And the 17 and 19 year olds...

19 year old (boy) “Bai, darwaja kaayko nai kholela hai?”

I hand over the key to him silently. He is half Nepali. Slit-eyes, creased furthermore owing to sleepiness.

17 year old (girl) “Mujhe de. Chaabi kaunsi hai mujhe pata hai.”

He sliced a sullen glance at her and then at me. He walked away. If looks were knives, we would have been shred into pieces. The sparks were crackling wildly.

For five whole minutes we saw him struggling with the 20 odd keys hanging from the bunch.

19 year old (boy) now irritated “Konsa chaabi hai?”

17 year old (girl) takes the bunch from him silently, selects a key and opens the lock. She turns to me and hands over the key bunch. I open the door and wait for him to enter. 17 year old (girl) is waiting on the other side. We are making an effort to not smile but our eyes say it all.

19 year old (boy) studiously refuses to look at either of us. He keeps his things and walks out. As he passes us his face breaks into a smile but he is trying his best to hide it. He says gruffly “Theek hai, theek hai. Hota hai kabhi kabhi.”

Conversations with a 15 year old

It was in Hindi. What follows is verbatim and transliterated.

"So....what do you plan to do after 10th?"

"I don't know."

"You don't know."

"Yes. My mind has become dumb. It is not speaking to me."

"So how are studies going on?"

"Well. Every morning I wake up early. And when I look out of the window I see the first rays of the sun hit that board over there. Nothing moves. Everything is still. Even the leaves. It looks like a painting."

"Why don't you write about this?"

Looks at me with that sidelong glance. And smiles.

"I tried doing that once. Then I felt - whom am I kidding? Am I intellectual enough to write? And then I stopped."

"What happened to you yesterday? You seemed a little off mood."

"Yesterday? Nothing. There are times when I tend to withdraw. When I've had enough. But today in the meeting. I suddenly saw darkness all around me. I did not like it. This blur. This unknown opaqueness. Its not good."

"It is very necessary to be friends with some people and not rub them the wrong way."

I started. I stared. I asked. "What do you mean?"

"There are times when I get beaten up at school for no rhyme or reason. Bullies just pick me and beat me. Suddenly after some days I come to know that A bhaiya and the rest of the gang have bashed those bullies for having beaten me up. This happens because I make sure that I am cool with all the older guys. R bhaiya should be careful. He should not rub these guys the wrong way."

He hangs around. Inconspicuous. You won't even notice him. Even if he passes and re-passes you a hundred times you won't notice him. He has this slouching strut. He wears low-slung jeans and loose t-shirts with sleeves folded. Or shirts with the first three buttons, unbuttoned :). He is very short, very thin, he has dark brown skin, dark and gleaming like freshly polished virgin wood, he has beautiful expressive brown eyes and a smile that can melt a heart of stone. And when you start talking to him you then realize that he is different from the rest. He is deep. He is profound. He is wise beyond his years.

Why is Preeti not thinking Preeti thoughts???

Clearly there is a miasmatic hoverance around me for some time now. I am leaving a lived life behind me and I’m strangely not reacting strangely to the change. Are my natural or rather predicted reactions hiding behind the hovering hoverance and clouding my “Preeti” thoughts??? Because what I am feeling right now is an exhilaration and a “with arms wide open” kind of freedomish feeling. And what “Preeti” would feel right now would be “oh, will it be all right, will I be all right, will I be ok at work, will I be able to live alone, will I be able to sleep at night…blah blah blooh blooh.” Why is Preeti not thinking like Preeti??

And life also seems to be rewinding. It is scarier than shit scary. There is music, there is the reuniting with dark othernesses (well, I say reuniting, but maybe it was dormant and has risen up and uncoiled itself, like one of those serpents that wait and strike at the right second), there is poetry, there is novelty in work, there is also a kind of crippling responsibility (new place, bills, cleaning sprees, sob sniff) which can be quite hmmmmish but oh well…what the hell… [that rhymed…:-)]

Lots of things are on the agenda. All of them might happen, might not happen. It’s all right. If we get everything we want the fun would cease to exist in our lives. There should be a thirst for ungot things, a drive to get those things, a fire to fight for those things.

OH DAMN… I love life. I love me. I love the earth. I love the otherworld, the never world (so what…I love the idea of it, ok, hmph). I love the nature around me. And I truly truly love you!

Foibles of youthood

Intro:

Two of us were going down M. G. Road. This was when Bangalore was extremely beautiful, with an unpredictably English weather where it would rain suddenly and where grey was actually the colour of the times. M.G. Road was resplendent with the boulevard and Plaza and the cafés. The year was hmmnnn… 1997. R (as she would be known from now on) was riding a Hero Puch and pillioning me. As we rode down, enchanted by the boulevard, we happened to see a vision of handsome manliness on the other side of the road. It was none other than Marc Robinson, fresh from the Alisha Chinai hit (damn, which was that one?). So the coincidence was that just the other day we had been discussing this man and reveling in the fact that he was a Piscean. And now there he was. In all his glory. R turned the bike in the middle of an ongoing traffic (and there was no divider on M. G. Road at that time, mind you). Horns blasted, people swore, abuses galore…but she went on mindlessly deaf, but mindfully focused. There we were on the opposite side parked, waiting and watching him. He came walking down. He’d seen all the commotion and understood what it was for. And as he passed us, his head was bent and there was an enigmatic smile on his face, waiting to break into a laugh. And all we did was gape goggle-eyed at him and watch him till he turned at one of the bends.

Three of us at Fort, Bombay. We were in the vicinity of SNDT. There happened to be this thela wala who was making chai and batata wadas. Hunger pangs were creating a bloody din inside our insides. So we thought we should capitalize on the presence of this God-sent solution to our gastronomical yellings. It also must be understood by all of you that we were at a phase where the dough was sparse to say the least so we had to make do with such alternative alternatives. So there we were holding kaanch ka glasses stuffing our faces with batata wadas (that were extremely delicious, by the by) and a car stopped right in front of us. The door opened and we saw this muscled leg encased in boots and wrapped in well-fitting blue jeans. As our eyes went north wards we saw a beautiful, taut chest and broad shoulders hidden inside this black t-shirt that seemed to have been sewed on to the skin till it became a second skin itself. Further north wards and we FROZE. Arjun Rampal. Yes, there he was. And we stood with chai glasses and mouthful of wadas literally transfixed. I mean, I remember I couldn’t even move. All I did was just stand and stare. Oh well, he smiled at us and imagine our chagrin when we saw Mehr Jessia on the other side of the car. She wasn’t smiling though. Come to think of it, she looked rather miffed. So… we saw him go and sighed at how cruel life could be.

Outro:

I call it a foible. But in actuality it is these little incidents that make it worthwhile going through youthood and living it well. What not have we done when we were young. And how beautiful are all those experiences and events. Every little thing had an enchantment of its own and brought with it a wealth of memories that I still treasure. But if you ask me, I think I would do the same thing even today. I mean if I were to see, say … Ethan Hawke or Ajay Devgan, I might stand and gape goggle-eyed. So there. I feel all of us need to keep the child in us alive forever. Because the wide-eyed wonderment is a feeling that is so divine that it leads to nothing but a happiness that can only be described as pure.

The Identification of Identity

I am Al-Kahira, the conqueror of nonsense and flowers.

I am grateful for my stupidity, admitted easily, yet I am
concerned with specific details of style as I sit here in rags.

By circumstance and not by choice this shrub has blossomed:
by choice and not by circumstance this life has been kept
plain.

I made an effort and found stuff to ignore, leave rusty things
unstruck.
I neglect the spectacular and overlook the apparently
important with deliberation.

I’ve waited aeons for the reversal of my interests: Now life
has become the joke and sweetness and hilarity of my own
thoughts have turned into a fascination for me.

No matter what anyone tells you: I do not belong to any
creed or sect, culture or race, nor to any period in history.

My only qualification is the age of my soul: I own three
palaces of quiet pre-dawn moon sound.

Humiliation is my clothing that I wear to sit and bark with the
dogs. I disconnect like dusk and most likely no one will bring
flowers to my grave.

I am ardent without deed and I am information zero,
unimportant iridescent: Grand Palace of Mercy.

Till now I stayed in one place not avoiding you:
now that the traditions are beginning to dissolve, I
put on my wintercoat and walk away.
Business done.

My contemporaries have declared society to be the central
item and are discussing things of importance as
I am speaking to you now.

As my mother taught me to, I keep to myself a lot.

I am the lover of trees, found worthy of loneliness.

I could be the postman, the milkman, the sick person,
the transvestite.
It takes one to recognize one…

I am the unknown dervish.

St.Scribbler identifies himself with this statement drop-down...and i was mentioning to him that if ever there was a female counterpart to this, i would love to be that (maybe i am, maybe i am not). He is a philosopher and a saint in his own rights apart from being one of the best unpublished writers i've ever read. I got this beautiful piece of literature from him and felt that the poignancy that it is suffused with, like an intoxicating perfume, is so pure and raw. There is also this sufi, off beatish, mystic, vagabondish aura that surrounds it.
Nice. Definitely.

There is something about this man...

I could not forget
But I will not endeavor
Simple pleasures aren't as special
But I wont regret it never.

To the city of mine - WOMBAY

Intro: THE PAST

We are a family of five. My father came to Bombay in the early 60s and so did my mother. They have seen bombay grow and grow and grow. They grew with the city too. On the 9th of July 1978 at around 4:50 am i was born. Out of my mother's womb into another mother's womb - WOMBAY...My childhood i spent with her. She gave me an entire playground to play the game of life. i remember my christian and muslim neighbours celebrating diwali and holi with us. i remember waiting in anticipation for the goodies during christmas and id. i remember travelling alone in local trains and BEST buses late in the nights, being accompanied by wearied sabjiwalis and machchiwalis. we would sit down near the exit in EMPTY local trains, ignoring the seats, letting the wind chill our faces and share a companionable silence. i remember rejoicing the first rains and then alternately cursing it because it would gather strength at the beginning of the academic year. new uniform, newly plastic covered books all a soddy mess. when i left the city and moved to bangalore, i acted as though i was unaffected. well...

Outro: AND NOW

Today the five of us - my family, we sit in front of the television. we watch what is happening in bombay. there are tears in my mother's eyes, in my father's eyes. they are watching the city where they built their dreams and their lives, burn and fight. i wonder why one needs to kill... to state one's case. and whats the point in killing innocent people? and the 100 odd who died - what about their families? what happens to them now? what about children who have lost their fathers and mothers? what about parents who have lost their sons and daughters? what about all those people living in the city unsure about their neighbours, about friends, unsure about their own safety?
and me...i feel sad. i know that loved ones are safe. yet i feel the way a child feels when her mother is not doing too good. this is a city that took care of me and kept me safe. i love her tremendously and i know she will bounce back to her old, raunchy, metrosexual, speed demonish self. but till then...