Today is India’s 62^nd Independence Day. I didn’t attend any flag hoisting ceremony. Nor watch on television the Prime Minister’s traditional salute to the flag and address to the nation.

What I did do was stumble upon AR Rahman’s brilliant rendition of Maa Tujhe Salaam/ Vande Mataram that features the kind of music only he can make.

I have heard the song and watched the video hundreds of times. But it still has the power to cause me goosebumps. No, to make me shed tears of simultaneous pride/ pity for this vast, weird and completely crazy country I happen to have been born in.

Don’t get me wrong. I am about as patriotic as the next steal-from-thy-neighbour and damn-the-country Indian. If I had to give up the comforts of home, I’d probably live abroad without much regret. But some things do move me. This song does. Watch it and feel it.

India's Got Talent snapshots

At long last, there’s finally an Indian TV show worth watching. I haven’t been following ‘India’s Got Talent’ at all but this morning’s display of…well, talent – had me enthralled for almost the entire duration of the show. Reality TV was never so worthwhile!
Apparently today’s show (a repeat telecast) was some sort of a semifinal where the takings included – sample this:

• A 20-something deaf and dumb guy who danced the sensuous Marathi Lavani dance without ever having heard a single note of it! What’s more, the dance is traditionally meant for women and includes a whole range of gestures and expressions that I’d never thought would work on a man. Guess what? I was wrong.

• A Bhangra performance by a troupe of super-enthusiastic guys all from a single college somewhere in Punjab. There was so much zest and energy to their movements that it made people leap to their feet and cheer out loud! But what I admired most of all was their superb coordination. 6 people moving as much in tandem as is humanly possible. It was so good that, if you looked at one dancer’s foot somewhere to the extreme right and then some other’s far away to the left – you wouldn’t be able to tell the difference! Amazing, that’s what it was!

• A group of kids (evidently from a lower middle-class background) who had such agile and flexible bodies. They walked on their hands, jumped over each other and over themselves in beautiful formations and – hold your breath (I did!) – even managed to thread a needle with their bare feet. That’s right – they supported their bodies on their heads and threaded a needle with their toes. If I had just about 1% of their flexibility, I’d be a prize-winning famous contortionist!

There were 6 other acts as well but I was only watching off and on. Apologies if I missed mentioning some gems here. Still, watching this show was perhaps one of those very rare moments when you actually feel something stirring inside you, a feeling of supreme pride that you – like all these shockingly talented people – are an Indian.

I guess I shouldn’t have been surprised then to see Siddharth Basu’s name among the quickly-rolling credits at the end of the show. The man has always managed to do one up over whatever the current trend might be.

Move over ‘Moment of Truth’, ‘Bigg Boss’, ‘Fear Factor’ and (ugh!) MTV Roadies/ Splitsville/ random show where surprisingly young and supposedly innocent people bitch/ carp/ crib/ politic against each other to win some obscure bike or some-such prize (?) Mr. Basu shows what reality TV is – and should be – all about: A platform for true talent, nothing more, nothing less.

The mists of Lonavala

A lot of water has passed under the bridge since I last posted. For one thing, the month has changed – bringing me closer to my birthday. (Hey, do birthdays really get less exciting as you grow older? I don’t know yet…mine still looks enticing even from the distance of a whole month.)

Anyway, those of you who sent me ‘Bon Voyage’ vibes (can’t say ‘wished me’ for a post that got zero comments, can I?) after my last post, would be disappointed to know that the voyage didn’t materialize after all. Not that weekend, at any rate. Midnight saw me burning with fever; as a result, my kicks remained untouched all weekend.

Last week, though, was another story. I begged off work for 5 whole days. Add to that the weekends before & after and what I had were a respectable 9 days away from the desk. Not getting into details but here’s how all that time was spent:

• Shopping & eating out (2 days)
• Taking a quick trip with a friend (2 days)
• Another trip with family (4 days)
• Chilling out at home (the last remaining day)

The weather was cold and rainy, the conversations deep and thought-provoking, the walks long and wet…everything just the way I like it.

Panchgani monkeys huddling for warmth

And yes, I had two amazing animal experiences as well! But more on those in the next post. Need to wrap up early today – it’s Raksha Bandhan and I just don’t wanna miss the opportunity to go be with my cousins & extended family.

Neither Here Nor There: Travels in Europe (By Bill Bryson)

Whoops! And it’s already been a week since I saw you last!

It’s weird how each day inches so s-l-o-w-l-y by while the years (or a week, in this instance) just seem to up and run. Anyhow, this past week has been full of ups & downs. The first part was more down than up, and even though things were really picking up on the work front, other things were sliding waayyyy down to their lowest ebb ever.

Why so low then? For one thing, being a moody person isn’t as great as those eccentric geniuses make it out to be. You never know when a sad/ weepy mood is coming on. One moment you’re feeling all superior, looking down on that part of the world that takes immense literary pleasure in reading Mills & Boon and other Harlequin Romances. And the next you surprise yourself by weeping uncontrollably over the death of the heroine of the most non-thrilling thriller/ suspense book you’ve ever read. (If you must know, the book is ‘Odd Thomas’, authored by none other than the paranormally-obsessed, prolific Mr. Dean Koontz). It doesn’t help that the heroine is described more or less as a walking candy stick, with her pink cap, pink skirt and pink-and-white blouse cutting a very ‘hot’ picture (at least in the eyes of our hero).

Okay, so why am I rambling on about a book I don’t even intend to recommend to you guys? God knows about that, but there is one I do wanna recco. Recommend, and how! If some of you (like me) have been foolish enough not to have read Bill Bryson, do it now! Do it yesterday. The guy’s a happy-go-lucky genius and, if he hadn’t been older than my father – not to mention married – you’d have been reading Mrs. Bryson’s blog right now.

I’ve just been introduced to Bryson by a friend (thank you, thank you, J) and I started off with his ‘Neither Here Nor There: Travels in Europe’. The man is so chilled-out, so ready-to-go-with-the-flow and, most importantly, so observant of people, places, things…that it’s a real pleasure to forgo Internet and television and only curl up with him in bed. (That sentence was about to end with: ‘…that it’s a real pleasure to read him’ but then I thought to make it an itsy-bitsy more fun than that).

Now that you have my book/ author recommendation for the week, I also highly recommend a mini vacation – the likes of which I am all set to go for tomorrow. Just grab a pal (as I did) and jet off to one of the tiny hill stations scattered all over the place. The rainy weather makes it all worth it. Don’t know about you but there’s something about water falling unbidden from a zillion faucets that makes me want to sing and dance madly. And since quiet office aisles & cramped city sidewalks are not the place to do either of those things (sing or dance), I figured it’d be better to make it happen in a place where only the trees and the birds could bear witness.

So off I go tomorrow. But don’t you worry – I’ll be back just a day later on Sunday. And this time I promise not to be so lax about posting…

Stray dog - Mumbai

It’s an awful awful sound, the yowling of an animal in pain. As my friend told me: “I can’t stand it.” And this is from a 6-foot-plus giant of a man who’s pretty much a ‘toughie’ on most counts that count.

But the municipal corporation has made up its mind. The animals are to suffer. Actually, little changes with this. ‘Suffer the animals’ was always the diktat. Even before the government publicly walked all over its old sterilization policy with feet shod in shoes soiled with shit.

 Don’t mind the language too much. I just happen to be boiling with rage.

Dogs, especially, are so obviously meant to be beaten, thrown acid upon, starved to caricature-ish skeletons & generally thrashed to death – or to a fate worse than death – that it amazes me how this simple fact seems to escape almost all the educated, intelligent people I do know. Or perhaps I only know the wrong kind of people.

For a week now, I’ve been working with a fresh new writer. If I had to describe him, I’d say he’s someone full of enthusiasm, completely ‘into’ his work – someone who does not hesitate to ask questions and make corrections whenever he’s wrong. So what’s the problem? Okay, not to split hairs, but he is a little too enthusiastic – if you know what I mean.

For instance? When I asked him to write some content for a website, he mailed me back a CorelDRAW file containing his “vision” of what the site should look like. This would still have been fine if, in his enthusiasm, he hadn’t completely overlooked the ‘content’ part of it. The design of course was no use – by his own admission, he is not much of a designer. Luckily, things moved fast once I’d called him with the news that it was quality content delivered on time - and not his vision - that would get him paid

The incident left me thinking about the perils of being a newcomer to your field of work. People view you with suspicion, expecting you to trip up at any moment. And more often than not, you oblige.

I remember the first time I met a Times of India editor to pitch a story idea. I prepared for the interview for a week beforehand, compiling a file full of my previously published articles in kiddie newspapers and college magazines, collating diary entries that seemed particularly interesting, digging out old class essays with such groundbreaking themes as ‘Global warming: The final solution’…even a humorous piece on dealing with unwanted guests.

Armed with a thick file, I donned my most grown-up, journalist-y outfit of the day – a khadi-cotton kurta paired with a severe white churidar - and tied my mousy hair in (what I thought was) a professional-looking bun.

My ‘interview’ lasted exactly 37 seconds. The editor I had arrived to meet was “out for a smoke,” said his colleague, demanding to know instead what my ‘broader ideas’ for the paper were. Now this I hadn’t much of a clue about. I’d been browsing a magazine article on genetic engineering in their office lobby, and this led me to say that I’d like to bring a whole new scientific tilt to the paper. Seeing her eyes refuse to come unstuck from the monitor, I added that the said scientific tilt could be achieved by publishing a series of articles about new advancements in genetic engineering. Yeah, right.

Something about my earnestness – or my naiveté – must have made an impression on that assistant ed, for I left the place with a mandate to work on an article on ‘Genetic science & advancement in India’ – to be researched & submitted within 48 hours (!)

I still don’t know whether it was euphoria or panic I felt more of. And the best of it is: after working night and day over the next 2 days, I spent the next 3 weeks twiddling my thumbs (also using them to dial the editor every 20 minutes) while they tried in vain to find space for my 500-word article in their 16-page newspaper.

So yes, I do have some idea of what is to be all wet behind the ears. And I guess my new writer now has some idea of waiting around to get served…after all, it’s been 45 whole minutes since he last called!

I hadn’t known him too long. A couple of months at the most. But the news of his passing came as a shock nevertheless. Especially because he was so young. So nice, friendly, sincere.

Little would he have known, when he set out on a picnic, that it would be one of his last few acts in this lifetime. I can imagine him waving goodbye to his dad, to his sister. And then jauntily putting on a pair of sunglasses even as he headed towards the waiting bus.

It was supposed to be a day full of adventure, of negotiating swift river currents secure in a raft packed with colleagues. With friends. But before that adventure could begin, he decided to undertake a small swimming adventure of his own. Of course it proved fatal. The water had been calling out to him, as Death often will do, in forms benign yet deadly.

And, like Death, it brought him down. To a place where he couldn’t fight anymore. Nor think of an escape from the inevitable.

God knows how it feels to want air, so bad you could die. I tried holding my breath in the shower this morning. It lasted for maybe 30 seconds and didn’t feel all that bad. But I had always had the option to quit. Quit before the panic could take over my capacity to think, to get out of there.

Just imagining it makes me queasy. I cannot trust harmless, bottomless water anymore.

Death by drowning. And then you feel no more. Not the swirling darkness of the water, not the fish come to get their pound of flesh from what remains of your earthly existence. Not the gentle falling and rising from the riverbed to its surface. Again and again. Just like breathing.

It’s not so unbelievable, when you think of it. People die in accidents, in plane crashes, of old age and sickness – even in their sleep. But when those people have a name that rings a bell, a face you recall, a guileless smile you will never forget, then the whole equation changes. It is part of the selfishness of being human. The moment you know someone, they stop being a statistic. The existence of that person in this world takes on an importance all its own. And the ceasing of that existence, the power to make you dream of slimy riverbeds, night after restless night.

I had never attended the funeral of someone my age, before. I hadn’t thought I was old enough for that to happen. But it did. Just one evening ago.

I will never understand this world. Taking the stairs up to my grandma’s place recently, I noticed that, at every bend on every stairwell was plastered a ceramic tile with a portrait of a Hindu god or goddess. This struck me as rather odd…a painted wall with just one tile on it? Why would people bother with something like that?

Turns out my granny knew why. Seems that paan-chewing Indians will spit in every corner they can find. And the only way to prevent the vista from going all red on you is to put the fear of God into those paan lovers.

Speaking of more oddball people, I think what the Aussies are doing Down Under looks pretty sad from Up Here. Here’s a bunch of people actually paying them for the privilege of filling the coffers at their universities – even as they eschew a whole world of opportunities in their native land (as well as in better-known campuses across the US and Europe). But is the native heart at peace? No! They want not just their money, but also their blood.

Now I agree that things are not as simple as that. But is it really so hard for people to just get along with each other? I can understand a certain amount of resentment in places where people just barge in and take hold of what rightfully belongs to the native. But in this situation, it’s the Australian government’s sustained ad campaigns in India, their depiction of their country as the next education and leisure destination, that’s caused the recent influx of Indians there.

Perhaps, before they come back to woo us again, they need to woo their own people with an ‘Incredible Indians in Amazing Australia’ ad campaign first.

Did you know that, as per Indian mythology, Radha & Krishna never got married? Apparently, there are some intricate explanations for their unfulfilled – yet eternal – love. Non-religious that I am, I had never paid much attention to all those mythological stories that you tend to absorb no matter where you live, what you do and who you interact with, in India. If anything, these flotsam stories about divine love, about Krishna’s innumerable wives and his flirting around with all those gopis only pissed me off. Here was a guy we called God, I’d argue, and even he couldn’t stay faithful to one wife, one woman! And then we crib about the patriarchal society we live in!

After all, if you can block out the image of Ram asking his wash-his-feet-and-drink-the-water pativrata wife to take the Fidelity Fire Test, or of honourable Arjun wandering off and taking every beautiful woman he met as one of his wives, or of Krishna getting married to not one, two or three but to 16,000 women and fathering 16,000 children (!), well then I have very little to say to you. Except that you and I have nothing in common.

A few days ago, however, I attended a dear friend’s lavish wedding. The bride’s party had engaged a group of folk singers to keep the guests entertained as, onstage, the various rituals and pheras were being conducted. Though almost all the songs were in Gujarati with the vocals almost drowned out by the chanting of the priests or the chatter of the wedding guests, yet whatever little I heard of the music gave me goosebumps. Here and there I caught phrases about the various promises Radha makes to meet Krishna on the banks of the river, about how Krishna woos her with the music of his flute or about how nature rejoices at the union of these two divine souls, here on earth. Later, a Gujarati friend helpfully pointed out: “The music was so touching. All the vows, all the rituals of the wedding were being mirrored and enhanced by it. Each of the songs depicted the many moods of the Radha-Krishna pair – the greatest love story ever!”

After the wedding, I more or less forgot about the whole thing. Until recently when I happened to watch one episode of a TV series about Krishna. The characters were discussing how Radha and Krishna had been cursed by some saint (or someone of that sort) and would never be able to meet – post their childhood – for the duration of their earthly avatar. And it was a long duration – Krishna is believed to have lived to be approximately 125 years old!

5 minutes of googling told me this: In Indian tradition, Radha and Krishna are considered the most divine, the most passionate, of lovers. Yet they spent their lives never being able to consummate their love whether by sight or by touch. Apparently, at one point, Radha even asks Krishna to marry her (presumably before they were separated at around age 10). After making the request, when she turns around to face her lover, she finds another Radha standing in his place. And Krishna tells her: “Can you marry yourself? I am you, and you are me. We are one – how can anyone unite one entity?”

I admit I found this thought incredibly moving, deeply romantic. In a world where everything is so transient, where people divorce for reasons as trivial as you can imagine, can you also imagine a love so strong, so unshakeable, that 115 years of separation could do nothing to change that feeling?

Of course I do not believe that the people we worship as gods were anything more than the well-known, good or popular people of those times. By that token, I do not believe that Krishna and Radha were a god & goddess who came down to earth by divine plan. And if there is any truth to the stories, then whatever did happen, happened to normal earthly beings like you and me. Putting it in this perspective, I feel, only adds to the amazing dimensions of the Radha-Krishna love story (if it can be called that). Two average human beings, separated almost all their lives, yet carrying a torch for each other all through those long years. Now where do you find something of that quality anymore?

Whoa! Was this a windblaster or what?! Someone had left the window wide open and, as I took my customary seat on the bus, I felt my neatly-put-together hair (this is rare!) being pulled and pummeled from 20 directions at once. I reached out to shut the window but the fresh morning air felt too good to resist, though the crazy hairdo at the end of the ride did make me wish I had gone in for a verryyy short haircut over the summer.

Actually why not? I should get myself super-short super-sexy hair – a la Mandira Bedi. Speaking of which, doesn’t she carry off that cropped mane rather well? The problem is, I don’t know whether it will look that great on me. Especially since I intend to be wearing quite a few Indian ethnic clothes in the near future (family wedding coming up). Also, it’s sure to make me look taller than I already am – not something I need in my life at this moment. So I guess the sexy new look will just have to wait. *Sigh*

This morning I sang my old school anthem. I did it in my head and was ecstatic to realize that, in spite of it being a few months over a decade since I left school, I can still sing the whole long complicated version of the song! I do have some long-term memory left. Yay! And after that, I also sang ‘It must have been love’ by Roxette. Just to celebrate. Yes, I do know it’s a sad song but I like it. Especially since it sounds so damn good when I sing it in my head!

So this marked the beginning of Tuesday for me. And just as I was hoping the day would go off equally as well as it had begun, someone came along to ruin my happy mood. T’was too good to last, what?