another turning point

Dear Mama

2011-02-25T23:48:00.001+05:30

It’s going to be two months now and I have finally understood that I will carry your loss in my heart, my thoughts and my conversations...for the rest of my life.

Memories: Of the special way you said my name on the phone, the joy and pleasure coming through in your voice. Of how you would make my favorite dishes each time I visited Delhi the last few years, and how you excitedly brought home goodies every day. Of how you complained that I spent all my time reading rather than chatting with you over those precious few vacation days. Of your boundless energy. Of your beauty. Of your tales of bunking knitting classes and learning how to cook from Dad. Of the way you fooled a one-year-old me into believing you went to office in the evenings while you merrily watched movies with Mamaji. Of repeatedly making you recount the forgotten parts of my childhood, mostly for the joy you took in narrating them. Of the way you shunned the camera, and the pleasure we took in threatening you with it. Of ribbing you about your dates with Dad at Connaught Place after your engagement. Of your fondness for Pyaasa. Of your academic brilliance and your dreams of getting into the foreign service, cruelly shattered due to the failure of an elder sibling. Of your nagging. Of the sound advice you gave me that I seldom heeded. Of the pride you took in your subject and your job. Of the courage with which you took on life. Of the way you ended every phone conversation we had in the last two difficult years with ‘I love you’.

Regrets: Of not telling you enough how much you meant to me. Of not saying I love you as many times as I should have. Of saying too many “You did not” and too few “You did”. Of not being able to break into the inner shell you retreated into recently. Of the hug that I did not give in my hurry to leave on that cold January morning, little knowing I would never see you again.

Anger: At life, for dealing you a lousy pack of cards – you deserved better, Mama. You fought long, you fought hard, you played by the rules. But by leaving so quickly and unexpectedly, you hoodwinked us all.

To quote one of your your favorite songs - Yeh duniya agar mil bhi jaaye to kya ho. I hope you are in a happy place, Mama.

Wake up, Karan Johar!

2009-10-08T18:25:00.004+05:30

Karan Johar must have had an impossibly happy childhood. So he refuses to grow up. And paint a contrived, over the top view of the world.

A cute 20 year old who wears t-shirts with cartoon characters. The first time, it's cute; the fifth time, Grow up!

A spoilt 20 year old who does not understand that money does not grow on trees watered by tequila & vodka? Grow up!

An unemployed, middle class 27 year old stumbles upon a vast apartment overlooking the sea in one of the most expensive cities in the world. So much for all the Bombayites who break their backs for decades, trying to own their tiny little piece of heaven!

A 26 year director who decides to make his first film based upon, guess what, his own trials and tribulations (spoilt kid belonging to a top film family who obviously grew up believing money is watered with beer and girlfriends).

A young 'serious cinema' actress who has taken her intellectual label so seriously that she carries a perpetual sulk in all her movies. It looks fresh the first time, but by the tenth time, you just feel like straightening out her mouth with both hands so she looks less like the Joker. WHY SO SERIOUS Konkana?

The redeeming moments - the tension between the hard-at-work girlfriend and stay-at-home younger boyfriend. The music - the beautifully worded Ektara and the breezy Kya Karoon. And Ranbir Kapoor a.k.a. Sid, who has surely inherited his dad's genes as he infuses the main character with a believable innocence.

It's finally sinking in!

2009-10-08T18:21:00.001+05:30

After months of anticipation and excitement, the day is almost there - in another 4 days & 4 hours, I leave for Beijing on my onwards journey to Chengdu for my Corporate Service Corps assignment.

As I inform my project and department teams about the away-time, I can sense their excitement. I am flooded with follow-up emails & ST's - how do we apply; do you know what you will do; do we get to choose a country; who are the other team members; Wow, you'll be involved in some of the earthquake reconstruction work; etc. As friends from outside work who are aware of the assignment also email me, I realize what a unique opportunity IBM has presented us with!

For now, my life revolves around checklists – and the entries are increasing by the day!

- Passport & Visa: Green
- Complete background reading on Chengdu & China: Yellow – you can never read enough about this vast and fascinating land, can you?
- Collect previous team experiences on my assignment: Yellow – again, so much information, so many different places.
- Plan travel in other parts of China: Almost Green :-) I just need to choose between Lijiang and Wuyi Mountain for the last leg of the journey, and make bookings accordingly.
- Shopping: Red. Guess I’ll save this for when I get to China.
- Scream from the rooftops that I’m off to work with a global, cross functional team on social and economic issues: Green, font 100

It’s difficult to stay focused when I can barely contain my excitement - 7 weeks - hurrray!!!

Tokyo, Interrupted

2009-09-26T22:23:00.006+05:30

My first impression of Tokyo is of a city straight out of a child’s toy box – block upon block of glass and concrete, packed together, competing with each other to touch the skies. After the charming houses and vibrant hues of Bangalore, the surfeit of identical skyscrapers and complete absence of greenery comes as a shock – the first stretch of trees I saw was in front of the Imperial Palace on my third day in the city!

But walk the streets and you realize that there is more to Edo than simply the race to the top. The restaurants with their brightly colored signs, the pretty lamps, and the quaint door and window curtains are a complete delight. The famous Japanese efficiency and perfection leaves you spellbound when you encounter if firsthand. But like a mature woman resplendent in her red lipstick and bright rouge, Tokyo is best encountered in the evening - with its makeup of bright lights full on to dazzle and captivate the visitor.

So here are five things about Tokyo that I liked:

1. The food, definitely. The Japanese are known for their innovation in technology, but their food is equally, if not more, creative! Most of us know Japanese cuisine by our sushi & sashimi and teppanyaki, but there is so much more the country has to offer – I sampled Hitsumabushi, an eel meal with special eel from Nagoya ; Shabu-shabu, the Japanese hot-pot; Izakaya – casual Japanese dishes, which include hand made udon (thin, grey-brown noodles) and soba (thick wheat noodles) ; Kushiyaki – meat, fish or veggies on skewers; raw chicken sashimi (I was feeling adventurous, and it turned out to be quite nice! ), Okonomiyaki (pancake stuffed with cabbage, seafood and/or meat) and its variant Hiroshimayaki; Monja – veggies in soup cooked on a hotplate at the table; Yakitori – baked chicken; and finally, Ramen – Chinese style wheat noodles in a thick broth with veggies/seafood/meat. And of course, the crowning glory – the best sushi in the world at Tsukiji fish market.

2. The technology, obviously. Simple things that amaze you – like how the radio would magically turn on the moment I’d turn on my bathroom lights. The cute little mini-projector. The little hand-held devices on which the waiter takes the order which automatically gets transmitted to the kitchen – one of the restaurants we visited had a little machine on our table through which we could directly place our request! I was also told by my Japanese colleague that technology is intensively used in agriculture – which explains how the country continues to produce amazingly fresh fruits & vegetables. Is our agriculture minister listening?

3. The efficiency and abundant display of common sense. The best example is the cafeteria at office – a lady with her small battalion of helpers would so efficiently allot tables to a patiently waiting queue of 50-100 people at peak hunger hour! For a land prone to typhoons and storms, rains are common, but that doesn’t interrupt life in any way. Each office and restaurant has a little machine into which you stab your dripping umbrella – and voila, it emerges packed in plastic so you don’t bring the rains indoors. Such simple stuff that you wonder why no one’s thought of it before.

4. The quaint little customs. It is considered rude to leave the restaurant door open after you have entered. But please don’t be a stupid foreigner as you try to open or shut your taxi door – it is remote controlled, silly! The immaculately well turned out taxi drivers in their gray coats and white shirts. The extreme politeness in official and social interactions – the most commonly heard phrases in Japan are hai (Ok/I agree) and ‘arigato gozaymasu’ (Thank you for your support) – even business leaders will start their meetings with you with the latter phrase! And it’s still fairly common to see people in offices bowing deeply and not showing their backs to people considered more senior.

5. The different faces of the city by day and by night. Tokyo early morning is best witnessed at the Tsukiji fish market – as locals and tourists head to their favorite sushi place for breakfast, then stop by at a tea shop to sip their favorite brew in pretty little saucers, stopping by on the way to pick up some colorful plates and essential herbs for the house. During the day, the city is a hub of activity as suit-clad men and women go about their business And in the evening, the bright lights and skyscrapers of Ginza, Shibuya and Roppongi dazzle and beckon the onlooker into their embrace.

Talk to a local and you will notice many similarities with India – the craving for a son in the family, the tendency to continue living and caring for your parents, the glass ceiling for women in the workplace ... In many ways, the Japanese are much more rooted in custom than the average city-bred Indian is.

The notorious quirkiness and loneliness of the average Japanese is not hard to miss as you walk the streets. Most people walk alone, with their heads bowed or buried in a newspaper – the younger set is lost in their PSP’s or music players. 15-20 hour days are common at work, which undoubtedly would take a toll on family life, especially over an extended period of stay. While I was in Tokyo, the Democratic Party ended the historic 50 year old rule of the Liberal Democrats – but my colleagues did not expect any real change and said the results just showed that the people were fed up and wanted some change – which in itself is extremely uncharacteristic of the stoic and patient Japanese. The IHT proclaimed that no government could bring about a real change till the Japanese opened their doors to foreign immigrants and allowed major reforms in their all-power bureaucracy.

Japan to my mind is at a unique crossroad– the stagnation in the economy has also raised questions about the adequacy of the traditional Japanese values of consensus, hard work, quality and team work. The political change is the first indication that their legendary patience is running out, but are they ready for the big change?

Saturdays

2009-09-11T13:00:00.001+05:30

Last Saturday
Wake up at 8 after eight full hours of sleep, thank you Hypnos!
Scrambled eggs, ham and toast for breakfast. Satisfied burp.
Train to Kamakura.
Hot, hot, hot …daintily wave my Japanese fan and slurp on iced tea.
Say hello to the resident deity at the Shinto shrine.
Hike to the beach and catch a view of the Pacific Ocean.
Go to german café, ignore surly owner and chill on German beer, sausages and potato wedges.
Hop to Italian café next door. Stretch out at the ocean-facing bay windows. Nibble on dainty little starters and pizza.
Greet the bronze Budha.
Back to the hotel – run 5 km on treadmill. Attagirl!
Okonomiyaki and Monja dinner at Shibuya. Yummmmmy. Chatter and laughter as we make the pancakes. Enough time for me to finish a bottle of sake
Delicious sleep at hotel – Monday is still a night away!

This Saturday
Three hours of sleep, constant snoozing of alarm, panicked waking up – I’m sure my flight has taken off already!
Throw up airport sushi breakfast in the flight. Feverish sleep for 5 hours. Horrible to fall ill on a flight.
Another 5 hours of flying from Singapore to home. Dinner is fish again – hope it doesn’t mean another trip to the loo :-(
Looong wait for suitcase at the carousel. Obviously.
Crazy cab driver with F1 aspirations on Bangalore’s roads. Tick him off.
Our man takes revenge by refusing to carry my suitcase up the stairs despite my offer of generous tip. Bluhdy. Pant, heave, yikes
Midnight. My bed beckons. What a terrible, terrible way to spend a Saturday!

No free lunch if you're a woman

2009-08-16T23:01:00.004+05:30

Afghani women who refuse to have sex with their husbands will not be given any food. And they can go out to earn their food only if the darling husband provides permission.

And who do they have to thank for this benevolence? Not the Taliban, but the moderate Prime Minister Hamid Karzai. You see, Mr Karzai needs to win over minority hardliners in order to secure another term in power. And if this grand mission requires sacrificing a few more rights of women, so be it - they are used to suffering anyway.

Again, I count my blessings. And again I wonder how it comes to this - how governments that are meant to represent our best interests rub our noses into the dust. And we wait for it to pass, without a whimper or a whisper of protest.

Books : Half of a Yellow Sun

2009-08-15T01:32:00.004+05:30

2 Oct 2007
I enjoyed reading Half of a Yellow Sun by Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie.
Set against the backdrop of the Nigerian-Biafra Civil War of 1967-70, the book follows the lives of Ugwu, a bright African house boy employed by Odenigbo, the brilliant socialist reformer; the dissimilar twins Olanna and Kainene - the former stunningly beautiful and compassionate, the latter ugly and brilliant; and finally Richard, Kainene's British born fiance who feels more at home in Biafra than in his native land.

The book chronicles the impact of war on the lives of the protagonists- the loyal and innocent Ugwu rapes a bar girl when he is forced into army service (only to learn a year later that his favorite sister Anulika was raped by five Nigerian soldiers); the changing dynamics in the relationship between Odenigbo and Olanna as the latter emerges from needing Odenigbo to providing strength to the family as they witness the deaths of their relatives; how Olanna and Kainene overcome their differences and rediscover the sisterly warmth that they missed out on during their youth; and finally, the softening of Kainene in the presence of the mild, besotted Richard.
One of the reasons I enjoyed the book was that, as an Indian, I could relate with the context - the British colonization and divide-and-rule policy that deepens the suspicions between the Yoruba's and Igbo's (the North and the South) is reminiscent of the Hindu-Muslim divide. Adichie treats her characters with realism and empathy - gently portraying their warts and blemishes without passing judgement. Her choice of characters is also interesting - the poor Ugwu who is educated by his masters and goes on to write a book; the stunningly beautiful but surprisingly insecure Olannna who comes into her own during the war as she displays a Melanie-like courage; the handsome and reformist Odenigbo, so good with words but utterly helpless when faced with adversity; the brilliant and acerbic Kainene, evidently resentful of her twin's beauty and yet unable to ignore her enigmatic presence; and handsome but meek Richard who aspires to be a writer and ends up 'belonging' to Biafra.

This is a book about not forgetting, even though "how quick leaving had been and how slow returning was". The descrpition of the war, of how politicians use people's passions to their own ends, is moving without being melodramatic -"He (Biafran leader) would come back with justice and salt" - Olanna's belief when she hears that His Excellency is going abroad to look for peace is a poignant commentary on the common man's feelings about war.

The relationship between the twins is also well explored - when Kainene comes to meet Olanna after a long estrangement, the sisters are taking tentative steps towards a reconciliation. As they talk, Kainene leans against Olanna, and then suddenly, as if remembering something, straightens up. Olanna then feels the "slow sadness of missing a person who was still there".

The element of surprise, that essential spice of life, remains intact in Adichie's writing. Some of the chapters end with a short extract from a book titled The World Was Silent When We Died. We read about Richard working on a book by this name, but the true author is revealed in the end, dedicated "For Master, my good man" - 'my good man' being the reformist Odenigbo's name for Ugwu. Kainene's disappearance and the author's refusal to divulge her whereabouts - is she dead or alive? - keeps the reader hooked.

There is no happy ending, but there is hope - of renewal, of survival and of life carrying on, despite all odds.

London bus rides, National Gallery and British Library

2009-08-15T01:30:00.000+05:30

13 Aug 2007, London
A visit to London is incomplete without a ride in the red double decker buses (made more famous in India thanks to Rahul serenading Simran in one of those!). I thought it would be a good idea to see a bit of London through these buses - after all, a good traveller has no plans and is not intent on arriving!

So I boarded the Number 15 at Bond Street, went down Oxford Street, past Hyde Park Corner and onto Edgware Road, which seems to have a strong Muslim presence - there are numerous places selling Lebanese food, and there is the the Islamic Bank of Britain, Al-Mustafa, and surprisingly, Ladbrokes!

We took a left onto leafy Sussex Gardens, with shaded trees, hotels, inns and lodges. Then onto St Mary’s Hospital, to the left of which is Sir Alexander Fleming’s house, and to its right the Imperial College, London.

We went further down to reach Paddington Underground, with the Hilton Paddington next door, and further down to Eastbourne Terrace, with the old Paddington station on one side, and a dull brown, Russian looking building (London seems to have several of those!) on the other. In contrast, Westbourne Terrace further down is prettier, with pale yellow old buildings and pubs with the trademark basket of many hued geraniums hanging on the front door.

The bus ended at Old Paddington Station, which, contrary to my expectations, appears on the outside to be dingy and unprepossessing – more like a warehouse than a train station. No wonder so many of Dame Agatha’s murders were committed on trains out of Paddington!

While I was poring over the bus map to decide where to head next, No 205, which goes by the British Library, arrived. I had been debating whether I should visit the Library, and the arrival of the bus made up my mind. We rode up Liverpool Street, past the trademark London red colored houses with white windows and white arches, onto Hyde Park and then the Edgware Road Underground Station, further onto Marylebone Road.

The Marylebone Underground Station is an old building in reddish brown and skin-brown bricks with white doors and windows. Further down is the extremely old Westminster Council House, next to which are the fortress-like red and white mansions.

Further on is Baker Street, peppered with several old buildings and mansions in red brick and white trimmings. Madam Tussauds is also situated on Baker Street, close to the old building that houses the UG Station, as also is the old St. Marylebone Church.

Baker Street leads onto Harley Street, famous for its doctors and physicians. The Regent’s Park UG Station is situated here, and further north is the Portland Street – Euston Square crossing which has several modern glass and chrome structures, an aberration in London’s ancient skyline.

Euston Road is peppered with several historical structures, but the contemporary red bricked British Library, set against the backdrop of the St. Pancras Parish Church which is currently being converted into a five star hotel, is striking.

Europe, here I come!

2009-08-15T01:24:00.000+05:30

8 Aug 2006, 5:45 am, Blore HAL Airport
So here I am – ready to board British Airways flight no BA 118 to London. Though it still hasn’t completely sunk in that I am on my way to London, France & Netherlands – I guess that will happen only after I reach Heathrow. John Steinbeck says in Travels with Charly that in long range planning for trip, there is a private conviction that it won’t happen. In my case, for some inexplicable reason, I have been almost wanting it not to happen.

Not surprising, considering that this trip was decided on an impulse, and that my travel plans have changed at least five times a day over the last ten days! Thanks to which, I am now well versed with the geography of France, Germany & Belgium – no mean accomplishment given my intense dislike for the subject.

So to begin at the beginning. Flashback to three weeks ago, sitting in P’s car, listening to her block tickets for London. She’d told me about V’s plan of picking up a BMW in Munich and driving around Europe, and while it had sounded exciting, I really hadn’t thought I would take up the offer. Now, however, the prospect of Europe on top-class BMW wheels appeared to be just the break I needed.

So tickets were booked; A, my school friend in London informed, who also decided to take a week off and join us. The question now was – should we follow V’s itinerary or plan our own? After all, I had already seen Munich, Berlin and a few other places in Germany, so it didn’t make sense to spend more time there. Anuja mentioned she had a friend in Belgium, and since it appeared to be relatively easy to get a Schengen for Belgium, we decided in two minutes to travel to Belgium. And thus began the game of musical chairs.

For I had to get to Netherlands ultimately, since I was booked on a return flight from there. The original concept of ‘BMW driving in Europe’ now put in the parking lot (I still harbored dreams of having a spin in the car), I came up with new itineraries very day, each enthusiastically embraced by A, and equally enthusiastically discarded upon presentation of the next dream route. So one day it was the Belgian village route, another day a discovery of Rhineland, a third following the German cuckoo route through the Black Forest, and so on.

Finally, we settled on a driving holiday in France. Since we were limited by geography (I had to enter from Belgium and exit into Netherlands), it wasn't too difficult to narrow our dream destination to the Normandy regions of France. So while A arranged the car, I now concentrated my energies on identiying a suitable chambre d'hote (bed & breakfast) in Normandy, with the intention of driving along the English channel for a while and then venturing further inland.

A concurred (as she had been doing to all my mad cap plans over the last week!) and volunteered to arrange the car - so now, I will be driving in Europe - DDLJ, main aa rahi hoon!

Harlem

2009-08-15T01:16:00.001+05:30

What happens to a dream deferred?

Does it dry up
like a raisin in the Sun?
Or fester like a sore -
And then run?
Does it stink like rotten meat?
Or crust and sugar over-
like a syrupy sweet?

Maybe it just sags
like a heavy load

Or does it explode?

Countee Cullen

Frankfurt Diary

2009-08-15T00:39:00.000+05:30

2 Oct 2004, 12:30 PM
So here I am. After telling Dad to take me along on an impulse, not really believing I'd make it after he said Yes, later hoping that the trip wouldn't work out (mind over impulse?), and finally getting my visa at literally the last moment (while I was boarding my flight to Delhi, with planned departure the very next day!) - I am finallydisembarking Air India's flight at the Rheine International Airport, Frankfurt. Someone please pinch me.

Of course I have butterflies in my stomach - after all, this is no client visit where I'll be escorted around, can hop, skip & jump into and out of cabs to my heart's content and have the luxury of splurging on the exotic locla delicacies (thankfully, exotic food in Germany probably means dry, dry meat, so I'm happy to pass). I am on a personal visit to earth's most expensive continent, with zilch planning or background research (I was busy winding up work you see!). It's not something I'm very comfy with, but that's what makes the trip exciting too! Achtung baby.

The airport's typically German - no frills and supra efficient. I personally believe that airports reveal the character of a country (you only need to look at IGI for verification) - here, I completed my customs clearance in a mere 60 secs - ohmigosh!

So all signs in German when we step outta the airport! Hunting for a cab (too much luggage, and Dad is paying :-)) - ah, there's a cute driver - kinda intellectual looking. The weather's nice and bright - what am I going to do with all the heavy wollens I lugged along! OHMIGOSH - the cab driver has a PALM installed next to his steering wheel. No not a tree you duh, but a palmtop - ohmigawd, ohmigawd, ohmigawd - can I swap places with you please? Ok, lets' concentrate on the view outside (envious glance back every minute at the Palm - sigh)

Hotel Intercontinental, Room 1614
Our room overlooks the Maine River and the view is breathtaking. I can see a jogging trail running parallel to the bank (of course I will plan to go jogging at 6 am, and OF COURSE I will never do it), a scating ring teaming with kids, a few cruisers and a pictursque bridge begging to be walked on. The waters are placid and clear (or is it just the '360 feet view') and the banks beyond are a lush green, but right now my soft bed beckons!

Evening
Walked to the Haupbahnof (central station) - what a pretty building teeming with life and yummilicous smells - I wander around and see all kinds of cuisines - Chinese, French, Sushi, Lebanese, Italian - yummmmy.
Walking back to the streets actoss the Haupbahnof in search of dinner - Dad recalls a good Turkish restaurant that he frequented on previous visits (every second eatery in Germany is probably Turkish). Let's go beyond the crossing, says Dad.
H: Look there Abs, that part seems to be full of life! I'm sure your restaurant is there
D: (squirming in discomfort) No, that's where the live bands are
H: Oh really, WOW, Let's go there then!
D: (half turning away) You can go, Not me
H: (Since when did dad become such a frump?) But WHY?
D: Coz they are live bands
H: Even better, I love live music!
D: (half shouting) don't you understand - its nude shows, striptease..
H: Ohmigosh, I thought you meant people jamming away
D: (Do-you-really-belong-to-this0world look) Can we turn back NOW?

Sigh. But now I'm tempted to explore the 'live bands' (Big evil grin). We turn into a side street, and my eyes light upon an Eros Center - rooms aglow with a warm red light, the sign of a heart outside. Looks nice and cosy - not the dingy and dirty hovels we seem to have back home for these services. We continue to walk down the street, which is lined with discrete places advertising peep shows (entry free - wah, wah). But you can't see a thing or hear a sound outside - this is definitely not Patpong! There are also numerous sex shops advertising toys, aids, the works. My curiosity is piqued - I'm dying to see what's inside! Gotta come back here sometime. Sigh, wish I wasn't alone.

3rd October
Decided to take up the advice of the Tourist Info lady and walk around the city center. The streets are deserted, most shops are closed, but everything's working to Germanic precision. Ogled at the Merc showroom - took a pic of the sexy Black Beauty inside (C Class - only Euro 90K). Frankfurt has some mouthwatering cars - sexy convertibles (BMW, Merc, Jaguar), cute Opels and Audi's, sleek VW's - you name it. sigh. Wish I could marry a German. Sigh. Miss A terribly.

Walk, walk, walk - after soo many diversions, finally stumbled upon the Old Opera House - Alde Oper. And it's worth the 30 minute walk - a beauty that commands attention! The statues of a demonic man & woman, the beautifully carved lamp posts, the entire facade - I catch my breath. There is a fountain close by, and an open air restaurant with red seats (fitting for an opera cafe I must say!). I walk around the building, admiring the facade and the engravings. Time to capture this for posterity - ouch, my roll's reached its end, and the backup rolls are in the hotel. Bloody careless. Trudge back home.

Finally going for my walk down the bridge on the river Maine. As I wait for the lights to turn, my eyes rest upon a couple across the road - arms entwined around each other, kissing and hugging, even as the lights turn green. As we pass each other, I can't help notice the girl glowing with happiness.
Shit. I wanna go back home. Miss A sooo much. Sigh sigh sigh.

A typical weekend

2009-07-22T12:58:00.003+05:30

For the single and fancy free, the frenetic planning starts mid week (and often on the previous Sunday itself). So here are some options that we discuss, debate, embrace and discard:

Louis Banks is playing jazz at Alliance....we MUST go and listen to him

There is a play at Rangashankara, or at Chowdiah…or a festival of movies at MMB or AFI or….

Bangalore School of Music is organizing a Mozart tribute, a piano recital or a symphony orchestra

Hey, how about the Odissi performance tonight…or the Karnatic Music concert (never tried that before)

Let’s wake up early on Sunday, go to Cubbon Park to listen to the morning ragas, jog around for a while (15 minutes) and top it up with breakfast at Koshy's or yummy omelettes at Lakeview (we've switched loyalties to Ants now)

Where should we go for dinner tonight? I’ve tried virtually every dish in Herbs & Spices already…Mainland China – nah, just had the buffet the other day….

I will just oil my hair, plonk myself on the balcony and attack my unread pile of books.

Hey, I haven't seen a movie in years (read, 5 days)....lets catch the last show at Lido today

Let's watch War of the Roses or the latest movie we downloaded on the laptop

.....Sooo many choices, so many decisions. And unsaid, just beneath the surface, a wish to not have so many choices, to have something more concrete to fill up the void…whatever that might be.

Curious about what the happily married DINKs and the hum-do-humaare-do talk about!

Wanderlust - the road beckons!

2009-07-09T23:53:00.002+05:30

I'm applying for the Great Driving Challenge sponsored by Mitsubishi Cedia. Those of you who have enjoyed reading about my journeys over the past 3 years, please to show your support by voting for me at http://www.greatdrivingchallenge.com/application/Hina/

Spread the word, thanks in advance :-)

The perfect wife

2009-06-21T21:28:00.002+05:30

We were having lunch last week when we heard about the Shiney Ahuja rape case. "Why a maid, when he just had to bat his eyes at me", a friend joked, and we laughed in agreement. We thought it was a frame-up or the latest media grabbing breaking news. But when there appeared to be some truth to the charge, our immediate reaction echoed the sentiment that has dominated public space - what was the need to do it with a maid when he could have put one in with virtually any girl (of better social standing than a maid - but that was the part that's left unsaid).

But this post isn't about class distinctions. This post is about Shiney' loyal wife - Anupam. A wife who has been in a long distance relationship with her husband for the past several years. An educated and successful career woman who has by now mastered the art of turning the other way on reports of her husband's affairs. But a woman, who, despite being 10,000 km away in New York, can state with conviction that her husband is incapable of committing such an act and is being framed. A conviction that every perfect wife has uttered over the past zillions of years, the honorable US Secretary of State included.

I can't understand women like her. I can understand the need to stand by your partner and forgive his infidelities, but this is rape for chrissake! What, I wonder, would she have said if Shiney was accused of raping her sister? In all probability, she would have still supported her husband. When will we women break away from these misplaced shackles of loyalty and duty, and learn to stand up for the truth instead? Why couldn't Anupam say something like - I find it difficult to believe that my husband committed such a crime, but I will let the law decide. And if he is found guilty, I will publicly condone the act - for I can understand a man who cheats, but I cannot understand a man who has to force himself upon a helpless little girl to satisfy his urges.

But that is not what good wives do.

Customer Service

2009-04-16T18:21:00.000+05:30

Overhead, a lady calling a guy in the US at what must be close to 11.30 pm his time.

Hi Sir, this is XX from ABC, this is about the customer service complaint you ...hello, hello....can you hear me Sir, hello, hellooooo, is it too late for you Sir?...this is about the customer service....hello Sir....SIR, SIR....oh, you were sleeping. I'm sorry, I will call you in the evening...what time should I call you...

I am very curious to know if the poor bloke continued the conversation, and if he decides to to continue his patronage of ABC after this 'service' call. Duh.

I have a dream...

2009-03-18T00:23:00.000+05:30

...of meeting this SUPER DUPER rich man. Who doesnt stink. Who's reasonably nice and funny. Who likes travel and adventure, sometimes. And maybe, just maybe, he digs something more than Jeffery Archer or Sydney Sheldon. Dare I dream that he knows who Vikram Seth or Pablo Neruda is? No, I'm getting beyond myself now.

So, he's reasonably nice & funny. and VERRY rich. That's all.

He likes me. and I like him.

We get married (ok, Im not too particular about getting married, as long as I have legal rights over his money!)

I wake up every morning and make orange juice for him. no added sugar.

We go jogging in the park (I can just about manage 7 am, though 8 would be much nicer, thank you).

We both have happy, fulfilled lives. He's busy amassing his riches. I'm busy blowing them up on big rocks of diamonds, little black dresses and pointy red shoes. Just to keep HIM on his toes, you see.

We give each other space. Over the years, he falls for my best friend. And i fall for his brother.

But, this too shall pass.

And we live happily ever after....

Dear Roger

2009-03-05T11:43:00.005+05:30

Dear Roger,

I should have paid heed to the age old wisdom of watching my words when I expressed sympathy with Rafa after the French Open final. I thought he was content being the greatest Number Two in the history of the game. I suppose you thought so too.

Looking back, the warning bells rang in the 07 Wimbledon final, when he took you to five sets. Granted, the courts at Wimby are getting slower (I am told this is a deliberate tactic – slower courts mean more long rallies and hence, hopefully, more interest in tennis – no one is talking about the quality of play of course), but let’s also admit that we under-estimated Rafa by assuming he was happy with the tag of clay court specialist, shall we?

After the disappointment at Melbourne and the humiliation at Roland Garros (forgive me, but I still cannot erase the memory of the final set), I was looking forward to redemption at SW 19 . When you lost those first two sets, I was ready to flee to the Swiss Alps. As the third set started, one thought played repeatedly in my mind – Oh God, please don’t let him lose in straight sets, please God, pleeeeeease.

Luckily, God heard our collective pleas, and you drew upon your deepest reserves to fight off the challenger. Your scorching backhand pass when Rafa held match point in the fourth set will remain a part of “Federer Magic Moments” tales to my grandkids. When you pushed the match into the fifth, I was screaming with joy – the Emperor was not going to cede his crown easily, and I was already celebrating a record-breaking sixth.

Oh what a heart breaker the last set was. Just as you seized the momentum after the first rain break, the pendulum appeared to shift towards Rafa after the second rain interruption. I suppose you were taken by surprise too – for who before this gutsy Mallorcan had dared to battle so long and so hard against The Great One, and that too at your spiritual home?
But we consoled ourselves – perhaps it was fair to the prince, given how well he had fought these two years. Did you sense then that the luck was turning away from you? I have to admit that I did not.

Things just seemed to get worse from there, didn’t they. Suddenly you were losing to the likes of a much improved Andy Murray and Giles–who-Simon. The very people who had idolized you now called for your head – he’s lost the fire, he should just retire graciously while he’s on a high. Comparisons with Bjorg were ominously invoked. I’m sure you laughed at their folly – forgive them for they know not about perfection. Yes Roger, Ed Smith was bang on when he said that your motivation is mastery, not competition. Unfortunately, this may just turn out to be your greatest liability against Rafa.

It could have been so easy for you to give up. I have often wondered – What does a gymnast do when she realizes one morning that her body no longer bides her command; what does the marathoner do when his feet do not obey his exhortations to run FASTER, FASTER! ? The fire is still there, but the midas touch is cruelly snatched away. The Gods had blessed you, but suddenly, just before the coronation, they decided to look the other way.

But then, these are the obstacles that separate the boys from the men, ain’t it? And forgive us silly mortals Roger – but we love triumph in the face of adversity. And for the greatest glory, well, a few tumbles, a couple of injuries, a near-death experience – that makes the tale so much more entertaining. If you win it all too easily, like you did, we are a bit disappointed (and jealous). We attribute it to good luck, choosing to ignore the extraordinary effort that you had put in over the years to hone your phenomenal talent. But throw in a slice of bad luck, a run of losses, and we’re back to loving you again – “what an extraordinary talent – he should have got to 20 Grand Slams by now, had it not been for ….” – we say with misty eyes.

So you valiantly fought on. And you celebrated the small victories when the big ones eluded you – the Olympics Doubles being a case in point. You still didn’t look your old self – the magical feet seemed be a trifle slower, the precision reflexes just a wee bit off target – but you persevered. Fittingly, you got your reward when you annihilated Djoker & Murray to win a record fifth US Open.

I was more relieved than delighted – The Great One was back. So were you. 2009, and a record equaling 14th Grand Slam title, beckoned.

Let us not talk about the Australian Open final, shall we? Let us not talk about faith misplaced, about the ogre in your head, about being faced with your mortality. But, dear Roger, the facts are these:

- I know you want to reclaim your Number One ranking, but it is going to be exceedingly difficult, if not impossible – not with Rafa’s current form and Murray, Djoker and the young set breathing down your neck.

- You are 27, five years more than Rafa and the Young Brigade. In a sport that gets younger each year, you are a veteran (albeit a much loved and much revered one)

- Undoubtedly, you are the most inventive player in the history of the game. But the Rafa Cavalry can read your game, and if they can’t match you on talent and beauty, they CAN blunt you with raw power. More importantly, they are not in awe of The Great Federer – they step on court to beat you, not to give you a good fight.

- You CAN still win many more Grand Slams, including the French Open (though I do not see you beating Rafa to win it – and it kills me to admit this!). You are physically fit, have looked in much better touch in 09 than the whole of 08, and you still have the fire and desire for ascendancy.

But – there is no doubt that Rafa has improved his game much more over the last two years than you have. True, your game is almost perfect, and your biggest strength has always been that you have no apparent weakness – but the Mallorcan draws out the devil in you, doesn’t he? Over the last year, you have looked uncertain against him – both in your tactics and your execution. Should you try and bring him more to the net? Maybe, but certainly not at the French Open. Should you try and outlast him from the baseline? But you like finishing your games quickly – so you usually run out of patience much before he does. As a result, you have failed to capitalize on precious opportunities and repeatedly allowed him to wrest the game away from you. In short, you have let him do to you what you have done to numerous other worthy players over a career of breathtaking brilliance.

So is there no solution to the Rafa conundrum? Of course there is. But acknowledging that there is a problem is the first step towards addressing it. And I get the feeling right now that you are simply not willing to admit that, possibly for the first time in your life, you are faced with a challenge that you cannot unravel on your own (or with the help of the former Swiss Women’s No 1).

So, why not forget the No 1, why not focus on the Grand Slams, and get some help while you’re at it? Why not get a good coach that you can stick with for a while? Why not visit a shrink who can help bury the demons? (Many years ago, you and Marat Safin had two things in common – prodigious talent and a volatile temper. You sought professional help at the start of your career – and look where you are now compared with the equally talented Russian). And why not borrow a lesson or two from your opponents, especially the one that reads “Don’t give up”?

There is nothing any tennis lover wants more than to watch you play, if possible for ever. And we would much rather see you surprise the challengers with your beauty and guile than hear your views on the WTA rankings. Bring back the belief, the glory will follow.

No Country for Western Wear

2009-03-03T23:41:00.003+05:30

Amongst the many attractions of Bangalore when I first landed here five years ago was the security and freedom it offered to young, single women like me. This was especially true of Indiranagar, my adopted neighbourhood in the city. I could drive back from work at 3 or 4 in the morning, every day. I could walk back home after dinner at 10 pm, 11 pm or midnight. I could stop to rescue a puppy at 1 in the morning while driving the wrong way up a one way road. I did not have to think twice before booking the 10 pm movie show (heck, this has become my preferred movie show now!). I could hop into an auto at 11 pm, and be assured of safe delivery. All while wearing jeans (or a skirt) and a t-shirt. Unlike in Delhi, I was not constantly worrying about my safety - no longer did my environment remind me that I was vulnerable.

For the last four days, as I drive back from work, from the late night movie or from a late dinner at a friend's house, I seem to notice many more clumps of men hanging around street corners. Each time I see such a group, I clutch the steering tighter and reach our for my cell phone. If Im walking, I look downwards and quicken my pace. Will they think my jeans are too tight, my t-shirt too short? Or that my dress is inappropriate, unsuitable to Indian culture? Will they heckle me and humiliate me for forgetting my roots and values, even as a vast hoarde of my countrymen will speed past, ignoring my predicament, glad that their wives and daughters and sisters are safely at home?

And then we snigger at Pakistan ceding ground to the Taliban in Swat valley.

Here comes the spring again

2009-03-01T16:21:00.003+05:30

The sky is a brilliant blue, reflecting the color named so aptly after it, watching indulgently as the clouds play their quiet but violent tug of war.

The trees are proudly flaunting their newly acquired coat of shimmering green leaves, gently swaying to the music of the wind.

The African tulips have disappeared. The rich-red flowers of the Gulmohar are being roused from their sleep, yawning as they prepare for their glorious profusion all over the country. Already, the jacaranda is stretching its lavender wings towards the sky.

Here comes the spring again.

The Friends Scavengers

2009-02-25T19:58:00.005+05:30

I can choose my friends no longer.

In many ways, FB is a blessing. I am connected to most of my Masters batchmates and seniors & juniors, thanks to which I know how old their kids are, the international vacations they took, the re-unions they had with their families, what they thought of the latest flick in town, whether they think Rafa owns Fed, ....... and vice-versa. I've also reconnected with zillions of school friends on FB - almost all of who I had lost touch with, thanks to the lets-pretend-school-never-happened phase that all of us go through (I have been in regular touch with precisely four friends from school over the years - and this is a much better number than most!).

But what do I do when a random colleague from work (as opposed to a work-friend) sends me a request on FB? Or when the guy I've just been introduced to over lunch wants to be friends on FB (and leaves a comment on my pictures just 5 minutes after I accept his virtual hand of friendship - I shuda followed my instinct to ignore his request!). Can I be friends with my ex-ed on FB while not being friends with them in 'real' life? And how do I react when someone from my team wants to be my friend on FB? Just stay away from the website, I guess.

Not surprisingly perhaps, this is not just limited to personal networking sites. At work, I have been occasionally pursued for 'friendship' by co-workers who I have bumped into at a cafe or a restaurant, or who have 'discovered' my profile on the intranet. These un-gentlemen then make it a habit of pinging me every day, refuse to catch subtle and not so subtle hints to bugger off, till I have to finally tell them in no uncertain terms to clear off or else...

Time was when we were choosy about who could be called a friend, a close friend or a best friend. Friendships would be forged over shared moments of laughter, madness, tears, bitching, pranks, music, books, nite-outs and drunken driving. A friend was not the cheap commodity it has turned into today. Good friendships were hewn over years, often over decades (I just realized that K, S, A & I have known each other for two years short of two decades, whoa!).

Have we turned into such a lonely people that our social quotient is measured by the size of our 'friends network' on FB or Twitter?

Just another day

2009-02-15T01:49:00.004+05:30

Chopin. Polonaise. Mazurka. Etude. Prelude. Waltz. the Funeral March. And the Fantaisie Impromptu.

Eliot. Love songs. Lost city. The yellow fog that curled once more about the house. Souls etherized against the sky. Measuring life with coffee spoons. Coversations that slip between velleities & carefully caught regrets, attenuated tones of violins mingled with remote cornets. Lilacs. Hyacinths. The drinking of tea. Preludes. A heap of broken images, fear in a handful of dust. HURRY UP PLEASE IT'S TIME. Tirisuis. The third who always walks beside you. Hypocrite lecteur. Datta, Dayadhvam, Damyata.

A rocking chair.

Neruda. I can sing the saddest lines tonight. Isla Negra. Slowly dies who. Something of yesterday clings to today. The spans of cements, two breasts, two abysses...held by the concrete calligraphy that writes on the page of the river.

Seth, too. All you who sleep tonight. The Room & the Street. A kind of loving. Unstated intentions. Plums. Red suitcases. A helve of dares, a loaf of shoulds. Sit, drink your coffee. Chinese sunsets. Perhaps, this could have stayed unstated...

And maybe, just maybe, The Who. Run, run, run. A quick one.

A touch of spring.

Frankly, my dear, I don't give a damn

2009-01-19T12:29:00.003+05:30

My dear X:

Thank you for wanting to wish me on my birthday. And for wishing me on new year's. And telling me about your vacation plans. And your reading list. And the name of your poodle.

And the name of your wife. And the link to her blog.

What exactly were you thinking? Was it a case of one upmanship, a so-what-if-you-write-so-does-she and look-what-a-kool-wife-I-got? If that's the case, good for both of you, says moi.

But if I know you (and I could be horribly mistaken here), this wasn't about scoring a point. So what, then? Possibly it was just a polite bringing-two-bloggers-together. But did you really think that I would visit the link, read her posts, drop her a note about her Wodehouse-ish wit or Kafka-esque insights? And she would reply in kind, one of us would invite the other for coffee, and we would soon become bossom buddies who would exchange notes on a myriad topics ranging from the best way to make prawn curry to how you are in bed? And we would all live happily ever after.

Of course. Except that you forgot to pay heed to Ms Parker's wise words : Shoot if you must, but hold in view; Women and elephants never forget.

Through the looking glass

2009-01-16T00:26:00.003+05:30

I started blogging towards the end of 2005 at what seemed, at that point at least, to be a particularly low time in my life (yes, some clichés are true, all it takes is pressure and time to forget, if not forgive). Till then, my pet strategy when faced with such difficult situations had been to run away to a new place - and it had always worked. This time, however, I was faced with a dilemma – I liked Bangalore and did not want to abandon it. More importantly, I did not want to run away.

So I dropped anchor. But shorn of my usual armor, I needed diversions to cope. A friend suggested blogging. What will I write about? I wondered aloud. It comes on its own, you’ll find it therapeutic, he reassured me.

Short on options, I decided to give it a shot. I certainly did not believe I would last beyond a few posts, much less that I would have a little less than a hundred posts over three erratic years of blogging (yes, I am trumpeting my perseverance ;-). So I am tempted to indulge myself by reflecting on the years since my first declaration that “2005 will go down as the year of losing faith for me”.

2006 was the year of renewal. The unexpected shock – learning to cope with its presence; constantly preparing ourselves for the worst; desperately, desperately hoping for a miracle each time we met a doctor; the relief and joy at survival… it challenged how we would function as a family, and in doing so changed our lives and each one of us in incontrovertible ways. Looking back, I realize that it also provided me with a much needed ‘new battle to fight’ - something that occupied my energies so completely that I had neither opportunity nor inclination to dwell upon the past. The disappointments of the previous year appeared insignificant, even ridiculous, compared with what we were facing now. And so overcoming the disease also came to represent a symbolic victory of sorts…as S rightly remarked, this was the year I found myself.

2007 was certainly the year of celebration. I was so exhausted with the stress – both physical and mental – of the previous year that I just wanted to go out and celebrate life. I had never come this close to mortality – and while it made me not afraid to die, it also made me happy to be alive. So we did numerous places in and around Bangalore and of course – Kanha, London, Normandy, Belgium, Amsterdam, Thailand & Singapore. Most certainly the year of travel.

Which brings me to 2008. A tough cookie, this one – for I still can’t figure out what 2008 was about. Singapore, Costa Rica, Coorg, Tranquebar & Shekhawati notwithstanding, this certainly wasn’t the year of travel - I’m extremely disappointed at not having traveled to a new country this year, the first time this has happened in six years! No life changing love, and so no losing of faith; no insurmountable obstacles, and so no major triumphs to be proud of. Yes, there were some challenges on the home front, but I guess I’m getting used to them now. I hate to admit it, but it was a year that was possibly more interesting on the professional front than on the personal one. It was a year of driftwood…a very ordinary year.

Hasta la vista, baby!

2009-01-16T00:16:00.002+05:30

One of the craziest weekends I’ve had in a while – here’s remembering a wonderful November weekend!

Friday evening : Rock Nights at Opus, did the place groove !!! I was completely bowled over by the guy who rendered ‘What’s Going On’ and the lovely guitar riffs by the Kunal Kapoor lookalike. Had a fantastic, rocking time after ages !!!

Friday Midnight – Saturday Night : Driving, Driving, Driving !!! A few watered-down drinks ( I had a Caipirinha-cousin and two Margarita’s, D some beer and gin/vodka tonic) + totally groovy rock music + another weekend stretching ahead + two nutty people who love driving = INSANITY. On an impulse, close to midnight on Friday, we decided to drive 400 km to Jog Falls. Why Jog Falls? I have no clue – but I do know I would have agreed to drive to Kandahar if you had asked me!

800 kilometres of driving across twenty hours, endless cups of sweet coffee, the hunt for clean loo’s, idli-vada for breakfast, dhaaba made dal-roti-egg bhurji (my favorite road meal!), Kurkere, Bingo, the same tape playing repeatedly for hours, random conversations (how else would you describe talk about cuff-links!), the stupendous stretch between Sagar & Shimoga, the non-existent roads in many stretches (will the Karnataka government pleeeease wake up – I don’t mind paying more than 23 rupees for real roads!). A looong drive, that too unplanned, with someone with whom there is no memory of the past and no possibility of a future – this was just what I needed to beat the blues !

Sunday – Surprisingly, I am up at 9 despite not having slept the night before! Rush to Giri’s house warming ceremony – the drive to Bannerghetta National Park (well, almost) should only be undertaken on a Sunday morning! Rush back to Chinnaswamy for the India-England ODI. We lead the series 3-0, so I am secretly hoping for an English win to keep the series alive.

We reach the stadium around noon. Get our faces painted, buy the tiranga jhanda and troop along to our stand, FURIOUS to discover that the one-hour queuing up and the considerable ticket price has got us a seat behind the camera crew, cutting off the view of the pitch completely ! Luckily, this is Bangalore, the organizers are helpful and we are two abla naari’s – so there is some adjust maadi and we get some vintage seats at the corner of the stands.

Chinnaswamy is a wonderful stadium to watch a cricket match in. The grass is a freshly painted green, and since the grounds are not very large, you get a fantastic view of all the action. Of course, the buzz at a cricket match in the subcontinent is a must-have experience – even Ravi Shastri draws big applause (certainly much more than his ignominious World Cup days!)

The weather looks dubious – there are a few raindrops occasionally, followed by a hint of sunlight playing peek-a-boo with the clouds. Fingers crossed.

We are delighted when KP puts India in to bat, and Sehwag sets the pace with a cracking boundary on the first ball! He has to be seen to be believed – standing nonchalantly with his bat slung over his shoulder (almost like he is at a dhobi-ghaat) and then plundering the ball in all directions. Annihilation at its finest. Sachin joins in the fun at the expense of Broad, but looks tentative thereafter.

The first showers arrive unexpectedly, but in full force. I don’t mind it too much – after all, this is part of the fun! We take cover in the hall behind the stand (I’m sure the coffee man is sick of me by now – if the organizers discontinue with the practice of free ‘High Tea’, I am partly to blame). The downpour gets heavier, and we are suddenly faced with the depressing prospect that there may not be any further play!

Luckily, the Bangalore showers are true to form, and depart as unexpectedly as they made their first appearance. We rush back to our seats to catch 30 minutes of the supersoakers in action – I must say I am mighty impressed with their performance in soaking up the water! Broad runs in to resume the proceedings, and there is a stunned silence when Sachin is dismissed in the fourth ball of the over. However, Gambhir continues the party by flicking the first ball he faces for a four.

The run making feast continues, much to our delight, but the clouds want to join in the fun. A light drizzle soon turns into a torrent. It appears highly unlikely that the match will resume. Just 11 goddamn overs – this is worse than a T20! We decide to drown our sorrows by indulging in a sumptuous dinner at the Only Place. Our painted faces attract the attention of the oh-so-good looking owner – there is some compensation for having missed the cricketing fireworks after all! Hot soup, some delicious fish and lots of creamy pasta – with deep sighs for you-know-who - do their bit to revive our spirits. As we get into the car, D sms-es saying match is likely to resume. We decide to ‘chake a tance’ and head to Barista to kill some time – we’ve just ordered when D calls to say match will resume in 10 mins – hurray! Coffee in hands, we rush back to Chinnaswamy – complimenting ourselves on our brilliant foresight of dining close by : -) Our seats have been occupied by the stadium guards and there are more officials than spectators in the stands, but who cares! The English batsmen do not disappoint – they display admirable efficiency and commitment in making a complete hash of a simple job. When KP walks in, P & I just can’t resist cheering for him – what a hunk of a man! Both of us are secretly hoping for a long innings from him – but our man disappoints and is out before we can say hello. Bluhdy. The old saga continues, England continues to lose wickets regularly and do a great job of snatching defeat from the jaws of victory. It is midnight, I wave goodbye to the camera crew. My fantastic weekend has come to an end - look forward to many more!

Where is Ivan Lendl?

2008-12-01T23:28:00.003+05:30

My first memory of tennis is watching a dowdy, unattractive Czech play against a fiery young Blonde on the pristine grass of Wimbledon. It needed no deep knowledge of tennis to guess that the Czech wanted to win, BADLY (Im not sure if Lendl's famous grass-is-for-cows had been declared just before this battle). But even my 10 yr old untrained brain could somehow figure out that the dashing blonde would prevail. It was the summer of 86 - the year that Boris Becker became the youngest male title holder at Wimbledon. A strange presentiment told me that Lendl would never win at Wimbledon. And I think he knew it too.

I've been hooked to tennis since then. Through the years, I have frowned upon plodders like Lendl & Courier, saving my adulation instead for the breathtaking brilliance of an Edberg, an Agassi or a Federer. Now, I have much more respect for Lendl's tenacity and ambition.

I guess I'm growing up.

"The God Delusion"

2008-11-28T00:37:00.003+05:30

I first heard of The God Delusion from a random sms. A day later, I came across an article on the book by Suresh Menon– though this was primarily a compilation of extracts, he sounded suitably impressed. And the same evening, I started reading Amartya Sen’s Identity and Violence – whose principal argument is that societal violence stems from the tendency to associate human beings with a single identity, most commonly related to the person’s religion or community. The coincidences were too many to ignore – much like a message from God (pun intended!) – enough to pique my interest.

I read the first chapter of the book from NYT, which dwelt largely on the difference between Einsteinian religion and supernatural religion. Not very exciting fare, but one should not judge a book by its first chapter!

The NYT’s review on the book seemed to indicate that the book had its merits, but apparently some of the arguments were far too specious, rhetorical and occasionally caustic to appeal to the rationalist. Wikipedia’s synopsis of reviews about the book appeared to corroborate the views of the NYT’s Jim Holt.

Both Bertrand Russell (whose views I can speak of more authoritatively, having read Why I Am Not a Christian, What is An Agnostic, and Am I an Atheist or an Agnostic – all excellent reads) and Dawkins (who I have not read – so what I say is likely to be an interpretation) present compelling rational arguments for the non-existence of God.

My dissatisfaction with both, however, is that they focus on the Christian God, i.e., both dwell upon the notion of a collective God, as defined by the Church. Indeed, Dawkins’ book would have been more aptly named The Christ Delusion, or at least The Religion Delusion – Russell, to be fair, was more explicit in his naming. Russell, being a precise mathematician, goes to the extent of including belief in Christ as part of his definition of a Christian, along with belief in God and immortality. Dawkins tries giving us a definition of what belief in God can denote – belief in a supernatural creator that is appropriate for us to worship – but his focus thereafter appears to be on a Christian God.

Given this, it is no wonder that both move on to making an impassioned plea for the abolition of the practice of religion, and by extension, abolition of belief in God.

I will try to examine my thoughts on this, but with some modification. I will go with the definitions of God proposed by Russell and Dawkins, but my God will not just be Christian – he (or she!) may as well belong to any other religion. That is easy – I need only ignore the first part of Russell’s definition (about the belief in Christ). Also, while my God has powers that are appropriate for worship, the forms of that worship need not necessarily be collective, and is for me to decide (and may include no worship at all). By this, I want to introduce the concept of a personal God – a belief in God, without necessarily an accompanying belief in religion.

So, why does one believe in God? More importantly, why do most people tend to exhibit a strong belief in the existence of God, and treat the existence of entities such as Martians and spaceships with skepticism, given that we have seen neither?

I think it is partly due to what we learn at our mother’s knee – where did I come from, Mommy? Well Dad and I prayed to God to give us a bundle of joy to light up our lives and He gifted us with you. Any entity that has created the special ‘I’ was bound to have powers to grant, and deny, wishes. And by the time we understand the boring truth about how we to came to be, the belief is too far entrenched for us to discard – the result is regular visits to His House (church, temple, etc.) to demonstrate our belief and convenient explanations of chance instances as ‘acts of God to right the Universe’

It also cannot be denied that a belief in God has the capability to inspire some to reach for the impossible. Everyone needs an anchor, something to hold on to and to believe in when all else is falling apart, and for most people, God plays this role to perfection. I personally don’t believe in any of the miracles attributed to Gods of various faiths, having never been witness to one myself. But I have seen instances where people have been inspired to achieve impossible feats, and have attributed this solely to a belief in God.

Given this conditioning and so-called evidence of his super human prowess, God is built into something to be appeased and feared. Keep him happy, do as he bids you to (which will be decided by his torch bearers), and he will reward you. Anger him, and he will ensure you will get your come-uppance. To quote Russell - It is partly the terror of the unknown and partly, as I have said, the wish to feel that you have a kind of elder brother who will stand by you in all your troubles and disputes. I’ll take that further – his existence not just gives you someone who will stand by you, but also someone you can blame when things don’t go the way you want them to. It is an explanation of the unknown by an artificially known-unknown. You might as well replace him by a robot, or a Martian!
So the good fortune that we usually attribute to a faith in God is really an outcome, partly of our inner strength and capability, and partly a dash of good luck. And the bad times when God is supposedly punishing us for sins perpetuated years ago (or maybe in some other before-life!) is really ‘just one of those bad times’ when our luck runs out.

But we continue to attribute this to God because human beings like having a reason, a justification, for everything, even if that reason is inherently irrational, or leads to irrational outcomes and behaviors.

So, what if God was one of us, Just a slob like one of us, Just a stranger on the bus, Trying to make his way home.

What about religion?
There is no disputing the arguments laid out by both Dawkins and Russell, as well as numerous others, against religion – the misdeeds of the Church (and other religious bodies) perpetuated down the centuries are adequate evidence. In India itself, there are numerous instances of people who flaunt every convention of humanity (deceit, rape, loot and murder), all in the name of God. I am as inclined to believe in the existence of Christ as in that of the Greek or the Hindu Gods – which is almost zilch. In fact, I am sometimes tempted to believe that Christ and the Bible are the outcome of the first successful marketing campaign launched by the chiefs of religion – no wonder the Church is reputed to be one of the best run organizations in the world!

But all the evidence of the misdemeanors of religion relate to religious fanaticism – religion that is exclusive and taken to the extreme. Unfortunately, it does not account for the ‘moderates’ - the significant numbers who are devoutly religious, and have the good sense to not participate in religious extremism, or those who are moderately religious (most people I know, including my parents, would probably fall in this category ) and finally, those who are not religious at all, yet have a belief in God (I was a former member of this clan).

So, on the one hand, we have the faithful who are inspired to greatness by God, but who may not feel the need to impose their faith on others. And on the other hand are the zealots who may not understand God (or religion), but use it as a weapon of power (and destruction). Does the existence of the latter mean that everyone should stop believing in God and/or stop going to a Church/mosque/temple? To me, this sounds as specious as the famous Indian argument to ban ‘revealing clothes’ and ‘public display of emotion’ to cut down on rapes and eve teasing!

At a metaphysical level, there are no rights and wrongs anyways. But given that we agree on a definition of what is right and what is wrong, I see nothing wrong in believing in God or religion, as long as the belief, and the practice, remains personal and non-invasive. In fact, their presence might have more benefits that the Agnostics or Atheists are willing to give them credit for. If God’s presence, even if fictitious, makes life more bearable for me, whether I call him God or Jesus or Ali or John is really no one’s business. Many priests act as wonderful guides for youth, several religious institutions provide food, clothing, shelter and education to the needy, and many religious practices (such as Buddhism) provide support groups to the lonely.

But the problem arises when I want others too to see him exactly the way I see him, and to mould their actions in deference to him the way I do. We do not expect other people’s parents or spouses or children to emulate ours, nor do we expect them The same degree of moderation, if displayed towards God and religion, will make the world a much saner place

Like Russell, I believe that life in general does not have any purpose, but human beings have purposes. I would like to extend that belief to state that, just because what I am doing is not a part of some grander design, does not in any way diminish the value of my thoughts and actions. Unlike Russell, however, I see nothing timorous in using the imaginary crutches of religion to bolster my confidence, as long as those crutches are not used as a weapon to injure someone else. Look for imaginary allies in the sky, for what is life without a little imagination, but do not let your imagination limit your actions, or the free will of your fellow beings. Reach for the impossible, but do not expect it to happen on its own, and do not be discouraged if you do not get your heart’s desire even after trying. For the greatest miracle is what lies within a wise and compassionate heart.

Coorg Trekking & Rafting

2008-11-28T00:22:00.007+05:30

In a way, it was the perfect build up to a weekend full of adventure. The literally last minute shopping for clothes and floaters, the hilarious fiasco of landing up at Mainland China and almost collecting someone else’s order, only to realize that E had placed our food order with the Calcutta branch (the Indiranagar folks were kind enough to rush the food to my Bangalore address – bless them Lord with tons of food, always!), and finally, both of us getting locked inside the bathroom (and the house) exactly 10 minutes before our bus was to pick us up! The last really did frighten me – and I am eternally grateful to B for the inventive rescue.

Finally, we dawdled up to Barbecue Nation at 11 PM to catch our bus – we were on our way to Coorg, for a light trek in the mountains and white water rafting in the river KKR.

The bus was not exactly what we had anticipated (a Volvo was expected for the money we were paying!), but we were too excited about our recent and anticipated adventures to care! The jerky lamb we had devoured for dinner was soon forgotten, and we treated ourselves to Kurkere and Ferrero Rocher while we chatted and finally dropped off to sleep. I slept fitfully – the rain water was seeping in through the window and there was hardly any leg space – but some sleep is better than none! I finally woke up around 6 the next morning as the bus was navigating its way through a carpet of shimmering green. The sky was a pristine white and the air smelt of coffee and spices – we had entered the land of the Kodava’s.

Coorg Guest House was more like a college dormitory, and we were aghast to discover that nearly ten women would be accommodated in our room – which had a single loo! After a long queuing up for our bath, we made our way to the dining room for a wholesome breakfast of poha and sweet coffee. By 8 am, we were loaded into the jeeps to make our way to our trek starting point.

Giving us company in the jeep was Raju, a tall, handsome Coorgi dressed in boots and a hat that reminded one of the cowboy Westerns. It was he who broke the pleasant news that the trekking route was infested with leeches, and conversation quickly turned to the most effective means of fighting the dreaded creatures.

The sky was still misty as we crossed the stream that took us to the base of the our trekking destination. The mountains loomed large in front of us, and we had just learnt that we had to climb nearly 8 km – so much for an easy trek! In a way, we were glad that we would not walk under the exhausting glare of the sun, though the rains would make the path more slippery and treacherous.

We made our way in single file up the first hill – in all, we would scale three small hills before reaching the summit. The path for the most part was rocky but not very steep. There were frequent stops to fight off the numerous leech attacks with salt & deo, and also to take in the breathtaking views of the town below whenever we stumbled upon a spot of plain land. By about 9.30 AM, everyone was exhausted and glad to make the first pit stop – we had covered only 3 km by then! The chatter was diminishing, and it was a quieter and very exhausted group that dropped down at the second pit stop. I was grateful for the muesli bars, and somehow, the peak seemed really far away. We plodded on, however, and finally, our goal seemed a lot nearer. The last one km was the steepest part of the climb, and was made much tougher by our weakening limbs. However, it was an awesome feeling to run up the little hillock at the top of the hill and find a nice rock to seat our tired body on – we had climbed nearly 3000 feet and finally made it to the top!

We made our way back through a shorter route, and stumbled through numerous streams and pretty butterflies. The route was slippery, and I even got a leech bite towards the end of the trek as a trophy for all the exertion! We were back at Coorg Guest House by about 2 pm, and did we have a ravishing appetite!

In the evening, we were driven to Irupu Falls. It took tremendous will power for our tired bodies to climb the 100 odd steps to the fall, but the effort was well worth it. Thanks to the monsoons, the ice cold waters roared down in magnificent splendor, and the tremendous lung power could be heard miles away!

We spent a lovely hour by the Falls, hopping and skipping our way over the rocks and soothing our aches and pains in the refreshing chill of the waters. It was dark by the time we made our way back to the Guest House, and we took a quick shower to prepare ourselves for the evening barbeque. Getting to the barbeque site was a bit of a nightmare, as we had to make our way down a km long rocky path in almost complete darkness (the torch bearers did not provide any assistance!), dreading leeches and other sundry creatures of the night. Two large fires had been lit next to a large lake (Luckily, alcohol was prohibited, else many in the group would have certainly landed in the lake before the night was out!), and we were happy to note that the boys had already started barbecuing the first lot of meat.

Day two was reserved for the adventure we all awaited - rafting! Most of us had no prior experience with rafting (My rafting experience in the placid river Sita in Jharkhand hardly counted!), so we were bouncing with nervous anticipation. We soon discovered that there were only two rafts available, so we had a long break as we awaited our turn! Luckily, Prakash, the owner of the estate (http://www.coorgwhitewaterrafting.com/) has a rudimentary kitchen with a cozy fireplace close to the rafting start point, and he kept us occupied with tales of his youth to the accompaniment of endless cups of tea & coffee.

The first batch returned in a few hours, high on adrenaline and adventure, and it was our turn to pad up in the rafting gear and listen attentively to our coach’s instructions. After a few practice drills, we were ordered to jump into the water! While the swimmers dived in joyfully, the non swimmers had to be cajoled & occasionally pushed in – our shrieks for help and the later whoops of joy at our miraculous survival (or so it seemed) must surely have been heard as far as the next district.

We were now ready to push off into the waters. The first twenty minutes was simple rowing, enjoying the lush greenery, waving to our friends by the banks & oohing at the solitary kingfisher perched on a rock. Soon, the river began to open up, and we caught sight of Morning Coffee, the first rapid on our course. We braced to follow the instructions of our guide, but we needn’t have worried. Just like its name, our first hurdle was short & perky, and presented minimal challenges to us amateurs.

Our first success had us all jumping with bravado, and we whooped with joy as we successfully navigated the next two rapids - The Grasshopper & Ramba Samba. In between, we made a brief detour to a small alcove by the banks – doubtless a shelter from the storm for frequent river travelers.

We were now brimming with confidence, till our guide cautioned us about the next rapid – the Wicked Witch. It’s unpredictable and if you don’t follow my instructions, you can get caught in an endless whirlpool, he warned – and we soon discovered the truth of his words as we kept on going round and round when one of our team members mistakenly rowed forwards instead of backwards! There were a few apprehensive moments as our guide barked out commands like the rapid fire round of a game show – Forward! Right! Duck! Left…Left, Left, not RIGHT !!! - but finally, we were through and emitting war cries as though we were Hagar The Horrible’s soldiers back from massacring the English!

By now, the river had opened up to reveal vistas of dense tea plantations and mist covered mountains. The view was breathtaking - the weather just right with a warm sun creating a sheen of shimmering yellow and green against a brilliant blue sky. We would have been happy to chug along at an easy pace while soaking in the fantastic sights, but our last rapid awaited – the Big Bang. This was reputed to be the toughest hurdle on the course, but luckily did not pose much of a challenge to us veterans.

All too soon, the banks of the river were visible - our adventure was drawing to a close. The swimmers dived in for one last tryst with the blue waters, after which we dragged our water logged bodies & the rafts across the sand. We strolled along the coffee plantations & admired the brilliant hues of the greenery and the variety of flowers. The elevation afforded a superb view of the river and reminded us of our recent adventures. As we piled into the jeep for our return journey, we suddenly realized how exhausted and ravenous we were – but our dreams of a piping hot meal were interrupted by the extremely bumpy road revealing brilliant vistas, sprinkled with conversations with a 20 year old on the disastrous effects of the Nano & the Tata’s massacring of Oliver Ridley turtles. The discussion was a fond reminder of my college days when the world was painted in strong shades of right and wrong – there is still nothing more intoxicating in this world than a delightful combination of youth and idealism.

A word about the organizers – the Bangalore Mountaineering Club. Kudos to Neeraj & his team for regularly coordinating outdoor and trekking activities in and around Bangalore and bringing together a diverse set of nature lovers. I do think that there is scope for improvement in the organization – for instance, the buses & accommodation can certainly be improved upon. But I also recognize that this is not a full time job for Neeraj, so one cannot have the same expectations as from a professionally run travel outfit. I’m quite hopeful that as the club grows in popularity (and it already is!) and the founders get regular cash flow, these aspects will be looked into – it would be wonderful for Bangalore to boast of an adventure club that offers the best of the very best travel experiences in the world!

Shame

2008-11-27T11:29:00.003+05:30

Goa is one of my favorite destinations in India. It is one of the rare places in India where you can just BE, if you know what I mean. There is a sense of freedom in Goa that I am yet to experience anywhere else in India, except maybe in Bombay.

But the recent cases of rape & murder have sullied Goa's idyllic reputation, revealing the sordid politics and drug dealing that seem to chase all good things in India. This recent article in the press makes me ashamed of Goa and of my country.

The mother of the German minor, who was allegedly raped by Goa Education Minister Atanasio Monserratte's son Rohit, has withdrawn the charges against him. The German woman has written a letter to police, saying 'the whole system has failed her'.
On November 5, Rohit was remanded to three days police custody by a Goa court in connection with the rape case. Rohit had surrendered before the Goa police. He was booked by Goa police on October 14 for allegedly raping the German girl and had gone missing after that.He appeared before the police on November 1 to give his statement, a few hours before the 14-year-old German girl deposed before a magistrate after initial reluctance.

Too many of us exult over India's GDP growth and the growing number of Indians in the world's richest list. We live in the dangerous delusion that India is finally being recognized as a developed country. I find this ridiculous, for true development is indicated by how well a country's policies & systems treat its 'less advantaged' citizens -the poor & marginalized, women and children, amongst others. And if people, both from within and outside the country, repeatedly experience systemic failure, we should abandon all pretense of democratic development. Hell, this is not even civilized behavior, forget about development.

S F T - Scarce Fed Transmission !

2008-10-06T00:42:00.001+05:30

Tennis-wise, this has been amazingly intense year. With all the excitement in the Slams and the recent high of the US Open, I was raring to see some more of the old Fed at the remaining hard court tournaments. But just when I was seriously evaluating the business case for attending the Shanghai Masters, Fed announced his withdrawal from Stockholm -worse, he said he may not play for the rest of the year! While I agree with the logic of his move (I strongly believe he should just focus on the Grand Slams now – the ranking race should be secondary, and exhibition matches only in India!), I feel strangely bereft.

Strong dose of Scarce Fed Transmission. Whatever will I do once he retires?

When the Gods want to punish you

2008-10-01T04:00:00.003+05:30

they answer your prayers! But not the way you wanted it :-)

So I dreamt of hopping to Argentina, skipping across Brazil & jumping intoMexico. Instead, I am back in Costa Rica. As if once wasn't enough.

Why does my life move two steps back for every step forward?

Movie-thon

2008-10-01T03:51:00.002+05:30

E came up with the perfect antidote to beat the blues two weeks ago - watching five movies across three days!

I can laugh out loud when I think of how we plonked ourselves at the PVR counter in Forum on Thursday afternoon, with E declaring: Now you have to listen carefully...first you give us X tickets for Y movie for today's show, then XX tickets for YY for tomorrow afternoon, then.......I tried my best to pretend I didn't know her as we succeeded in confusing a series of ticketing attendants and caused adequate exasperation amongst the folks standing in line behind us (poor guys probably wanted tickets for the show that started 5 minutes ago!) . But I could not help giggling every time she threw the charlie into an even bigger tizzy by demanding tickets for King Lear or Shakespeare’s Lear (as opposed to The Last Lear)!

So here was our Movie-thon Itinerary:

1. What Happens in Vegas: Predictable chick-flick, with both Ashton Kutcher & Cameron Diaz doing what they do best - acting silly & romantic. Great 10PM week day fare when you are looking for something mindless and completely timepass. Good start.

2. The Last Lear: Why did we decide to watch this on Friday 10 PM ! The story had potential – the last shot at Shakespearean glory for a talented stage actor who is persuaded to act in a movie by a brilliant but diabolical director. The casting was also good – the original Angry Young Man is now a masterful Cranky Old Man and did a fantastic job of depicting Harry’s anguished brilliance and of mouthing Shakespeare; the ethereal Shefali Shah was brilliant as Harry’s mistress; and Preity Zinta as the inexperienced model-turned-actress & Arjun Rampal as the director were adequate. But somehow, Ghosh lost his way – the story within the story of the clown was not given sufficient attention and came out sounding hollow, the reason for AB quitting stage was very flimsy, and Ghosh spent un-necessary time dwelling upon the unhappiness of the two women. P was probably right when she remarked that Rituparno Ghosh has made a habit of disguising lazy filmmaking as art cinema - when will he realize that showing dirty sinks and torturously lingering over the despair of his female protagonists do not a good movie make.

3. A Wednesday: Ironic that I got an sms about the blasts in Delhi while watching this movie. Neeraj Pandey has done an outstanding job with this movie about terrorist bombings - given that they are alarmingly becoming a more frequent part of our lives. A timely and relevant story, well etched characters, great pace and humor (the Police Commissioner gets a call from a credit card company on his counter-terrorism hotline), a twist-in-the-end and fantastic acting (Naseruddin Shah & Anupam Kher were at their brilliant best). Great watch.

4. Mamma Mia: So I say, Thank you for the music, the songs we’re singing, thanks for all the joy they’re bringing…. Watch this only if you’re an ABBA fan – and if you are one, go watch it NOW and have a blast! Who would believe that Meryl Streep is close to 60 when you see her rolling & jumping & dancing with sooo much energy– what a fantastic actress she is (so what if she is barely able to open her mouth thanks to all the Botox – P’s astute observation again). This is not a movie that you sit down and watch in a cinema hall– I wish Opus would screen this on their Kroakanites and let everyone just sing and jump and dance alongwith! I’m sure E & I irritated quite a few of our neighbors in the hall by loudly singing out each and every song – but who cares when we got extra large dollops of joy and verve for our Saturday evening!

5. Righteous Kill: Jon Avnet gets Al Pacino & Robert de Niro together in a movie after decades, and what does he do? Casts them as boring old New York police detectives and gives them a story where the so-called suspense is evident in the first 30 minutes itself. No pace, no drama, no story, no suspense – no wonder Sonny & Bobby sleep walk through their roles and give us a dud of a thriller. Russell Gewirtz can surely do better than this, especially after giving us the brilliant Inside Man.

The Laughing Policeman

2008-09-22T12:52:00.002+05:30

Book sales are a wonderful opportunity to pick up usually unaffordable coffee table books (or the complete works of Sherlock Holmes with the original typescript & illustrations). To me, they also provide occasion to pick up stuff that is not on my books-i-must-read or books-that-sound-vaguely-familiar list - a reasonably interesting storyline with the bonus of nice paper, a nice or unusual typescript or an attractive cover is usually enough to seduce me.

This year at the Landmark sale, my focus was on light reading – which means a bit of fantasy and a lot of detective fiction. I wanted something different from the variety that I usually read, and it was sheer coincidence that I stumbled upon The Laughing Policeman on my way out to the billing counter.

The blurb sounded interesting, the paper was slightly yellow (I dislike Rin-white paper), the type just the right size (not scrimping on paper), there was a lovely green hard bound cover and a recommendation from Sunday Telegraph on the authors (the Swedish communist couple Maj Sjowall & Per Wahloo). On a depressing Wednesday evening when the inclination to cause serious bodily damage – to your boss, spouse/boyfriend, parent or self – is at its peak, the perfect antidote to the unfortunate realization that you cannot commit murder is to read about one.

It turned out to be a delightfully different read. The authors’ communist leanings are revealed in the first chapter itself when the police are reported to be busy because “they were obliged to protect the American ambassador against letters and other things from people who disliked Lyndon Johnson and the war in Vietnam”. And so a small girl holds up a placard that says “DO YOUR DUTY! KEEP FUCKING AND MAKE MORE POLICE!” while an old woman waits in vain for a patrolman to smile and take her across the street. Meanwhile we meet Superintendent Martin Beck and Lennart Kollberg playing chess – with the former attributing his inability to win to a lack of chess sense!

Soon, the crime takes place in the cold November rain and we are slowly introduced to the other policemen - Kristiansson & Kvant, Gunvald Larsson, Hammar, Ake Stenstrom, Melander, Ek and Ronn. As the investigation unfurls at an excruciatingly slow pace, the reader becomes better acquainted with these men as their characters (and personal lives) are slowly revealed in vivid detail.

Almost the entire story unravels through the actions of the officers, either in the police station or on the beat – and the wry humor and commentary on world happenings during the conversations is what makes the book transcend an ordinary thriller. There are digs at America (the frequent mass massacres there and how it is possible to ‘order a gun by mail order’, Vietnam – the book was written in the 60’s), the press, The Great Detective General Public, politicians, bosses and consumerism. The sentences are short and simply worded (possibly because it’s a translation) with barely concealed irony.

The policemen are painted as ordinary humans, with their foibles and special talents and stupidities. As the photographic memory man Mellander remarks on the public’s distrust of the police: The reason is that the police are a necessary evil…The crux of the problem is, of course, the paradox that the police profession in itself calls for the highest intelligence & exceptional mental, physical and moral qualities in its practitioners but has nothing to attract anyone who possesses it.

And so, when Ronn is dispatched to get a possible statement out of the dying man who was still dying at XX Hospital:

(Ron) had carefully thought out two questions, which for safety’s sake he had written down in his notebook.
The first one was:
Who did the shooting
And the second:
What did he look like

Or, the reflection on the personal lives of Beck & Kollberg:

She (Gun) was exactly what he (Kollberg) wanted, but it had taken him over twenty years to find her and another year to think it over.
Martin Beck had not spent twenty years in search of his wife. He had met her seventeen years ago, made her pregnant on the spot and married in haste. He had indeed repented at lesire, and she was standing at the bedroom door, a living reminder of his mistake, in a crumpled nightdress and with red marks from the pillow on her face.

The title is derived from a record named The Adventures of the Laughing Policeman by Charles Penrose – a Christmas gift to Beck by his daughter that is unsuccessful in her attempt to make him laugh. Beck does laugh at the end of the book though. After the mystery is solved, he discovers that the answer lay all along on the desk of his murdered colleague - Beck & Kollberg had forgotten to check under the blotter when they kicked off their investigations in Stenstorm’s office. An appropriately self mocking conclusion to a book that refuses to take anything too seriously - a good lesson for life, or something like it!

Encounters with Officialdom (2) - International Driving Permit

2008-09-22T12:46:00.002+05:30

It started with another of my peculiar obsessions – I wanted to obtain an international driving permit. Why, I still haven’t figured out - given that I have successfully driven without one on four continents. Perhaps I can blame it on the scare I had in Lille when the French nearly denied me the car I had booked for my driving vacation!

So when I went home to Delhi in March, I enlisted the help of Mrs B, the trusted lieutenant who has helped everyone in my family navigate the complex and murky Transport Office world in our bid to acquire the precious DRIVING LICENCE. For her unique brand of assertive charm well disguised under the “Sir”’s and “Please”’s is just what one needs to deal with the officers at the RTO.

The fun began when we got the application form. The documentation required a medical certificate from a doctor and a signed affidavit from a legal practitioner. I was mentally agonizing over how to locate a doctor and a lawyer at such short notice, forgetting that the motto of Indian bureaucracy is: rules are made so someone pays to break them. Sitting right outside the crowded and dirty office building were two women with typewriters, calling out the rates for a medical certificate and a legal affidavit the way hawkers sell onions & tomatoes in a bazaar. Yes, the first was a registered doctor, the second a practicing lawyer – and each had hit upon the golden goose of her profession. For a princely sum of 250 rupees, I would get an official stamp of being in sound mental health and of being a bona-fide citizen with no existing criminal record against me - no questions asked.

And did I mention that the women took shade under a large banner that proudly proclaimed the celebration of National Traffic Transparency (Anti–Corruption & No– Bribery) Week? But in India – sab chalta hai.

Documentation ready, Mrs. B employed her charm to snake to the front of the long queue for the submission of the documents (Bhai Sahib, please make way for ladies!). The next step was a personal interview with a ‘senior officer’. We were ushered into a miniscule room that was just about the size of a regular office cubicle. An extremely fat man dominated the room – his back rested against the wall, and his stomach supported the small table in such a way that it was impossible to distinguish the boundaries between flesh and wood. I briefly wondered how many people were needed to pull him out, for I certainly could not imagine him being able to pull his weight to a standing position on his own. Maybe he went around with the desk attached to him….my reverie was interrupted by a loud blob as the ‘officer’ spat some beetle juice into the waste paper basket conveniently placed at his feet. My interview was about to begin:

So you want to apply for a driving license?
Yes, Sir (this was Mrs B)

Do you know how to drive?
I quietly showed him my driving license issued 10 years ago, restraining myself from stating that this very office had issued the same to me.

Why do you want an international driving license, Have you ever been jailed before? He was clearly not impressed with my credentials.
I looked at him in surprise, wondering if he really expected an answer, when Mrs B discreetly stepped in – Sir, her mother is ..., her father is …., very respectable and educated family Sir…”, thus cutting off my sharp response of “ If I have been to jail, you have surely served life imprisonment ten times over!”

Did you write this application yourself, he continued belligerently?
I did, I reply quietly (I really did, even though the ‘lawyer’ had offered to fill it for me for free).

Write on the legal affidavit that you have filled the application yourself, and that all the information declared herewith is correct.
I looked at Mrs B in surprise – isn’t a legal affidavit meant to affirm the truthfulness of my details? She nodded imperceptibly, and I began to write, when our man cut in – Write it in Hindi. I shrugged and defaced the legal affidavit with a handwritten statement reaffirming what the affidavit already stated

By now, the officer had run out of other insults to throw at me - or maybe he was saving them for the long queue waiting outside. He affixed his stamp & signature on the application, and dismissed us with another spat of beetle juice.

Why have you written on the affidavit in hand, it is illegal! - shouted the clerk on the ground floor when we returned to him. Ask your officer, he made me do it – I snapped at him, ready to slug it out if he dared to refuse my application. But the clerk was evidently used to the ways of our man – he quietly accepted the documents and ordered me to return in the evening to collect the license.

I made my pilgrimage in the evening, only to join a queue of ten others ahead of me. The clerk at the counter reluctantly drew out a big file and started filling in the driving application for the first candidate in the line – in a laborious and illegible hand. I will spare the details – suffice to say that it was another hour of shuffling between floors, pasting slips in a notebook and trying to decipher the clerk’s calligraphy before I was handed my license.

So where are you moving to in the US? asked the guy behind me as we were leaving (we had become friends by now). Nowhere, I muttered. So why did you apply for an international permit, anyway you can drive on your existing license in any country if your period of stay is less than 6 months, he asked me in surprise? I am probably a crazy sadist, I mumbled.

The fat officer would have spat another round of bettle juice in agreement.

Encounters with Officialdom - 1

2008-08-21T16:26:00.003+05:30

A pleasant Saturday evening. After weeks of running around and ‘follow-up’, I finally seem to have a permanent solution to the recurring problem with my car’s power windows! I roll down my window as I drive back home, partly to enjoy the pleasant breeze, and largely to relish the joy of a window that rolls down when I want it to :- )

As I navigate the steep bump in front of Figurine Fitness while speculating upon how I should celebrate my car’s fitness, I hear a rude honk from behind. A black Safari, with dark tinted glasses to match, evidently in a hurry to save the world (as usual!). The road is narrow with houses on both sides, and is speckled with numerous cars and side lanes a – I cannot risk accelerating beyond the 45kmph that I am currently at! But my friend in the Safari is more daring, and resumes his incessant honking. I raise my hand in the rear view mirror as a signal to him to take it easy. Suddenly, he swerves from the left, overtakes my car and then deliberately swerves to the right to ram into the passenger door, and then speeds away. For a moment, I can’t believe this has happened – I had heard of, and expected, such irrational behavior in Delhi, but not in peaceful Bangalore. My next thought is to give chase to express my indignation, but the pragmatic part of my brain is already telling me this won’t work – the guy is driving like a maniac, and I have no idea how many men are inside the car. I quickly note down the car’s registration number, and still in shock, drive to my home a km away to inspect the damage.

What I see breaks my heart! There is a huge dent on the left side of the bonnet, and an ugly scar running all along the passenger door! I am furious by now at the completely uncivilized and barbaric behavior of the guy – this can happen only in India! I decide I will not let him get away. Immediately, I call 101 to give them the car’s registration number, but they tell me I will need to go to a police station to file a case.

By this time, I am seething. I decide I will go to the station, but I also realize I need to mobilize some resources – a lone woman who cannot speak the local language (except – Kannada gottilla) is unlikely to meet with blazing success with the notorious Indian police. P is out of town; I call D –she’s out with friends; C doesn’t pick up his phone. My mind’s numb by now – all I want is to DO something! Heck, I’ll go it alone, I tell myself. 101 had directed me to the Ulsoor police station. I ignore the openly curious looks of all the men squatting in the station, and march up to the duty officer and pour out my tale. Our man, however, is unimpressed, and continues to pick his teeth as he gleefully informs me this is not under his jurisdiction. But 101 directed me to Ulsoor, I splutter. He shrugs. So what do I now, I demand. Go to Jeevan Bhima Nagar station, he states dismissively.

Thanks, I mutter, I didn’t expect any better from you, so why be surprised. By now the angry indignation is wavering – going by this experience, I am unlikely to get anywhere even at JBN. So do I bow in and keep silent, like most of us do, ineffectual against the notoriously corrupt SYSTEM, I wonder. Not quite yet, I decide. If we ‘evolved’ people also start giving in without a fight, then the future of our country is indeed bleak.

As I drive to JBN, I again try to mobilize some resources – H, my landlord’s son is out with friends, but he suggests I contact Uncle whose clinic is very close to the station. Unfortunately, Uncle has just stepped out, so I take a deep breath and decide to face this alone.

Unlike the sprawling campus of Ulsoor, JBN station is a small corner house converted into a station – two or three small dinghy rooms in a straight line, one room leading to another, all crowded with harassed fellow sufferers. As you move from one room to the next, you get the feeling of being sucked into the vortex of a deep well – or maybe it is just my imagination working overtime! However, I am pleasantly surprised when the first officer I meet with offers me a seat before I can spill out my tale. I am escorted into the innermost chamber (the bottom of the well?), where two or three officers are frenziedly manning the phones. One of the officers remarks they got the car details from 101, and have traced the car’s owner. A driver was driving the car, he says – we know the owner, he is a nice man. If he’s such a nice man he should be more careful about the people he chooses to drive a car, I rage. The officer shrugs and says the owner lost his son a few days ago, thanks to the manic driving of one of his drivers.

I am so angry by now that I have no sympathy for the owner, even when I hear about his son’s death. What about my case, I demand? We can give you the phone number of the owner and you can negotiate a settlement, the officer says. But I don’t want settlement, I fume – I want to meet the driver and I want to see him face the consequences (probably slap him, Hindi movie style? But I don’t say that!). The other alternative is that you file a case with us, the matter will go to court, your car will need to be left with us for the examination, and well, you let the law take its course, he suggests with a deadpan expression.

I can see where he is leading to by now. In my beloved country, the law literally takes its own course, and a very long and tortured course spread over decades at that! Letting the law takes its own course would mean constant haranguing (and bribe paying) by police officers, countless visits to the courts, endless dealings with petty officers...for in the Indian judicial system, the powerless (or less powerful) is guilty and the influential innocent, no proof needed.

My mind baulks, the resolve weakens. I had marched into the station demanding to “see justice done”, but in my outrage, I had momentarily forgotten what that means in India. And despite the odds, if I still decide to pursue the long path of justice, would I really be fighting against the ‘right’ accused? The owner claimed the accused was a driver, but because of the dark windows, I had no means of verifying the claim. For all I know, a family member was driving the car, and a poor man at the bottom of the food chain would pay the price (I have grown up on a staple of Hindi movies with such incidents you see). Or even if it was the driver who was at fault, maybe he was exhorted to drive faster by someone, or under pressure of an unrealistic deadline. Who could tell the real story?

Plagued by moral doubts, uncertainties and unease at the thought of dealing with the complex system, I decide to give in. I write out a letter, but I do not file it – instead, I meekly tell the officer I am open to negotiation, and head back home to retrieve what remains of my weekend.

In the end, I was left with a vague sense of disappointment . I was pleasantly surprised by the civility and responsiveness of the officers at JBN, and was glad that I did something (contrary to my middle class upbringing of deferentially giving in to the notorious system). Yet, I could not get over the nagging thought that a civilized society would never allow such incidents to take place at such alarming regularity, and that I, as a part of this so-called civilized society, was in a way as much to blame as the ‘system’.

The Music of Words

2008-08-21T16:16:00.001+05:30

I had a manic-Monday-types Friday – chock a block with difficult conference calls, meetings and interviews. I was so exhausted by the time I was done by 8 that I discarded all thoughts of gymming and headed straight home. Dined on some soup and dinner rolls. I was alone at home, and somehow, time appears to inflate when you are alone – unless you are drunk or asleep. There wasn’t anything interesting on TV (I get bored of TV very quickly anyway), I didn’t have the energy for a full fledged movie (not the kinds that I had at home anyway) or a book – but it was Friday for chrissakes, and I detest turning in early on a Friday night. Somehow, the more I stretch my sleeping hour on a Friday night, the more I tend to savor the seemingly endless possibilities of the weekend – so what if most of these possibilities remain just that, limited to the realm of my imagination.

Unexpectedly, it started to rain. Not the gentle pitter patter of a Bangalore evening shower, but more like the gentle drilling of a crane, coarse but blunted as if a piece of cloth covered its mouth. I could almost imagine the raindrops falling straight down - not slanting - but vertical. Slow, incessant, seemingly endless - just the kind of rain that depresses me. Give me a tumultuous downpour any day – one that knows that a quick departure is always better than a long drawn farewell.

So it was probably the combination of my solitary-yet-content state and the slow, unending rain that made me drift towards reading poetry after a long time. Surprisingly, I did not drift towards Vikram Seth. Instead, I dwelled upon the lyricism of Eliot’s Burnt Norton & The Love Song of J Alfred Prufrock, the latter a poem that I can read and re-read a thousand times and one; the wonderfully constructed Patterns that compassionately but unsentimentally chronicles a young Flanders woman who has just learnt that her beloved fiancé who she was to marry a day later has been killed in war; Under One Star by Wislawa Szymborska, a delightful peep into all the delightful little pieces of life; Maya Angelou’s And Still I Rise – oh, what a powerful writer she is!; Wilfred Owen’s cry against war, Dulce Et Decorum Est; the wonderfully ironic A Strange Problem by Kanwar Narain on ‘the power to hate with all my heart Is ebbing by the day’; Harivanshrai Bachchan’s melancholy reflections on life in Kya Bhoolon Kya Yaad Karoon; and finally; Books, by Gulzar, an interesting eulogy to the decline of the physical reading of books.

A bit of caustic wit and irony was called for after all this sentimentality, and who better than Dorothy Parker and Emily Dickinson to supply it! I shared Parker’s disappointments in being forced to live with one perfect rose, and shared Dickenson’s Presentiments on “Faith” (a fine invention), “Hope” (the thing with feathers), formal feelings after a great pain, not being able to stop for Death, and a certain slant of light in winter.

I ended with Vikram Seth of course – a seven course Michelin meal should be polished off with a fitting dessert. I suppose if I was given the chance to take just one book on a marooned island, I’d take his Collected Poems. That, or Neruda, is all the nourishment one needs!

Unintended

2008-07-27T21:19:00.001+05:30

First, the unexpected death.
Then, the blasts.

Suddenly, I am more alive to the mortality of those I know & love.
And hence, the white flag.

Perhaps, I regret it already.

Words, silly words
reckless
sometimes ridiculous
casting their spell of inevitability
when all I desire
is a certain ambiguity.

The Peach Orb

2008-07-14T16:21:00.001+05:30

An ode to our trip to Ranganathittu - composed by Elina. Editors scouting for the next Sylvia Plath may please contact her directly.

The waterfall belonged to Gulliver’s Lilliput Land
And yet inspired a lot of freakishly frolicking folks
Who looked beyond the torn black slippers?
Bobbing along the blue green current and
The catch of the chilly marinated day!
The coracles weaved themselves
amongst the slight waves of the man made dam
And the memories of kingfisher colored children
laughing into the peach orb of a vanilla sky.

In the winding roads of an unborn morning
We had set out to meet a few birds and
And a scarcely traveled path of kindred time
And we discovered out of bounds marshes,
Amongst bound bamboo growth in definite gardens
Foxes and lions of Indian Politics, an insecure Indica
And a foreign cuisine for our north of the Vindhya tongue
And some light which fell through the
Canopy of trees and kissed our foreheads as we literally
Cooled our heels by a brook bordered by fish scales and
Love Ballads which celebrated the genre of gullible childhood.

And it is all a celebration of the times we live
Saluted by Mona Lisa smile on dark glasses
A discovery of ‘What The Point’ amidst surreal banality
And this poem to us.

Here's looking at you, Fed

2008-06-08T21:09:00.004+05:30

It is heartbreaking to watch a magician suddenly lose his art. There he comes charging to the net, only to miss a volley he would have usually aced with his eyes shut. The perfect forehand goes just long, the incredible angle has disappeared. The razor sharp serve is uncharacteristically vulnerable. Not just once, but again and again. The proud shoulders droop, the head nods increasingly in desperation. The heart still hasn't lost the fight, but the body has lost the midas touch.

When the agony ends, as end it must, the winner is more apologetic than ecstatic. For he recognizes that in his victory he has humbled, maybe even humililated, a master.

Today Rafa won a record 4th French Open, defeating The Great Federer 6-1, 6-3, 6-0.

During the final, ignoble set, I mailed to a dear friend telling her how disappointed I was. Here is what she replied:

What is to separate this man from the Gods? Every once a year he is confronted with his mortality and to the fact that there is one aspect of his prowess that one other human is better at, thanks to Nadal.

The wisdom of her words made me think - what about Rafa? Everyone talks about Roger Federer and how Roland Garros would be the crowning jewel in his coronation as the Greatest Tennis Player Ever (if not the greatest athlete ever). We all sympathize with TGF for being repeatedly denied the only major title to elude him for four successive years by this ONE man (for everyone acknowledges that were it not for this kid from Mallorca, Pete's 14 and Andre's Slam would have been conquered years ago). The French crowds, delighted with TGF's charm and fluency in their language, have unsuccessfully rallied behind him against the defending champion. But had it not been for Fed, Rafa would have undoubtedly been Numero Uno in men's tennis. For now, however, he has to stay content with winning at Roland Garros and being the best Number Two ever in men's tennis.

So in a way, they each take away from the other, and in that taking away, add to each other's greatness. Their evident mutual respect and affection only adds to the allure of this great rivalry. Shakespeare could not have scripted this better - for in the decades to come, no mention of The Great Roger Federer will be complete without naming Rafael Nadal. And this is how it is, this is how it should be.

Watch Agneiszka Radwanska

2008-06-01T22:50:00.005+05:30

Justine Henin's untimely exit from women's tennis, though unfortunate, has made the women's draw at Roland Garros much more exciting. The Williams sisters, true to their erratically scintillating form, have lost to rookies. Sharapova seems to have lost the razor sharp brilliance she displayed in Melbourne, and has relied more on her shrieking grunts than her shot making to get through to the 4th round. Ivanovic and Jankovic have been consistent, but frankly, they present minimal threat to Henin-Williams-Sharapova on a good day. Kuznetsova, Dementieva, Chakvetadze & Safina can always spring a surprise, but the greatest thrills have come from watching the under-19's in the main draw.

I haven't caught too many of the matches, but two girls I am really impressed with are Suarez Navarro and Agneiszka Radwanska. I saw parts of just one match of the former - the 4th round match against Penetta (who got rid of Venus Williams in the 3rd round). S Navarro boundless energy reminds you of Sanchez Vicario, but she is fitter and much more lethal - with a one handed backhand that makes you wish she would play against Justine Henin, the queen of the single handed backhand. Will Suarez Navarro go on to become a Djokovic, or remain a one Grand Slam wonder aka Tsonga? - only time will tell.

But the one who really caught my attention is 19 year old Agneiszka Radwanska, voted the emerging player of the WTA tour in 2007. Yes, she lost in straight sets to Jelena Jankovic in the 4th round, but did she give Jelena a scare! Radwanska has a good game of course, but what gives her an edge over her contemporaries is her tenacity, level headedness and surprising physical stamina, her frail frame notwithstanding. She just did not give up against Jankovic, keeping her kool and saving several match points to force the second set into the tie breaker. Had Radwanska made better use of her serve, Jelena would have been under serious threat of not making the QF's.

Fortunately, Radwanska has time on her side, and if she gets the right guidance and manages to stay fit, we'll surely see much more of her on the women's tour in the later rounds.

How to be Strong

2008-05-21T10:10:00.000+05:30

Someone on the radio was interviewing a breast cancer survivor today. Amongst the several facile questions, this one took the cake: (incredible wonder in her voice) How did you find the strength to cope with this, how did you muster the strength?

I found the question so ridiculous I burst out laughing. If you have cancer (or any other potentially fatal disease), you do not have the luxury to brood over questions such as how will I muster the strength to cope with this disease? Because that is not a choice – if you do not find that courage, you are dead. Quite plain and simple. You put your faith in your oncologist, your God, you family, your friend, your astrologer, your dog - whoever – and just keep on fighting the goddamn cells and hope that you destroy them faster than they breed in your body.

More on Thailand

2008-05-20T16:09:00.003+05:30

Unfortunately, and unlike most other countries, taxi drives in Thailand are boring. The driver doesn’t speak English, and if he does, all he wants to know is how much you earn, and hence how much he can cheat you.

So the scene for surprise and interest shifted, surprisingly, to my hotel’s elevator.

Giving me company in the elevator one day was an American man and a Chinese-American lady – they were both emerging from the excellent Spa, and the lady was passionately elaborating on spa hygiene and related horrors. As the elevator doors closed, she remarked (shouted is more like it, but I am a polite listener) – I mean, nayl fhunghus is extrehmely diffhiculht to gaid rid auf. As I was leaving the elevator, her subdued male companion remarked – anye fhunghus, for thad madder. Touche'. The brilliance of the conversation left me spell bound. I hope they saw the smile as I left. I wish they understood what it meant.

Another morning. I am heading out to work. A short, slightly plump (healthy looking?) Arab enters the elevator. He gives me a brief, disdainful glance, then settles down to admiring himself from all possible angles in the full length mirror, lingering a wee bit longer on his womanly bottom. No surprise that he got off at the Health Club – there are full length mirrors there all along the wall behind the treadmills. I suspect he didn't get much of running done though.

I guess you need a bit of madness to stay sane in this crazy country.

Holidays in Hell – Doing Business in Thailand

2008-05-20T16:03:00.002+05:30

I blame this on PJ O’Rourke. If I hadn’t been reading Holidays in Hell in, appropriately, Thailand, I promise I would not have called out the country by name in this post. But after my third visit to this land, I am in no mood for niceties. And if Mr O-Rourke can describe hell in the beautiful city of Beirut, I don’t see why I shouldn’t spill the beans on the ‘best tourist destination in Asia’.

The stupidity starts with the visa. You can get a visa upon arrival for tourism, but you need a non-immigration visa if you are traveling on business. But that is not enough. You also need to apply for a temporary work permit after you have entered the country – the non-immigration visa is simply for you to get out of Suvarmbhoomi airport and reach your office. But officially, you cannot work at your office till you have the work permit.

No one understands English of course, even the ones who can supposedly speak it. Communication is excruciating – and this is not because of the language alone. The bigger problem is that a Thai’s comprehension level is at least ten times slower than that of an average human – and I am being polite here. Everything needs to be explained, re-explained, re-re-explained…and numerous irrelevant questions need to be patiently answered. A has to be followed by B, and if you jump to C, prepare to spend an extra fortnight to explain the why’s and the what’s.

Have you attended a meeting with over five of these blokes in the same room? It’s like playing Chinese whispers with people who are deaf, but God compensated that with the faculty of speech. First, they will look you over and discuss you loudly with each other in Thai, frequently looking and pointing at you so you know you are the object of attention. After this polite welcome, they will settle down to the bawling in Thai, with frequent looks at you to confirm that you do not comprehend a word, which being the case the decibel levels will keep on rising. The amount of noise and stupidity that goes around is enough to drown an army of Chinese pigs.

The favorite Thai word? It may be a three letter word outside the workplace, but inside, it’s ISSUE. A glow comes into their eyes when you mention this word – and they will have a two hour long meeting every two hours to discuss issues. Don’t forget to send minutes of meeting, else that will be another issue. But don’t expect them to do what you asked them to do – they wont read what you sent. You can bring it up at the next issue meeting, but in the end, it’s all your fault anyway. They are remarkably well organized that way – they will do all the shouting and cribbing while someone else will do the work.

As for Thai men in the workplace, they all appear to be the same with their soft voices and Buddha like countenance, cultivated no doubt after years of training and suffering. The women simply outnumber –and outshout – them.

Next time I hear about going to Thailand (on work), I am jumping from the thirteenth floor of my office.

Created Dec 07

Romulus, My Father

2008-05-05T15:35:00.003+05:30

Raimond Gaita's father loves to collect beetles* and make them fly in the wind. "For luck", he says. And also for self belief and resilience - words he does not state, but lives his life by. The film adapation of Romulus, My Father, starring 'Hector' Eric Bana, is a touching interpretation of Raimond Gaita's novel by the same name.

At heart a simple tale of survival and kinship, there are several interesting scenes in the movie. The young Raimond once takes eggs for one of his friends - an old, decrepit man who lives in the back of beyond in remote Australia. The old man is delighted, but there is no water - so our man pees into a pan and boils the eggs in them, much to young Raimond's consternation!

Then there is Hora, Romulus' s friend in need and a father figure to young Raimond. An unlettered handyman, Hora loves reading and dispenses several words of wisdom to the eager youngster during their outdoor pursuits. While kayaking with Raimond, he quotes Bertrand Russell and states - If you enjoy wasting your time, then it is not a waste. Later, during a difficult time for the family, he remarks - Things change; watch your thoughts, for they decide what you become in life.

Probably the best part about the movie is that while it is a tribute to Romulus, the audience gets enough time to get to know the other key characters - Raimond, his manic depressive mother Christina, Hora, and Hora's brother Mitru, who falls in love with and marries Christina but is finally driven to take his life by this decision.

Romulus himself is outwardly no hero, just an ordinary man who loves his son and posesses an intense will to survive against all odds. So it is that he recovers from a near fatal accident and a later bout in an asylum after his wife's death, and lives to see his son study at St Joseph, a dream he had cherished and nurtured.

There is an interesting scene when Romulus is beating metal against fire to mould it to his will (he is a handyman - good with his head and hands - which may explain why the locals call him Jack). The beating of the metal fades into the incessant ringing of the bell at St Joseph's, interrupting young Rai's reverie. Thus it is that the lives of the father and the son are entwined.

The ending manages to bring in a bit of suspense. Romulus is back home from the asylum, but has he recovered? He wakes his son in the middle of the night - it is time to move home. On the way, upon Raimond's prompting, he narrates how Mitru was killed: He biked to the top of a tower, and jumped; but before that, he stuck a knife pointing upwards in the ground, "Just to make sure". They stop for the night by a cliff, Raimond sleeps, Romulus is gazing across the rocks. Morning breaks, Rai awakens and looks around - there is no sign of Romulus. He rushes to the cliff and looks down in fear at the sheer drop. The despair on his face echos the question in the viewer's mind - has Romulus abandoned his son too, just like Christina and Mitru did? "Pappi !", screams Raimond. "I am here", comes a gruff voice . Romulus is collecting beetles by the side of the cliff - for luck, and life.

Seasons in the sun

2008-05-05T14:25:00.005+05:30

APRIL is the cruellest month, breeding
Lilacs out of the dead land, mixing
Memory and desire, stirring
Dull roots with spring rain.
Winter kept us warm, covering
Earth in forgetful snow, feeding
A little life with dried tubers.
Summer surprised us, coming over the Starnbergersee
With a shower of rain; we stopped in the colonnade,
And went on in sunlight, into the Hofgarten,
And drank coffee, and talked for an hour.

- T S Eliot, The Wasteland (The Burial of the Dead)

Do you....as much as I .....

2008-03-19T22:31:00.002+05:30

They tell you that after a period of intensely missing someone comes a time of forgetting and healing. They are correct.

What they do not tell you, however, is that the period of forgetting is often followed by one of intense re-remembering, where the temptation to peel off the cure is nearly as strong as the original feeling itself.

The Cells must be crazy

2008-03-19T22:26:00.003+05:30

The word ‘cancer’ and its associations is probably the strongest signal of impending mortality to the human mind. I remember how, when we were first faced with its inevitability, everyone would whisper the word softly and deferentially, in a tone that indicates fearful respect for something that one does not really understand. Almost like we were in a temple or a church.

So a cancer hospital seems to be an unlikely place to make new friends and revive broken and forgotten relationships. But when you remember the coming of winter by ‘that time when we were in room 304’, the hospital does become your second home. You start recognizing not just the doctors, nurses and the staff, but also the other ‘regulars’. You exchange notes on treatments and medicines and kids and hopes and dreams. You think about all that you have done and all that is still left to be done, and wonder if you can get the fickle caravan of time to stay awhile with you.

It is not a pretty sight, but in a strange and perverse way, it also gives you strength. You see little kids with their heads shaved off for the treatment – some smile mischievously through the pain, others howl with an agony that haunts you for days. Any feelings you may have of ‘why me/why my family’ disappear when you hear a 25 year old man talk reassuringly to his wife after his first chemo session – she is not at his bedside because she has just given birth to their first child.

So it didn’t appear that strange after all that Dad mended the breach with one of his oldest friends at his bedside in the hospital. Or that a dear friend with whom he had lost contact some years ago should emerge from the room next to his, herself undergoing chemotherapy. He also made a lot of new friends, and surprisingly, not just with the nurses (whose phone numbers and e-mails he assiduously noted in his notepad – a job that was later entrusted to us when his cataract started troubling him more).

Of all the new friends we made, probably the closest bond was with a brother-sister duo, whose father had been admitted in the room next to ours with lung cancer. Uncle was a role model – he ate and lived healthy (we heard him advising his daughter against all ‘white’ stuff while refusing sugar in his tea), shunned drinking and smoking, had been managing the entire household (including washing & cleaning) as his wife was an invalid, and faced his unexpected illness with cheerfulness and optimism. Mridula-di and Vishal clearly worshipped him, and why not?

Uncle’s first visit to the hospital coincided with dad’s later cycles, and they would often ‘consult’ with us veterans. Dad stayed in touch with Vishal, while I exchanged an occasional email with Mridula-di. Dad’s visits to the hospital reduced (touch wood), but sometimes he would run into Vishal, in which case he would always pass on detailed updates on Uncle to me.

Over the months, life limped on and then gathered momentum, and communication dwindled. Last week when I was in Delhi, Dad asked me if I’d heard from Mridula-di. He’d called Vishal a few days ago, but hadn’t got a response. We hoped Uncle was better.

Vishal called Dad today to tell him that Uncle died a few weeks ago. Apparently, Dr Chaturvedi, the friendly doctor who loved talking about his son’s video games when he caught me watching movies on my laptop, hadn’t given him much of a chance. But when you are battling the errant cells in your own body, the faintest chance can offer brilliant hope.

I wonder what Dad told Vishal when he heard the news. It is difficult mouthing clichés about death when you know how close you came to it yourself. All you can say is a silent thank you – to Life for giving you company, to Death for staying away. Amen.

Paved Paradise

2008-01-25T22:58:00.000+05:30

Saturday evening. It’s raining again in Bangalore. I used to joke when I moved here three years ago that the moment you think about stepping out on a weekend, it begins to rain in Bangalore. Mercifully, however, the downpour is neither torrential nor incessant – more like a show of crackers that dazzles and delights for a few moments, and then disappears, just as suddenly as it appeared.

So when there was a brief lull – which can be but an interval or the final bow for the day, always maintaining that element of intrigue - I decided to go for a walk down 100 Feet Road. It had been a while since I had taken in the smell of wet earth and savor the freshness that seems to imbibe even the dullest of objects after it has rained, and I was suitably armed with my old floaters and a black umbrella.

It turned out to be a horribly rude nudge into reality.

I have stayed off Indiranagar 100 Feet Road since I came to Bangalore more than three years ago. I still remember falling in love with this stretch of concrete as I was driven down it in a rickety auto rickshaw on my way to inspect my second house. The vast expanse of the road, the wide cobbled pavements straight out of a European town, the gracious houses deferentially sitting behind the majestic trees that formed a leafy arch across the width of the road, the red jacarandas in full bloom - I was reminded of a story of an enchanted grove that I had read as a kid. I confess that the road played a big part in my saying yes to the house, and continuing to stay in its vicinity since then.

But the slow rotting of this beautiful city has predictably not failed to escape 100 Feet Road. Many of the houses have been sold off and converted into shops and restaurants, leading to drastic cutting of the graceful old trees that once lind its banks. The beautiful stone pavements – once one of the widest in the city – have also been dug up and destroyed due to the construction and a stated intention to widen the road (which, of course, has not been followed up with any action). The road itself is in a pitiable condition – potholed at several places, overloaded with vehicles and noise and people, deprived of the many hued flowers that lent to it a unique calm and serenity. Destroyed by a hungry marauder who, unable to understand or appreciate the beauty of a beautiful Van Gogh, viciously slashes and rips it apart.

And so a walk that started with pleasurable anticipation turned into an incessant dodging of slush on the pavements and navigating between angry traffic at places where there was no pavement. Within five minutes, I was forced onto one of the more peaceful by-lanes (relatively speaking) to escape the vicious anger of this once beautiful road.

They paved paradise, and put up a lot of shops.

Blackout

2008-01-25T22:52:00.000+05:30

Come, let us go our own way, without remembrance of what passed and could have passed between us. Let us meet as were to perchance meet two strangers, without recognition or recollection, devoid of memory and possibility.

The Sound of Patterns

2008-01-04T17:16:00.000+05:30

An old unpublished post (is that an oxmoron?) - Aug 2006

A few days ago, I attended a formal office conclave to celebrate the inauguration of our new facility in Costa Rica. It was an elegant affair – about twenty of us from the office, and after a brief speech by the Costa Rican President (the guest of honor), we were shepherded into the cafeteria-turned-into-ball-room for champagne and light snacks. I noticed a pair of musicians at one end of the room, and immediately headed for that corner.

Throughout the two hour affair, which saw a score men, and a few women, all dressed in somber black and grey, network and talk shop, the man on the guitar and the lady on the flute plucked their melodies – oblivious to their audience, their bodies gently swaying with the music like soft waves – now the flautist would smile and challenge the man with a melody, now the guitarist would respond admirably and throw back the gauntlet.

What I liked best about the pair was not the music they played, but they way they played the music. Although they had been called upon to perform for an audience (albeit an indifferent one in this case), the music that they played was first for themselves – for them to create and them to savor. The artiste’s enjoyment was primary; making the audience happy was secondary.

And I think that is how any beautiful creation should be – a pure, confident and forthright expression of your heart, unencumbered by doubts and disbelief….not targeted towards the lowest or the largest common denominator, but created solely for the pleasure of creation. Like Howard Roark’s architecture in Fountainhead.

Later in the evening, the guitarist’s place was taken by a lady with a harp! I have never seen a harp before – it looks like something you would weave pretty patterns with. Come to think of it, that’s what music does too – except that you need to hear the patterns.

Simply the Best !

2007-10-08T18:27:00.001+05:30

Real men also cry. Even when one of them is possibly the greatest player in tennis history, and has just equaled a 27 year old record held by another all-time great. So it was when Roger Federer won the All England Lawn Tennis Championship for the fifth consecutive year, beating his nemesis Rafael Nadal in a final that was complete paisa-vasool for tennis lovers.

(This post has been WIP for too long, for Fedex has since gone on to win the US Open against the precocious Djokovic, despite being decidedly less than his usual brilliant self).

It is not easy to write a dedication to Roger Federer, for whatever I say about him would have been said before, and better. Anyone with even a mild interest in tennis acknowledges that the Swiss does not need to equal or surpass any more records to prove that he is the greatest player ever in the game of tennis. For His Royal Highness Roger Federer’s claim to greatness is not his ability to break and create records at a breathtaking pace – it is that he has brought beauty and elegance to a game that had begun to be too strongly associated with bulging muscles and nerve wracking grunts. He glides on court like a ballerina from the Bolshoi and uses his tennis racket to orchestrate the most breathtaking shots that the game of tennis has seen in a long while, using his talent, intellect and intense concentration to unsettle even his strongest opponents. A lethally reliable serve and a tremendous repertoire of shots notwithstanding, what impresses me most about Federer is the manner in which he conserves and optimizes his energy, raising his game by several notches in the rare instances that he is behind.

Tennis was never a beautiful sport, but watching Federer play sometimes tempts one to draw comparisons with a Chopin composition, a Van Gogh painting or a Somerset Maugham character - quite simply, it moves you emotionally in a way that one would never associate with a rough game of sport.

So it does not come as a surprise when great tennis players, current and past, discuss him in reverential undertones and writers like David Foster Wallace write tomes on Roger Federer as a religious experience. "He just plays you, trying to make you play your worst and he plays his best. He matches up his strength to your weakness unbelievably," said Federer’s first round opponent at the US Open. If Federer continues the way he has, a DVD on Federer moments will soon become a must-have for tennis fans.

I had saved my ode to Roger Federer for the 2007 French Open. Watching the maestro play throughout the tournament, I was confident that this was the year of his Grand Slam. Yes, there was that little matter of disposing Rafa, two time champion and king of clay, but that could be taken care of. The official crown of The Best Player Ever beckoned Roger.

Unfortunately, the feisty Nadal cares a dime for reputation or greatness, and denied Federer that opportunity, stamping his authority over the World No 1 for the second successive time on clay.

So I told myself – going by the measure of records as a measure of greatness, Federer is not the greatest player in tennis, at least not yet. After all, when you contrive to lose a Grand Slam final in 4 sets despite being ahead and having several break points against your opponent, you still have some work left to do.

And then came Wimbledon – Nadal & Federer once again. Emperor versus a worthy pretender. Already, it appeared that Nadal was much more comfortable on grass than Federer was on clay. And then there was his youth, power and tenacity, not to forget that he is one of those rare players against whom Federer has lost more matches than he has won - this was indeed going to be a dream Wimbledon final.

True to form, the match did not disappoint. Both players played breathtaking tennis – sometimes winning a game at love and at other times clawing from behind to clinch a game, made some unexpected unforced errors, and came up with some near-impossible shots – battling each other with that rare hunger and tenacity that distinguishes the great from the good. Hawk Eye also played its role, with a rare outburst from the level headed champion. When Nadal won the second set, Commentator 1 said of Mika, Federer’s girlfriend: She looks nervous. “So does he (Roger Federer)”, quipped Commentator 2.

Two sets later, Commentator 1 of Mika: “She had some nails 2 hours ago”.

But after over four hours of breathtaking brilliance, HRH prevailed, palpably lifting his game in the final set to deny Nadal the opportunity of dethroning him. And in a telling demonstration of the tremendous respect that the world’s best two tennis players have for each other, Nadal embraced the champion at the net. Meanwhile, a particular sequence in the game stays with me. At one set all, Federer is serving to level the 3rd set 6-6 and take it to the tiebreaker, when an ace fired by him is challenged by Rafa – who has successfully challenged several Federer points before, much to the champion’s chagrin. Federer shakes his head in disbelief, as if to say - you dare challenge an ace fired by ME? The shot is called in, Federer wins the point, and backs it up with two unplayable serves to win the game. Just in case you missed the point – no one challenges Roger Federer.

But men’s tennis is changing. For a legion of youngsters – Djokovic, Murray, Baghdatis - are joining forces with Rafael Nadal to challenge the world number one’s complete domination of the game. The Emperor has mercilessly destroyed his opposition in the battles till now, but some say that he has hardly been challenged, except possibly by Nadal. So as the boys throw the gamut for the war ahead, will the ‘aging’ Federer succeed in stamping his superiority once again? If that is so, as most of us hope it will be, the best in men’s tennis is yet to come.

But as the competition draws closer, Federer appears to be in no mood to relinquish his crown. For as he said at the press conference after the US Open final upon being asked to compare Djokovic and Nadal – No 2 or No 3 does not matter, what matters is being Number 1.

From anyone else, that would be arrogance. Coming from Roger Federer, it’s simply confidence.

For now, a closing glimpse. At the post match Wimbledon press conference, the presenter asked Federer: 15-40 down twice in the second set, and you still won (the final)?

Well, you get lucky sometimes, he smiled.

Champions are also humble.

Change of Heart

2007-07-17T10:28:00.000+05:30

To make love with a stranger is the best.
There is no riddle and there is no test. --

To lie and love, not aching to make sense
Of this night in the mesh of reference.

To touch, unclaimed by fear of imminent day,
And understand, as only strangers may.

To feel the beat of foreign heart to heart
Preferring neither to prolong nor part.

To rest within the unknown arms and know
That this is all there is; that this is so.

Unclaimed - Vikram Seth

Tiger, tiger, burning bright...

2007-04-17T18:28:00.000+05:30

Thank God its Thursday ! Finally, it was time for us to start our journey towards the heart of India – the Kanha National Park in Madhya Pradesh.

The excitement started in Bangalore, when we were running late for our flight and had forgotten to book a cab. In desperation, we offered an autorickshaw 100 bucks for the 4- km ride to the airport. Our man took our exhortations to drive fast quite seriously, and his manipulations of the auto as we were caught in the jam outside the airport, accompanied by entertaining commentary and expletives (aimed at the other drivers) was worth every rupee. For once, I was glad I was not driving my precious car!

After an almost-night-out in Bombay, I was ready to drop off when we reached Nagpur the next morning, but there was still the 220 km road journey to cover. The Qualis offered to us by a friend’s relative turned out to be a bit of a squeeze for seven women and their luggage, but we somehow survived the 5.5 hour road journey. The highpoint was stopping at a hand pump on the way to drink and soak our tired limbs in some refreshingly kool water!

We reached our accommodation, the MP Tourism run Baghira Log Hots, at about 4 in the evening. Not being able to take a safari at that time (we were too tired anyway!), we had a relaxing evening spent sitting outside our cottages and gazing at herds of cheetal flock past as we listened to the sounds of the jungle. The rustic resort is located in the core zone of Kipling country (the name of the resort is obviously inspired by The Jungle Book), and turned out to be a great place to enjoy the Park.

The excitement commenced right away, as we found a baby elephant caught in the grass next to our cottage (panic not - all elephants in the park are tame) and later heard a leopard hunt a deer in the park.

The main activity at the Park is, of course, the jungle safari - there are two safari’s in a day (morning 6-10 and evening 4-6). How many animals you sight depends upon the time of your visit and of course, your luck. I finally broke my jinx of no tiger sightings in several previous wildlife trips by seeing three this time! Looking at this majestic creature - the lazy and regal walk, the proud tilt of the head, the soft and shiny fur and the mesmerizing eyes – is an experience of a lifetime that sends an unmatched thrill down your spine.

The two male tigers were actually ‘sighted’ by forest guards, who then transmit this information to all safari jeeps so that the visitors can come for the ‘tiger show’. This is essentially a 2-3 minute circling of the tiger as you sit atop the park’s elephants – it may appear a bit contrived to purists but you are unlikely to ever get a closer viewing of the king of the jungle, so it is worth the 100 bucks per person. We also had the more natural ‘stumbling upon the tiger’ experience when we came across a tigress nonchalantly ramble across the road that we were driving on.

Our safaris would not have been half as entertaining without Sharmaji, our jeep driver, who, with seven women who he wrongly presumed were innocent college kids, imagined himself as Kanha’s Casanova (much to his chagrin later!). We learnt all the wrong facts about Hindu mythology from him, and even though we were left to ‘catch’ the wildlife on our own, his inimitable vignettes (Main hee who Sharma hoon joh Sita ke saath tha, mujhe zyaada bolne ki aadat nahin hai) and the laughter they evoked are unforgettable.

Though the tiger is clearly the main attraction of the park, on offer are several other wonders for a nature lover. Kanha is the only park that is home to the barasingha (12 horned deer), and our superb luck continued as we came upon a group of them sunning themselves in an open meadow, as if parading for a National Geographic photo-shoot. Other animals that you are likely to come across are various groups of antlers (cheetal, sambhar, chousingha and barking deer – the last look more like street dogs!), bisons, wild boars and of course, langurs (you can see them peering longingly at your food from outside the windows of the dining cottage). The park is also known for the nilgai, the leopard (we waited in vain to see one), sloth bear and dhol (wild dog) – we came across a pack of the last polishing off their kill a few hundred meters from our cottage.

There are also wonderful opportunities for bird lovers – some birds we sighted that you don’t see in cities were the blue jay, the rocket tailed drongo, the junglefowl (we even saw one fly!) and the brainfever bird (heard, not sighted). We also came across a kite hunt for its prey and several egrets by the ponds.

Apart from the safaris, the Kisli gate has an excellent nature’s trail that you can walk or cycle - watch our for the tiger and leopard pugmarks! A wildlife film is also screened here every evening. The Kanha museum in the middle of the jungle is an excellent source of information on the park’s inhabits.

On our second day at the Park, there was a light shower in the evening – although the thunderstorm that preceded it made us think we would be flooded in for the next week (sigh, wishful thinking). But then, every sight and sound in the wild is on a grandiloquent scale. I had a great time getting wet in the rain, trying to match step with a peacock as it strutted across the trees in front of our cottage. The thunderstorm did manage to break the park’s electricity pole though, and there was a sense of adventure in sitting out in the jungle in complete darkness with only the blanket of stars to guide you, hearing an occasional distress call from a cheetal or a leopard growl next to you (or so we imagined, as we ran into our cottage!).

The cottages are quite comfortable, given that you are located in the midst of the jungle in the heartland of India. Seven of us were comfortably accommodated in two clean and pleasant A/C Deluxe Rooms. The pricing, at a little over Rs.3,500 per person per night (Includes all meals, but excludes safari's) is quite reasonable for the peak season - the staff is also flexible when it comes to accommodating extra people in the room. They are also extremely helpful and courteous - they will entertain your requests for tea and coffee at odd hours with a smile. The manager is extremely knowledgeable about wildlife, and is an excellent source of information.

The food is definitely one of the highpoints of the resort, apart from the service and the location. The menu of simple Indian food (dal, veggies, and a non-item item) is extremely tasty and reminds you of the cooking in old Government guest houses. The only area where we could fault the cook was the deserts. There is also a decently equipped bar (they even had some red wine!) and happy hours in the evenings.

Our only grouse was with the safaris – the charges for these were higher than those published on the MP tourism website, and a lot of expenses were not disclosed upfront. Also, being the tourist season, a lot of local boys were being sent as jungle guides, instead of the trained forest staff. It would also have been nice to have a covered porch outside each cottage, especially for the hot summer months.

The best time to visit the park is the summer months, when the heat draws the animals to the watering holes. Do remember to carry comfortable cotton clothes (no denims, please), sunglasses, caps and sunscreen, and a good pair of binoculars. Our manager told us that Dec to Jan are also great for sighting the barasingha – apparently its antlers are in full splendor during these mating months (the antlers are shed every year after this season) – but the temperature touches sub zero levels then.

Don't you believe in God?

2007-04-17T17:39:00.000+05:30

Two ladies came knocking at my parents’ door this morning, distributing a leaflet about a talk by some holy man. Very politely, I declined, but the ladies did not take kindly to it. Why can’t you take it – demanded one loudly. I don’t need it – I replied, still polite. Don’t you believe in God??– she demanded in an accusing tone, even more loudly. What I believe or not believe is my business, I don’t ask you about your beliefs, so spare me mine - I replied, matching her tone this time. With a shake of her head, she went off.

Why is everyone so bent on making you believe in Parmatma – the One? Everyone from the stranger at the door to my own mother is upset with my Godlessness, even when, pardon my French, its no bloody business of theirs? If God does exist, I’m sure he doesn’t need the vote of someone who is skeptical about his existence to keep him in business – he enjoys an absolute majority anyways. Why then are his followers so caught up with not only convincing you about his existence, but also the superiority of their God, be he Hindu or Christian or Muslim or Jew? After all, I don’t go accusing people of God-ness when they choose to hook up un-authorized loudspeakers late into the night for a ‘paath’ (holy reading), or when they kill other people (many of whom are God-believers, incidentally) in the name of their God, and then think a holy dip in a freezing river or a grand yagna or pilgrimage will wipe clean all their sins (a belief perpetuated by the holy men who benefit by such ceremonies).

I do not feel compelled to convince people to not believe in God - one’s beliefs are a matter of personal choice, insofar as they do not violate the right of others to life and freedom. And not believing in a God is not the same as not having faith. True faith comes from within, and does not need to be shouted about, or killed for. If I can respect a believer even though I may not understand her, why is my *Godlessness* such a matter of discomfort for her?

Armchair Cricketing

2007-03-29T12:12:00.000+05:30

Much as we malign our cricketers, no one gives them credit for their vital contribution to India's rising economy. Journalists and TV channels can continue their lazy coverage of non-topics by analyzing India's performance or non-performance with plump spaghetti-clad starlets and anyone who has seen a bat (not necesarily the cricketing one). Politicians get another non-issue of which they have no clue to debate about in the 20 minutes in a year that they actually attend Parliament. Company and agency ad-honchos have ample opportunity to exercise their creativity by trying to decide the optimal combination of cricketers in a single ad and whether they should be pictured in their playing fatigues or otherwise. And the public gets to eat food that comes straight from the kitchen of Sachin and Tendulkar - talk about a double whammy.

And of course, we also win an occasional home series, for those really interested in the game.

In India, everyone and their bai (not to be confused with bhai, the kindly Big Bro who, alongwith BCCI, ensures sustained interest in cricket worldwide at great personal and financial risk) has an opinion on cricket. So it is too tempting for me to not say my two-taka about the Great Indian Cricketing Non-Show. Here goes -

The BCCI has completed its assessment of the poor performance of the Indian cricket team in the World Cup, and come up with some radical suggestions for a make-over of Indian Cricket & Company (ICC):

Vandana Luthra, the owner of one of the largest slimming and beauty clinics in the country, will be the new coaching agency for the team. Luthra’s staff will provide special grooming and beauty treatments to the players, with special pre-shoot ‘glow’ packages. VLCC will provide these services free of cost – in return, the players will be the new brand ambassadors for the chain. The hottest selling item in Luthra’s bouquet is expected to be the Sehwag Special, which is targeted at balding middle agers who have trouble distinguishing their waist from their stomach. Confidential sources tell us that a special make-over for BCCI Chief Sharad Pawar is also planned.

Acknowledging that new talent is needed in Indian cricket, the BCCI has declared an annual Mr. World-Cricketer pageant, which, like the Fairina Miss India, will be sponsored by the Timespass Group. In an attempt to draw young talent, the contest will carry an age restriction of 45 years. The BCCI will also invest in a chain of World Cup Salons all over the country to groom candidates, and is planning to hire Salman Khan, Mandira Bedi and Navjot Singh Sidhu as Special Advisors. Tie-ups with Indian Idol, Jhalak Dikhla Jaa and other reality shows are also being explored.

BCCI has also decided to petition the International Cricket Council (ICC-2) for a change in the cricketing format. Under the new format, a team will be allowed only upto 30 runs through ‘running between the wicket’, and an individual player will not be permitted more then 10 such runs. The top five batsmen of a team will be prohibited from running between the wicket. BCCI officials have used a scientific approach to arrive at these numbers – an analysis of singles and doubles made by Indian batsmen over the past 5 years.

Said a top BCCI Official – We are stung by criticism that the Indian batsmen are unable to make singles and always go for un-necessary big shots. Feedback collected by us (from current and former cricketers) indicate that no one wants to watch two aging, de-motivated and over-hyped men running between two pieces of wood. And you know we as a country dislike hard work when short cuts are available. We realized that the game needs a radical makeover, and it is up to India to seize the money, err, I mean, momentum.

The Board has also responded positively to criticism about composition of the Selection Committee. Henceforth, only politicians, mafia lords and small time Marwari businessmen will be drafted into the Selection Committee. A special quota has been set up for politicians with police cases pending against them. This will help bring more professionalism into the art of fielding and arm twisting, said a senior Board official.

Meanwhile, the Indian cricket team and its management (15 team members with families, 100 staff with family, neighbours and their friends) is preparing for a whirlwind site seeing tour of the West Indies (we had booked for post Super-Eight stage, and it’s really difficult getting five-star bookings now – said an exasperated official). The boys are really looking forward to unwinding after all the hard work, remarked Greg Chappell, the Indian coach.

In a minor development, the BCCI has been rechristened Board of Cash (and Cricket) Control in India, and has elected Sharad Pawar as its first life-time President. A new selection committee consisting of Lalu Prasad Yadav, Pappu Yadav, Mulayam Singh Yadav and Amar Singh has also been appointed. A Senior Board official said that they were awaiting acceptances from Narender Modi and Arjun Singh.

Post Script:
Sachin Tendulkar, who was planning a third restaurant chain called Sachin Tendulkar’s, after Sachin's and Tendulkars, has launched a nationwide talent hunt for a new name for the restaurant. We recommend Shhhhot

Last Night - A Tale

2007-03-28T20:18:00.000+05:30

Last night your faded memory came to me
As in the wilderness spring comes quietly,
As, slowly in the desert, moves the breeze,
As, to a sick man, with cause, comes peace.

Raat yun dil mein teri khoyi huyi yaad aayi
Jaise veerane mein chupke se bahaar aa jaaye
Jaise sehraaon mein haulay se chale baade e nadeem
Jaise beemar ko bewajah karaar aa jaye

-Last Night by Vikram Seth, translated from the Urdu of Faiz Ahmad Faiz

I

Happy Diwali, jaan !

He woke up to the fragrance of halwa wafting in from the kitchen, the sweetness suspended in the air, mingled with the scent of bitter almonds…just like the smell of oft-visited memories that you wish you could forget.

Diwali was when he had last spoken to her. She said that she was driving, no actually, waiting for the traffic light to turn green, when he had called . He heard her pick up the phone, then a Shit, then the phone was disconnected - she probably recognized his home number just as she pressed the ‘Answer’ key. He persisted, and as he had expected, she relented and picked up the phone the fifth time. Happy Diwali – he had murmured. Happy Diwali – she replied brightly. Only he would have recognized the false cheerfulness in the voice. How are you? I am driving, let me call you back – she had said, using his aversion to talking while driving as her excuse.

Of course she hadn’t called back. He kept on waiting throughout the party, even leaving the phone switched on till the last moment as he boarded his flight. She had surprised him for once.

So those were the last words they had spoken. Last words to last a lifetime of absence. Nothing grand, when you think about it. But then, reality is seldom as dramatic as we would like it to be. It is the mundane and everyday occurrences that create the real drama in life.

He smiled as he kissed his wife of five years. Happy Diwali, he whispered. There is no going back, he thought. Only an eternity of looking back.

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

Somewhere within your loving look I sense,
Without the least intention to deceive,
Without suspicion, without evidence,
Somewhere within your heart the heart to leave.

- Interpretation, Quatrains by Vikram Seth

II

She typed in the first two alphabets of the name, then stopped. Why are you doing this? –admonished an inner voice. That chapter ended years ago. Keep on scratching an open wound and it never heals, and you have only yourself to blame. Life has moved on, and so should you.

Besides, didn’t you tell him yourself, in no uncertain words, to stay out of your life for ever?

Yes I did, she thought. But I wonder how much of it I really meant, and did I really mean for ever? The hurting words were the only way I had to express the hurt I felt inside. Pity that fleeting words and actions are taken to be a permanent expression of your thoughts and intentions.

She finished typing the name, but the fingers lingered…what I am letting myself in for, she thought? But I wonder where he is, how he is, what he is doing ….She took a deep breath, and pressed Enter.

There was a brief write-up, and a picture. He was growing a beard now – the kind that was sported by wannabe-kool-dudes or the creative-types during her college days. Funny, for he was neither. The wife had a pretty smile, and a possessive hand on his arm. And there were two little children. The boy had inherited his big brown eyes, the girl his frown as she peered into the camera.

Maybe Pandora’s pithos is best left unopened, maybe some wounds never heal.

***************************************
If you had known…if I had known…ah well,
We played our cards so suavely, who could tell?
Ten years ago, so suavely, with such pain…
And, being wise, will do so once again.

-Reunion, by Vikram Seth

Whose Life is it Anyway?

2006-12-27T01:21:00.000+05:30

Met Life wants to offer me ‘a strategy for managing my life’ (I’ll do the strategizing dude, why don’t you try out the implementation for a change?)

Airtel wants to call me at least thrice a day when I am on roaming, precisely when I’m taking a well deserved siesta, watching a movie or listening to my favorite song, 'to take feedback on their services'……@@####, Need I say more? Now if you’ll pay for my roaming charges please?

My banks want to appoint an investment advisor to help me manage my money:

We believe the stock markets will still rise Ma’am
Sure, I’m sure Harshad Mehta believed that too
Hehe, You are funny Ma’am. We are not Harshad Mehta – we have done analysis and have experience in this field
Err, what’s your background? Are you a Certified Financial Planner?
No Ma’am, (chest heaving out, evident pride) I am an MBA from Mahabharata Institute of Management, and I have been in this role for the past 6 months …I will send you literature too Ma’am…now if you look at Downthedrain Mutual Fund…what phenomenal returns Ma’am..Shall I send my junior to meet you Ma’am…he will bring all the papers

The receptionist at my beauty parlor (he’s male btw – what do you call a male receptionist ?) wants me to undergo ‘spa treatment for my damaged hair’ when I ask him for a shampoo. Or else, at least buy the most expensive shampoo he has (One of the numerous L’Oreal varieties, all exorbitantly expensive!). As I leave without making a purchase, he volleys that they have a discount on the combo pack for ‘problem skin and hair’. Touche’

Every bank in the country wants me to take a personal loan – very cheap, miss, interest rates will rise in a month miss….

My mom’s LIC agent calls me early morning each day (9 AM – I just begin dreaming then) to tell me about the latest ‘best scheme’, when the only scheme my mind is willing to acknowledge is sleep, sleep, sleep.

My neighbourhood kirana shop helpfully volunteers with the latest ‘blemish reducing cream – top class, just like Shehnaz’, when I ask him for toothpaste.

Salma, my maid in Bangalore, wants to teach me how to make pasta (the one with kadi-patta in it…straight from Mysore), how to assert myself with my sweet landlady, how to keep my room clean, how to rear the fledging sapling my flatmate picked up on an impulse….

My Mom wants me to get married, buy a house, wash my face every night, learn how to cook, read less, not bite my nails while I read, drink less coffee, lose some weight, eat some more of the gajar-ka-halwa she made only for me, be less stubborn, curb my short temper, be less trusting, …..take charge of my life…wait a moment, I SHOULD TAKE CHARGE OF MY LIFE WHEN EVERYONE WANTS TO TELL ME HOW TO RUN IT?

Millenia's Angry Young Men

2006-12-07T16:25:00.000+05:30

The Angry Young Man is dead. Long live The Angry Young Man.

Amitabh Bachchan got a second life, and possible cinematic immortality, by playing reel and real life Godfather (the latter by seeding working class crorepati’s). Meanwhile, his Angry Young Man – the role that created a superstar of a tall, gauche and deep throated youth three decades ago, a role that could be played to perfection only by him – has been resurrected, albeit in a new avatar.

Take a look at three of the recent hits in Bollywood – Rang De Basanti, Lage Raho Munnabhai and Khosla ka Ghosla – and you know what I mean. While Amitabh’s angry young man gave form to a middle class that was just beginning to find its identity and voice, these movies depict the new middle class –one that is comfortable with its new found stature, yet recognizes its limited control over major events. And the best part is that the new Indian middle class no longer relies on the emergence of the lone rebel who becomes a part of the very system that he seeks revenge on – our new pilots, engineers and local dadas can take on the role just fine, thank you. And they will do it more smartly too – drawing upon not just the brawn carefully cultivated in the local gym, but also all other resources at their disposable (brains, family, and most importantly, society).

Take the directionless youths in RDB, out to have a good time with no care in the world, till they lose a close friend to corrupt politics. What do these guys do? Unlike our old angry young man, they don’t just surrender themselves to Big Brother after they’ve killed the joker-politician. No, they first take over a radio station and create awareness of what they have done, and why they did what they did. The rich son doesn’t just leave Dear Corrupt Father to be given his dues by ‘kanoon’ or the local deity – he finishes him off. True, a lot of people found the solution extreme, but then, desperate situations sometimes call for desperate measures.

Or the nerdy engineer in Khosla Ka Ghosla - bent on escaping his embarrassing middle class family and creating his dream life in the US. But when his father is fleeced of his lifetime’s savings and his dream house, he doesn’t flex his Mister India muscles and go out and challenge the goons of the corrupt land grabber. Instead, he enlists the support of a renegade thief and his girlfriend’s drama troupe to fool our smart developer and get back the house, with interest!.

And lastly, good old Munnabhai and Circuit, who effect a change of heart in hardened Lucky Singh by deploying the Gandhian principles of non violence and compassion. A contemporary revisiting of ahimsa.

Why do we like these guys so much? Coz like Amitabh Bachchan was to the 70’s generation, these people are just like you and me. We can relate with their dreams, and empathize with their sometimes vacuous lifestyles. And what happens to them could have happened to any of us. No one knows whether their solutions would work in real life, but then, how many people could have realistically gone and physically fought the bad guys too? What is important is that they are bothered enough by the injustice to do something about it. Madhavan’s friends could have buried him and got on with their foreign dreams. Nerdy engineer could have told his father to write off the house – he would make enough money in a year to buy him two such houses. And Munna-Circuit could have forcibly evicted Lucky Singh and grown their stature in BhaiLand. That they don’t take the easy way out is what earns them our admiration and accolades.

And the trend is not just limited to reel life. In real life too, Delhi, struggling with continued rapes and road rage deaths, is celebrating the conviction of Satish Sharma for the tandoor murder case, even as it waits for justice to be handed out to Manu Sharma and the Yadav clan. As I write this, Shibu Soren has been handed life sentence for conspiring to kill his secretary, and Navjot Singh Sidhu has been sentenced three years imprisonment for a road rage death.

True, most of these judgments have taken over a decade to arrive, leaving the accused free in this period – in an ironic twist, Manu Sharma, accused of killing Jessica Lal in a pub upon being refused a drink by her, has gone ahead and set up his own pub, which is doing quite well. These cases may also be a drop in the ocean (who knows how many cases go un-convicted, un-reported or buried), and have created concerns of ‘who will judge the judges’ (as Barkha Dutt pertinently pointed out).

But then, ridding India of corruption is like cleaning the mythical Augean stables. Granted, what we have now is probably just a wayward, spluttering stream. But let us not downplay the importance of these small victories either – for they open the frontiers of possibility, and give us hope. And it is up to us now to not just applaud, but seize the momentum. Long live the Angry Young Man.

The Road

2006-10-02T22:14:00.000+05:30

I really can't comment how bad or good BJP and its paraphernalia is for India, but I think they deserve credit for trying to accomplish over five years what the Congress couldn’t do over fifty – world-class roads. How many times have we rued the dismal state of India’s infrastructure, how numerous are the occasions when we have been secretly disappointed that even Beirut or Amman or Timbuktu has better roads than us! I wouldn’t DARE driving on these roads – remarked my American companion while we were coasting along in Costa Rica. Wait till you come to India – I thought, while outwardly continuing my pitch of you-haven’t-lived-if-you-haven’t visited-India.

Vajpayee’s Golden Quadrilateral appears poised to change all of that. Call it one man’s vision, but you have to also give credit that, in a country notorious for inaction, for once a grand idea was translated into concrete. I have driven with pleasure down the Bangalore-Mysore Expressway (gateway to Srirangapatna, Mysore & Coorg, amongst others) and the Bangalore-Pune highway (Mangalore, Pune, Goa,..). Two weeks ago, we decided to test out the National Highway from Bangalore to Chennai.

The drive, of course, is breathtaking. You’d think it’s just a road, but each road has a different tale to tell. The gentle cruising at 100 kmph, racing with an infinite expanse of white and blue, the many-hued flowers mushrooming in the middle of the road, the numerous shades of green, the exclamations of joy as the road plays hide and seek with you, now swerving to the left to reveal huge rock formations benevolently gazing upon you, now curving up to reveal an expanse of silken paddy fields. It is a feeling that can best be described as coming back home – joyous and unencumbered – after a long and arduous journey.

But what lends character and distinction to driving in India is the numerous sights and sounds that you encounter on the way. When you drive in other parts of the world – US, Europe, others – you are at best an observer of beauty. The landscape is like a beautiful ice maiden that holds you at arm’s length – to be admired from afar. In India, you are the actor and the spectator. You wave at the numerous children and adults cramped into a three-wheeled vehicle, and they respond with joy. You curse at the bike driving on the wrong side of the highway, but you make way for him. You recognize the right of way of the bullock cart and the odd cow. You stop for tea at Reddy’s Punjabi Dhaba, smiling at the attempt at all-inclusion. You laugh at restaurants that go by the names of Cup and Up and Roots and Shoots, and try to stomach Drive and Digest with unending glasses of fresh nimbu-paani. You smile when the chai-wala calls you back to return the 50 paisa left over from your bill of 4 rupees 50 paisa for four, steaming hot cups of delicious tea. You make a stop to take in a breathtaking sunset, and are amused to see Fair and Lovely amongst other emergency items in a small tea stall. You run around with the kids (and the goat and the dog), even as you show them ‘magic’ by opening and closing your car door from 50 meters afar.

Driving in India is not just about getting from place A to B. It is getting to know all that lies in between – the people, the places, the sounds - the good and sometimes the ugly. In a way, it is descriptive of Hindu philosophy – the journey is much more fulfilling than the destination.

May God Be With You

2006-10-02T22:12:00.000+05:30

I’m a Hindu by birth – a has-been believer in God who does not believe in religion and its associated symbols (such as temples). Over the past year, I have started questioning the existence of God, but I still feel irresistibly drawn to a Church.

As I sat quietly in the last row of an ancient Church in downtown Costa Rica, I wondered what it is that makes so many people – young and old, rich and poor, men and women – come to a Church. There they are, surrounded by images of Jesus, Joseph and Mary immortalized in glass and color, sitting quietly with themselves. Maybe the martyred Jesus gazing benevolently upon them, the wooden benches and the warm yellow light, and the quiet all around, gives them a sense of warmth and isolation – of being with yourself, finding yourself. You can shut out the world out here, I thought…till the loud screeching of car brakes from outside reminded me that the world is all around you…

Two can Win

2006-09-04T12:46:00.000+05:30

Numbers can be misleading. They tell you the facts, but not the stories that weave those facts. A bit like ends without the means.

Take a tennis match. The score-line tells you who won the match, but pretty much nothing else. It does not tell you how close the match can sometimes be, and how the guy who wins may not always be the one who played better. It does not tell you how long, and how intensely, a rally was fought, nor does it tell you the role played by that fickle lady called luck. It does not tell you about the exhilaration of an exquisite drop shot that caught your opponent unawares, or the agony when your perfect backhand lands just beyond the line. It does not tell you about the mental strength that makes you climb an insurmountable Everest even when you keep on slipping down, and the disappointment when your body gives in just when you have the summit in sight.

Numbers tell you that that a legend made it to the second round of his last professional Grand Slam, beating a 21young upstart 6-4, 6-4, 3-6, 5-7,7-5. They do not tell you how close the winner came to losing, and how valiantly he fought to win.

They do not tell you that a 21 year old Cyprian clawed back from two sets down and 0-4 in what appeared to be the penultimate set of the match to stage an Agassi-like comeback – against Andre Agassi. Had he succeeded, which he nearly did, he would have been the first man in six years to snatch away a 2-0 set lead from Agassi. And the last man to beat him in a Slam match.

Numbers do not tell you that this young man would have put a 36-year old legend out of his last professional match on his home ground, had he not suffered sever cramps - and how he still hung on, forcing several dueces and then holding on to his serve, despite being barely able to move.

They do not tell you how valiantly this young man fought back every time defeat appeared to be a certainty for him, and how he never lost his wide grin despite a partisan and hostile crowd. How he fought for every point as if his life depended upon it, even when playing seemed like a physical impossibility. Nor do they tell you about his magnanimity and graciousness towards a lucky victor.

Numbers do not tell you about the tenacity and hunger of a 36-year old man playing his last professional tournament, who fights for each point as if he is a youngster in his debut season, much less a man preparing for a comfortable retirement. A man who continues to push the boundaries of physical and mental endurance, constantly challenging himself, and in the process, some unlucky opponents.

They do not tell you that if this man uses all and sundry means at his disposal to secure victory – some fair, like his talent, hunger and perseverance – and some not so fair, likely an unruly and partisan crowd and his opponent’s physical weakness – you forgive him. For the world loves fighters, especially those who win.

Numbers do not tell you that like it or not, patriotism and sentimentality will count more than respect for talent, and money will continue tightening its vice over sports. Why else would an educated crowd loudly cheer a double fault by a gutsy player who was badly cramping, only because he was playing against their aging countryman? Or why the patronizing and idiotic commentator would make a statement like – ‘If Agassi loses today, the game of tennis would lose, the US Open would lose’. I couldn’t understand how the game of tennis could lose from the victory of a worthier man in one of the best matches in recent times, till I realized that an aging 36 year old American was the reason for packed Center Court attendance and record breaking TV viewership. Jimmy forgot to add that the game and the tournament would lose money.

Numbers also do not tell you if Andre Agassi is the ‘nice person’ that he nobly exhorted his colleagues to be at the start of this tournament, or merely a devious person hungry for victory. Was it Agassi’s conscience that made him nervous and repeatedly drop serve and net shots even when Baghdatis could barely move, or was he selfishly trying to prolong his opponent’s agony to force him off the court, thus denying him the possibility of a win. One would like to believe the former.

It is debatable whether Andre Agassi deserves to be in the third round of his last professional tournament. Or whether 21 year old Marcus Baghdatis deserves to return home after an awe inspiring comeback. ‘Deserve’ is always a matter of perspective.

What is beyond doubt is that I saw one of the best games of tennis I’ve seen in a while between two great players. And realized that sometimes there are no limits to human courage and endurance. And when you have crossed that line, there are no losers.

Fear of Flying

2006-08-29T00:49:00.000+05:30

I don’t know how or from where I got it, but I’ve had this mad desire to go bungee jumping for the past week. There is a spot close to San Jose – on a bridge 265 feet over a river – that is a world famous spot for bungee jumping. I made up my mind to go there this weekend and try my luck.

We reached the spot around 11 am, just in time to see a guy get strapped and stand on the narrow platform. He turned back and gave me a nervous smile, and I smiled back encouragingly. He stood for two minutes at the edge, shook his head, came back and sat down. All the while, his two friends (who were gonna jump next) were encouraging him in Spanish. I wandered around and took in the breathtaking view – lush green foliage all around, plunging into a narrow river strewn with huge boulders. Suddenly, I heard a shriek – the guy had jumped. We watched in amazement as he almost touched the river, shouting like mad all the while, and gently swayed below the bridge….there he’d be on one side, and then I’d run over to the other side of the bridge to catch a sight of him. When he came back, he was grinning like a Cheshire cat, all pumped up.

I was excited. What did that guy think as he stood on the platform, and how did he make the leap? I wanted to do this, I was gonna do this!

The second guy was cucumber kool. He’s gonna go down in a flash, without a sound – I thought. I was wrong. The moment he stood up, he started shaking his head, and after a few minutes of to-and-fro, he was back on the bridge, unstrapping his gear.

If you think too long, you’ll never jump – I told my companion knowledgeably, as if I’d done this all my life. I’d been chatting with the third guy, and he told me they were from Portugal. You jump? – he asked. I think so, though I’ll be shit scared – I answered. Im very scared too…the toughest part is getting yourself to make the jump. I’ve jumped from a parachute, but there was someone else who made the actual jump – I just followed him. Getting myself to jump will be tough. I nodded, mentally mapping out how I’d make the leap.

In the end, the third guy, the one who’d jumped from a parachute and who’d dragged his friends to do the bungee, couldn’t jump either.

I was next. I was cool, calm and confident, as I asked Charlie the instructor to repeat the instructions and tested out the clasp for the rope that I’d have to grasp for the return to the platform. I’d pumped myself up, and my strategy was clear – I wouldn’t look down. I’d look into the trees, stretch out my arms, and imagine that I was Jonathan Livingstone Seagull. Charlie says the women are better at this, remarked my Portuguese friend. I smiled back confidently – I wasn’t gonna prove Charlie wrong.

The moment I stood up on the platform, more than 250 feet above the river, I started blabbering, just as I’d seen the other guys do. I have to be crazy to be doing this, why am I doing this, etc. Initially, my knees were shaking, but after a few moments, I was steady. Move forward, your toes should be slightly outside the platform, commanded Charlie. Gingerly, holding the support to my left, I made my way forward. To gain confidence, I let go of the support and stretched out my arms horizontally. After a couple of minutes of nervousness, I managed to let go of the support, with my toes slightly outside the platform, and my arms stretched out. I was in position for the jump.

You’re good, now jump, said Charlie. I tried….but I just couldn’t. I closed my eyes, I thought all kinds of things to myself, I imagined myself dancing to music, but I just could not jump. I just couldn’t understand it. I was prepared for this, I had wanted to do it, I had thought about how I would do it, I wasn’t scared of death (the worst possible outcome) But the left side of my brain had sensed danger and completely taken over, and my feet appeared to be locked and glued to the spot. All the advice I had doled out to my predecessors was forgotten in a trice. I can’t do this, but I soo badly want to do this, can you push me Charlie? I asked in desperation. He wasn’t allowed to push me, but he stood behind me and gave me a countdown. Jump at zero, and he began, but the moment he’d reach two I’d ask him to start all over again.

I still believed I was gonna do it, but I think the Portuguese guys sensed otherwise. Adios, one of them called out to me, if you stand there too long you don’t make it, shouted another, echoing my thoughts of ten minutes ago.

In the end, I did not jump. As I stood there, my brain convinced me that it was not worth doing, that it was beautiful just standing on the platform with my arms stretched out (it was), what more joy could I get from jumping…the works. I still can’t believe it, for I had looked with a bit of contempt at the last two guys who did not jump. I will do it, I had told myself – I want to do it and I can do it.

But when you stand on the platform, you undergo a transformation. What I felt then can best be described as preparing to commit suicide – for that is what the 265-feet jump appears to be as you stand on the 18 inch strip of metal, the protective ropes notwithstanding. Had I been blindfolded, not known what I was going in for, I think I would have done it. Or if someone had pushed me, or if it was a situation of desperation, a last resort. But having had enough time to see what I was in for, my brain just did not let me release my defenses.

I had looked forward to the jump as a symbolic way of letting go of my fears and defenses. I tried ... but in the end, I didn’t have enough guts to leap out of my secure armor.

I still haven't given up though.

All that Jazz

2006-08-29T00:03:00.000+05:30

My Saturday evening didn’t turn out as planned. I wanted to attend the Camerata Klaipeda by the Lithuanian group at the National Theatre, but by the time I managed to locate an ATM and then beat the pouring rains, all the tickets were sold out. Only uno – I pleaded with the lady in a mix of English and Spanish– but she shook her head sympathetically.

Disappointed, I made my way back to the Multiplaza for a late lunch. Upon entering the hotel, I bumped into my favorite Jazz band – a Cuban (saxophone), a Tico (guitar) and an American (piano). You never returned last Tuesday – exclaimed the Cuban & the Tico. I smiled apologetically – remembering my un-kept promise of returning after dinner for their music. I’ll compensate today, I promised as I settled down on a sofa close to the piano.

Surprisingly, I was the sole audience (the small area is usually packed), so I was asked for requests. Umm, play some Louis Armstrong, I said, trying hard to recall names of some famous jazz players (blush). An excellent rendering of What a Wonderful World was delivered, followed by My Funny Valentine. Inspired, I asked for Something Stupid –they didn’t have the sheet music, but the Tico knew a bit of the tune, and they made a valiant, albeit a slightly inaccurate, attempt to play it for me. Very sweet.

He sings really well – said the Tico of Mark, the pianist, as I went over to chat with them. Requests for songs followed, and Mark sang Cry me a River, Sorry seems to be the Hardest Word and a pretty song called Moon and Sand that I hadn’t heard before, to the accompaniment of the piano.

And oh yes, there was a 15 year old kid who wandered over from a party in the vicinity and stood watching Mark play for some time. You play well - she told him. He smiled with evident pride. Do you play – he asked conversationally. A bit – I learnt the piano when I was 8. And then, she sat down and belted out some awesome Chopin – mindblowing. I could see Mark was humbled.

Not a bad evening at all…so what if I didn’t hear the Lithuanian band, I had a trio of artistes perform just for me. Not to mention the Chopin maestro.

And I think to myself…It’s a wonderful world.

Lessons in Language

2006-08-28T23:09:00.000+05:30

On my flight into Costa Rica, my companion asked me – Do you speak Spanish? No, I replied. Oh well, just remember to say ‘No avayol Espanol’ – it means ‘I do not understand Spanish’.

Sage advice, as these turned out to be words I have most often used in Costa Rica in the last six weeks (apart from buenas and gracias). In a country where most people do not understand or speak English, communication is a challenge – and since no (wo)man is an island, this leads to encounters that are sometimes exasperating, sometimes touching, and always interesting!

There are tons of exhilarating moments…like the cheery ‘Comos Estas, Ina’ of the guards in office each morning and evening, and the answering smile when I manage to murmur a ‘Muy bien’ back to them. I make it a point to greet the guards every morning and evening – they are friendly, cheerful and give me the best lessons in Spanish!

Then there are the appreciations of my accent by my colleagues (hear, hear), and the gentle corrections – like with poqueeto, which I am told I still don’t enunciate correctly. This usually results in friendly banter in which I make them parrot some Hindi words (the most fun is when I ask them to say dhanyawaad)

I will also treasure the shopkeeper in Grecia who could not understand a word of English, but came running out into the middle of the street to help me when I repeatedly lost my way and drove around in circles (he finally asked for a paper and drew the map on it…..God bless him!),

Many strangers have helped me order my lunch or dinner, or make a simple grocery purchase. But my moment of pride came when I managed to get a customized meal from my favorite Mexican haunt. I wanted chicken fajitas from a combo-meal, but without the combo of French fries and Coke, and with no cheese. I also wanted to take the meal home. I managed to use broken Spanish and sign language to communicate how I wanted my food, and succeeded.
To-Go, I told the lady. Si?, she questioned. Parajevar, I said, groping for the word and hoping I got it right, but inwardly preparing myself for a series of useless gesticulations. Si, Si, To Go, Si? She smiled back, as she packed the food. Si, Si, I replied in happy exultation - I’d managed to make her speak Engles!

Some of my most frustrating experiences have been communicating with the so-called bilingual staff at the hotel. Like when I wanted to contact the seamstress, and they couldn’t understand …I used all kinds of words like tailor, repair, mend etc., till I figured out the Spanish translation (costurera). Or when I called to enquire about making a call to a local mobile phone, and they connected me to the beauty parlor instead! The morning wake-up calls are quite funny….my dreams are interrupted by a spattering of Spanish till I groggily reply ‘No avayol Espanol’ - it sure wakes me up!

Then there are times when you call up a tour operator, and in response to your hesitant ‘Engles?, no avayaol Espanol’, you hear a smattering of Spanish, followed by the phone slamming down. Or when people keep on talking to you in Spanish even after they have heard and acknowledged that you do not understand it. Sigh. Or when that guy at Subway smirked at me when I was trying to explain what I wanted in my sandwich – I could have strangulated him!

Language - communication of meaning in any way; medium that is expressive, significant, etc. No wonder the joy of getting through far outweighs the despair of incomprehension.

Perhaps this could have stayed unstated...

2006-08-15T23:16:00.000+05:30

I mentioned An Equal Music in my previous post. Given my current state of musical exaltation :-), I can't resist the temptation to quote this epigraph to the book, dedicated by Seth to his partner Philippe Honore':

Perhaps this could have stayed unstated.
Had our words turned to other things
In the grey park, the rain abated,
Life would have quickened other strings.

I list your gifts in this creation:
Pen, paper, ink and inspiration,
Peace to the heart with touch or word,
Ease to the soul with note and chord.

How did that walk, those winter hours,
Occasion this? No lightning came;
Nor did I sense, when touched by flame,
Our story lit with borrowed powers -
Rather, by what our spirits burned,
Embered in words, to us returned.

To me, these words, like any beautiful composition, have a timeless beauty to them - lyrical, magical and eternal.

Food, Music and Shopping

2006-08-15T21:59:00.000+05:30

This weekend I decided to take it easy. I mean, getting a bit tired of the 'what-I-am-doing-this weekend' planning....I just wanted to have no To-Do's for a change.

So dragged along two Ticos and a Philipino-American for some yummilicous Indian food. I was going to have Indian food after 6 weeks - so I was obviously quite excited. Went to this place called Taj Mahal which is really pretty - it's actually a beautiful house converted into a restaurant. The weather was awesome, so we decided to eat in the courtyard, dust and bugs notwithstanding. Got really excited when I saw a tandoor, and even more when the cook turned out to be from Punjab - felt so good to finally talk to someone in Hindi!

We had a complete orgy - lassi, seekh kabab, lamb biryani, garlic naan, yellow dal, mughlai chicken - all under the pretext of 'introducing' Indian food to my companions. sigh. Travelling around the world has made me appreciate better the variety and richness (literally too!) of Indian food ... I mean this place served only North Indian food and had at least 50 items on its menu! Now if you were to just add South Indian (not just idli-dosa-sambar but more eclectic stuff), Konkani and Bengali cuisine to this, can you imagine how long the list would be !! Incomparable.

Did quite a bit of shopping too - sigh. I'm a compulsive shopaholic - one of those strange creatures for whom blowing up money is a sure-shot boost of adrenalin. Aargh.

The highlight of the weekend was Sunday evening, when I headed to the opulent Nacional Teatro for a performance by eight young cellists from Berlin. What a fantastic performance - I am amazed that a single instrument can create so much beauty !! I particularly enjoyed the performances by a trio (two men and a woman), and also some of the pieces where all eight performers played together - mindblowing! Can you imagine what coordination of individual brilliance it takes to get eight different composers to create melody and harmony with one instrument? And these weren't original compositions mind you - playing anyone else's music is always moe difficult, but when it's the likes of Bach and Mozart - you get the picture.

I loved the way one of the cellists would start off in the lead, then the second would take over and the first would fade away and complement the new lead, then the third, and so on. It's magic, pure magic....a social fusion of individual expression. As I closed my eyes to soak in the performance, I realized how meaningless words are for music of this nature. A thought that seemed to be reflected in the frequent exchange of glances and smiles between the cutest couple of the group.

"Music, such music, is a sufficient gift. Why ask for happiness; why hope to grieve? It is enough, it is to be blessed enough, to live from day to day and to hear such music – not too much, or the soul could not sustain it – from time to time."

Vikram' Seth's last lines in An Equal Music could not have said it better.

Mindless Monday

2006-08-15T05:43:00.000+05:30

Horrible day.

Spent hours filing my expense claims - my company has attained the pinacle of complexity in this goddamn activity. Felt soo irritated...all non value-add. Did a couple of administrative stuff - email followups, same-time clarifications, all that jazz.

Feel so useless...didnt do one 'meaningful' thing today (does not need to be necessarily in work)...terrible way to begin the week!

Hopefully it can only get better from here. Tomorrow is another day!

Othello and a Pirate

2006-08-11T03:09:00.000+05:30

I finally managed to see Pirates Part 2. Frankly I was quite disappointed. I am a big Pirates and Johnny Depp fan, so maybe I was expecting too much. But I thought the first half-hour was a complete waste. All that tribal stuff was complete mambo jambo and entirely expendable. And just when the movie picked up pace and got us interested with the possibility of a romance between Depp and the fair maiden, it ended! Bah. So evidently intended for a sequel. And Davy Jones is slimy (literally!), but not half as wicked as Captain Barbossa - thank God Geoffrey Rush is returning in the sequel to the sequel.

My biggest grouse with the movie is that it had too little of Johnny Depp - he was the star of the first movie! And since he (alongwith Barbossa) had all the witty dialogues, the movie was like a 500-page P Smith novel with P Smith getting only 10 lines. Not enough, not enough.

Saw Omkara at a small Indian theatre in Atlanta...most of the women were wearing pretty embroidered stoles so it was like being back in Delhi in autumn :-) The language is gross, but I liked the movie. I especially liked the fact that he used a very relevant political backdrop, yet stuck to the story without getting mired in the politics. And the music is mind blowing.

I thought Saif's acting was awesome - he's growing into a very versatile actor! He looked more evil than Ajay Devgan, who I suspect has a canned shot of himself with eyes narrowed and perputual scowl and sells it to all his directors. Cheaper by the dozen...standardization at its best. Kareena was very ordinary, reducing a meaty role full of possibilities to pathetic wimpiness. Wonder how a Rani would have up scorched up a character like that.

What are you reading today?

2006-08-11T03:06:00.000+05:30

I had some time to my flight while leaving the US, so I obviously ended up at a bookstore. I havent bought a book for a month now, so I was getting the itch to spend some money :-) Something well paced, engrossing and witty is just what I need to get over my blues, eh? Si.

The first section had the 'How-To' books - The Eight Habbit, Nice Girls Dont get the Corner Office/Man of Dreams, Why Men Fall Asleep After Sex ...all that kind of crap. I hate self-help books - I think they are an oxymoron anyway coz self-help means YOU help yourself. The gyan these books contain sounds very good but I would either not want to or be unable to implement most of it.

The next was the post Bridget Jones chick flicks - The Shopaholics series and other such stories about wacky-poor-girl who is out-of-job and/or out-of-money but gets handsome-rich-charming-man-of-dreams at end of novel after crazy/silly/sometimes-funny,always-unreal encounters. I call these the modern MB's. You enjoy reading them sometimes, hell, you want to read them sometimes when you want complete mindlessness, but after you have read a few they get tiresome. The problem is not that they are unreal and have no story (you don't read such stuff if you want a story), the problem is with the writing - there is no humor or wit at all. It's like someone has run a random program over a million words and generated these books. Gimme a Georgette Heyer or a Dorothy Sayers or even Precious Ramotswe for a chick flick!

The next was the 'popular authors' category - Dan Brown, Mario Puzo, Crickton, Archer, King - the lot. All wearisomely-very-similar. Aargh.

Then there was the 'poignant story' category - The Nicholas Sparks kinda sob-stuff. Any author who wants to be taken seriously today will write a poignant and moving tale about love or life and its purpose/meaning - preferably both together. Which is fine with me - some of them are quite nice to read. The problem is when these books become succesful, so the Sparks and Morrisons and Smiths of the world think that they can go on writing poignant stories for ever. A random program again, but on a different set of words. Sigh. Im giving up hope by now.

Is this what the world is reading today? Where are the good books that make you laugh, that make you cry, that make you think, that sometimes make you take a leap of faith? And each different from the other....whatever happened to variety in writing? When I think of some of my favorite writers - Maugham, Steinbeck, Russell, or even Seth and Rushdie - they always had a new tale to tell. Vikram Seth even has new ways of telling his tales - that's what makes him so interesting. Or if they had the same theme - like Stevenson (adventure) or Wodehouse (BritButler humor - right ho Jeeves!) or even Asimov, Bradbury or Adams - they made each work so thrilling and absorbing that you are left gasping for more. And the subtle humor that would light up even the most sordid tales - that's what makes a good book to my mind.

A great book is one that tells you different things each time you read it. You understand it bit by bit, and it never ceases to wonder or amaze you. It's like love, or old wine - it gets better with time. Most of the stuff that I saw at the bookstore was like a one-night stand - read it, shut it, forget it.

Indian Salsa

2006-08-10T22:10:00.000+05:30

Browsing through the music collection at a gift shop at the Costa Rica-Nicaragua border, I stumbled upon an album titled World Salsa Beats. Salsa music from Mexico, Brazil, Zambiar, India, Timbuctoo and Latvia (no those weren’t the exact places, but a good imagination largely compensates for a bad memory), it ran.

Indian Salsa?? I turned the CD in happy anticipation, only to be left dazed and perplexed. A Shaan remix of a forgettable Hindi oldie (I cant even recall the song now..and I have grown up listening to 60’s and 70’s music thanks to my Dad) was India’s proud representation for world Salsa. Eh??

City of Blinding Lights

2006-08-02T01:18:00.000+05:30

So here I am...finally reached the USA !!!

Couldnt contain my excitement as the plane was landing...I was literally jumping in my seat like a little kid. The sun was just about to depart - at 7.30 in the evening! Wow looks like Im gonna have long days here.

Getting out of the Atlanta airport is a complete nightmare - in font 40, bold. You go thru the Customs check (answering inane questions, giving fingers and eye prints), wait for ure luggage to arrive, collect it, then re-deposit it (!!!), go thru ure security scan (take off shoes, laptop, blah-blah), take an airport train to reach the last stop, find ure way thru several levels to finally reach the last and the messiest stop - baggage re-claim - where you hunt for your poor lil bag amongst luggage from at least ten other flites on the same belt. Phew. They say if you can drive in India, you can drive anywhere in the world. I say if you can get outta a US airport unscathed, you can pretty much travel anywwhere in the world.

Of course the worst security check I had was at Charles de Gaulle, where the poker-faced lady asked me questions like 'Are you carrying weapons that can be used for attacking co-passengers' and 'Has your bag been used to carry forbidden substances' etc....I mean, does she really expect someone who is doing anything of that to declare aye aye !! And the building is soo ugly.. not what you'd expect from the gateway to the most romantic city in the world !

I'd asked the hotel to arrange for a pickup, and my worst fears came true when I couldnt locate him. I needed quarters to make a phone call, but no one seemed to have them! One lady helpfully loaned me two, which got quicly exhausted in a call that ended up in the answering machine. whew. finally found a cute lil kid who had tons if quarters but insisted - I can't spend my money. Finally convinced her that she wasnt spending it - she was just exchanging it for a nice, big note (my sales pitch for the crumpled dollar bill in my hand)...she finally consented after confirming with her Dad, God bless her, and keep her smiling!

As the cab drove across concrete, metal and glass buildings, I felt comfortable - as if I had come home. And I thought to myself - this is my world. This world of cars and street lights and signs in english and people and buildings all along - this is where I belong to. The mountains and the valleys and the blue skies and Spanish chivalry is good for a vacation, but I'm really an outsider out there.

Neon heart, day-glow eyes, The city lit by fireflies...And I miss you when you're not around
(Sorry U2!)

Sunset

2006-07-27T04:42:00.000+05:30

As we waited for the elevator last evening, we saw a perfect globe of glowing amber poised over the horizon, standing out against a background of white, blue and grey. Reminded me of an ace swimmer poised to dive into the unknown deep. And just like the swimmer, the amber globe began its rapid descent, so that by the time we reached the ground floor, the sun had disappeared into the vast white-blue ocean, leaving behind only traces of golden light to remind us of its beauty, and hope in our hearts that it would be back in its kingdom tomorrow.

There is something magical about watching a sunset.

As I gazed at the white mist settling over the mountains that frame the central valley, I couldn’t help thinking that it’s like nature is retiring for the day too, settling into a comfortable white blanket to rest and recover … to leave behind all thoughts of joy and sorrow, for there is work to do on the morrow.

Tomorrow is another day...but for now it’s time to go home.

Habit

2006-07-27T04:40:00.000+05:30

Costa Rica has managed another first – managed to bring consistency into the life of someone who hates habit and routine.

After about ten days of experimentation with restaurants and food, I have (subconsciously!) settled into a dinner routine that has very low variation. For my last meal of the day, I alternate between Matsuri and Rosti Pollos. From Matsuri, I order a Matsuri salad and Shake (Salmon) Maki or Salmon Skin Roll. From Rosti Pollos, I alternate between Chicken Fajitas and Quesadillas, both with 'maas papa fritos' (extra nachos – sigh!). Usually I brew a cup of tea in the room to go with dinner.

Aarrrgh. I cant believe it. I love variety, hate standardization (except while preaching it at work : -)), certainly hate routines. But I suspect I am beginning to enjoy my new found dinner schedule. Sheesh, I need to escape from here before it’s too late – my mom will actually believe there is hope for me if she hears of this.

Today is the Matsuri day.

Where are the dogs?

2006-07-27T04:37:00.000+05:30

While hunting for a Sushi place close to my hotel, I passed a huge mansion where I could hear some dogs barking. Somehow it sounded out of place, till I realized why – I hadn’t seen any dog in Costa Rica till now. And then it struck me – I haven’t heard/seen any street dogs in any of the countries I have visited (excluding Pakistan)! Let me say that again - across nine countries in five continents, I have never, ever seen a stray dog. Lots of pampered and well pruned pet dogs (though not necessarily well mannered), especially in US & Europe, but not a single stray dog.

Weird, given that you practically live with street dogs back home. I am usually greeted with at least five street dogs in my house lane, and the number multiplies after 11 pm. Several of my friends have repeatedly petitioned the government about the menace of these night creatures close to their homes – one of them carries a stick with him if he is returning home after 10. As a kid, I remember the sense of adventure in visiting my aunt’s house, because it was haunted by a street dog that would bite any non-family member who visited the house. Oh, the fun in sneaking through the back door, always on the look out for a sudden appearance of the deadly animal, and the thrill of horror when my favorite uncle had to take 16 stitches when he dared to enter the house in the dog’s presence.

Whoever said it’s a dog’s world was probably born in the sub-continent.

Stupid Innovations

2006-07-19T01:10:00.000+05:30

The conference room I sit in has an auto power saver thing...which means that if the sensor does not perceive any movement for about ten minutes, the lights go off automatically.

Since I sit here alone, there isn't any movement of the kind that the sensor expects. So every ten minutes the lights go off, and I have to stand up and do a little jig or wave my hands vigorously at the sensor. Duh.

Costa Rica Fast Facts

2006-07-14T05:41:00.000+05:30

Info gleaned through my conversations with locals....

The name Costa Rica means Rich Coast – supposedly christened so by Christopher Columbus when he passed by the coast and saw people wearing jade necklaces.

Tempted by the promise of riches, the Spanish invaded the region, only to discover that the name was a mirage. Costa Rica did not turn out to be a storehouse of gold or other precious metals, and the Spanish used this as a destination for outcasts and exiles…much like Andaman islands was for India during British rule.

Costa Rica is the first country in the world to officially abolish the Army. We are a peace loving country, say the people, and it shows.

Coffee, banana and sugarcane grow aplenty here. However, in recent times numerous coffee plantations have been sold off, to be converted into shopping malls, luxurious condominiums and villas. Pity.

A majority of the population is Christian Catholic. However, the country is secular to other religions. The government is democratically elected.

Cars are imported into the country from the US, and carry an excise duty of 58%! Nonetheless, one sees various luxurious brands on the road. Apparently, there was a time when Costa Rica had the highest number of BMW’s per number of inhabitants anywhere in the world! SUV’s are very popular, possible partly on account of the largely mountainous terrain and the poor state of the roads. Nissan and Toyota appear to be the favorite car brands – Hyundai is perceived as definitely down market. I still love my Santro though J

Most of my colleagues in office are Industrial Engineers – looks like that was the hot career option here!

Since the area is prone to earthquakes, the government has mandated that no building can be taller than 4 floors. So the office buildings and malls are prettily landscaped villas spread over acres of land…quite scenic.

The phrases that I use most often are Buenas (Good), Gracias (Thanks) and No avayol Espanol (I don’t know Spanish!).

Some of the problems faced by the country are similar to ours. Bad roads, for instance (though I personally feel their roads are far better than ours…sigh). I had an interesting conversation with a colleague where he said Costa Rica’s two major problems are lack of planning and absence of a common identity. Again, problems faced by India too.

Mountain biking is very popular in the country. Most of my colleagues belong to a group that goes mountain biking at least once a fortnight. In fact, my 50 year co-passenger on the flight was also an avid biker. No wonder most people look so fit and athletic!

The locals appear to be fairly conscious about their appearance. Most women wear light make up and matching jewellery, and the men gel-style their hair. Almost everyone has fab bods, thanks to a love for physical activity and gym workouts. I notice that many people brush their teeth after lunchtime - something I saw in Thailand too, another country that is very appearance-conscious. Must say though that people carry their age well...most of my 29-30 year old colleagues don't look a day over 25!

Recently, the country has witnessed a lot of migration from neighboring Nicaragua, something the locals obviously don’t like. When I was telling a colleague that I didn’t like downtown Costa Rica, he explained it was because it is full of Nicaraguans!

Tourism is a mainstay of the economy. Not surprising, given the proximity to the US, the fantastic beaches, rainforests and volcanoes, and the relative inexpensiveness of the place for American tourists (The local currency is a Colon, and 1 USD equals 500 Colons…most people convert their money into dollars since they think its safer). Surprisingly, however, all road signs are in Spanish, most people do not understand English….even my hotel voice mail is in Spanish!

The country witnesses only two seasons – dry and rainy. During the rainy season, it is usually sunny during the morning, and it begins to rain heavily during the afternoon. However, most days have been cloudy, with a minor sprinking of rain sometimes. The only day during my trip that the weather stuck to its schedule was the Sunday I decided to drive out into the mountains. Arrrgh. More on that later.

Here comes the sun again

2006-07-14T05:36:00.000+05:30

I just can’t understand it…a week into into Costa Rica, and I still feel strangely depressed. This couldn’t be happening to me, an avid traveler, a professed lover of all things new and beautiful…I stuck out for 1.5 years in one of my jobs simply coz whenever I’d plan to leave they’d send to me some exotic country!

I hate to admit it, but part of it is home sickness…yes, looks like I am finally beginning to get attached to a place…and Bangalore of all places! I guess I miss my fully reclined routine there…late mornings, weekend drives, long walks in fantastic weather, and tons of freedom to try out arbit things. Don’t like the thought though…comfort zones make me uncomfortable.

Another reason is language. Everything, including the road signs are in Spanish, everyone around me speaks in Spanish….my colleagues revert to Spanish over lunch, everyone in the hotel greets me in Spanish. After the initial novelty of a new language wears off and you have mastered the few cute phrases, you long to hear something familiar. So I have been playing English/Hindi songs in the background at work. Comfort zone again? This gets worser and worser.

I also realize that, being used to over populated India, I miss seeing people around me. Here a neighbour’s house will be at least a mile away from yours…I was completely taken aback to see a crowded mall over the weekend, coz I barely see two people on the highway. Looks like the Pied Piper of capitalist dreams has his lure here too...malls are as popular here as back home.

But probably the biggest reason is the long leave of absence of the sun. I have arrived at the beginning of the rainy season in Costa Rica…which means that when it isn’t raining, it is cloudy. I have barely seen the sun come out since I arrived here…coupled with the mountainous landscape and the scare population, it is a depressing sight...somehow it appears that the clouds have coated everything in a dreary soot of grey.

Two days ago when I was going to return my car, Senor Sun was out for a brief stroll, and the countryside appeared completely transformed to my light-starved eyes. Now I understand why the Brits make such a big deal about sunshine.

How much is life worth

2006-07-12T02:35:00.000+05:30

Remember 21 grams? Yes the Sean Penn movie with the tagline - how much does life weigh? And then it claimed that 'we all lose 21 grams at the exact moment of our death... everyone. The weight of a stack of nickels. The weight of a chocolate bar. The weight of a hummingbird...'

After yet another series of blasts in Bombay, I cant help wondering - how much is life worth in our country? It appears that the authorities had prior info on the blasts, but were not sure where they would occur and hence took no action. In a country of a billion, life is cheap. But how cheap?

In the west, they would condemn this as an act of terrorism and immediately go and bomb some country. That is one extreme. In India, we forget about it in 10 minutes, because death is an integral part of our lives. That's another extreme.

State of my Mind?

2006-07-08T02:29:00.000+05:30

I haven't really ever found a place that I call home
I never stick around quite long enough to make it
I apologize that once again I'm not in love
But it's not as if I mind that your heart ain't exactly breaking

It's just a thought, only a thought
But if my life is for rent and I don't learn to buy
Well I deserve nothing more than I get
'cause nothing I have is truly mine

I've always thought
that I would love to live by the sea
To travel the world alone
and live my life more simply
I have no idea what's happened to that dream
'cause there's really nothing left here to stop me

It's just a thought, only a thought
But if my life is for rent and I don't learn to buy
Well I deserve nothing more than I get
'cause nothing I have is truly mine

If my life is for rent
And I don't learn to buy
Well I deserve nothing more than I get
'cause nothing I have is truly mine

Ohh.. my heart is a shield and I won't let it down
While I am so afraid to fail so I won't even try
Well how can I say I'm alive

If my life is for rent
And I don't learn to buy
Well I deserve nothing more than I get '
cause nothing I have is truly mine

If my life is for rent
and I don't learn to buy
Well I deserve nothing more than I get
'cause nothing I have is truly mine
'cause nothing I have is truly mine
'cause nothing I have is truly mine
'cause nothing I have is truly mine

Life for Rent
Dido

Will you erase me?

2006-07-07T05:20:00.000+05:30

Blessed are the forgetful, for they get the better even of their blunders.

How happy is the blameless Vestal's lot!
The world forgetting, by the world forgot
Eternal sunshine of the spotless mind!
Each pray'r accepted, and each wish resign'd

Look at it out here, it's all falling apart. I'm erasing you and I'm happy!

Match Point

2006-07-07T04:36:00.000+05:30

I finally managed to see Match Point - on a long trans-Atlantic flight. I had wanted to watch it since someone forwarded me this quote (which is narrated at the beginning of the movie):

The man who said "I'd rather be lucky than good" saw deeply into life. People are often afraid to realize how much of an impact luck plays. There are moments in a tennis match where the ball hits the top of the net, and for a split second, remains in mid-air. With a litte luck, the ball goes over, and you win. Or maybe it doesn't, and you lose.

Quite an awesome concept - it completely ridicules the idea of 'moral justice', claiming everything in life is pure chance. Some people get lucky, others just get by (to quote Notting Hill). As the main protagonist himself says towards the end - It would be fitting if I were apprehended... and punished. At least there would be some small sign of justice - some small measure of hope for the possibility of meaning.

Something I tend to agree with - I think human beings take themselves, and their goodness, too seriously. And end up getting caught in a mirage of conscious, morality and justice.

There is an interesting statement somewhere in the middle, when the characters are debating 'easy way outs' - Faith is the path of least resistance, claims Jonathan Rhys Myers. Amen.

Headlines

2006-06-28T00:03:00.000+05:30

The Page 3 of a decent newspaper (the regular paper, not the City Page 3) is a fair indication of the issues that the city is grappling in.

In Bangalore, the papers talk about the crumbling infrastructure and the ineffective goverance, as the city sit precariously on the edge of an abyss, very similar to the deep holes that dominate the city's non-existent roads. It is sad to see such a beautiful city run to seed on account of no governance and high corruption. No wonder wikipedia has this to say on the city - However, as a large and growing metropolis in the developing world, Bangalore continues to struggle with problems such as air pollution, traffic congestion, and crime.

In Delhi, blessed with sufficient funds and undoubtedly the best roads in the country, the papers continue to report the latest rape and suicide cases, day on day.....in a strange twist of justice, no woman - rich or poor, child or old - feels safe in a city where rapes occur, repeatedly, in broad daylight in some of the most crowded areas of town. Even as young kids getting 86% in their Boards commit suicide coz the cut-offs for a decent course in a respectable college are at least 90%.

As Time Goes By

2006-06-28T00:00:00.000+05:30

Distance– both in terms of time and space – sometimes gives you a perspective that is otherwise missing. I realized this when I headed back home after nearly 7 months

Waiting for my luggage at the Domestic Airport, I see guys with military and punk cuts dressed in bright clothes and thick gold chains, yapping away loudly on the cell phones while furtively looking around to check out the babes (and see who was checking them out). Welcome to Delhi. As I looked roof-wards in amusement, I noticed for the first time that the high windows above the conveyor belt were set in stained glass – a cheap variety, but stained glass nonetheless. Surprise, surprise – and this is just the beginning.

I got my first shock as I happily trooped towards the familiar spot where my family usually waits for me at the airport. My parents, both of them, looked completely shriveled up! While Mom has been unwell for some time and has been telling me that she has shed mass, I was completely taken aback to see my always-ruddy-and-healthy dad looking decidedly weak. With a tinge of sadness, I realized that whoever remarked that people shrink as they grow old was possibly right – my parents were growing old. A fact that my father laughingly admitted to in the car when I pointed out that he seemed to have grown weak.

Surprisingly, my Mom did not comment this time on how I’d grown fat – in fact she even conceded that I seemed to have lost a few pounds! Amen.

Two days later, when I went to my mom’s school to accompany her for a shopping trip, I got my second shock. I bumped into the guy who had taken me through the paces when I first began driving. A tall, handsome man bubbling with youthful exuberance, he had just the right dash of brashness that is so exciting to someone who has just gotten behind the steering wheel. No wonder I took to heart his exhortations of driving without fear, much to my Dad’s chagrin (it was his car at the receiving end) - 'kya hoga, gaadi thook hi jayegi na..gadi chaloge to thooke gee hi. Par Daro mat'

But now, I gazed upon a man whose hair had more silver than black, the once proud shoulders had a slight stoop and there was a definite corpulence around the waist. As I looked in incredulity at him – it’s been only a few years since I learnt how to drive – I suddenly realized that just as people around me were aging, so was I.

Sometimes you realize you are growing old only when you perceive the ‘oldness’ in other people, especially those associated with your youth.

Rain

2006-05-22T16:52:00.000+05:30

FINALLY, the skies opened up in Bangalore. After months of sweltering and exclaiming Gosh-wotz-wrong-with-Blore's-weather, the Gods finally smiled down. And boy - did it pour! I could hear the war cries of the clouds and smell the wet earth inside my sound-proof glass encased office....thankful that some things don't work, sometimes.

We went out to get a bit of the action. There is something about the skies opening up that makes you want to forget everything and just go out there and get drenched - maybe its a sort of a cleansing of the mind's cobwebs,or simply a desire to go back to the mad spontaneity of childhood. All around me I could see happy faces - people like me who'd come out to catch the first showers. Funny how weather can make such a difference to how you feel.

Feeling happy and uplifted, I was humming a cute Hindi oldie (Choti si kahani mein, baarishon ki paani mein, saari vaadi beh gayi). Someone close by was humming Raindrops keep falling on my head....yikes, what a bummer ! Who wants dejection when I was dreaming of getting soaked in the rain and then heading home to a steaming cup of masala chai and yummy pakodas.

And then it struck me - most of the English songs based on rain that I could recall had an undercurrent of melancholy/sadness -be it Raindrops Keep Falling on my Head or November Rain or All I Needed was the Rain - all are about rain bringing back memories of a loss or washing away a loss (mostly love, no surprises on that). Au contraire, a lot of romance and naughtiness in Hindi songs surfaces in the rain - be it the beautiful Rim Jhim Rim Jhim from 1942 a love story, the full-of-hope Ghanan Ghanan from Lagaan or the soft Saawan Barse Tarse Dil, not to mention the numerous songs where love/passion blossoms with a wet jig ...from Raj Kapoor-Nargis to the SRK-Kajol.

Well. Some people feel the rain, others just get wet.

*created 9 May

Jungle Retreat, Masinagudi

2006-05-22T12:18:00.000+05:30

The Jungle Retreat at Masinagudi (www.jungleretreat.com) is a great weekend getaway for those living in and around Bangalore.

The location, at the foot of the Nilgiris, is breathtaking - you can see the grand hills looming in front of you as you lounge about during the day, and a carpet of stars at night - the perfect ground to test your knowledge of constellations. The cottages are warm and comfortable, and are spaced sufficiently apart from each other to provide privacy. Dont be surprised to find a deer sharing your balcony when you come out to breathe the fresh morning air.

There are activities for both the adventurous and the lazy - trekking, safari and a variety of indoor games. The guided trek through the Niligiris is fairly challenging, but there are ample opportunities for photographers, even though we didnt come across any animals (except a few frightened goats!). The jungle safari will have more than its share of elephants - we were lucky enough to sight a small panther, apart from the deers and the bisons. There are also wonderful photography opportunities during the safari - lovely flowers of all hues, cacti, and butterflies.

The food is delicious, the music great and the bar well stocked. Snooker, chess, fuzeball, carrom and a variety of other indoor games means you have enough to do.

I had a fairly hectic trip, but I did manage to snatch a blissful hour on a hammock. Amidst the gentle chirping of the birds and the awe inspiring Nilgiris, you feel a serenity that is difficult to describe. The staff is courteous, and I thoroughly enjoyed my amateur sparring at snooker. The bar is willing to invent a drink for you if you sketch our your preferences - the Cosmo is quite nice.

The tree house is breathtaking and oh-so-royal, and the view from the top made us forget our initial doubts about whether it'd hold our combined weight! And I loved the variety of music that they had.

Rohan, the owner, an enthusiastic wildlife photographer, has some amazing pics put up - do check out the python swallowing the deer. And check out his photo album - it shows the place while it was getting constructed, and also some famous visitors, including the Little Master - yeah none other than Sachin.

Caution: cell phones do not work here. I personally love the feeling of being un-connected and un-reachable, but for workaholics who cannot live without checking their mails or barking orders on the cell phone, this is going to be a true break from working!

On Beauty

2006-05-09T15:05:00.000+05:30

So finally decided to test D's ravings about the salon at the Leela. I have a nagging doubt that it wont be as 'inexpensive' as she claims it to be, but wot the hell. Think I can try it once. And I need some pampering.

Some highights from the visit:

I was greeted at the entrace with blood red curtains - ohmigawd ! But otherwise the place was quite nice - pleasant lavender smell, the soft murmurings of the numerous staff (they outnumbered the customers), the creamy leather chairs and old-wood furniture and panelling - this is clearly a place for luxury!

As I looked around, I realized that the customer profile here was different from most other parlors - no college girls/ young women, but mostly middle aged women with lotttts of money and time to spare. All elegantly dressed, but what I noticed most were the sandals. Carrie Bradshaw would have cried at the awesome display of footwear in that square foot of land. All beauties - strappy, elegant, glimmering with the color of money...it seemed that Gucci or Versace had randomly selected those women to model their finest creations.

Sigh. Well at least Im not wearing my 3 year old platforms.

As I was getting my head oil massage, I saw the most shocking sight of them all - a kid, not older than 8 years, was getting her hair colored AND highlighted. Ohmigawd. To think that the first time I colored my hair was when I was 25, and even then I was so scared I was convinced my hair would drop off as punishment or something.. Granted I was a bit late in the coming, but isnt 8 years old a bit too young?

Damn, they should have an age restriction on this stuff, else I'll lose the few things where I can claim to be 'mast' in my teenage sis's eyes!

Bookseller of Kabul

2006-05-09T15:04:00.000+05:30

Back at home. The Bookseller of Kabul had seemed interesting. At least the page I had opened it on - which prompted me to buy the book. So I settled down to read it. Boy, what a depressing book. Its not that she has written the book in a depressing manner - there is no over dramatizing, no attempt to make things appear morbid than they are, no searching for cynical hidden meanings and connections (ala Milan Kundera). In fact, the book is fairly journalistic - no nonsense and (hopefully) factual. But the facts themselves leave you with the feeling that there is no hope at all for the people of Afghanistan. And especially the women. It is quite evident that the writer herself was moved by the hopeless fate of the women born into that society, for quite sub consciously, her stories bring out the dismal situation that all the women protagonists - young and old, ugly and beautiful - are stuck in.

In a world which focuses largely on the joys of positive thinking and holistic healing and discovering your inner joy, the story of the Bookseller of Kabul comes as a rude demonstration of the helpness that a man's place of birth can put him into. I know that a lot of our postive thinkers would exhort me to look at this as an example of the resilience of the human spirit, and give me examples of the potter's wheel and coffee beans and what not to show how fate tests the strongest (so what if they have never gone through this so-called suffering). But I would rather face reality for it is - stark, naked, and for the women in Afghanistan - brutal and worse-than-death.

Hair and Now

2006-05-09T15:02:00.000+05:30

So Khursheed refused to give me a hair cut. Some gyan about can-only-be-trimmed-right-now. Damn. And i went up about trilling to everyone to watch out for my new look, woke up early on aSaturday morning AND took a shower. Need to drown my gum.

So headed to Blossom. I can look for some second hand Somerset Maugham's and Russells. And I'll need some Georgette Heyers and Dorothy Sayers for the plane, rite? Right.

Mmmm the smells of a book shop...not the plastic and vinyl smell of the modern stores where you have the books neadtly categorized and labeled....but a nice old shop where you can inhale the musty smell that comes from pages that have been turned and marked and treasured, over and over again. And the joy of hunting for a book, and stumbling upon a beauty that you didnt even know existed, the thrill of finding several orginal editions of your favorite book, and trying to choose between them ...

So I finally ended up buying eleven books. AND came back to Blossoms (supposedly to buy a pen), and bought two more. Ohmigawd. I gotta, gotta make an inventory of my un-read books. And Ive already 'started' at least 6 books...sheesh. Okie I promise I wont read any of these till I finish the back log.

And didn't I want enough money as a kid to buy all the books that I wanted to? And now that I have that money, I still feel guilty about buying them. Why? Coz now I dont have enough time to read those books. Damn. Life always slips in an invisible caveat which you notice only when it's too late.

Thank you for the music

2006-05-04T00:27:00.000+05:30

Watching Big play his parents' favorite song on a gramophone in Sex & The City today brought back some cherished memories from my childhood.

I know this may sound arrogant, but let me say it anyway : For those who have never heard music played on a gramophone - my condolences.

My first introduction to music was listening to Jagjit & Chitra Singh weaving their magic on a round black plastic disc....There is something about listening to a song on a gramophone - there is a richness to the timbre that I think is hard to find in even the fanciest surround sound/home theatre systems. It seems as if the singer is sitting in front of you, singing for you, only you. The feeling gets reinforced as the little needle takes your hand and gently leads you on a journey of love, hope, despair and beauty. Its the perfect make believe world, with the singer moving the potter's wheel, giving shape to your dreams...and your life. Fiction becomes fact till nothing else matters....just how music should be.

When I was about 12, we shifted into a new house. While packing (there were no Movers & Packers then), my mom threw away all my Dad's records - a priceless collection of at least 100, if not more - as junk. Even the kabadi would not have them. The beautiful gramophone - with its solid wooden casing, the smooth red velvet casing inside and the i-belong-to-a-different-era smell- was also given away, probably to the maid or the dhobi. So much for Rafi, Kishore, Manna De, Hemant Da, Geeta Di and the Mangeshkars.

I would give anything to have some of those records back. I still harbour hopes of buying a gramophone someday - supposedly for my Dad, but I suspect its more for myself.

Don't it always seems to go, that you dont know what you have till its gone ... They paved paradise, and put up a parking lot.

Yesterday's junk is today's loss.... and tomorrow's fortune.

Future Backward

2006-04-20T18:20:00.000+05:30

Someone sent me a corny forward which said - live everyday as if its ure last day.

I find it much more convenient to assume my last day is really far off, and hence continue my lazy state of existence :-) But it got me thinking - if i knew i had very few days left in the world, wot are the things I'd really want to do, that I'd feel sorry thatI hadn't done.

The most important is travel - go to all those places that I want to see in the world, do a bharat darshan on train - i really wanna go to the unexplored nooks and corners of the country. especially do Leh & Ladakh. Therez soooo very much to see - i wonder whether I'll ever be able to do even half of it.

Next is a lotta other stuff ...read all the books that i want to - backlog from my existing collection plus all those books i really wanna read but stop myself from buying; something related to music; go bungee jumping. etc-etc.

But travel is the most important. If I really knew that I had just a year to live, I would immediately quit my job and gallavant all over the world. And I would probably end up covering a large majority of the places I really wanna go to. coz I'd have no 'future' to think or worry about.

But the fact that I assume that I will live longer, and hence can/will do it later, stops me from doing it right now. I.e., the possibility of the future limits the reality of my present. For better or for worse - only time shall tell.

Arrrrgh.

April Sunday

2006-04-18T18:32:00.000+05:30

Sunday....one of the best days that I have seen in Blore for a long time. Such awesome, awesome weather - the kind that makes you see beauty in everything and everyone around you, the kind that makes you want to just stay still and soak in the moment, without brooding over the past or worrying about the future. Its almost like the first few days of being in love - nothing can wipe out the smile on your face, for God's in Heaven, all's right with the world.

So we pulled out our bean bags and floor cushions and plonked ourselves on the balcony. From the second floor that I stay on, the nearby houses are barely visible...all you can see are the tops of the trees gently pirouetting with the wind and the clouds battling away in the sky. Also there are no street noises, so it almost feels like you are away from the town. I had a book with me, but I was barely reading - it was much nicer trying to catch an occasional sweet melody amongst the chirping of the birds (the wild cackles of the crows mostly), the secret whisperings amongst the trees, and the faintly delicious smell of pakodas cooking somewhere close by, playing hide and seek with us.

And there was Deeksha - watching DCH on the comp and giggling loudly to herself. Each time we'd hear her cackles, we'd laugh out loud ourselves. No reason really - we were just happy.

No one spoke, but we each had a faint smile on our faces...for in the mad confusions of our lives, we had suddenly, and briefly, stumbled upon a haven of bliss.

Of God, and Living

2006-04-11T23:24:00.000+05:30

" If I were not an atheist, I would believe in a God who would choose to save people on the basis of the totality of their lives and not the pattern of their words. I think he would prefer an honest and righteus atheist to a TV preacher whose every word is God, God, God and whose every deed is foul, foul, foul. "
Isaac Asimov

"Razors pain you, Rivers are damp,
Acids stain you, And drugs cause cramp.
Guns aren't lawful, Nooses give,
Gas smells awful. You might as well live."
Dorothy Parker

"Yield not thy neck to fortune's yoke, but let the dauntless mind still ride in triumph over all mischance."
William Shakespeare, King Henry VI

Footnote: The clubbing together of God and Living is purely coincincidental, and should not be perceived to indicate any connection between the two, stated or otherwise :-)

Goa Diaries - Jan 2006

2006-04-11T20:21:00.000+05:30

Reached Panaji Friday morning. Nice shower, breakfast at Mongini's. Then we headed to Donna Paula - had a big debate on who's the guy and whos' the girl amongst them :-)

Lunch at Mum's Kitchen, then headed to Miramar beach. quiet place. we wanted more excitement, so headed to Calangute. drove a water scootie, the waves hitting u on the face are soo awesome ! then Bret taught me to 'ride' the big waves, so splashed about in the water for some time. headed back to the hotel, dressed up and went to this hep place called Club Cabana. we were certainly over dressed for that place !!! tried dancing to some trance music, but finally gave up. there was some arbit swim suit show going on - there were even men dressed in bikinis !! the rest of the gang got busy watching that...i went to a corner and dropped off to sleep : -)

Saturday was wedding day. went for a quick splash to Bagha beach. came back around lunch time, drove about an hour to the wedding village, got caught in a traffic jam (in Goa !!!) on the way so missed the first half of the service : -( the church looked really old and was beautiful (i saw a pic of it in a Jetwings later!).

then headed for the reception - loved the way they celebrate their weddings - the welcome circle, the wedding tip tap dance, the jiving....a friend of mine taught me to jive, so danced and danced. Kept on putting my arm around his waist instead of his shoulder though (blush). When they called us to dance inside the circle, he kept on telling me - put your hand on my shoulder. Hehe.

came back to the hotel around midnight, changed and four of us headed to Tito's on 2 bikes. the drive was awesome, and then we found this shack by the beach that was playing good school time music...just sat & watched the waves wash up and the full moon and the stars - i simply loved it. headed back around 5 in the morning - i crashed, while two enthu guys actually stayed awake throughout and went back to Bagha at 7 !

Wot i loved:
the beaches, the water
the roads !!! they r soo drivable. wanna ride a scootie there next time.
the pretty cottages and houses by the side of the roads
the people - everyone kinda lets u be - u really dont feel you are in india

Let bygones be...

2006-04-11T20:16:00.000+05:30

Salma, my cook, pounces on the opportunity to talk whenever you enter the kitchen. So no wonder she started again when I came in this morning for my breakfast.

There I was, pouring my cereal, making the right sounds but barely listening to her tale of relatives caught in an accident, till she said – jaane waala to aata nahin hai na didi. I stopped in the middle of heaping Waheeda Rahman’s muesli into the bowl. So true.

And it ain’t just true for the dead.

Adventures of a globe trotter : Beirut, Dec 2002

2006-04-06T23:33:00.000+05:30

Next to Heidelberg, one of the most enchanting places on earth, at least amongst the places that I have visited : -) I was in Beirut for just about 4 days on work - at that time, I could not afford extending these official trips into personal ones : -(

But the memory remains....a letter that I wrote to my friends, and some pics. Visit www.downtownbeirut.com for a visual treat of the city.

Hello people !!! Am back from Beirut - had a smashing, rocking time - I wish I cud've stayed there for ever !! The city is beautiful - it turned out to be totally different from wot I'd thought it would be. The Mediterrean Sea was a stone's throw from my hotel - & with itz waters so blue, it was absolutely stunning. If you thought Marine Drive is happening, you've gotta walk by the coast to see how happening it is - my first day I had lunch at a place rite across the Sea - amazzzing experince.

The most happening place in Beirut is Downtown - the center of the city which also has some of the best buildings (architecturally) in town. All the buildings had been destroyed during the Civil War, & they have actually resurrected all of them by re-doing the exteriors while maintaining the original architecture .

My favorite spot was the Roman Bath Gardens - an area that has a small stream running by the side of some ancient Roman remains (which have been preserved till now),with an ancient Church on one side & an equally old Mosque on the other - itz one of the most breathtaking & serene sites I've ever seen - u feel like uve been transported to a different time altogether - Koks u wud've just freaked out on the architecture & the layout ! T

The lay-out of Downtown is like our own Connaught Place - on a smaller & much prettier scale. The entire area is done up in cobbled stone - has a very European feel to it ..there are shops & Cafes & eateries all around, all of which have outdoor seating. Sitting there, you get a stunning view of the mountains - pity I coudn't go skiing there !

About half of the population in the city is French - & I spent my time there saying 'Bon jour' & 'Merci' & of course, 'Bon apetit'. As usual, my most interesting encounters were with the taxi-drivers - it was fun chatting with them while they took me all over the place coz of the language problem. & oh yes, the day ends at 3 in the afternoon & I had Internet access in my room, apart from MTV & movies of course!!

OK..I can just go on and on...but the gist (!!) of it is that it was welcome break - somehow the city is verry bright & happy,and with Christmas round the corner, it was even more festive - all the trees on the roads had been strung with lights so the view was even more breathtaking at night ..& when ure company pays for you to stay at a posh hotel & gorge on all the food tht you want to (I actually tried controlling my food intake for the first 2 days, but after that, I just gave up!) - well, Paradise's not far.

Itz back to the real world now - but I'm sure gonna put fite to tag along next time something cums up in Beirut - I'd definitely recommend it as a fantastic vacation-spot to anyone interested.

PS: To be honest, the title of this mail is a bit of an exaggeration -I'm neither a globe-trotter, nor did I have any earth-shattering experiences that could classify as adventures, but wot the !!);

San Francisco Chronicle - Weekends 2 & 3

2006-04-06T23:20:00.000+05:30

04 October, 2005

Went over to Kokil's at Portland - what a crazy, last minute trip!! There we were, talking on the phone Sat morning, and we are both like, we are soo close (just about a 3 hour train journey), we have to, have to meet !! So Diwakar goes scouting on the net, quickly books tickets for the evening, and there I am - headed for Kokil's house in Portland! Yeah its just a day trip, but wot the hell - dunno when I will get to meet my oldest friend again : -)

Kokil's house is so charming and serene ! It was also good to get to know Diwakar - I'd only just met him at the wedding. Watching Kokil and him plan out each and every detail of our shopping expedition, weighing each pro and con, I cudnt help thinking - these guyz are just made for each other : -) The shopping was awesome fun - picked up my comp, discman for Deeksha, shoes, clothes, and of course, the last 2 hours when we were selecting the umm-special-stuff was such awesome, awesome fun !! How we preened and giggled : -)

October 8, 2005

My last weekend in SF. Sigh. Saturday was spent in office, finalizing the presentation. But I was determined to keep Sunday for myself. Trudged off to the Exploratorium .... caught off at the wrong spot, and while I was waiting for the bus, this Chineses guy started chatting with me. He was a prof - single and in his mid-30's - on his way to the Golden Gate bridge. Asked me if I wanted to join him (ouch!) - but I'd told I'd rather do the Exploratorium first. He offered to join in, but baulked when I told him the entr is 20 odd dollars. hehe. Poor thing. I almost felt sorry for him. It's terrible being alone in a strange land, but its worse being lonely. And I could sense the loneliness in him. I know how terrible that feels.

So the Exploratorium (http://www.exploratorium.edu/) is a complete wonderland ! Such awesome, awesome wonders of science - the musical instruments, the sand dunes and the water effects, the optical illusions, and Little Red Riding Hood : -) The crowning glory was the Tactile Dome - its a maze which you explore in pitch darkness - you walk, climb, slide, jump...all using your sense of touch. The concept is to demonstrate how we underuse our sense of touch. Most people go in groups, but well I was alone.I took a deep breath, and walked in....to complete, pitch darkness. Gawd it was scary! I came out and asked the shy Brit guy who was waiting with me if he'd mind acompanying me - poor guy had no choice. Somehow, having someone with you, anyone - even a stranger, is reassuring. Basic human nature maybe? I felt so much braver, and there we were, tumbling away, trying to find our way using our hands, and boy, was it fun ! A must-do experience.

Trudged across the road to get a sighting of the Golden Gate bridge. I personally find the Bay bridge more impressive, but Im sure this wuda been a wonder when it was built decades ago. We still dont have a bridge that comes close to it in India :-(

Hung around the beach to watch the air show of the Angels - the beach was lined with people. Then trudgd along to find Ghiradelli Square. Walked almost 2 miles before I found a bus stop - I have to, have to have shed a few pounds with all my walking ! There was a band playing some music in the middle of the square - and pretty good music it was too! bought some chocolates, and then headed to the highly recommended Pizza Chicago - the best pizzas in town according to Kokil. Imagine my surprise when I discovered it was run by an Indian! A popular Italian joint run by Indians - well ons econd thoughts, why I am surprised. Uncle-ji chatted with me in Hindi, while Aunty-ji and beta-ji were running around taking orders and clearing tables. The pizza was yummilicous. The Great Indian Story goes on. Amen.

They say good things come to an end quickly, and here I am, locking my last suitcase in La Quinta Inns & Suites. I will miss you SF.... Till we meet again!

San Francisco Chronicle - Weekend 1

2006-04-06T23:07:00.000+05:30

Letters I wrote to friends when I was in SF in Sep05....a chronicle for my old age :)

27 September 2005

Saturday: Woke up JIT for breakfast, headed for town (SF). Walked across all the piers (43 of them I think– at least a 2-3 mile walk)…awesome view. Walked around pier 39 , had crepes for lunch, gazed at the antics of sea-lions (got a pic of 2 of them smooching). At the last pier, there is a WW-2 submarine and a war ship. Took the inside tour of the submarine – very neat (awesome audio commentary and well, ive never seen the insides of a sub, that too a war one).

Then walked into a museum where they had some really antique manually operated musical instruments which you could 'play' for 50 cents – great fun again.

Walked to fisherman's warf – got my name painted Chinese style (flowers and all – does ne of u want it?), walked over to the park that has an awesome view of the bay, was enquiring abt some trips to canary row and napa valley when the agent offered me both the trips free – the only catch, I need to be a US citizen: -( So now I'm looking for single US citizens who can get me 2 trips worth 150 dollars free. Sigh. Wish me luck,

Sunday – just lazed around. Was too tired : -)

Back to hectivity now.

San Francisco Chronicle - Arrival

2006-04-06T22:27:00.000+05:30

Letters I wrote to friends while I was in SF in Sep'05.... a chronicle for my old age : -)

22 September 2005

Okie so here I am…had a pretty hectic first 2 days to be honest!

Almost lost my spectacles again at the HK airport :- ) got a tour of the entire airport (and its massive, believe me) including the ferry train in my efforts to retrieve them. Air journey fm HK to SFO was a killer – there was a time when I thought I would never be able to walk again coz of the cramps! But no major cribs there.

Am currently staying in a suburb called Castro Valley which is about 45 mins fm the main city (where my office is). Its’ a small, quaint little place with a very good looking front desk attendant! Alas, he was only there the first day, and no Bret, I haven’t implemented any of your suggestions – yet. Castro Valley is a small town with a single main road (called Castro Boulevard) and beautiful surroundings – ideal for just walking, which I did yesterday on my way back from the station.. The weather’s a lil chilly in the mornings & evenings, but day time warm and sunny – hope it stays this way over the weekends too!

The other guy on my project arrived ystrdy nite – he’s a Blorean whoz been with Mphasis for 5 yrs (!!!) and is abt to get married. He has a cousin who stays 15 min away from our hotel, and has graciously offered that I tag along with them over the weekend – which I don’t mind at all since the cuzzin has a car! Apparently there r quite a lotta other Mphasis folks in town too – shud meet them once we move here over de weekend.

People here have been nice & helpful till now – esp when compared with my Frankfurt experience! Esp in Castro valley – everyone smiles and chats with everyone in the bfast room, and there was this really nice woman who gave >me directions to my hotel at the station and chatted for some time – we parted with a warm shaking of hands (no Bret she wasn’t hitting on me, or me on her!).

I notice a huge population of Chinks here (to include Chinese + SE Asians) – no wonder the flite fm HK was full. Also a fair population of Indians who r obviously here for IT work – there was this couple in the train yesterday, with the guy talking abt how he needs to go home to choose a girl (in deference to his mom’s wishes), and the girl talking loudly in Hindi giving him gyan on priorities and marriage – quite interesting : -)

The project’s also q interesting – organizational structure and interpersonal conflicts related to a platform which was adopted 2 years ago and is gonna get phased out in another 2 yrs. Have had various meetings, and the problems and the apparent solutions are quite obvious, but there are soo many softer issues involved that its gonna be a challenge making the recommendations and more importantly, bringing a structure to the approach and solutions. And technology is quite interesting – dude the industry is so much evolved than the BPO space, and there appears to be so much to do, I am very tempted to say no to IBM and join Solutions.

To be very honest, am still not sure about IBM – cant say why. The CRM’s here are also quite a bunch– Abhijit is very professional and consult-ish, Rakshit is a typical Punju (married thank God!) – loud and aggressive, and he’s an IIM-A to boot : -) Georg looks and talks like a professor (he wears those Harry Potter-ish glasses) and has bugs bunny teeth.

U know wot...as I write this mail, I can look upon the valley from my window - curving roads lined with trees and picturesque houses, with the cars winding up, and the sun setting in the background - its beautiful!

and oh yes - today i went to the exercise room. 130 cals - not bad no : -)

So thatz quite a bit! Please keep writing in with ure updates..so long and have fun!!!

Stuff about Life

2006-04-06T22:14:00.000+05:30

That's All

2006-04-04T23:36:00.000+05:30

I wanna take 6 months off..... ...Travel India by train. Get down to reading my ever increasing backlog of books.... Drive around...destination anywhere. Watch the sunrise as i sip on my kapi.

Welcome to wherever you are.

Where the streets have no name

2006-03-31T15:14:00.000+05:30

I have often thought that the essence of a city is captured by walking on its roads. Or for that, even a country. Even a Martian walking on an Indian road, any Indian road, will easily guess that he is walking in the most populous part of the planet. There are people everywhere, and no place to walk on! I'm sure the oxygen levels of Indians show a marked rise when traveling in the first world.

Contrast this with Europe, which boasts of wide pavements and vast green stretches, but hardly any people! As you walk down the roads of Luxembourg, you often come across happy couples sharing a long kiss on the road – thankfully neighbor Germany hasn't doused the French passion. German roads will boast the stoic German who refuses to make eye contact, the enthusiastic cyclists and the oh-so-awesome cars zipping away at over 50 mph! In San Francisco, you see people from all nationalities – Indians, Paki's, SE Asians, Blacks, Scandinavians – everyone, so you know that this is truly a melting pot. I am sure the same would hold for New York, or Singapore.

I was in Chennai for a week, and my strongest memory of Tamland is the overpowering stench that hits you as you walk down the streets. And this wasn't any street mind you, but arguably the posh-est road of the city, which houses The Park and The Taj and numerous other upscale shops, restaurants and hotels. In fact, I was quite impressed with the great roads and the fancy neon hoardings as I was driven from the airport to my hotel. But when you walk down the wide roads, you see open drains, uncollected refuse and of course, the stink – everywhere.

Now take Bombay – probably the filthiest amongst the Indian metros (I haven't really stayed in Calcutta which I've heard is equally bad). But I remember walking down Churchgate station as a kid, and I was completely taken in by the focused Bombay wallah – everyone seemed to have a mission, a goal…perhaps he wasn't going to reach his destination just yet, but he was definitely going to make sure that he got there someday. That memory pretty much defines the image that I have carried of Bombay – the only go-getter city in India, with a true middle class which believes in working hard and partying equally hard (Where else would you find large lower middle class families out to enjoy a day at Esselworld for 10 dollars apiece, more than 15 years ago!). And over my several visits to Maximum City over the past two decades, this image has only got strengthened..

And finally, Delhi, my city of birth and youth. They say that a woman should walk on the pavement there with her arms folded in front of her chest and her elbows sticking out – so that she can elbow away the men trying to grab her boobs. Of course the problem with that is that the men will go for your bum instead – but well, it's a matter of optimization. And when you hear the lewd comments, you mostly pretend you don't understand Hindi and walk on, till you reach tipping point and muster up enough courage to turn around and slap the guy. Pity, given that Delhi probably boasts of the best roads in the country, and most roads actually have a pavement - even though the pedestrians still insist on walking in the middle of the road. Its all a matter of training, as Mark Twain would say.