A Mumbai Reprise

Mumbai. My muse. My city. My home, always. Mumbai, where I come from.

Enjoy my latest publication, which is an ode to the maximum city

Mumbai Reprise

Where I come from

Street after street

Stands silent witness

To the constant triumph

Of Darwinian principles

Where I come from

Dreams burn in a cauldron

And the ashes disperse

In the waiting arms

Of a moonlit sea

Where I come from

The greatest steal

Is a few feet of space

The greatest prize

A few quarantined thoughts

Where I come from

There’s beauty still

And a pulse that never

Subsides, late into the

Smoggy arms of night

Where I come from

Your constant companions

Amidst the teeming hordes

Are an ascending emptiness

And a clandestine pain

Where I come from

(sigh) Where I came from

I wander still, in my dreams

A city of penitent angels

A city of cavalier djinns

A Morning Song

I heard the morning song;
Stiff notes stretching
Their sinuous arms

Dawn races those

Who are racing it 

To beat it to coffee

Critters, birds sing hymns

Light filters through
"Aarush" carries 

The blessing of "Ushas"

Aarush - first ray of the sun

Ushas - Hindu deity of the morning, dawn

The Flight Of The Monarch Butterflies

Taking a break from writing short stories to publish a poem in this month's Spark magazine. The theme for the month was 'Journeys' and the poem draws upon the journey of a monarch butterfly, a creature that has always fascinated me, and its contrast with that of humans. Read on.

http://www.sparkthemagazine.com/?p=6858

The Flight Of The Monarch Butterflies

Each year it happens this way

Each year those million monarchs

Are born, sprout wings, and fly off

To a warm place, a continent away

Something living goes there, puts down its luggage

Collapses on the bed, kicks off its shoes

Orders room service, hatches some progenies

And then without apology, promptly dies

A life with no correction,

No retraction, no redemption

No reset, no egress

No nostalgia, no regrets

We too could be monarchs

We too could journey with no return

Never turn to wonder at ‘what if’

Never have a chance to go back

And yet, nature’s scripts for us differ

Not for us the singular sense of purpose

Our journeys are bound to a leash

Our future tied to the past

Fly, O Monarch, fly to your tenacious end

We fly forward only to look back

We travel in circles, in our hearts

Our beginnings married to our end

Why I Hate Helium

This story dates back more than two decades. I was coming to the end of my twelve glorious years at my school. Jack of all trades, master of some. The mastery did not rear its head on the athletics field too much, though I could hit a mean cover drive and defend my stumps with the ferocity and tenacity of Tipu Sultan. I was considered to be among the lot that did well at extra-curricular activities not involving sports. Writing, debating, you know the works. To my horror and I am sure to that of everyone in the school at 7.25 am each morning who heard it, I was also part of the school prayer group that trudged to the principal's office and sang the glory of Goddess Saraswati and the like each morning through a solitary microphone. Quizzing however wasn't one of those activities. In fact, quizzing wasn't an activity at all in my school, the best I can remember. We seemed to have skipped the ability to do simple question and answers in my alma mater. So it came as a complete surprise when my first official quiz was to be not in the school premises or that of another. It was meant to be on the All India Radio. Yes, our good old AIR, of Vividh Bharati and cricket commentaries in Hindi. I don't know how it was arranged, but arranged it was, and me, of the extra-curriculars fame was picked from the three divisions along with my very good friend Mohit to represent the school. Why us? Maybe we could name more states in the Indian Union than others or knew a little more about the basics of physics than others. Or, more importantly, we conveyed the impression that we did.

So, there we were, packed off with our school librarian to the AIR recording studio. I think it was in Prabhadevi. I was expecting a fierce round of competition there. Tough teams from all the top schools in Bombay (which is what it was then). I had fresh memories from a disappointing performance at a Hindi debate competition I had participated in at the Jamnabhai Narsee School. The winner was clearly leagues ahead of me and a lot of the other competitors there. With that in mind and with no experience in quizzing, I wasn't sure how this could ever end well. We waited, and we waited some more and the teams arrived. Correction, a team arrived. It was from the Cannossa High School in Andheri (E). A couple of girls trudged in with their teacher. Was this it? Did the rest just now show up in fear? I was willing to believe that narrative. What's more, of the two girls, one was in the 7th grade. We might as well have collected our prize and gone home.

We were waiting nervously in a lobby waiting to be called inside. A classical singer came out alaap-ing with passion. We were ushered in. A round table awaited us. Microphones were kept there. The quizmaster asked us our names. I dug deep and came out with the heaviest baritone I could manage. Parth Pandya, I said. Can you say it one more time? Parth Pandya. Aah, I see. Welcome.

Now there are two types of quizzes. There is trivia and there is the kind where the question is phrased as a clue. For eg. you could ask the question 'Who is the highest run-getter in the history of test cricket?' or you could ask the question 'Which cricketer born in the great city of Mumbai, was once compared by the great Don to himself and was named after the famous music director S.D. Burman?' The answer to the two would be the same: Sachin Tendulkar. The latter, more refined form of quizzing, wasn't something I was introduced to until I got to my engineering college. This quiz on AIR was just that - trivia. Either you knew or you didn't.

The rounds started and the questions came flying thick and fast. There were some about dinosaurs and some about history, some about geography and some about inventions. The answers came, in fits and starts. Some from us, some from the girls. It was't the cakewalk I was expecting it to be. In a few minutes, we forgot all about the fact that we were recording for the radio or that this was a setting very alien to us. Quizzing, after all, is all about ego. Let no quizzer tell you otherwise. Knowing an answer or cracking a clue gives most of us to that moment of finite glory, and we savor it.

The rounds went on, the figdeting in seats continued, until the quizmaster (or radio personality, or both) told us duly that the last round was coming up. The scores were tied - the contest down to the wire. There were four questions left, and like boxers punching and counter-punching, we took our turns. They got two, we got one. This wasn't happening. We were losing. To a team with a kid two grades lower than us. This was it. The moment of reckoning. The moment where the collective intellect of Bhavans A.H. Wadia High School was to rise spectacularly and save the day. The fingers were on the virtual buzzer (I think it was just raising the hand to get to answer first then) and raring to go. For broke.

"What is the lightest metal?"

"Helium", blurted out an inexperienced quizzer

"No", shouted his partner

The ship had sunk. The gas, though, would have escaped! 

I sank my head in my hands. The battle was lost. In the coming years, I would quiz again. I would win. In quizzes and places far more challenging than this. I would start quiz clubs where I would see others participate in this shared joyous activity. But I came to hate helium from the bottom of my heart that day and it hasn't changed since. The unbearable heaviness of being a quizzer that lost his first quiz thanks to his faith in his eager ears and a gas most foul (well, I'll grant that it is odorless) stays with me till date. Some day, there will be a quiz question with my name on it; I'll go for it because my gut says it is the right answer and the right answer will be Helium. Maybe then, I'll get closure.

Niloufer's Birthday

Happy to share my latest publication in Spark. Their topic for the month was 'She'. I am excited to share my short story, set in a Parsi house, about a woman whose presence permeates the air even when is not there physically. Read on.

http://www.sparkthemagazine.com/?p=6783

Niloufer's Birthday

“Her shoes. I married her for her shoes”, Ardeshir said, his hands leaning on the table.

The ten-year-old boy was toying around with his fork when his grandfather’s statement made him stop.

“Shoes, Bapawajee?” asked a wide eyed Cyrus.

Ardeshir smiled and looked to the wall.  A young Parsi girl dressed in the fashion of the sixties, mounting a Mona Lisa smile, smiled back at him in black and white. His wife. His Niloufer.
He had sought out Niloufer before they got married. Spent time around where she lived, stalked her at her college, slipped in notes to her, and finally mustered the courage to ask her out on a date. At least, that’s what kids would have called it today. Back then, he simply scribbled a few words on a chit of paper, asking her to meet at Bandra bandstand at 4 pm on Sunday. That she came was a surprise for him. That she spoke to him was beyond his wildest imagination. Niloufer had saved him from the curse of solitude, for it would have been none other for him.

“Jawa dene dikra, you won’t understand”

“Pleaseeeeeee Bapawajee”, insisted Cyrus.

His mother Kainaz gave Cyrus a stern look which made the boy go silent.

“How’s it tasting, Pappa?” she asked, changing the topic to the dhansak she had made for the evening.

“It’s good. It’s good”, nodded Ardeshir vehemently.

“I have to thank Mamma for teaching me this. I remember the first time I tried it after I married Rustom. I don’t think my mother’s dhansak was a patch on this.”

Rustom raised his eyebrows a little, looking up from his plate and smiling mischievously at his wife. “I love the bonhomie, my dear wife. I wonder if your memories of your early days in this house are a bit clouded. You and Ma rarely agreed on anything, remember?”

“Who hasn’t disagreed with your mother? Maybe not you, you Mamma’s boy”, replied Kainaz.

Ardeshir stopped to look around his house. Sixty years he had lived here, but there were two chapters to his life here. The second had begun after he had met her in Bandra that fateful afternoon. They got married six months later.

He remembered it as clear as day. She, a resplendent bride, in her saree. He, the reticent groom, in his jama-pichori. They sat opposite each other, separated by a cloth curtain. The priest placed his right hand in hers. He then fastened them with raw twist, which he put around the hands seven times. That girl was inextricably tied to him for life.

“Are you back in the sixties again, Pappa?” asked his daughter Khushnum gruffly.

Ardeshir looked at his daughter gently. She had an anger that he could never assuage. An anger that always simmered on the surface.

“I think you could grant me that today, couldn’t you, Khush?”

“Why this ritual each year, Pappa? Why this need to talk about her? Why take your family down this memory lane? Not everyone has fond recollections of days past!”

“She is the tie that binds us. We gather to celebrate her, Khush. Not every story has a happy ending, but for you to say that there are no fond recollections of your mother is disingenuous.”

Cyrus shifted uneasily in his seat, not understanding the discussion going on, but fully aware of a sense of tension pervading the room.

“She may be the love of your life, and she may be Rustom’s favorite parent and she maybe Kainaz’s hero, but I don’t worship the ground she walks on.”

“Khush!” said Rustom, finding his own voice rising.

“Now you speak up, big brother”, Khushnum continued, sarcasm dripping from her tongue. “Where were you when your mother, our mother, was messing with my life?”

“I didn’t agree with her Khush. I didn’t side with her, but I respected her choice, just as I respected yours. You could have done what you pleased. Walked away to a life of your choice”

“That’s easy for you to say. My own mother opposed me, my father was not willing to support me, my brother remained silent through it, my sister-in-law …. Forget it!”

Kainaz was waiting for the time she would be dragged into this conversation. “We all have our reasons, Khush!”

“But of course Kainaz. Why would you go against your mother-in-law? Why would you ever go against a woman who accepted you despite your weakness for getting pregnant before you got married?”

“Khush!” shouted Rustom with more fervor, barely containing himself from slapping her. Ardeshir’s face turned to stone – he was shocked at the words and worried about their effect.

Kainaz was stunned at that utterance from Khushnum. Never since the wedding had this topic been brought up in the house. She thought that everyone had accepted the past and moved on. She was wrong. Hurt ran deep in this house.

Khushnum realized she had crossed the line. The wound had been inflicted and she now felt overcome with guilt. Quietly slumping into a chair in the corner of the room, all she could do was mutter “sorry” under her breath to anyone who was still in a position to listen.

Kainaz was shedding gentle tears in her chair. She thought of the woman who had accepted her with open arms when she and Rustom had timidly stood before her, with Ardeshir telling them that they had committed a mistake. Ardeshir was not willing, but Niloufer had convinced him that it was the right thing to do.

Rustom paced around the room with his head down, willing himself to calm down. His mother was the one who had always helped put a lid on his temper. He missed the cool comfort of her voice, the way she held him as a child when he would cry out with nightmares, the friend he confessed to even when he was in college. He admired his father, but loved his mother. She was the parent he preferred. Today, he needed her more than ever.  He was mad at Khushnum but was also sympathetic to her plight. He finally walked over to her and placed a hand on her shoulder.
Khushnum looked up to him with pleading eyes, begging for understanding. “If she could allow you, why not me?”

She was in her teens when she had fallen in love with a Maharashtrian boy, who lived just outside their Dadar Parsi colony. Niloufer, for all her liberal attitudes, was staunch in her stance. Parsi girls should not marry outside their religion. Khushnum had pleaded, protested, tried everything to convince her, but failed in doing so. She had considered running away and marrying that boy, but couldn’t bring herself to abandon her family. She remained back, and the hurt festered within her.

“Because she was flawed. Because she loved you.”

Khushnum raised her teary eyes and looked to the balcony. She recalled sitting in the warm summer evenings with her mother in the balcony, enjoying the light breeze that filtered through the concrete jungle. It had always been an easy relationship, no matter what they said about mothers having testy times with their teenage daughters. It was never meant to change. And yet, she had gone from loving her mother to hating her. But she never could build indifference towards her, no matter how hard she tried.

The ghost of Niloufer hovered in the room, filling the silences that stood between them. Niloufer was gone. Lost to the family that mourned her, celebrated her, reviled her, loved her. Each year, they gathered together on this day. Each year, Niloufer brought them together even when she wasn’t there.

“Cyrus? Do you still want to know about why I married her for her shoes?” said Ardeshir, acting oblivious to the storm that had passed.

“Yes, Bapawajee”, said Cyrus meekly.

“I was nervously waiting for your grandmother the first time we were supposed to meet. When she arrived, the first thing I noticed were her shoes. She was wearing flats instead of heels. I knew right then that this woman was caring and understanding.”

Before Cyrus phrased another question, Ardeshir clarified with a smile. ”She didn’t want me to look too short.”

He then looked up to the picture on the wall and muttered, “Happy birthday, Niloufer!” 

A February Morning Surprise

Sharing my latest publication in Spark, in their issue themed on romance. What happens when a husband decides to surprise his wife by writing a love letter to her one fine morning? Read on.

http://www.sparkthemagazine.com/?p=6708

A February Morning Surprise

Dear Wife,

It feels strange to be writing this letter. In this day and age where the art of coaxing a pen into conversing with a piece of paper are over, my purchase of a fountain pen feels anachronistic. We talk each day, we text each day, instant message and there is also the occasional e-mail. I thought I would write to you this time – literally. What I can’t express in words, I’ll express in words. Just not the spoken kind. The handwritten kind. I know you would never see this coming. A surprise hidden in plain sight!

How long have we been married now? I know the math and can tell the number of years, but it feels much longer than that. We were living together a day before we got married and continued to live together the day after. We split our chores and had our fights. We went to work and found time and means to unwind. We spent most of our time talking about the mundane while squeezing in just enough to talk about things that were special. We were romantic with each other, we were harsh to each other, we couldn’t stay without one another, we couldn’t stand each other. What was true on the day of the marriage remains true more than a decade later.

Love isn’t the charm that leaps out of pages of a novel. Love isn’t the rose tinted promise in commercials. Love is languorous and laborious. A work in progress, an investment of emotions. We didn’t know that then. We know that now. The tedium of this discovery takes us away from the obvious ways in which we remain special to one another. Between our jobs and kids and pressures of mortgage and family and uncertainty over the future, it is easy to lose sight of the large picture. We made it this far. We made it together.

It is said that after marriage, love gets stronger and the arguments longer. We certainly have our disagreements and there are certain things which have a dead end. We have hurt each other many a time trying to find a way through the morass. The important thing, we need to remind ourselves, that we have the power to hurt each other but we also have the power to forgive.

Lest you think that this is a sermon on the ways of love, rest assured that the intent isn’t that. All that heavy pondering that goes on in my mind remains dormant for the most part. What swims up to the surface are the little things that go towards making the little puzzle that is us. The million reasons we should be together can easily be countered by the other million where we shouldn’t be. What strange elements we bring to the table! One person’s fiery attitude is met with another’s calmness, one person’s determination met by another’s laziness, one person’s good looks met by another person’s better looks. One person’s penchant for spice met by another’s inclination towards sweet. The sum of our characteristics might likely cover the entire range of human emotion.

We are dissimilar, but drawn together as if by a rubber string the moment one tries to deviate too much. You will find that I do the bed exactly the way you like it though I think it is extraneous. You’ll tolerate my dulcet (ok, I’ll admit harsh) tones just because you don’t want me to interrupt my singing. If we were alike, we would have imploded, so perhaps the difference is a blessing in disguise.

No matter what, the one thing that I will pride myself at all times is my ability to surprise you. Like the time when we were dating and I drove five hundred miles to show up at your doorstep. Or this rather unexpected letter you are now holding. Written without rhyme, reason or occasion. Here’s to many more years of togetherness and surprises.

Love
Your husband

*************

Dear husband

It must be that time of the year when the scent of perfumed paper riddles the air. It must have been that since I can’t imagine how one wafted in from our bedroom. Perhaps a little paper plant made its way surreptitiously. Like you did, into my life. How many years has it been? I think we both know the answer to that.  But I know that perhaps you’d want to skip the actual number. It would remind us both of how old we are.

When is the last time I wrote a letter? Actually, it was only last week. I wrote a long letter to my grandfather, replete with several references to our kids and what they are up to. The love of our lives, those two devils. Thinking of my grandfather took me back to the time you had come home for the first time for the formal introduction to my family. Do you remember it? You waltzed into the room like you owned it, crossing one leg over the other, putting your hand across the sofa as if you frequented that place often. Do you remember my telling you that it stunned the family and how you thought it was a stupendous success that you managed to do that? Now that I think of it, you probably interpreted their being stunned as thanking their unbelievable luck. I think that interpretation might have been a little left of centre. Not that it matters anymore. What matters is that you and I are together and haven’t been stunned by our luck, simply pleased with it. There is no one else my parents would have had mild disapproval of that I’d rather be with.

We look at life in different ways. You are about the grand vision. I am about the minute details. You are the person who would rather write a ten year vision statement than rearrange the books in the library to make more sense (Having ‘The Da Vinci Code’ next to ‘Metamorphosis’ seems like a tad too generous on Dan Brown). I notice the things you don’t. On the brighter side, I also notice that the things that you do in fact do. That little effort you put into doing the smallest things for me perks up my day and makes me love you more.

Sweetheart, your intention trumps your execution more often than most. The mistakes, if careless, would have infuriated any woman, let alone me. The mistakes, though, are bungling of one pure of heart, and would win anyone over. You arrange the bed each morning and I rearrange it one more time after you are done. Do you remember the last trip to St. Louis? You bought me earrings for a black dress I used to wear that still existed only in your mind – I had outgrown it five years ago. It is in these little gaffes that I have discovered a great joy. I have learnt to smile and grimace each time I eat the omelette you make for us. You truly are the lost visionary, and for that, I am thankful. It perhaps would have been an issue if you and I both were lost staring at the ground and missed the stars altogether.

More than anything else, your attempts at throwing surprises keeps the amusement alive. Remember the time you landed up at my doorstep after driving five hundred miles? I had known it all along. Your carefully crafted plan should have included briefing your roommates about it. I had waited. I acted surprised. I loved the moment and wanted you to enjoy it. Here’s to more surprises as the years roll along, even those that are discovered.

Love,
Wife
P.S> Next time, you might want to order a fountain pen and scented pair on a different credit card whose bills I don’t review each month
P.P.S.> When you are done reading this, come downstairs. I have made omelettes.

To My New-born Son

Pleased to share a poem from this month's Spark magazine. I had jotted down a few lines a little while after my older son Aarush was born. Now that he has turned five and another new-born in the house is nearing two, I thought it was a good idea to revisit the lines. This goes out to all the parents who have experienced these feelings in some shape or form at this life-changing event. It is written from the perspective of a father, but I daresay the emotions are gender-neutral. Enjoy.

http://www.sparkthemagazine.com/?p=6607

 

To My New-born Son

You may be
Of you mother’s womb
But you are of my brow
And my sinews and bones
And that mind that never ceases
To wonder about you

Is life’s irony writ
On your crinkled little face
That a man of thirty years
Searches for himself
In a boy of thirty days?

What August rains
And striking days of summer in May
Await us
While we bide our time?
Growing, inching forward, you and I

What unuttered words, smiles and tears
What careless pronunciations
Of words we hold dear,
What blistering scraps for
Beliefs we differ on,
Lie ahead of us?

How goes our journey together,
From inception to conclusion?
The start: You, light as a feather,
Cradled in my arms
The end: I, lighter than you
Hoisted on your shoulders.

Dasht-E-Tanhai

This is one of Faiz Ahmed Faiz's great works. A desert of solitude, a mirage formed in a lover's heart. Achingly beautiful words.

Dasht-e-tanhaai mein, ai jaan-e-jahaan, larzaan hain

Teri avaaz ke saaye, tere honthon ke saraab

[larzaan=quiver, saraab=mirage]

Dasht-e-tanhaai mein, duri ke khas-o-khaak tale

Khil rahe hain tere pehlu ke saman aur gulaab

[khas-o-khaak=dust and ashes, saman=jasmine]

Uth rahi hai kahin qurbat se teri saans ki aanch

Apni khushbuu mein sulagti hui maddham maddham

[qurbat=closeness, aanch=warmth]

Dur ufaq par chamakati hui qatra qatra

Gir rahi hai teri dildaar nazar ki shabnam

[ufaq=horizon]

Is qadar pyaar se hai jaan-e jahaan rakkhaa hai

Dil ke rukhsaar pe is vaqt teri yaad ne haath

[rukhsaar=cheek]

Yun guman hota hai garche hai abhi subah-e-firaaq

Dhal gaya hijr ka din aa bhi gayi vasl ki raat

[subah-e-firaaq=morning of seperation, hijr=parting, vasl=union]

I was first introduced to this ghazal through Iqbal Bano's rendition of it. A trait of a great ghazal singer is his or her ability to infuse life into the words and bring out the emotion behind the ghazal. Iqbal Bano's voice captures the haunt of the solitude very well. The way her voice dips and rises in each harqat lifts the ghazal to greater heights. You can listen to it here.

I recently came across another version of the same ghazal. This was rendered by Meesha Shafi in Coke Studio Pakistan. This one is a more modern rendition and has psychedelic overtones at the end. Meesha Shafi had a tough precedent to follow and does a decent job at that. You can find it here.

A Veil Of Colors

Pleased to share my latest published short story with all of you. The theme for this month's Spark magazine was 'Flashback'. The story is about how an incident in a man's past affects his life in the present in more ways than one. Read on.

http://www.sparkthemagazine.com/?p=6520

 A Veil Of Colors

She sat on the ground, leaning forward and staring at her creation with great intensity. Smudges of blue streaked her beige pant, one that wore marks of earlier battles too. A bowl of water, muddled with colours her brushes had emptied into it, lay on her left. A flourish of the brush and then she would move onto the next colour, committing to the pool yet another of her choices. On her right lay her instruments of trade. A box full of tubes filled with colours, that had been squeezed out fully or partially. A case full of brushes of various thicknesses. Canvases stacked up behind the box, of different sizes. The top of each canvas peeked out from behind the box. A pair of intense, inquisitive eyes stared out. Above that was a branch of a tree, from which a bird’s nest dangled. A mop of hair was right in front of that nest. It would remain a mystery as to who that hair belonged to and which bird was trapped inside. This room to me was always full of mysteries.

I walked into the room quietly, making sure I didn’t disturb her. I looked at the work in progress and then looked back at her. She was wearing a green sleeveless top. Her slender left hand rested in her lap, the brush poised to strike. The music system was playing strained notes of a sitar.  Raag Kalavati, it must be, I guessed.

I stepped on an empty bag of chips. She heard the sound and turned towards me. The features of that face I had come to love came into full view. That aquiline nose, those lips flush with life, the rounded jaw, even the hair tied into a disheveled bun.

“When did you come?” she asked “I didn’t notice you.”

“Just now.”

“So, how was it? The session…”

“Good, I suppose. We talked about my time at the school. The first three years I spent in Mussourie.”

She gave a terse nod and went back to her painting. It was a habit of hers. Switch on, switch off. It was back to forgetting that I was in the room at all. The evening sun was beating down on her painting. I realised I could see some streaks of colour, but nothing more. I wondered if I should close the blinds.

“Is that it? Are we done talking?” I asked. My voice must have sounded a bit testy because she immediately snapped out of her focus and looked at me.

“No. Please. Go on. Tell me.”

I couldn’t shrug off my irritation that easily. I strolled to the window and lit a cigarette.

“We spoke about my first few years in Don Brasco. My parents always thought getting me into that boarding school was the high point of their parenting efforts. All those details I had forgotten came back to me. Those initial days when I was put in Ludlow House. It was a completely new world for me. I took me a while to get to like that place. Thankfully, I wasn’t alone. A lot of the new boys who came felt that way.”

She uncrossed her legs and got up, gingerly walking over to the kitchen. I took a drag of the cigarette and took a good look at her painting, now that she wasn’t blocking the way. A smorgasbord of colours presented itself to me. It was as if someone had painted an ocean of yellows and reds and most of all, blue. Waves upon waves of color overlapped over each other and fought to dominate. Blue, however, seemed destined to win. In the midst of this ocean floated two seeming innocuous, but rather large eyes. They were writhed in sad despair, shedding silent tears that filled the ocean around them. The painting was beautiful and haunting.

I wanted to kiss her, tell her that she was magnificent, that she had breathed pain and life into the canvas, that she was gifted, and that her talent was going to take her places. I did nothing like that. Instead, I went walked right past the painting and grabbed the ashtray behind the canvas dropping heaps of ash while holding onto my words.

“Tell me more.”

“Great friendships were forged in the first year. As they say, adversity bonds people together. So it did with us. Harmeet, Vijay, Anand, and …” My voice trailed off.

Silence filled the room. I could sense her eyes bearing down on me.

“Tell me, how do you know what to paint? Where do you get the inspiration for all these?”

It was my favourite question that I never got a straight answer to. There was pain and melancholy in her work, but the source never revealed itself. I was left to wonder if she had some past hurt that manifested itself. Every time I saw her work, she became more mysterious to me.

“And, Saurin?” she asked, answering my question with a question.

“You know who, Sakshi. Do you really need me to tell you?”

She paused, knowing fully well that I was talking as much to myself as I was to her.

I extinguished the cigarette and said, “Shantanu.”

“Yes, Shantanu, my best friend in school. That very antithesis of who I was. The quiet, unassuming, mysterious Shantanu, who answered in monosyllables, but read in tomes. Always first to class, always prompt with his work, difficult to indulge in our games of mischief. That Shantanu, Sakshi.”

I realised I had walked all across the room as I continued with my soliloquy.

“For months, we sat on the same bench. I copied his homework, grabbed from his plate at lunch, teased him, but he never complained. When our Christmas vacations arrived, I began packing to head home. Everyone seemed to be.”

I stole a glance at her. One look and I realized that I must have been building up a frenzy.
“But Shantanu wasn’t. He had no reason to go back, no place to go back. He had been orphaned when young and was now being supported by his uncle and aunt who had little affection for him. I felt miserable when I heard that. I made a decision then to take him along. No way was he going to spend his time alone here.”

“Shantanu protested as much as he could, but I was too dominant for him. I made him pack his bags and head to the station with me. Being on time was never our strong suit. I went over to the platform with his bags while I waited for him to buy his ticket. The train was already on the platform, ready to depart. The train horn went off – It was time to go. I looked nervously towards the gate. There was no sign of him. I ran hurriedly in search of the S3 coach that I luckily found. Our plan was to take turns using my reserved seat. I threw the bags in and went back to the door.“

“The train started to move. Just then, I saw him stumble onto the platform. I smiled and waved at him. He saw me and doubled his speed. This was not looking too good. The train had picked up quite some pace. A little longer and he was going to be at the edge of the station. I held my hand out so I could pull him in. He ran as fast as he could. His hair bobbed up and down and the spectacles on his nose threatened to fall off. But he was catching up. He was going to make it. I stretched my hand out some more. I closed my eyes to blink. When they opened again, his hand was lodged in mine. We had done it. I smiled at him and pulled harder. But …”

I took a deep breath, steeled myself and continued.

“His hand slipped from mine. I saw him drift away from me and tumble onto the station. The momentum had been too much. The fall made him tumble several times. I was told later that he had cracked his head open with the fall and the internal injuries had been too much to survive. All I remember is that look of shock on his face when he tumbled.”

“I let him down,” I said, realising my bad choice of words, fighting against the silence in the room. No answer came from her.

“Didn’t I? Have you nothing to say?” I went on, the object of my affection suddenly becoming the object of my antagonism.

“For years, I have felt…” I grasped at thin air searching for the right word.

“…. Trapped. And after all this, you have nothing to say?”

Silence as usual.

“You know, you don’t have to solve my problem. But a little empathy wouldn’t hurt. Perhaps you could tell me that my pain means a little something to you.”

The causticness in my tone was meant to hurt. I knew I had little right to be mad at her. I couldn’t expect her to drive my demons away. My helplessness manifested itself in anger over her indifference.

“Who said it doesn’t, Saurin? Not everything is expressed in words.”

She took one long look at her paintings and left the room. I fixed my gaze and looked at the paintings anew. The veil began lifting as I sifted through the canvasses. The bird in the cage, the eyes with the flowing tears, the look of pain and anguish appearing from painting to picture. A rueful smile crossed my lips. I realised I wasn’t the only one struggling to escape.

The Final Goodbye

So, it is finally here. The second test of the Sachin Tendulkar test series, his final one in whites, his final appearance for the country in a cricket field. It is a time for reflection, for applause and above all, for emotion. You can see the outpouring of emotion coming from all wakes of life - I have spent the past few days reading article after article from person after person whose was either directly involved with Tendulkar or whose life was immeasurably enriched by the presence of the Master in their daily life - a living deity beamed into their rooms.

At this time, I wish I were in Wankhede, waiting and getting to see the Master in play one last time. It is a visceral experience like no other – watching Tendulkar bat on his home ground. I have experienced it once. From the moment that the second wicket falls, all eyes go to the dressing room. You see a figure move, a tiny speck when seen from the distant galleries way above. The shuffle is familiar to you, the adjustment of the handguard second nature. He trudges down with a bat in his hand and the gloves not quite strapped up. As the departing batsman walks back to the pavilion, I wonder where his mind is. Is he thinking about his dismissal or are his thoughts drowned out by the chanting of a name – a single name of two syllables that becomes a cry of celebration and despair at the same time. “Sachin, Sachin”. Over and over, the voices of thousands ring that battle cry that surely has made every visiting player in India smile in wonder. The small figure crosses the boundary into the field, looks up at the sun, does a few jogs and goes into his zone. Oblivious to the burden on a billion people. He takes guard, looks around, shuffles some more and then settles into what must be the most perfectly balanced stance of all batsmen.

The miracle isn’t that he has scored more runs and centuries and played more games than any other player. The miracle is that he has done so despite the expectations placed on him. When he goes onto the ground one last time in Wankhede, I wonder what will go through his mind. Will he let himself go despite a life spent in restraint? Will he allow the world to seep in for a change rather than shut the noise out?

Tendulkar may not succeed in his last game. The odds are against him. With all this pressure, with all the hype, with all the emotion and his own divorce from the game after a quarter of a century at the highest level, the odds are certainly against him scoring big. But again, if he scores a duck, it will serve as poetic justice. Bradman would be proud. It doesn't matter. As Dhoni said, the important thing is that he enjoys his last match. We all sure will. It is a celebration of a career spent in service of the game and the country.

I won’t label myself a sentimental fellow, but I won’t be surprised if I my eyes turned misty sometime over the next five days. Thank you for all the memories, Sachin.

For Whom The Cell Tolls

Pleased to share my latest publication in the Spark magazine. Their topic for the month was 'Going Mobile' - a look at the various ways in which the ubiquity of cell phones in our lives affects our choices and relationships. I have written a set of haikus to reflect that. Read on.

http://www.sparkthemagazine.com/?p=6429

For Whom The Cell Tolls

An invalid man
Forever bed-ridden, talks
On his mobile phone

A face beams at mephone-world
Smiling, I pick up the phone
“Hi!” an angry voice

A flight touches down
People wake up with glee the
Phones they put to sleep

Sword ready to strike
Tense wait while the screen turns red
A loud cell phone ring

Girl gives boy her love
Girl gives him vivid photo
Permanent regret

I sNt u a msg
I knw Dat u wud luv it
Nly If u NdRstud it

She loved a good drive
She loved a good drive with gin
Knocked them down like pins

Pigs knocked off by birds
Level cleared. Pumped fist. “Hurray”
Baby cries alone

A Religion Without A God

Sometime, in the week of November 14^th 2013, I will lose my job. When the little man with a giant shadow takes a final bow in whites for the last time and trudges back to the pavilion to a rapturous applause and a standing ovation, one of my vocations as a Sachin Tendulkar fan will come to an end. When I started my blog in 2004, this was what I had put in the About Me section "... and will probably stop watching cricket when Tendulkar retires." In 2004, I never felt I would have had to make that choice:(. Tendulkar was always timeless. The man was God, not mortal. He would never retire, the straight drives would keep flowing, and I would keep practicing my religion of cricket. But that is not the case anymore. His heart has told him it is time to go. Tendulkar is retiring and now we are left with a religion without a God.

Reams have been written about Tendulkar’s effect on India, his effect on the game, his standing among the greats. But the real question to ask is: what has Tendulkar’s career meant to you? Was it a nagging constant as a cricket widow, consigned to watching your husbands and son stuck to the television as they wondered how he does it again and again or were you inexorably drawn to watch him cream a cover drive? Were you as a student always seeking to figure out ways in which to bypass the authoritarian pressures of attendance and education so that you could watch him murder the Aussie attack on a sunny Chepauk afternoon? Were you glued to a computer monitor in a faraway land praying for the pirated sports feed to stay honest while he batted, knowing fully well that he has been known to crash servers which never could handle the scale of his fans? Are you a father who gave his son his first bat and told him two things: this is a great game and Tendulkar is the best batsman of all time?

From 1989 to 2013, the lives of a billion Indians have been punctuated with this man’s presence. For Tendulkar fans, events in life correspond with another one of Sachin’s innings. If that isn’t consistency, I don’t know what is. You can strike up a conversation with someone else on one of Sachin’s great knocks and know fully well that the other person will recall exactly where they were and what they were doing at that time. Tendulkar’s dotted career is replete with lines that folks use to connect to one another. It, as I stated before, is all about what it meant to you. So deep was I steeped in his career that at a Mastermind event, I chose ‘Test centuries of Sachin Tendulkar’ as a topic. There are so many incidents that I can recall where a Tendulkar knock added subtext to a life event for me.

Like the time when we played Sri Lanka in the semi-final of the 1996 World Cup. It was the day that the results of our first semester of engineering were announced. Rumor was that the mark sheet was going to be put up in the college sometime in the evening. I got the call when the second innings had started. The prospect of seeing my marks was exciting and nervous, but nothing would drag me away from the screen till Tendulkar was there. He got out and I got out of the house. The disappointment of the low scores I got was nothing compared to the fact that the man and the nation were denied.

What about the other heartbreak of 1999? I was giving my NCST (National center for software technology) entrance exams the day Tendulkar was setting Chepauk alive with a near impossible single-handed chase against the Pakistanis. His back was hurting, he had no support from the other side, but he kept going on like the last action hero. His 136 was worth its weight in gold, but the rest of them could not get the remaining 17 runs. I remember calling home after every paper (there were six of them) to find out what the score was. A bunch of were walking down to the railway station with a radio between us having its volume turned to maximum. The funereal atmosphere was penetrated with the news of the tailenders giving up one by one.

Or the time I was busy watching him do one more chase at Chepauk. This was a fourth innings chase of a target set by the England team. Sehwag had laid the foundation the previous day and Tendulkar was crafting a masterful chase of the remainder. He was on 53 not out when I was put into another situation where I had to abandon my chase of the chase. Our first baby decided that it was time to come out and see the match as well and it involved a sudden rush to the hospital. Among my first questions after the madness of close to thirty-six hours had settled: how much did Sachin score?

I am sure most people have similar stories to tell. How you abandoned another pursuit, stopped your life for a few moments, met with friends to make it a communal experience, deserted sleep to wake up and watch a game in a different time zone – all because Tendulkar had taken guard. In the age of disunity and disharmony, our lives synchronized for a little while.

It was not just his innings, but a little moment in time of a knock that would stay with you. I often dream of a shot he played against Michael Kasprowicz in the Desert Storm innings. The ball was pitched on a good length between middle and off. It swung slightly in the air and was shaping to move away. He was in position in an instant and you could see him have enough time to adjust his shot, bring his bat down, and in a perfect arc, hit it straight down the ground. It was perfection and it stayed with you. How often have you watched the videos of his upper cut against Shoaib or his bullet drives in Australia against Lee? How many such moments of genius have you accumulated in your mind?

As the dust settles down and we reconcile ourselves to a new reality where there will be a different number four playing for India in whites, the presence (or absence) of Tendulkar would be understood. The batting records are beyond challenge, but to measure him on account of his batting records is like looking at the maximum speed a Ferrari can reach. The whole is more than the sum of the parts. The whole in this case, is a true gentleman who has shown the way for how genius combines with hard work, ego can be subjugated in pursuit of excellence, a man dedicated to his art sometimes surpasses it.

Cricket is my religion and Sachin is my God. Atheism awaits me now.

My Darling Nicotine

I am pleased to share my latest publication with the Spark magazine. Their theme for the month was 'Attachment'. I approached it from the point of view of addiction. I have written a song on Nicotine addiction, set to the tune of 'My Darling Clementine' (or 'Ae dil hai mushkil' if you are a Hindi movie song buff). Just remember to say Nicotine the way you would Clementine and it will all fall in place
Here is the original link to the publication: http://www.sparkthemagazine.com/?p=6337

Also reproducing it here for your reading pleasure

My Darling Nicotine

(Sung to the tune of ‘My Darling Clementine’)

In a jiffy, I whip out one
That piece of beauty is mine
And inside it, lying softly
Is my favorite Nicotine

Chorus:

Oh my darling, oh my darling,
Oh my darling, Nicotine!
When I light up, you light me up
I love you, Nicotine

Those fried lungs, those chaffed lips,
Those stained teeth are mine
What is mine, by now is yours
As I am too, Nicotine

Chorus:

Oh my darling, oh my darling,
Oh my darling, Nicotine!
When I light up, you light me up
I love you, Nicotine

When I meet you, always with me
Is your best friend Listerine,
Your smell lingers, even when you are gone
Always with me, Nicotine

Chorus:

Oh my darling, oh my darling,
Oh my darling, Nicotine!
When I light up, you light me up
I love you, Nicotine

I love you, but you kill me
Why the loathing Nicotine?
I need to patch up, it’s time to break up
Let’s part ways Nicotine

Chorus:

Oh my darling, oh my darling,
Oh my darling, Nicotine!
When I light up, you light me up
I love you, Nicotine

How I miss her! How I miss her,
How I miss my Nicotine,
But I kissed my little children,
I forgot my Nicotine

Chorus:

Oh my darling, oh my darling,
Oh my darling, Nicotine!
When I light up, you light me up
I love you, Nicotine

A Tale of Two Kiddies

My article this month in the Spark magazine comes from my experiences as a parent of two young kids. If you have been in the same boat, hopefully this will resonate with you as well.

Here is the link to the original publication: http://www.sparkthemagazine.com/?p=6243

Reproducing the article here for your reading pleasure

A Tale of Two Kiddies

Parenting is not a perfect science. However, if you survive raising an infant (and the measure of the success is that the infant survives you to become a boy or a girl), you’d say to yourself: what is one more thrown into the mix? My wife and I are blessed with two young boys. Let’s call them A and N. This article is to talk about the joy of handling two young kids. There is no pre-requisite that you need to have two kids in order to read and enjoy this piece, but those with two young ones will hopefully relate and learn from this. Since I claimed that parenting is not a science, nothing in here has to be empirically proven for more than one family. I will claim to be an expert parent. So is the chap next door.

Here is a little back-story to set the stage. Our first-born, A, arrived into this world in the last legs of the year 2008. They say the birth of a child is a life-altering moment. You know it’s coming, but you can’t gauge how it will shake up your world. Imagine yourself driving around the freeway on a cold morning in Chelyabinsk and you see this flash of light across the sky. You know that something huge is happening, but it is only when the shock wave blasts the glass off windows and knocks you off your socks that you know it has hit you. Baby. Meteor. Same thing.

A is a fantastic son. He has to be. He has our genes in good abundance. Through his initial years, he was a guinea pig and a teacher for his parents, helping them find their way to through the maze of parenting choices. And then, just as life with A settled into a steady manageable rhythm, N arrived. That was completely antithetical the arrival of the first born. Everything was well prepared, everything was in order. The first might have been as tense as landing a spaceship on an asteroid. The second was as smooth as landing an airplane at Dubai. A year has passed since we moved on to this four-person dynamic in the family. It has had an interesting effect on all concerned. Here are some learnings for parents who choose to go through this experience.

Welcome to single parenting

While once you were two parents doting on one child, you now have the distinct pleasure and privilege of managing two kids, turning you into a single parent for large stretches of time. While as a husband, you might have pampered your wife to no end in the first pregnancy, during the second stretch, the pampering you might manage and be valued for is taking extensive care of the first child. While as a wife you might have worried during your first pregnancy about the shape and state of the life in your belly before it pops out, you now partition that stress into accounting for how your older one will cope when the baby arrives.

It will all come back …

…, like a splash of cold water on your face. Almost everything that you knew about handling a baby comes rushing back to you the moment they hand you the baby at the hospital and wish you good luck. The chaos, the twenty-four hour routine, the nights, oh yes, the nights where sleep is hostage to a seven pound bundle of unpredictable behaviours.  When it does come back and you are back to your own familiar and ‘experienced’ ways, you’ll reach the conclusion that with two kids, the stress levels aren’t as high as it was when you had one child, but the amount of work to manage two will shoot through the roof.

The second one is anything but the first!

As the younger one grew to an observant young fellow, we started realizing that all milestones were being hit with a lot of alacrity. Walking, talking, eating seemed to come to N more naturally than they did to A. N also turned out to be quite independent. Is it a matter of survival for the second ones? Unlike their older siblings, they never will get the 1:1 attention of their parents. When left to fend for yourself, you tend to grow your skills faster.

Get the whistle out

The younger one might spend the first year in absolute adoration of their role model. At some stage, adoration will be replaced by imitation. What the older one does, the younger one attempts. And soon, what the older one has, the younger one wants. Thus it begins, leading to the parents spendinga lot of time  in resolving conflicts. There is a saying that with one child, you become a parent and that with two kids, you become a referee. We have our whistles firmly in our lips, ready to call foul at the earliest.

The seven stages of adjustment

The presence of a younger sibling can incite jealousy and can incite protectiveness. Different kids take it to different levels. At the beginning though, there is little for them to be peeved about. Everyone is calling them a ‘big brother’ or a ‘big sister’ and even though they may not understand the privileges and the challenges that come with that title, it ‘feels’ and ‘sounds’ good. Not to mention the various gifts that they get at the birth of their sibling, either out of guilt or nicety or parity. Since the number of hours in the day don’t go up from twenty-four to forty-eight, it is a reality that the time available for them with their parents has reduced and so is the focus that they need to contend with. Some act out, some act in, some simply ignore it. If you have got the timing right and they are at the age when they are marching towards independence, they cope much better.

Obi-wan Can-I-Be?

“You should eat your food. It is good for you”. The moment I heard A pass on this excellent piece of wisdom to his younger brother, I was convinced that you have certain privileges as an older child that can’t be denied. That piece of wisdom came from a boy who has never eaten food unless he is constantly hounded by his parents. But that clearly did not stop him from taking on the role of the elder. The protector. The entertainer. It is a metamorphosis worth treasuring.

The curious case of the little ones

What must it feel like to arrive in a world where three people dote on you? What must it feel like to be in a world where you’ll never get to be the only one your parents focus their energies on? Young ones arrive in this world with this dichotomous conundrum to solve. The young ones get half the attention, half the paranoia, half the pressure and half the experimentation that the older ones were subjected to. You can’t possibly follow their milestones with equal microscopic focus, you don’t fuss about their eating or sleeping to the same degree, you let them cry a bit longer than you did your first born until you are certain they are crying because they mean it and you certainly won’t let your hands singe away to ensure that their things are sterilized to the nth degree. The second ones aren’t the same as the first, and they benefit and lose something by that measure.

The answered prayers

When you have gone through the experience of one child and have had your share of the struggles, you intuitively wish for it to be easier the second time round. If your first one did not eat food easily, you wish the second one will comply. If the first one gave you sleepless nights, you wish the second one will sleep better. Rest assured, your prayers will be answered by the second one. Of course, there is no guarantee whether they will do the things that the first one did well. Never challenge nature’s sense of balance.

The story of parenting two kids will have its own shape and form as time evolves and the two kids grow up from being infants, toddlers, kindergarteners, make their way to school and college. Each episode will bear its own stamp and re-forge each equation. Until then, here’s hoping that your adventure with a pair of kiddies is an equally fun ride.

An Unexpected Visitor

Sharing my contribution to this month's issue of Spark. The theme was the same they had in previous August issues, 'India Decoded'. This year, I have penned a satirical story on the state of affairs in India. As always, questions and feedback welcome.

http://www.sparkthemagazine.com/?p=6107

Nine and counting

Happy birthday dear blog. Thank you for being around for nine years of low key (as the name suggests), but satisfying conversations. Thanks also to the dozen followers, four odd regular commentators and ten odd anonymous folks who still diligently come about (without being forced to :)) Onwards to a decade of writing on this space!

The Game Of Life

It is life, one is taught
When one
Slides down the snake
At 99

Get up again, for
A rout comes before a victory
Pray for the ladders
And brave the serpents

March, one is told
March away, for you shall win
This is the true truth
Truer than the one never told

That your fortunes aren’t yours
To govern
They bow to the whim
Of the capricious dice

True Grit

I am pleased to share my forth publication on the OneFortyFiction site. As always, the ask is to write a story in one forty characters with a distinct beginning, a middle and an end. It is a challenge I relish. Read on.

http://www.onefortyfiction.com/archives/true-grit

In case you found it too cumbersome to go to that link, here's the story right here :)

True Grit

He had to be precise, yet his hand trembled and the candies came tumbling down. He stormed out of the store cursing his conscience again.

 

A Chain Of Miseries

Sharing my publication from this month's issue of the Spark magazine. Their theme for the month was 'We, the people'. I have explored the slightly darker side of human kind - the feeling of incompleteness and misery that we all suffer from. Read on.

http://www.sparkthemagazine.com/?p=6000
 

The City and Nature

My publication in this month's Spark magazine. Their theme for the month was 'Nature'. I have written about how the civilized world, personified by a city is always at loggerheads with Nature. Read on.

http://www.sparkthemagazine.com/?p=5895