seemed visibly relieved and skipped off to the sidewalk, to make way for the surge of traffic. As her auto zipped ahead, Shyama craned her neck for a last glimpse. The little beggar girl was looking like a real little girl now, scampering with her balloons, her eyes softly alight as they followed the bobbing of her temporary friends, a small smile playing at the corners of her lips. All little girl, till the light changed again.

How many needs were there, to cater to? Shyama wondered. And were we doomed to always take something away, while giving another?

One can never serve all the beggars in India. Nor can one fulfill all the needs of one beggar. You try and save them from cold and they die in the summer heat. You try and send them to school and they die of starvation for lack of income. You try and find them employment and they die of overwork and underpay. You find them a home and they die of misplaced gratitude that makes them steal your stuff and run away. You clothe them, they die hungry. You feed them, they die of exposure. You love them, and they die of embarrassment.

Shyama had already realized that this act of giving at the crossings had far less to do with the beggars, and far more, with herself. The arc that her hand made from her lap to the bag, from the bag to the window, drew a pattern between some undefined points in her life, and at the same time, erased something else – something that ought to be erased but never could be – as transiently and as ephemerally as a wave on sand.

Having come to terms with the superfluity of the entire purpose, Shyama was now quite comfortable introducing frivolity to the act itself. If it served no higher purpose than to make invisible arcs through the empty slates of her mind, than how seriously could she take the entire thing? Might as well have some fun and colour, circus and mirth, while she was at it.

And so Shyama stocked her car with bagfuls of candies. Candies and glucose biscuits all tumble-piled onto each other; glittering through the transparent plastic bag with unpredictable promise. The kids, beggar though they were, had an aesthetic instinct. They knew that tears and frowns and whines did not quite go with this booty. Sad stories and orange lozenges at the end of them? You didn’t need a public school education to figure out that that didn’t work.

And so it came about, that Shyama discovered a whole new side benefit to the Kids and Candy theme. Apart from making her crossings experience delightfully uniquely her own, she now had the added bonus of being greeted by a riotous, grinning, laughing bunch of kids, who behaved like kids. Since there was no money to be made here, the watchful grown ups and beggar pimps at the traffic light indulgently let the kids be during these one minute romps. No harm done, even to business – the same kids could return to other car windows and reapply the miserable teary expressions, and the car owners wouldn’t even notice the change. India’s sensitivities and sensibilities both, could be quite awe inspiring at times.

Over a period of time, the kids came to recognize her, and her weaknesses. They expanded their business with ‘didi’. Although she had totally stopped giving money, newspapers, they realized, she’d buy at times, in spite of lecturing them on how one paper was not very good and she much preferred another. The other thing Shyama found difficult to refuse, were flowers. The kids would sometimes crowd around her window, clutching drooping bunches of yesterday’s roses, bought, stolen or begged off the corner florist, maybe while he was shutting shop late at night. The florist perhaps gave the flowers away for free, knowing they were of scant use to him now. The roses would be well past their prime, sad in their marginalized beauty, not very unlike the kids who clutched them hopefully. Although their petals were already falling off with every slight movement of the hand, the roses would be packed quite cleverly, with bright cellophane, and sometimes with extra twigs to hold the stems up, hidden well behind and under extra green foliage.

Shyama noticed all this. And she could not resist buying them. When she put the flowers in a glass on her office table, they’d be nothing more than stems in just a few hours, the petals adorning the polished surface like a bridal bed. She often bought the flowers as much for their own sake, as the children’s. To give them a warm home in their last few hours, and a decent burial in the office dustbin. Ten rupees for a bunch of five seemed quite worth it. Sometimes on impulse, or for lack of change, she’d buy five or ten such bunches, and pass them around in office in an impromptu carnival. It was fun, and the roses smiled wanly, she felt.


The kids developed their own group dynamics with her over the years. The ones that grew up slowly drifted to the fringes, while the younger, cuter ones took centre stage. The more confident ones talked more, asking her to get clothes, get blankets, even get jewellery. Sometimes Shyama would remember these requests, and while emptying out her cupboard, pack some of her old wardrobe into the car. At others, she’d buy sweaters and t shirts from the handcart man, thereby perpetuating and supporting this fringe economy. It fascinated her in its secret working; second hand clothes bought by the cart man by weight, from the Lal Qila area, carted back to south Delhi and sold per piece, and then bought by the affluent to distribute amongst servants and beggars, who’d sell them off again in Old Delhi and the cycle would resume. Shyama liked the self sustaining economy of this cyclical process, and liked contributing to the futile churning of it.

At times, wistfully, after a manic day of debating irrelevances at work, Shyama would wonder why she did not make this fringe life of hers her entire life. There were people like that out there: working with street children, spending time teaching, releasing reports, visit-lecturing at international forums, chronicling pain, demanding release.

But Shyama never could take that significant leap. She liked her comfort zones too much. She enjoyed her extravagances; she was addicted to her superfluities. She had another secret reason, but she never articulated that, because it smacked too much of smug self-justification. But one reason also why she never managed to change her calling, was because she seemed to hardly ever met any of the NGO types who looked happy and fulfilled. Maybe it came from being face to face with suffering all the time, maybe it was the side effect of having to fight and yell for every last bit of grant, every tiny bit of concession, every blackboard, every chalk, every wooly blanket, but the fact remained, whenever Shyama met anybody who’d made the leap, they failed to inspire her. When she read about them in magazines in newspapers, her heart stirred, something swelled in her soul and she’d almost make up her mind. But then she’d meet the person in flesh and blood. Or, someone like the person written about. And her resolve would melt. A friend would call her for a night out at the pub and she’d quickly agree to meet, for a lager and a laugh, relieved that she didn’t have to save the world quite yet.

And so the fringe life continued. As the country progressed and Shyama read about 8% GDP growth, she’d be wryly amused to see that the beggars were better dressed in Delhi now. They genuinely were, compared to a few years back. Almost none of them were in tatters, there was nobody half naked, at least not in South Delhi, and even the whining expressions were gradually getting replaced by more self confident, poised aspects. The faces at the window had changed their story. They seemed no longer to say “I am pathetic, therefore pay”. Rather, the submission was more direct, more forthright, more honest, “you can afford it. Therefore, pay”. They put the onus back on you and that made it more difficult to refuse. And they wished you well, at the end of it, with a nod and a smile, and somehow, the transaction was an equal one.

“Didi”, an impish and utterly cute girl with wild mop of hair, had grinned at her through the window, on Rakhi day some years back, “2 rupaya de de, rakhi lena hai chote bhaiyya ke liye”. The ‘chotta bhaiyya’ in question was playing in the dirt near the pavement. The request was so endearing, Shyama had felt a bit guilty about putting it to the test. But she did, anyway. Smiling back at the girl, she’d said “I have an extra Rakhi in my bag, will you take that?” The girl’s grin had widened. Sure, she’d replied. But could she get some money too? For sweets? Shyama had promptly produced the sweets as well. And the girl, grinning wider still at being caught out, had happily accepted both the sequined thread, and the sweets, and scampered off to another window for the money she still sought. Shyama had never been able to figure out if the girl had been honest with her or dishonest.

Beyond the fringes of life at the crossings, the rest of Shyama’s life played out pretty much like life does for most young, 21st century women in Delhi. Work, and friends, and independence and longing; relationships and break ups and the perennial whirligig of time space and substance. When love arrived it came in a guise she had not imagined. When Shyama married it was in a way she had never anticipated. But it was a happy fulfilled place nonetheless, breaking through imagination and fantasies, and arrived at, in spite of them.

The night of her wedding reception, Shyama’s car stopped at the same dear familiar crossing, on the way to the reception venue. Her husband and some of her friends were already waiting for her there. Shyama had no wallet and no money on her, the sweets too had run out in the car. Dressed in bridal finery, Shyama felt the shock of the unfamiliar most acutely when one of the older beggar girls came to her window. This juxtaposition of the totally familiar with the new sense of unfamiliar she was waking to, made Shyama’s heart skid a bit. Who she was, and where she was, became a momentary blur in her head. The beggar girl was looking at her in wonder; she’d never seen Shyama like this before. About to proffer her bunch of wilted roses, the girl’s eyes widened and her smile deepened. Shyama smiled at her a bit sheepishly. “I can’t take anything from you today, I have nothing on me.” “Going somewhere special?” the girl asked. “I got married yesterday”, Shyama confessed, feeling embarrassed and awkward, as though meeting an acquaintance she had forgotten to invite. It struck her then that she did not know any of these children’s names. The girl lit up, “take some flowers then, you’ll look good carrying them.” Helpless Shyama shrugged “But I have no money today, I’ll get all of you sweets tomorrow…”

Shyama’s driver turned around. Unsure whether he should reach for his wallet and help his mistress out, or shoo the girl away so that Shyama was not hassled unduly, the driver waited for his cue.

It was at this point that the beggar girl took charge of the moment that had slipped out of Shyama’s control and comprehension. She thrust a bunch of roses in at the window. “Take them” she commanded. “You can pay me tomorrow. Or not. It doesn’t matter. ‘Koi baat nahin’.”

When Shyama walked into the resplendent reception lawns, the lights twinkling in the trees and Chopin playing softly over the sound system – her husband and her father in law’s choice - she clutched a bunch of red roses close to her. The old sad flowers seemed to seep a confidence into her, a rock solid identity while she dealt with new fragile ones. Every time the evening threatened to overwhelm her, Shyama referred herself to the flowers for a sense of rooting. She carried them around the entire evening and then late at night, when she came home tired and flushed, content and flustered, the roses found place in a glass on the table in the bridal room: the best gift she’d received that evening.

Reflection

A stillness of time
Is required to reflect
the swaying branches of our mind

And quiet is a place
Uninhabited

The blind leading the blind

The blind leading the blind
Can make a lot of noise you know
Clawing and cawing directions
In a desperation of aborted sense organs

And stillness left aflutter.


Quiet is a place I bought a ticket away from.

Hello everybody. I am back. At work.

Rustle [from the diaries]

The sunflowers open their face to the sun
And I think of you drifting somewhere in the city
A March breeze tosses my heart
I think of you again.

They have raked the autumn leaves
And heaped them at the side of the street
I brush my rustling thoughts of you
And gather them in a gentle corner of my mind.


19/03/97

Summer [from the diaries]

A koel has gone insane
This summer.
She sings saucily
Through hot afternoons
Urging mango ripes to overflow
She sings into the sunset
As if
She decides when dusk should fall.

Hers is a wanton call
Coaxing the sap out of drying barks
Seducing the juice
From summer blooms

A koel has gone mad
This terrible summer

It’s pecking at my heart
To pour its liquid song
Into my veins


17/6/98

Preparing [from the diaries]

By the time you dropped off the flowers
At my door,
By the time the trousseau arrived,
By the time the jewellery that grandmother had saved
Arrived by parcel from another city,
By the time you went and changed
Into your brand new suit

Did you notice how a few stars dropped by
To timidly witness our grand moment?
A gruff sun having left
For not being looked after well.


15/11/97

Sunset [from the diaries]

In each of our cities
The sun sets in different ways
It hides behind scaffoldings sometimes
It sulks behind soot stained buildings.

How does the sun set in your city?

Does it pale into the neon lights?
Choked by a passing bus
Does it hitch a ride sometimes?

White, dusty skies
Red lettering running to sell engine oil
Against a bizarre tree

My city hums with me.

Choking me with its venom
Spewing me onto its roads
Driving me from sun to sun
Lamplights on the run.

28/5/99

Take My Trip

This is the Maldives. The turquoise blue is for real. It's not a trick of light. The beach is genuinely pearl grey.

And there is nothing to do. Except snorkel, fish, sun and beer.

If there is any song tucked away in any part of your heart, you deserve to treat yourself to the Laguna Beach Resort, Maldives.

Just don't go alone. Alone can be very lonely here.

Grey Blue

It isn't as though I am not familiar with grey-blue. It is a feeling I've met many times, around the gentle bend of a song, in a chilly office when you suddenly look up and realise that the sky has darkened and most of the cubicles are empty, and the electrician is switching off the tubes, one by one, by one...

The quiet hum of machinery, the drone of a distant TV with a couple of office boys and a security guard hunched up around it, half guilty for being there while I still work, so snapped up into irritating attention whenever I pass by to visit the ladies or walk into the studio.

A radio station is a funny place to work in. A monstrous machinery of people, strategy, technology, database and planning - to talk to one person. Its astounding. While an ESPN gears up to cater to a billion people during the EPL, a Star Plus grooms itself to please millions of viewers per saas serial, what is our job? To make ONE person smile.

The rest follows. But the day you loose sight of that one person, you're sunk. You cannot address yourself to a mass on radio. The only way to procure the masses, is to forget them and focus on the individual.

That, I think, is what Amitabh Bachchan used to do. Talk to an audience of one. And get the nation by the balls of its imagination. O yeah, its his birthday tomorrow. Happy birthday big b.

Grey-blue often keeps me company while I work here. Today I was chatting with the jocks team in Jaipur about who they are really talking to, and why... and I started to do this typical character sketch of an average middle class listener. What does he think about, what are his insecurities, how does he feel, what does he wish for? 6 matches of the ICC Champions Trophy are happening in Jaipur, but does this guy have a ticket? Can he buy one if he wishes to?

And I suddenly felt that unbidden lump in my throat and that slight pin prick behind the eye lid. A tad embarassing when you're addressing a gaggle of giggly barely-out-of-teens.

I don't know when grey-blue will show up in this line of work. That's probably why I love this job so much. Sometimes, when I'd work really late, and the office would be deserted, I'd step into the on air studio, before leaving for home, on a chilly winter morning. I'd know that the roads outside would be fogged over at 1 or 2 a.m. and just before braving that cold lonely drive, I'd push open the solid thick wooden doors that lead into the On Air.

Normally the engineers would've darkened the room before leaving. And the entire studio would be in dim, weak starlight streaming in from the massive glass paned windows on a clear night. Else the sound of the radio would be filtering in through the dark, and just the red and yellow lights on the consol would be glowing, and twinkling, and blinking... like friendly magic.

I've stood there, in the shadow, on many a night, and felt grey-blue curl up like a muffler around my neck, a rug at my feet. I've heard the strains of a soft song filter out of that twinkling blinking friendly magic, and reach its gentle fingers out into the night.

And as I stood there, I have imagined that same song soaking into a romantic drive a young couple is taking on the gurgaon road; sinking under a blanket where a teenager has hidden a radio; caressing an old man as he nods off to sleep on his rocking chair; keeping a night watchman company in his wooden shack, accompanying a call center executive as she works late into the night with a steaming cup of coffee by her side.

Our entire working, planning, thinking, strategizing, meeting - for that one moment.

Do you know that what you hear on your radio set is actually playing 8 seconds after it plays out from the On Air studio? Jokingly once, a jock of mine had said about the On Air - if the rest of Delhi is in the present, then this studio is the future.

As I have stood there late into the night, watching the blinking lights, and feeling the emotions that seep out of that room to touch lives, hearts, moments, situations, fights, cuddles, huddles, arguments and pain; interest and boredom, aloofness and involvement - I have felt for a split second that I genuinely did stand in the future and beheld magic near enough to touch.

And I have quietly left the room, wrapped in grey-blue, wondering if any of us understood the power we held in our hands. And if we'd ever put it to the right use.

Lost and Found

We used to play
Hide and seek

And school had a wooden box
Called Lost and Found

Whenever I had to hide
I'd want to jump into that thing

But it scared me
Because there was always the fear
Of not being found

If you hide
You can be sought
And its altogether friendlier
In the parking lot

But the lost and found box
Had an attitude

It smelled of hope.

A desperate tiffin box
A forlorn pencil holder
An altogether abandoned umbrella

Each looking up ingratiatingly
At every half interested head
That peeks into the lost and found box

And what if your status changed
From lost to 'stolen'
Instead of 'found'?

Then where would you belong?

Hunting

There was a larger purpose here.

I'm sure of it;
I had kept it most carefully.

You know how it is
With these carefully kept things.

Stashed in trunks
Stored in strange places
Remembered so hard
That it guarantees forgetting.

However,
I know I'd parked it here somewhere.

A larger purpose
With a lilac view
Those rose tinted things
Fighting mildew

I even remember the paper I wrapped it in;
An old newspaper with an inspiring editorial
And the mothballs just in case...

Do purposes evaporate?

World Heart Day

Funny that September 24th should be World Heart Day. Its also Baba's birthday - a man with a very big heart, who died of a heart attack.

This is not going to be a maudlin piece about how much I miss my father and how I suffer from clockwork sentiment like so many others. Clockwork sentiment? You know, the sorts that spring up obediently and punctually on specific days. Oh, its a birthday. Sniff sob nostalgia. Yikes, its a death anniversary. Snivel, whimper, memories.

Not that those emotions are untrue. Memories do come unbidden, images appear in sharper focus. You remember excruciating details that you manage to keep at bay the rest of the year. My sympathies to clockwork sentiment, including my own.

However, like I said. This is not a piece cleverly weaving the pathos of world heart day with the death of a large hearted man who died of a heart attack. [dang, I do like that connect, don't I? Mentioned it a second time in the span of 4 paragraphs!]

This one's about developing a personality. I was 20 when my dad died. I was a confident, successful, accolade winning, teacher petted, academic achiever kind of youngster. Everything I touched seemed to turn to gold. I was the role model and the model child. Yeah yeah.

Then one day I was standing in front of my bookshelf at home, wondering which book to pluck out of the rack. As my eyes scanned the titles, they stumbled on one I'd read recently, just before baba's fatal attack. Did I like it? Was it a good book?

I remember the slow sense of realization coupled with mild horror that assailed my brain, as I processed my own thinking. I had absolutely no idea whether it was a good book or a bad one. I had no clue whether I should recommend it or trash it. Sure I'd read it. Sure I'd absorbed it too. But had I formed an opinion about it? No I hadn't. And why?

Because I had not gotten the chance to discuss it with my dad.

Once this sinking awareness set in, I got into a morbid fascination of testing it out on other things in my life which I thought I had an opinion on... books, movies, people, food, clothes. Gosh. It was a horrible excercise. Because at the ripe old age of 20, I discovered that I did not have a single opinion of my own in this world.

All my views were directly bounced off my father's opinions. Either he liked something so I liked it too. Or, he hated something, and as the rebel teenager, I began to like it. Or he loved something and in order to be different I chose to dislike it. You get the drift right? I'm not saying all my opinions were the same as my father's. What I'm talking about is even more sinister. All my opinions were a product of my father's views on the subject, coupled with my equation with him at that point of time.

Trust me, it sounds trivial now, but it was a very painful realization then. That I had absolutely no personality to call my own. No thoughts, opinions, ideas, views, concepts that were truly original. Sure, all our notions are influenced somewhere or the other by history, culture, context, peer group, family, friends and tradition, but within that we amalgate what we call a singularly personal world view. This direct richocheting off a strong personality's mind and believing it to be yours can be quite misleading and disconcerting.

I am 31 today, going on 32, and I still find myself stopping to think 'what would baba have felt about that?'. At times the exercise is an amusing one, at times frustrating. But I do hope that somewhere along the way I may have learnt to distill, process and gleam a position that is genuinely mine. A stance that may well be reflected in like-minded people, but which is not arrived at because of them.

Because I went through this quiet realization many years ago, I also test it on people I am close to. Colleagues, friends, family. I try and see, especially if I am close enough to that person, whether they are still in the 'richocheting stage' or the 'assimilative stage'.

So where are you?

The reason I ask you to think about it, is because I hope and pray that a tragedy, like the loss of a loved one, not be the spring board for examining the development of your personality. Death is a great teacher but hey, not a very pleasant one. But since that day I've often wondered - had baba not died, would I still be richocheting, and not ever grasping that I am?

Many, sadly too many people I know, are richocheting. I know this sounds hopelessly pompous and priggish, but its true. Very often, people who come across as strong willed and opinionated, actually aren't. You just have to meet their closest people - a parent, a best friend, a partner, a boss - and you realise where their world view stems from.

On the other hand, funnily enough, a lot of seemingly tentative people are assimilative. They appear unsure, hesitant, questioning. You'd think it would be the easiest thing in the world to influence their minds. But no, they are not that easily swayed because they are good listeners. They will hear you out, absorb what you say, process it and then assimilate it into their world view. Open to being agreeable, but not open to being overtly influenced.

These sort of minds are not aggressive or confrontative. Because they have no turf to defend. They are not embedded in a subconscious emotional connect that they dare not defile. For example its so much more uncomplicated to take it easy when my opinion's are attacked rather than when My=Baba's views are under threat. After all, I loved that man, I must defend him, right?

Hey its his birthday today. Birthday, not birth anniversary. Because he continues to live and glow in the recesses of my mind. And perhaps the girth of his personality does not admit defeat, but I continue to love and battle him in a way that one can only do with someone who was more than close; who was a part of oneself.

Happy birthday baba! Keep up the fight.

CALCUTTA [from the diaries]

ONE:

What she remembered of Calcutta were hot summers and pinafores. The kind of pinafores that one had to cross the mighty seas for, catch a flight from another country, catch a train from another city and finally arrive at cool houses with cement floors and loud indulgent voices.

From there the pinafores weren’t far away. A tram or a taxicab, sometimes even a rickshaw would take you to them. For her, Gariahat was not a market. It was the triumphant sound of what to Ma was a secret treasury. The coffers of all that could not be found anywhere else, even if one were to scour the entire universe. Gariahat. Home to the magical pinafores, which could not be found anywhere else in the world.

She preferred it when the pinafores got a bit old and wash worn. True they did not quite remain as crisp and as white as they first were, billowing off hangers strung high on the shopkeeper’s shack. As Ma and the shopkeeper haggled good-naturedly, the pinafores would proudly fill themselves up with the Calcutta air and swing and sway and swing and sway…

But Ma never got those pinafores down from the hangers. What a waste it seemed to her, that after pointing to them and haggling over them and making them altogether the focus of the entire transaction, Ma would make the shopkeeper pull out fresh flouncy pieces from a large cardboard box.

That’s the only time she would be consulted. Which ones did she want? The ones with the leaves and flowers? Or the ones with the carrots and apples? The ones with the orange and red threads; or the ones with the blue and green patterns? She never knew, she could never say. Choosing pinafores seemed a matter of grave and serious deliberation. After all, one had travelled the seven seas in search of these exotic things. How could she possibly decide?

Finally the purchase was made. She was the proud owner of four new ‘pennys’ as grandma would curiously call them. And Calcutta was the only place where she was allowed to play with only the pinafores on. In Delhi one had to wear a frock over them. In the other country, which you had to catch a flight to after the summer vacations were over, somehow the pinafores lost their seat of pride and glory. That’s where you needed gum boots and fur coats. That’s where it snowed. Pinafores got snowed under other clothes.

But here? Here it was different. Prickly heat powder and cousins who were always in the twilight zone of friend and stranger. Load shedding and hand fans. And the chatter over her head that never seemed to end. Pishis floated effortlessly into Mashis who got enmeshed with Nau Daa-s and Mejo daa-s and then found themselves entangled in Didis and Mamas and Kakamonis. An assortment of nicknames followed and a string of addresses chased them. She never knew very clearly who was who at the end of it all when she met them. For her, they were conversation: carried from one land to another, from telephones and dining tables to four poster beds and string chairs, and it seemed a bit strange to her that they should become real people one had to say ‘hello’ to.

Calcutta. What else did she remember of it? Bathrooms she did not like and too many sweets she had to eat. High ceilings and creaky fans and oh yes! Bars at the window. Curtains at the window. She somehow loved both the bars and the curtains. They seemed to make the windows come to life. Give them the respect that sleek sheets of glass and Venetian blinds did not offer them. The windows in Calcutta, she was sure, were happier off, with their creaky wooden doors – imagine windows with their own little doors! Blue or green painted doors, two per window, opening out onto the street, with little wooden blocks at the corners that prevented them from banging shut if the wind got into them. And to cap it all, every window had a sill low enough and wide enough for her to sit on. Yes, she liked the Calcutta windows.

From there the world seemed altogether a friendly place. Everyone spoke the language that was greeted as a strange tongue anywhere else. What was a secret cipher in the rest of the world was the common code here. And so, subliminally, without knowing when or why, the brief and sporadic trips to Calcutta notwithstanding, inside her head, Calcutta was home.

TWO:

The Mumbai sky is clouding over again. Perhaps it will rain. I hope it does. A short piece of blue sky framed by some fluttering clothes on a clothesline suddenly reminds me of Calcutta. Perhaps it’s the time of the evening. I’ve never been very fond of the dusk. Ever since I was a child, the dusk has made my heart heavy. She always seems astray, like she’s lost her way between the day and the night. And her forlorn silence makes me sad.

Or maybe it’s just the grills at the window that remind me of Calcutta. Or, the sound of children shouting, as the play in the compound 4 floors below. Some sound, sight, texture of childhood returns. I am almost scared. And it still hasn’t begun to rain.

As a child I used to be mostly silent. Mostly bewildered. Mostly absorbing. Sometimes, I think, one never outgrows one’s childhood. I am still mostly all that inside.

Yesterday Mumbai came to a grinding halt. A bus explosion at Ghatkopar, two killed, 28 injured, 4 critically. Frantic calls from home. Yes Ma I’m ok, no Ma I was nowhere near Ghatkopar, yes yes, I never travel by bus anyway.

And then Balasaheb swung into action. And Mumbai stopped. Stopped without question, to question. Stopped without protest, to protest. The pictures in today’s papers are ludicrous. Grinning women in Shiv Sena uniform, stopping trains like it’s a festival. Rail Roko at Thane Station could well vie with Ganesh chaturthi in terms of exultation. Not to be outdone, the Muslim community quickly takes out a protest march condemning the blast. Or maybe they’re just plain simple scared. Nobody wants to give Mani Ratnam a chance to make a sequel.

It’s a scarred world that we live in. But the square blue patch of sky I can see from the bed reveals none of that. Where would you be right now? Now that you have told her about me, our 3-day fantasy has begun to grow roots inside my head. Too much beer, too much Maugham and three heady, sense-sloshed nights. Nights that were meant to fly away in the wind like a careless ribbon. Nights that are now growing tentacles and acquiring a geography.

Somehow your being in Calcutta has sent me into a time spin. That city is not meant to be the present. It’s supposed to be the past. Soft, shadowy patterns under ceiling fans. Calcutta is a fathered world, and the first few days of my first adult romance. Now that neither Baba is alive nor that romance, your bringing Calcutta to life seems silly.

The sun sets completely. I heave a sigh of relief. This is good old uncomplicated night. Always in black, always the same, no matter which window you look at it from. This is not the bewildered, identity-crisis-ridden half pink, sometimes mauve, suddenly purple occasionally orange, streaked with red flushed with vermilion splashed with amber stroked with azure, sheeted with grey riot that the dusk can be. Now I feel safe.

The Kumbh Mela at Nashik started yesterday. Like most everything reported in the papers, controversy surrounded it. Much was made of Akharas and boycotts, central legislations and temple trusts. But today, the Times of India reported “Splendour, shlokas and sniffer dogs kicked off the Kumbh Mela here on Wednesday with prayers for world peace.” And in the meanwhile, J M Lyngdoh won the Magsaysay for his “convincing validation of free and fair elections as the foundation and best hope of secular democracy in India”.

Ours is a robust country for sure. Validated by the square piece of blue sky that has turned an obedient black now. I wonder if you will call tonight. There’s the bud of terror growing right there… yes, I can feel it, in the centre of my chest. I know it so well. I know I will water and nurture it till that all-too-familiar fear grips me again… how many times, just how many times have I grown this plant. A fear that blinds and binds me, makes me alternately cling and run… you’ll hear too much of me, you won’t hear from me at all, there will be deluge and drought, agony and ecstasy, pain and exuberance… you don’t know the pattern perhaps, but I do. The next few months will be an emotional roller coaster for us, before this ubiquitous ‘us’ rises and rises high, high in the air in a stream of glorious flame, spins and turns and showers multi coloured stars and finally explodes in a rain of glowing streaks. Oh I know this one so well. And finally when we drop to the ground, spent and burnt, our fireworks but a shimmer of a memory, that square patch of blue sky will still be square, and still be blue.


THREE:

She never knew quite when she fell in love with Durga Puja. Everything was wrong with it. It was noise and it was crowds and it was sweat and it was new clothes that were always uncomfortable because they were always the wrong fabric for the wrong season because they were always made keeping the winters in mind.

But when it came to Durga Puja, there simply was no choice. One simply had to be excited. One simply had to look forward to it. At the end of four days skin rash, shoe bite and upset stomach, you just nursed yourself back to the rest of the year and regretted that Pujo was over.

Amidst the sodden banana leaves and swollen conch shells, the golden goddess shone down. It was her favourite pastime to establish a secret-connect with the idol, even as the multitudes prayed and the cymbals crashed and the drums beat. She was sure that when she looked into those deep black lustrous eyes, they shone and sparkled just for her.

The smell of Sheuli flowers always told her that Pujo is near. It was heady, the anticipation. A four-day sabbatical from life as she knew it. A heightening of senses, a loosening, dislodging of pain.

Crisp cotton saris and blouses with plunging backs. Dark kohl to line the eyes. The excitement was akin to a wedding and yet different. And even now, after all these years, the first glimpse of the goddess was still heart stilling. Overwhelming. Pain rattling. Something about unfinished chapters and completion of circles. That idol was the centre and the reference point and a quick scan of the year gone by. When She arrived, she felt old.


FOUR:

I light a cigarette. The entire flame of the matchstick gets absorbed by the nicotine tip. I love it when that happens. Flame absorption. How did Ayn Rand describe a cigarette? ‘Controlled fire at the fingertips’. I loved that.

I must return to Delhi soon. It’s most truant; this weeklong leave, soaking in the music and the poetry, humming to the guitar and watching patches of square blue skies. Very wasted.

There was another blast after the Ghatkopar one. This time at a pyrotechnic technician’s residence in a slum cluster in Jogeshwari. Alternately dubbed as an accident and as sabotage by the media and the politicians. Apparently Mumbai is on the edge; not that I can tell.

I am on the edge for sure. I stare at my phone and allow the smoke to curl in vague patterns around my fingers. The centre of my heart is lead. Dark grey and heavy. I’m sure if I fell into the sea right now I’d drown quicker. The waves we saw breaking at the Gateway of India – I could have honestly drowned in them. It would have been very Daphne Du Maurier-esque.

You’re not with me today. Across the miles I feel you peeling off like Velcro. Something is tearing at the fragile fabric of an ephemeral world. Something is reclaiming you like sea land.

The terror is growing. Its gnawing at my insides and the sky is a sheet of grey metal. A crow is beating its wings against it. I’m sure it’ll break something. The sky is unyielding today.

The Maharaja of Marine Plaza

5 year old Veer was not enjoying the game anymore. He was finding it difficult to keep his lips from pouting, and in spite of the rain, it was becoming increasingly impossible to fake the tears as rain drops. Any minute that impish brat Rani would squeal out - "Veeru is crying!" and they'd start their blasted little dance around him, "Veeru kitna chhota hai, veeru kitna rota, veeru vada pao khane ka, nadaa kholke dikhaane ka".

Hate that Rani. She really thought she was the queen of the chawl or something. Beastly. It was all her fault. And there she was, at it again...

"What what whaaaaat? Your baba is what???"

Veer braced himself, stood straight to his full height - all 3.5 feet of him, and said with as much conviction as the last 5 times, albeit a bit droopy with tears. "My Baba is a King".

The kids exploded. Some rolled in the mud with laughter, others hugged each other and guffawed till the tears ran from their eyes. The women of the chawl looked up from their fish baskets and smiled. The grime grinned from the dark cement. The stench smirked.

Veer ran home. Hating everybody.

Aai was sitting on her haunches in her faded green work sari, sunning shrimps. She looked up warily from her basket as Veeru burst into the sun streaked enclosure outside their kholi. "Go slow you crazy fool. If you slide on the fish don't come crying to me, crybaby".

It was too much for Veer. Aai too? He started scouring the chawl for Baba. There he was, smoking his last beedi before getting on for work. They looked funny together, Aai and her Pathan husband. When Shera had come to Mumbai to escape the war in Afghanistan, nobody had expected sweet little Jyoti bai to fall head over heels in love with him. Or for that matter, the exotic Pathan to give her a second glance. But obviously something happened, and before 6 months were up, Jyoti bai's tummy started swelling.

Of course Shera married her. And of course everything was normal at the chawl after that. But somehow, Veer had become the product of some unspoken contempt in the neighbourhood. Veer was too young to understand why Aai kept her distance from the other fisher folk, and why baba looked so different from the others. Nor could he understand the mild ridicule he always felt sting at the back of his neck. And now that he had that one chance to be first among equals, Baba was not willing to come out into the open and tell everyone the truth.

The problem was this silly promise Baba had taken from him. Why couldn't he just tell everyone else that he was a maharaja, and stayed in the chawl only as a disguise? But Veer figured, he couldn't. The disguise wouldn't work would it, if everyone knew? And enemies were everywhere. Baba would've kept it a secret even from Veer except for that resplendent gown and turban Veer spotted one day in the trunk. So soft, so silky, so unbelievably rich. Veer had just put the turban on his own head, which had of course promptly swallowed half his face, when Baba walked in and grinned at his predicament.

Picking him up in his arms Baba had told him the most incredible story. About palaces and queens, chandeliers and palanquins; about intrigue and war, and secret tunnels and escape hatches. Breathless, Veer had heard him out - how his own Baba was actually the emperor of a vast kingdom, and was in hiding right now. And how Veer must swear to secrecy, otherwise the entire chawl's life would be compromised. Veer was allowed to occassionally peep into the trunk and stroke the turban, but not much else. In excitement and thrill, little Veeru had made his breathless promise to Baba. Never ever to speak a word....

But to see Aai sitting in that dirty green sari, when SHE was the real rani, not that snot nosed brat outside. And baba, in his torn bandi, smoking a beedi when hukkas could be laid out for him on satin cushions. Veer couldn't keep his word. He simply couldn't.

Not that he minded life in the chawl; it was the only one he'd ever know. But surely Aai and Baba missed their days in the palace? Could he do nothing about it? He was small, but he was smart. The other day when Pappan's kite got stuck on the tree it was Veer who'd retrieved it without damaging. And even Rani, who was 2 years older, and a smartass, came to him with her problems in english. Veer had the best grasp on english in the entire chawl. Grown ups included.

Veer decided something had to be done. Kallu was the only solution. But Kallu was mean. He was a bully and always laughed at everything the kids said, just because he was 13. Kallu behaved like he knew everything better, although Veer had seen the tea stall owner - who employed Kallu - hurl abuses and humiliate him in public. But Kallu continued to behave like the dada. And the kids had no choice because there was no one else old enough to give adult advice and young enough to be one of the group in the entire chawl.

The rest of the teenagers had either run away, or were in some strange homes, or had died. So Kallu it had to be.

Veer went looking. Kallu was not at the tea stall, but his wire tea tray was missing too. Which meant he'd gone on an office delivery. Which meant he'd not return without a smoke. Which meant Veer could very easily find him behind the Colaba fish market with those awful boys.

By the time Veer managed to slip and slide over the slime of decaying fish and reach the empty shack at the back, Kallu was pleasantly stoned. Being the youngest of the dubious clan of ‘beedis’ as they called themselves, Kallu was the least bothered about cops, raids and beatings. As a result, he enjoyed his smoke most leisurely. When Veer huffed his way to him he found Kallu alone, grinning like an idiot.

“Vee vee!” Kallu belched. “Kya re?”

Veer started without preamble. “Kallu, I need help”. Kallu looked quizzical. Veer almost never approached him and if he did, it was with much feet shuffling reluctance. This forthright open faced request was new.

“Kya be” said Kallu again, narrowing his eyes.

“My Baba is a king. And nobody believes me.”

Kallu sprayed out ganja smoked spit contemptuously on the dirt floor, "call the king to come and clean this!" he smirked. Veer waited patiently. He was getting used to this.

When Kallu's remark did not evince the sort of distressed tear burst reaction he was hoping for, in order to get the pest of his back, he shuffled reluctantly out of the shack.

"Allright. I'll help you. But you've got to convince ME first. I don't think your baba is a king. I think he's a terrorist. A runaway. A refugee. A bomber. If you can prove to me that that red bearded weirdo is a king, I'll take care of the kids in the chawl. They'll all be bowing and courtesying to him from tomorrow. Deal?"

Typical hateful Kallu swagger. Even when he was interested in doing something, he managed to make the other person feel like he was doing him a favour. And this one was an out an out favour, so it was pretty certain that by the time the entire deal was over, Veer was meant to be feeling dizzy with gratitude.

Veer wished he could've smacked Kallu across the head like he'd seen the tea stall owner do. He swallowed his pint sized pride and agreed. "Deal".

"Ok so how do you know your baba is a king? Where is his palace? Who are his subjects? Why does he live in the chawl? Where does he hide his crown? Why are his kinsmen not looking for him? India doesn't have kings and queens and neither does Afghanistan. So where did he rule?"

The line of questionning was getting a bit too complicated even for clever little Veer. He looked up, a puzzled frown creasing his forehead. "But his palace is right here," he clarified. "That's where he goes every evening. Why do you think he stays at the chawl by day and goes out by night? So that nobody spots him. And I've seen his crown - well, its not really a crown because it doesn't have those jagged edges. But its silky and red. And he has a gown that goes with it. Haven't you seen him leave the chawl with that packet? That's what it contains. He goes to his palace quietly and talks to his courtiers and tells them how to run the kingdom. Then he comes and hides in the morning so that the enemies don't spot him. His kingdom is this entire area. All of Colaba and Cuffe Parade and Marine Drive..." Veer prattled on, but Kallu was beyond listening.

Kallu's expression was reflecting more and more incredulity. He was beyond laughing as well; he was genuinely non plussed now. Veer sounded so convinced. And it WAS true that Shera only left at night. With a packet under his arms. And returned in the morning with the same packet.

Kallu was beginning to feel uneasy. Obviously Veer had no clue what he was talking about. All this king nonsense was total rubbish. But these were unsure times. An Afghan in the chawl, leaving each night... where did he go? What did he do? How did he make a living? How come none of them had ever asked? That silly Pandu did come for rounds every week, but the lesser said of these Mumbai cops, the better. For god's sake, they had not even managed to nab the 'beedi' gang with ganja yet. And they'd catch a terrorist. Right.

"Come lets go". Kallu had taken a decision. On the pretext of Veer, he'd follow Shera tonight. If Shera spotted them, he had Veer as a shield. Surely even a terrorist would not hurt his own child. And then Kallu would be a hero. The papers would talk of his bravery. Vilasrao would throw a party in his honour. There he'd meet Ritesh and the other stars. Shah Rukh Khan would come and shake his hand. Maybe Priyanka would give him a kiss on the cheek like she'd given that loser Hrithik in that junk film....

They waited way past sundown. The tea stall owner hired another boy and swore under his breath that he'd give Kallu the beating of a lifetime when he came to collect his pay. Aai stopped wondering where Veer was and decided it was futile to worry, the boy would be fine. Rani trooped around the chawl wanting to tease Veeru a bit more and finally fell asleep sulkily in her mother's lap.

Veer and Kallu hid, although there was absolutely no need to hide. But they had already gotten under the skin of their sleuthing roles, and hiding and skulking around was integral to that.

Finally around 8p.m., after a frugal dinner, Shera left the chawl with his customary packet. The Afghan had long legs and walked briskly and the two kids were trying not to get noticed. So they kept losing him, and by the time they reached the long Marine Drive stretch there was so much traffic and so many headlights that Veer totally lost his bearing. Afraid that the pest would get hit by an oncoming car and spoil the entire plan, Kallu finally hoisted him up on to his shoulders and gave chase. The gentle jog and the split point lights splintering into his eyes slowly hypnotised Veeru into semi slumber. And he missed keeping his eyes on his father's rapidly receding figure.

Suddenly Shera dashed into a maze of dark alleys curving like arteries behind the main stretch of the sea-facing boulevard. Kallu couldn't keep track of where the Afghan went. He wasn't about to give up now so he hailed a taxi. He had mastered the art of dodging taxi fares when he'd reached his destination. The driver looked at him disgustedly. He could spot a runner from a mile and had little hope of a decent fare, but he took the risk anyway. There had been no business since morning and this might just buy dinner.

"Chalo" Kallu commanded imperiously. "Kidhar" came back the bored but valid drawl. Veer giggled. He loved it when someone, anyone, took Kallu's trip. Taken aback and suddenly feeling just 13, Kallu stammered "Marine Drive". The driver raised his eyebrows and shrugged, as if to say "and where do you think we already are?", but then he shifted gear and the taxi was off on the long sea winding stretch of a road.

"What are we doing?" Veer quizzed. "Where's baba? Aren't we going to look for his palace? I thought you said we were following him? Where did he go?" Awake now as much as he had been asleep a minute ago, the way only 5 year olds can be, Veer kept tugging at Kallu's arm and asking questions.

Kallu stopped paying attention. He was scanning the roads wondering what he would do now. The life and pulse of Marine Drive were also sucking him into their glamour and he was finding it difficult to stay focused on his current task. What swank cars, what amazing buildings, what stylishly turned out people. They all looked like film stars. The warm yellow lights glowed inside the new cafes that dotted the promenade and smiling faces suffused in aromatic fumes twinkled at their wide windows. Advertisement panels brought the underside of the over bridges to life, selling everything from insurance to toothpaste, with wide mouthed models flashing sparkling smiles in neon. Hotel after hotel with liveried guards and elegant doormen seemed to welcome, yet with a hint of a dare...

Exotic names. Intercontinental... The Sea Princess... Marine Plaza.... Kallu jerked up from his half recline and craned his neck out of the taxi window. At the door of Hotel Marine Plaza stood a tall liveried guard with a trim red beard. His gown was elegantly long and creamy and on his head was a red silk turban. As the taxi slowed in the snaking traffic, the Afghan's eyes locked with Kallu's, even as he bent to retrieve a middle aged lady's leather suitcase. A stricken expression hit Shera's face as he looked beyond Kallu into the taxi and noticed Veer, looking in the opposite direction at the sea....

Kallu felt the world slow down. A turban, a gown, a night shift, a proud Afghan opening a glass door to a boy in rich threads who didn't look a day over 17. Followed by a middle aged paunchy man, who tossed his car keys into Shera's hands... And Veer's head was turning. Slowly as the taxi revved up again, Kallu realised Veer's head was turning because of the expression of panic on Shera's face... The light at the crossing twinkled to a tantalising yellow before the liberating green... Shera lifted his hand to half cover his face but a guest at the Marine Plaza was talking to him, asking for a car announcement and Shera had to nod and smile...

"Veer look there" Kallu yelled, almost yanking Veer's head back to face towards the sea. See how... how lovely the sea looks at night... I'm sure your baba's palace must be beyond those twinkling lights there... its called the queen's necklace... I've heard that there is a lovely palace beyond the sea there... Now I get it, your father rules from there... why could you not be clear earlier... that's why we lost him, he travels by sea, maybe even underwater, to his castle..." Kallu was blabbering, but his fingers had an almost vice like grip on Veer's neck, willing it not to turn, willing the taxi to move, willing, willing the darkness to swallow one proud Afghan who was not a king...

The next day Veer walked triumphantly into the playing area, his hands confidently tucked into Kallu's grasp. "Kallu has something to tell you all" he began....

Angry at Anger

What is the chemical composition of anger? Where is its black bleak fountainhead? Is loneliness its younger cousin? Is sadness its secret partner? Is pain its alter ego?

Delhi has come to a grinding halt today. There are protests. And burning. And stoning. There is anger. Palpable in the giant traffic crawl like an endless centipede oozing itself out onto this city's streets. Those of us cocooned in our eyries, those of us who managed to avoid the jam - literally or symbolically, don't quite know whether to feel thankful, or guilty.

Like a cremation, we watch human goodness burn. Human faith smolder. Human contact give way to the trajectory of a stone. And there is no knowing where the stone will land.

Children are stuck in school buses on clogged roads today. Parents can't get to them. Stripped homes waiting for whitewash to kiss their walls stand barren and exposed. There is no whitewash to be bought and the painters have gone home - or atleast tried to go home.

Our walls are bare and the 'marammat' shows through. Our children are stuck and we are waiting to be reborn to them. Our roads are choked and our destination is getting lonely.

Our people are angry. And they are not our anymore.

Somebody tried to seal somebody's shop. Somebody broke the law and as a result, somebody else is keen to take his livlihood away from him.

You know what amazes me, between the hand and the stone, the head and the throw?

The fact that if Mr. Gupta has thrown the stone because his shop is being sealed, and it is Mr. Aggarwal from MCD who signed on that sealing document - then it is but a matter of a series of coincidences and accidents that led to this moment.

If Mr. Gupta's father had encouraged him to take up a government job, if Mr. Aggarwal had had more enterprise and opportunities, it could've been Mr. Aggarwal's shop and Mr. Gupta's signature.

Both in Delhi. Both probably living in similar localities. One slightly better off than the other.

Maybe they went to the same school.

At a time when they did not get caught in snarling centipedes of tar with empty tiffin boxes.

Who's gonna bring the children home?

Full Toss

Coffee stains
On unwashed cups
Love hangover
In soft soap suds

Wash off the grime
Rinse out the rain

Water slides in melamine bites

Ring out a home again.

The party ends
The cups remain

The carom board
In boric stains.

Powdered dreams
And laboured loss
Walk towards or away
Hey. Lets toss.

Talent

As the years have unfolded, I've realised what a fundamental fallacy we are all victims of. History and literature have taught us to believe that love is an emotion. Whereas in reality, it is a talent, not an emotion. The moment you view love as a talent, your perspective changes hugely. And different people's relationship with love can be viewed in a far more empathetic, generous light.

Compare it to singing. Some are natural singers, some labour at it and excel, some take their talent for granted and let it atrophy. Some try their damndest best and achieve but a modicum of success. And some are just tone deaf. They simply cannot sing, try as they might. Most importantly, they may not even wish to try.

Do we resent these people for their varying singing abilities? Or do we take it as a given? Some can sing, some can try, and some simply can't.

Some can love, some can not, and some do not.

Its as basic as that. Loving does not come easy to everyone. It is a skill not a feeling; a talent not an emotion.

Attraction, affection, desire are emotions. The art of loving is the expression of those emotions. Everyone can feel their heart swell at the sight of a gorgeous sunset over the sea - thats feeling. Not everyone can pick up a paint brush and re create it on canvas - thats talent.

The Me I Wish to Be

The me I wish to be.

The me I wish to be, I was
But just for a bit.

It was fun, it always is
Albeit short,
It's still a lark.

Being the me I wish to be.

Fleetingly in a bus,
On an ocassional sunset.

Sometimes in the rain
Very often in the pain.

In a stranger's eyes
In the unwise of wise

In the guise of a friend
A lover on the mend.

Once in a while
I get to be
The me I wish to be.

And its always fun
And sometimes raw
Bit sour on the tongue
Bit soft on the paw

The me I wish to be
Invariably outshines
Me.