A Puppy Named Prateek-sha, and prolonged ponderous profoundness…

 

Paranthas. That is what started if off…

It’s cold here. And as the heat of the body goes inwards, to protect all those vital organs, it stokes the ‘kayagni’, the digestive fire, into an irrepressible force. You either heed it, or some of your insides undergo spontaneous combustion. (Ayurvedic vigyaan for free here, folks. You’re Welcome.) And yesterday evening, as the cold was setting in, prognosticating this very event, I went into the kitchen to cook some Paranthas. (The Windows Live Writer is applying semi-bold to all words it cannot understand… Paranthas, dearie, are sort of… stuffed Indian bread… if I said chappatis, you’d have… yeah, exactly)…

So, with Jacob here as my sous chef, made some of them, and a lip-smacking mushroom curry.   (For getting me back in the kitchen for cooking adventures, thank you Masterchef Australia. WHAT? Masterchef isn’t a word?!)But then, one of those lovely P’s was left over when we couldn’t stuff ourselves any more. I get heartbroken when creations get thrown in bins, be it poems or Parantha; even though most of my writings do get thrown by myself – masochist, I am.

So, I saved it in the casserole. Thought the girls would throw it out the next day and save me the trouble. Wished it weren’t so, and that thing would get eaten, somehow…

Morning. Pleasantly chilly. It had rained the night before, and the temperature had actually gone up a notch. I had just finished my breakfast and stepped out to find…

Soft hearted females, here’s you cue for ‘Aww… how sweet/cute/(“”)’

…and the first thought I had was, ‘I just found someone who will be really grateful for a cold parantha, and who’d appreciate it way more than any Matt, George and Gary. Thank you, God Of Small Things.’

The poor mite had got drenched in the rain, and was shivering like anything. It had somehow got in through our gates below, and climbed up two flights of stairs to curl up at the end of the passageway. Technically I am on leave on Thursdays, and I didn’t have anywhere to go, so I thought, why not play God and make it this particular dogs’ day?

And so it began. First, I rubbed it down with tissues. Then I fed it. Looking around for something else that could warm up a dog other than a bitch in heat ( couldn’t resist that one, sorry), I found nothing in the castaway section. Thus, the sacrifice of one old mundu of mine…(the bold again? I’m past caring, you indophobic computer…what the? I give up.). I wrapped it up, then took it downstairs. Once it got warmed up a bit in the sun, it took a stroll around and picked a prospective property…

 

This place is great, man! I’ll take it!

 

When it made up its mind, I moved in the bedding and stuff…

 

 

Then I went in to the clinic to act out the part of my alter-ego, as a caring Ayurvedic physician {who is ‘IN’ even on holidays} (and to get my hands smelling human again) […when I’m not in my ultra secret avatar of (G)oofyboy -  for whom stray dogs and their big eyes are like kryptonite to Superman…]

While scrubbing myself down, I succumbed to that fetish of mankind, and started contemplating a name for this newcomer. After attending to a patient, I invited the therapists to contribute their paisa worth… Sweetie, Rocky, Tommy, Shruti, (You racist bigot, you…), and a whole lot of others came up, but were condemned to the christening trash can. Being unsure of the sex of the small one, and too bashful/lazy to ascertain it, I asked my mind to come up with a apt unisexual name… It cranked its rusty levers, and coughed up – “Prateek-sha”, and then sat back, smiling smugly.

I stared it down till I got an explanation.

“Prateeksha, you dolt. It means hope. You symbolize hope for that creature. It does the same for you. What did that last sentence mean? I don’t have a clue.”

My mind has attacks of pseudo-Zen sometimes. As frequent as diarrhea in the South Indian tourists in Delhi. And as awful.

“Besides, if it is male, you can just call it Prateek Shah (ah, look! Communal discrimination) , with the ‘H’ silent in writing”

Huh? Okay, well, so that was fixed. Prateek-sha it would be. (We found out later on  that it was a female, therefore, with your  permission, pronoun usage likewise.) Next step, heating up water, and washing her down with some dettol et al. (‘dettol’ too? Really? Does chloroxylenol work for you? Apparently not…Oh, wait. Dettol? Of course, Brands are spelled with a Big B). Once again, dried it off, then set up the lodgings, this time with a personal touch…

 

 

Looking at the photo above, I now see it represents the life of the household pet. “We’ll give you a name (name board), we’ll chain you (them metal links), we’ll train you (skipping rope), we’ll wipe your s#!^ coz we don’t want it to stink (tissue paper)”

And so…

I’m living ‘under’ the name of Prateek-sha coz he doesn’t know my real one?  Anyway, ho-hum… This is so Winnie-the-Pooh…

And I’m cuter than that bear… so there.

 

Watching P-s like this made me understand the phrase ‘warming the cockles of my heart’.

To have someone to love, to care for..and to love and care for them – it is the greatest addiction you can have if you are attuned to the headiness of self-worth that is generated by gratefulness of others. When you do something for someone, you feel high. And after a while, you get bloated with self-importance and other noxious things. …That is why, perhaps, public servants are pompous asses sometimes, they do such a lot for so many. …That is why Krishna so wisely counseled – Karmani eva adhikaraste, maa phalesu kadachana… Reality? We don’t do anything for anyone else. All our actions help us. But our actions, through the change they bring upon us, change the universe.

All happy and glowing, I went up to drink some water, and when I was up there, glanced down. This is what I saw, and it slowly deflated me…

 

That is P-s on the left side of the fence, which is the right side to be. Marble floor, lodgings, food, water-bowl, the works… And left at the wrong side of the fence, those are her Mother and two siblings (out of the frame) on the right. They had come a-looking. I had played God, yes, but a petty personal one. Created a disparity of fortunes. Broken up a family that was happy in the streets. I couldn’t redeem even a bunch of strays, and look what the Big Man has on his hands, entire universes… If there is a God, then Respect, Thalaiva… You’re one heck of a Manager.

After lunch, I came out to find that Prateek-sha had again climbed upstairs… When I came near, she curled up around my feet…

…but I was still preoccupied with my melancholy thoughts… what was it that I had achieved?  Was there even a hope that P-s would live on here, and not get thrown out by Maheshettan when he returned from Delhi (The manager here. He is not evil, I assure you. But he has to be practical, unlike me on my off-days.) . What would P-s be like growing up in a hospital run by an Ashram, if it did that? A vegetarian canine? On how many fronts does an action leave an effect in Nature?

After a while, I snapped back to the present, and started going down, then stopped again, and looked back at P-s. She was looking at me, with a bemused expression like one of my housemates had back in college when he had too much white rum. We stared at each other for sometime, and then, Prateek-sha started nodding off… Have you seen babies who start to fall asleep, then wake up with a start… getting all sleepy without knowing it? (Or mates at boring lectures/powerpoint presentations for that matter, when you force yourself to keep awake during them) It is just adorable…  [MS guys, Live Writer also thinks powerpoint makes no sense…:)]

I carried P-s down and tucked her in…

Accidents? No worries, I’m covered by some top international names… what? Provogue is Not an insurance company??! I got scammed! IRDA!

Alternatively: Female all the way… footwear, and only the best will do…

 

… and then I thought, it has been a long time since I’ve posted something. Why not make her my muse?

___________________________________________________

As I got to that last paragraph, Jacob comes in and tells me – Prateek-sha is gone… most probably back to her mother, on the streets.

Somewhere, I must have expected this. I am not surprised.

I’ll see her again, she’ll be on the streets. She’ll come up to me, wag that tail, be happy and let me be happy for that moment. And she’ll move on. Just like one more of life’s gifts. She knows she has made a friend, and she is content with that. Gilded prisons hold no value for her, she’d rather be free to love whom she pleases… (I do tend to put my heroines on a high pedestal… :)

I read what I’ve written, and reflect on her brief presence in my life… I look at that image, P-s curled up at my feet, making little contented sounds,  and try to remember the feeling I had then – but I can’t, because right then, my mind was thinking, of what I had done in the past, of what would happen in the future. And I hear this from some recess of my being – the only way to a great death is to live each moment completely in the present. How well you do this determines how well you die. Enjoy that warmth of love, let it go. Savor the spiciness of the argument, let it go. Explode in righteous anger, let it go. And so on… If you deserve any of them, they will come back to you.

And I think – Prateek-sha knows all this, somehow. She was happy, even when her instincts told her she’d be back on the street. Why? Because right then, the sun was shining, she was warm, and she was evoking love…

Aren’t we all evoking it? From Creation?

This moment, just be.

Love.

 

P.S. : I figured out the kink in Live Writer after a while, but then thought I’d keep the bolds in this post… :)

2 minute verses... Dive in again...

[To be honest, this wasn't a strictly 2 minute verse... Once I got started, I got carried away, and took more than thirty...:)]


Do I dare dive in again?

The froth laps my kneecaps
The sand gets in through the pores
As they recede, filling the gaps
The waves sweep me from the shore

Each wave's a temptation, each tide is a bond
The sea is the vast, wide, variegated world
The charm - the lure of earthly love, of which the heart is fond
The fear - of against heartbreaking boulders being hurled

The calm, serene and golden sands
The restless, deceptive, dark waves
The new-age gurus and their magic wands
The aphorisms issuing from the ancient's caves

To whom do I have to prove
My nature, my freedom, my joy
Do I have to stand still, or move
Should I be brash n bold, or coy

It's not the first time I've gone in
to swim in the sea of life
But why do I want to re-enter din
When I've found silent shore after strife

And still I walk in knee deep water
The waves still enticing, beckoning, cajoling
But the shore's a goddess, once you caught her
and loved her, truly, there's no returning...

2 minute verses... Waves...

"Waves"

Ups and downs, success and strife
Contrasts'll be there till the graves
Realise that in this sea of life
They are all but just the waves

2 minute verses... The Dog and the Coconut

(The concept that was given to me was a Malayalam proverb - mongan irunna nayayude mandakyu tenga veenu)

"The Dog and the Coconut"


Very husky was the coconut
Twas contoured like a baboons butt
Falling through the thatched roof into the hut
It struck the head of an old mutt

This disgruntled dog that it had hit
On his face was disgruntlement writ
He had piles, he could not sit
His dentures would no longer fit

It was looking for a reason to cry
.....and This Was IT.


(The proverb has the same meaning - it means, that a coconut fell on the head on the dog who was looking for a reason to cry anyway)

2 minute verses... The Accelerator

"The Accelerator"

As I dwelled upon my mistake
That sinking feeling got greater
Driving after drinks near the lake
Instead of brakes, I'd floored the accelerator

2 minute verses... Butterfly...

[I remember writing this one... when I got the concept, I got more than one theme as an idea, and thought it would be interesting to develop them... Diya (who sent me the topic) got five for the price of one...:)]


"Butterfly"

Those other worms were never of your ilk
You realized that meditating in silk
Then you broke through in to your own sky
Just knew that you were a butterfly


............


There're hidden hues in you
Bring 'em out, give it a try
After self-introspection true
Burst out like a butterfly


.............


An english baker in Paris city, France
Was troubled by musca domesticans
As they landed on the icing of the pies
He screamed-'Get off the butter, flies'


............


My dear old neighbour had jaundiced eyes
He saw everything yellow, his only vice
Looking at a fluffy cloud in the skies
He marvelled - 'see, butter flies!'

.............

My salesman cousin on one of his trips
Tried selling pants with faulty zips
His shrewd clients said that the cloth was nice
But then they asked - 'Butterflies?' (But the flies?)

2 minute verses... Sunrise

[This one is from a later period, when one of my junior friends, Diya, gave me a topic on Vrishchika 1, 2008]


"Sunrise"

An angel came before me one dawn
and said, 'with you, I'm pleased
Ask anything, a wish you've won'
But my desires were deceased

I replied 'looking at this scene serene
I realize I've everything I want'...
"Won't you think of what you could have been"
Saying thus did he again taunt

I replied 'I could've been deaf
and not heard these sweet bird calls
I couldn't have enjoyed a clef
of the music when rain falls'

'I could've been mute, no sound from me
would've joined this worlds great symphony

'I could've had no sense of smell
or perhaps, no sense of taste
Flowers by scent I wouldn't be able to tell
And all cuisine would go to waste

I could've been devoid of the feel of touch
and not have felt this breeze's caress
Maybe to others, I don't have much
But what I have to me is not less...

O tempting One, I tell thee...
A great thing it would be
For a blind man to just see...
For him, wouldn't it be a big prize
To have a vision of this sunrise?

2 minute verses... Exams (and sex)...

[Yes, yes, it does seem that sex was on the mind of a lot of these people giving me the topics, what with insane topics like this and the hankering for 'better' endings in some poems... but then again, it was the first year of Ay. medical college, an environment some might call oppressive, so well... how can one pass judgement... ]


"Exams (and sex)"

Exams and sex - they're almost the same
As foreplay, we write reg. nos and name
Some guys finish early, others stay late
Former's premature ejaculation, latter's stamina great

You like exciting subjects for both
If well done, both give greatest kicks
You fear STD's & unplanned intrauterine growth
You dislike history, and hate mathematics

Once you've started, there're no retreats
And you just have to give it all
Your performance in the (answer) sheets
is remembered as your rise or fall...

The bent over position is used often
to write, and to suck the free tip
that may be soft or hard, i.e., of pencil or pen
often held in a very sweaty grip

Peeking into another's answer book
can be voyeurism, you know...?
And exhibitionism is when others look
into the answer sheets you openly show

Be it yearly, prof., suppy or sem
Even the class test every week
too much indulgence in any of them
As with sex, makes you very weak

We cheat, its 'all in the game'
But get caught in the act,then its 'Shame!'
Exams and sex, they're almost the same
(It's true, even if it is a bit lame)



[I had fun writing this one, btw... Connections, they're everywhere]

2 minute verses... Safe sex...

(Aww... come on... )


"Safe sex"

My Doctor, on Dec 1st advised me to
practice only safe sex
What safe was, I hadn't a clue
That advice me did vex

Safe is, said a welder I know
Putting the helment when sparks fly
That didn't help me much, though
My girl thought I was just too shy...


I then asked a roller-coaster operator
To be safe, he said, pull your (seat)belt tight
I pulled my belt so tight, yessir
that my pants wouldn't come off at night

A professional course was safe, my parents said
So I went for Bee Yay Yem Ess
But didn't even get one women in bed
Saw anatomical models, nothing else


(Again, the group that had given me the topic thought the ending was too sad for the protagonist... so...)

In the end, however, I got lucky
My lady doctor, full of (oomph &) pity
lovingly, in her (bed)room, instructed me..
Now I know condom from IUCD

2 minute verses... John...

"John"


I searched high and low in every room
But he was nowhere, he was gone
I was Father of the Bridegroom
But where was he, my first-born?

After a while, when I'd given up hope
He came rushing, like the sun at dawn
He whispered, smelling of lifebuoy soap
'I just had to use the john'

(Poor S, she had given me the name of her boyfriend for the instapom, but...:)

2 minute verses... The Flag...

"The Flag"


The flag was waving atop the upright pole
And by its side was waving yet another
They were so alike in cut and soul
They might have been born to one mother

But their colour was what made them distinct
not the truth or freedom that they stood for
Once upon a time, but now nearly extinct
was a unity among us, that perverse passions tore

My 'country', then my 'society', my 'family' and ME
Is this really what our thought ought to be?
Vasudeva Kutumbakam, the world is one family
Om Loka Samastha Sukhino bhavantu, Shanti..Shanti...Shanti he...

2 minute verses... Deja vu...

"Deja vu"


Your curses and screams came out of the blue
And struck me, I had not a single clue
As to what was that I did, or should do
Like always, twas all a sense of deja vu

This has happened before, a thousand times
I've been berated for even Hitler's crimes
Twenty four of twenty five years of marriage
Have been spent bearing the brunt of your rage.

2 minute verses... Angels and Demons...

"Angels and Demons"

Within you, there are passions hundred
And only you your self can tell...
'Love this one, and this one dread'
...which one to foster, which one to quell

Existence is means for all and all ends
And imprisoned in every one cell
is good and evil, on you it all depends
You are the devil, you are the angel

2 minute verses... The Youth...

"The Youth"



This, my son, will take you far
Over compressed mettle coated with tar
Use it wisely, to make love, not war
Thus spake Dad, handing me his car

I drove it carefully, with optimum haste
Mine is a young life, too good to waste
I had visions no pessimism could mar
As I drove down to the nearest BAR

But s*#&, in the quest I was betrayed
For my lack of GK, I dearly paid
Fate and politics played hard with me
Twas dry day..
..Anniversary of someone named Gandhi(ji)


 (The bit below was added when the group I sent the above to complained that the ending was a tad too sad for the protagonist)

On the way back, I'll have you know
I did pick up my girl for a movie show
Afterwards, we parked in the lonely wood
And made love, like Dad said I should...;)

2 minute verses... The Mobile...

"The Mobile"


Its form is designed to beguile
Its virtues for sale to the most vile
It's an easy mistress for every style
Just demands recharges, the handy mobile

You're connected, like it or not
to everyone else, and the chatterbot
Benign service providers and offers brand new
Bless - 'May the Network be with You'

2 minute verses... Sky...

"Sky"

I took infinite skies from Infinity
But Infinity lost not a bit
My sky is infinite to me
Infinity, It, doesn't even miss it...

All measurements are maya..
the wise ones thus do say...
Poornasya Poornamadaya
Poornameva avashishyatey 

2 minute verses... Sky travel...

"Sky travel"

My girlfriend just became an astronaut
On Chandrayaan II, a seat she's got
Soon, I'll have to wave goodbye
As my love is blown up into the sky

The sky is packaged infinity
My sorrow knows no bounds
She's gonna be oh-so-far away from me
My life will go to the hounds

What if she finds someone else and then,
you ask, a space-age romance unfurls?
Am not worried, on moon, there're no men
and on Earth are plenty of other girls...

2 minute verses... God...

'God"

Up in the heavens sat dear old God
And He stroked his long flowing beard
[For ages the only barber in his abode
was on strike, his dues weren't cleared]

No, seriously?

Up in the Heavens sat dear old God
And He stroked his long flowing beard
He surveryed the Earth with a grave nod
Yes-Apocalypse and Judgement Day had neared

He sat thinking there, the Good Shepherd
The fights in his name, which was but a word
And about the disparity in his human herd
Corpulence here, there skin and bones and turd

There Hell was bursting at its seams
Filled by bankers who'd sold empty dreams
Child traffickers and terrorists together moan
As they're roasted on fire and brimstone

2 minute verses... Egg...

"Egg"

With a Famous Grouse, Humpty-Dumpty sat on a wall

And after he had downed the fifth peg

He swayed, wobbled, and had a fall

Lying there, he felt a broken leg

Optimistically he said 'this is not too bad

Perhaps for a few months I'll have to beg

But after that, I'll still father a lad

What about if I'd broken the egg?

Dumping ground...2 minute verses...

Digging into the deep recesses of a hardback diary, I uncovered some of my 'instapoms'... [Inspired by the character Frederick Algernon Trotteville (nickname:Fatty, leader of Enid Blyton's 'Five Find-Outers, a series I had immense fun reading in my days of half-pants) who had this gift to spout verses instantly given a word/concept; I had for sometime asked people to SMS me any word that came to their mind, and I'd reply with an SMS having some sort of verse about an association that came to mine... One of those things you do to escape the inane monotony of college life when there are no youth festivals or band practice... ].. I must have scribbled down some before deleting the outbox...

Hurrah for the blog... anything can be published!

And so, we begin...

Happy Deepavali!

The guys at Orkut wouldn't let me scrap this... They say it is spam. I say it is not...

It is Deepavali today... Watching a posse of children playing in the park near the hospital, all those beautiful fireworks made me think of all of you - the people I know...

My teachers, who lit flames of knowledge inside me. My friends, some near, like a comfortable bonfire, some far away, like a welcome winter sun... Some who rise up sparkling like those 'phuljadis' - fire flower showers, some who are scaling new heights like those 'rockets', and some who are still on ground level, but throwing light and love all around them like those 'chakras', fire-circles... :)...

Some I've met only once, for an instant, but like flints meet - there have been sparks... Others glow elsewhere, but I still feel the warmth.

The bangs and booms remind me of heated arguments and fights, and convulsive laughter - both of which have been there in my celebration of life with you.

Seeing the cartons of crackers still to be opened, the joys and surprises waiting to be unveiled - it is just like the anticipation of building fulfilling relations with all  the interesting people that I will come to love as friends as this celebration goes on.

And when I thought of all this, I knew my Deepavali wouldn't be complete without wishing you all every happiness and all prosperity that I can think of... 

Here's to more fireworks... 

Happy Deepavali... !

Ecclesiastecising...

One of my favorite Bible saying is Ecclesiastes (Old Testament) 7:29:  "God made man simple, he made himself very complicated."
 One of my blog readers said that I have this predilection to use difficult language. I came across this poem while trawling the net the other day...


'Humpty-Dumpty'

Calm and implacable,
Eyeing disdainfully the world beneath,
Sat Humpty-Dumpty on his mural eminence
In solemn state:
And I relate his story
In verse unfettered by the bothering restrictions of rhyme or metre,
In verse (or “rhythm,” as I prefer to call it)
Which, consequently, is far from difficult to write.

He sat. And at his feet
The world passed on — the surging crowd
Of men and women, passionate, turgid, dense,
Keenly alert, lethargic, or obese.
(Those two lines scan!)

Among the rest
He noted Jones; Jones with his Roman nose,
His eyebrows — the left one streaked with a dash of gray –
And yellow boots.
Not that Jones
Has anything in particular to do with the story;
But a descriptive phrase
Like the above shows that the writer is
A Master of Realism.

Let us proceed. Suddenly from his seat
Did Humpty-Dumpty slip. Vainly he clutched
The impalpable air. Down and down,
Right to the foot of the wall,
Right on to the horribly hard pavement that ran beneath it,
Humpty-Dumpty, the unfortunate Humpty-Dumpty,
Fell.

And him, alas! no equine agency,
Him no power of regal battalions –
Resourceful, eager, strenuous –
Could ever restore to the lofty eminence
Which once was his.
Still he lies on the very identical
Spot where he fell — lies, as I said, on the ground,
Shamefully and conspicuously abased!

– Anthony C. Deane, in Carolyn Wells,  1922

Also,


'Twinkle Twinkle Little Star'

Shine with irregular, intermitted light, sparkle at intervals, diminutive, luminous, heavenly body.
How I conjecture, with surprise, not unmixed with uncertainty, what you are,
Located, apparently, at such a remote distance from, and at a height so vastly superior to this earth, the planet we inhabit,
Similar in general appearance and refractory powers to the precious primitive octahedron crystal of pure carbon, set in the aerial region surrounding the earth.

— William T. Dobson, Poetical Ingenuities and Eccentricities, 1882

I know this may be something like a filler post, but just felt had to post it... 

IT"S OUT!!!!!!!!!!

People sometimes tell me that if there is something repetitive about me, it is how I rant and rave about how awesome my friends are... Talented bunch... God's gifts to the world... Enterprising... Original... stuff along these lines... Well, here's something for me to defend myself...

This is Panchamahabhootas , (Click for the youtube vid) the directorial debut of Nidhin Vijay Anil... I sorta collaborated on the scripting... :)... Vineeth and Colin composed and mixed more than 200 tracks for it, and Deepak transferred subtle nuances onto digital film, and so on... More about these guys and others in upcoming posts... And, I'm thinking of changing my handle from 'atsavdelhi.blogspot.com' to something which is not as quite restrictive. (Also, since right now I'm not at SAV delhi, but at SAV Bhiwadi, Rajasthan, the name is not quite jelling... suggestions?)

About the short film... Good work, no? Please comment...

... I know that it has been a long time since I have posted anything to this blog... No excuses, I don't believe in them... Excuses are weird animals, when you start hunting for them, they appear all around the place... No fun.

But I am back, I believe... There have been lot of upheavals going on at SAV, and it must've been reflected onto me too... And in the meantime, I started a private blog which took up most of my time... Anyway, hope to keep flowing now...

In the months I stopped writing this blog, I got many people asking me why I wasn't posting, and that they would like to read more.. well, now is when you may start regretting...:)... Thanks for the support and encouragement, though, means quite a lot to me. ...

Long night...

March 20th...Seems like a long time since I have since I have felt like this. Tired... Happy... In a clean  place, that is full of peace and quiet...well, as quiet as it can get when a bhajan is being sung (loudly, with speakers and all) by some very enthusiastic people next to next door...It doesn't disrupt the peace much, even if it is 12.30 in the morning, not my peace anyway (these things are to be expected during the Navratra celebrations when ‘jaagrans’ are in vogue....proves peace is just a state of mind)...Just finished cleaning the rooms of stay, very properly, and then had a refreshing bath too... The jolly dholak beats and the rich blend of voices reiterating the verses sung by the pujari cum lead singer, who in between songs, prays to the goddess in a very cajoling way, with intonations and inflections that make him sound like a father bribing an insouciant child to climb down from the tree...They  just make me tap my feet to the rhythm and do away with the songs that I usually play in the lap while typing (wouldn't be able to hear them over this sound anyway, I think)

It brings back fond memories of the Sree Dharmasastha Bhajana Samithy, of which my father was a co-founder, and the endless bhajans in the 'mandala' time which we attended while we were in Delhi..Hymns would be sung to all the Gods, beginning with Lord Ganesh, and ending in Lord Ayyappa after traversing the pantheon's major personalities. I had a particular fascination with Lord Shiva when I was a kid – my reasoning was that he was a fair guy, with a good sense of what equality meant, dispensing death to all and sundry with certainty; while the Creator created unequality and the Preserver kept it preserved in one way or another – I remember asking the singers at a special bhajan (twas my birthday or something) to sing more of Shiva bhajans, and how they exhausted their stock of Mahadeva's paeans (all 5 of them), and asked me wearily/warily if I had enough, and if they could kindly move on to Lord Vishnu (we wouldn't want to keep the other Gods waiting now, would we?). We used to go to different houses for the Bhajans, and there usually was great food after the singing. And there was this grand Bhajana in the Kalkaji Ayyappa Temple, at the peak of the season...

“If plain adoration is seeing what you project in an object, adoration of divine is about finding the reflection of what you are adoring in yourself.”  Hmmm... that sentence just got typed, and I wish I knew who said it before this. It is easier for something that may be suspected of profoundness to be passed off as a quote from some important person, or some vaguely important person, or even a totally unheard of person whose name sounds like a sneeze and a name of an exotic animal mixed together, it will get more contemplation than just saying it as a stand-alone. And all wisdom that 'comes' to you is bound to have been circulating around for a few millenia, it had shined in someone's psyche before, and someone must have most probably put it into words. Finding them, these words, is the only task – given the 'n' number of living languages, the 'y' number of dead languages, and the 'x' number of languages that existed/exist without our knowing anything about it. That leads us to the next quote, which also welled up right now - “All of wisdom is but a translation of the One Spoken Word of God”...I think I'll attribute this one to a Dr. Krishnananda Thomas (The name also suggested itself) … Meanwhile, the ceiling fan has started making odd and disturbing clicking sounds all of a sudden, as if it is also trying to keep time of the bhajan, which has become a tad more vigorous now, with cymbals and bhangra type beats and the unexpected loud chants of 'Jai Mata Di' and such...

I tried to sleep for some time, then got up again... 1.57 am. And they are still going strong. Recollections of some stuff about Ghatotkatchas army in the Mahabharata (Ghatotkatcha was the Pandava Bhima's son by the demon giantess Hidimbi, and he and his legion grew in might as the night advanced, terrorizing the opposition) arise somewhere in my mind, which seems to have its edge taken off by the gentle lulling of sleep on the periphery. I can hear the small voices of the children in the group amplified into big small voices. The pujari must have invited them as guest singers or something...

Sleep tries again, and then gives up as I take a drink of water. It's either them or me, it says, and goes to a corner to sulk, sending a yawn or two reminding me that it is there...I think it'll be 'them' for quite some more time, given the vibes of energy coming from the bhajan, the night is still young for them... Man, the Goddess Mother will be happy when the night is over, bet she'll be looking forward to some sleep – just kidding, for the record, I have no intention of blaspheming, Holy One...

Main to paida hoon maiyya ke pairon mein... I am born at the feet of the Mother... thus they sing now...

And they come to a close of that song.. the chant goes around...'Bole sacche durbar ki...jai'...  Glory to the sincere/true group would be a good translation... anyway, ‘Jaagran’ – I just lived the what I think is the meaning… Goodnight, sleep.

…..................................................

And on it goes. It is now 3.30 in the morning. And after many days, I'm awake at the Brahma Muhurtam, if the technicality of sleeping before waking up is done away with. Finished a Discworld novel in the meantime. Hmmm... I think they're winding up, or atleast turning the speakers down, or perhaps my sleep deprived ears are shutting down. Perhaps I can manage to have a short nap...

A sack of books

I was in the OP with Dr. Raveendran, our speciality doctor who visits every month, when Yogitha announced that my aunt, Chandrika chitta, who had come in yesterday to visit alongwith Vijayan kochachan, had sent something for me through someone who worked at her office. After the patients left, she hauled in a big paper bag filled with books...

I remembered telling my chitta inquiring if I had any books with me to pass the time. When I answered in the not wholly positive, she had nodded her head thoughtfully...

And here I was now, with a collection that had Amitav Ghosh, Paolo Coelho, Arvind Adiga, Ira Pande and John Grisham in it, with lesser known names. There was also James Gleick's 'Chaos', David Frawley's 'Vedantic Meditations', five assorted books on medicine, and a bunch of special edition magazines. (And miraculously, none of these books had been read by me before, which is a rare occurrence, as any random bundle of books that someone gives me has got atleast one volume that I've been through.) My cup runneth over... This, in addition to a complete collection of Terry Pratchett's Discworld Novels that a friend gave me, and a stack of philosophy/management/psychology books that another one passed on... (I was not exactly honest when I answered in the not wholly positive, on hindsight)

They all expect me to read them, and the expectation weighs me down. Detachment is something I have to work on, especially with literature, it has its ill effects. For example, the average student studies when he is having his professional exams (prasutitantra,gynaecology and obstetrics), the confident or the diffident ones go to the cinemas, but I read the Dark Materials Trilogy of Philip Pullman at one stretch, taking breaks only to eat, three days before the exam. (And I got pretty good marks for the subject as well, the thing is, they could have been much better if the poring over books was done to the textbooks.) Procrastination, one chapter at a time – that is what happens with many to-do-now things if I'm reading something I like – 'it can wait until this chapter gets over'... and it becomes worse if it is a series...

Anyway, summer ahead. So much to read, so little time. Never going to be a dull moment when I can find time for a dull moment  with these books around.

The perpetual seminar...

We went to the Santhigiri Center in Bhiwadi today. I was looking forward to it, there was going to be a class held by yours truly, on 'lifestyle disorders'.

On the Sumo driven by Sumit, who seemed to overtake every other car with panache (as much panache as a Tata Sumo can muster) – indeed, only one car passed us during the journey, and it was a Mitsubishi Pajero driven by someone who was in a hurry and a good driver – I listened to Dr. Kiran describe how Bhiwadi was the Next Big Thing, and Poised For Development Unlimited, and of our Potential for Growth.

The center at Bhiwadi is appealing, and I met Dr. Roopa, BSMS there. We went on to the venue. I had prepared over 50 slides for what Dr. Kiran had said was going to be a '30 minute max' presentation, and the setup looked nice, what with the banner and all...

But that was it. The first patient wandered in a good fifteen minutes after the time when the presentation ought to have started. An attendance of one was good, no doubt, but how good was it for a full fledged presentation, with an introduction to Ayurveda and Panchakarma and the works? Not very. So I just gave him a consultation,  prescribed his medicines, put him down for two therapies, and he, as is wont among patients, thanked me and went on his way. This was repeated, patients coming in ones and twos, (thrice in threes); I, Dr. Rajiv and Dr. Roopa conscientiously consulted them thinking it wouldn't do for them to wait as we waited for the others to arrive for the event, and then, they disappeared after their case discussion and medicine prescription, leaving, at any given time, a maximum of 5 people besides us, which was again not a very good number for giving a lecture/class – if they wanted it in the first place. As it is, they would've fancied the consultation over the lecture; it was more personal, it would be over sooner, and they had other stuff to do over the weekend than sit around and wait for the mass to reach the critical limit for starting a conference and then sitting around some more while they were dispensed pearls of wisdom about management of their waistlines and blood pressures.

And that is how I learned somethings I'm going to use elsewhere – whenever you want to organize a presentation, class or a camp, do your groundwork well, and give it good publicity – create a need in your target group if it isn't present. Keep the seminar/presentation after the consultation, that way you can tell the people who consult you to come back at such and such time for a corker of a class which will be really beneficial to them...and if by then, thanks to your charisma, you have built up a rapport with the patient, he or she will come back, or stay back, to hear your words.

We had lunch at one of the Ashram's well wishers' house in the housing colony which had arranged the camp. The guy dabbled in real estate too, and he told us some anecdotes about the property deals around the area. The place has its share of nouveau  rich, who do strange things with all the money that came to them in a short time. One guy built a big pool next to his big house, but the downside was that he didn't know how to swim (he could have learned how, there was a pool by his house, but maybe he didn't notice it...), and the proud waterbody was reduced to being used for washing clothes by its side by the bai...later on, some village astrologer told him that having a hole next to the house was inauspicious, and he had the pool covered up. Much ado about nothing?

And there was this person who built a palace of a house, designed it himself, even. It had no less than eight entrances. Sighs of admiration invoked on seeing the exterior turned into nonplussed expressions when you found out that each entrance, inexplicably, had a toilet cum bathroom right next to it... (not inexplicable, according to our host, who was of the view that the owner wanted a minimum of waste to enter the house, so you had to do your ablutions, all of them, before getting in to the house.)

Doesn't a house get more and more empty the bigger it gets, especially if there are only so many people living in it? Back in Kerala, I'd heard many stories (and seen a few of them) of people doing things like blowing their life savings to build a mansion bigger and better than any other nearby, only when they were finished with it they didn't have money to furnish it, so they took to sleeping on the floor... and an expatriate who built his parents this large two storied house, but his mother, with her arthritic knees, climbed to the first floor two times ever.

Birthday...

Kill the Cake...?

The last time I had cut a cake and celebrated my birthday was when I was in upper kindergarten. I don't have much memory of it now, but I from the ill-preserved photos of that time, I think it was a messy event. It is tradition, apparently, because I found from that fount of all knowledge, Wikipedia (thought, to be fair, it did have the 'citation required' tag) that "In India it's common to rub a piece of cake icing on the face of the birthday person, after the cake has been cut."... one learns new things everyday.

So, the wheel turns and here I was again, dragged out of my cosy cabin and up into the hall to cut a cake while everybody sang and smiled. I have been reticent about celebrating birthdays for a long time now... That's not to say I don't like the barrage of calls, or the expressions in writing - it is always great to hear from friends and family and the servers at orkut, but why celebrate just one birthday, just once an year, when you can celebrate all around the year... One birthday, and 364 Alive days (or un-birthdays, as Lewis Carroll puts it in Through the Looking Glass)...  

Last year, one of the good things that happened on March 5th was that I was home... Not this time around. Feels better, birthdays do, when they're spent with mother, father and sister...

Zen @ Chocolate Puttu

The morning after Holi... I was greeted on the steps of SAV by our receptionist, Yogitha, with a big mound of chocolate. And even before I had finished it, in comes Dinesh with a plate full of the good stuff. Chunks and slabs and scrapings, like the discards of someone who was carving a big chocolate sculpture, and having no use or emotion for these beautiful shapeless pieces he had chipped off, had just given them away...

It was a pile of Toberlone that Dr. Jinzy Jaleel Anzar's father had brought along with him during his visit to Delhi, to spread cheer among its denizens, particularly us. The gross happiness of the city must have increased thanks to all the smiles all around SAV. 

But it was too much of a (very) good thing for the people here. Half an hour later, I was still holding the plate half filled with chocolate chunks with no takers. So I did what I have always wanted to do (since this morning, at least) - eat Swiss Chocolate with Malayalee Puttu (as everyone knows what Malayalee Puttu is, I will explain what Swiss chocolate is - It is chocolate that is particularly delightful to eat and apparently made in  Switzerland, though I'm not sure, perhaps it is outsourced. Malayalee Puttu, on the other hand, can be made anywhere - one of its primary advantages over Swiss Chocolate. All it requires is a steam producing unit and a cylinder to fill in rice/wheat powder that is placed over it; and something to prevent uninterrupted communication between the two )

Wise sayings say that if you are the Master of you Senses, then you can enjoy the whole world, the whole world is here to serve you... As the taste of the chocolate covered Puttu registered in the brain, I reflected how true that was. Cocoa from somewhere, lovingly grown by the Earth, planted and harvested by some nice farmer who sold it to a guy somewhere in Switzerland who had this brilliant technique to make it into rich chocolates; mixed with the steamed rice cake made with joy by Murugan from powdered rice which was one day on a stalk in some lush Indian paddy field, husked, bending the plant that bore it along with its brothers... All of this existed/exists just to provide the taste that I was experiencing now... 

What a smorgasbord of enjoyable experiences this world is! Everyone is a king, with all these senses to serve him, and senses are the ministers, with all these sense-objects to amuse them. And the aggregation of all these sense-objects, visible life, is the ultimate jester, the most intelligent of the lot, which does many    antics in all sort of costumes, all the while silently mocking the senses for their inability to truly comprehend it, to know its hidden parts.

The Chinese Conundrum

Aneesh went home in the evening - one of his grandparents had passed away yesterday, and he wanted to make it in time for the other formalities... (Funerals are one of the reasons for great get-togethers, one of my uncles used to say)... And Samson went to drop him off, after asking me to pick up something for his dinner from the 'mobile' Chinese shop...

And that was how I went to 'Hu-Sho Chinese Restaurant' (I'm not sure if I have the name correct, but it was something that I associated with questions that I would ask a person if I wanted directions to the joint- "show me"... 'show who?'  "Hu-Sho" )... 

It was a magical place...

Inside a..box...okay, a crate...not much larger than your average minivan, at one end there sat a guy who took orders from a horde of hungry people, and rattled out names like 'talumein' and 'hakka-style' and 'dry manchurian'. He was also serving up the food, taking the cash and putting in the sauces with the packed food. Three burners shot up flames around two woks and one big cauldron, and two other guys moved around, chopping, dicing, stirring, garnishing and pouring in gravies to appease the sizzling contents of the pans.

The 'Hu-Sho': Who Sure of what's cooking?

Eatery in the background, eager customer in car in foreground

And from this small setup issued forth a continuous stream of chowmein, fried rice and a whole lot of assorted stuff (I counted 47 items in the menu). Like the inexhaustible quiver of Arjuna and the unending supply of the Akshayapatra, the small refrigerator inside the van, which also doubled as a stand, produced chunks of paneer and pieces of chicken, chopped cabbage and onions. Liquid which looked suspiciously like water (it could have been very clear soup) was poured into one of the woks, and within seconds, it took on the smell and consistency of some kind of soup. They've hid the wands in the ladle handles, I think. While I was waiting, one of the guys had nearly finished cooking something, but the order for it was cancelled. The Chief (wizard) called out a solution. The apprentice who was brandishing the ladle casually added a handful of stuff  that to the untrained eye might seem to have been collected at random from the small piles of matter scattered all around the cooking area, but the measures were perhaps something he had been taught at Magical Potions class. After this, with an idle flick or two of the stirrer, in a move that would do McGonagall proud, he transfigured the Chicken Manchurian into Chicken Something Else...

I got my order just as two guys went into a deep discussion over the pros and cons of ginger chicken over chilly chicken...

And when I left there were more than a dozen people still milling around, some eating, some for take-away... 

They knew Hu-Sho wouldn't run out on them. It would provide... It was magic, after all.

Maybe they should send these Chinese magicians to impoverished countries where they can make huge quantities of food from very little raw material. It would be a better proposal than the ones made now - decreasing defence allocation worldwide to spend some money on hunger first, sharing, loving your neighbour like yourself (okay, that is an old proposal, but Jeesus!, look around you, and tell me how many follow it...)... following common-sense and conscience is so tough... yup, Chinese wizards may be the solution...

Wholly Holi... Holy Holi...

They came from me. 

The moment I heard the knocking on the door, I knew that the game was up. There was nowhere to hide, no time to plan a strategy. 

The knocking grew more persistent. The voices grew louder. They had no need for covertness now, they were taking no prisoners - this was war.

I calmly put on the shirt, its whiteness silently imploring me to pardon it from the atrocity that it would be subject to. But I stayed strong... did the buttons... took a deep breath, savouring the soon-to-be broken stillness... went up to the door...

Prologue:The first of March. Purnima of the Phalguna. Had lazed around after waking up, listened to some songs on the laptop and read a few pdf's. Samson, the accountant who is staying at the same place I am, left early for the SAV to clear up some work, and I had delayed the inevitable further...

There is no escape from Holi... Not once you have been infected with it once. It is one of those things that  memory cells in brain and blood file away under 'long term'. The Holi festivities that we were a part of during my stay in Delhi and Noida are vivid in their detail with the look on the faces of the people when we bombed them with water balloons (If I was a passable artist, I'd have drawn the face of a person who was pillion riding in a scooter that had remarkably not taken a hit till it came below the flats where we stayed and had put up fortress in the terrace - the balloon dropped right between the guys and splattered its colourful contents all over them), the contests to see which 'pichkari' would shoot the farthest from atop the terrace (casualities - again the people on the road below),the screams and the laughter, the dancing, in a nutshell, the absolute fun - all of it still summoned effortlessly from the abyss of memory.

Back to the day...

I opened the door to Aneesh, who promptly smeared pink gulaal on me, and ran inside to reload his empty water gun. Outside, the guys had caught Dr. Kiran (our zonal manager here) who was submitting meekly to the green and red streaking his face. After getting duly covered in all the colors that anyone around could get their hands on, locked up the flat and went out with the guys...

The shirt:After

There was no time for a 'Before' snap

We walked around the Malviya Nagar market, grooving to the beats DJs at the numerous do's were cranking out. What followed was a Holi like any other - rambunctious. (If I didn't know 'rambunctious', I'd have said something longer which better conveyed 'loud, energetic and lacking in restraint'. But because I do know 'rambunctious', and it is a nice word, not using it would be unfair to it). 

Murugan running across the road with a full bucket of water to rectify what was clearly to him an injustice - a group of revelers who were almost dry again... Jinesh getting hit straight in the crotch with a w.b. by a boy in a nearby terrace (who didn't get a hit on anyone or anything else earlier, in dozens of earlier attempts which were cheerfully mocked by us all)... Josil prancing about a tweenage girl outside her house and spraying her with colour below her neck, which she bore resignedly...Shyam rushing upto a small kid in the neighbourhood in a very non-threatening way,(shouting and wind-milling arms and painted with colors that could give a macaw a complex), and the kid rushing into his house crying for his mother... Gopan and Lijo doing crazy stuff... Wiping the color flooded floor of the hospital balcony with Shyam and then rolling Samson on it for good measure... The long walk afterwards through the streets and lanes, the occasional stop for allowing excited kids in the balconies to take potshots or empty their water pistols at us... Drinking Coke amidst the madness... (I was stopped by one group and someone in it poured an entire bucket over me)... We passed parties and ad hoc friend groups who were enjoying their drinks...

The crew over here: L2R,standing: Aneesh, Lijo, Murugan, Josil, Renjith, Me and Shyam

Sitting: Dinesh, Gopan and Jinesh

Behind the camera: Samson

The legends of Holi are many... It is the celebration that heralds the triumph of the devotee over the elements and one of the earliest inadvertent witch-burnings in history (Holika, sister of Hiranyakashyap, was burnt to cinders on the pyre that she had prepared for Prahlada, her protective blanket having been lifted by the wind and the Lord's grace protecting his bhakta)... It is a remembrance of the ever-playful, karmegha-varna Krishna acting jealous of Radha's complexion to get an excuse for rubbing colors on her face... It is a tribute to the courage of Kaamadeva who had to pay the price for arousing passion in Siva by being incinerated with the fire in the Mountain Lords' third eye... 

On the way back, near a park, Samson, I and Aneesh went over to a group that was celebrating... We rubbed the gulaal all over them, then hugged, 'happy holi' going around like a intoxicating hookah... I remember thinking - What a fantastic festival, you need to have this more often. Okay, there is the water problem,  also the environmental and dermatological issues with all the color too, but why don't people just hug others more, let down their defenses and let themselves be hugged too, and know immediately that there is no such thing as a 'cold' person...  And as we walked away, still in the glow of that warmth, I kept checking if we were all there, the colors made us one in face - unrecognizable. Just human.

And there was this small girl of four or five with the prettiest curls and a pichkari nearly as long as her. She and her mother were standing outside their house, and when I stopped besides them, the mother encouraged her to have a go at me, which she did, quite gleefully. I fidgeted a little, (what joy is there in bagging a standing target?), then let it hit me in the chest... Warm water... Considerate folks, they had heated the water before bringing it out for play... 

Back at the SAV, we dispersed to get freshened up, the centre was to be opened on three...

Went back to my place, and had a luxuriant bath, taking my time to scrub away multiple layers of colours and let the skin emerge... The bath after the play is also quite memorable as concerns Holi... Earlier on, when using 'Silver' colours and 'Permanent' colours were usual (now people are into the 'natural' colours thing) it used to take a few days of scrubbing and oil application before people were back looking like themselves again.

Went back to the SAV around three. No OP today, just some therapies...

Back at Kerala, sometimes I sometimes get the feeling that festivals are just another excuse to get drunk, or watch television that would be showing some 'premiere' flicks - what is the difference between Diwali and Ramzan if all you do is watch "Diwali' specials and 'Ramzan' specials? Festivals are a time for both enjoyment and introspection, revisiting history and myth, celebrating victories that have perhaps long since lost their relevance in everything but their capacity to point us to what thought, action and devotion are capable of.

The colours are off, but the smiles linger, and the memories never fade...