Finally, a sense of community!

It's been close to a year that I set foot in Mumbai...At first the city looked so huge and I was so scared that it nearly knocked me out!

With no idea of Marathi, no inkling of the crowds that walk superfast on pavements (I forgot...they barely exist in parts...), on rail overbridges, on roads, everywhere...and a coldness that pervaded the monotony of such speed, it looked like I wouldn't survive it!

And yeah, it sure hurt and badly when I had to get used to such chill closer home...when the next door neighbour looked non-existent, the one opposite my door too looked like he/she never existed there...and their/our neighbour gave these intimidating vibes that kept me off, despite initial attempts to get friendly.

Friendly neighbourhoods were commonplace once...my initial months in Mumbai proved they are extinct. In the wake of the Raj Thackeray onslaught against any human he perceived an `outsider', my husband and I sure got the feeling that we were foreigners in an alien land, migrants who were deemed to be thrown out of the place.

You saw it on the faces of people...you saw it in the explosive noise of a door being slammed on your face only because you passed by and were an outsider somehow hurting them by merely existing. My husband and I faced it when our housing society folks picked up a fight with us for no reason, when we were just returning from our night walk.

The hostility continued for a while too...In the meanwhile though, language and region that was used to alienate people like my husband and me, pushed us to make friends among others from the South, or even elsewhere. We were initially afraid, then angry, sometimes reacted, and sometimes just ignored what was happening around...but bonded nevertheless, offering support to each other during the initial months, and getting closer as time passed by.

Somehow...things have changed now. I got the shock of my life a few days back when the neighbour who does not as much as smile at me...rang my doorbell to invite me home for Satyanarayana Pooja!

They say never refuse an invitation to a prayer - specially Satyanarayana Pooja. I have grown to believe that when it comes to prayer, one may go to the enemy's place too if invited. I agreed readily of course, and went over with my other neighbour friends. No hostility. Only friendliness, warmth...even if for courtesy's sake! I would love to believe it was not just courtesy...nevertheless, it felt good to pray in someone's home! Especially if that someone showed change of heart.

Even so, when I walk out of my home to go to the doctor, or a shop, I do walk out with a sense of community...something I missed a great deal in my initial months.  I no longer feel an `outsider as Raj Thackeray would want it'...I hope it is not temporary, but things have changed...does 26/11 have anything to do with it?

Is this India?

Want to come across lambani women speak chaste English and sell off embroidered blankets at mindboggling prices? Or walk into lanes of magic lights that have so many foreigners shopping for trinklets that you wonder if you're in another country yourself? Ingo's Saturday Night Bazaar in Goa means just that...Am wondering if there are crowds around there...post 26/11...but this was how magical it was when I went there on honeymoon...It's probably where the cliched Western term of `drawing inspiration from Goa's fleamarkets' comes from.

Gifts that floor!

For those wondering what makes my blog look out of date of late, have not been posting so often. After effects of 26/11. And poor health too. No excuses. In the melee of managing my body and mind, have had a share of some joys too!

On Dec 16, my marriage turned a year old. It was as if just the other day, my fiance and I had entered wedlock, gotten over all that madness and tension, and gone on our Goa trip. It was as if just the other day, we stepped into this rented home that made me fall in love with it instantly.

A neighbour shares her birthday with my wedding day, and for us bunch who've gotten along like a house on fire, it meant double celebration! Despite a work day with loads of work my husband arrived early (extremely early by Mumbai standards - 6 pm), we had our share of celebration...my neighbour who got to cut her cake! Gifts being showered by other neighbours...something I did not expect for a wedding day!

There is something about gifts that makes one squirm or jump in joy! I have written in an earlier post (see the Weddings label) about them too.

A couple of gifts that we received just floored us! The first one, a lovely drawing of a couple on paper by my neighbour's daughter Pooja. She would have spent a neat hour at the piece. It's not like the couple had perfect faces or that it would have fetched a medal. But the sheer effort on her part to sit down and draw it out to show she cared...!! My husband fell for it so much that he declared he wanted to frame it and hang the picture on the wall! Pooja is surely elated and has gone ahead with such drawings for other occasions of family friends!!!

Another was a greeting card! Just a card? You would say! In this era of email invites, ecards, sms greetings and online gifting, we got this cute card from my parents and sister...a surprise considering they wished us on the phone anyways. But that they made that effort to post it on time, hoping it would reach us on time! Old fashioned....right? But old is gold...it's nostalgic! This card reminded me of how I received love wrapped in an envelope every birthday!

On the bookstore wall

Seen on the wall at Crossword: `There is no spectacle that is as terrifying as the sight of a guest in your house whom you catch staring at your books'

A man accompanying his wife on her book store visit altered this to: `There is no spectacle that is as terrifying as the sight of my wife in the bookstore, staring at these books!'

No prizes for guessing who the man and wife were. They were - my husband and I at the bookstore the other day. Again, I did not buy a book!

Gloom

The Taj, as pictured on Dec 6, 2008, a week after terror strikes.

Can you beat this?

Scene: A five-year old is chasing a family friend in their `catch-me-if you can' game. He tries hard to catch the 30-something `uncle', and becomes frustrated he cannot. The man incidentally, is holding a glass of beer as he moves between chairs and some empty space on floor. He keeps it aside so he can run better. So what does Mr Toddler do? He quickly makes his moves while chasing, towards the glass and declares to the `uncle' still far away for a catch, ``Paas aao, varna pee jaaonga' (Come close, or I will drink this up), holding the glass. Poor Uncle, taken aback by this shot of masterly manipulation by the toddler, gives in. 

PS: The toddler wanted the drink as it looked colourful, but knew it was not for him when that `uncle' gave him a glass of Sprite instead. Kids these days, did you say?

Some things do not change

Something about the party crazy Mumbaikar irks me. The bellowing fires of Taj, Oberoi and the bullet-ridden people of CST and Nariman House have not kept them off parties for long.

True they had to show sympathy to those who perished at Taj. True they felt just as sick too, when they watched in horror as bullets whizzed past streets in Colaba. True all the more, that it hurt every true Mumbaikar. 

That actresses and dance item girls were willing to keep a mellowed mood for the New Year was a whiff of fresh air in a city where everyone with money thinks throwing it away on December 31 every year is a necessity. But then, how long can one stay off work? Read party? It is hardly two weeks since the terrorists played havoc in our lives. And the ones who always partied by habit are at it again. Enough of the gloom, let us party, says their mood.

Can the urbane lot not replace their pleasure-seeking pursuits with realism for once? Probably reality is more complex than my anger.

Last night we went to a post-marriage reception of a friend. The mood was sombre as some of the TV stars came by to wish this friend of ours who happens to direct Hindi TV serials. It went on that way for over two hours, as some guys quietly walked to the soft drinks area and downed a few pegs. I doubt if Taj and Oberoi were any longer part of their banter though. They were far away from Colaba, and very close to Madh Island.

For me who was used to watching celebrities not in parties but at functions and conferences back at Bangalore, it was a first hand experience of how desperately TV actors try at their good looks and celeb conversations. Fake smiles, fake warmth, fake handshakes....no their intentions are not fake. They are working, struggling to get an assignment here, a role there. Actresses who've just been out of a serial or two as leads trying to look as sexy as they looked before!  

What do you do when someone you are used to watching on TV always, springs up before you in a chance banter? Chances are that while the face looks familiar, you are trying to relate the person to the character, clothes, looks etc, before you watch that fleeting face vanish. You realise also, that a saree-clad actress you were used to watching is a lot younger than she looked in a TV soap. 

The chatter of this crowd was by far too alien for a bunch of us. I took succour in the company of someone I knew from TV journalism and her friend who is close. At least we had the luxury of not having to fake our gestures!

It was after the dinner that the otherwise sober looking crowd got into action. As if the pent up desire to tap their feet was suppressed too long. The bride and groom were happy to oblige their colleagues as Hindi numbers played on, and the guys danced away. Two constables who were on rounds dropped by past midnight, were cajoled and pacified by some people, and finally left. Am unsure if they got their moolah. Far from the emotion of feeling charged to change the country for better.

As some of us walked out of the open air hall, it occured to me, some things just go on. Mumbai's obsession with its entertainment, some extravagance and camera is one of the aspects. So what if a couple of weeks before, people at five star hotels did what they loved best, and experienced the most nightmarish of episodes of modern Indian history!

Verdict: the people know better

Am glad the Indian capital's voter saw through political designs and voted for a chief minister's performance instead of falling for BJP's anti-terror plank.

My respect for her came down several steps after her statement about Soumya Vishwanathan, the slain TV journalist. She clarified herself on Karan Thapar's Devil's Advocate later on. But considering I have faced some tough times myself while on night duty at a newspaper, it stung.

Nevertheless, that the average urban voter is rising to the occasion, and making his stand clear, is a relief. For her to hit a hattrick, in an overly urbane capital state speaks volumes, in a political system otherwise heavily dependent on caste votes.

Crass, is an understatement for how the political class behaved soon after the terror attacks. Clear, is the statement by the voter. Relief, is when you see younger politicians making some sense in all the insensitivity around.

You've had enough Mr/Ms Politician! Deliver. Or be gone. 

This matters now

I have often been prompted to observe, that religion is corruption of the mind. I will explain why this thought, in a later post and more elaborately. But Pooja Bedi's interview in Hindustan Times, is food for thought. And it matters, in these troubled times, when everyone who can make merry on the current emotion is doing exactly that. Religion after all, is nobody's property. Do read the interview.

The veil between anger and hate

War on Mumbai. War on terror. Fight for India. Insensitive politicians. Hate Pakistan. Hate terror. Look at our heroes. Look at the police and army who laid down their lives. Let the human rights groups dare to talk against them now! Let's do something. Our channel is starting a movement. Join Us. Do your bit for the nation!

Spontaneous outbursts by the media perching itself on a moral high ground, or simply the design of elite-obsessed media honchos usurping the opportunity to brand their version of India's reforms. Of blazer-wearing handsome anchors daring the human rights brigade to talk. Agreed they dared the Sena with equal elan. It does not absolve them of influencing prejudiced rhetoric though. 

Ever since we Indians spent those three days and nights watching TV non-stop, these words have hounded the average Indian TV viewer with a never-seen-before urgency. 

We forget something when we fall prey to such powerful words in our moments of emotion - that the genesis of a terror attack is hate. That hate is taught, in varying degrees - in the form of prejudice when we are kids, through carefully chosen literature in textbooks, through the all powerful weapon called religion, in our homes.

Mumbai was attacked. By terrorists. By messengers of hate. They were schooled at it. They were taught to prejudice. But tell me, are we Indians not guilty of it too? Have we not been taught our own share of chauvinism in the name of religion, caste or class!

It is true we need to get Pakistan as a State to act against terrorists. But let's not forget those who spread terror on our very soil. Let us not forget that terrorism needs to viewed with a larger perspective. That hate breeds hate and the wheel of hate turns with no end.

The veil between anger which is a natural emotion at the moment, and hate, a destructive part of us, is very thin. Translucent. It is urgent that we do not direct our anger at the average Pakistani who is caught in the quagmire of an uncertain State on one side, the killer in the name of Islam on the other, and poverty on the other.

We need to weed out terror. From the neighbour's soil. From our soil. From our minds, to begin with. We need to use religion for our own righteousness, not the evil designs of anyone wanting to capitalise on it - be it the politician, the terrorist, or self-styled religious head.

A bruised spirit

On Saturday, exactly a week after it was reclaimed by commandos, I visited the Taj-Gateway area and Nariman Point. Bruised in spirit. Guilt-ridden. Eager to be there. 

Eager from the first sleepless night when I watched in horror, the dome of the Taj go up in flames, the windows catch fire, and gunshots piercing the night, on TV. Feeling guilty that while fellow journalists were risking their lives to do their stories, I had the luxury to watch the show live on TV.

It was December 6, when we could expect more attacks, in memory of the Black Day an era ago. Warnings of possible attacks elsewhere in the country, maybe even Mumbai although the city fresh from savagery of fundamentalist bloodshed, is unlikely to face one in the near future.

The city has been recovering from its battered self, with the `life goes on' ethic no doubt. But to remind yourself that anything can happen to you anywhere in this country of power-hungry politicians who know nothing of security beyond their armed commandos vigil, it is necessary you visit the terror-hit spots.  Yeah, am guilty I did not yet visit CST, rather VT. I will go back to CST too, soon.

The power issue in Mumai's collective psyche is something that needs to be written about extensively. On Saturday, Dec 6, the day when Babri Masjid was demolished, by fundamentalist forces many years ago, I found it necessary to get out of my comfort zone called home. I found it all the more urgent to travel by the train to South Mumbai, blast or no blast, terror or no terror, and feel normal. It is true I could not be part of that crowd of millions that marched to Gateway just three days before. I was then in Dadar's Tata Memorial Hospital, running around between the various counters, for a wannabe engineer who was diagnosed with cancer hardly a few days into college and whose relatives from Andhra Pradesh found hard to understand what the doctors told them.

The fact that Mumbai's elite finally woke up after having lost its own was a welcome relief. The fact that they did not wake up till the city's five-star hotels got hit, after watching their landmarks go up in flames, waiting till the most upmarket suburb got hit, is shameful. Even if the elite has come out in the open, how long and how sustained will its effort be in voicing out against terrorism? And is there any balm at all for the deeply wounded soul? 

How about the amnesia of convenience when it comes to people losing their lives almost anonymously in the other parts of the country to terror, be it religious terrorism or insurgent terrorism, or even State-sponsored terrorism? People die in Kashmir. They die in Assam. They die in Gujarat, Orissa and even in Karnataka and Tamil Nadu. They die because of terrrorists. They die of torture by government reps in different avatars - police, army, politicians...India's mainland mindscape rarely makes space for them!

I went to Gateway in spite of these thoughts hounding me. My husband, my cousin, and I had to get off at the junction before Gateway as vehicles would not be allowed into the barricaded area. Till about two weeks back, people walked around freely at the Gateway, alongside the Taj hotel and took the ferries for Alibaug and Elephanta caves. Not long ago, I sat under the tree near the statue of Maratha warrior Shivaji, chatting up with my husband. So that was the last time?! 

The area has been a sitting duck for terrorists all along. And it will be for a long time to come. It's not like the Indian government machinery did not know it. The Intelligence lot did their job. It is that the government chose to criminally ignore it. Like it does always.

It was heart-breaking to watch the two symbols barricaded away from the public. Battered. A ravaged Taj and a mute Gateway. The Taj, I thought looked more beautiful than the Gateway when I first saw it hardly nine months back. Now standing erect just like before, but burnt within.

For the hundreds who were making a beeline to be there and see the terror-spot, it was no joy. They were there out of curiosity. Out of concern. Mostly out of feeling. A largely unspoken unease pervaded the air. Their wanting to offer condolence and not knowing how.

A lone youngster went around distributing pamphlets about a bunch of like-minded wanting to do something. About waking up. Doing something for the country...

By now, three days after the big protest, even candle-light symbolism of paying homage dwindled, with just one organisation from Kerala lighting candles, doing a prayer and taking pictures. Time: 6.40 pm. The cops who were perched or moving around at different points of the barricaded area started blowing whistles. So unlike the days just weeks ago when you could walk around there as late as 9 pm without fear, and watch the Gateway gleam in moonlight.

In a matter of minutes, the crowd was sent away...

It left me with the eerie thought -- will this be the future of this place? Of the collective psyche of Mumbai, India and the world? The city has seen spurts of violence induced by hate-makers who have ruled the roost for decades. It has seen blasts in trains, in subways, witnessed the goriest of riots. 

But this hit the hardest.

At the Oberoi Trident hotel spot in Nariman Point, there were no tourists. It was only in the first week of October when I went there with my parents-in-law and again with my baby-nephew. And wondered while we sat along the granite between sea and road, watching the Oberoi lit up beautifully in lemon-yellow -- what if some terrorist strikes these buildings? WTC-like? Huh...they're not as tall for planes to crash in! Surely, the crowds that throng this place would not do it if it was not secure enough! How I wish I could turn the clock backwards! Oberoi hotel has begun rebuilding. How one wishes those terrorists died in Arabian Sea before hitting the shore!

What about the lives of people who lost their families, everything? Can the place ever see more such tourists again?

``It was waiting to happen!'' said my husband, to my cousin, watching the open sea. A Victoria rider stopped his carriage outside the unlit hotel, hoping that some tourist would hop on for a ride after looking at the buildings.  No luck.

Cars would stop for a minute or two. People would come out, look at the hotel...speak in low voices...and move on.

 

We moved on too. With worry. With anger. With faint hope of positive change...very late. But change for sure. 

Goregaon to Chembur...sigh!

One look at the Goregaon staircase from the ticket counters to the platform and I wondered if this was going to be an `am I alive' situation after I finished the journey. People walk and walk in a mad pace a thorough-bred Bangalorean like me would find difficult to match.

After arriving late December and just a couple of days before the new year, I was clinging on to my husband for every step in the new city. As if the newness of being married and that strange feeling of having to share my space with another human being was not enough, this city made me feel lost in the crowd. It brought in that eerie sensation when you've left the journalist behind you and see yourself bracing for a temporary stint as a homemaker. For someone who believes being a journalist and doing stories is all that life is made up of, this was hard. 

To top it, my husband played the master to hilt in the mega-city. Don't walk in the centre, walk by the side. Don't swing your hands, you will hurt others. Don't move slowly, walk fast. Be fast. Eat quick. Move quick. Possessiveness does get to you at times. I was not used to being ordered around. I was stuck for words, feeling very very lonely in the madness of the new metropolis that I only visited...only heard more than lived in. I say new city in spite of visiting the same suburb much before.

Now I was penniless, having quit my job for the sake of relocation. I was in a daze after the killer of a wedding. I almost vanished into oblivion with my relatives showering praises on my great find for a husband, a great marriage organised by my father, a great show, my great luck that so many people attended my wedding, that it went without incident....

I seemed to wander in this crowd of thoughts trying to find myself, when my husband's adept schooling at surviving Mumbai came as a shocker to me. Had seen enough in Bangalore, but for a newly wed that I was, I thought it too much to take for a start. 

Goregaon station's staircase in a way symbolised Mumbai for me, in my first week. The forever moving people, the constant stirring sound of a juice shop machine, the carrots neatly arranged in a pile and masala chaas or buttermilk looking like ice-cream topped on tea-glasses, jaljira and limbu juice ( till now I thought lemon juice was known more as nimbu juice)...

The suburban railway lines showed to me, that for all the revenue railways earn through this city, there is hardly any upgrade of either the platforms, or the ticket counters, or even the bridges. It showed how railways were milking lines they built many decades ago.

That day, was a Sunday. And we boarded a slow train, he in the general coach and me in Ladies, to get off at Bandra and then board a bus for Chembur. I was furious with him, so was speaking very little in anger. His don'ts came by again, this time, to stand at the right spot for getting into the Ladies' coach. A train halted, and I did manage to get in, having been pushed, shoved and pushed myself in with difficulty. At Jogeshwari, another crowd of women got in to the already crowded nine-box coach. Gypsies, housewives, college-girls, children, wailing babies, most of them crammed up in the aisle. 

No room to move my body in any direction, forget my hands...that hung on to the handles above. I found it hard to hang on too...and cursed my Gods for not being tall.

It's not like I had never gone through such experiences. In Bangalore I have hung on to footboards, changed three or four buses on a single route, carried several kilos of books to college and still managed to get home and not fall asleep instantly. But that was over 10 years back, when I was in the prime of youth, raring to make it big in my profession, walking away and working away. 

The train crowd brought back those memories and I enjoyed the verbal duels too, but it scared the hell out of me in the magnanimity of the new city. When I finally jumped out at Bandra, rather was forced to jump, it took me a few seconds to recover from what just happened. The crowd never seemed to cease. 

As if it was not enough, my husband took me to the bus-stand close-by for the bus-trip to Anushakti Nagar. Another 45-minute bus journey with an added 15 mins of waiting. We got off the bus in the afternoon heat. But it was not over yet. We had to hop into an auto after walking some distance, for it would take us not less than 15 minutes to reach there by walk.

I thanked heavens when my husband waved for an auto-rickshaw as he was more of the walk-for-good health kind. When we did reach my friend's place at the BARC campus...I heaved a sigh of relief. But the thought of travelling all the way back to Goregaon already bothered me.

To think of, there are thousands of Mumbaikars who travel this way every day of the year. Hats off to them! They don't live their lives at homes. They live more on roads. In trains. In buses. Auto-rickshaws. Taxis. Sub-ways. Sky-walks...anywhere but home. 

Design

Is when a wave gently embraces the shore in afternoon sun, plays with its light and gives you a visual delight, even if for a few seconds. No celeb designer can match this lovely pattern play by nature!

Getting away with deceit: Big Boss 2's men

We human beings want to see rags-to-riches stories. Probably it was one of the many factors that worked in favour of Big Boss 2. 

I stopped watching the current season after Ketaki Dave's exit. The dirt-game was a bit too much to watch. Have been catching up with bits through rushes and news once in a while, and was not too pleased. The show, manipulations and back-biting looked so tailor-made to suit Rahul Mahajan's emergence as a winner. He has had his way too, just as most other men on the show. 

It was only after his exit and for the finale that we switched to Colors. The finale looked a pretense no doubt, despite the euphoria. That there is a lot of planning and scheming in a reality show, has been debated enough. But I want to concentrate on we the people, as viewers. It showed that there is a voyeur among us TV viewers, lurking and wanting to take pleasure in someone else's angry outbursts, love affair, fight and manipulation. It shows how we are gender biased in our values too. 

Sambhavna Seth was too loud with her flare-ups and foul language. She hated Raja and still danced with him sensuously. So she became the `bad' woman. In fact, early on in the show, Sanjay Nirupam raised questions about her character for being the `item girl' that she was. It is true I found her trying to ape Rakhi Sawant too. But I was willing to forgive her on that because everyone else was trying to be someone else from the first season. But loud women are not usually wanted around by men. They would rather have no women at all if they want to win. 

The men and some other women in the House made sure she got out. Payal was no less though she tried her best to act more dignified and stuck to her `only friend' Rahul. Eventually she was shown the door too. 

As for Monica, the once-upon-a-time gangster flame, she shot to people's hearts with her `I-am-not-so-bad tears early on. But whoever said she was demure! She was very much part of all the scheming by the power-heads in the group. She had to swallow her own words after Rahul, who had no qualms in professing love on the show, dismissed her as `just a friend'. 

Ketaki Dave, a genuine one among the lot, was shown the door way too early, by the inmates and by the public, for her` cooking being not so good'. Not one to play games or politics, the public preferred to get her out, swayed enough by a Payal Rohatgi who blamed her for `sporting a bad expression against her' during the Krishna leela task, and by the other inmates who said her cooking was not tasty! 

Am not sure if all or any of the inmates were willing to help or take over the kitchen when it was needed. But are we not taught to say Annadaata Sukhibhava as children? It is not right to scheme against someone who is making an effort to feed you. Instead a Raja who tried ordering her around stayed on till the end of the show.

Alina who did all the cleaning and cooking also got treated like a maid, and got accused of gossip, back-stabbing...the same gossip and back-stabbing that the men inmates indulged in. 

The group had a few good men. Debojit and Ehsaan who tried best to stay off scheming. They were ousted. No qualms.

Rahul Mahajan, on the other hand played his game to the hilt. If Raja was an instigator whose game got visible, Rahul Mahajan's was a cleverly less visible game. He was someone the inmates accused of being too much of a Krishna, perching himself in the girls' room, cosying up with Payal and Monica (all in the same show) and in spite of all this, emerged a winner who sacrificed his crown for the sake of other inmates. In the end, for all the flirting and courting, he got away with the `just a friends' cliche. This, for a politician's son who has a recorded history of drugs, was accused of wife-battering, is going through a divorce and is even nursing political ambitions. His father belonged to the party that preaches `Hindutva values'.

Raja was the loudest, most temperamental, with a history of domestic violence and even hit a journalist on camera. He got in to Big Boss house to clear his name. But the last three months have seen him at his manipulative best, angry and ordering people around. The only guy he seemed to have a real equation with, was Rahul Mahajan. He got away with calling Sambhavna names, and managed even evade an eviction. 

Not sure if it was for posterity's sake, but the two women who threw dirt at each other were made to patch up! 

Diana was like a whiff of fresh air in the House and brought in some dignity. But if she got attracted to Ashutosh, us the viewers thought something was `wrong' with her, no matter how much Monica and Rahul indulged in their new found intimacy on the show or when Rahul and Payal had their moments.

And the winner was a guy often accused within the House for using foul language. Yeah he needed the money. He was from the village and was also accused of lack of hygiene (this is a subjective thought) by the inmates. It is not as if he played a completely clean game. If his girlfriend was Sonal, he still got too close to Diana. But we the viewers want winners out of nobodies. 

We want to see those who need the money get the money. So that it gives us a semblance of hope for making it big some day, somewhere in the corners of our mind.  It does not matter to us of the man in question has a clean image or not. We do fall for his realness. And make fool ourselves into thinking `they are after all human. They wanted to win, for the sake of their family...' Wish such thinking went in favour of women too. Were the women in the show not wanting to make their families proud too?

Green charade

In the compound of the block adjoining my apartment's building, there are neat corner patches of earth between walls and all the claustrophic cement. This whole patch of buildings, cement, gardens and drains on the hill-slope was a lush green jungle, a few years back. 

Am dealing with the guilt pangs of living here. But the housing society's idea of greenery irked me more. The corner patch closer to my home window (I live on the 4th floor and look out of the windowed cage or caged window, whichever way it sounds better) had an enviable garden till recently.

Hibiscus, almond, banana, tulsi, ornamental plants and many other shrubs that grew irregularly, but made the place look dense. Watching the plants from my windows gave me some welcome respite from the mundane white and pale pink between the many home walls. 

Every late morning, a man in his 60s clad in a red dhoti would come with his kalash, worship some chosen plants, pour water over them, circle them or do pradakshina as one would call it, and soak in the morning air.

Often an elderly lady from another flat would come by, admire the banana plants bunch, and make sure they were watered before she moved on for a walk. Once in a while, children used it for their hide and seek games too.

A couple of months back, the society hit on a brain wave. Out with the trees, plants and shrubs, only those ornamentals bordering the corner garden were spared. And the almond tree that grew lean and mean by then. They uprooted the banana plants' bunch and would have left them to die, but for the emotional woman who cajoled them to shift the plants over to another green patch.

The rest were gone.

They levelled the soil, and grew grass on it. Made it a prim and proper looking lawn. But then, no one was allowed to venture into the green green grass. They were allowed to only look at it, not feel it. Sigh! What a farcical idea of greenery! Two weeks ago I was secretly amused at the sight of children on the lawn.

No. They were not shoved away by the eagle-eyed security guards. But were busy chatting up. Seated on a newly fixed swing, they spoke for hours, much to the delight of my husband and me, who went back in time to our schoolday chats with buddies.

In a day or two, the iron swings were given a fresh coat of green paint. Greenery, huh! As if it was not enough, they dug up the earth again and removed them the next day. So it is now two patches of watered brown earth between ornamental plants and dried up grass, that no one can take delight in.

Turning green. Wish people saw sense in the real meaning of going green, rather than make it a fashionable excuse for elitist facade.

Fortitude

Is when you stand against the ocean and its overbearing waves , however small you are. 

Pic location: Pondicherry/Puducherry

Google excites

Google has been the most dependable search engine for ages since I got hooked to the net. But Friday was one of the most exciting of those googling email days. Its new Themes makeover has in a way brought life into the mailbox. Novelty factor maybe.

A whole new look log-in page, colourful themes options in the mailbox. Themes to suit your moods. And colours more importantly. If the sombre greens are boring or the blues and greys do not please you, try the pebbles for that nostalgic trip by the riverside. Probably Orkut themes were only a trial-run for the gmail theme options. Would like it if they brought about themes that relate to professions too. The colour and theme settings are a lot ahead of yahoo too.

I like the desk theme and the pebbles theme most. Did try the classy black theme, but realised that it is hard-hitting on the eye with too much contrast. So it is back to the desk theme, or occasionally sky and sun combo. To my delight, even the weebly website making portal has diversified itself, just in time for that dream website of mine, should I say!

Wish I could work around using folders or at least compartments in the mailbox too, which would solve a lot of trouble. Am hoping Google's R & D team works on that front.

Am yearning for a day when I open a mailbox to find my blog, website, chat (it's around true, but limited in options) desktop options, to-do lists, all in one page. Stars in my eyes...alright...am getting back to the earth.

Mirage

Not a photograph. Not on location. It's a part of a painting by an artist. What a perspective! Wish I met the artist. Clicked this picture on Dec 31, 2006 at Bangalore's Kumara Krupa Road. It's the last Sunday in a year when the road comes alive with colour splashed over canvases and plays riot on the road's pavement. The road, is home to Bangalore's prided fine arts college often in controversy - Chitrakala Parishad (my dream college - not all dreams come true!) 

Flummoxed

Is the word to describe my reaction when I heard something about the TV serials going through re-runs, repeats and marathon repeats for the last three weeks. They will be back on air from November 24, thanks to a deal arrived at between producers, channels and worker associations. Am hoping I do not get hooked to them again.

Ever wondered why the TV serial makers use so much lightning and sound effect to describe even a monotone of an actor's expression in every episode? It is not just to drag the scenes on for the 25 minute slot. Production houses have noted the average homemaker's TV viewing behaviour. 

``She is not in front of the TV all the while. She is either in the kitchen and listening to the dialogues, or sitting before the box sporadically, between breaks. It takes a lightning or a sound flash to bring her back to the TV,'' said a TV serial crew member who spilled the beans in a casual dinner chat at my friend's place. He said one of the leading production houses had conducted such behaviour research and so introduced the ....perennial lightning flashes. 

Yes, We Can...make less trash

Obama's acceptance speech with these golden words ring in my head when I look around my home. On the surface, it looks cool. Spartan furniture with a nearly ethnic look, essentials that speak taste (they are compliments I receive from friends usually). Looking closer, I feel sick. A lot of trash I do not want to accumulate, but end up doing just that.

Old magazines, newspapers, a deluge of plastic covers from every mall shopping stint my husband and/or I go on, old bills, loose papers, medicines that no longer find use...the list goes on. Even my kitchen resonates at times with things I do not need. I could go on with my guilt trip. But of late I realised something.

Happened to watch an NDTV Lifestyle show featuring actor-director Rajat Kapoor's home. For a director-actor and anchor of his repute, I obviously expected a home done up by interior designers, with diffused lighting, cushy wall decors, drapery and everything that goes into such homes.

Amazed. That's probably the word I can use for getting glued to the channel instantly. Watching the father play with his kids, mess up the sooji while making ksheera in his match-box of a kitchen, and wash bicycles with the children... makes one nostalgic about their days. His home's unassuming middle-class look was what baffled me most, for a city where I find even the middle-classers aspiring for style. He did have a word or two to mention as the episode wound up, about not complicating his life with too many desires.

What a value to pass on to children! He talks this in times when parents, teachers, schools and our society teach children to want more, to desire and aspire to achieve just that. Rajat Kapoor's focus on `live and let live' is a breather no doubt. 

He was right about the fact that we tend to complicate our lives with too many desires and wants. That dress out their on the shop window, those earrings I saw at Lifestyle...that piece of furtniture I want to buy...or wall decor I want to do the home up with...we never seem to be happy with what we have.  We want to buy more and earn to buy. It would do so much good if we learnt to achieve in spirit rather than in material.

It's probably what is leading to so much trash in our homes. In wanting certain things for home, we do end up buying them. Once we are done with the buying, we end up not using everything we buy. At times, we are not merely spending money but indulging in retail therapy.

When the spending gets too much, it is no longer about retail and therapy but addiction...to buy, to hoard. To let go of some pent up emotion by letting go some cash. 

This lost cash could translate to some veggies we buy and do not use, to furniture, furnishings, and mostly clothes. At times I look at my kitchen and wonder if I am actually using some ladles that were handy initially, or some spoons that hang on to the stand. The result however is horrifying. I have a deluge of plastic covers that I do not want to throw. It's all simply the result of forgetting to pack a plastic bag or shopping bag into my purse. Else, it is about a supermarket's lousy rule that they will pack the purchase only in their own plastic bags.

If I alone have hoarded a hundred plastic bags, what about the other 96 households in the colony I live in, and the thousands of other households in the city! Also, we make on an average, at least half a kilo of household trash, do not segregate it into organic and inorganic as there are hardly any options available for doing so! Imagine the amount of trash that accumulates as a result!

I may not be another Sharyn who made her life miserable in trying underneath, to get away from pain. But it sure does hit me when I look at the aisle between my kitchen and bedrooms.

I discovered it is possible to do away with a lot of trash, by first not making it.

If on an average your home generates a kilogram or less trash in a day, you could cut it by at least one third by not buying veggies that you do not eat, not buying the flour from the provisions' store if you do not use it, by carrying not one but two bags when you venture out. The bag's size could depend on places in the city you may visit, and the distance from home.

As for clothes that you're dying to buy, try putting them off for `next month'! A lot of times such temptations are momentary. You do feel a lot better when you reach home and remember you did not waste. A bit of gandhigiri, but helps. It has worked with me.

Me heading to my pile of magazines...to sift, sort and toss them out (I mean sell them off to the raddiwallah)

What's special about this pic?

For a picture of not so great quality, this one is actually special. Why? Look close. The second gentleman (seated)" from your right. Does he look familiar? He is errr...a former President. 

He is who children love and loves them too. He has a vision for the country. I do not agree with some ideas he spells out for development, but admire him all the same. He is Abdul Kalam. The studio pic was shot when he worked at Aeronautical Development Establishment, Bangalore. Seated on extreme left is a close friend of his, Mr Dhanaseelan who was kind enough to let me get it scanned, a few days before he assumed office as President. It was published originally in The New Indian Express, Bangalore. 

Disgust

Is when I find crushed dry green leaves in the branded tea carton I have just torn open. So what? They are tea leaves, you would say. I put two spoonfuls of the tea into water. If it was tea leaves alone, their colour would have spread in water. The dry leaves in their million bits that were obviously mixed with the tea to give it weight, just floated on it. I can understand if unpacked tea was messed with. But branded tea! I do want to green my life...not this way.

Routine

Is when a buffalo crosses the railway track with the same ease like it has done before, or probably does so every day, unmindful of another train moving on its adjacent rake. 

My husband clicked this picture, amazed at its non-chalance while the train he was in moved ahead.

Beaches + babes = Bollywood musts

Beaches are for Bombay's myriad films as are weddings for its umpteen Hindi serials. I bet no Hindi serial runs today without a wedding episode, replete with the exquisite decor and finery. Just like serials, one hardly finds Hindi films these days,  without the right masala - beach babes, item numbers, colour et al. Dostana only reinforces stereotypes perpetrated so effectively by Hindi cinema.

Watched it on Saturday, with family and friends. Morning Show, that costs a lot lesser than the sky-high weekend evening and night shows. As for the film, a bad newspaper review prompted me not to go to the theater expecting too much. It turned out alright. A few observations despite feeling fairly entertained. Many questions too. Am certainly going to stay far from doing a mundane film review.

The film definitely takes the urbane crowd's acceptance of gay community, a level up. It's not a comedy though its makers claim it is, but raises a few laughs. It does what a film must do - entertain. Plus, I did not find anything objectionable against the gay community. Such a relief! I was at no point tempted to run out of the theater. 

In the first few scenes though, John Abraham casually flaunts his body while pulling his pants up a neat one minute after the scene starts filming. The Censor Board has been truly kind to the director. Another flaw was the irritably poor lip-sync in the first scene.

Several other aspects that I am bemused about in the film made me sit back and wonder about the Hindi films we Indians are getting to watch lately. When it comes to subjects that even slightly deviate from convention, our film-makers tend to safely set them overseas - in the oh-so more glamourous West.  It happened with Kabhi Alvida Na Kehna. Still, Karan Johar would like to call it as brave as Brokeback Mountain. That film surely did not need a body-toned Priyanka with her sexy bikini to sell itself! 

Throw in a beach scene or two so you could show the heroine as hot in bikinis. A guaranteed ticket sale quotient. Throw in generous splashes of blues and hues, pinks and oranges for designer interiors. Make sure the protagonists are NOT poor. Wealthy middle-class, is just about fine. When I watch the Dostana songs, am reminded instantly of the beach song in Salaam Namaste. And the Rio beach rendezvous in Dhoom 2. 

What I continuously feel enraged about is how anyone above 40 or in the 50s has to become either a respectable elder in the family (save Mr Bacchan Sr) or ends up as a caricature - read Boman Irani, Sushmita Mukherjee and Kirron Kher in Dostana. It was Kantaben in Kal Ho Na Ho. Dostana follows with her different avatars. But then, we have had so many Kantabens in our movies!

Having said this, I loved the fact that a parent of a possibly gay son is shown accepting the relationship, albeit in a comic way. I cannot fathom how a mother would get convinced in a matter of minutes and a heroine's soothing words, that she has to accept her son's gay reality. The mother has spent a few days with her son -- is there not a single occasion her son could use to spill the beans about their pretending gay for the house?

Colour can be used in its most creative forms in cinema. We have seen it in Dil Chahta Hai, where the same blue was used to show the different moods in so many frames. We have loved the yellows in Lagaan that brought in brilliance of cinematography. We loved the polka dots effect in Bunty aur Babli and even the amazing light play for frames in Yuva. But colours just to grab your attention! 

Our ace film-makers have mastered it so well that it has become a stamp of quality! 

Despite a shocker of a kissing scene between Abhishek Bacchan and John Abraham, the heroine goes to her hero in the end. The two are left to themselves - gay or not gay.

Dilemma

Is when I find a dust bin that I don't want to use. Holy Trash! This waste bin fixed by Brihanmumbai Municipal Corporation looks so sacred I prefer to hold back the plastic waste I am carrying.

Stupidity

Is when the proud owner of a home refuses a fellow neighbour's proposal to plant trees outside her home as it would `spoil the look of her home'. She goes ahead and gets an existing tree chopped. While the rest of the neighbourhood is excited and busy planting trees, she goes around fitting air-conditioners that hike her power bills. 

Hard to believe? It's a true incident and happened to an artist friend living in Bangalore's Hennur Bande area, and who is involved in community projects through his work and otherwise. 

Serials stuck in time, so what?

Before I sound judgemental about our regressive Hindi TV soaps, let me admit I have been hooked on to some of them myself, either years ago, in intermittent phases over time, or the recent ones on NDTV Imagine.

The housewife who was addicted to these soaps, seems the hardest hit in a household now. Or so it seemed. Interesting revelations of mothers-in-law who controlled TV remotes getting nothing worth it to watch have emerged from the producers-workers-channels strike in Hindi tellyland.

I heaved a sigh of relief, but with some disinterest obviously, when I heard Kyunki...the aging pioneer of saas-bahu serials would be off air. Towards last weekend however, I asked around what happened in its final episode. No one around me had watched the last episode! Time was when the glorious Buniyaad, the classic story, ended on TV, and my family and relatives scampered to catch up with its last episode.

Kyunki...began on a domestic note, but went on to play God, killing its protagonist, bringing him back to life, introducing the filmy vamp who is not just an outsider plotting against families, but insider plotting against her kith and kin, making sure that the sound of lightning is not limited to rainy seasons in a year, but episode after episode, with every commercial break.

In TV serial industry jargon, weekly serials are known to be `shot like films' on `outdoor locations' where people move, while in daily serials, it's the camera that moves.

I did watch Kyunki...that despite being regressive, was tolerable for a couple of years. Over two years after that, I would catch up with an episode once in a while in spite of the storyline going haywire. The makers ran out of ideas soon. So Baa became a monument, while Tulsi and her lot would go through a generation leap with greyer hair, only to return to less grey hair after a chunk episodes with characters getting pulled off air, put back in, vamps and villians vanishing to return, with those dying sure to return from the dead some day, replacements done in a jiffy with an accident and plastic surgery...Uh...am sure God shows some patience when s/he makes look-alikes and plots. 

Ekta Kapoor redefined the word regression with ample use of technology in the 21st century. She may be the czarina who brought a channel its TRPs. But to inspire women to return to kitchens and home politics rather than think progressive! One has to draw the line somewhere.

Serials like Baa, Bahu aur Baby and Sarabhai vs Sarabhai were only a welcome respite. This one, despite being a thrice a week soap, kept my family glued to TV over weekend dinners.

The arrival of Jasuben Jayantilal Joshi ki Joint Family among others in NDTV Imagine, only ushered in a change. Even they have started getting lethargic over the weeks. They are nothing compared to those gems of stories we had for serials - Nukkad, Buniyaad, Hum Log, Waghle ki duniya, Phir Wohi Talash, Mullah Nasruddin, Appu aur Pappu, Kile ka rahasya, Lifeline....wish those times came back! 

So when I heard Tulsi would vanish from the screen and that Parvati had left long ago, I sent out a prayer...to please bring in something good for that slot. Kyunki's end was pathetic, bordering on bizzare.

  

So what am I doing now?

I have more time on hand than ever before. More time to read. More time to catch up with news (on TV and online), and lifestyle channels I watched occasionally before. Am glad I can even go down into the courtyard of my building, to meet neighbours. Even neighbours seem to sleep early, eat early and cook early. 

As for men, I am sure they are back at getting more control over remotes, like they did during IPL's last season and do it every cricket match day. My heart goes out to women who have to give in to cricket these days. 

Serenity

Is in the eyes of a grandparent who holds his grandchild, happy, content, gleeful and looking more humble than ever before.

`The bride delayed the reception'

Every marriage we attend we hear this. So easy to blame it on brides!

At marriages I would attend before, I would be restless too, and get amused when I heard this. Obviously, it is not always the bride's fault! But people find it so easy to pass the buck instantly and say she took time to get ready.

I did not realise the enormity of the whole thing until people delayed the ceremony before my wedding reception, drew me up the wall and did just what they do otherwise. Blamed me for delaying the whole thing. I feel like hitting out at people who say that, even now. The other day, when an aunt mentioned this in passing...the same words practised by everyone else through hundreds of such wedding receptions, I threw a fit. Naturally.

In my case, our families decided to fix the engagement ceremony for....the evening slot before reception. And it caused me a ruckus. I bet any ceremony held before the wedding reception delays the whole thing, frustating guests who wait. That the bride is expected to look beautiful, should be given time to dress herself up, is conveniently forgotten by people around her.

Any make-up session, be it by a beautician, the bride herself, or her relatives, takes a neat one hour to do. But when families plan the affair...they at the most assured the bride that she will have about half an hour between the engagement ceremony and reception - to dress up. Brides usually nod their heads, feeling assure that people around them will surely give them the needed time.

What is left unsaid is that this `half an hour' slot which in itself is unearthly for a wedding make-up session, is presumed rather than alloted. It is subjected to pushes and pulls, confusions galore, and last-minute mishaps like garlands gone missing, the concerned people being busy with other wedding chores that crop up miraculously at the precise hour, and so on.

The engagement ceremony or another variation known in the South as gnanavaasam gets delayed and strangely no one bounces blames on others about it.

With the engagement schedule gone haywire, the bride is somehow expected to wear her saree in lightning speed (like our Gods and Goddesses vanish and appear in different avatars and costumes, in our films). A bit of lipstick and eye-liner should do the magic and she will be expected, to `please not make the guests wait'. Suddenly, the onus of the entire wedding schedule falls on her head and she is expected to play the magician who should not keep the guests hungry, who `should be a good girl' and come out of her chamber in a jiffy.

Hey, it's not like she is given the liberty to `look ordinary'. She still has to look dazzling and not an iota less.

Guests who have walked in early and worried as the ceremonies `other than reception' are still in progress, pray that the bride finishes her make-up quick and comes out. What they would not know, is that if there is no beautician out there to spoil her looks ( I say spoil because that's precisely what most beauticians end up doing to brides -- fix a pancake on the face rather than let the bride's personality shine through), there are 10 people out there to manage her.

My cousins were having their panic attacks and losing cool just then, after a circus of helping me change into two sarees for the engagement ceremony. A cousin's kid had fallen sick and her hopes of giving me a hassle-free make-up session had vanished into thin air. The result: people around me were deciding on my look then, much to my horror, leaving me speechless for those moments, and unmindful of the door closing and getting shut every minute with my mother asking us to hurry up...visitors who wanted to take a peek at the bride's chamber so they could snatch a two-minute conversation hopping in, hoping to help.

By then, me, an advocate of wedding schedules having to be sensitive to guests, me who wished to be the best host to my guests, saw my punctuality-at-wedding dream crash down to a million microscopic bits. I do not remember what expression my face had in that hour, but a friend told me months later, that I was in tears, feeling helpless, with all the delay and commotion. Having been warned by friends and relatives to just `shut my mouth up' for those two days instead of protesting, I was tongue-tied anyways.

I would plead once in a while that the guests were waiting...to no avail. My mother would come and drop in a statement...``just send her as she is'' to my cousins and friends. To my dismay, my fiance had worn his blazer and was seen chatting up guests, long before....how I wish I could do just that, hop into a great salwar kameez, go to the dais and say `Go to hell with the saree for now'! Sigh...as if people around me were so merciful as to wear what I felt comfortable in! I had to be a `good girl' who showed off her traditional clothes you know!

My tummy was churning and I had a faint doubt if I would throw up. As if the financial troubles, pressure, subtle ego-clashes that I had to manage before the big event were not enough...as if people would be there to wipe my tears when I would cry alone in another alien city...

They would continue to blame me through their lives though...for delaying the day's events. They would care absolutely not, if someone else and situations beyond my control did it.

The make-up session was over...thank God...I had died a hundred deaths already. The half-an-hour that was promised to me! By now it was a joke forgotten for long.

And it is not like I had respite for the shorter make-up session the following morning. I squirmed when the priest handed the wedding clothes after a delay again, and said, ``Get ready with these wedding clothes in 10 minutes and come''. I pictured this image of me wanting to deliver a punch on his face. But reality bites...I wouldn't do it!

His words blaring chauvinism would have spoilt my mood for the entire day. Even as my cousin was tense with the disarray my make-up paraphernalia was in, and tried doing whatever she could before the auspicious time or muhurtham passed by, my fiance, done with his bit of the wedding ceremony, was at my door with another cousin, and prodding me to get ready quick.

I had lost my cool by then and asked them both to shut up. My cousin obviously felt bad. It was his birthday that day! My fiance tried calming me down. It wouldn't work. The reception hungama had already made me look like the villain.

I came out of my chamber with that scorn on my face. I got photographed that way too. Then, like an angel sent from heaven for that moment exactly, someone said a few golden words to me. I cannot remember exactly what she said, but in effect it was, ``this is a very special moment for you. You will not get it ever again in your life. Stay calm and forget what just happened. Enjoy the whole thing!''

I was angry, but her words seemed to register in my head instantly. I knew her, but was meeting her for the first time, and at my wedding. She was the wife of Ramanianna, a neighbour at Chromepet where my granny, Ammumma lived. His dad is my mother's mentor. Not even my absolute disagreement with the symbol-madness and` tailor-made for the male species' aspect of the wedding ceremony seemed to bother me then. Let me just go through this...I thought.

And smiled through the rituals. After all, was that not what was essential to two souls getting together, far from the parade of prosperity that led to doom in the name of a wedding!

It still hurts. It hurts like a knife driven into my heart today, when I hear those insensitive words from people who've attended others' weddings. It kills me further when my own people continue to say it through their wedded lives...that I caused the wedding reception delay.

Lonely

Therapy

Is when my husband finds me depressed in general, takes me over to a mall and leaves me at its bookstore. I get lost in the world of titles, authors, books and everything in between ...my heart leaps out to so many `wish I bought that' kind of books, while he perches himself in the lobby, ogling at shoppers. In no time, he finds me `back to normal'. The catch: It's not like I can buy books out there!

Chinese onslaught on our market shelves!

On my last trip to Bangalore, I squeezed in some time to shop for household items that I would not be able to get in Mumbai. And like many householders who get irritably helpless, I too was, about Chinese goods. Earlier it was silk that China flooded Indian bazaars with. Now it's about hair clips, toys, cosmetics, show-pieces... anything that I would want for a home. I am personally not against China or its people despite their over-bearing foreign policy, or their gnawing at our Indian borders.

Believe me, I have a genuine problem when I hop into a store wanting to buy Indian gifts and find to my horror, that 75 per cent of the gift store's shelves are flooded with Chinese makes. Even statues of Indian gods and goddesses seem to have a Chinese stamp on them. At first I was irritated. I have, in the past, asked the shop staff to please find me Indian makes. They would go on to explain that the raw material was Indian or Chinese...and the procedure of making was Indian...etc. Lame excuses. On one occassion, I found a cuddle-toy with a little tag that read, `Made with pride in India'. I bought it instantly.

My first pick at M K Retail, CMH Road, is usually a pack of branded garbage bags that fit just right in my trash can. Thank God that brand remains Indian still. Noodles (agreed China is the place to be for noodles) have got inundated by brands sounding Chinese. Wall hooks made of plastic, that one needs to only gently nail into walls instead of having to drill holes with that annoying noise of a drilling machine and drill-bits, are my next favourite at MK's. Back at my parents' place, I have fixed this hooks with ease at all possible places they're needed in.

In the last two years however, these hooks have either been in short supply or completely vanished. I still wonder what happened to the brand. MK's did store them a few months back. This time my anger knew no bounds to find a Chinese brand with obviously inferior quality hooks, replace this brand completely. If 10 packs of the earlier brand were available before, about 30 packs of this brand have flooded the shelves now.

These days, I hesitate when I pick up products at the supermarkets...what if it is ....sigh!

I understand our businesses are looking for profits, but why don't they understand that encouraging such large-scale onslaught of Chinese goods will kill our businesses? Greed was what about the hard times of recession we live in today. Greed is what sets off such dumping by the Chinese. And it is greed again, that our businesses need to curb.

Time we learnt the lesson right!

A mauled Bangalore lost in dust, should we say?

I just found a press note where a bunch of Bangaloreans, greens and the like-minded, came together to walk and `reclaim' Bangalore. Reclaim - the word is too magical now. Obviously their target was the Metro project that has killed any bit of green left in the city. Mauled at. Its very symbols of glory butchered by bull-dozers.

The discovery: that Metro projects have been abandoned elsewhere in the world. Am not sure how true it is. But I have been to Bangalore after hardly four months and got shocked to see the face of the city change so much! An entire stretch of CMH Road lost in the metro madness...in reality...lost to dust and concrete. When it gets completed after some years (looks like forever now), I bet not a soul in the elephantine government machinery will bother to replant trees on the spot or even make some effort to restore greenery.

So what if the MG Road boulevard, a tourist attraction and the remnant of a bygone Bangalore's South Parade, is lost? So what if it succeeded in hitting the last nail on the coffin of CMH Road's serenity or Race Course Road's lovely green stretches?

The Ulsoor Jhatka stand that till recently housed traditional shops selling pooja items, symbolised an erstwhile rural and religious Bangalore's confluence with modernity. To me, the obscure structure facing Someshwara Temple's chariots, was a showcase of the very essence of Bangalore. But in the insensitive eyes of a city population now infested with Software bees, it looked every bit a traffic hazard. Metro was the best excuse to sting it to dust. No talk of rebuilding it, no idea where it is gone! Bangalore's heritage? Did someone whisper that? Sorry, I heard not even whispers.

Metro's various patrons who threw public opinion to winds when they conceived the project in the name of technology, will care little for these things in later years. They will do best to garner political mileage. As for the technology fixers, the firms that will become `We built it' icons, they will make many more millions selling its pictures. At best, the babus and white-collared honchos will plant stories of self-praise in the media -- a media eager to fall for anything metro and anything `infrastructure'.

Can any of them dare to bring back same number of leaves on the trees, the same number of branches, and manufacture the same amount of oxygen as from those many trees at those very spots? They dare not yes. They dared to axe them though.

Evening

Smelling your hair smelling of sea

I remember waking up to the sound of the clammy ocean,

Waking up to your smelly hair,

(Smelt salty to me),

Smelt like you didn't care,

If you carried a bit of the ocean, or not inside your head.

I remember,

Telling you you looked lovely

(although your hair still smelt crabby)

I remember waking up beside you

Cold, shivering from the cold of the invading

sea that had stealthily breached the warmth of

the room during the night

I remember you had slyly taken away the quilt,

leaving me to face the sea

I remember the angry roar I had conjured up out of

my fear as the waves carefully lapped up the

blackness with their intensity,

You were then beside me, blissfully unaware of

the deep dark ocean beating against my heart--

wakeful me, dreaming images of dread, of not

letting the sea break us up like it does a lonely

catamaran out to fish

That night, you slept, while I waited

Counting your heartbeats for the faintest signs of love.

- Ravana

Wedding gifts...vs gifts you want

Browsing through wedding pictures of relatives, friends and friends of friends brings back memories of what happened before and at my wedding. 

Gifts, an integral part of the whole wedding tamasha can give one nightmares too. Gifts mostly in the form of clothes to relatives of groom and bride, friends, gifts for the groom and bride...the list goes on.

A couple of months before printing my wedding invites, I tried talking my dad into fixing a footnote on the card -- that gifts were not welcome, or that selective gifts, like donation to a charity of our choice, would be encouraged. 

A little before the wedding cards were printed, he refused the idea. He insisted some of his friends would not make it to the wedding if we added the `no gifts' footnote. Having seen weddings where irrelevant gifts get dumped on couples, and also a wedding where the groom and bride held a blood donation camp, it was only natural that I wanted something meaningful. Even the blood donation camp idea got dunked.

The best wedding gifts should ideally suit the bride's and groom's personality. My fiance' made no specific demands, keeping pace with the mood among elders. I kept praying for those ideal gifts - books or book vouchers from stores! After all, buying books would not be as easy as it used to be, before the wedding! Gift coupons for home furnishing stores give couples a choice plus prevent their pushing off those big expenses to later dates. Even money that I did not favour then, is of help to the couple and their family, for all the expenses incurred.

Needless to say, I have landed the gifts most other couples do. Dinner sets (about three or four of them) that I could not carry to Mumbai, Ganesha showpieces that I am not able to hang on the walls of my home because it's a rented one, little showpieces too fragile to carry on travel...the list goes on.

Gifts from the lot I cherish are few and thoughtful. An ethnic key-holder that has an interesting imprint etched on it - of Lord Ganesha and Lord Balaji. Books (yeah I did get them) gifted by the Tehelka team in Bangalore which seemed to know my tastes better! Boxes of turmeric, kumkum, yellow thread and other such traditional cosmetics gifted by elderly women.

For those who have managed to fix footnotes such as the one I wanted to, and succeeded, kudos! May your tribe increase...

   

Amusement

Is when I tie a Santa-Claus rakhi on the tiny wrist of my friend's son, and his dad advises the 11 month old...`Promise me you will not make more sisters.' The toddler's name means the one who attained enlightenment under a bodhi tree several hundreds of years ago! Time will tell if he follows his dad's advice or enlightens him in future!

Tranquility

Is when symbols merge with the earth to find meaning...when they know no time...when mother earth embraces them anyways 

Needless Gloss

We Indians have got obsessed with gloss and marble so much over the years, that we've started to fix them where they should not be too. Pray for those unfortunate wayfarers who would slip over this neat floor with his/her baggage in tow. All for the blind love for mirrors on the floor! Scene at the Hubli station.  The railways would do better to make these public places disabled friendly.

A train journey homeward

It's been a while before I posted anything. Travel and fatigue. Courtesy: Indian Railways. One of the most fruitful trips back home though. There is nothing like catching up with family and friends. More so, the excitement in its run up to it. Recession has put us middle-classers on guard so much that we opted for a second class sleeper ticket for a 24 hour journey by train. 

The journey from Dadar to Yeshwantpur was just as tiring, though it lived up to its `part as friends when you get off a train' bit. Co-passengers were carefully multi-lingual for a start.  I call it the Raj effect. They would speak in as many as three languages...trying to gauge which language we husband and wife spoke. In a while, we realised that none among us were Maharashtrians or had any bigots in our midst ...most of them just heading home. Southwards. To Bangalore. For a refreshing Diwali. The excitement had to be seen to be felt.

We wanted to fix our food packets and water bottles. The fittings - unassuming but crucial accessories for luggage and water, were missing. The bogie looked like its berths and partitions had not got cleaned for ages. Worse - this train did not have a dustbin in its bogies. Green wannabes like us obviously scampered for plastic covers that served as dust-bins.

Some trains have Laloo's blessings. Other's get cursed by his and the burgeoning railway machine's neglect. For the whole part of the night that we boarded Chalukya Express, there was no sign of the ticket checker. Probably they safely avoided the headache of having to provide berths for waiting list candidates! Night over, the wait-listers and sneakers from unreserved compartments made their exit or moved about elsewhere. Safe for the ticket examiner's entry! 

It's interesting to note how the ticket checking pattern is so unique to trains from Mumbai towards South, and backwards. And leaves passengers with confirmed tickets, at wits end on how to make their berths and baggage safe for the night. For, those who sneak in are experts. They make themselves comfortable on a pal's berth, on the floor, near the toilets, just about anywhere. They know they will not be thrown off the coach!

The real cause for all their trouble is that unreserved bogies are too few for too many. And a nightmare if you travel with children on an unplanned trip. But do the railways care? Their coffers are full anyways in the season's rush!

One doesn't need to travel in A/C cars at night this season. Just make sure you get the lower berth and get close to the window. Make sure you shut the glass door (which will slide up on its own anyways)...and cool wind will send you shivers. You cannot survive the night unless you're covered up!

The second part of the journey was nostalgic...for me at least. At Belgaum, where the train stopped, I got off the train to catch some fresh air and bought the Belgaum kunda (da pronounced as in `the'). Reminded me of those days years ago, when I first arrived on an investigation and spent sleepless nights! 

The Ghataprabha, Tungabhadra and other small rivulets wading their way through rocks and so sombre in contrast with their monsoon fury...the sunflower fields, jowar and bajra crops...hues of green, black-brown soil, golden yellow of ready-for harvest crops...even passing by them on train was like coming back home! 

Afternoon brought in warmth, but as the train progressed towards south, it only got cooler and cooler. By early evening passengers in our cubicle began to slowly chat up. When the train reached Tumkur, a eunuch came by for her moolah. The men were shocked as she perched herself on a guy's lap. He looked every bit an Airforce entrant and was too stunned by her behaviour. It prompted me to ask her...`Are you from Bangalore? I know Bangalore's hijras don't come in trains!' She said she was from Mumbai. 

A couple of names I dropped from the hijra scene to check her authenticity, put her at ease and we got chatting while the men around us (my husband included) looked at us, scandalised. She said she would be back in a few minutes. And my co-passengers were trying to get over what just happened. A eunuch perching herself and pushing herself on them was a shocker...that a woman among them should get chatty with her was an even bigger shock to handle. She returned while I was still explaining about transgender rights to them. That's around when my husband revealed my journalist background to them.

The casual chat put me in touch with news on transgender front again. She said ration cards were no longer a problem for her lot. And that she was shifting base from Mumbai to Tumkur and had found a husband. ``I will get married in the court soon...'' I wondered and still wonder how the court would permit it...in the absence of laws to protect transgender people. 

Gossip flowed too...but it was time for the train to move and her to get off...not sure if she made money that evening...for the business time she spent with me. 

Her name was what floored everyone around. Madhuri Dikshit. She insisted it was her real name. And even gave me her number. She vanished just as quickly as she appeared.

It took a while for the bunch to veer its conversation on to other topics. They tied up with each other for auto-rickshaw rides to other parts of Bangalore, gave directions to first time visitors and even exchanged numbers as the journey drew to a close! 

Yeshwantpur station was such a welcome sight on that rainy night! Slope replacing stairs so we could move baggage into the other platforms easier! Tubelights everywhere and a neat floor...such a far cry from the days I wrote about while in Indian Express! About five years back, politicians were in a great hurry to flag off trains from here, without caring much about developing the terminus.

I doubt if the waiting room is any good...for the huge crowd that settled itself in the lobby. There was something that made all my fatigue vanish after this. The ride back home...and the sight of my four month old nephew. Wow! What a finish!

Yippeee! I did not burst crackers!

It's true! For the first time, I refused to light even a sparkler on the day of Deepavali. After a tiring 24-hour journey to Yeshwantpur in an over-crowded train that had those with RAC (Reservation Against Cancellation) status, Waiting List status and some even sneaked in unable to get a foothold in Unreserved bogies, it was so refreshing to see my baby nephew and play with him!

My first Diwali after marriage was special too. Two of my cousins visited Bangalore that day. Feast time for hubby and me at my parents' place! And loads of fun despite a cold Bangalore with winter playing its role to tee. On the next day, the day of worship, I lit lamps, prayed to Goddess Lakshmi, met my near and dear ones, went baby-visiting in Bangalore, and did everything that kept me on the move! But did not burst crackers!

When after the Deepavali pooja, my mother tried cajoling me into it, I managed an excuse and said if I did so, I would have to hang my head in shame. It worked! 

My mother seemed to understand. And I hopped off to meet more relatives!

But....but....cracker smoke did get to me even if I was not the culprit...smog and smoke managed to choke my lungs badly. Result: Am back at Mumbai with a bad cold. 

Diwali...deepavali....concern

When serial bulbs hang down the window of an apartment out there, when plastic buckets and floor-mops hanging in the facade of a shop suddenly give way to ever-so-inviting colourful lamp-shades, when the sky outside my window comes alive with a lone cracker once in a while, I know it's time for diwali. Diwali season out here in Mumbai seems more colourful than Bangalore, at least when it comes to products on display.

What irks me though, is that none of the newspapers run campaigns on eco-friendly diwali, although social consciousness about crackers causing pollution has risen a great deal over the decades. It's not done at least on a scale like during the Ganesha festival.

Cracker making firms have on the contrary worked around to selling the `eco-friendly' tag by claiming to adhere to pollution norms. Safety is spoken about when it comes to children, yeah. In spite of it we have children and sometimes adults who fall prey to the erratic show of light and noise in the name of prosperity.

The legends about the festival are so sound and so full of meaning. The purpose is all the more meaningful - victory of good over evil, celebration of such victory with holding light, spreading light and joy, to conquer darkness. Invoking prosperity - symbolised by Goddess Lakshmi. Lighting lamps alone moved from the original tradition I was shocked the other day when a friend said some neighbours of hers were getting together to celebrate diwali with a few pegs of beer, not just by playing cards! Losing money to a game of cards is no prosperity! Beer....is that not a guaranteed way of throwing money...thereby disrespecting it!

Am lost for words when my husband's argument for crackers goes thus: bursting crackers is one of the biggest joys a child could have. Depriving him/her of this joy would be hurting.

 Maybe the whole stereotype of ``the more crackers you burst, the more prosperous you are'' that's been imposed on the society, has led to such thought, and in turn to more cracker sales.

It's time we explained the real meaning of diwali to our children. I would say throw crackers to wind. Light a few lamps that emit more light. Get creative...make a rangoli. Think of decorating your home by recycling home junk...it would make diwali more meaningful. 

As for me, being back in Bangalore for the festival is in itself joy. I don't need crackers to express it! When I say this, am praying no one thrusts a sparkler into my hand!

I love this in Mumbai

A few slices of cucumber, some carrot, beetroot, radish, tomato, some lemon, spices...and lo, a colourful salad's ready by the roadside. All for Rs 10! Wow! Such a relief from five-star salad bars and their loads of mayonnaise! Spotted this entrepreneur on Bandra's Linking Road and loved the salad! Value for money: 100%

Aarey Sunset

I had posted about my not-so-pleasurable boat ride at Aarey Colony's Chota Kashmir. Here is a picture of one of those stolen moments. Just hope such visuals remain in Mumbai's landscape longer! The super-speed with which its realtors are killing it, only shows these are views that may end up in the museum soon.

A journey and a worry

Am heading to Bangalore starting tomorrow. Fear in my head and longing in my heart. There's nothing like home. But when going home means a 24 hour train journey, a two hour journey by local train, and the quarter of an hour by anautorickshaw or taxi to the local station, it does bring about uneasiness. 
God knows if things will be fine en route. Or if the goons will get at us somewhere, somehow.

Fear of a certain Raj Thackeray who has managed to make us Indians feel unsafe. Raj Thackeray and his rioters hold the city to ransom at their whim. They talk of a pro-Marathi agenda. But it is really not that. It's just about how they get a few goons to go about destroying vehicles...buses of their own state, shops of their own state, kill people of their own state, to make their pro-Marathi point.
That Raj Thackeray wants to become another Modi is in itself one should fear. The danger with Modi is not just about him using his hate-and-murder politics in his state. It's also about inspiring thousands of other Modis. Ditto with the Raj, who does not mind sending his offspring to an English medium school, but preaches a pro-Marathi policy to the rest of the world. He must be smiling inwardly. After all, his hate-campaign has paid off!
By his logic, all people of particular states should belong where they are, and not dare to venture out. To add to the hurt, Shiv Sena gives the example of DMK for its pro-Tamil stand.
Move back to Bangalore where I have grown up, and it seems like familiar turf. Pro-Kannadaactivists (I cringe at calling them that) arm themselves with red and yellow flags, hit out at any one who is an `outsider' given a chance. Violence in the name of love.
Violence in the name of language.
The root purpose of languages evolving in humankind, was to communicate. To unite. To help love each other better. That language should be turned around and manipulated to manufacture hate shows there is something seriously wrong with the society.
At a personal level, I find it very nice when someone lauds me for being able to speak in six languages. As an Indian I feel that's far less. My target is 14, although it remains a dream for now.
I've been eager to learn Marathi all these months. Where I find glossy pamphlets to advertise filmy dance classes and art classes that mint money, I haven't found a single board with anyone offering to teach Marathi, in this part ofMumbai. 
With the hate and hurt campaign terrorising people out here, am only wondering if I may run into anti-outsiders, in the bargain. 
The bottomline is that they want to elicit votes out of gullible commoners by making them feel unsafe rather than safe. A friend told me the other day, that real Maharashtrians are gems at heart, that what we are witnessing now, is just the handiwork of selfish elements. I have met a couple of them too - my maid who leads a life of dignity. A cop's wife who welcomed me and my husband into her home for the dandiya raas in their colony, with love that seemed a whiff of fresh air. A neighbour downstairs who is reserved, but reciprocates affection just as much.
It's about time the real locals came into limelight and spoke about their own great qualities. 
We're living in times of Raj. Is it by any chance, echoing the times of the other Raj India was crushed of centuries under? The British Raj? 
I have reason to believe so. For now, I am hoping my train journey to Bangalore goes without incident.