349, 348, 347, 346, 345, 344, 343: Trip to Kasol, Himachal Pradesh

The first time I saw the Parvati river, I had tears in my eyes. The unfettered power and peace of a river that is named after a woman who prayed for Shiva is visceral. May all our prayers be that way.

Some more pictures of the rain, mountains, mist...

421, 420, 419, 418, 417

What I put up on Facebook

What I did for my birthday was shove a few clothes in my bag, turn off the lights, close the door behind me, and head out at midnight for the Velas beach with some people I didn't know too well. For my birthday, I wanted to take off. And I did.

The Velas beach is where the Ridley turtles lay eggs and they hatch and the little turtles are released into the sea. A really big deal is made about it all. For me, the weekend and my birthday was about endless walks on the beach, standing hypnotized in font of a sunset, sharing a smile with stranger who was recording the sound of the waves.

It was about a serenditous stumble on another white and golen beach, a trippy road trip, an unplanned halt where we turned off the lights and watched a large swatch of sky fill with fireflies...it was about going up a really high tower and watching the beautiful yin and yang that a fortress and the sea make. It was about screeching to a halt as we watched a large, stunning , black and white spackled python (so long it covered the span of the lane on the highway) cross the road.

There is something about being free. About being happy. About being with travelers in an unknown place for an unknown time that strangely makes you feel more connected with those at home.

When I watched the endless sea crash a limitless shore...or i watched tons of fireflies blaze near bushes...or I caught the rhythm of a massive snake in the pitch dark of the night...I felt strangely with everyone I'd ever known. I wasn't available on phone or facebook...but in some sense I'd taken everyone with me. I hope you felt the magic too.

Stewed

This afternoon, I got back from a short trip to Panchgani. It was nice, sort of.

I don't get the deal with short getaways and brief stints anyway. I had planned this one because I was really eroded by work and some other goings-on at home and hearth. So when A visited, I thought it would be nice to venture somewhere briefly. Frankly, I like long holidays. In fact, more than holidays, I like sabbaticals. Smaller holidays seem like such a dash of desperate escapism. What can you sort out in 2 days away from routine that you can't by switching off your phone for 4 hours on a Monday evening? In fact, with this trip I realized that when I am frazzled, I need to be in my familiar surroundings to be soothed. Being agitated and taking short trips just really wears me out. Because here's the thing. I like being treated with tenderness when I am stressed. More than compassion or kindness, I need tenderness. Soft voices, soft footfalls that are mindful that I am trying to sleep, soft words (not harsh advice). Lately, though, it doesn't seem to be happening. I find myself going hoarse explaining what I want, why such and such is hurtful...but it doesn't seem to make any difference. It's easier to handle such apathy in my own zone. In a new place, it's just too awkward and messy and I will undoubtedly be really hurt about something but then I don't want to ruin the mood so I will crib about unclean napkins instead. (Which, by the way, you must be careful about if you are headed to Panchgani.)

This is exactly why I prefer sabbaticals. Take 6 months off, Take a year off. I would rather do that, replenish myself in a more wholesome manner and then return to regular programming, so to speak. Short trips only come in the way of any real progress and wind me up even more. When you need change, why settle for distraction?

Anyway, that was a rather large prelude to what I am coming to. 

I got home today, somewhat pleased but also a little miffed and bruised at certain things. In fact, I was so upset that I willingly took a nap. (Apparently, deep anger brings out the sloth in me.) When I woke up, I decided to cook. (I'll take a moment here to reiterate. I...decided to...cook. COOK. Which involves one to  be in the kitchen for some indeterminate amount of time, handle utensils, chop veggies, dispense vegetable peels, etc. I decided to do all that voluntarily. Just points to the fact that I was out of my mind with some deep gnawing worry.)

Anyway.

I made cauliflower stew. It was a simple stew with lots of onions and garlic softened in a mix of olive oil and butter. To this were added cauliflower flowerets, tiny slivers of ginger, cumin powder, salt and hing. Then I added a lot of water and let it boil on slow flame. Meanwhile, separately,  I dissolved some Maggi coconut powder in warm water. Here, I didn't follow the instructions correctly. For thick milk, I had to dissolve 3 heaped tablespoons in one cup of water. Instead, at first, I dissolved 3 spoons of powder in 3 cups. But since I like a strong coconut-milk base in stews, I increased the amount to 6 heaped spoons in 3 cups water. Then I added that in slowly to the stew. I loved that pinkish hue that slowly spread across the thick white base, making it slightly sweet, creamy and flavorful. Finally, I finished it off with a strong dash of pepper. 

It was really nice.

Given the increase in sullen moods now, I think I'll be cooking more often.

Quickly, I write

I'm back from a two-week trip to Denver. In my time there, I worked much, walked much, ate much, and loved much. Every time I shut my eyes for a little bit longer, I see them - the trees, the skies, the pinecones and the soft flurry of snow that danced through the streets at downtown.

There was an exhibit of Da Vinci's machines that captivated my imagination. I saw a huge parade of elks during a new moon night. I saw the Rockies trimming a fabulous horizon.

One morning was perhaps the most magical. I woke up. That sunrise,  my soul drifted off my body and led my life that day. It led me to the town of Boulder. Such a butterfly of a place that is. Small, quaint, energetic, and bursts of flowers and fruits everywhere. A colleague took us to his place, which is a lovely home in the mountains. There's a dirt road that leads up to his driveway. There's a birdfeed outside his cabin that feeds fuzzy little sparrows. There's a firplace and little vase that has strands of bird feathers. And there are sunsets and trees one spots through the skylight that seep every splinter of jadedness out of you.

I had a beautiful time. My heart just felt so full right now, I had to get it down.

Peace, peace, peace!

 

Lessons from Palolem

This is Palolem. It is a crescent shaped beach and so pretty that it could be a pearl that got loose from an angel's embroidered wing. This time in Goa, my friends and I decided to take a day off to go to a different beach from the close to our hotel. Somewhere distant. So, we woke up early, ate a quick brekker and set off. Then we walked through little strips of road that knitted paddy fields, hailed a bus and set off for Palolem.

Palolem is deep in the south of Goa. From where we were (Benaulim), we had to change two buses to get to the beach (one to Madgaon and another to Palolem from the bus depot there). It was a long sheery ride. We went up a road that swirled around a green, green mountain. It was like tracing along the ribbon of candy color that rolls about a lollipop. On the way, the bus would be hailed by large crowds of school-children. They'd hop off somewhere between a purple house with yellow windows and a red hut with blue walls. There were all these souvenir-type things that made us chuckle. (Beauty can crack you up too. Not everything is poetry.)

We saw mountain streams dribbling over little ponds, rain come and go, the bus get full and empty, yet the world staying calm and grey.

Then we reached Palolem and the waves there were bigger and had quite a roar. The sea wastempting as sin. I, however, had decided to skip wearing a costume that day because I'd woken up feeling feverish and thought I'd done enough frollicking in the water the previous 2 days. (Or so I thought.)

But 12: 15 I spotted the sea. 12:16 I was deep in it. Walking as far as I could go in, turn my back to a huge wave and then, as it lifted me up, start swimming. Sometimes, two or three waves would come in quick succession. That's when I would quickly start floating on my back.

Now, floating on one's back is exquisite to begin with. But when you feel the heft of a wave rising under you and you are upturned looking at dark clouds gather atop a faraway island and feel the tickle of raindrops on your salty lips - it is exceptional to the point of heartburst.

Since I was swimming in my tee and shorts, I got soaked to a degree that hasn't happened since childhood. And I can't imagine how right that felt. It felt correct to be this joyous, wet, and free.

In yoga, we are taught to visualize ourselves as a drop of water that merges with the ocean. In the ocean, we learn what a cakewalk that is.

I think we are meant for this kind of surrender and this kind of freedom.

Nothing less and nothing else.



Back home

I'm back from an impromptu trip to Goa. My cousin arranged this holiday with his family and I tagged along. Goa has such a pulchritude of lazy, indolent, gut-wrenching prettiness. It's a joy to share it with just about anyone - your family, your friends, an ex-lover you just made peace with, your dark inner cynic, your impoverished romantic heart that seems to have a windfall when it sees a wild fortress sea at Candolim.

This trip was quite an adventure. You haven't really seen rains unless you have seen them on the ghats. We stayed back a night at Amboli because we couldn't proceed to Goa. And in Goa, we did a million things in a couple of days. We took a cruise in the middle of a blazing storm, got drenched at the Calangute beach, supped on parathas and xacutis and luxuriated in the opulence of churches. The best part was smelting in the joys of my niece and nephew. That feeling of walking into huge walls of waves with kids in tow - the exhilaration is unbeatable.

I'm now home, in Mumbai - warped and wefted in the songs of the sea. With my mum's cheery chatter in the background and good food in my belly. With the terrace splattered with streaks of rain. With ropes of grey clouds getting more thickly interwined by the second.

Life is good. Actually it's more than that. Life is goodness.

Life lessons on the road

At the signal, I could see a really adorable Sardar child in the bus. He was looking at my car. So, I turned down my window and thrust my hand out to wave. In doing so, I accidentally hit the cyclist coming from behind the car. (It’s amazing how quickly those blokes can zigzag in the midst of crazy traffic. Of course, today I faced the kind of traffic one would wish for by rubbing a vintage lamp. It was that smooth. So I can’t quite understand why that cyclist had to change lanes, slithering from here to there, like a tapeworm.)

He stumbled a bit and snapped, “Itne zor se indicator kyun deta hai?” Indicator? If that’s how one indicates, one wonders just what exactly one is indicating.

In keeping with the spirit of the thing, though, I replied, “Zor se diya, tab bhi aapko nahin dikha!”

He grumbled something and went on his way.

The child who was watching all this, smiled. He was so cute! But this time, instead of waving or anything, I started the wipers and then squished a little water on the windscreen. He looked so happy! He actually started jumping in his seat and pointing at my car squealing with joy! But the lady who was accompanying him didn’t seem to be too interested. All of a sudden, she took a purple bow – the kind you tape up on presents- and put it on his little turban. Oh God! I really wish I could have darted into the bus and squeezed his cheeks! He was such a tight, little lemon.

And then the stupid tempo behind me started honking. They are really annoying – these tempos. Half the time, on Asalpha, they swerve as if they will tumble on one side or the other. But they don’t and go crating along irritatingly. Not to mention the stupid messages painted on them that mean god knows what! I saw one that had ‘Baawarchi Mania’ painted in hot pink. Sheesh!

Close to Mankhurd, though, the road narrowed because of some naaka-bandhi. So, all the cars had to squeeze into a single lane and crawl ahead. To my right, I saw a police jeep. Great! Now, the way police jeeps move is that they will blindly cut across lanes, other cars be damned. And they do that with such alacrity and purpose, that you wouldn’t want to be in their way. I was trying my best to move to the left to allow it to pass by a great margin. Slowly, the jeep overtook me and a little ahead – it did the unimaginable. It flicked on the indicator.

I have never known that to happen. I think a lot of other drivers were stumped too. There was a moment when things just seemed to move in slow motion. As if everyone were dazzled by this flood of white-light, or in this case, tiny flickers on orange.

Then just as I was applauding the police for its etiquette, I saw the unfolding of the eternal question – “What happens when an irresistible force meets an immovable object?” The force being the jeep, the object being a big, burly BEST. The bus rammed ahead to stop the police jeep in its tracks. The jeep honked, the bus didn’t move. The driver looked out and politely asked the bus driver to let it pass. The bus driver looked out and snapped at him for changing lanes. He also, imperiously demanded that he should pass first.

This was the police! I mean, I never thought a BEST could show such audacity to the police! I didn’t think anyone could! The driver of the police jeep shrugged and got back in. The bus started. And in a split second after, when the gap between the two vehicles increased a bit, an auto almost squeezed through it and whizzed past.

So, here’s the answer to that eternal question – a resistible force and a movable object will slip through and go ‘Nyaah na na nyaah nyaah!’

Introducing J, ladies and gentlemen

McLeod’s Ganj, Main Chowk

Cy and H are in the hotel room, snuggling under a rug in front of the telly. J and I are walking around the market place, taking in sights and smells of a fading day. The sky fogs up with the varnish of winter and slowly, the stars come out. At first, there’s a smattering of them, then a few thousand more, and finally, constellations lay crushed and strewn across this deep, dark canvas. If you took the heel of a stiletto, dipped it in molten silver and beat it all over a lush, black pashmina shawl – that would be the sky we walked under that night.

A friendly man with ruddy cheeks walks towards me and hands me a pamphlet. He smiles, tells me, “Aap apne friends ko bhi layiyega”, and walks on. My friend is admiring some fur-trimmed booties somewhere.

I walk up to J and show her the pamphlet.

I: There’s a party here, at Mc.LLo. We’ll go?

J: Of course not! We’ll have a nice cosy time amongst ourselves.

I: But I want to go! There will lots of people, and lots of noise, and lots of fun!

J: There will be people you don’t know, noise you don’t like…and besides, didn’t we come here to introspect?

I: Yeah well…I don’t have too many thoughts, as it turns out.

J: But don’t you want to be with us? (This wasn’t as heartfelt as it sounds. She was trying on a cap at the time and this was a fuzzy attempt to assuage.)

I: I am always with you people! Let’s go out and make new friends?

J: Are you crazy? It’ll be full of drunk, uncouth men who’ll just want to paw us and grope us!

I: No, it won’t be like that! Everyone’s here to have fun! They’ll have fun, we’ll have fun!...and oh! look! See, there’s a DJ! See, DJ Raakh! I want to see DJ Raakh!

J: Huh! Never mind DJ Raakh! Listen to me… we’ll take a walk, we’ll sit under the stars, we’ll have fun! Trust me!

In the mean time, I spotted this group of glorious young boys and girls, all swathed in cashmere and expensive brown boots. They walk up to McLLo. One of them has a pamphlet in his hands.

I make a final plea, “But J, all the happening people will be there!”

J, in a solemn sotto voice, “So? Ditch them! Mukta, we have already…happened.”

*******************************************************

Open-sky café, off Temple Road

J and I are in a very charming little paratha place close to our hotel. The joint has a glass roof that is currently covered with brown canvas. There are three wooden tables and plastic chairs inside, along with a little counter where parathas and omlettes get cooked. On one side is a little electrical apparatus that where pots of tea get made.

It’s night already and J and I are out to get dinner for H and Cy.

There’s no electricity, and little lanterns are kept on tables to take care of the light. The whole place is swathed in this candle-calmness that one associates with peace and piety. From where we sit, we can see an entire valley lit up. It looks like a bower of little bursts of colored light.

We are eating our parathas and are waiting for a couple more to be parcelled.

Winter beauty and winter musings bring along with them this incredible, sweeping melancholy.

I look out and think about the last time I had visited this place with A. Now I don’t know what he’s doing, whether he has visited this place since. I think of that now.

I tell J that probably the most lingering sadness of failed love is knowing that you will never be missed anymore. I ask her if one can ever…and I mean ever… get over the primal want of being someone’s memory. Someone’s old age reminiscence. Someone’s midnight memory, or a stray remembrance that holds your heart and twists it on a Sunday afternoon in a park. I ask her if I will ever find anyone who will miss me the way true love misses. And how can one expect one’s heart to settle for anything less than this?

In this warm hallowed pristine glow of three lamps, in this little space above the valleys with the sound of simmering water, I asked J this.

And J, all the while looking down into her plate, said: burp.

*******************************************************


My friend is very, very wise.

My Endymion weekend

Last weekend I had driven to Murud Janjeera with my roomies and another friend. No biggie, except that I drove all the way there and…get this…all the way back. Alone. By myself. Solely.

Again, no biggie, since it’s only 165 kms or so from here. But only a couple of months ago, I was scared of taking the car out to the market place. So it was a definite challenge for me to drive on highways, through crowded village roads and, at one point, reverse on a slope (I still break out in a sweat when I think of that). Now that the trip is behind me, I feel…umm…strange. There’s a weird, unknown, vague feeling of happiness. I guess, after a long, long time, I’m feeling proud of myself.

I must say, I had great company on the trip. Friday night, they insisted that I go to bed early, shutting off lights, tucking me into bed and making me cheese and chilly sandwiches the next morning.

Our trip to Murud was really cool. We listened to radio at 5:30 in the morning, and from what we heard, I think we had stumbled upon the Nadeem-Shravan-Kumar Sanu channel. They were playing that whole spate of songs from the era when Mahesh Bhatt still made movies. It was pretty nice, but unfortunately, the driver never gets to listen to her choice of music. So, although I would have liked to listen to Dil Hai Ke Maanta Nahin, my roomie started singing a perfectly horrible song from Ashoka. (I don’t remember this song but it is so ridiculous that it could have been part of the movie – it goes, “Aa taiyaar ho ja, aa aa taiyyar ho ja…”. Apparently, this song comes on when Shah Rukh prepares for the Kalinga war…actually, no not Shah Rukh, but King Ashoka…he he! a little humour there, see..)

Anyway, one of my friends was dressed in a cute, teal-colored fringe top and another one was wearing a pretty smouldering safari skirt. Now, such attire had a pretty interesting effect on people who served us in pokey-little eateries. They would clamour around and open long forgotten cupboards to pull out tea cups and saucers…because these madams could not be served in regular chai glasses. That was funny.

We had pretty good brekkers – I liked my crisp vadas and soft idlis, but what I was eyeing very longingly were my friends’ huge platters of masala omlettes. They looked so tasty, all spiced with turmeric, and chopped onions, chillies and tomatoes. I tried very hard to savour my medu vada the way my friends were wolfing down their eggs, but it wasn’t very convincing. I just sighed very loudly every few minutes. Nope…I’m not a very nice dining companion when there’s non-veg food on the table.

Oh, and there was a beautiful detour. Just before Alibaug, we took a wrong turn and drove on a narrow muddy strip. After a bit it was clear that we were headed the wrong way, so we stopped by a little stream to ask for directions. That stream was thickly shadowed by trees and lined with big, brown rocks were speckled with sunlight – that place looked straight out of a storybook. I half expected a badger to come out of somewhere and invite us to tea.

There were some washerwomen and some men hacking coconuts from trees. That moment, right then, with the cold stream water under our feet and a sunny sky over our heads and the smell of a happy balminess all around, that moment – felt green. Leaf green. As if, that little slice of our lives were tightly wrapped in a bit of betel leaf and tucked away for ever.

What’s more – we bought ourselves some coconuts and slurped them sitting on rocks and dipping our feet in the cool stream. It was so idyllic. Us having our coconuts and my cute, blue car winking in the sunlight beyond.

When we reached Alibag, we decided to make a stop at the fort. Now, everyone had different reasons for going there. The more ditzy amongst us just jumped out of the car on seeing horse carts, another one wanted to know the ‘history’ (pffft!)…but me…ever the one with above-average depth wanted to go there because the fort was called ‘Kolaba’ (my most beloved place in the whole world – marginally more than Bandra. In fact, if I had been able to afford a SKODA, I’d have called it Colaba. Because I got a Swift, I named it ‘Bandra’. I think of everything.)

This fort is really pretty. There are places inside the fort that have ‘Jai Bhavani’ temples. Some of them are not more than small clearings with stone statues overgrown with thistles. But they are decorated with marigold and smeared with sandalwood and that seems to lend a certain civility to the whole thing. But the most interesting part of that place were huge brightly coloured walls that were almost crumbling down. They were in bright glossy blue (a blue where indigo, violet, and turquoise got into a fight and lay splayed and splattered), Jaipuri pink and capsicum green. All of these walls formed a backdrop for some outrageous poses that we captured on camera…lending a different meaning to guerrilla tactic.

Finally, after driving through Kashed and wondering why our respective companies couldn’t open an outfit on that beach, we reached Murud. As we didn’t have any reservations, we couldn’t get those charming cottages by the sea. So we settled for one BIG room with one BIG bed for 500 bucks some 5 minutes from the beach. We got our luggage into the room, told each other that we must leave for the beach right away, and promptly sunk into the sleep of death for the next 4 hours.

I can’t explain that sleep – it was so dreamless and soft. And feathery and satisfying. It felt as if the light that shone outside dusted itself off before it came into our room. It was pleasantly cool and dark, yet we knew that we weren’t losing time because it was still bright outside. It was a sleep that filled our bellies and kept away any niggling doubts or unpleasant thoughts or unfinished lists. It was a sleep where portions of us became whole again.

When I woke up, I found that that the people I had travelled with had somehow regressed to a pretty disturbing state of childhood. Two of them were yelling and throwing pillows at each other, and another one was probably scaring away Satan by singing in the bathroom. They were having fun – so I was informed rather curtly when I looked alarmed.

Anyway, we headed to the beach soon after, carrying our purple mat with us. Now, this purple mat has an interesting story. I had got it with me because I thought I’d do some suryanamaskars in the day. But I never got around to that. My roomie then wanted to borrow it so she could do her tarot readings on that. But she found she was more comfortable on the cool marble floor. The other roomie, on the other hand, prudently decided to use it as bedding when guests came over. And that’s how it has been used ever since.

Of course, now the mat seemed to be on the threshold of assuming a new avatar – a happy beach accessory instead of a rebuked spiritual prop. And, maybe I’m imagining things, but it looked happy. Since my body was still a little stiff from all that driving, I’d decided to pass up on the swimming. I’d decided to sit on the shore and watch waves after waves just wash up and recede and not get in there to feel the thrill of being one with the sea. That’s what I’d decided.

And what did I know?

My other friends who were wearing their swimsuits waded in and splashed around and all…and I just couldn’t take it anymore. I just dove in and started swimming. I couldn’t let the small matter of not wearing a swimsuit come in the way of such pure joy!

The sand was clean and soft. It wasn’t as gravely as the strip in Juhu (and perhaps I sound like the regular Bombay hick – but to me, Juhu is a beach). And I felt the waves just come up to me and take me away like the meaning of a poem – something you probably learnt as a child, but understood years later. Like the sense and strength of that line – A thing of beauty is a joy forever…The waves just felt like that. There was a bizarre craving… of wanting to get subsumed by a huge colossal wall of water descending on you…or that brilliant feeling of lightness when you are floating on your back and you get lifted so high that you feel you’ll be able to peep over a palm tree now…that surreal moment when you become a mote in a stream of something large and seamless and…you dare to hope…eternal.

A couple of hours later, the sun began to set. A few hours after that, a wee mole of a moon came out. And even later, the vivid blue-black sky shattered with a few dozen fireworks.

Time stripped the canvas around us to paint something different and phenomenal in the course of an evening. And whilst all this was happening, we sat huddled on our purple mat, shivering the breeze and sipping hot cups of ginger tea.

Some of us just took in the satiety of a perfect trip and sighed. Some clicked the blitzes for posterity. Some wondered how, in this huge world and this mammoth planet, there was a miniscule piece of earth that had four blissfully happy hearts.

Some silently raised a toast to Keats - for reassuring the world that they would never lose sight of their constellation of memories; for writing '...A thing of beauty is a joy forever.'

Sawadika

I am back...and I love Phuket.

It's sort of like a beautiful dream that stays with you long after you've woken up...it's not exactly like watching a thousand birds fly away in the sunset. It's a lot like finding a beautiful shell when you're eight years old and holding it like its the most precious thing in the world. It's quite similar to swimming in a pool of dark during the storm.

It's not exactly like that...but...as the Thai put it..'it's same same, but different.'

Phuket...I love you.

Shirdi weekend

I had a pretty sad but enlightening weekend. Sad because I had mistaken several things and several people for what they actually weren’t. Enlightened because I finally saw the truth.

I was at Shirdi this weekend. I find it very crowded and all that, but I love sitting at the Dwarkamai when I’m there. It’s very soothing. People inside that quadrangle are much calmer than those who compete for a longer glimpse of Sai baba inside the temple; who push aside older ladies and snarl at children wriggling through queues to locate their mothers. If one could gauge or measure such things, the space inside the Dwarkamai is on some other frequency altogether. I was sitting quietly in one corner when a man came and gave me some prasaad. It was a ladoo. I remember thinking that the yellow of the ladoo would look very nice on a lotus.

I like the Sai baba statue in Shirdi. The marble is a beautiful moon-shine white. In fact, it has a bluish-vein tint to it if you look at it from certain angles. But the best bit is Sai baba’s expression. It’s so joyous – he looks like a loving, indulgent grandfather.

When I was there, I wondered where I’d gone wrong – so wrong in my judgment of people and situations; so wrong about my own abilities. Of course, I do understand that there’s nothing right or wrong about people or situations – they are either necessary or not. Any situation that’s going to make to face your fears is definitely going to come your way. There’s no question about that. So, I suppose, the deal is to not be afraid of anything.

But how can one not be afraid? How can one not balk at the uncertainty of all life? How can I not feel scared about running out of money when I get old? Or become dependent on people and not own a house or a car? Or even if I have a car, then not be able to afford fuel? And what if my parking space is taken over by someone? Or what am I going to do after my parents are no more? And what if I have no job? What if Bombay gets submerged by the time I’m 35 and then I have to move to Pune where the only food available are poisonous potatoes? I love potatoes.

Then what about loneliness? What if I go blind? And I can’t even read books anymore? I have not yet cultivated any habit or hobby that doesn’t engage my eyes – after all these years, I still need to look at the keyboard and type. It’s really weird – when one has to think of times of rationing one’s senses.

But as acutely as I was thinking all these things, I sort of got this feeling that all these thoughts are superficial. Deep down, I know that it’s all going to be okay – much more than okay. The worry is like the film of oil on water. It’s really thin and flimsy and all, but it’s still on the surface. It’s what I can see.

Near the Dwarkamai is a Shani temple. Now I’m not sure about this, but Shani is either the planet Saturn or the Lord that governs this planet. He is perceived to be the most ruthless and harsh planets because he brings destruction and loss in his wake. Shani is supposed to be the planet that compels you to pay your debts, or collect your dues if the case applies. Some bits of Hindu mythology speak of how the mandate of Saturn influences even the Gods. This planet is supposed to trigger the karmic slate to be wiped clean. With this, you begin your period for getting what you deserve and losing what you don't. No wonder, then, that people are so anxious to placate the Shani deity. Generally, people pour oil on a dark, stoic-looking idol on Saturdays and recite the Hanuman Chalisa. Legend has it that Hanuman is the only God that could control Shani. This, of course, is just one interpretation that I am aware of. I’m sure there are others.

But personally, I think people shouldn’t fear something that operates purely to give them a fresh lease of life. Why regard it as malefic? If anything scuttles away layers of falsehood so that you know exactly where you stand, if something forcibly unclenches your fist so that you lose resistance and gain liberation, one should be grateful for that kind of experience. Anything that is fair is always regarded as unduly stern. Just goes to show badly we think of ourselves – if we consider the possibility that we will get what we deserve, we assume we will get blackened, tough experiences, and not happy, uplifting ones.

Instead, people turn to alternatives that feed a fragile sense of well-being. That, to me, is so calamitous. How can you rely so heavily that can lull you into delusion? It’s better to know where you stand. There’s no act more benevolent than cleansing the soul. But I think it takes time for one to understand this.

There’s a beautiful song in a movie called ‘Gardish’ that sums up my impression about this whole dark deal. ('Gardish' is a great film, by the way.) Jackie Shroff goes through life thinking that his father, Amrish Puri, is unduly severe. Later in life, I think he loses him and falls on hard times. That’s when he reminisces about his father’s love. This song is set to that memory:

Hum na samjhe the, baat itni si,
Aap sheeshe the, duniya pathar thi...

How little we understand of all that we know.

Assortments

I don’t like the way people check you out at office parties. As if simply being out of office and sludging liquor gives one a license to freely ogle and comment on what one is wearing, what one is drinking, how one is dancing, etc.

It is dismal that vegetarian fare in buffets is reduced to a staple of 4-5 dishes of black dal, some korma-type agglomeration of orange and red vegetables, palak paneer, rice, and chewy naan. Just because a person doesn’t eat meat anymore doesn’t mean that she has lost all taste for food. I think more vegetarians must be drawn to high fat and sugary foods than non-vegetarians, because one desperately looks for compensation to tickle the palate.

One of my New Year resolutions is to lose around 8-10 kilos by the end of the year. It will be more difficult to do this now than before because the motivation is slightly tepid. Although, in my mind, I have a very clear image of how I want to be - sharp, lean, angular without any of those womanly ‘curves’, I don’t think I can summon up all that drive that will help me get into that shape. At least, not immediately.


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I don’t think I should buy any clothes at all this year. It’s easier said than done, because I buy a lot of clothes. Not that I particularly like them – I mean, of course, I do, but I usually never end up with what I really like. They are either too expensive, small, or incongruent with my lifestyle. The thing is I hate repeating clothes. Ever since I was young, I hated repeating clothes. Even when I was in school, I had five sets of uniforms for the week. Of course, I would repeat them over the month (much to my chagrin), but I would absolutely not repeat a uniform in the same week.

I know this sounds snobbish, but my dislike doesn’t stem from snobbery. I just think that once something is worn, it’s worn out. Time for something new. Of course, I can’t afford to do this now, what with the same pair of jeans being worn again and again and again. But, yes, someday when I can afford it, I will wear pretty likeable stuff one time and move it along.

Nowadays, I don’t even like reading the same book again, or watching a film I’ve seen before. I even want a fresh, squeaky new set of people to interact with. It’s strange. I intend to figure all this out when I go for my Vipassana course. One year of being vegetarian and shedding at least 4 kilos and I’ll go for the course.

A sharp metabolism helps meditation, I think. You acquire focus faster.

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I am a little confused – as to whether I am looking forward to the rains or not. *Smiles* I am, I think. I remember my very first walk up Pali Hill in early evening during the rains.

Bandra, dearest Bandra, come to me.

Although I am happy now to have you as my everlasting desire and not home. Still, baby…come to me.

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I am so phenomenally distracted. Why? What’s on my mind? Well, lots, yes…but they don’t need to be there. I wish there was some locker in which you could dump pieces of your mind and go to work. I really need to work with a lighter mind.

I think I am trying very hard to get peace of mind. It shouldn’t be so hard. Maybe I need to approach it in a different way.

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Today is my cousin’s engagement and I am wearing a pink cotton sari. With tulip-pink nails (I’m not wearing the nails, I got them ‘lacquered’), and delicate pearl ear-rings and a pearl necklace. I love pearls. Pink and pearls, in fact, is my very favorite combination. Along with white with silver, red with platinum, and black with nothing.

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I am just trying to clear up the dregs in my mind before I get down to work. But I am extending all this time like crazy. I procrastinate way too much. I really think I should work on mustering up sufficient drive to get something done – or simply, to get something – like a Skoda Fabia. It’s a really good looking car. Reminds me of a piece of jalapeno perfectly roasted in butter and coated with an even layer of crisps. Imagine driving around in something so tasty.

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I wonder if I’ve written about it before, but it bears repeating – what is it with the MTV roadies? What kind of shitty slop is that? And why is Nikhil Chinappa trying to act so harsh and unpleasant? He’s such a charming chap. Who IS that other egg-headed man anyway? The one with a repertoire of carps limited to ‘F**** wannabe!’, ‘F****** fake wannabe’, ‘F**** predictable fake’, ‘F***** Bani’. Who is Bani? Or is this what ‘Bunny’ sounds like in blasé drawl?

Sheesh! Roadies. And why Chandigarh ALL THE TIME?

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Hill Road is fabulastic when it comes to bargains! I mean, the selection of tees or pants you get there is remarkable. And you don’t even have to worry about size. Of course, one does come across certain horrendous pieces that look like a pile of FisherPrice toys melted and clumped to form huge florid symbols. But what the heck- some bad taste is acceptable in the face of such bargain!

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The first month is practically speeding past. And I’m not really very gung-ho-ish about the kind of pace I am packing in at work. I am such a slug. In any case, I think the problem is that I tend to be too ambitious and try to work on too many things at the same time.

What I should be doing is take one thing and let that occupy the central part in my mental shelf. I’ll move it around, just to see how it looks here and there, but there should be only one thing on the shelf. When I have finally figured out what to do with that one thing, I will move on to another. Eventually, I may have a crowded shelf, but at least I will know how they all got there.

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I have been feeling sort of stuck, so I thought I’d just scribble something down to engage my hand and head. I just doodled: ‘There are so many scrunchy excerpts!’ Wow!

Also, on another note, if we aren’t careful, we become what we don’t want to become.

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With regard to anything, I think the trick is to take it slow. Although bulldozing and destroying ‘constructs’ is great, it is best to let something settle down and then incinerate it completely with single-minded focus.

For example, let’s say you are trying to get over someone. We put so much importance on moving on that we immerse ourselves in a hundred little details. We kick up a storm because we’re moving. But one day, all this escapism is bound to catch up. So, I think it is best to let things stand for some time. I mean, one just has to go through troubled times. They can’t be avoided. But it can either be done simply and with grace, or it can be done in a choppy, harsh fashion. So, you grieve for a while, make sense of it all, and then when the pain has numbed (as in it feels dull and throbbing, and not like a thousand fiery pin-pricks), you apply your strength, root out the grief and throw it away for good.

Not giving oneself enough time is the same as not giving oneself enough credit. It can only lead to dissatisfaction.

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Yesterday, a colleague mentioned that it is so much better to not know one’s purpose in life. Life becomes boring once you do. I disagreed. I told her that life veritably becomes much more liberating when you know what you need to be doing. That rids you of second guesses, etc. “So, why is knowing what to do a bad thing?”, I asked her.

“Because then you have to do it.”

Yes. There is that.

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It’s lunch time and I am trying to maneuver a huge tray through a crowd in the cafeteria. My colleagues are sitting and one of them is discussing her brother-in-law. She calls him a ‘cocky dick’. Everyone hollers and two people snort out daal and almost make me lose my balance. I think I should eat alone.

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I don’t understand this whole business of…understanding. If everything is supposed to be interpreted subjectively, then what is misinterpretation? Then everybody is right. So, how can anyone be far off the mark? Surely, there must be one common peg to everything. You can use that peg to hang anything you want, but it needs to be on that one peg. You can’t hang something on another wall, because if you do, then maybe that is misinterpretation.

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It would be nice to have an art gallery with a bed. Lie down and look around at canvasses. Lovely thought.

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I came across something on the net about women clicking photographs of men who eve-tease them. These photos are put up on a website. I don’t feel too comfortable about this. It seems like taking the law into your own hands. It’s not like slapping someone, which would be self-defense.

How do you judge the credibility of the source? How does one know that a woman, in fact, is sending across the photo? It could be the alleged perpetrator’s jealous brother-in-law.

But extending this further, maybe one should also take photographs of the by-standers as well…the ones who stand around and do nothing. Or, for that matter, authority figures who need to be ‘requested’ to step in and who do nothing of their own accord.

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My distraction is getting chronic now. I can’t seem to tackle any task at one go. I need hundreds of breaks and stops to get back to something. I must do something about it…besides giving in, that is. I tried that and it has only spoiled me further.

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Every time I work in a project full-throttle, I am surprised at how frequently one has to go back to check one’s fundamentals. A good project, though, allows you to do that instead of making you feel guilty about it.

And it’s astonishing how much I get done when my phone is out of charge.

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I have just finished plugging in difficult portions of a lengthy document. That done, I went to the canteen for some snack. I had a plate of saabu daana khichdi with tasty, sweet curd, one dhabeli, and a cup of tea. I am so full and sated that I’m feeling drowsy. And today promises to be a long, long night. Looking forward to it though. Yay for client calls!

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A cousin recently got engaged and it was such fun. He got engaged to a Punjabi and their ceremony is called ‘Roka’. I like the name. It’s so sweet and innocent. ‘Stopped’, ‘Halted’, ‘Desisted’.

In any case, I love Punjabis - they have such an incomparable amount of ‘joie the vivre’. My prospective sis-in-law’s family was thunderously represented on the dance floor. Her 90 year old grandfather was swinging away to glory. When people told him to slow down because he’d recently hurt his back, he scowled and lifted his walking stick in the air to shoo the naysayers off.

That’s what I love – the total gusto with which these people dance. While my family shuffled around self-consciously, all the while keeping one eye on the buffet (we’re Oriyas – that should explain it), the other group just took to the floor and sang along and swiveled and jumped. It was such a joy to watch them! Even when the DJ played some Spanish numbers (I mean…'Spanish!’), they would just embrace the music even if they couldn’t sing along, even if they didn’t understand the song…I love that spirit! Have feet, will dance. For that reason alone, I think I should everyone marry a Punjabi. And from what I see around me, I think everyone is.

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Usually, when I’m late for office in the morning, I take the 533 bus from Vashi depot. This bus goes to Oshiwara and stops very close to office (which is not in Oshiwara, but en route). Now, the thing with Vashi buses is that they are severely crowded throughout the day. Not only this, but if you don’t find a seat when you get in, it’s likely that you won’t find one until you get out. Everyone seems to get off only at the last stop.

Today, the bus was more crowded than usual. I suppose everyone, like me, had overslept on a Friday morning thinking it to be Saturday. So I pressed my way in and the bus careened off. I am so horrible with balancing myself that I was most thankful to the crowd for wedging me in securely. I was carrying a big, unwieldy lunch-box that was hitting the people around me. Then, I had to dig into my purse for change and I practically fell on top of the man in front of me. He was dozing and woke up with comic alarm. On top of all that, I had moisturized before I left my house, so my hands were greasy. I couldn’t get a grip on the railings and again I did a mini-pirouette before stamping someone and hitting someone else with my tiffin-box.

Blarmy tiffin! That’s why offices have canteens – so employees don’t become nuisances when they travel in BEST.

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Had gone to Pune this weekend. It was a lovely trip – especially the ‘to’ and ‘fro’ parts. I went in one of those tin cases that are non-A/Cs and have twisted railings and teal-colored rubber seats. It was great fun. I had a window seat in a practically empty bus, and I saw enough sights to remember all the happy holidays in my life. Some road trips are like that, you know – you see trinkets of clouds and puddles or huts and grazing cows, and they probably remind you of some field you had spotted when you drove through your village in your childhood.

These non-AC buses make a trip feel so much more picnick-y than the A/C Volvos with Dhoom and Dus playing again and again and again.

This bus took a slightly longer, but a much prettier, woodsy route. I had two gulps of very refreshing sugarcane juice in Khopoli, and I nibbled through a box of chikkis while we lobbed over Lonavala. There was a stretch where I could see swatches of very different kinds of grass and hay. Some squares looked like luscious emerald felt. Some stacks of hay looked like silken flax. And there was an exquisite type of entwinement that lay across the farmlands. They were like huge weaves of a humungous bird. So fine and intricate were its meshes that you could see the fractured prettiness of the world through it. Under the regular Deccan sunshine, these stacks glowed luminescent like an angel’s eyes.

I could only imagine what they’d look like in moonlight.

I had almost finished my chikki by the time we crossed the stretch. Sometimes, even with Nature, we’re only left with crumbs and yet, we’re happy.

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When, in the not-so-distant past, we would applaud the Bombay spirit, and talk about the soft heart in the hard cage phenomenon, there was no mention of ‘outsiders’ then. When we spoke of robust large heartedness of the feet on the street, we never spoke of outsiders then.

But now, when there is attack and shame, we speak of outsiders. Why?

And if the message is that our local homegrown cops cannot deal with the ‘outsiders’, then maybe we need to bring in more capable officials from ‘outside’.

The ones who don’t think that only bomb blasts merit prevention and protection.

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I love reading NY Times, especially their theatre and movie reviews and their food and fashion sections. They are imbued with such intellect and, sometimes, wit. Sharp, sharp, sharp!

I was just reading a review on a couple of Shakespeare’s plays running in Broadway. The review is quite cleverly titled: ‘Howls and Wonder: Shakespeare on Love’ and it talks about ‘Much ado about Nothing’ and ‘Othello’ (this one has Ewan McG as Iago).

The writer talks about the portrayal of Beatrice and Benedick thus: ‘…..Beatrice and Benedick are tricked into believing they are the objects of each other’s confessed love. Both are literally baptized into the new faith.’

It’s true…Love is a new faith. What a wonderful way of putting it!

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Sometimes I wonder if there would be anything in this world if it weren’t for expectations. All thought, theories, institutions, consecrated action groups – what have you… arise out of a sense of disappointment or discord…out of a sense that things are not as they should be. What “should” they be like? Where would we be without this invisible benchmark? This strange, difficult yardstick?

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There are so many scraps of paper between my books and diaries with the openings of stories for the book that I want to write. It would be nice if these scraps were like litmus papers. They’d turn blue if you jotted down ideas that would actually lead to something big – like a published book; and they’d turn red if they were only going to remain tired itties of articulation.

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I had a really substantial tea-time snack now. A huge plate of ‘spring dosa’ which had shredded cabbage and thin, brown onions and lots of green spring onion stalks. That and a large mug of apple juice. My stomach and my soul feel so sated now. I have that happy drowsiness that one feels all day during vacations. Mucho nice!

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I caught a trivia show on radio this morning. Apparently, Bandra station is a 100 years old. Well, it certainly looks it.

Oh, that reminds me…I haven’t booked a train ticket at Bandra station since years now. I usually get a return ticket from Vashi or I travel without a ticket. Just kidding…I take the bus to Vashi from the depot nearby.

I love taking bus numbers 211 and 214 from opposite the station though. I used to live on Ambedkar Road before, and these buses were just the perfect way to reach there. Even today, I love the sweet folksy atmosphere of these buses. They are clean and manned by really courteous conductors and bus drivers. They drive around colorful, bright breakfast places like ‘Just Around the Corner’ and a bustling vegetable market. Then they ride up a narrow cobblestone path and you see such homey sights from the windows that they warm your heart and make you feel cheery. Finally, they stop just outside my building.

I love Bandra. There are seven heavens in one plane of existence and then there is my continent of childhood with the pin code: 400 050.

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I think my current workplace has loads of people who just need to grow up. It is choked with people who are too full of themselves and can’t see beyond their own noses. When I’m in the company of such people, I feel I’m in the midst of squalor. It’s a very surreal kind of feeling. I think that all communication means inviting people to or getting invited to step into a person’s internal crevice, an inside room. So, each one of us are these carriers of hollow spaces. People who are full of themselves seem to have these spaces strewn with rubbish. Garbage cans are full and you have to tiptoe around them carefully so as not to sully yourself. There is no place for you to sit and barely enough for you to move. It’s best to get out of there.

Then, there are cynical people whose inner spaces feel like coffins. There is so much darkness and dampness. Blinds are drawn tight and there’s no fresh air or sunshine.

On the other hand, some other people have such open hearts that they are a delight to be around. Their inner spaces are sunny and airy. There’s no clutter and everything in it feels roomy and comfortable. You don’t have to walk on egg-shells.

Their inner spaces feel like home.

I would like to depict this idea in a painting.

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I think I’m going to Seasons today – to buy a salwar kameez piece for my cousin. Although it will be a pain to get there, what with all this traffic, it will be nice to go shopping with my mom. I think it’s a great boon to have an interesting mother. I mean, even if I don’t agree with anything she says, at least our disagreements are entertaining. I’d like to have dinner with her though – just the two of us. I hope it works out. It will be great fun!

The problem with buying a salwar kameez piece, though, is that I can’t find a nice enough one for my budget – which is 1500 bucks. Maybe I can up it to two thousand rupees. I suppose I’ll just get a couple of kurtis, I think. A red one and a white one. Maybe if I throw in a green one, I’ll make it a Christmas trio ensemble.

Or should I get some nice, luxurious, scented stuff from Body Shop? Choices, choices…

For now, though, an evening with mother sounds great!

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There’s a man in my office who has very beautiful eyes. His lashes are thick, and brown, and they cover his brownish-grey eyes so gently. Looking at his eyes, you get the effect of looking at the moon through the branches of a fir tree. I think he must have spent many hours by a lake.

His screen has a picture of a little girl. I think it’s his daughter. She has the exact same eyes. So beautiful.

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I’m going to make some important changes at work now. I am definitely going to be on time every day. And I have to work in some time to read more about my professional ‘frontiers’ so to speak. Just so I know what’s going on. If one’s not careful, though, it’s easy to limit one’s awareness of professional development to finding out which company is recruiting.

On that note, I think my field is full of clueless people. Most people are in this field because it’s a rather cushy job and pays quite well. Compared to the jobs they were dissatisfied with on account of work or pay. But what I find irritating is that no-one takes the time to read up about the field or spend any free time learning more about it. How is one supposed to feel any engagement with a profession one knows nothing about?

I think that’s why theories are important. They give credence to a discipline. They validate the notion that this field was important enough to dedicate organized thought to.

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I’d gone to a tarot card reader the other day. He has a small shop that sells feng-shui type stuff, and he had a shelf displaying the cutest, littlest, portliest ganpatis. They looked so plump and rotund and chubby, with their tummies thrust out and smiling so beatifically.

Anyway, he told me that I eat too much and that’s why my creativity is blocked. Due to gluttony. I have tremendous potential that I must be mindful of, but it’s just swishing around in some celestial cup because I’m a great gobbler. I told him that I was a vegetarian now, and I have given up meat. “That doesn’t mean you are eating any less,” he said.

Oh well. If my stars, along with my waistline, are giving out that message, there must be something to it.

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Yesterday, I checked out the Crossword sale and found a couple of things I liked – a coffee table book on Desperate Housewives for 249 bucks, I think, and a really neat looking collection of fashion illustration. But I’ve decided not to buy anymore books now. I got a couple of DVDs though – ‘Capote’ and ‘Friends with Money’. I wonder when I’ll watch these flicks.

I was quite tempted to get the DVD for ‘Ratatouille’ though. Next time, perhaps.

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Now, FabIndia is getting frightfully expensive. Why should those faded, curtain-print kurtas cost 650 bucks? Sheesh! I think now cotton is taking the place of silk as a fabric for the rich and elegant. I approve, of course, because cotton is such a smart fabric.

And I also like the ‘cotton-silk fabric’.

I was thinking of getting a smart pair of paints made in this cotton-silk fabric – in some sort of a vibrant print – maybe yellow and pink with silver and turquoise threadwork,. And I’d team it with fitted black tee and chappals.

I quite like the vision in my head.

Where is Nalli’s in Bombay? I think I’ll never find good salwar-kameez pieces in Mumbai.

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Went to Seasons in Santa Cruz yesterday. They had some good stuff and some pretty avoidable stuff. So, it’s basically like any other store. I still didn’t find any salwaar-kameez material I liked, so I just bought something for myself. It’s quite pretty – a churidaar-kameez in ivory colored crinkled cotton with small, dull gold mango print. It looks quite classy – something I could wear to a music recital in town.

Anyway, the trip to Santa Cruz was interesting – I went in one of those squeaky clean, shiny new trains that have gleaming rails and all. Very good. People were, I think, better behaved there. I think we are impacted by our environment more than we give credit for.

In any case, I overheard an interesting conversation between two ladies. One of them was complaining about how crowded the trains are on Sundays. “More than weekdays, it would seem,” she observed.

Her friend explained that frequent travelers use the trains during weekdays. They are the regulars. So, they are adept at the kind of maneuvering and strategy required to get in, make place for oneself in the crowd, and get out as painlessly as possible. On the other hand, on weekends, especially Sundays, the crowd consists of housewives or women who don’t travel too often. So, they just apply brute force to get in and shove around a whole lot to make place, etc. This creates panic and commotion. So, it’s not as if there are more people; there are more clueless, disorganized people. Which is why the volume of travelers seems overwhelming.

Great insight, I think. It’s the same with driving - it takes lesser time if you know the route and the roads – every slump and every bump.

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I’ve had some really good eats lately.

Now, Bembos seems to be a really nice place to eat. I was there the other day (in Mulund) and I tried an Argentinian veggie burger. I really liked their patty. It was crumby and crispy and it had a really nice prickly, herb-like relish on it. Also, I love the fact that they have black coffee. I love black coffee with my burgers – more than Coke.

And last night, after a really really l-o-o-o-n-g time, I had a thali. It was so unbelievably satisfying.

This was at a place called ‘Navratna’ in Vashi. We used to eat there a long time ago when our house in Vashi was being constructed. But since we’ve moved there, we’ve hardly eaten there again.

I love the wholesomeness of thalis. All the little katoris with different tastes and textures. I particularly liked the thick methi daal and really soft, melt-in-the-mouth tandoori rotis. There was also an interesting dish with karela cooked in milk and grated coconut. And the kheer wasn’t too sweet or thick. It was made with vermicelli and saabu daana – both good ingredients for interesting body.

I am feeling so full now, 24 hours later.

I think it’s time to stop.

Thali is a good sign-off to a post titled Assortments.

What they read, what it meant, and how it’s all the same

I was eating a plate of hot, spicy aloo tikki outside the Paschimi gate of the Taj. The adjoining lane is lined with stalls selling ugly monstrosities that capitalize on one of the most beautiful monuments in the world. So, a stall may have plasticky-looking Taj Mahals that get lit up with orange and green lights on the flick of a button. For a few bucks more, the lights will also dance to the tune of ‘O O jaane jaana, dhoondhe tujhe deewana..’

There are humongous rugs on which the marble mausoleum is woven against a garish maroon and yellow background. And of course, there are varieties of coasters with chipped transparent flicks (which are supposed to be ‘mother of pearls’, no less).

Anyway, as I slurped my last spoonful of sweet and pungent chutney and asked for a plate of fresh matthi and chai, I overheard something interesting. A young lad of around 12 years and a much older man, weathered by age and climate and wearing a faded dhoti and brown mojris, were talking about where to get lunch.

Older man to lad: “Mujhe bhook toh lagi hai beta, par main koi maansahaari jagah mein nahin khaoonga.”

Young lad, keen to make sure the old man eats something, reads the signboards of the eateries there. Strangely, there are more English signboards than Hindi ones. The boy, probably struggling with the language, actually moves his index finger along the text of the signboards to read.

Finally, he stops at the signboard of a place called ‘Sheh-Jahaan Mumtaaj Lunch Home – Pure Veg’.

Lad: Hum yahaan khaa sakte hain.

Old man: Maansahaari to nahin hai?

Lad: Nahin. Yahaan pe likha hua hai – 'poore' veg.

Not everything is always lost in translation.

Eggspectations in Agra

I have just returned from a fabulous holiday in Agra. It was cold and the drive from Delhi to Agra was delicious – streams of sunlit roads, tickling stretches of mustard fields, huge kettles of boiling milk at Mathura, mounds of pale sand where women worked on swathes of ‘phiroza’ and orange-colored cloth, delicate rims of pink and purple in the sky making you feel as in you were trapped in the pupil of a celestial eye with a fading iris all around it.

Ruddy camels padding along brick-laid lanes, chaarpais laid out in the sun with raspy radio in the background, hot tea in glasses, full meals - husky rotis smeared with butter, and bowls of spicy yellow daal, dark chhole in thick, brown gravy, chillies slit and rubbed with salt and lemon juice, and tasty jeera papads.

And finger-licking side dishes made with eggs.

It was about 2 or 3 degrees when A and I first strolled along the dusty, crowded Fatehbaad Road. (Interestingly called ‘Fatyabaad’ by some locals.) Considering I had given up meat, it was difficult to stay warm just eating vegetables and the like. So I practically consumed every egg in sight. And the way these eggs were prepared was absolutely fabulous.

My favorite was the omlette in which they’d break two eggs and add masala and onions to the beaten yolk. They’d let the egg cook a little and while the yolk was still runny, they’d add a couple of bread slices in the centre and fold the egg. This way, the slices got coated with the egg and the omlette acquired a fluffy sponginess because of the bread. This omlette, now a large and filling dish, was cut in cubes and served piping hot with green chutney, chaat masala, and a lump of butter on top of it.

Another version was the humble boiled egg. I fancy it more because of the preparation method than its taste – although the latter is mouthwatering.

Here, the cook takes a hard-boiled egg and shells it. It’s really pretty – the way his sharp thumb nail flakes off the skin in mosaic tile format. After this, he takes a string and deftly splices the egg into two. I think the string is used so that none of the hardened yoke crumbles out. Then both parts of the egg are sizzled on a hot pan until the yolk is browned a little bit. The halves are then sprinkled with chaat masala, one other kind of powder, chopped onions, and some dhania and served.

The tastes are so piquant that you definitely need something warm and sweet to round off the meal. So we head to the adjoining rekri where a man sells hot, creamy milk in little clay pots and another one fries imartis. I get one fresh imarti in a leaf bowl and two ladles of milk on it. I gingerly dip the imarti in the milk and nibble my way to gastronomic heaven. The huge cloud of lovely smells and tastes that cocoons me in the winter evening is awesome.

I think I’ll have a great new year.

Happy 2008 to y’all. May you enjoy it on a full, full belly!

While he was sleeping (Poems from my trip to Mc.Leod’s Ganj)

We were at St.John’s church. Just A and I. If mist could be melodious, it was. The graves were somber, cold, and peaceful. Beyond that, there were large, tall trees that played with the fog the way long fingers work through yarn.

A was tired, so he put his head on my lap and slept.

I was inspired, so I wrote.

I]

There are solid cubes of rocks
Parts of an unfinished wall
Wonder what they’re there for
To alleviate or to stall
Passage of lazy time
Or quivering lapses of history
Or hush and give a logical end
To sudden bursts of mystery.



II]

The scene here
Is mechanized to be a poet’s pen
The trees weave stories of ‘How’s’
The clouds sift through texts of ‘When’
But fodder for poetry
Comes either to the imaginative
Or to the brave
Not too many
Tread to find tumult
In a quiet, historical grave.


III]

I keep writing verses
As my husband is in slumber
Amidst ancient memory
And seemingly vintage lumber
In the fashion of a Byron’s poem,
His breaths leave a trail of nuances taken
From pools of dreams and memories, stirred and shaken,
But now, I simply wait
For my sonnet to awaken.

On my trip to some place

I am currently planning a swift getaway with husband. It is taking me every ounce of determination to not just pack up and leave for home now. This feeling to be out of here, to hurriedly pack a couple of shirts, a notebook, and a pen, to be the willing adbuctee of an open road ...this is such a precious tug.

Here’s a wonderful poem that toasts the spirit of a wanderer:

A Wanderer's Song

A WIND'S in the heart of me, a fire's in my heels,
I am tired of brick and stone and rumbling wagon-wheels;
I hunger for the sea's edge, the limit of the land,
Where the wild old Atlantic is shouting on the sand.

Oh I'll be going, leaving the noises of the street,
To where a lifting foresail-foot is yanking at the sheet;
To a windy, tossing anchorage where yawls and ketches ride,
Oh I'l be going, going, until I meet the tide.

And first I'll hear the sea-wind, the mewing of the gulls,
The clucking, sucking of the sea about the rusty hulls,
The songs at the capstan at the hooker warping out,
And then the heart of me'll know I'm there or thereabout.

Oh I am sick of brick and stone, the heart of me is sick,
For windy green, unquiet sea, the realm of Moby Dick;
And I'll be going, going, from the roaring of the wheels,
For a wind's in the heart of me, a fire's in my heels.

John Masefield

Thus we sat by the sea

We were at Tranquebar for our honeymoon. It’s a sea-side village a few hours from Pondicherry. We sojourned at a bungalow on the beach (helpfully called ‘Bungalow on the Beach’). Our room had a verandah with wicker chaises, white cane settees and tables, clay ash trays, and choice views of the landscape and the sky.

Sometimes, we’d have coffee there. Sleepy, slightly disheveled, scruffy in glorious holiday indolence. Our morning brew would come in bright, navy blue ceramicas with a glint of teal. On the round, white table-tops, the cups looked Mediteranean. Opposite the verandah was a Danish fortress that seemed, at once, blanched, bright, and faded. In the Hemingway sunshine, it conjugated through shades of yellow – corn, butter, chartreuse, beige, maize, Navajo white….

Sometimes we would walk on the beach, just the two of us. The sea and the horizon would be rimmed in a green that looked like the iris of a fairy’s eye. There were deep gorges and fissures where crustaceans lay and planktons grew. And the strip of sand stretched like a grainy, ecru carpet. The water licked our toes and the sides of our feet, until I could stand it no longer and splashed my way inside. The swell of waves almost lifting me until I was wet to my waist was incredible. A watched indulgently and took a few snaps.

One day, we found an abandoned canoe. An abandoned canoe on an isolated beach with swaying palms in a raspberry sunset is the stuff movie dreams are made of. But we were there for real. We sat inside and looked around. A surveyed the vastness of the ocean quietly. He turned to me and said, ‘Don’t you think this is perfect?’

‘For what?’, I asked, knowing fully well how sublime twilight on sand can be.

‘Smuggling’, he replied.

I do look forward to growing old with him. The poet.

Just enough for a postcard

I am just back from a holiday. After a nourishing two days with parents, I returned to Pune. It was late and dark, and yet, somehow, I felt happy and free. There was no agitation about whether I would get an auto or whether I would meet a freak on my way home. There were simple merry plans of having dinner alone and walking back, if nothing was available.

This sense of secure belonging was a memento from my trip, I think.

Suddenly, I have this need to pay homage to all those who travel the world – who feel at home on so many, many parts of the earth.

It’s great to look back to see how many steps you have taken, and understand that none of them have been on a ‘strange’ land.

And with that, the greetings

Rickety seats, loud co-passengers, Manoj Kumar getting wet in the rain on T.V.

Z and I look at each other and sigh. The bus trip to Mumbai will be very, very long.

Then Z lightens up the mood.

'One day, Santa (of Santa/Banta notoriety) joins NASA. After six months, the agency changes its name to SATYANASA.'

And with that - Happy Diwali, everyone!

Once upon a time, there was this day

Yesterday was a day of fairytale sequences.

A walk in the park where I saw a spectacular black and green snake. It was the kind of green that would shine in a coal mine. Made for a resplendent slither.

Then, a languorous breakfast and unhurried morning reading. Hazy drift into slumberland and a quaint, funny dream. Hurried plans with friends.

A mince-burger snack by the Khadakvasla dam. Watching water released in swift torrents, creating this spray curtain all around. It is something else to watch the sun through water mist. The innocence of guile. Thinking of college, of the teacher who told me, ‘Speed has nothing to do with progress, direction does.’ Listening to the sonorous gush of free water and thinking that speed does have something to do with progress. It’s more than beauty. It’s more than strength. It’s power - and that is more than so much else.

A trek to the fort. Watching the fog close in at the peak. Feeling fingers go cold and seeing feathery clouds roll in with the wind. Watched the rustle of soft, velvety leaves. The landscape looks like a verdant picture that got blurred. Sitting on old canons in the midst of moss. A perfect, oval lake, complete with an ancient bough arching over it.

A meal cooked in one of the huts. Regular fare – bhakra, besan sabzi, onion and mirchi chutney, crisp bhajia in spicy batter, little pots of thick, slightly sweet curd, creamy, milk-chai. Tasty food had on a charpoy, watching a snail climb a plant. Smiling, remembering how I had thought of speed a few hours back.

An easy climb down. A ride home with a muffled Bon Jovi.

A last look back.

Behind the seemingly uncomplicated tapestry of history, nature and a sudden trip, the sun goes down on an old fort.

To think, I had woken up imagining this to be just another Wednesday – same old, same old. It was, actually… much like timelessness.

Wonder what the snail is thinking.