Chiffonesque

I left home early to come to office. It had started raining and the morning sounds of my neighborhood shimmered with the rhythm of the rain. I walked up the small lane behind my house that joins the main road. There’s a pond on one side where buffalos bathe later in the day when the sun’s out. There are a few huts that house loud, cheerful children. One of them usually runs up and down my lane swinging a key chain in the air. Maybe his parents have told him that it’s a kite and it’ll fly someday if he keeps running with it. Just as I believed that the more up-market restaurants bred their own chicken- poultry that had four legs. That would explain why a plate of tandoori chicken in Sea Rock had four pieces, and one in Great Punjab had two. I think of this lane as an excitable child. The leaves that flit about the road, the red mud that cakes the stones, the wet pebbles that tessellate the ground – they’re filled with such young urgency. They all have so much to say. Their language is ...

This was a year ago. Strange things were happening cosmically. Several stubborn planets glided in neon concentric circles and perfectly aligned with each other. So, Mars was a 180 degrees from Venus and Jupiter was out of the way and Saturn was benignly distant and there were a lot of other even-keel placements that one really doesn’t give a lime about. What this meant was that people were suddenly finding their old music albums behind sofas, or shiny pennies on clean sidewalks, or birds controlled their poop good naturedly. In such a time of happy happenstance, two inconsequential people were chewing the fat around a dining table – my brother and I. My brother was eating. Ordinarily, this description would suffice if it were meant for an ordinary person, but not my brother. To say that my brother was eating is akin to describing the sea as wet. My brother approaches food with a somber, tactical reverence. Nicholas Cage around a projector – pointless, painful, pontificating. He deifies...

Last Friday, I was in a bus going back to Mumbai. I fell asleep around the time the bus left Pune and woke up when it halted at Lonavala. It was dark and through the stained glass of my window, I could see glistening windcheaters huddle around food stalls and canteens for cups of coffee. In that nocturnal morass, small swirls of steam climbed up from plastic cups to nothingness and gave up on the way. One man held a cup and looked about for a dry place to stand. But, understandably, this was rather difficult, because what was not wet was damp. And damp is worse than wet if you’re thinking of eating or drinking anything. He stood in the centre and looked about in the drizzle. To the right of him was a wide, dripping beam, and to his left was a place with wet chairs and tables. He walked to the beam and stood under it. Then he looked up to the sky and was reassured that he’d made the right choice. There was a broken streetlamp next to where he was standing. I loved the way rain looked in...

Do friends help you get through the night? In the absence of cable TV, alcohol, or Gerald Durell, I think yes. They do. Last night was the first night I had to spend alone. ALL alone. No music, no T.V., no funny books. Now, the thing with Monday nights is that they come after Monday days. And Monday days are the stuff lumpy gravies or banana-flavored lip balms are made of. Tripe - blahed tripe. So in tradition of all things dreary, my Monday morning was progressing ever so slowly. A fat, thick-waisted mollusc could have whizzed past me, done a figure eight, and come back after having dinner. My day was positively dripping boredom, one eternally dangling drop at a time. And then, the office guy delivered a parcel at my table. He thumped it on my workstation and waited. 'Why is a new girl getting parcels in office?', he wondered. He could also be standing around to see just how fast I could rip paper. That is one of my few noteworthy virtues, by the way. My fingers can sear thro...

Slope of an empty spoon that moonlight grazes and goes away Bereft lily pad in a pond, clinging to a scent that wouldn't stay Fading blackness of the night A last unturned page Old brown blood Green raw bud A cracked glass that won't hold a drink Spilt perfumed wine Not all, not much, not all that much -But that is what it means to miss.

A thing of beauty is a joy forever, Its loveliness increases but it will never… Compare to the dusty mires, the clunky fuss, Of a dilapidated Pune bus. - Begun by Keats, finished by yours unruly The other evening, my friend and I waited for a bus... the bus, any bus.. at a stop that reminded me of Vaudeville. That place deserves to extolled as the seat of all existential plays. I doubt if Beckett ever visited Pune; but if he had, ‘Waiting for Godot’ would have a Deccan slant, as most things in Pune do. They all slant – the way faucets in thrillers drip. You don’t know why, and you can’t guess how, but that’s the way things are. If it’s in Pune, it must slant. Pune – the italicized city. My friend was remembering the good old days in Mumbai. She was telling me about the time the force of the crowd during rush hour had practically lifted her out of the train compartment. (She’s small.) ‘It was a Virar local’ , she sniffed misty-eyed. There are no normal people in this world. And then, ...

I've been getting these forwards lately that compare the Katrina hurricane tragedy in the U.S. to the Mumbai monsoon crisis. The comparison, in all these forwarded emails, begins with that declaration of odious originaility: 'Couldn't stop making this comparison.. ' (Really! Wonder what you'd have done if no-one had sent you the email.) This mail notes, in excruciating pedantia, how Mumbai trumped New Orleans in various aspects. An excerpt: inches of rain in New Orleans due to hurricane Katrina... 18 inches of rain in mumbai (July 26th).... 37.1 number of people to be evacuated in new orleans... entire city..wohh number of people evacuated in mumbai...10,000 Cases of shooting and violence in new orleans...Countless Cases of shooting and violence in mumbai.. NONE So on and so forth...and it ends with a sorry tongue in cheek remark: USA...world's most developed nation India...third world country.. oopss...did i get the last fact wrong??? Well, I don't know abo...

Client visit today. So: 1. Breakfast from Barista's. (It is somebody's idea out here that a Tandoori Paneer sandwich is morning food.) 2. Tomato soup has salt. 3. Conference room has enough chairs. 4. System guys are not listening to Aashiq Banaya or Woh Lamhe . 5. Receptionist is at the reception attending calls. 6. Security is not at the reception attending calls. 7. Flush is working. I make eye-contact with one of these raison d'etres and mouth the words, 'Please come again.' She smiles back.

I was in Mumbai on Saturday morning. Woke up to a heavy drizzle and started yearning for some tea – Long Island and iced; but settled for black and honeyed. The neighbor pottered about plucking tulsi leaves and chilies from her balcony plants. I waved a beatific hello; she swished foliage politely and went in. I contemplated the quiet joys of domesticity and decided to get a hair cut. Perhaps there were other thoughts in between contemplation A and decision B, but I forget. So, after watching Iqbal, I went for a haircut to a L’Oreal ‘ tress salon’ . Very swanky - black and chrome and everything Rome. (There was a woman in Roman sandals and a floral toga-top, and two men with expressions of sullen betrayal. ‘ Et tu, brut ?’ hung heavily in the pomade-laden air.) ‘Yes, ma’am? ’, asked a pretty, blond girl. If I were casting for Heidi, she’d be my choice for the lead. ‘ I want a hair cut’ , I answered. ‘ Of course. This way, please .’ I was escorted to a nifty, swiveling chair that nobody...

Sometimes, there is truth in email forwards. The one I’m talking about is a powerpoint slide that had an ebony black beetle on a dewy, bright leaf looking all Rousseau-esque. The teal italic font read: ‘A friend is someone who sings your favorite song when you’ve forgotten the tune.’ My pal, Mohit, sent me my Mumbai rhapsody – pictures of Mocha. Thank you.

It's fun seeing the natives getting restless during festivities. Especially in a new place. No matter where you are, you’ll witness some control-freakism that bubbles up when people put up twinkly lights. One of my friends, T, had spent some time in Bangladesh while her husband was posted there. They stayed in a quiet locality with manicured lawns and mellow streetlights. It was an area where diplomats recharged their dulcet voices and their children learnt the piano. Actually, so did my friend; though she was an engineer’s wife and as diplomatic as a paternal aunt. Diplomacy, to my friend, was just another book that Henry Kissinger wrote. She used that book to prop up the short leg of her piano, by the way. Anyway, T was telling me about this incident that occurred one time during Eid. A group of people had come over to her building and were decorating the trees. There was no problem while putting up the streamers and flowers, but when it was time to put up the navy blue and silve...

This morning, I took a bus to work. Actually, the bus took me, but on with the story. In Mumbai, I usually don’t get into very crowded buses. I can afford to do that because the next bus comes by before nails have outgrown the polish. But not so in Pune. If you have missed the bus, you truly have missed the bus. From what I had seen of Pune buses, they were always crowded. People hung out and patronizingly tapped autos on the hood at traffic lights. It was a scene that evoked great affection when I looked at it from inside a car. But in Pune, I’ll be without car or Scooty; so it will be the autos or it will be buses for me. (I was cursed by an auto-fellow last night. If the curse comes true, my son will be a very poor man. I reached home and prayed for my unborn son’s posthumous prosperity; for the sake of the family he’ll leave behind.) Anyway, my friend and I waited at the bus stop and finally spotted something that’s called a ‘bus’ in Pune. It was made of some undetermined material ...

Here’s the thing about Pune - it’s not Mumbai. Just as no other place besides Mumbai is. Therefore, traveling from home to office does not always have to take one and a half hours. So I need not have left my place at 8:00 to reach the office at 9:30. That was my first lesson. Since I reached at 8:20, I had plenty of time to think about it. But even though Pune is not Mumbai, software companies in Pune are like software companies in Mumbai. All conference rooms are set to sub-arctic temperatures, all coffee machines dish out bad coffee, guys will not make eye contact when you talk to them, girls will look away immediately, and the HR will provide you insufficient information. And the systems department. Oh, the systems department! Do all systems departments across the globe hold hands and sing ‘We are the world’? They should. They share an oneness that rates ye up there with self-actualization. It’s touching, really, after you’ve got over the Stepford Wives resemblance. Then there’s th...

It was my last day in office yesterday. And last days in office make you realize so many things - like how you can discuss your 'last days' and know you aren't talking about impending death. That's a nice feeling. Then there are the gifts. They are so many, they are so varied, and they're all so wonderful. Anything that comes free and with a finality is always beautiful; unless it's death. Then you really can't have much of an opinion about it. And even if you did, who'd listen to you? Anyway, I came into office as merry as a monsoon cloud. I was so pissed that my attitude needed diapers. So, to anyone who asked me, 'Is it your last day today?' , I was tempted to reply, 'Yes. Will say hi to that maggot in the coffin I'll be moving to.' This 'last day' business reminds me of something that happened to me earlier when my office had shifted to Hiranandani, the BPO (B standing for blah)-saturated business park. I was outside the A...

Deep in the visceral hollow of Yucatan, the sky turned cinnamon. Marshy waters and placid lakes stirred restlessly. High, wild reeds swayed in a wind that was undecided about whither it should blow. And watching this tranquil disquiet was Rupert, a stunning, white heron. Rupert was handsome yet lonely. He glided like a fragrance. You could see a trail of silky heron flaps when he flew across the sky. He flew perfectly and he flew alone. One evening, he was hopping around in a lake to see if the water cockled the same way every single time. It soothed that raging emptiness inside him – the routines of ripples. And then…and then…. He saw Shamin, that blazing pink Chilean flamingo. Suddenly, the marshy clot of Yucatan, that had hitherto floated blandly through the world, peeled its final scab and became raw. Shamin had no business being there. Shamin belonged to that bird-world of grotesque openness; where wings pierced through clouds and blotted suns and tore the skies savagely. Yet, Rup...