Sealdah station. It’s a Saturday…and hence a holiday for many. The time is midday. I was travelling upstream…which meant the rush should be in the opposite direction (I just read it again and got how it sounds. I’m not that abominable that me travelling in one direction compels people to choose the other direction. I meant that during that particular hour on a Saturday most people travel downstream to return home from work.)
So the platform should be relatively deserted. And yet…what did I find? People (spreading objectionable odours) in multitudes jostling every where…crowding into your breathing space. It was getting scary…I’m no Geet from Jab We Met and crowds make me feel very claustrophobic and stir my instincts to run. (...that I feel like running away from every single thing that doesn’t conform to the dogmatic whims designed by me is an entirely different issue.) On hindsight I should have wanted to fly…since there wasn’t any space to allow me a sprint…(see how I can’t think properly even in purported emergencies…pitiful and disgusting.)
But it made me sit up and wonder…Indians need to look into this serious problem of over flowing population…admitted that India is the 7th largest country but does it really mean that we need to occupy every square femtometre of space available?
PS: When the father of the nation promotes “Do or die” could we really blame the Indians for choosing the much easier first option???
The sky above the port was the colour of television, tuned to a dead channel. Mrittika looked intently…she could discern the figure of a lone girl dressed in wet rags.
A month ago Mrittika was browsing the television aimlessly. She had tumbled upon channel 666 which she had not known to exist.The channel was showing a stormy night at an abandoned port. A lonely, rusty boat was anchored that swayed to the tunes of the gale. And standing among some tinged pebbles the silhouette of a young girl could be seen. Every day Mrittika tuned to that channel hoping to steal a glance at the girl’s face. Each day the picture grew fainter, one day the boat took the colour of a dead channel, the next day the moor and so it went on for thirteen days. And on the fourteenth day which happened to be a full moon day the vision disappeared completely and channel looked completely dead.
As the moon began to wane the port started reappearing. In a startling moment of revelation Mrittika realised where the port was. Once, shipwrecked, Mrittika’s parents had taken refuge in a desolate island for a night. On that fateful night Mrittika was born. And she would turn 18 in a few days. The island was calling out to her. She had to visit.
Lined by palm trees quivering in the mild breeze, floating amidst rippling waters the island looked like a wisp of dream under the enchanting stars. Mrittika felt a strange feeling of serenity flooding her senses as she stepped on the island. The scene looked exactly same. Her boat anchored at a corner, shiny pebbles strewn around, a chilling wind wafting through her hair…
Mrittika saw a girl lying supine…she was unconscious. Mrittika tried to rouse her. The girl opened her eyes. Mrittika braced. The countenance of the girl was in no way threatening yet the suddenness alarmed Mrittika. The girl spoke in a low whisper as if she was afraid of someone. “You finally came,” she smiled. “It’s the right time. In a few minutes there would be an annular eclipse and you must stare into my eyes without breaking contact.” Mrittika wanted to ask why…but the moon was about to hide from the sun and the urgency in the girl’s tone possessed her. Mrittika looked into her eyes. Her body started feeling numb…she was drifting into nothingnesss…
Mrittika opened her eyes…she was lying on the island dressed in wet rags. The girl was standing in front of her. When she turned Mrittika got the shock of her life. It was Mrittika’s body. The girl was in her body. She smiled. “You are the new owner of this island. Bye…” Saying this, the girl stepped out of the television into Mrittika’s bed room. Mrittika could see her through the television screen, smiling smugly. Mrittika was suddenly seized by a spasm of helplessness as she saw the dead channel haze engulfing her from all sides.“Let me out...”, Mrittika shrieked. “Shhhh!”, the girl hissed. “Everyone’s asleep. You don’t want to wake them up. Wait for the next baby to be born on the island. You must pass on the island to the next rightful heir.” Mrittika had a thousand other questions to ask…but she was on the wrong side of the television and the girl had switched the television off.
PS: Why the deviation in the nature of the article posted? Well...actually this had won me a prize from The Times of India and some friends who had missed out on reading the published version wanted to take a look.
The little one and grand old one: The very popular "aari" and "bhaab" respectively. [If you are not a bengali...read along...I am about to explain the concept...and do let me know if such a concept is prevalent in your state as well.] Whenever we had a slight tiff we touched our errant friend's pinky with our own and announced "Aari". The solemn declaration meant we would not talk to each other and would not be seen in each other's company in the playground. Within minutes we did make up if we felt the need to gang up on a third friend...translates to touching of thumbs and announcing "Bhaab". This happened more than 10 times with more than 20 people in the course of a day. And I went to the largest school in Asia...so imagine how difficult it was for me to maintain the balance sheet every day. [Man...childhood was tough.]
The ring finger: When we stepped into adolescence suddenly the ring finger made its foray into prominence. This is the age when every one falls for some one. I fell for Shahid Afridi and when he broke my heart I redirected my affection and devotion to Ian Thorpe. Then there were others like all (yes, all) the members of Italian soccer team, Alexei Nemov...no, you are not going to get a politically incorrect name in my crush list! Anyway, people kind of believed some stupid stories about the ring finger at this age...however not all people are enamoured by this finger. It's mainly the girls...the ever irritating giggly type of girls who are absolute airheads and laugh all the time in and out of context thinking it to be an alluring trait do this. (I can proudly declare that none of my female friends fall into that category...and neither do the male ones. )
The index finger: We were all taught that pointing finger at someone else is rude and forbidden. And we know that the best way to get any thing done by a child is by asking the child to refrain from doing it. But this finger lost its significance when I was in fifth grade and the following phrase became popular: "When you point one finger at another person the rest four point back to you" Thereafter I always chose to point at someone using all the five fingers thus absolving myself of any ambiguity whatsoever! There was another purpose of the index finger. Teachers often announced an authoritative "Finger on your lips." (Why did they have to mention "your"? Had our intentions been doubted at such a tender age? Sick...) We were supposed to place the vigilant index finger on our lips and maintain absolute silence. We obeyed the teachers and became masters of ventriloquism.
The central finger (Am I the first one to refer to it like that?): What a crushing defeat this finger inflicts on the other finger as we grow up!!! Suddenly, every thing starts to change around us and we curse ourselves for wishing so earnestly to grow up (As if we had grown up in response to those prayers. Proof: I was one wuss who had always wanted to remain under the aegis of my parents...but then...did the sky lords listen? ) And when every single thing in our life goes askew at the end of a long, hard, hopeless day...when we find ourselves at a loss of words to describe the high level of indignation and irritation this dear finger acts as the messiah and puts all our frayed nerves and feelings into proper expression.
PS: People under 18...what are you doing in my blog? Go back to dreaming about pale Pattinson or Emma Watson (Why do their names rhyme? ) placing a ring on your ring finger.
The time period taken by a subject to fall in love with another subject is exactly equal to the time taken by the former subject to get over them.
Explanation:
1. T=1 second: You see a person and fall in love. Soon you see that person with their lover. You perform a mental comparison of yourself and the lover, emerge the clear winner and turn away with a complacent sneer. (What? You lost? May be you had been aiming too high.)
2. T=1 week: You can’t just think of anything else but them. You decide to gift a chocolate then change your decision to a flower and then back to chocolate (since flowers don’t come with the safety valve of ”I think of you as a friend”). You are just about to present the chocolate when she/he starts to babble about her/his boyfriend/girlfriend. You eat the chocolate yourself, bless yourself for the judicious decision taken earlier, eat some more chocolates during the course of the week and move on.
3. T=4months: You were so in love with this person and now you have to move to another place. You know things can’t work out. You turn to songs for comfort and they croon about your lovelorn self. You take to reading books and find that the stories are woven around your love life. You run to the movies for solace and again find the movies have also been made about you. You curse the world and rush to your friends and become the talking point for one day. Then find that almost every one else has had one or more such experiences. You realize that there is indeed more to life.
4. T=4 years: Hmm...trust me and give it 4 years...you will get over them. If you don’t you can kill me. (You have to find me first...and I hide well!)
Aberration from the law: Let’s call this aberration the case of swinging interest.
Say there is someone whom you have liked for 5 weeks and then the person makes an appearance in green and scarlet. You immediately get over this person and find a new interest. The trick is that your liking for that fashion disaster returns when you find that the adoring qualities are still existing in that person. Again you like this person for a year and one fine day the person chooses to criticize you about something that you are insecure about. You take the insult bravely, save the tears for the night and again find a new interest the morning after. Basically, this person acts as a buffer. Nature abhors vacuum and so does your heart. So whenever there’s a lull you can fantasize about the buffer. So this continues...until one day you find that the person has turned you off and you are not willing to find a new interest. In fact you are finding the annoying qualities adoring too. The buffer needs to be buffered!!! Or...may be it’s time to take your swinging interest seriously.
Thin ice...buddies...thin ice...tread carefully.
PS: Some real life examples would have made my article more delectable but that would have caused a little inconvenience to some people and a lot of inconvenience to my very existence...so...
“Dur ki cheez hi kyun laagi hai haseen
Paas ki cheez ka kyuh nehi hai yakeen...”
The apparently shallow lines evoke an absolute truth. Now you'd say nothing is absolute, everything is relative and I’d ask you about the statement you have just made and this would go on for a while…so coming back to what I wanted to say: Things appear far more appealing from a distance than when you approach them.
Instance 1: Nature. The verdant forests, the lush wily pastures, the pristine saintly mountains, the meandering coquettish rivers, the silent celibate deserts, all look to be beckoning us, enticing us to give up mundane daily chores and to join them in their salubrity. But before you give up your life…let’s take a closer look…everywhere you would go you would have to live among muck. Yeah…I know birds and animals look so happy and free. But would you be ok to live in unsanitary (yuck yuck…) environment without the amenities that you are used to?
Instance 2: (Apparently) timeless songs. You are sitting in the window seat of the bus…a gentle breeze is wafting through your hair...the background music is a beautiful song (the lyrics of which may well have been written keeping you in mind)…you are completely lost in your fantasies… And then the bus starts to move…you strain your ears to catch the fading tunes…but the song fades away in the chatter. What happens next? You go home, download the song, listen to it a thousand and one times, get your eardrums fatigued and replace the song with a new one.
Why do we inevitably do this? Why are we hellbent on killing the aura? Is it not better to observe from a distance and pine away for the surreal charm rather than possessing it only to plunge into the smothering monotony?
PS: Alternative title for the article could have been “Commitment phobia”.
Screeeeeeeeeeeeech...and the car stopped one femtometre away from me. This has happened to me with an unhealthily high number of times. The glance and the words of the halting driver range from unadulterated apology to unabashed fury. But that’s the way I have been...clumsy in crossing roads by myself.
Luckily for me I have escaped all those what-could-have-been-a-fatal-accident scenarios unscathed. I had once jumped out of a running train (it was yet to gather full speed) after realising that I had boarded the wrong train. A severely bruised elbow (a bruise that my sister had labelled as a “movie bruise”...apparently she had seen such a bruise only onscreen and believing such bruise marks to be unrealistic had ridiculed the ineptitude of the make-up team) and a scratched knee was all that I got out of the accident. And yes...some questioning looks about whether I was trying to commit suicide. (Always a bad idea...even if your life gives you the extremes of pain there being no guarantee about a rosy afterlife suicide is a stupid, high risk and of course irreversible project) Anyway as I was saying...every time I escape an accident I look at my life line smugly, secretly smiling at death...why I feel this way is beyond explanation since neither my life line is my artwork nor is there any glory associated with being careless while crossing roads...but I do it.
Crossing roads at night becomes more like a challenge for me. Way back in childhood I had read in a book that while hunting the prospective prey is flooded with a strong light that dazes them. Somehow when I look at the headlights glaring down at me, almost urging me to move I stand transfixed much like the lower animals.
Life has strange twists...I now have to cross a national highway 10 times (no exaggeration) each working day...all by myself. This is exactly the kind of thrill I was NOT looking for. I still chicken out whenever I have to cross a road (pun intended)...but what to do...just as the life line on my palm is not my art work so aren’t the several other lines that call boardroom meetings to decide upon the course of my life and always conveniently forget to include my opinion...sigh...sigh...
I wanted to start this article as “Are you texting?” written as “R u txtng?” But I could not bring myself to do it. Why? Simply because it looks UGLY. Hey…take no offense. I have nothing against people who like to use the sms lingo. It just bothers me…a lot. Once I had shared my distress regarding this grotesque travesty of the English language with my alumni association. While most people saw my point an elder member had thrown some bitter (and somewhat amusing) sarcasm in my way. This person felt that only filthy rich people can afford the luxury of typing out entire words since the mobile services allow only 160 characters per sms. [ I didn’t care much about this person’s opinion. In another discussion this person had said Rafflesia was this person’s favourite flower. Reason? It emits a vile odour similar to that of rotting flesh. The day has not come when I would start valuing the opinion of such wack jobs.]
Some crusaders of the sms lingo might say 'Who has the time to write “r”, “i”, “g”, “h”, “t” when just an “r” followed by an “8” serves the purpose?' A thousand other reasons could be offered that would sound perfectly sensible and yet it would continue to bother me. The time factor is indeed a relevant point. And one day when I would lose out on some plump offer because of my lust for unadulterated spellings people would come to sympathize with me while secretly thinking, “Serves her right.”
As far as the cost factor is involved the mobile services did listen to the prayers of the sms addicts. New schemes have been launched which allow us to send texts for free(almost). Yet people keep on using contractions… It did not eradicate the prevalent evil and introduced a new one. Flurry of forwarded texts! Every one is succumbing to it. Me? Of course. I forward every text that I find a wee bit interesting (but not before I edit out the grammatical errors and expand the annoying spelling contractions.)
Gone are the days when we sent the exceptionally clever jokes to the ones with a quick wit, shared the “best friends forever” messages with the dearest of the friends, saved the mushy romantic messages for the latest crush (and deleted the drafts after getting over them) and forwarded the classic insults to the ones who had the humour to appreciate them. Now every body sends out every thing to every one (may be the names of the prude ones are left out while sending out crude texts).
Another new trend is sharing overwhelmingly romantic texts with every one…the sender has in mind the picture of one face but where their mind is blessed with brilliant picturesque clarity their guts lack the zeal to the tell the “face in mind” about their feelings. The way out? Resort to bulk texts! Send the lovey-dovey sms out to the entire group. That way one gets to express his/her feelings and she/he does not get the liberty to reject him/her.
And of course there are the immensely irritating texts from some dubious companies. Yesterday one sms actually asked me to send my name followed by a certain code to a certain number to know whether I am fake or real! If you want you may doubt my integrity but to ask me to doubt myself… Inanity has indeed achieved new levels.
Not that I complain about the huge volume of texts…makes me feel good actually. (Not the ones from phoney companies though) [And also if my mobile is silent on a particular day I get to know that something is wrong with the handset…no kidding…this has truly happened.] But I do yearn for the days when people meant what they wrote in an sms.
PS- Man might worry his head off in pursuit of progress but there would always be cribbers who would enjoy all the luxuries bestowed on them dirt-cheap and yet find excuses to laud the olden days when they had been cribbing to be in possession of the same luxuries.
