Chiffonesque

You think you know some place and then someone who's never been there before will show you something new and unexpected - like a beach in Alaska. I met a friend at Mocha at midnight. He was late because he'd spent a toad's infinity in the gym. He'd done something called a benchpress, which strangely enough is a maneuver where you do not not press a bench; several sets of crunches, which again is a cruel term to call something you do to your abdomen; several miles on the treadmill, etc. etc. All this, I was told, after he'd sprinted on the beach. Tardiness was therefore excusable. 'And what did you do?', he asked me in his haloed healthy glow. 'I reached for the remote', I snapped. It was his first time in Mocha. He looked through the menu and turned up his nose (a very foreboding gesture if done in an eatery or near boss.) Then he told me what most men tell me in restaurants, 'You order for me.' But before I could, he qualified his request - ...

The other day I met someone who had worked in Brazil for a couple of years. When I asked her what that was like, she said that the best part of living in Brazil was getting to speak Brazilian Portuguese. She told me that she'd never enjoyed speaking any other language as much. She loved the way it rolled off her tongue, the way the words gave a name to her most delicate feelings, the way it allowed her to articulate so many different things. " I always thought I spoke the truth much more when I spoke Portuguese." Personally, I don't know any language well enough to be on the same page as my friend. My literary expression is still limited by a numbness; by a routine inarticulate verbosity. And this is exactly why I've always been fascinated by how people in different islands of life tell their stories. And this is how I've become so enamored by this fickle and difficult island, 'Fashion'. But it wasn't always like this. I went to a school where homo...

Since everything around me is currently behaving like a wet, temparemental cat, I am stewing in righteous indignation. I cannot edit my profile to my satisfaction. Anyway, what can be done using a mere 'field', I shall do by putting forth a 'post.' Self-righteous indignation doth brings forth self-aggrandisement. My email address (that did not get included in my profile) is: raut_mukta@hotmail.com And on the subject of contrariness, watch Viruddh. Watch Amitabh and oh so definitely watch Sharmila Tagore. Sunjay Dutt you definitely won't miss but pay close attention in any case. Welcome, Mahesh Manjrekar - I most definitely have missed you since Astitva. And yes, if you like the movie, or are indifferent to it, use the email in this post. Actually, the comments section does just fine... and I'll stop with the temperamental feline mewing right now.

Lesson learnt in convent school: You are one of many. That's why the uniform. Lesson learnt in avant-garde college: You are unique....just like everyone else. I have since then, tried to unlearn these lessons. I have since then tried to believe that I am indeed distinctive. But since then I've discovered a macabre truth - I'm worse than a non-distinct entity...I am a predictable one. I love trying new restaurants and going for 'different' films and plays, and keep recommending them to all and sundry ('all' being friends who don't listen to me anymore; 'sundry' being friends who will soon be part of the first group). But I think I stopped doing the new wine and dine section since I visited this coffee place called 'Mocha'. Mocha has a Moroccan theme with huge uncomfortable chairs and heavy tables and red drapes and dim-lights and cheesy foods and creamy, chocolatey desserts, and yes...coffee. I don't like chocolates or cream or cheese ...

Nice things happen when you're caught in the rain without an umbrella...as I just found out. I am currently on a break from work, but I came into office today because I had some stuff to wrap up and..okay, there's no getting away from it, I was missing my swivelling chair a little bit. Anyway, today being Friday - the day social life opens up like a Venus flytrap, I had gone to the bank to withdraw money. That's when the rains came down swift and hard and I got stranded under the canopy of a shoe-shop near the bank. There were several others stranded there. Many of them were from office who, like me, thought carrying raingear was not really important- office being so close and all. We'd just dash off, get work done, and dash back. As it turns out, slippery tiles and rain that falls like tap water is not so good for dashing. As I contemplated my many options of either staying put and dry or dashing and getting wet and injured, someone tugged my hair from behind. I turned...

So this is what it feels like. This numbness of insomnia. My eyes feel dried up and parched. They burn. I don't blink, thinking that maybe sleep will come into my empty, open eyes and get lodged in there like a little pebble. My head feels a little heavy but there's no nausea. I thought there would be. But my stomach feels settled and strong and I do get hungry. But it's the thinking that has been the casualty. It's fraying like lime in water. I need to read a page several times before I understand what it means. These are pages I myself have written. These are pages I have skimmed over several times in a span of 15 minutes and understood. Words - these are words. I could understand words and sentences and language. They were the bylanes I could travel at night with only my blinking mobile for light. Now, trying to understand something is like trying to hit a moving target. It is difficult. I also feel slow. A drugged panther. Virile without vigor. And then there is the...

Was at a club last nite. There was a glass partition that separated the dance floor from the lounge area. Sat nursing a drink and a wistful longing for sleep in the sitters section (not baby sitters, by the way, though it may be a good idea considering how young the patrons are getting nowadays - just the area where people sit and shrug their shoulders rhythymically and tap their feet.) My pals had travelled to the other side of the Looking Glass to shake a leg (there were four legs in all actually, although given the space crunch, i guess only two got shaken.) I saw a group of really young kids dancing to the song 'Baby Come Back.' Girls in sparkly strappy tops and guys in glossy Tuscan Verve shirts jumping up and down happily. Just that - jumping up and down, laughing uproariously, and singing aloud. You can't help but grin. Such fun! Such youth! That age when dance isn't about rhythm or grace or movement or style or 'knowing the steps'. It's solely and wh...

I am now tired. I am also fed up. I am irritated and grouchy and snappy and scowling. People are behaving unreasonably. They are coming in loud, kitschy droves to restaurants that can only seat half of them. ‘Why don’t you join some tables?’, they ask in grating high-pitched voices. If the hotel intended to join every table in the room, it would have, gung-head! Go and book the terrace if you want to entertain the population of Homer Simpsons you share your sad office space with. There are others too. You go up to someone. You tap them on the back. They turn, they look, and then nod and say, ‘Tell me.’ Yeah! Thanks for the permission, sweetheart. I just wanted to flash my badge and scoot. But now that you’ve mouthed those magic words, I will indeedy ‘tell you.’ And yes, ‘anywayz’ IS NOT a word. It’s a sloppy, lazy emblem of the vacuously inarticulate. Then there are those artsy-fartsy (more fartsy) women who dress up in Fab-India uniforms. So, same fish-block print kurtas; same onion-...

That place that is dark and filled with light That snow that is wet and red with fright The bag that is slashed The gut that has burst The middle that was last The second that was first The burn that is angry The wound that is dried The music that is deaf The corpse that has cried The glass that is burnt The spill that is spread The cloth that is jagged The joy that is dread The place that is light The level that is steep The cave that is bloody The eyes with no sleep. My tenth day without slumber.

Nowadays, given my cranky insomnia (there used to be a time I thought this infernal thing was stylish), I dread the one and half hour commute to office. I am usually seated next to people with bony elbows who like to do the crossword, dangling their limbs this way and that, or those who pray. I know the latter is a good thing and all….but I don’t trust people who shut their eyes, do some astral gliding into another plane, and have a one on one with Him. It scares me. Today, I was in a bus that was driven (and I use the term loosely) by a guy who got his license before he learnt the function of brakes. He would slow down at every stop for people to get in and then slow down again for people to get out. If a person waited for the bus to stop before getting down, the driver would snap sharply at the jelly-spined dodos. The dodos would get scared and jump off in fright. (That, I believe is how the birds got extinct in the first place.) I think the brusqueness was a carefully devised strate...

It was Niharika's birthday. Anumita, Chandrika, and I get into a busy train. Chandrika finds a seat and wedges herself in it. Anumita and I stand near the door. It's better to feel like a sardine in a crowded fish tank than a dead one in a can. A tells me these incredible stories of her early years in Mumbai. We find that I'd applied to the office where she was working many years ago. Big city but small world, I think to myself. We reach V.T. and catch a cab to Marine Drive. On the way, A & I point and shriek at those quaint places in 'town' that you visit when you're either studying or underpaid. We gasp at a pretty Japanese rock garden in the middle of a road. They've even styled a gnarled tree-trunk to look like a magic lamp. Chandrika, through it all, wonders what the big deal is. Anumita, Chandrika, and I are walking towards Niharika's building. Mumbai's skyline looks all grey, opaque, and misty. The lights have just started coming on. Our h...

Ah! Comforting, slow tedium! I wish I could be in a morning room somewhere arranging white roses in a lilac bowl. Or shopping for cigar clippers in an antique store, running my finger tips on Afghani carvings. Or washing perfectly round plums in tepid tap water. But no complaints here. I quite like where I am now and what I'm doing. My mind drifts between thousand pinpricks of imagination and I write with poise. In fact, if I had formidable talent and a supportive husband, I could, at this moment, write like Virginia Woolfe. (I like to spell Woolfe with an 'e' - my signature for her.) I was surfing for material on privacy and demolition for a storyboard that I have to script and I chanced upon this blog that talked of both. Of course, both were discussed in contexts very different from what I was looking for, but made an interesting read nevertheless. This blog, like most others, was peppered with several links and I went clicking on one after the other. Following my sweet ...

All my company needs is a carrot-topped businessman with a baby pout- and we have ‘The Apprentice’ drama on our hands. We have these two teams who don’t see eye to eye (unless it’s a cruel twist of fate)– the techies and the mangies. The techies are people who wear porridge colored shirts and black trousers. (We don’t have women in that department in our company.) They do not make eye-contact with anyone who is not a techie. Techies deal with computer systems, coding, outages, and anything that can be acronymized – VPN, FTP, SPC, ETC. They regard women as that section of ‘non-techies’ who cause problems to VPN, FTP, SPC, ETC. Women do not have it in them to fight viruses, they have no innate appreciation for hackers, and women writers – ahem! Techies believe that God in all His wisdom must have created that life form whose computer always hangs when they download a Wordsworth poem. (By the way, they scratch their well-oiled heads – what man writes about daffodils?) The mangies are the ...

It’s not true that the opposite of what makes you sad will make you happy. Planet M Powai has a better book collection than Crossword Powai. Anybody who has introduced you to a writer you love, has introduced you to your soul mate. To err is human – thank God for that. A beautiful poem feels like home. Such has been love, ever since time began; ambrosia to the Gods, hemlock to man. If a person keeps insisting on something more than 4 times, the opposite is true. The most important truth you will hear from one who loves you is – I miss you. The most important truth you will hear from an adversary is – You are right. It is possible for expensive things to be priceless. There is no way you can get a life – so one must stop telling others to do that. The color of tea escaping from tea leaves into milk is beautiful. Beauty is a cliché. A cliché is a powerful truth that is only accepted and not understood. If it isn’t a truth, it’s a lie and it’s not cliché. A backward glance, a second chanc...

I have a friend. (It’s my blog’s equivalent of ‘once upon a time.’) He’s a nice but strange fella. In response to my request to introduce me to his ‘interesting’ male friends, he introduces me to the girl he is dating. We meet at a coffee house late at nite. He introduces us and falls asleep. Would have been awkward but I really liked Date girl. She is pretty with delicate hands, sips tea, and can tell stories. Here’s a cute one she told me about one of her pals (who, please note, does not fall asleep after perfunctory introductions.) Pal has a pet dog he is very fond of. (It’s in keeping with the human tradition of being fond of the pets you have and not going off to Snoozyland after introducing strangers.) So, he plays with his pet – grabs him by the ear, pulls its cheeks (I’m sorry – I haven’t had a pet so I don’t know how else to describe it), scratches its chin, gives it a backrub, etc. etc. Then one day, he goes to visit a friend who’s just had a baby. The friend gingerly puts th...

I have two friends who are 'seeing' each other. They are seeing what it means to be together, to sit and talk for hours, to walk together and be silent, to introduce each other to friends, to go on picnics by themselves, or to crash at each other's homes. They are checking out how much they can tolerate each other - with affection or indifference; or whether they can tolerate each other at all. I'll call my girl pal X and guy pal, Y. (after the chromosomes - cliched but clever..and also alliterative.) Y calls up to fix a dinner date. X ignores the calls because she doesn't feel like talking to him. He calls thrice, messages 5 times, mails twice, and then gives up. Goes for movie with roomie and has beer. X asks Y if he is free the week-end. Y says he is busy with his stunning female friend who has just come into town for a seminar. It's been a while since they met after college so they'd like to be by themselves. Y is sure X 'will understand.' Y spen...

I have a ceramic mug. It’s moss green with dark brown lines smudged on it so that it looks like the bark of a tree. I don’t usually use it but today I decided to. Mood. I got some hot water and went to the break room for a tea bag. And I don’t think I’ll ever live to say this again – the break room was empty. There were no people and there was no noise. The bean bags lay squished in one corner. It was too delicious a moment to pass up. I have this gift of instant disregard that I used now to ignore my busy day ahead. I sat on one of the bean bags, clasping my warm cup of tea like a precious pearl and looked out the window. The sights were nothing spectacular, just as unheard symphonies are. There was a huge froth of cloud that had a hole in the center – as if a straw had been dipped into it and then removed. An eagle flew in perfect poise within this spot, an unknown picture in a celestial frame. The steam from my cup whimsically made spidery webs before it trailed away somewhere. It w...

There’s an apologue about sucking up. It’s called ‘The Emperor’s New Clothes.’ The story is about this emperor who is duped into wearing ‘invisible’ clothes and going out before his subjects. The subjects, of course, don’t want to offend the emperor, so they ‘ ooh ’ and ‘ aah ’ about the clothes the emperor is wearing; until a child yells out ‘The Emperor’s naked! He isn’t wearing anything!’ I often think about that story when I think about the politic rhetoric or when I read a best seller or when I watch an award-winning film. But sometimes I think about this when I watch people’s reactions in movie halls. I’d gone to see Mr. And Mrs. Smith. Why? Angelina Jolie and Brad Pitt. I sat through the movie? Why? I’m a movie buff and Angelina Jolie. I hated the film. Why? Slow (fossils were regenerating at the pace of this flick), and Brad Pitt. So there you have it – a film that has nothing to say, takes a long time to say it, and has an inarticulate but cute Archie Andrews as one of the spo...

I’ve been to several smoky clubs and sun-kissed spas and garishly lit cafes and somber soirees and loud parties. I’ve been around and I’ve seen plenty. And here is my observation: Sexy people do not smile. Sure, they give a lopsided grin or a lazy smirk. Their hooded eyes may show a glimmer of amusement… but they do not smile. It’s not that they are distant or cold, but you wouldn’t think of approaching them unless you are ‘prepared.’ You know, it’s like stepping out on the cobbled streets of Vienna. You need your coat and your scarf. They are not like the ‘smiling people’ – they’re not like Goa – where shorts and Ts are all you need to go claim the sun. So, this is what I decided to do when I was tired of being ‘sweet’ or ‘cute’. This was my game plan for being sexy: I decided not to smile. But turns out, it’s not as easy as you think. Smiling can be an affliction. (Yes, it’s also a ‘sweet’ thing to do – don’t I know it?) Smiling can be a hopeless reflex. It can be an involuntary musc...