Thursday, December 21, 2006
lanterns at horniman
Horniman Circle Gardens has always been special to me. The first time I ever went there, I was awed. The gardens are not very big, but they're circular, with four quadrants, and huge trees these large stalks creeping up the sides. I wanted to lie on the grass and stare at the sky, with trees and leaves infringing the frame. We had a performance there. I'd never been to Horniman before, and I was nineteen. But I was - am - bohemian. So, when they were setting up, after we did a dry run (and dry run is correct, seeing as how we were supposed to do the entire play in a tray made of water), and then some of them left to get coffee et al. I elected to stay back, because i decided to draw the trees.
I went back more often then, for the theatre. They held their festival there that year, and me being the youngest and newest volunteer, they pushed me off into the non-troublesome sector. I was supposed to keep an eye on the exhibition, and chill at a bookstore they'd set up there. There were these two boys, who brought us tea from a stall nearby. I remember I read Asterix to them. The bext time ever. Then, we drew what we could, and laughed ourselves silly.
That was two years ago. Last evening, returning from work, I took the outer route walking to the station. Passed the garden, saw the lights. Decided I wanted to go. So there you are.
Tuesday, September 26, 2006
Inside the closed room they sat, their bodies curled, in the shape of foetuses, knees drawn up, hands together in a prayer, chin halfway down to touching their collarbones. Their eyes open, they look at each other unblinkingly.
Inside her eyes, he sees a wealth of nothing. He wonders if he should touch her. Outside the room, the wind chases away its demons, ripping at everything that was stupid enough to remain standing. Like the trees – the tall, tall coconut trees. The rain knocks repeatedly at the walls and maybe it wants to be let in.
He wonders if he should touch her.
The room is closed. There is no light. Were the windows, or the doors open, there would still be none. The storm has chased away light, the people whispered. The pious held on to their beads. In their own houses, inside their own rooms, behind boarded windows and tightly locked doors.
The boy and the girl are not pious. If you were a fly on the wall, you would see that they were scared. Not pious. They sit on the floor, in that empty room, and listen to the sound that travels in through the walls, and worry that the walls will collapse, or that lightning will burn the ceiling down. The girl, she starts rocking back and forth, but her body still has the foetus like form it seems to have adopted.
The boy worries about the girl. Fear seems to have made her hair flat (albeit soft), and her eyes empty. He wants to tell her there isn’t anything to worry about. But he’s so scared himself. With every sound from outside – it is the only sounds he can here – the winds chasing up and down the roads, the rain knocking, knocking, knocking, trying to trick them out into the open – with every sound, his fear grows more real. He is not a coastal boy. Out in the mainland, the storms are not so mammoth.
Between the boy and the girl, there is a candle. It is the only one they have. She pushed it at him an hour ago. It’s only been an hour. He looks at the melting wax, and wonders if it is melting faster than it should. It’s only been an hour since the candle, and he wonders if he should snuff it. But it seems to be all that is keeping him from crying for his mother. It is all that is keeping her in light.
The boy and girl, they are here in this coastal town on a holiday. They are not very old, and their parents are not sure where they are. The boy and the girl, they have run away. The girl has a great aunt, who gave her the keys to her home in the little town, and they took a train and two buses to get there. The boy has some money. The girl got some from her great aunt. Miles away, in the city where they live, the girl’s parents are raging at the great aunt, quite like the storm outside. This is when the boy lit the candle. They are asking her, and very loudly so, what she was thinking, to have let a couple of kids go off like that. And they want to know what they will say to the boy’s parents when they find out that their relative has given the key. That was an hour ago. An hour has passed since, and the great aunt has passed away. A heart attack – her third, and, as doctors will say, fatal. The girl’s mother will continually remain bitter about the fact that the old woman died smiling, and without answering them. The old woman knew a cat, who lives in the neighbourhood, who stalked into her house, looking for some food, and in the way of cats, some company.
At this moment, the cat is curling up in the lap of the dead old woman, who will be found sitting in her chair, in another five minutes, by the girl’s father. He will walk in, alarm the cat, who will jump up on him, scratching his new suit, and then scramble away, and they will never see her again. Because the man did not look at the cat to notice anything distinguishing, so even if he saw her again, he wouldn’t know it was the same cat who ruined his new suit. But he will, to everyone who asks, tell the story of how some crazy cat tried to claw him dead when he was in shock at finding his aunt dead. Truth is, he will be completely clinical about it, and do his duty as her most able living relative. All his life, his wife will resent that. All his life, his daughter will try and ask him about the cat.
At the precise moment that the old woman died, the boy touched the girl. As a touch, it was as chaste as you could get, in today’s day and age. As a touch between this boy and this girl, it was as monumental as it could get, as the boy has never touched the girl. As the old woman’s breath hitches for the last time, in a hiccup like sound, the boy lifts his hand, and passes it from the right side of the candle, and touches her forearm. The girl says nothing, continues to rock, and her eyes are still empty, and still almost unblinking. As the cat enters the old woman’s house, through the window of her living room, and gingerly steps around all those little trinkets that old women collect as a testament to their years, the boy rests his hand on her forearm, and then grips it, a light and comforting grip. The girl stops rocking back and forth. An almost silence settles in the closed room, and the boy holds his breath. The cat purrs, rubbing herself against the open doorway of that room, where the old woman is dead on her favourite chair that facing the window, her body basking in the evening sun. In the closed room, in the sudden hush, the girl looks at the boy, for the first time since the storm started that morning.
The cat, she finds the old woman, rubs her head against the old woman’s feet, in an uncharacteristic moment, gives her left big toe a little lick, and then lithely jumps into the woman’s lap, curls up, and goes to sleep. In the closed room, the boy, and the girl, they sit, in their foetus-like positions. The girl is still, and looking at the boy. The boy is holding her hand, in candle light.
And the devil has stopped knocking on the rooftop.
Inside her eyes, he sees a wealth of nothing. He wonders if he should touch her. Outside the room, the wind chases away its demons, ripping at everything that was stupid enough to remain standing. Like the trees – the tall, tall coconut trees. The rain knocks repeatedly at the walls and maybe it wants to be let in.
He wonders if he should touch her.
The room is closed. There is no light. Were the windows, or the doors open, there would still be none. The storm has chased away light, the people whispered. The pious held on to their beads. In their own houses, inside their own rooms, behind boarded windows and tightly locked doors.
The boy and the girl are not pious. If you were a fly on the wall, you would see that they were scared. Not pious. They sit on the floor, in that empty room, and listen to the sound that travels in through the walls, and worry that the walls will collapse, or that lightning will burn the ceiling down. The girl, she starts rocking back and forth, but her body still has the foetus like form it seems to have adopted.
The boy worries about the girl. Fear seems to have made her hair flat (albeit soft), and her eyes empty. He wants to tell her there isn’t anything to worry about. But he’s so scared himself. With every sound from outside – it is the only sounds he can here – the winds chasing up and down the roads, the rain knocking, knocking, knocking, trying to trick them out into the open – with every sound, his fear grows more real. He is not a coastal boy. Out in the mainland, the storms are not so mammoth.
Between the boy and the girl, there is a candle. It is the only one they have. She pushed it at him an hour ago. It’s only been an hour. He looks at the melting wax, and wonders if it is melting faster than it should. It’s only been an hour since the candle, and he wonders if he should snuff it. But it seems to be all that is keeping him from crying for his mother. It is all that is keeping her in light.
The boy and girl, they are here in this coastal town on a holiday. They are not very old, and their parents are not sure where they are. The boy and the girl, they have run away. The girl has a great aunt, who gave her the keys to her home in the little town, and they took a train and two buses to get there. The boy has some money. The girl got some from her great aunt. Miles away, in the city where they live, the girl’s parents are raging at the great aunt, quite like the storm outside. This is when the boy lit the candle. They are asking her, and very loudly so, what she was thinking, to have let a couple of kids go off like that. And they want to know what they will say to the boy’s parents when they find out that their relative has given the key. That was an hour ago. An hour has passed since, and the great aunt has passed away. A heart attack – her third, and, as doctors will say, fatal. The girl’s mother will continually remain bitter about the fact that the old woman died smiling, and without answering them. The old woman knew a cat, who lives in the neighbourhood, who stalked into her house, looking for some food, and in the way of cats, some company.
At this moment, the cat is curling up in the lap of the dead old woman, who will be found sitting in her chair, in another five minutes, by the girl’s father. He will walk in, alarm the cat, who will jump up on him, scratching his new suit, and then scramble away, and they will never see her again. Because the man did not look at the cat to notice anything distinguishing, so even if he saw her again, he wouldn’t know it was the same cat who ruined his new suit. But he will, to everyone who asks, tell the story of how some crazy cat tried to claw him dead when he was in shock at finding his aunt dead. Truth is, he will be completely clinical about it, and do his duty as her most able living relative. All his life, his wife will resent that. All his life, his daughter will try and ask him about the cat.
At the precise moment that the old woman died, the boy touched the girl. As a touch, it was as chaste as you could get, in today’s day and age. As a touch between this boy and this girl, it was as monumental as it could get, as the boy has never touched the girl. As the old woman’s breath hitches for the last time, in a hiccup like sound, the boy lifts his hand, and passes it from the right side of the candle, and touches her forearm. The girl says nothing, continues to rock, and her eyes are still empty, and still almost unblinking. As the cat enters the old woman’s house, through the window of her living room, and gingerly steps around all those little trinkets that old women collect as a testament to their years, the boy rests his hand on her forearm, and then grips it, a light and comforting grip. The girl stops rocking back and forth. An almost silence settles in the closed room, and the boy holds his breath. The cat purrs, rubbing herself against the open doorway of that room, where the old woman is dead on her favourite chair that facing the window, her body basking in the evening sun. In the closed room, in the sudden hush, the girl looks at the boy, for the first time since the storm started that morning.
The cat, she finds the old woman, rubs her head against the old woman’s feet, in an uncharacteristic moment, gives her left big toe a little lick, and then lithely jumps into the woman’s lap, curls up, and goes to sleep. In the closed room, the boy, and the girl, they sit, in their foetus-like positions. The girl is still, and looking at the boy. The boy is holding her hand, in candle light.
And the devil has stopped knocking on the rooftop.
Thursday, September 07, 2006
Chronology of female love. (for G, the Wiser.)
when i was younger, they said love was easy.
they said love comes to everyone, because there is someone for everyone.
they walked in gaggles of giggles, and they gossiped about the people on tv. no, not the detectives, or the single women fighting battles in men's worlds, but the rich families where everyone slept with everyone else, in the pretext of looking for love. that was when they believed that love was a thing of forever, and sometimes those sluts who looked for love in everyone's bed, or on everyone's couches, or everyone's kitchen tables, saunas, boardrooms or balconies, well, just sometimes, they got in the way of love.
that was also when their hackles went up, and they got so offended, when the pimply faced class hero, touted to be the next, and most successful sports captain, went up to one of their dreamy, pretty selves, loved and adored like rockstars, and proposed his undying love.
at that time, all of us - the class hero, the girl he claimed to love, who sensationally slapped him for his forwardness, her adoring gaggle, and the rest of us who usually watched their antics wide-eyed - we believed him when he said he'd love her forever.
a few years passed, and they all wondered if it was a bit of a war. some of them were still the adoring gaggles, but some others had become the adored, with everyone including the geeks and the sidekicks turning to look as they passed. but the class heroes (yes, there were more'n one, and of course, they were best friends) now no longer got slapped. and their pimples soon disappeared, and they read out poetry they wrote, about their infatuations, for girls they met at the swimming pool. the sidekicks too, got lovesick letters, and there were loudly exclaimed "ewwww's" when the senders were discovered. that was when my uncle, he pulled me aside one family evening, and sternly forbade me from accepting anything shaped like a rose or a heart. i do believe it was the 13th of february, and he considered his advice fair warning.
eventually, we got past the back stabbing, and the boyfriend stealing, and the unanswered questions, and finished school. we all believed then, that now, love would be easy. and love would come to everyone, because it's a big world out there, with more than the 20 boys in class, and more importantly, the 10 acceptable ones.
that was when we lived on wishful thinking, and believed we would be friends forever. eventually we grew up, and stopped talking. eventually, we grew into sheep, or into individuals, and eventually, we had nothing to say to each other over coffee. except reminiscing about who we loved, and how we loved.
no one talked about anything current. except the headgirl of our year who will eventually marry the house prefect she was seeing since back then. it was accepted, and understood, that if you were happy in a relationship then, well, it wasn't going to last, because there really were many many boys in school, and now that you're in the big world, there were only some, because now, more than ever, it applied that there was someone for everyone.
we fell in love, we thought, when we didn't have a choice. we handpicked for ourselves, our personal objects of attraction. we teased, and we taunted, and we turned coy like fucking ingenues. we thought we were so bleeding original. we thought we were the cat's whiskers, until they broke our hearts. or we grew tired of them. there was only so coffee, and hanging in canteens that we could bear before fickleness overtook and our gaze looked elsewhere even as we proclaimed undying love.
then came the rare specimen, and lust hit like a sucker punch in the gut, and we were left all but gagging, at whatever drew us most. soon, the source of attraction shifted base to the mind. there were friends, brothers, who we'd adore - one for his body, the other for his mind. and eventually, we'd put out for the mind. we would want to talk for ages, we would get breathless, with the theories, and the philosophy, and the all out war on capitalist madness, while we still thought us to be silly, and female, and mush-brained in comparison.
we built our worlds around them, those who lured us with their minds, who controlled our thoughts with their words, and only because we let them. we weren't those pea-brained blondes we claimed to be sometimes, but for them, we'd be that. we'd do that. we'd put them on that pedestal, where they could do no harm, and set them up for a fall. we'd think them flawless, incapable of doing any wrong, and they never even asked that of us. we'd let tiny slip-ups pass, covering up for their god-like status, unwilling to disappoint ourselves. we never realised they hadn't asked for us to call them gods. aye, and did we not love them, for having settled their gaze upon flawed creatures such as ourselves? and thus we set us up for another fall, because when they made that one mistake that mattered the most, we could never understand how we could still love those that had fallen from grace.
but we moved on, because most times, we didn't really love them, just worshipped them, for to love, is to see, and understand flaws that exist in most of us.
so we got a little wiser, and we moved on, and we pulled on our armour a little tighter.
for what is love, if not fighting all battles.
they said love comes to everyone, because there is someone for everyone.
they walked in gaggles of giggles, and they gossiped about the people on tv. no, not the detectives, or the single women fighting battles in men's worlds, but the rich families where everyone slept with everyone else, in the pretext of looking for love. that was when they believed that love was a thing of forever, and sometimes those sluts who looked for love in everyone's bed, or on everyone's couches, or everyone's kitchen tables, saunas, boardrooms or balconies, well, just sometimes, they got in the way of love.
that was also when their hackles went up, and they got so offended, when the pimply faced class hero, touted to be the next, and most successful sports captain, went up to one of their dreamy, pretty selves, loved and adored like rockstars, and proposed his undying love.
at that time, all of us - the class hero, the girl he claimed to love, who sensationally slapped him for his forwardness, her adoring gaggle, and the rest of us who usually watched their antics wide-eyed - we believed him when he said he'd love her forever.
a few years passed, and they all wondered if it was a bit of a war. some of them were still the adoring gaggles, but some others had become the adored, with everyone including the geeks and the sidekicks turning to look as they passed. but the class heroes (yes, there were more'n one, and of course, they were best friends) now no longer got slapped. and their pimples soon disappeared, and they read out poetry they wrote, about their infatuations, for girls they met at the swimming pool. the sidekicks too, got lovesick letters, and there were loudly exclaimed "ewwww's" when the senders were discovered. that was when my uncle, he pulled me aside one family evening, and sternly forbade me from accepting anything shaped like a rose or a heart. i do believe it was the 13th of february, and he considered his advice fair warning.
eventually, we got past the back stabbing, and the boyfriend stealing, and the unanswered questions, and finished school. we all believed then, that now, love would be easy. and love would come to everyone, because it's a big world out there, with more than the 20 boys in class, and more importantly, the 10 acceptable ones.
that was when we lived on wishful thinking, and believed we would be friends forever. eventually we grew up, and stopped talking. eventually, we grew into sheep, or into individuals, and eventually, we had nothing to say to each other over coffee. except reminiscing about who we loved, and how we loved.
no one talked about anything current. except the headgirl of our year who will eventually marry the house prefect she was seeing since back then. it was accepted, and understood, that if you were happy in a relationship then, well, it wasn't going to last, because there really were many many boys in school, and now that you're in the big world, there were only some, because now, more than ever, it applied that there was someone for everyone.
we fell in love, we thought, when we didn't have a choice. we handpicked for ourselves, our personal objects of attraction. we teased, and we taunted, and we turned coy like fucking ingenues. we thought we were so bleeding original. we thought we were the cat's whiskers, until they broke our hearts. or we grew tired of them. there was only so coffee, and hanging in canteens that we could bear before fickleness overtook and our gaze looked elsewhere even as we proclaimed undying love.
then came the rare specimen, and lust hit like a sucker punch in the gut, and we were left all but gagging, at whatever drew us most. soon, the source of attraction shifted base to the mind. there were friends, brothers, who we'd adore - one for his body, the other for his mind. and eventually, we'd put out for the mind. we would want to talk for ages, we would get breathless, with the theories, and the philosophy, and the all out war on capitalist madness, while we still thought us to be silly, and female, and mush-brained in comparison.
we built our worlds around them, those who lured us with their minds, who controlled our thoughts with their words, and only because we let them. we weren't those pea-brained blondes we claimed to be sometimes, but for them, we'd be that. we'd do that. we'd put them on that pedestal, where they could do no harm, and set them up for a fall. we'd think them flawless, incapable of doing any wrong, and they never even asked that of us. we'd let tiny slip-ups pass, covering up for their god-like status, unwilling to disappoint ourselves. we never realised they hadn't asked for us to call them gods. aye, and did we not love them, for having settled their gaze upon flawed creatures such as ourselves? and thus we set us up for another fall, because when they made that one mistake that mattered the most, we could never understand how we could still love those that had fallen from grace.
but we moved on, because most times, we didn't really love them, just worshipped them, for to love, is to see, and understand flaws that exist in most of us.
so we got a little wiser, and we moved on, and we pulled on our armour a little tighter.
for what is love, if not fighting all battles.
Wednesday, July 12, 2006
sillybabyboy
family, it's a strange one. one half's too good for the other, the other halfs too good for the first. in their own heads they make up these demarcations. in leading their own lives they're so pure. my nephew is a few months old, and i hate his name. i whisper in his ear that it's not his name, no his name is something else. sometimes, i whisper his name in his ear, and he gives me his favourite kind of smile. the blubbery smile. other than my cat and my ex-boss's dog and his puppies, this is the first baby i willingly held, and did not whack. be that as it may, the little bugger was playing "whack the lens" with me. come too close, he reaches with stubby baby unco ordinated fingers to grab the lens seeking some kind of focus and kills every intention of focus, mister blubber man.
Saturday, July 08, 2006
Ashaadi Ekadashi
People consider the 11th days of each fortnight (approximately) extremely important, in religious fashion. The eleventh day of Ashaad (June-July, according to the Hindu calendar) is given special importance, known as the Mahaekadashi (Maha = big, great). In a small town called Pandharpur, on the banks of the river Bhima, scores of devotees of Vithoba, an avatar of Vishnu, pour in from all over the country (though mostly just Maharashtra), for a great festival celebrating the defeat of the demon Mrudumanya. Mrudumanya, it is said, prayed so long and so well, that Lord Shiva, pleased with his devotion agreed to give him whatever he wanted, even if it was a power to defeat and conquer all gods including the great Shiva himself. Throughout Indian mythology, one sees Shiva empower all sorts of demons, almost as if giving that mythology a raison d'etre. Eventually, of course, the gods created a woman, Shakti, for she alone would kill the demon. Shakti is Ekadashi, and the fast of Ekadashi is in remembrance of the vow that we pledge to her, so she will be enticed to save the world from destruction and evil.
In Pandharpur, on the Ashaadi Ekadashi, Lord Vitthal (Vishnu's avatar) went to visit Pundalik, a sage, who, at that particular moment, was massaging his parents' feet. Pundalik throws a brick, tells Vithoba to wait on the brick, and lo and behold we have a pilgrimage town made out of Pandharpur. This is how they workde on the tourism industry in the before-dark ages.
Now, the fall out of this is, if you can't get yourself to Pandharpur, but you have a city, and more importantly, a railway station, all for your convenience, you work it. Yesterday, about 150 people gathered at the Churchgate station, waving flags, chanting, singing, playing music - all devotional ok? - and of course, asking all and any to make a donation. All in all, fun stuph.
Saffron is commonly known as the colour of Hinduism. Flags ahoy.
Donations welcome.
All in a day's prayer.
In Pandharpur, on the Ashaadi Ekadashi, Lord Vitthal (Vishnu's avatar) went to visit Pundalik, a sage, who, at that particular moment, was massaging his parents' feet. Pundalik throws a brick, tells Vithoba to wait on the brick, and lo and behold we have a pilgrimage town made out of Pandharpur. This is how they workde on the tourism industry in the before-dark ages.
Now, the fall out of this is, if you can't get yourself to Pandharpur, but you have a city, and more importantly, a railway station, all for your convenience, you work it. Yesterday, about 150 people gathered at the Churchgate station, waving flags, chanting, singing, playing music - all devotional ok? - and of course, asking all and any to make a donation. All in all, fun stuph.
Saffron is commonly known as the colour of Hinduism. Flags ahoy.
Donations welcome.
All in a day's prayer.
Friday, July 07, 2006
lamp study
lamp study, originally uploaded by mycrotchetyluv.
just messing with my cane lamp outside my window, needed to blow off some steam. it's not that every picture actually says something. except that the bulb may possibly just die. very very soon.
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