a patch of blue
is all we need
to ease the summer murkiness.

rainbows in the eye
as a teardrop forms
sadness of the lonely

freeze

Imagine such a thing happening at Rajiv Chowk Metro Station...

...anybody game?

nostalgia

when words don't come easily
when every nerve in the body
has been sensitized by pain
when the throat chokes
and the bile increase
when tears don't flow easily
when you gasp for air
and a little deliverance
enter the empty space where memories disappear

blind faith

I was tested today. It was a test in blind faith in another human being... well, actually a family.

I was walking back home from the market this evening. The sun had gone down in a blaze of red and it was dark by the time I reached the road to my apartment complex. Just outside the complex, I saw a man with his wife and the wife holding a baby in her arms. They were looking very lost and as I approached them, something inside me wanted to ask them what was wrong, and if I could help in any way. I held back and didn't ask. But the man spoke up as I passed by, and asked if I could speak Marathi (a regional language of India, primarily spoken in the state called Maharashtra). I said no. Hindi? yes. He said some men ran off with their money and they were stranded in Delhi without food, without shelter. He is a house painter, but obviously could not find work at that time of day. They looked working class, but were not in rags. They were hungry and thirsty and tired, but worst, they were dejected. He expressed his pain at having come to beg like this and asked for money to go back to Maharashtra. He said he would send the money back if I could give an address where to send it.

I was uncomfortable. I thought maybe they needed directions to get somewhere. I would have gladly helped with that. But when it came to money, I get very uncomfortable. Even with beggars, I have mixed feelings. I want to help, but is my loose change actually helping? In India, we are made to distrust beggars from a very young age. Maybe we have so many beggars that those who are in a better financial condition simply create this distrust in order not to succumb to each and every one of them, even those who perhaps in all probability are actually destitute.

Most crucial is the question: Will giving money to a beggar actually propel him/her to work instead of simply begging? Some actually have day jobs at construction sites and beg by night for a few extra rupees. Or set their innumerable children to do the begging at streetlights, markets and tourist spots.

My oldest memory of a beggar is when we were travelling somewhere. I was maybe 4 or 5 yrs old. It was winters. And we were eating. This little boy who was about 4-5 years old too, and had absolutely no clothes on his impoverished body came to us. My mom gave him some of the food we had. He went away, but left behind a string of uncomfortable questions and an unerasable trace in my mind. "Why is he naked, mummy? Why does he ask for food? Where are his parents? Why is he poor? What is poor? Why don't all people have money? How can we remove poverty, mummy?" My mom never had any final and conclusive answers for me. One question always led to another. Even today, do we have any answers? There isn't any answer.

But these people, were just better-dressed beggars, con-men, or actually in real trouble? There is no answer to this question either. It was simply a matter of trusting their word. I offered food. He said someone gave them biscuits. I said I couldn't give them money, I was a student... He asked if there was any other person who could help... I said, ok, wait, I will try.

I came upstairs. quickly filled a small bottle with milk for the baby, and a larger bottle with cold water. put them in a polybag. got out a 100 rupee note from my wallet and went back down. They were still there, waiting for me. The security guard saw it all, as I showed the milk and water and money to the man, said it was all that I could do and left. I didn't give him much time to feel embarrassed at the charity nor did I receive profuse thanks. I walked away still feeling confused, telling myself I did good. I had more than a hundred rupees worth cake and multi-grain bread in my hand when I encountered them. It was a luxury that I would consume without a thought. But for these, a hundred rupees may mean more than anything at this moment. (Rs. 100 is less than $2.50, about 300 yen, it is a small amount in USA or Japan, but most working class Indians don't earn that much in a day.)

I don't know if I did right. I thought, let me trust and have blind faith in their word. I don't know if I did right because it is a human tendency to distrust. But I also feel naive. I am trusting someone I don't know and giving them a big amount of money. (normally one would give Rs. 5 to a beggar, or 10 in some cases). I didn't feel completely happy with what I did. Only because I feel everyone else would tell me I am stupid to have given in. I felt guilty telling my sister, even though she said it was ok. She didn't say I was silly. I don't know why in this case I need approval from others. I never usually do. I listen to my instincts and go with it. Why should I feel that maybe I have been duped? They really did look lost and I wanted to help. So I did. Was it wrong of me to? Is it wrong of me to be having these thoughts?

I console myself that I do not go to temples and offer donations, but have done something that is in a way equivalent to that blind faith. And maybe I have done more good than giving at a temple, if it helps this family. I always become angry at the hordes of people who go to temples and in the name of offerings give away more than they would to a person in need.

There was once a major event when many Hindus all over the city received calls early in the morning, that Ganeshas will drink milk today. The news spread like wildfire. And everyone went to their neighbourhood temples to offer milk to Ganeshji. I cannot count how many litres of milk was sold, and touched to the lips of that stone idol, and wasted by countless people. I refused to go. My friends came to summon me so we could go together, and I said it was bullshit, and that I would rather give the milk to a poor and hungry person. My friends were horrified at my atheism and I didn't care. I was proud to be above these silly mortals. I was proud that my family (mom, dad and sis - i.e. excluding relatives) did not go to feed Ganesh. I always believe in paying it forward - to my peers, to my fellow human beings - not to an unknown and unknowable God. I had an opportunity today to put my belief in action.

If religion is blind faith, then my religion is believing in human beings. There are doubts in this religion as in any other. Doubts that undermine the faith. Faith that has to fight its way.

Question is - have I passed the test of faith?

Rakhi

In this day and age, I find some customs really silly. One of them occurs on the festival day of Raksha Bandhan. Sisters tie a Rakhi on their brother's wrist, do tika, give a dry coconut and the brothers give money/gift and promise to protect them in return... The main good this festival does, is that it gives an opportunity to meet up with family members and relatives. I would usually not bother with the useless ceremony, but I live in family of strong beliefs and so I cannot hurt their feelings.

I don't have any real brother of my own, but I have 4 cousins - 2 born to my dad's younger brother, and 2 born to my mom's 2 brothers. There is also the little boy of a family we met in Mauritius and are close to. They share our ancestral surname - Agarwal, and thus, felt that we are all one family. Mohit, the boy wanted Didi and I to tie Rakhi on him, so we have been sending Rakhies by post.

This year, only he and my youngest cousin were available. The other 3 were out of Delhi. This youngest cousin, Krishna, is a 5-year old bunch of naughtiness which drives me insane. He never listens and always does the opposite of what you tell him to do. I got toy rakhies for him this year, ie, it was a ribbon with small toys stuck on it. Of course, they were torn out the minute they were tied! When he went to the market with Mamu (my uncle, his dad), we girls had loads of fun racing the cars.

We went to a new part of Delhi to meet the other 'brother'. I hadn't met them in a long time and the kids are so grown up that I felt very old! Ashi was a few months old when I first saw her and played with her! and Mohit was 4-5 years old. Time flies so fast, and meeting them made me realise how long ago it was when I lived in Mauritius.

When coming back home, a really embarrassing thing happened! A guy was sitting on a seat reserved for ladies. I challenged my sister to ask him to vacate the seat. She said, forget it, poor brother, today let him enjoy the seat. And I said, on the other hand, at least on this day, the brothers should be vacating seats for their sisters. And maybe I spoke too loudly, for the guy sitting with his mom stood up shamefaced. I think I blushed a very deep-red because I was just saying in general and the look on his face was as if I had directed my words at him alone!

Later that night, my sister's 'brother' treated us to dinner at the Air Warrior's Club at the Air Force base in Delhi. It was just like entering Camp Schwab in Okinawa for me. Sarthak's dad is in the Indian Air Force, so he has a 'base pass' :) ...good times..

baby jamun

I sowed a Jamun seed about a month ago. And have waited patiently for this day. My mom had given up hope and wanted to use the pot for something else. But I persevered. This morning I woke up and went to see how me plants were doing, and behold...


am feeling like a proud parent.... :)

awesome day...

I had made a list of things to do post-papers and I was able to strike off two items from it today:

1. Watch "The Dark Knight" and,
2. Go somewhere fun.

My sis, her 'brother' and I headed off to Saket to watch the movie. We got horrible seats even though we came two hours before to buy them! My neck still hasn't recovered :( ! From next time, I shall definitely book tickets online! Last time you know what happened (read the previous blog post...) ergo, I am not taking chances, my movie luck seems to have gotten depleted.

So... The movie was awesome. Everyone kept saying its very dark. I didn't think so. It was, but not so much that that would be its only quality. The story was what excited me most. I guess for Batman fans it would have been so obvious with Harvey Dent flipping his coin. But I realized he would be Two-Face only when his face actually catches fire. I never read the comics and Batman has always been just another superhero for me. I guess being a girl who is more into literature, comic books come second and aren't very important. Thus the way the story was reinterpreted in the movies have been very exciting. I also liked that in Nolan's version, Gotham City is like any present-day metropolitan city. Not like previous versions where it has been fictionalized into this magical, unrealistic dream landscape almost. I liked that the characters were realistic and relatable. I don’t remember what the name is, but the Batman movie with Uma Thurman as Poison Ivy… Or Jim Carey overacting as the Riddler... it just reduced the action to banal ridiculous events with the overdone fantasy elements.

From my mobile phone camera:

And Heath was great! I still can't believe he is no more. Why did his last movie have had to be the one in which his handsome face was covered...?

Aside: While watching the movie, I had my cell phone in my lap. I didn’t realize when it slipped off and suddenly when I realized I didn’t have it, I panicked. My sis showed me light with hers and I found my dear old big fat mobile under the seat in front of me. I came so close to losing it, my heart nearly stopped! It’s the worst thing that could happen to me. Thank God it didn’t happen!

And I found my second favourite Barista drink - Swiss Mocha Frappe! (the one in the center)

After the movie, we headed off to Gurgaon in search of this Karaoke place Sarthak had seen while driving by. After getting stuck in traffic and having to take plenty U-turns we finally reached it, and it turned out to be so expensive! The deal was, you hire the room and order food worth at least Rs. 5000 (about $110) and you can sing for an unlimited time period. And you have to book one day at least in advance for it. We were only 3 people and we had 3 hours before the place closed. So it wasn’t worth the big bucks... Maybe I will go another time, if there are more people to split the cost between us and more time to enjoy the food and singing.

Instead of Karaoke, we settled for bowling, go-carting, pool and air-hockey. It was a day of firsts: My first time ever coming to Gurgaon. Finding a Karaoke place in India was also a first. The very first bowling experience in India for me (and I have bowled only 3 times before that). First time playing air-hockey and I beat my sister with seven goals! It was also my very first go-carting experience, which I did not enjoy very much. My leg was cramped, I was hot, and the arm band was icky, and the helmet kept covering my eyes! I did 3 laps and didn’t care for the other 7 that had been paid for. My sis took my turns and I was glad to be sitting out!

Even though I didn’t enjoy go-carting, the day was fun overall. :)

you know... or know not!

A long over due blog on the only typical Bollywood movie I love---

It is called Jaane Tu... Ya Jaane Na. The post title is the literal translation of the name of this movie. A more meaningful title would perhaps be - whether you know, or you don't.

It has all those unrealistic elements that go into making a bollywood movie. All those elements that usually make me pull my hair with frustration. It has typical song-and-dance sequences; a talking portrait; two rude men in Cowboy-Western wear riding horses to nightclubs (who later turn out to be otherwise); it also has that stupid stop-her-from-leaving airport climax; and it also has some overacting. And yet, it was all directed brilliantly. The script is tight and kept one involved throughout. The humour was in good taste and the dramatic scenes nail-biting. (You might be thinking, well isn't this obvious? Ah! but you see, most Hindi films that are considered good, don't always have humour in good taste and nail-biting dramatic scenes.... ) The most amazing thing was that I am usually annoyed by clichés; but, in this movie, those very clichés had been redone brilliantly and by the end of the movie I wanted to see it again!

(Papu Can't Dance? I think he can and HAS! ;P )

I had actually gone to seen The Dark Knight with Isa, but when we reached the cinema, all the tickets were sold out! So we decided to go see Jaane Tu, even though Isa had already seen it on her computer. We went to another Cinema hall for that. Thankfully we got tickets there as we arrived there 2 and a half hours early for the show. We spent the time eating and shopping.

The movie started at 7:30 and ended at 10:25 pm. I was afraid I would miss the last train to Dwarka. We ran from the hall and I had to say excuse so many times and navigate my way through hordes of people who didn't understand my urgency! They were climbing down the staircase so slowly!! I thankfully reached 3 mins before the last train came and reached home like 11:45! That was the most late I have even come back home alone in Delhi! If I had missed the train, I would have had to go with Isa, as there were more trains for her stop. But I didn't want to do that. We had guests from USA at home, and plus, I didn't really want to go to the hostel that night.

I reached home safe and sound, met the guests, got a good humoured scolding from parents and was still happy because of the nice time I had had with my dear friend :) And because there can be an occasional clear blue sky and amazing sunset in Delhi :

Mr. Locust, you will scare Dali away!

My Mint plant had a visitor the other day...

Auld Lang Syne

yesterday night I found online one of my batch-mates from my old school. We have been keeping in touch through chat occasionally. Actually, I usually disappear for long durations and then when I resurface, we have a long conversation catching up with each others fast-paced lives. Yesterday we had a particularly interesting conversation recalling the good ole school times. And there was one particular incident that involved the two of us...

See, the story goes like this: We barely spoke to each other in class for the four-five years we studied together. At that time most boys and girls were still excessively shy around each other. So, while in school, I hardly knew this person. After loosing touch for 8 years, he initiated a chat with me some four years back. We had both joined a school batch mates group and came in contact again. Although I haven’t seen him in over 12 yrs, he is now a good friend.

While reminiscing about school days, I didn’t remember as many people and incidents as he did because I changed schools twice after class nine and I even moved to a new country for my A levels! He reminded me of this very embarrassing event in my school life - an event I shared with him: We both took a supplementary exam together.

These exams were held for those students who were either absent on the day of the exam or had not passed it the first time. Both of us were NOT in either of these categories. But by default everyone around would think that we failed the exam, and therefore, it was embarrassing! I, for one, was mortified. I was never the best student in class, but I was not one to fail exams either. I usually did moderately better than most. I wasn’t hardworking and diligent. I would spend all my time reading fiction, hardly bothering myself with homework! But I was not blasé enough to not care about failing or passing. It was a matter of big shame to get low marks! and failing was the pinnacle of humiliation.

Anyway, what really happened was that we both landed up at school to take the exam the day after it had already been held! I had forgotten about this episode until my friend reminded me of it yesterday! I spoke to my mom about it today and even she remembered it! And she told me that dad didn’t scold me the first time it happened (how could he? I came home red having cried my eyes out at a friends place coz I couldn’t go home directly!!). My dad chose to scold me after I came back from the supplementary. And I was mollified in retorting I wasn’t alone in this mistake! :)

It’s amazing what the mind wishes to keep stored up there. It’s been twelve years since it occurred, but I never thought I might forget this affair when it happened the first time round. It took my mother and a person whom I never thought that I’d be good friends with in future, to remind me of this small chapter in my life. It was funny remembering this stupid incident. And all this while I had not even realized it was this guy I was chatting with for 4 years who was the same guy I shared that mistake. And it’s probably the only interaction we had in school!

I was rolling on the floor laughing out loud yesterday chatting. It was nice. I haven’t laughed like this in a while. :)

Reason for a Headache

I went shopping with my cousins today. Even though I hate shopping, that's not really the reason for the most massive headache I have suffered from in a long while. I actually initiated this spree as I really was in need of stuff. Have been living minimalistically for some while now - just one pair of jeans, 2-3 shirts, and a pair of floaters!

When returning, less that 3 kms away from home, I got stuck is a massive traffic jam because the red-light at the crossing had stopped working. Of course every single one wanted to go and not stop to let anyone else pass. It resulted in the worst jam I have been in in a while. Some wise man actually came out and tried to resolve the confusion, and I wish there were awards for such pro-active citizens! I wanted to call the police but my cell phone signals disappeared. That has never happened to me before. I tried calling my dad and sis but how could I with no signal... What bewildered me most was that for the longest time there was no traffic cop in sight to resolve the mess! We have faced bomb blasts in two major cities of the country on 2 consecutive days, and 500 people have died because of terrorist attacks in the past year, and every time we are told that security is being tightened. What utter crap! What kind of security is it if a policeman is unavailable for over 20 minutes with over 500 vehicles mixed up and lined up at a major crossing??

The truth is that in a country with the 2nd largest population in the world, there is absolutely no value for life. So what if a few die, when there are more than 100 being born every minute? It is disgusting but our intelligence agencies are full of shit. Corruption is rampant and work is limited to how much can go into one;s pocket. The attitude is "Who cares anyway for something that is not benefiting me" and it is ingrained in every one of us. I mean, if people actually cared for the greater good, would there be such a jam in the first place?

Dali is awesome! So is Marquez!

Recently, I finished and turned in a 4000-word research paper on the representational similarities between Salvador Dali and Gabriel Garcia Marquez. The basic point of the paper was to draw the commonalities of Surrealism in the paintings of Dali and of Magic Realism in Garcia Marquez's One Hundred Years of Solitude; the way in which imagination is deployed by the two in order to portrait the universal themes that cut across cultures; and the depiction/manipulation of time.

And I am still preoccupied with these great people's work.... I am reading Love in the Time of Cholera, and desperately searching for Destino, an animation project by Disney and Dali. the videos exist on YouTube but they aren't the best quality...

wrong Konnections

so yesterday a good friend and I went to see a movie. We saw Kismet Konnection. Though we really wanted to see another film more than this one, yet our urge to see any movie was stronger. The promos had seemed alright and I haven't been reading the papers these past few days so I didn't know what the critics had to say about it. It was a Hindi Bollywood film so naturally I had my doubts. But, the actor of this movie, Shahid Kapoor has blossomed into a gorgeous hunk (which means I didn't think much of him before his last film - Jab We Met) and I didn't mind ogling and drooling at him for a while ;P !!! And he did look good in this movie too. But, his looks could not save the movie as he overacted many a times.

The actress, Vidya Balan is amazingly beautiful, and photogenic, but, she didn't look that good in the movie, my friend and I discussed (since we had nothing else better to do during the movie) and came to the conclusion that she needed a better hairdo, a better bra, a gym membership and a more serious acting roles. Her hair was done in a way to make her look younger than Shahid, but she still looked older. She was made to wear bras and corset tops to make her figure look better, that failed as well. She has what Indians would call 'a heavy lower body', she isn't fat, but she looks so in western dresses. She looked gorgeous in Parineeta which was a period film, so she had worn mostly Indian clothes.

The story wasn't too great and even though there wasn't anything original about it, it could have been rendered a thousand times better. The acting, the editing and direction overall was so particularly bad that the story just could not be saved!

It was supposed to be a light, fun, romantic comedy, BUT:
the comic scenes didn't work,
there wasn't much chemistry between the two (she just looked older),
the over-acting made it a pain to watch, and
the movie was so light that it was nothing just fluff and mindlessness.

(The traditional from-my-phone-camera-photo, therefore, not the best quality...)

The most interesting part was that we went to see it at a bad movie theater. Which meant it was cheap and run-down and just really bad! We were told to keep our bags out; they had a token system storage thing at the back. We went through this shady, narrow lane to the place, only to discover it was a man sitting on bare wooden takht (which is like a low table, but in India we put a mattress and cylindrical pillows and use it as a sitting place). My friend and I had doubts, as I was carrying a laptop. We decided to put my bag into her's but upside down so that if one would open, it would take some effort to reach the comp. It wasn’t full-proof safe, but we decided to take a chance. When we went to back to it to deposit it, a policeman was also sitting in the takht. He asked if there was any laptop and I hesitatingly told him yes. Then he said we can take it in, they will just check it. All this was due to the ‘strict’ security checks at public places.

Anyhow, during the movie, when a song would start, the lower regions would start howling and whistling, but because the songs were not really sleazy, the noise just fizzled out like a bad cola. And people clapped for the most stupid things! When people go watch a movie out here, they do so to have fun. Because really, there aren’t many places the middle and lower class man can go for entertainment. There aren’t affordable places for enjoyment that also are safe for women. Either its such upper-class stuff, where I don’t fit in as I am too chilled out and happy-go-lucky a person to buy branded stuff and be all snooty page three! Or it’s the roadside “Wine and Beer” shops that cater to the low class. So where does the middle class go?

I complain about lack of fun-spots (to myself mostly), because my friends don’t really go to bars or clubs and I would not go there alone. I want to have the company of friend to have fun... And actually I don't even like bars and clubs so much, just wish there was go-carting, or ice-skating rinks, or bowling alleys, or gaming centers (with purikura and taiko drums!) or... u get my drift!

I wish there were Karaoke places here like in Japan - affordable and accessible. Most of all, I wish there was more safety for women so we could go out without having a male escort to protect us. Yesterday, I came home at quarter to eleven in the night, but I could do so only because of the Metro. And still my parents worried about how I will get back home! If there was a safe environment, maybe parents would allow their kids to go out more, and that would create a demand for more places, and having more places means that the overall standard would increase n price would decrease; and it would also allow men to see women for who they are and not merely sex objects, thereby increasing security!

effects of time