scattered thoughts...

some say they are chasing money, some say appreciation, some merely running...but the thought of not chasing anything occured to me lately. loss of ambition or the very notion of not knowing where one is headed can be scary at one hand and extremely self relieving on the other.

scary as one cannot fathom the depths of uncertainties that one is in and self relieving because for a change there is no desire to control, especially time.

someone once told me i want to do nothing and then i thought what a loser. how exactly does one actually do nothing. i mean for common sense purpose one has to wake up, brush teeth, take a bath, eat...etc i mean take care of bodily requirements and then one has to do something to assure the food comes to the plate or the plate goes to the food. unless of course born in royalty, even dead is good enough in case of royalty. but coming out of a middle class boy i found it scandalous.

i often thought work was to keep oneself busy beyond a point...i mean how much can one at the end of the day stare at the stars with absolute no desire to touch them or to write poetry? but then i realised that leisure as and act in itself was beyond hyperactive minds like mine. i mean i will at any given point in time would actually be running away, murdering or even dieing myself in my head even if my body has not twitched a bit. then how the hell was i to understand a perfectly sane, intelligent guy of my age reiterating that he wants to do nothing.

his thoughts come to mind today because i got the news of his death in the morning. and the entire day i have been trying to figure out whether the guy actually died satisfied or not. he actually did nothing after dropping out of college with the exception of leaving home and wandering in the woods every now and then...but was he happy? did he accomplish doing nothing and still manage to live his life in content?

sour..bitter...sour

The politics of the country has had enough of the grey lot and now is looking for young blood but alas! In my profession the nature is yet to change course. And by the time it does, I might be too old to be questioned on grounds of experience 

emni emni...

ki bhalo lage boli:
bristir pore rodh...bristite bhijte bhijte icecream khete
cinema dekhte...gaan shunte...naach korte...
roder dike pith kore shuye thakte...may masher gorome!

purono diaryer pata gulo pore pore chire felte...hariye jete
kalboishakhir jhore dishahin hete jete...

purono pawa chithi gulo porte...kinto nostalgia ta thik poshaye na!
hoi hullor...pujor dhak...lokeder saaj
fuchkaa...tok jol...bhalo laage!

purono boyier pata...natun boyier patar gondho
ekta kobita Love Songs of J Alfred Prufrock (elioter lekha)
milan kunderar boi...

bhore bela ek cup cha aar ekta cigeret
dupurer siesta
raater aalo...streetlights er pattern e uronto pakhi...

another way...

it is a boring day...and there is nothing much that i can do to make it any interesting.
a passing thought...of interesting times, of being charmed by the 'not knowing' status in life...

a question - now most feared - 'where am i headed?'
the answer not known, the uncertainty looms over and often i cannot breath due to the weight of this question.

proudly i amuse myself by saying "i am headed nowhere!"

but then it is just for amusement's sake...the reality far too shaking!

fleeting thought!

i have come a long way...crossing over rivers and mountains
i have travelled vast spaces and met a lot of faces
yes, faces indeed!
happy and sad, pale and rosy, all varieties and kinds
but still there is a lot to see...
the hunger for life is still burning within me!

it is a calm night, nothing in it to suggest otherwise
the clouds are resting from their day's journey
i am indeed hoping for some rain
but then my wish don't count!
I'm just an ordinary soul!
a face among the many faces...

sometimes i wonder how does it all look from the top
thousands and thousands of faces
moving below...rushing
talking, crying, smiling, screaming, kissing,
angry, sane, insane...
each looking like the other
with the uniqueness blurred due to heights

and down here...
the prejudices so high
the observations so critical
the pinning of character
the categorization of moral

the mystery of my own self
the challenging task of knowing the rest
the shadows of convenience
the tales of betrayals...

life they say is all about living
but caged in our definitions
dominated by premonitions
i wonder what it means to be alive?

random thoughts

election time went by...a new government and a new fight for seats.
its like a sale, buy what you can't afford otherwise...funny! and this is heroic.

i met u in a mall, i was a zombie, u thought i was funny. i still am lost in your eyes and u...just killing time!

a small kid...rolling over a grass and searching for deers...its a deer park with no deers...he is happy and doesn't miss the deers...he is young and doesn't know what is it to miss someone.

life has been kind and funny...i am clueless and still thinking am not.

a bus ride to nowhere...
rains and ice-creams
hot sun and burning cheeks
tear drops and disappointments
a gentle hug and a loving smile...

life has its own trips...its highs and trance
and i am so very lost!

politicians and their wits...
lawyers and their lies
social workers and their fab India obsessions
communists and Nike shoes
all go hand in hand...and i wonder how?

oh life i m clueless!

work took me to a new land...its homeland though!

Its dark outside and I am some 20 kms away from the national highway and 100 kms away from the life that I know. Somewhere in the interiors of Uttar Pradesh I am headed to a small block known as ‘Shivgarh’. It is so called because it is the home of the worshipers of Shiva the lord. My decision to go to Shivgarh was based on an impulsive decision to know rural life. I am born and bought up in cities and this offer to work with the people was too tempting an offer.

When I told my dad that I want to go to Shivgarh, his only remark was the place where there is no network…I wonder what tempts you to go there? I did not know what to say, and I still do not know why I have come here. I hope time will tell.

Its day 2 and I already have this urge in my gut to just pack my bags and run, run back to life, its so strange I do not consider living here as life. In the midst of nowhere, I am stuck with people who I don’t know. All those eyes observing me as if I am alien form a Spielberg film. This is the same country I have known for so many years, through my geography and history books and I have so many times felt an Indian. But still living here under the surveillance of the local people makes me feel this is some different place, some other era.

The feeling of wanting to runaway is subsiding and the peace of this place is growing in me. The cool mornings and the pleasant nights and the starry sky seem to reassure me that my decision to come here was not so bad at the end of it all. My training has begun and what I am learning in the so called professional environment is so drastically different to what I have studies so far. Today I had gone to Siwan, one of the most difficult programme areas and was waiting for this woman named Parvati to deliver her first child. In Shivgarh most of the women are named after the various forms of Parvati the wife of Shiva, giving it a feel as if Shiva existed somewhere nearby and all the women that we saw were some or the other way his wife. The labor had started yet the baby did not seem to push, it was not any complication but was just taking time. This was my first time and I wanted to cherish every bit of it, but the stink inside the saur was making my stomach sick. The woman had been locked in here since last night and we came in around 4 in the morning to see how it happens. What is done to the child and the mother? I had read so much about deliveries, seen documentaries where the baby slides out of the woman’s body mixed with blood and vernix. The excitement was increasing my craving for a smoke, but the daima had said that the baby was due anytime and so I did not dare move. Oh yes, smoking here is a pain, women are not seen smoking cigarettes only the older women in the house smoke hukka that too never in front of the men, unless she was the head of the family and to a certain extent influential. Suddenly the saur came alive and the women started running around. The water seemed to have broken and the baby was making its way out.

Time to give a little data here: in Shivgarh close to 90% of the child births take place inside the house. The houses in this part of the region are either made of mud or of bricks depending on the economic condition of the family. Inside the house there is a room that is used for storing the grains that the farmers grow. It is a room, interior in the house with no windows, only one door which has been decorated with tulsi and fire is burning outside to keep the evil spirits out. This dark room turns into a delivery room when the women in the house are expecting a child and are taken inside once labor begins. This is the time when the saur is said to come alive. Parvati too has been brought here last night when her mother in law felt that the baby was due anytime. Now standing inside this closed room with three other women and my notebook I feel strange. This is also a way in which children can be born inside a closed dark room with no windows and lots of smoke to keep the evil spirit away. The smell of urine, sweat and the cries are filling my stomach. I am thrilled and saddened at the same time. I don’t know what I was feeling, I too would have a child one day but to have it here like Parvati was beyond imagination.

Ok the moment that I was waiting for was taking pace now, the daima asked for some hot water and the mother in law started massaging the bulged belly with some oil, mustard oil. She was putting pressure on the belly with an experienced hand and asking Parvati to push, push hard. Parvati was squatting on the floor, in tears and pain and trying to push. At that moment she seemed brave to me. Much stronger and braver than her appearance suggests. The air inside was becoming hot and damp, the door was now closed and the women oblivious of my presence went about their task. The dai was rubbing the inside with oil and saying that it will help the baby to pass out soon and everyone was waiting for the baby to slide. Finally in the midst of a lot of screams I could see the tip of the head and the bulging mouth of the mother from where the baby was jutting itself out. The daima with her experienced hands was trying almost to pull the baby out. Finally the head popped out neat and the pulling was easier due to holding space. The baby was patched in red and white, the blood and vernix. The stench had now become unbearable, but that one sight of a live body coming out of another was unforgettable. I had seen a cow and a goat deliver before but nothing was as spectacular as this. The woman was still in pain and was still squatting. For a second I thought that there could be another baby, but then no it was the placenta that she was waiting for. The umbilical cord was been gently massaged down so that the placenta would drop. After about some 5-7 mins, the placenta came out. An ugly sight, of blood and cord. Parvati finally lied down, the worst was over. The news of the baby had traveled out of the door while I was watching it come out into this world. The baby was a tiny little girl and now preparations had begun to bathe the child and some discussion was going on as to whether they should bathe the child or sponge it as they were told by the intervention team. The mother in law wanted to bathe the child as otherwise she was not able to hold a child that was stinking so bad. Parvati oblivious of all this was in a trance of receding pain. She was made to drink a home made protein drink with ghee in it to recover from the blood loss. And I was trying hard not to faint. I was an observer in the saur, and as quiet as those mud walls. But I had the urge to pick the baby from the floor and hold it against my skin. All this while the poor thing was lying on the floor and wondering (if at if she was capable of it) that where the hell was she.

knowing myself

The view from the window was serene and calm, perhaps the only movement was the realization of the distance traveled by earth around the sun. Except for time everything remained static for that moment. A temple, far away…in between the ground and the sky blurring together in a huge space of colors and shades…of course it is sunset. The flaming sky and the dusky earth penetrating each others territory yet defending it own…

I stay still, scared to move or even blink. I want to see the changing colors, the fight of the bodies and gradually with slipping moments everything is too dark, the dullness of the earth has won over the flaming red of the sky. It is all quiet and silent now. It’s a village in some far away block some 30 kms away from the highway. In that darkness of nightfall, I ask myself what I want for the rest of my life and I feel an urgency to run, my instincts tell me that its time to move on, leave the calm and the silence behind and explore once again the noise and the adulterated world of dream-chasers. The only pinch was I didn’t still have a dream to chase…I have lived in moments flowing with the feelings, not knowing the way or the consequences of it.

Before I leave there is of course the pain of parting, parting from the familiar for the unfamiliar. It’s a feeling of idiocy and thrill, the conflict of saying a yes or a no. The polarities have defined my life and my preference had obviously been very instinctive, without much strategic foresight. My friend once said, take a decision and make it right. But now I know, its important to take a decision and face its consequences and in reality there are no right or wrong decisions.

My attraction to the wild is also reflected in my taste of men. What appeals to me is the indefiniteness of the character. The polarities they constitute of…each men were something that I was not…the magnetism of the opposites and also the mystery of the unknown. Often people say they are thrilled by the chase and after which they are lost…but I have always liked the relationship after the chase is over. The chase is the most formal and superficial phase of any relationship, it’s all about proving and not exploring the find. We don’t explore while we are chasing, the rules of chase are formulated and used in different styles…what is the interesting bit is the knowing of what the other is like, continuing to explore the taste buds, the sensations, the realms of security and the insecurity and finally of accepting. We don’t generally walk up to the limits of accepting with all, but with some we do…

unfamiliarise the familiar said someone

Born and brought up in cities amidst noise and fog, I was yet to realize calm and beauty of nature. Places where I have lived have been thoroughly adulterated and modified to an extent where even crows don’t look the same anymore. The noise. the rush. the hurry, overriding every other thing in life. But one good thing about this is that no one around you bothers you…they just let you be you. There are no questions asked or judgments passed…but of course there are the observations! The continuous struggle to typify people as this or that, in some way or the other. Crossing over bridges is misunderstood as it requires efforts to redefine realities. Any exception is an anomaly, is a threat.

Being a woman you are either the babe or the sarified-narified image of customs and any cross over between the two is a threat. Threat that de-familiarises the familiar. I have often been referred as a manly-girl (if at all it means anything!) though definitely my structure defies any such obsolete proposition. I am yet to understand the ‘scape of this phrase…maybe I will or maybe not…for me I would like to think of men and women without definitions based on anything but physiology. My journey and decisions in life have often taken me to un-chartered territories. The adventure of the journey began one day when I was walking back from school and just didn’t feel like taking the usual road that lead straight up to where I live. Without knowing much but just armed with sense of direction I started walking towards home but in a different route. When I came home I was thrilled with my discovery but then to my surprise I realized that everyone in my family knew about the ‘new-route’, and had never shared with me. More so because they never walked it. And as a result they somehow could not feel the thrill within me. This small incident is actually indicative of the fact that in life there are fewer ‘new’ ways, and even if there are such new ways…people know about it, its just that very few would like to give it a shot. Try and discover what it means and where it takes life. It is the same threat, threat of the unfamiliar yet somewhat resembling of the known.

Life bound within the limits of the known and the fearful seems tempting when one has crossed over the bridge of certainties and decided to go completely for the thrill…but its just a mere temptation, that looks pleasant when life become a bit too adventurous and somewhat out of control. But for the wild it is always the thrill that keeps them going. I think I am still stuck over the bridge of certainty and both sides appear tempting to me, of course with their own limitations. Maybe I just want the best of both the worlds.

Reflections!!!

whatever you said perhaps meant nothing, nothing at all...
I have known you and still there is something that remains a mystery
was it you I wonder after so many cups of coffee
who could have let me fall, who could see me lose myself
and yet not help me hold

we had started long ago, an autumn dusk, a cup of coffee and cigarettes
we both were young then, both excited to be sneaking out of our homes
and spending our evenings together
sex was not in our mind then, we were young to be innocent
and scared yet to behave like adults

today when I rest on your chest, it does not feel the same anymore
at one time I use to wait for you to hold me
it was a gesture that reassured me life
now it’s a mundane routine of togetherness
it took me a long time to understand the pattern underneath

the poems, the flowers, the initial sweet nothings
had nothing to do with my being
it was all a play and you acted well
whatever you say now stands in stark contrast to what I felt
but nonetheless they are as true as me and you

it’s does not make you wrong or bad, they are feeble accusations of distress
it’s just the game that you play, to kill time or to test your prowess
I am just a mere prey
The underlying threat of losing you is a reality now
Your conscience remains unadulterated
Cause there has been no deceit, you had warned me all along
It’s me and my faith in love that failed

It was me who argued that love can heal
And now I am wounded so bad that I am not sure what will heal me
Even being with you has become a farce now
And letting you go still so very painful, even though you aren’t mine,
You never were!