arpeggios

Uneasy lies the Bald Head

2011-10-05T23:22:00.000-07:00

10 years back, somewhere around this time of the year, I lost it. Looking back of course, there was nothing to lose it for, really. I was at the fag end of my 23rd year of life, in-between jobs and not married. Big crime. And everyone was making a huge deal out of it ( it will be interesting to note here that ALL those same folks have kids today who are way above that "tender" age limit and are still not married.Ahem!). Anyway, I was young and hassled and hyper-sensitive to the opinions of those around me. In desperation, I turned to Thirupathi Balaji and asked Him to solve my issues. I had a luxurious mop of jet black, curly hair thanks to good genes and years of eating fresh water fish. I decided to give it to Thirpathi Balaji.Just find me a decent job dude, I said, and someone I can love; in return for my hair. So, I came home looking like this...

I don't need to mention specifically that this move did not go down well with anyone around me. Suddenly the neighbors avoided me, the relatives raised eyebrows. And it particularly did not appeal to many naysayers who were now convinced that I was a freak of nature and a terrible example to both young and old :-P

I was a forceps baby, my mother says. The kind that wants to stay on in the birth canal and is half hearted about making an exit. So, I had to be pulled out with tools. This is considered to be a very dangerous form of birth; many babies suffer brain damage. I think I am fine, though. The good thing about a forceps birth is that soon afterwards, the nurses will give you a skull massage to set your plates back in place again. So the day I shaved I realized that I had a pefectly round head thanks to some nurse with very talented hands.

At this point in time, I had multiple piercings and wore amethyst pendants on an indigo thread. Very artisty, bohemian. Of course, people who saw me thought I had done this out of a misplaced sense of being cool and anti-establishment. I used to wear scarves of all hues to cover my head when I went out. The trippiest part was sitting casually in a restuarant, reading a book and then all of a sudden pulling off my scarf, shocking decent folk who sat around me. Heh heh, those were the days! ;-)

My hair grew back very very fast. I landed a job! And started dating a certain bassist I had met online. Things in my life were on a roll suddenly. So maybe Thirupathi Balaji does grant favours after all.

I have to shave my head one more time. I made this promise to Thirupathi Balaji once again sometime back. So one of these days, I will moonlight in my bad-ass look of yester years. Watch out naysayers. Here I come to corrupt your progeny again! >:-D

Happiness is a Green Marsh

2011-09-29T22:34:00.000-07:00

I live on a marsh in the heart of Koramangala, a busy business district and suburb of Bangalore. It is highly unlikely to find a marsh of this size here. Land is at a premium and even tiny plots are lapped up by eager developers to make multi storey apartments which they sell to professionals who don't mind living even in a pigeon holes, so long as they can be close to work and can avoid the crazy Bangalore commute. So how did this marsh stay a marsh? How come no construction big wig has come along and bought it off and raised a skyscraper jungle here? Apparently the land is under dispute and has stayed this way for more than 25 years. We are talking of more than 175 acres of prime land.

Some of the nose-in-the-air Koramangaleans I spoke to before moving here, who have been living in "4th Block" since the past 3 generations ( 4th bock is something like the Bel Air of Koramangala), pinched their noses the moment I told them about where we had bought our flat. "But that was a septic tank!" one lady exclaimed. "It is reclaimed land.There is honestly no point in investing so much money to live on shit-wetlands". The lady must be right. Everything stands unusually lush and healthy on my marsh including the vegetables that my neighbours grow in their private gardens on the ground floor. Now I know why the soil is so nutrient rich!

We moved to this apartment complex some 6 months back to be close to the kids' school. The residential complex is unbelievable- it is green, has all facilities and a very limited number of flats ( just about 120 ) and the entire complex is spread out over 3 acres of beautifully landscaped gardens. It is so quiet, you can hear the birds sing. Since this is right next to a marsh, there is no main road next to it and there is absolute silence at all times of the day. But here is the catch- the approach road is not tarred and since the property adjacent is disputed, there is no way a decent road will come up anytime in the near future.

The builder had a hard time selling these flats although they are so full of air and sunshine. Folks were put off at the prospect of getting onto the "jiggly road" as my children call it, right after breakfast and bumping their way along for more than half a kilometer till the approach to the main roads. Most people, whose style is flooring the accelerator the moment they are seated, have had flat tyres. Shoot over 10 km/hr and damage to the undercarriage is a given. I have dodged snakes and coyotes and some riffraff too on this road. But it is just a half kilometer stretch and I sometimes think people make too big a deal out if it. Can't blame them I guess- blame the age of instant gratification.

I am a crazily overworked mom. What I look forward to the most in my action packed routine is my mid-morning coffee break, after the kids and husband scoot off to their respective destinations. I sit high up, in my favourite balcony on the second floor, which is open on three sides and look out at my beautiful marsh. It is overgrown with weeds and shrubs of all sizes and shapes and stretches in all shades of green, as far as the eye can see. On most days, cowherds bring their animals to graze. There are eagles soaring at all times of the day. Squirrels, mice and birds are forever scampering in the rows of private gardens downstairs. Far away on the horizon, there is an occasional glint and glimmer as sunlight bounces off the metal bodies of steady streams of soundless cars.

And I think how wonderful it all is. The odds of looking at a marsh this beautiful in a congested city like Bangalore, is almost nil. Most apartment complexes ( high end or not) furnish views of the neighbour's underwear. And I wonder why people crib so much about the little jiggly dirt road and the fact that this land was once upon a time a septic tank.

From what I hear, there is no way any road is coming for a long long time. And the marsh is disputed and there is no way it is going to get resolved or developed for a long long time. So I can wake up everyday and have my mid-morning coffee, looking at my lovely marsh for a long long time.

"This could be Rotterdam or anywhere, Liverpool or Rome, Because Rotterdam is anywhere, Anywhere alone..."

2011-04-10T11:28:00.000-07:00

I've relaunched the comic strip that I ran a few years back on the blog, but this time on Facebook! Do follow it on http://www.facebook.com/Oormila.Cartoons

The do it yourself Barbie Doll Princess Cake

2011-02-02T08:41:00.000-08:00

Ok people. This is how you make the Barbie Cake:

First you bake three cakes in three sizes, one bigger than the other, so that you can stack them one on top of the other...

Then you mix some cream and butter with sugar and whip it all up really smooth. This is going to be the "glue" for your cake.

Now to make the "fondant icing" or the edible sugar play dough to wrap all over the cake- You take quarter cup water and dissolve a tablespoon of gelatin in it ( by warming it in the microwave). Then, in a saucepan, boil one and a quarter cup sugar with one third cup water. This is thick sugar syrup. To this, add a teaspoon of vanila essence, and a tablespoon of glycerine. Mix all this together. So basically, you have a mixture of gelatin, sugar syrup, vanilla essence, and glycerine.

Put a kilo of icing sugar into a bowl and make a hole in the centre. Pour the liquid mixture ino the centre of this and start kneading...

Tada! Here is your sugar play dough.

Now make the fondant into balls and put a bit of food colour into them. I wanted light pink and dark pink, so have accordingly added colour...

The fondant should be kneaded till the food colour mixes completely and is even.

It is very important to seal the fondant in cling wrap or a plastic bag to prevent it from drying out.

Now let's prep the cakes. Take the biggest round first and coat it with the butter-cream-sugar mixture.

Be generous with the coating.

Stack the next round on top of the base.

By the way, to make sure the cake holds together well, it is a good idea to put some toothpicks into the cakes and poke them down. Make sure you don't choke on the toothpicks though, heh heh...

There is the last round going on top of the stack.

Now take a clean plastic sheet. I didn't have one available, so I cut open a large plastic bag.

Roll out the fondant. It will be like chapathi dough.

To make sure that the skirt "undulates", take strip of rolled fondant and make little pillars. Line the sides of the cake.

Here is the dark pink fondant for the front of the doll's skirt.

Put it on one side of the cake. It will drap well and the butter-cream icing will act like a glue.

Now roll out and cut the light pink fondant and cover the sides of the cake.

At this point, your cake should look like this.

Now cut a little hole in the centre of the cake. Remove the legs of the doll and insert it into the hole. Roll a little fondant and wrap it around the doll's hip to make a belt.

Tada! Now go impress people with your cake! Happy Baking everyone! :-)

My "virtual" Tuscan garden- a wall mural

2010-11-26T09:29:00.001-08:00

The finished piece- Tuscan arch and courtyard with Butterfly Samarra in the foreground :-) The girl is real ;-)

This is my first attempt at muralling. I was in Home Stop a few weeks back when I saw a lovely set of wrought iron garden chairs and a table. They were placed on a wooden deck. There were differently themed backdrops erected behind these decks- seascapes, trees, desert scenes... I had a Eureka moment. We had just bought a new place in Koramangala and one of the balconies had a 10 ft high and 6 ft wide balcony. It would make the perfect backdrop for a "virtual" garden. Put these two chairs and the table in front of it and one could simulate the effect of sitting in a garden!

I toyed with the idea for a while, making preliminary sketches. Vivek has always been supportive of all my eccentricities. But I wondered if he would think that this was a little over the top. Surprisingly, he was thrilled with the idea. So I sauntered off to the paints shop and got myself a litre of White Apex Ultima Exterior Emulsion and several little bottles of "Staints". That is what they call the colours that are mixed with the white base to give you whatever shade you need. Now, I have never worked with house paints before and secretly feared that at the end of it all, I would be left with a really pretty wall mural but conked out kidneys! But some intense research later, I was convinced that the paints and their negligible fumes were safe. I set to work.

I am going to guide you through the process ( many friends liked the finished work and expressed interest in how it was done. Some folks wanted to try it at home on their own walls. The Magnanimous Oormila is only happy to share the tips. Please DO try this stunt at home. It is perfectly safe)

First, I took a big red crayon and drew the picture on the wall. I felt like a mischievous 3 year old The last time I scrawled on a wall like this with a red crayon, I got a spanking and a red bottom...
I didn't go into too many details at this point. Kept it simple.

Next, I worked on the bricks. I used shades of brown. I also worked on the wall and marked out a bit of foliage on the left.

I wanted a view inside the arch. So, I sketched out some trees in the distance and marked the horizon and sky.

I see some pretty trees with pink flowers on the inner ring road everyday on my cross country fro Banswadi to Koramangala. I have painted that on the right. To make the trees and the foliage on the left seem 3-D, I have given a grey shadow to the left.

I have put some white flowers on the shrubs on the left.

Okay, now for the gutsy part- get on a high stool and paint the top of the wall. I also drew cobble stones and have done a rough underpainting in dark brown.

Final stage- I deepened the shadows thrown by the tree and the shrubs. And I made the cobble stones more even.

Tada! Enjoy your virtual garden! Here I have asked my little girl to stand in front of the mural to give you and idea of perspective and scale...

The Myth of Sissy-Puss

2010-05-08T10:26:00.000-07:00

It was the fag end of our holidays. Almost September. We had just arrived at our great-aunt's house in the back waters. She had written to us saying that there was a two week intensive canoeing camp happening in the village. She thought it would be a treat for us kids. My cousin and I signed up for it promptly. Two weeks of great-aunt, good food and water sports. There was no better way to end a vacation.

We walked into the courtyard carrying our backpacks. Suddenly a large hairy creature the size of an overgrown bandicoot whizzed past our legs. I squealed and jumped. The furry thing was scooped up by a beautiful young platinum blond who stood in the doorway of the outhouse. She looked like a water nymph in her chiffon ruffled sun dress, her pale hair blowing in the wind. She greeted us, carrying the animal in her arms. The fluffy rag moved again. It was a Persian Cat.

"Heidi," she smiled charmingly, giving both of us a hand," I'm staying here for a fortnight. And I see that you have already met Sissy-Puss."

The cat glared at us with its cataract clouded eyes then turned its head away with disdain.It looked like a knotted, worn out carpet. It was hard to believe that someone as strikingly attractive as Heidi could have a cat as ugly and unkempt as Sissy-Puss.

“That’s a really unusual name for cat!” my cousin said, laughing.

“Yup. My father named him after a Greek King. How old are you kids?” She bent down to smile at us like we were toddlers. It struck us how how short we were. Heidi must have been a good five feet eleven inches tall.

“Thirteen,” we said in chorus. My cousin blushed beetroot red and shuffled his feet. Heidi had the most mesmerising sea-blue eyes and I think she knew she could daze men of any age.

“Aw! Sissy-Puss is older than you guys then! He's fourteen. I've had him since I was a little school girl. He’s the closest thing in the world to me.” She looked indulgently at the cat and released him from her arms towards us. Sissy-Puss didn't think much of us. He hissed, turned his tail up, flashed his bottom in contempt and walked back towards the outhouse.

Great-aunt rented the outhouse of her villa every year to students who came for brief stays. It was always by word of mouth. Great-aunt was a widow and her kids had all settled abroad. She lived in a sprawling mansion that looked like a heritage home. One of her sons had brought a classmate along during his student days in the U.S. That fellow had such a good time, he went back and raved to all his friends about his stay in the backwaters.The next year onwards, there was a steady stream of foreign students who came down to great-aunt's place for holidays and vacations. She was a gracious hostess- she cooked for them and put them up comfortably in the outhouse as paying guests. Since all the people who came there were friends of friends, she always had good people. And for someone her age, good company.

Heidi was the guest there this month. She was German, great-aunt said and was studying towards a degree in philosophy at a college in Oxford. She had brought her cat along for her stint in India. Heidi and Sissy-Puss had been in Manali and Dharamshala for the summer. Now that the weather was much better down south, she had come to Kerala to do a tour of the back waters.

My cousin and I ran into the cat on our way to the dining room. It was stretched out on the carpet with its eyes half closed, enjoying the patch of bright sun that came in through the skylight. It flicked its tail hearing our footsteps but didn't bother to raise its head. My cousin went up to take a closer look . Sissy-Puss suddenly bristled, put out a paw full of sharp claws and hissed.

“What a crappy cat,” he muttered, “I have seen rottweilers with better attitude.”

Heidi joined us for lunch. “I absolutely love Kerala food,”she said. “I think it has to do with all the coconut you guys add. I think these home made pickles are awesome too.”

“Sissy-Puss doesn't seem to be in such a good mood,” my cousin said looking at the cat. It had gotten up now and was ambling away with its trademark disdainful look.

“It's his afternoon siesta time,” she said, forking a mix of rice and fish into her mouth. “ He's a very fussy fellow. Just cannot do without his nap. He can be really crabby otherwise.”

“Has he had something to eat? Do you think he will like some of the fish ?” I asked.

“Oh, Sissy-Puss has only cat food. I've got bags of it. In fact, the majority of my luggage was cat food and I had some serious explaining to do to the customs officials. He never eats anything else.”

She helped herself to a generous amount of fish curry."This is really good," she said.

“But don't cats like fish?”

“ I guess they do. Sissy-Puss is a pedigreed cat, you see. Give them the right things to eat and they live healthy for years. Sissy-Puss has outlived most Persians I know. His only complaint is cataract which is expected for a guy his age. He's ship shape otherwise. You got to maintain them well.”

I raised an eyebrow. Heidi's words seemed incredibly ridiculous in the light of how scruffy Sissy Puss looked.

Two weeks went by without incident. Heidi was usually out sight seeing or was busy working on her papers in her room. We met her only at dinnertime. Sissy-Puss would be in the outhouse most of the day, lazing in his basket with the table fan on. My cousin and I were almost through with our canoeing lessons.

That afternoon it got horribly cloudy. Our lessons had been cancelled on account of the bad weather. It was a sudden squall. The lake behind our house was in spate and the waters were dark and choppy. The skies were black and the heavens looked like they would unleash their wrath anytime. We ran indoors and waited in the dining room. There was a breath taking view of the lake and adjoining paddy fields from the french windows. Heidi entered with great-aunt.

“Stunning weather,” she said, walking up to the window. She adjusted her light cotton shawl around her shoulders. “I am yet to see the furious Kerala rains that my friends keep talking about.”

Great-aunt had made fried pearl-spot fish for lunch. It was the local delicacy and was famous the world over. It could arguably transport the eater to seventh heaven with each mouthful.

“Seriously, Heidi,” I said, “you must give your cat some of this. Think about it. He comes all the way from Oxford to Kerala and to the land where the pearl-spot fish thrives. And he goes back without having even a bite. How sad is that?” I felt convinced that the fish would do wonders to Sissy-Puss' sour temperament. Perhaps it was eating the same boring cat food day after day that had made Sissy-Puss such a sour puss.

“She's right, Heidi. I don't think an occasional indulgence will do him any harm,” great aunt said. “I am diabetic and I have an ice cream once in a while! I'm still cool. Pushing 65!" She winked at the girl.

“This dish is unbelievable, it really is!” Heidi gushed, smacking her lips. “What do you call it?”

“Karimeen Pollichathu,” great-aunt said with pride.

“I am never going to get the pronunciation right,” Heidi laughed. “Yeah, maybe I'll give Sissy-Puss a wee bit. This fish is a real treat!". She flaked the flesh off a whole pearl-spot fish and mixed it with some rice for the cat. Great-aunt put it in a coconut shell and as was expected, Sissy-Puss made short work of it.

It rained non stop for the next four hours. The courtyard was flooded and the lake had swelled beyond the wave breakers. Heidi and Sissy-Puss stayed indoors all evening. She turned up for dinner with Sissy-Puss in his basket, looking a little worried.

“ He doesn't look too well to me,” Heidi said, her voice strained. “He hasn't been active or responsive. I don't think the fish agreed with him.”

By late evening, Heidi was pale with worry and was pacing nervously in great-aunt's living room. Sissy-Puss was in his basket meowing weakly. His eyes rolled back from time to time and he looked queasy. Heidi wrung her hands and cried, “He looks really sick, ma'am. I need to take him to a vet right away. Please!”

Great-aunt started freaking out. This was pearl-spot fish not puffer fish! If fried pearl spot fish could kill, the entire population of Alleppey would have been wiped out by now. Not to mention their cats. She began cursing herself for having suggested that Heidi feed her cat the fish. It never struck her for a second that Alleppey fish might not necessarily suit German born, Oxford based Persian cats. She made phone calls to the local vet. He was stranded due to the rains and there was no way he could make it to the house. He prescribed some medicines for a bad stomach though. Great-aunt sent one of the workers, a strong swimmer and regular participant in the boat races, wading through the water to get the medicines from the village .

Sissy-Puss was dead by morning. He had had a few bouts of diarrhoea through the night. He lay stretched out in his basket, writhing from side to side, his expression as contemptuous as ever. Then he let out a rancid meow and was gone. We were shell shocked. Great-aunt didn't know if she should say sorry or not. Surprisingly, Heidi didn't lose it like we dreaded she would. It looked like she had gone into a stupor and had become completely numb. She just made some calls and sat silently by the phone like a stone. Some guy called Stephen rang up and said he would be there as soon as he could. She quickly packed her things and Sissy Puss' possessions. Great-aunt didn't know if it would be alright to ask her what to do with the cat's body. We waited for her to break her silence.

Heidi made some more calls. After a sleepless night, she told us that she was going to get Sissy-Puss embalmed. The waters had receded by now and great-aunt called the local funeral parlor. Heidi went to town to make arrangements. Our parents arrived that morning to take us back. We never saw Sissy-Puss again or got to say goodbye to Heidi. Great-aunt later told us that she left two days after we did, with Sissy-Puss embalmed in a box. She was inconsolable and very tearful. She left in a highly emotional state saying that she hated India and that it had taken her faithful companion away from her. Stephen had come to take her back to Oxford.

I was in class on a hot Delhi monsoon afternoon. It was five years since that vacation in the backwaters where I had met the German girl and her cat. The professor was waxing eloquent about the theme of the absurd in Camus' The Outsider. It was stuffy and humid and everything seemed absurd. The drone of the fan coupled with the heat made my eyes droop. Then, the professor made a reference to the myth of Sisyphus.

I was jolted from my sleep. The professor talked about the Greek king who was doomed to roll a large boulder uphill only to have his efforts undone at the end of the day, when the stone would roll back. Poor Sisyphus was cursed to do this for all eternity on account of his bad attitude towards the gods. I suddenly thought of Sissy-Puss and his bad attitude and imagined him with a gigantic boulder, maybe one of wool, doing this for all eternity in cat heaven. It also struck me that this was where Heidi and her father had got their inspiration for Sissy-Puss' quirky name. I muffled a laugh.

I nudged my bench-mate and scrawled on my notebook, “I actually knew a cat called Sissy-Puss.” He giggled noisily and wrote something back.

“Something funny, miss, that you care to share with the rest of the class?” The professor looked up, cleared his throat and took his glasses off. He pointed the arms of his spectacles in my direction.

All eyes were on me. I felt the horrible beginnings of a heart attack coming on. “Sorry sir. Just.. nothing. The name, it reminded me-”

“Of what?” the professor snapped. It was unbearably hot in that classroom. The professor wiped beads of perspiration off his forehead and slammed his text shut. He crossed his arms and looked at me most indignantly.

I should have had the sense to apologize and shut up but just like Meursault in The Outsider, the heat had obscured my thinking.

“ I once knew a cat called Sissy-Puss, sir, that died of indigestion,” I blurted. I didn't realize how ridiculously corny or cocky it sounded till it came out of my mouth. The class was in uproar.

I had the rest of the afternoon to think leisurely about Sissy-Puss and Heidi once I was sent out of the classroom. I wondered what happened to Heidi. How did Sissy-Puss finally get packed and sent home? Was he buried on German soil or was his final resting place in some pet cemetery in Oxford? Did Heidi think the pearl-spot fish actually killed her senile cat? Or did local vet's medicine do it? Or did Sissy-Puss die a natural death, having had the privilege of supping on a king's feast of pearl-spot fish as his last meal? What actually killed Sissy Puss?

I Had A Little Nut Tree...

2010-04-17T10:05:00.000-07:00

All night, the rains spat. At about 3 a.m there was a crashing noise and part of the roof above my room caved in. There was a torrent of rain water, broken tiles and branches. When we ventured out in the morning to survey the damage, no one could believe what they saw. The Nutmeg tree, the pride of the estate, had fallen. Every one's face fell with it. After all, it had stood its ground for over half a century, weathered as many monsoons and several bad tempered storms in between.The invincible, deathless tree lay partially uprooted, leaning heavily against the back wall of the summer house.

My grandmother first showed me old, sepia tinted, moth chewn photos of the Nutmeg tree when I was six years old. She was about eighteen in it, thin as a lotus reed and was standing with an equally young and strapping grandfather. Next to them, reaching up to their thigh, was a nutmeg sapling. My great grandfather had planted it in her honour a week after she came to the estate as a new bride.A beautiful daughter-in-law's arrival needed to be marked with something that equalled her in worthiness .The nutmeg tree was thus a permanent fixture from her days as a young adult and so it was understandable, the fondness with which Grandmother regarded it. Although she never said it, she knew with a sense of unmistakable pride, that it stood for her beauty and the prosperity that her arrival had brought to Grandfather's family.

I often thought the tree had some distinctive rock star qualities. It had the bed head look and was wild and unfettered in its own way. It was a sight to behold when the storms struck. The tree head banged, thrashing its several arms on the clay tiles of the roof of the summer house. It looked scarily like a doped out rock star whacking his guitar on the roof. Sometimes, in the twilight, I imagined the tree to have the silhouette of a rocker from the 70s. On hot , still summer nights when the leaves were dry, dusty and motionless, the tree could have been the outline of a Hendrix with a distinct Afro. On wet damp monsoon evenings with its massive foliage hanging heavy and limp, its bark glistening like snake leather pants, the tree could have been Morrison. No one could deny that the tree had marked personality.

The summer house stood at the far end of the courtyard to one side of the huge iron gates that framed the long walk to the ancestral home. The tree spread itself above it. The summer house had a very shady past. Smelly, rather.It had originally been a cowshed for over thirty years. This was when grandmother had her own mini farm comprising of seven cows, a chicken coop and a sprawling vegetable garden. Then grandmother grew old and the cows got too rowdy for her to handle. One of them kicked her while she was milking it and she broke her hip. Grandmother retired. The cows were sold and the chickens were curried one by one depending on the frequency of guests at the estate. Grandmother decided that she couldn't tend to the vegetable garden either so she threw several handfuls of balsam seeds into the patch and within two weeks, there were pink and purple blossoms choking out the tomato and beans.

Grandmother then decided to convert the cowshed into a little house. She got the masons to wall the shed, put clay tiles on the roof and mosaic on the floors. The cow house was reborn as a summer house and soon lost all traces of its previous associations. With time, it started looking to the manor born. So the nutmeg tree gracing the front yard near the gate along with the fancy new summer house, stood for all that was magnificent about the estate.

The old watchman had been at the ancestral home from the time he was a young man. He believed that the nutmeg tree had supernatural powers. He said that great grandfather had planted the tree after getting the sapling blessed by a tantric. It was more than just a symbol of prosperity; it played the role of a protector of the household. The reason it had been planted at the front gate was so that spirits could not get past it. If anyone cast an evil eye on any member of the house, the tree would make sure that it was negated. There was a funny anecdote about the coconut thief who prowled in the neighbourhood at night. One night, he decided to steal nuts at our farm. He managed to drug the watchman and waited till the old man fell asleep. He then climbed the coconut palm next to the nutmeg tree and chopped quite a number of coconuts off.

No one really knows what happened after that. People were awoken by horrific cries. When they rushed outside, they found the thief suspended by the back of his shirt from one of the branches in the upper reaches of the nutmeg tree. He was completely disoriented and looked like he had been lifted up and hung on a peg. When he was taken down and asked what had happened, he replied incoherently that he had lost his balance and fallen into the foliage of the nutmeg tree. However, the old watchman had a different interpretation. He said that when he came to, he saw the tree put out several of its branches and wrap themselves around the thief and pin him down!

The watchman said that the thief went insane after that. He ended up in an asylum where he continuously rambled about his strange experience in the tree and would run for cover if he ever saw anything that looked remotely like a nutmeg. Grandfather seriously doubted this version and attributed the yarn to whatever anesthetic the thief had administered to the watchman. Besides, soon after the incident, he saw someone who looked very uncannily like the thief, grinning most cheerfully from the bottom corner of the local newspaper,looking perfectly compos mentis. He had apparently moved to a different locality and had been operating there with considerable success before he was nabbed. Not by any nutmeg tree this time, but the neighbourhood gurkha. However, our tree was still the hero having caught the thief red handed while on our property.

Kerala summers are a hot, sticky affair. The nutmeg tree was so lush and so expansive, at least fifteen people could have sat comfortably in its shade at high noon. Not even a ray of even the most intrusive bit of sun could reach the ground. I have spent eight summers at the ancestral home, each of them them two years apart. Whenever I came to the estate, things would be different. For one, I grew up from toddler to young adult. New trees were planted, old ones were cut. But the permanent sight was the Nutmeg tree. I have spent several afternoons propped up against it with a book.The watchman was usually superstitious about people sitting under trees in the afternoon hours. He would shoo us away from the tamarind tree if we sat under it.

"Spirits" he would caution, his face taking on an alarmed expression. "There are wandering souls caught in limbo between the worlds of the living and the dead. You don't want them considering your body for residence! Then it will be very bad. We'll have to get the trantri to beat the devils out of you then."

But somehow, he had no issues with us relaxing under the nutmeg tree. This was our arch protector, the pride and power of the estate and the ancestral home. It had seen grandfather and grandmother as young newly weds, their children and the children that they had. The tree was a living member of the family.

The tree leaned like a colossal giant against the back part of the house. Several of its branches had pierced through the tiling of the roof.

"I think it will be okay once it is put back on its feet". Grandfather flashed a torch into the huge cavity that had been gouged by the part of the tree that had been uprooted. It was broad day light by now and the sun was glaring through the clear skies but my grandfather wanted to be sure by torch light. Whether tonsils or trees, torch light was in his opinion, the best way to examine any problem. " We just need to get a few workers to ease it back into upright position. No damage done. The root is intact".

We were visiting for the holidays and had spent the night at the summer house the previous night after a party.
"This... this looks bad. It must have been one hell of a monstrous gale to do this kind of damage. Let's get the farmhands right away". My father rushed back into the house to make phone calls. My mother and I stood watching the tree in disbelief. I sniffed.

" I wouldn't worry too much!". Grandfather put an arm around my shoulders and hugged me. " We have put coconut trees back on their feet again after they got pulled up in storms like toothpicks. Our nutmeg tree is far mightier than that!". Somehow I didn't believe this magic realist attempt to reassure me.

Nobody had breakfast till the farmhands arrived. The watchman kept pouring water over the exposed roots as if cleaning a wound. Grandmother kept stroking the branches.

The farmhands got to work at once. One of them made a makeshift pulley throwing a rope over the tree in a loop and pulling it behind a sturdy mango tree that stood close to it. They heaved and sighed and the tree rose a few feet. Then it crashed again into the roof of the house bringing down part of the wall with it.

Grandmother shrieked " What are you people doing? I don't want the branches to be more torn up than they already are. Careful!". I had never seen her that upset before.

All morning the workers sweated, trying to hoist the tree. By afternoon they gave up. The tree was still slanted against the roof and had not budged an inch. Father paid them generously for their efforts though. In a desperate attempt to keep the tree alive, the farm hands shovelled mounds of earth over the exposed roots and told us that we should be prepared for the eventuality that the tree would grow "sideways" from now on. It might not stand upright but it would certainly thrive in a "lateral" position. As incredibly stupid as it seems now, it sounded like a reassuring option at the time. We just wanted the tree alive and were willing to overlook the direction of growth.

For two days, we kept shovelling mounds of earth over the roots in an attempt to cover them. No one was bothered about the house. Then grandmother had a bad feeling that the leaves were not looking too good. " I think we need to get the tree back on its feet again as soon as possible" she said.

A group of gypsies were passing through the neighbourhood and had heard from people about the giant nutmeg tree that had fallen on the estate and the desperate family that was trying to resurrect it. Their leader landed up and said that they would lift it for us- for a handsome sum. Grandfather did not think twice. " By all means" he said.

The Gypsies could make out the misery on our faces. They proceeded to go about it most scientifically. The leader drew up a detailed plan of what was to be done and instructed his people like an experienced foreman. Finally they ended up applying the very same tactics as the farmhands had two days before. There were some twenty of them and they hoisted the tree up. The leader proclaimed that the tap root was perfectly fine and that the tree would thrive as before without a doubt. Never before in our lives had we collectively hoped that this would be true.

For the next one week, it became an obsession to check the tree out first thing in the morning to see how it was faring. Did it look healthy, did it look like it was doing ok? For the first few days, we felt that all was as before. Then Grandmother found an unusually high number of dried shed leaves at the bottom of the tree. The branches started looked crusty and it was apparent to even a fool that all was not well with the tree. It started looking emaciated and grey. Within two days, the abnormal leaf shedding became too obvious to brush aside. The tree was slowly beginning to look skeletal as it became progressively bare. The nutmegs had begun to wither and shrivel.

Nobody wanted to accept what was apparent. We sat in the front porch of the ancestral home sipping hot coffee looking straight down the walk where the nutmeg tree stood at the iron gates. No one uttered a word.

" I think we should spare it the ignominy of wasting away like this", Grandmother finally took a call." I'll send for the wood chopper ". A collective gasp rent the air.

" Cut down the tree? It has been here forever! What will this place be without it". Grandfather was horrified.

" Oh For God's sake! There is nothing that can be done now. I think that it died the day of the storm. None of us wanted to accept it. It has been long gone". Grandmother sighed unhappily and quickly went inside. She was the iron lady of the house, not one to show her emotions in front of people.

So the tree was cut on a hot Tuesday afternoon. It came down branch by branch and Grandmother stood bravely through all of it. Every time a branch was chopped, she would bend over tenderly and pick all the shrivelling nutmegs off it. This was the last harvest and she removed the fruits respectfully as though she was removing armor off a dead warrior.

The view from the house suddenly looked alien and bare. All that was left to remind us of the tree was a gigantic cavity where it had been. The cutters loaded all the wood into a huge cart. The watchman opened the heavy iron gates and the cart left the estate.

A fierce patch of sunlight that had eluded the earth all this time, shone down on the spot where the massive tree had stood for more than fifty years.

The Jazz Concert

2010-02-23T09:02:00.001-08:00

Acrylic on canvas, 24"X36". Collection of Vishy and Gazal Vishwanath.

A Painting Unveiled and Missing shoes!

2010-02-20T09:19:00.000-08:00

Friday was a huge day for me. My painting, Genesis, got unveiled by the CEO of ThoughtWorks Technologies Ltd at the inauguration of their new Koramangala office. It is one of the biggest canvases I have worked on in a long time- a massive 6 X 2 feet.

The run up to the event was crazy though! I left my son with my aunt, dropped Samarra to school at 1 p.m and headed off to the ThoughtWorks office where my hubby and his rocker friends were getting ready for the gig in the evening. I sat around listening to the band tune up and left around 5 to pick up my girl from school. I had her change of clothes and my dress, heels and jewelery in my back pack. The event was to kick off in an hour and I figured that since the school was walking distance from the office, I would have enough time to pick my daughter and head back, scrub off the dust and grime and get into my lace black number for the evening. But strange tidings awaited me.

I heard a familiar crying from inside the class room ( that's when I realized that every animal can distinguish the bawling of its young one no matter what. I always wondered how the seals and gooney birds on National Geographic found their offspring in a congested colony of seals and gooney birds but now I know how). Anyway, my offspring came out looking all distressed along with her apologetic teacher. Someone else had gone home wearing her crocs and she was barefooted. Of all days to lose a pair of shoes. I had like 45 minutes to get back and change.

The Principal came out to talk to me and my first question was if she knew any shoe shop close by. I also told her that I had to be at an event that I had been waiting all month for; and that I had to get my daughter shod. And time was a factor! A search party was sent inside for the shoes but they all came back with empty hands. 30 minutes to go...

I cracked a PJ about going to the event barefooted like M.F Hussain. Everyone except my daughter thought it was terribly funny. She thought it was just terrible. So I carried all 16 kilos of her and got onto the main road. There were parents taking their kids away in cars. I looked at the shoes of some of those kids. I had to think quickly if I was to get back to the event. I thought of asking one of the parents with a kid the size of mine if I could bum shoes. On immediate second thought I ditched the idea. Then on a desperate lark, I accosted a mum I have never spoken to before. She was getting into her car with her kid. I explained my situation and asked her about any shoe shop nearby. She was a godsend. She drove me to one and I jumped off, thanked her profusely and grabbed the first shoe off the rack. The salespeople must have thought me an odd ball because I shouted God bless! God bless! and shook hands vigorously with the main cashier before flagging down an auto. I bet I was the most eccentric customer he has ever met.

I arrived at the office to see the dignitaries at the gate. I raced to the elevator and well, if you have latched onto to the frequency of this story, I don't need to tell you that it wasn't working. so I bolted up the stairs with Samarra, her bag, my bag and the shoes. I changed into my dress and stilettos, rubbed war paint under my panda bear eyes and gave myself Donatella Versace lips. I doused myself with perfume, scrubbed Samarra, changed her and gave her something to eat. I opened a packet of salted peanuts for myself and dashed to the lobby where I did a terrific skid on the vitrified floor that would have got me a place in the Olympic figure skating event. I stopped skating a few inches short of the satin ribbon and looked at some 100 people and the chief guest. Just that they were on the OTHER side of the ribbon. I raised my hands ( opened salted peanut packet in one) and dived under the ribbon and joined the amused crowd.

The CEO cut the tape, everyone cheered and I realized that Samarra was missing! I pushed through the crowd and heard the familiar bawling again. Everyone had moved to the lobby where my painting was about to be unveiled and people were looking around for me and calling my name. I raced to the area with Samarra and the evil new shoes played up. The poor thing tripped and the carpet claimed a good share of the skin on her knees. Fresh bawling started. Mercifully, my hubby had surfaced by now and I tossed him the kid and bounded over to explain my work. Just that I was so out of breath and confused by now that everything was spinning and the painting made no sense to me!

I did an impromptu explanation of the piece which people later came and said they liked ( I swear to God I don't remember anything). In the photos I am carrying my daughter so I guess at some point I must have taken her from my hubby.

Well, the adventures stopped there, thankfully. the rest of the evening was great fun. My husband and his office band ( they are called Vp and the Cookie Cutters. Err, I named them by the way) played some awesome numbers. The food was great, the people were great. It was fun...

Before leaving, I spent some private time with my painting. It was a very satisfying and humbling experience seeing it make it the journey from my studio to the lobby wall of a prestigious organisation. I remain in a space of deep gratitude to the Universe as ever :-) Missing shoes, dysfunctional elevators and scheming carpets not withstanding! :-D

Well, you know what they say about modern artists being cons heh heh. For those of you interested in what the painting stands for here is the explanation:

Genesis is built around the themes of Creation, Ideation, Energy and Positivity.

I have planned this piece to work not only at the level of theme but also colour, myth and symbol. Let me explain each of these:

The palette is primarily reds, oranges and yellows. In color therapy, red is the hue of dynamism, passion, excitement and enthusiasm.Orange and yellow stand for health, happiness, optimism and vitality.So a painting done in these shades is meant to exude the overall vibration of well being.

If you look at the left panel of the painting, the reds and browns give the impression of an aerial view of the outstretched wings of a dragon in flight. Mythologically, the dragon is considered to be the most majestic being in the Cosmos, standing for power, wisdom and strength. If you look at the way the colours move, the strokes are directed upwards, representing ascent.

At the level of symbolism, the painting represents a sun flare. The sun is the centre of all life and growth. The painting thus comes to represent Genesis at a primal level. In the creation myths of so many traditions,all thought and ideas are represented as emerging from this primodial soup of Matter. The blue streaks represent exactly that. The flame of the bunsen burner is hotest at the blue centre. Ideas are thus most potent and the blue streaks represent moments of inspired thought in their raw form. The white patches are symbolic of the tranquility attained through meditation- a reminder that all great enthusiasm must be balanced with deep introspection.

So, this energy painting is meant to uplift and energize one in the work environment ! The beauty of Expressionist art is that every time the work is viewed, new forms and new ideas seem to emerge from the interplay of colours. The enjoyment of the painting is enhanced by the fact that it is always open to interpretation.

Here are two snaps of my husband and his band VP and the Cookie Cutters. Congrats Risha, Jayant, Vishy, Nadeem, Angshuman, Manish and Vp. And there is Samarra up there too with her dad!

Cityscape series III, IV, V, VI

2009-11-22T08:34:00.001-08:00

I have been running crazy with my Cityscape series. I have tried out palettes that I have never before tried- like the last painting in purple and orange. I have ideas blocked out for some 5 more canvases and then I think I'll wrap it up and call it a day. Till then, it is City time at Bramasole.

Bramasole news

2009-11-14T19:49:00.000-08:00

Spent an awesome weekend with my 4 year old in my studio. She had some work to finish ( she is on a dinosaur series) and I was putting the final touches to a work that had come back ready from the framer's.

I have been working on my Cityscape series ever since I saw some amazing photos of New York city which a friend had shot. I was very inspired. So I started on canvas number one, which was a city by the river. The keynote of the painting was reflections. That one canvas made something in my head go boom. Three more canvases followed, all strikingly similar but with subtle changes in mood and light. Am now expanding the series to include cityscapes at dusk and twilight. Let's see how the inspiration holds up...

If this isn't happiness, I don't know what is :-)

Whispers in the Wind

2009-11-13T19:52:00.000-08:00

This piece, in Acrylics, is in the collection of Mrs. Nandana and Mr. Varun Sarin in New York. Varun told me about how he loved fall colours- the oranges and the yellows contrasted against the blue and steel grey of the season. Varun and Nandana got married this fall. So I thought why not make them a piece that encapsulates the essence of the season they got married in. The result was Whispers in the Wind.

Wish you a long and prosperous married life, guys. Thank you for sending me this beautiful photo of the framed work. When ever you look at the wall, think of me :-) God bless...

Inside Bramasole

2009-09-25T09:37:00.000-07:00

I got a few cane chairs and some tables today. My studio has become my chill out zone now. Yes, the quilt on the left is my work too. Am doing up the place bit by bit. So it is up from just easel and paints to a quilt, some rugs, pillows. Curtains tomorrow...

The other day someone asked me why I had named my studio Bramasole. It rhymes scarily with a very very popular cuss word. Besides, why an Italian word for a studio in a corner of Banaswadi? Bramasole means"to yearn for the sun" and just like the villa in the movie became the turning point in the writer's life, my little Bramasole inspires me to do stuff I have never attempted.

I must have seen Under the Tuscan Sun some 10 times. I loved the movie. Even the far fetched implausible romantic bits. So feel good, so uplifting. For me, it was all about life giving you what you always wanted in forms that you never expected. It is a movie about rising again, keeping the faith, staying optimistic.

My daughter paints with me too. And here is her first work in the studio. In this "astrapt", you see a red tree and a " yellow stegosaurus" hiding behind it. One of the green patches is supposed to be a tiny T-rex biting the yellow dino's behind. Ah! And the blue patch is her version of "splatter painting". My very own Marla Olmstead!

Summer Night City- Cityscape II

2009-09-25T04:05:00.000-07:00

Productive day at Bramasole. Have gotten into the habit of painting a few hours a day now. My Cityscape series is slowly unfolding. Am having fun experimenting with knives and textures. Bramasole has set me free in a lot of ways, really. I mean, I am able to boldly express when I am in that space. I'm slowly crossing over into figurative abstracts from being a pure Impressionist for the past 15 years...

Cityscape 1

2009-09-23T08:36:00.000-07:00

Am dabbling in abstracts these days. Or "astrapts" as my 3 and a half year old says. So far so good. Here's number 1 from my cityscape series...

New beginnings

2009-09-15T08:34:00.000-07:00

My studio finally opens! And I've started work on an abstract series. Watch this space :-)

Big Ambla

2009-09-05T08:16:00.000-07:00

After a one year break to be full time mommy to my baby son, I've started painting again. Just finished a large abstract of someone I have known for a long time. My mother. With a twist of course- this is how she looked at my age. I am a huge fan of Modigliani. Hence the slim neck and angular composition. As for the palette, well this painting is for my bedroom which is in a sea blue-green theme.

My daughter, who held the palette for me at times and most happily washed my brushes, was the first one to make note of the fact that the painting was of "Ambla", as she fondly calls my mother. The moment I finished the preliminary coat, she rushed up. The canvas was almost double her size. She said " Mamma! That's Ambla. Big Ambla!". Reminded me of a story I had read about John Lennon. Apparetly his son Julian showed all his nursery work to his dad without fail. One day he came back with a sketch of a little girl with diamond shaped eyes. He told Lennon that it was "Lucy in the sky with Diamonds". The sketch inspired the famous Beatles number of the same name.

I decided to call my canvas Big Ambla after Samarra's name for it.

A midnight recital

2009-07-19T09:50:00.000-07:00

At 11 p.m, the tot announced
Wailing away,
It was that time of the night
for some father-son ballet.

Steps and leaps,
And Pas de basque, well,
He executed them all,
Holding the bawling rascal.

Like a desperate, two-left-footed
Margot Fonteyn.
Pirouette and Arabesque
He tried in vain.

At 12:30 a.m
when the dear devil did tire,
They fell asleep, the ballerinas,
Scion and sire...

P.S:
(If you're wondering where the mother was all this while,
She slept through the routine with an amused smile)

Hands

2009-07-16T21:41:00.000-07:00

These are my hands. I was sitting at the computer thinking of a good story to write. Nothing was happening. Writer's Block. Then I looked at my hands. And I had one of my epiphanies again.

Let me tell you a story...

I was a chronic nail biter.The flesh at the end would form ugly mounds that folded over the boat shaped slivers that my nails were bitten down to. Sometimes , when there was no extra length of nail to bite, I would chew on the cuticle, the surrounding skin. Alright, I think I have grossed you out...

A simple Google search for why people bite nails will reveal everything from obsessive compulsive disorder, anxiety, neurosis to more serious disorders like clinical depression. Let's just say I was a very anxious and nervous kid. Why? Let's not go there. My blog is no longer a space where I can rant freely. Heh heh. The problems of increased readership, I say.. The flip side of fame ( delusional me speaking! Ahahahaha!).

So, yes, where were we? Nervous kid. Right, so from the time I was like, maybe 4, I began to get into this frame of mind that the whole world around me was falling apart. Now folks can be divided into two groups, a Kurukshetra of sorts. There are those who say that that the world was indeed falling apart around me . Then there are others who say that "in my warped estimation", things were falling apart around me ( The Matrix Model where nothing really is. You think so, hence it is real. Maya Theory for steadfast Hindus). I shall, to appease the second group, take it on myself. You know, accept responsibility. Be a man about it all. Woman. Whatever.

So, "In my warped estimation", my world was falling apart. Nature had blessed me with deep sensitivity which manifested as music, art and writing. The flip side was flimsy emotional skin. I perceived stress in heightened form. I will find supporters to vouch for the fact that those stresses were not " merely perceived" but "real" but like I said before, " to appease some", let's say that those stresses were exaggerated by my over sensitive self. Oh my. This puzzle-speak thing is just not my style and I am twisting and squirming here. Tough for plain speak folks to go all cloak and dagger. So this para ends here. Full stop. You readers have a brain, don't you? Think then...

Anyway, nail biting was a great release, a fantastic outlet. Feel stress, bite. Feel anxious, bite. Feel angry, bite. Feel rage, bite. Feel small, bite. Feel helpless, bite. Eventually it became feel anything, bite. So, not in just those stress moments but even when watching TV or listening to music, it was all about peeling any nails that had dared to grow back.

I remember n number of instances where this nervous tick of mine became a source of deep shame. Bitten down nails create a very bad first impression. It is a dead give away to your state of mind and speaks volumes about your self-esteem and self-confidence I would be at a competition, holding the winner's trophy and people would come up to shake hands. And they would be appalled at the monstrous state of my nails. I would be at a recital and people would come up saying " Oh, show me those hands. You play like magic!". And I would be distraught at the way people reacted to what they saw. Ugly gnarled fingers with non-existent dirty nails.

In college, my hands were the bane of my life. Professors, classmates, friends, everyone I met would look at my nails and make all kinds of deductions about me- insecure, under-confident, conflicted. Correct deductions at the time, I must say in all honesty, but it was mortifying, to be exposed in such a way. Only psychos indulged in such disgusting self-harm.

I tried many times to quit cold turkey. And succeeded. My nails would grow and I would be astonished at their beauty. To think that such ugliness could transform itself into such fully formed things without a trace of the trauma I had subjected them to, was astonishing. Left alone, those keratin wonders looked so perfect. But then, the next time I felt stressed, I would degrade them. I would relapse. Almost like a crazy Gardener running amok among his roses shearing them away ruthlessly. Perversely, there was a satisfaction in seeing them back to their misshapen bleedy selves. So I continued this cycle for 25 years...

Then, in 2002, I met a handsome, shy, bassist. I was quitting cold turkey at the time ( for the nth time!) and on our first date, I had long, manicured talons, painted a sexy dusty rose. I waved them proudly in front of him all the while during our animated conversation. He later told me that he was stunned by the beauty of my hands. Ironically, Life took over the next time we went out. My nails were gone! Back to bleedy boats. And what was unbelievable was that the handsome, shy bassist made no remark about it. Even when I looked all self-conscious and sad, my fingers curled leper-like when we sat at the cafe. A fundamentally good person having a bad time, he reckoned, he later said... Very tolerant and very optimistic. No one would have bet on me in those days. Anyone else would have marked me off as a psycho and shown a clean pair of heels, seeing such hideous self-mutilation.

Well, I married the handsome, shy bassist, you know. With persistent effort and self-inquiry into addressing the real problem for my nail biting, I quit once and for all. Other things fell into place after that. I blossomed as a human being. I found the basic things I never had as a person.

I have evergreen dusty rose talons now. Tantalizing and beautiful. I shamelessly brag, don't I! I have earned it, my dear readers. My children ( we have two " as -of-now-not-so-weird-ones") like to hold my hands and trace the shape of my nails. My 3 and a half year old daughter, a fashion conscious diva in the making, has a pet phrase at bedtime " mamma, your nails are sooooo beautiful. Can I grow mine too?". Now what could be more fulfilling for an ex-nail biter than hearing that?

My hands have reflected my life. I love my hands now. I love my life...

Rebirth

2009-05-21T00:14:00.000-07:00

One dusty Delhi afternoon
something splintered in my head.

I put my quill
in a dumpster
on a dirt road.

Then I held my breath and ran.
For years

from faces and mouths
and voices.

I quarried two stone masses
And pulled shutters on the world
Aligning my bent spine
Against their cold hinges.

But all the while
I never felt ashamed
To hold sable brushes or knives
And egg-tempera tubes,
Or wrench notes
from piano keys.

Strange.
Because the quill was my true gift...

Something has happened again.

I've been hiding too long
In my primitive fortress.

World,
I can write words
Again...

A case of the Shudders...

2009-04-01T10:34:00.000-07:00

NEVER EVER EVER tell a precocious toddler where you are taking her. Especially if it is shopping at the underwear store.

My daughter Samarra just got her report card. The teacher made a special note that she has the uncanny ability to retain matter, recall it with ease and make personal observations about it. That is apparently commendable for a 3 year old. I was all puffed up with pride and tapped my kid appreciatively on her head. What I didn't know was that that special talent of hers would cost me very dearly in the evening...

I desperately needed new underwear. A new store had opened just a stone's throw from my house. I tagged Samarra along and told her I needed to go get some new "chaddis". Samarra has this very quirky accent- a slightly modified version of mine. She calls them shuddi, with a drawl.

My daughter talks nineteen to the dozen. That way, she could shame me and my mother, both non-stoppers talkers, put together. We were out of the gate when neighbors approached, out for their evening walk. Samarra ran up to them and wished them. This was followed by an extempore on how we were going shopping for "shuddies" for me. I was wearing a bright red dress and my face blended into the outfit. I smiled and ushered her along and requested her not to say the word "shuddy" while out in public.

That of course, was fuel to the fire. My daughter is after all a chip of the old block. You tell me not to do something, I will jolly well do it ten times over with flair and flamboyance. So, as soon as we approached the next gate down the road, she looked at the neighbour there, waiting to say hello to us. Then she looked at me. And in a classic example of your own genes coming to bite your own arse, she turned to the lady and said "Hello aunty. We are going to shop to buy mamma shuddy". Then she gave me a look of innocent triumph. The lady, her husband and their son-in-law who were all at the gate, burst out laughing. And I thought these games were to be played only 10 years down the line when she turns teen-queen!

I took her announcement in my stride. I am quite thick skinned these days. Besides, I don't like to cramp Samarra's style by hush-hushing her all the time. She is a free spirit, very bold, unafraid. I am not one for repression. I teach her the essential social graces but if she chooses to be irreverent at times, I let her be. So long as no one gets killed, I am ok.We were about 100 meters from the shop. She launched into a monologue about her baby brother's shuddy, her own collection which has frills and of course, just as we were turning the corner and there were some 20 people at the paanipuri stall, the topic shifted, very providentially, to my shuddy. Everyone in that stall expressed instant interest. One woman shook with laughter.

We got into the shop. Just my luck. There were six young Iranian students there who live diagonally opposite my house. Before I could say anything, Samarra looked at the main salesman and blurted " Mamma come to buy shuddy". The last word of that sentence was delivered in the shrillest possible register and in my embarrassment, I heard it especially amplified. Time froze in that shop. I don't know what they call knickers in Tehran, but from their elbowing, the boys definitely got it. The cashier didn't know what hit him and he seemed more embarrassed than I was. The tailors who operated at the end of the shop kept chuckling and laughing. I managed fake composure and hushed Samarra through clenched smiling teeth. She demanded to be hoisted up on the counter. Then came the killer line. With a dramatic wave of her hand and knitted eyebrows, she said " Bring the shuddy!". The saleswoman and I both burst out laughing. The tailors were roaring. The Iranians were in splits. The cashier was wiping tears...

In the next fifteen minutes or so, we saw many shuddies. She had expert comments to make on them. I was a good sporty mom- I let her choose some for me.

I saw the neighbours again today when I stepped out. One of the ladies kindly asked me if the "shopping" yesterday was fun. How diplomatic. As for the Iranians, I am waiting for them to graduate and leave my colony...

Dusty Old Blueprints

2009-03-22T11:08:00.000-07:00

One of my Bach books fell out of the bookshelf while I was cleaning yesterday. It was dusty. As are my fingers these days when it comes to tough classical pieces. I had last played those pieces effortlessly when I was 17 years old.

It was one of those rare days when the baby slept longer that usual. So, I sat at the piano and decided to work out a piece. My fingers fumbled at first. I took one note at a time. Suddenly, something unbelievable happened. My fingers started moving on their own. It was as though they seemed to remember. Of course, my playing was anything but perfect; I hit slurs where there were none and there were wrong notes galore. But in that cacophony, the basic melody was there. A faded blue print of the music obviously existed deep inside my brain. It was a good feeling. Now, with some practice, I would be able to play the piece again without making Bach turn over in his grave.

This post is not about Bach. Or piano music. It is about another faded blueprint that exists in my mind. After 14 years, I came face to face with it again. And I was so overwhelmed that I didn't know how to handle it...

I am a Pantheist, a Neo-Paganist. I worship the Sun, the Moon, Trees. I can say that I follow Hinduism in its oldest form where there were deities for everything from heavenly bodies to natural phenomena. There is only one power and that is Nature. According to me everything else that happens in our lives- luck, love, illness, death are all random occurrences which we interpret, analyze and quantify in the context of our religious beliefs and cultures. I do not believe in the the Will of any entity sitting and monitoring our lives with ledgers into which bad and good deeds are entered and consequently punished or rewarded. Do good, feel good. Good Karma, Bad karma. That has been my path for years now. But that was not how it was...

Before my kids were born, I debated on how to direct them when it came to faith. I was keen that my children should know their Hindu roots and be familiar with the scriptures just like I was. I decided that I would tell them all the stories from the Ramayana and the Mahabharata and get them familiar with the "Gods" from a cultural perspective. So, my 3 year old daughter knows Ganesha and his antics, Shiva and his temper, makes fun of Kubera and Narada and her favorite "God" is Krishna. I light the lamp in the pooja room and tell her that "Light is God". Then she says "But Krishna is God". And I am stumped. I don't want to launch into a thesis on my beliefs. She is 3 years old after all! She can make her own intellectual formulations later on if she likes. But the present moment is all very strange for me because I am a non-believer struggling to dish out faith for a 3 year old in a convincing manner. One of the hardest things in the world is selling something you don't believe in...

The other day, she was sitting and playing with her blocks. Suddenly, she started chanting a shloka that she had learnt at her Montessori. "Saraswathi namasthubhyam". I almost dropped my son in surprise. I felt a blue print slowly emerging in my head...

When I was my daughter's age I used to be an ardent devotee of Goddess Saraswathi. I chanted Shlokas everyday, many times a day. I prayed before I studied, before I did any creative piece of writing. I prayed before I painted, before I played the piano. I prayed every time I went for a competition. I prayed every time I won. I read the scriptures, read Hindu creation myths, stories.

Then, I went to college...

I can imagine how the folks who upheld Creationism with religious fervor felt when Darwin published his theory on the Origin of the Species and what that puncturing of faith did to their psyches. It was like I had walked out the door and there was a totally different world waiting for me. One in which everything I thought real was not. Much like the guy in Plato's Simile of the Cave who ventures out one fine day to find that his life was a lie. My faith was shattered. Logic gnawed at me from all directions. The more I read, the more things seemed bleak. Nihilism, Existentialism, and all other Ism-s assaulted me. Everything I had believed in, was reduced to fairytale. My "Gods" became little cartoon figures in a graphic novel. I began to see them as not the Omnipotent divinities I had been conditioned to see them as, but as"Mythical Icons who existed within the cultures that created them". My Krishna became just a "hero" from ancient times. My Saraswathi became an "embodiment of the faculty of knowledge". She was no longer the living, breathing omnipresent deity who could bestow blessings like I had believed for the better part of my life. As my reading continued, so did my disillusionment of all religions. Russel's "Why I am not a Christian" took apart that religion for me. I was faced with a convincing case of Godlessness...

I became an Atheist. A few years later, I took a softer stance and shifted to Agnosticism. The desire to worship something, to find meaning persisted. So I became a Pantheist. I acknowledged a power higher and stronger than myself- Nature, and worshiped her. But I was convinced that I was just a creature of chance, floating through a maze of random experiences with no benevolent power protecting me. My belief in this was rock solid. And it was anything but reassuring.

Yesterday, I heard my daughter chant the hymn to Saraswathi again. I was at my study table, writing. I stopped for a minute, smiled at her and went back to my work. Then, for some reason, I slowly wrote the four line hymn on the top of the page. Then, I had a surreal moment. I saw my whole life of 31 years rush past in fast forward. I had visions of myself praying with innocence. I suddenly craved for that again.

How does one find faith when one is convinced otherwise? I remember a state of primal bliss when I knew nothing intellectually but blindly believed. The peace, the feeling that I wasn't alone. That there was someone up there watching out for me, protecting me. Rationalists say that God is Man's creation as an insurance policy for moments of emotional weakness, that the brave take their fates into their own hands and plod through the world with conviction. I am human. I am not ashamed to say that while I too can plod through the world with conviction, there are times when I feel distressingly weak. How I wish the Gods of my childhood would come and hold my hands then...

How I long to revive the dusty blue print of faith again like I do long forgotten piano pieces...

Saraswathi Namasthubhyam Varadhe Kaama Roopini
Vidhya-Arambham Karishyaami Siddhir Bhavathu Me Sadhaa.

(Salutations to you, Saraswathi, the giver of boons and who is delightful in form. With your blessings I start studying and may success always crown my efforts.)

A Dog's Breakfast

2009-03-20T09:14:00.000-07:00

I got up at 5:30, pulled on my track pants and sweat shirt. I took a good look at my stomach. It was almost flat. Nice, I thought. For a petite woman, my stomach had stretched to unimaginable proportions during both my pregnancies and here I was 6 months after the birth of my son, with a belly that was almost flat. Good job, woman, I gloated. Now, let's keep the good work going.

I looked around for my stick. Only a suicidal idiot would go for a morning walk without a stick in my colony. The place is infested with aggressive stray dogs. I have a green steel pole that I take along with me; the pole of a mop that broke. It is abnormally long, looks quite foolish and the color is almost fluorescent. I have seen many joggers muffle laughs when I approach from the opposite direction. I look more like a pole vaulter than a morning walker I suppose, with the stupid green pole from a broken mop. Other joggers carry short sticks with them but I don't see the point. For the ferocious strays dogs that loiter in my colony, those sticks would be mere tooth-picks if they decided to taking a bite off your calf muscle. Ugly green pole for me any day. I am sure that it looks reminiscent of everything from Moses on Mount Sinai to the Dandi march but who cares. At least I can fend them off effectively with some Filipino Art of Stick Fighting which I had seen on National Geographic. I even tried some of those stick wielding moves in my living room and felt very confident that I was ready to taken on any canine attacks if the need arose.

I put my shoes on, locked the door and then realized that I had forgotten the stick. The moment I opened the door again, the lights went out. It was still dark outside and pitch black inside the house. I heard a small whimper- my son was stirring. I had to get out at once if I was to go for my walk. So I said a quick hushed bye to my husband who was groping in the dark for a candle and decided to go without my stick. Just one day. No pole. Come on. What are the odds of being bitten if I go out just one day without my pole?

I hit the service road. A few people stared at me. I was not in my Sergei Bubka form today and that was unusual. I was all the while worrying if my son was up and if my husband was having a tough time finding the crib in the dark! A gray dawn was breaking by now. A few dogs went past me on the service road. None showed any interest in me. I usually keep to the main roads but today, I felt like looking at a Gulmohur tree on a side road, up close. I wanted to paint one and thought I would check the tree out. There was not a soul on the road. Just two cars parked in front of some houses. I was halfway down the road. Then everything happened in fast forward...

Three dogs sprang out from behind the cars. One was especially angry. All three raced at me. I have a very husky voice. Actually, husky is a smooth term. I have a really rough, gravelly voice from years and years of teaching. When you scream with a voice like that, it is anything but pleasant. As both the dogs and I realized. My screams were so loud and so hideous, two of the dogs got terrified and backed off. The third one, the most muscular and pissed off of the lot, must have been hard of hearing. He was up in the air like Bubka, ironically, and took a clean swipe at my knee. I kept screaming and running. A lady who was just back from her walk came out of her house and saw me holding my knee. My other hand was wrapped around my throat and I was coughing. All the while I was whining" My throat! my throat". She was horrified thinking the dogs had probably had me in a death hold around my neck! I whined that the dog had bitten me on my thigh. There was one tooth cut and the rest were all teeth impressions in the form of a smile. Very nice.

I hobbled back home on jelly legs. My thigh's better now and doesn't hurt half as much as my throat.

I'm writing a letter to the Municipal Corporation to do something about these dogs. Tomorrow, I shall go out on a signature campaign in my colony with my green pole.

Along with rabies shots, I'm taking lozenges...

Slinging along

2009-03-17T20:27:00.000-07:00

I accepted arm-aches as an inevitable part of motherhood. I carried my daughter around for 2 years in the very tiring, upright position. After a while, your arm begins to throb. Then the baby starts slipping down, down down. Your shoulders rush to the rescue and with one immense heave, you haul the kid high with a burst of renewed energy. Then the shoulders give way too and the neck is next in line. All the while, the kid is enjoying the scenery of course. There have been days I have walked in through the gate and almost dropped my daughter on the cobble stones from the sheer exhaustion of burnt out arm muscles...

I first saw the "Kangaroo pouch" or "Baby sling" as it is called by top line baby shops, at a traffic signal. A beggar mother was knocking at the windows of cars. She had slung a bed sheet whose ends were tied together, over one shoulder. Her baby was peacefully sleeping in it. I didn't give the scene much thought. Till I became a mom.

When you have two really small kids like me, you worry when you take them both out together. While attending to one, the other one will be centimeters away from the headlight of a car. I had to find a way to keep my arms free to grab hold of the mobile kid while carrying the immobile one. That's when I bought a baby carrier. My son hated it. He would howl in it and spit on my clothes while squashed against my chest all the time. And worse, he would pull at his privates in agony. That's when I realized that the baby carrier with its tight harness between the baby's legs was serious torture on his manhood. I checked prices for a baby sling online and they were exorbitant. So I did what I usually do in these circumstances- I created one!

I made a Kangaroo pouch and for the past 3 months, have been slinging my son it. It is comfortable on the back and shoulders, distributes the baby's weight beautifully and the process of carrying your child around is no longer tiring. Also, because of its design, your hands are free and you can work while carting your baby around. The baby gets to be close to his mommy and be a participant in your daily activities than just a spectator lying on his back.

My son loves his sling. When he gets cranky, I slip it over my shoulder, place him into in and go about my work. He'll sit quietly, looking around. No whimper, no sound. If he is awake, he will sit up with his legs curled under him, like a J. If he's asleep, he'll be like a U. That's the only difference. Basically, he loves the feeling of being suspended ( Is this a symbolic pointer to the distant future when schooling beckons, I wonder? :-D)

I made my baby sling from the instructions on this site. So new mommies, who want to cart your little ones around without feeling too tired, go here:

http://mykarmababy.com/pages/BabySlingPattern.php

(Disclaimer: Be prepared for stares galore and advice about how your child will go through life with his legs frozen in the Lotus Position.)

Please do not use the baby sling for anything else other than the ease of carrying the baby. My brother sometimes uses the baby in the baby sling for ulterior purposes. Like when he wants to pinch the odd buck off his well off friends as you can see caught here on hidden camera. Very bad Moons, very bad!

My Mummy showing Leg!

2009-03-01T09:55:00.000-08:00

People usually eye me with suspicion. Especially the 60 plus crowd who live on my block. I step out on a bright sunny day to go to my daughter's school and fifty shifty eyes will bore into me from balconies, from behind curtains, from tinted car windows. I swear that even the cows stare. No, I am not delusional and I do not have a persecution complex.The way I see it, I am the regular mom. I have two kids and a husband. As far as possible, I go about my life without pissing other people off. Then what is it that makes me look so suspect?

I wear only dresses. No high-riding minis or scandalous numbers at all. Just simple one piece attire- summer dresses, shirt dresses, shift dresses, empire-cut dresses, maxi-dresses. As opposed to salwar khameez or jeans/T-shirt-kurtas which 90% of the population wear. That is what makes me stick out and make people hide behind curtains to see what it is that I step out in.

Of course, if I wanted, I could ditch my wardrobe and get some kurtas and jeans and dress like most other young people. Blend into the crowd. The "When in Rome..." tactic. Or I could just be myself. A pretty brave decision these days with the Ram Sena on the prowl, beating up women in non-Indian clothing. But then, that's me. No apologies about anything.

Everyday, I take my kids to a little park behind the local temple. The place teems with elderly, 60-plus women. They are of course, "dressed appropriately" in sarees and blouses ( never mind that they burst out of them or have rolls of fat clinging to their stomachs and hips on display for all to see. They don't by any stretch of imagination consider their clothes to be revealing. They are in "Indian attire" and consequently, "decent").

In my wardrobe, I have marked out a few as "temple-appropriate-clothing" which while being non-offending stuff, still falls within my style parameter- Long skirts, collared tops, stuff that buttons all the way up to the neck, ankle length dresses. Basically, nothing is on display. All covered up.

In spite of this, I have been pulled up more than five times by five different women. The conversation is the same with slight script variations. Here's how it usually goes:

An elderly woman rolls over to me and tries very hard to pull a convincing smile."You come here everyday with your kids?".

She scans me up and down beginning with my hair. It is a porcupine cut. Short and un-womanly. Then she looks at my skirt and blouse. I am in a full length tweed skirt and white peasant top. I could be a back up singer in a Hippie band...

"Yes Aunty", I bow respectfully, "Kids get bored in the evenings My daughter loves to play on the swing and my son gets very excited about going out".

Her next question, with its tactless delivery and bad manners, slams me like the stone that hit Goliath between the eyes.

"Are you Krrrrishyan?". She waits tensely for my answer.

Krrrrishyan? What the hell is Krrrrishyan? Ah! She means Christian...

I regain my composure and try not to show my irritation. "No Aunty. I am Hindu. Just like you. You are Hindu, right? I mean, you got to be Hindu because you are here at the temple!". I resist the urge to be cheeky.

The woman looks relieved that I haven't violated the premises. The Non-believer on the Believer's ground Syndrome. But that is short lived. She looks at me disapprovingly.

"I thought you were Krrrrishyan".

Really? What does Krrrrishyan look like? Am I carrying a cross on my back? Or do I have a poster on my forehead that screams Krrrrishyan?

She adjusts her saree over her love handles and says " You must at least wear a bindi, okay? All Hindus must wear bindis".

I smile, excuse myself and shuffle my kids towards the park. The woman goes and sits with her friends and says something to them. One cranes her head and looks in my direction and they all go back to their discussion.

I am not bitter. It's a generational thing, I say. Distrust, bigotry, stereotyping are things one has to live with. My concerns are more immediate- my family teases me saying that I am a prime candidate for Muthalik's beatings! Three women got beaten last week in the city for wearing "Western clothing". There is some kind of Talibanisation happening with Hindu Fundamentalists turning keepers of public morality. Aaah! That way, the folks on my block, the obese judgmental women, are all angels. No one has thrashed me... Yet! :-D

A Quasi-Senti post for a change

2009-02-19T21:38:00.000-08:00

When you have some things in your life that you think are invaluable, it is only natural that you want the same for your kids. Now, whether they get that or not depends on their individual destinies. If anyone were to ask me, what are the most amazing things that have happened to me in my 31 years on the planet, many things come to mind. If I were to filter a top-5, here they are in no particular order:

1.) Piano- I've had the good fortune to train as a pianist and be really good at playing the instrument. And I have a wonderful Japanese piano, my Kawai, 19 going on 20 but getting younger day by day!

2.) Painting/Writing- Did lots of crazy things over the years with these two.

3.) Vivek- Husband and Shrink . Shall not spoil things with sentimentality. Let's just say he's an excellent Lion-Tamer ( I am the case in point!)

4.) Aiden and Samarra- My a-laugh-a-minute wonders.

5.) Moons, the Bro

No. 3 and 4 are blessings post 2000. So, looking even further back, I think Nos. 1, 2 and 5 are the oldest good things. Of them, I have to go with No.5 as my most valued gift. Moons, the Bro.

I am 7 years older than my brother. I remember sitting in a strange medical college hospital in Kerala, waiting to see him for the first time. They brought him in some kind a of a bell jar like a lab specimen! Not the usual way babies are brought in for the first time and certainly, he didn't look like most babies usually do at birth. He looked more a cousin of the cuttlefish or the camouflage octopus- he was purple and grey. He had Iodine solution smeared all over him! The guy was a "Choriyan" from birth. There is really no English equivalent for the word. Let's go with "Allergic Dude" as a crude translation. He was born with some strange rash and the doctors had slathered Iodine solution all over him. But I was totally taken up with the dimpled-fleshed, podgy, marine-life-looking baby that stared at me from the bell jar. And there started a connection that lasts to this day.

Being so many years apart, we've not been together for prolonged phases at a time. I went away to college when he was still in middle school. Then, I went off to work and missed his college years. But the strangest thing is that there has never been a disconnect. We've stayed unbelievably close through letters at first and then emails. We were always in the know of things in each other's lives. We think uncannily alike, share the same whacky sense of humor, the same comically distorted outlook at times. People who have known the two of us over the years vouch for the fact that we are really the same people in two different bodies. He's seen me through good times and bad and has been the only one who has not been just a fair weather friend( which very disappointingly, other people from whom I expected support, have been). We've been staying together now for the past 5 years ( he's on the floor below mine and we meet everyday and go nuts, as is our style, over tea and cookies). What's different about our relationship is that I am not the calm, collected and cool headed elder sister, mother figure or any such Madonna on a pedestal. And he is not the mythological son-like, obedient or dutiful brother. We are two equal chimpanzees in a parallel irreverent universe!!!

I want this for my kids. That they make each other their best buddy. That they have a bond that survives the years and experiences that the world will throw at them. That they too can connect over tea and cookies and plot about puncturing tyres of the people they don't like. I can see traces of it in them already and am optimistic that they too will have a fulfilling relationship with each other. My son crows with delight when his sister approaches and the girl absolutely loves her brother. Who know, maybe they too will be like me and my bro :-)

A Forbidden Conversation

2009-02-18T18:34:00.000-08:00

When we were growing up, my bro and I were very proud of the fact that we had an "Open Communication/Discussion Home". That meant that we could talk about anything under the sun openly and the folks never got at our throats or shut us up. No topic was off limits. Except of course that one topic... And it is not what you are thinking of, I can assure you.

No one was allowed to talk about Death.

Death was not to be mentioned at home. It was a dreaded and forbidden subject which was never referred to. Talk about death and my dad would shush us and immediately launch into a chant of Krishna Krishna or the like. My bro and I found it strange because we felt that devotees with my dad's intensity are supposed to accept the fleeting, brief nature of the world. In fact the first thing that ought to strike them is that Mr. Yama can arrive anytime in any form and that nothing in the world has control over that one aspect of our lives. And talking about Mr. Yama is not inauspicious at all. So blocking out the fact that Death is a part of Life, or being afraid of it, always struck us as odd. But my bro and I accepted the generational divide with grace. We never offended the old man with the forbidden topic...

The other day, my bro and I were sitting in the balcony and having one of our weird conversations. We are like identical twins, my bro and I, and we have the same strange sense of humor. Irreverent and often shocking. So we make sure that we take off on our weird trips only with close friends or better, when it is just the two of us. And certainly not when dad is around!

My brother is severely allergic to all foods in the pulses family ( daals, grams, peas). Accidental ingestion of even a speck of these things can send him into anaphylatic shock and if not immediately treated, can mean permanent bye-bye ( euphemism for you know what). And he has come dangerously close to these bye-bye situations many times. As for me, I have an allergy to pineapples that has landed me in the I.C.U on some occasions. Overdose can mean bye-bye for me as well.

"You know, I am on an aggrandizing trip", my brother said, puffing up his chest. "I want to amass ALL of dad's wealth! But you are competition. I certainly don't want to split the inheritance with you. I want to eliminate you". There was the trademark evil laughter that usually accompanied these kind of insane conversations.

I handed him a ham and cheese sandwich and bit into one myself. " So, what's your plan to get rid of me?" I asked, faking some fear.

"One of these days, when you least expect it, I'll squirt some pineapple juice into one of your meals and heh heh, you're history".

"Oh yeah?"

"Oh Yeah!!!" my bro growled. Mia, our cocker spaniel, growled with him too.

"How's the ham and cheese sandwich", I asked.

"Great! Pass me another one"

"Good. Might interest you to know that the spread is chickpeas and butter", I chuckled. " I've beaten you at the Inheritance Game sucker! You're erased".

For a brief millisecond, my bro was stumped.

"Ha ha! You almost had me on that one", he laughed nervously and went back to eating the sandwich, suspiciously. " Hey, on a serious note, what do you want folks to do with you once you have kicked the bucket?"

"Electric crematorium for me any day!. I certainly don't want to wake up clawing at the coffin roof like in some Edgar Allan Poe horror tale and find out that I'm actually alive!. Folks are most welcome to take whatever is still functioning- retina, kidneys, bladder, whatever. Yeah, that's how I picture it for me. How about you?"

My bro took a deep breath and looked very philosophical and profound. "Hey, if I go first, then float me down the Ganges will you? I know that no one will do that for me. You please take initiative and float me, ok? At Haridwar. Marigolds, bamboo raft. In full style."I could make out that he wasn't on our sick joke trip.

"That's disgusting!!!". I got up and slammed the platter of sandwiches down. "For all your talk about environmentalism, you want to do the backstroke down the Ganges on a bamboo hammock with marigolds? There's enough crap floating there anyway!!! How can you add to the rubbish? And worse, imagine being fish feed!!!! EEeeeeeeeeeeeeuuuuuugh!!!". I scratched myself all over.

" I've never been to Haridwar. That's why. It's this aching desire to see the place".

"Oh, for God's sake, let's go sight-seeing there sometime soon then. Till then, watch some National Geographic re-run". I ate another sandwich and passed him one. "By the way, I want to be interred in a pot and then want a nutmeg tree on top of me , ok? That's what I want".

"Why Nutmeg? I think you'll look better with a Jackfruit tree"

"Fine, Jackfruit then. ".

"Maybe a Coconut..."

"Oh shut up!!!!!! I just want a tree ok?!?"

"Ha!Ha!Ha! Done, sis, done".

Why do I get the feeling that my phone's going to ring anytime and it's going to be my dad, really irritated with this post?

Alley Cats and Good Looks

2009-02-12T19:50:00.000-08:00

For the past 5 years, it was the dogs. Now there is a new crooner on the street spoiling a night of desperately longed for sleep.

I first heard of the alley cat from my brother. He woke up one morning in the worst possible mood and told me that a cat had been meowing outside his window all night. He pulled back the curtains to shoo it away and found it on the ledge baring claws. It was no hungry, pitiable kitten that had lost its way. It was a very street smart, scruffy looking cat with an attitude that clearly showed it as studied in the ways of the world. It bared some mean fangs, flashed a dirty bottom in defiance and leaped off the ledge and onto the neighbors terrace to display its musical skills elsewhere. Just as my brother was settling back into sleep again, the cat was back on the ledge meowing notes that set teeth on edge. The cycle of shooing, running off and coming back continued through the night...

We all had a good laugh at my brother's misery. Then the cat chose a different window ledge in the house for stage. My window.

The miserable critter was back last night. It was the wee hours of Friday the 13th. My son was in his crib and it looked like he would sleep through the night for a change ( rare event!). I had gone to bed early too. It was all set to be a peaceful night and it looked like I would get some 6 hours of uninterrupted rest when the alley cat arrived on the scene. Now, I watch all kinds of paranormal rubbish on T.V and then go about imagining things; so my first reaction was to pull the covers over my head and screw my eyes tightly shut, thinking it was some stray spirit on the prowl that had taken the shape of cat. My imagination ran wild from there- I live at No.913 and that adds up to 13 and the spirit must have chosen my address deliberately. I tried mumbling some prayers ( I pray only when I am scared) and even looked around in the dark for my Rudraksha beads which I had taken off at the bedside. When I pulled the covers off, the bedroom came alive, enveloped in an strange blue light- my husband had bought a blue night lamp a few weeks back and in the context of Friday the 13th, the wee hours and eerie alley cat on the ledge, the atmosphere was very very ominous...

I shooed at the window. The cat pottered around. I shooed again. It tapped on the sill. At that point, I jumped into bed and pulled the covers over my head again. After a while, the cat's raspy meows got louder and metallic in tone. I had had enough of this nonsense-I got onto the balcony, yelled and flung a few things. By 5 a.m the cat was gone, so was my sleep...

That's me ( as photographer pal Santhosh's muse) after a well rested day, my hair combed, lipstick smeared, some mascara,some concealer, some bronzer, some decent clothes...

And that's the same me, first thing in the morning, looking two kilos lighter than the previous day, after a restless night of two dirty diaper calls, two night feeds and two episodes of yelling from the balcony and flinging bricks at the alley cat.

Needless to say, in the looks department, the alley cat would win hands down.

Klimts and Quilts

2009-02-11T20:02:00.001-08:00

I'm back for the time being. Don't ask how long this phase will last! I feel productive again and am cashing in on the fresh mood.

I love making patch work quilts. People do all kinds of things to relax. Some meditate, some sleep, some take holidays. I quilt.

I have a friend who runs a boutique. Once a week, I turn rag-picker, rummage in her rubbish and gather silk bits. These I wash, cut up into tiny bits and sew into strips which I machine together later. I attach these on top of old tattered shawls or blankets and voila! I have a new quilt. My kids love these home made wealth from waste inventions. My daughter, Samarra, will not go to bed without her pink "Cinderella" quilt as she calls it. My 5 month old, Aiden, too young to call anything by name, is fascinated by the colors and textures and spends a good deal of time face down, picking at the prints...

I photographed both of them a few days back, sleeping on their quilts.

Is it just me or does anyone find a similarity with Klimt's The Kiss ?

Big Momma turns 31!

2008-07-29T09:59:00.000-07:00

It's the camera dammit! The camera adds 10 pounds. The bro wanted this photo put up because HE looks good in it ( that's what he thinks). Go get your own blog, sucker!

What's wrong with these people? Don't they have any decent party clothes?

Forget the caption, Momma. Let me eat the cake in peace...

I turned 31. Lying down to get over the shock...

Two Pink ZZZs

2008-07-27T11:04:00.000-07:00

Home Sweet Home, Living and Dining...

2008-07-23T08:36:00.000-07:00

Photography has never been one of my talents. I have this really sophisticated camera though, that I don't know how to use and I doubt I will master any of its features in this lifetime. We have a saying in Malayalam "Like a dog who has been given a whole coconut". Basically means to not know your a** from a hole in the ground. I don't know my camera on the same premise. I wanted to shoot my new home and I thought I would post pics taken with what I know of my severely under-utilized rocket-science camera.

As a painter, I have a fairly developed sense of light and shadow but when it comes to photos, that sense eludes me. I tired shooting pics in early morning light and with the bulb lights on ( I am allergic to tube lights. They make me feel like a lab animal ). Here's my Spartan living room. I have furnished the house in what glaringly strikes me as "Jaundice potty yellow". Gross but appropriate ( if you ever had jaundice, you would know what I am talking about). That's my new painting up on the wall. I got a huge blank canvas framed and then put up directly before anything was painted on it. I didn't start work till about 3 weeks later. Till then, it was called The Void ( my salutes, Yves Klein, Yoko Ono). Vivek went a step further and called it "Study in Black" ( the more unrelated and eccentric the title, the more intriguing the painting, he reasoned. Everyone's heard of Barnett Newman's abstraction Who's afraid of Red Yellow and Blue) . I waited for the curtains and furniture to arrive so that I could plan a painting based on the colour scheme of the room. I'll post a close up of just the painting once I get the camera figured out.

Here's the piano area of the living room. My piano is almost 20 years old.Looks as good as new even now. That is a painting of Vivek as a 3 year old, above the piano. Too small to see clearly in this pic but I shall put up a decent photograph of it sometime. The box hanging in the middle of the room is Vivek's silk shirt which he had been promising to wear for the past 5 years. So one day, I cut it up and made a Chinese Lantern. That's me. I'll ask you to wear the clothes that you have been putting away at the back of the cupboard. I'll remind you on a weekly/monthly basis. Then one fine day, 5 years later ( I have infinite patience as you can see), I'll cut it up into towels or lanterns or whatever I think appropriate. Beware...

I've always been a big fan of minimally furnished homes. There is something liberating about emptiness looking back at you. I like the breathing space. My real reason in furnishing my home Spartan style is so that I have less maintenance to worry about. The last thing I want to do is get up in the morning and dust the crystal and polish the brass. I have neither in my house. Die-hard homemakers who have interest in just keeping house please forgive me for saying this but 30 years down the line, I want to have more to show in terms of achievement than the fact that I dry-cleaned the silk curtains every 2 weeks and vacuumed the Persian carpet diligently. Again, I own neither...

I wanted the dining area to be a blast of Orange. Orange is the colour of vitality and life.

A close up of the piano.

Am yet to shoot the other rooms. We have three bedrooms, one of which we have converted to a TV/computer/bass playing/studio room. The paintings are yet to go up, so watch this space for pics of the rest of the house...

Birthday Blues

2008-07-17T09:29:00.000-07:00

I'll turn 31 in 10 days time. That's 9 years away from 40! And considering 60 is a reasonable life-span given the quality of life these days, that makes me middle-aged! God, is this all very promising...

I'm not paranoid of aging ( yeah, yeah sister, who are you kidding. Read the first 4 lines of your post). I have never been the hair, make-up and designer wear kind anyway, obsessed with looking good. For someone who is ( soon to be!) a mom of two, I'm in pretty nice shape, which I pin down to good genes, exercise and recklessly eating chocolates. No bat's wings, thunder thighs, sagging unmentionables. Err, fore or rear.( As for the crow's feet, laugh lines and that one mysterious gray hair that surfaced six months ago, I have accepted all of them with the grace of a Zen Master). So, it is not like each additional year accumulated has treated me badly. It is just a psychological thing. I had a whole probationary year sitting on the fence. 30. Now, I have been shoved to the other side. That's all. It feels weird. And at least I am honest about it!

My 29th birthday was fun. My brother and friends threw a surprise party for me. I found some crazy snaps. These days, I am into snaps for some reason...Good times with my bro...

The two of us. Same nose, hair and attitude. Just 7 years apart. One of those rare occurrences in nature.

Cock eyes apart, is that one candle?

Where's the knife? On second thoughts, never mind. I think I'll go for it with my Indira Gandhi razor nose!

See, that's called a nose-job!

Photo for the hubby. Hint hint, male brain...

30th birthday was at home. I baked the cake. No, that's not a fissure. It's a golden Chinese Snake. Seriously. I was born in the Year of the Snake, so I thought I would artistically render it on a cake that marked a landmark year in my...... Oh well, that was a desperate try, heh heh...

That was the icing on the cake...

And that was the little pink cherry on the icing...

An Equal Love

2008-07-10T09:10:00.000-07:00

I have been looking at old photos from the past 3 years. Baby Number 2 is due in a little over 2 months. I know am going to be very tied up with him or her as newborns need nit percent attention. I am apprehensive when I think about how it is going to affect Samarra who has been the center of our attention for the past couple of years.

Do parents love their children 'equally'? Is there anything called equal love in the first place? I personally don't think there is any such thing. It is not humanly possible. For example, the rebellious daughter who has an earth-shattering opinion about everything and is a renegade, will obviously be less favoured than say, the perfect son who keeps his thoughts to himself, is controlled in his emotions and has a calm and well-adjusted approach to life. It is only human for parents to gravitate towards the offspring that is most like them or at least gives them less of a hard time! So where is the question of equal love? It is a myth...

I was reading up on the subject. One article concluded by saying that while parents may not like all their children equally due to conflicting temperaments, they certainly do love them impartially. It glorified the concept of unconditional love. I thought that was bullshit. All love is conditional. Parents are not Buddhas, however much they may profess to be.

I meet a lot of parents. I am in the business of meeting parents! And most of them are parents of teenagers who are giving them a hard time. One such mom came to me the other day with her issues. Son was playing up in school, getting into trouble all the time. She wanted me to help. I enquired about the family and their dynamics. I also asked about his other siblings .That is when this entire myth of unconditional love exploded in my face. This lady has two other children; girls. Both are fairly older than the boy in question. You should have seen her face light up when she spoke about the girls- how studious they were, how obedient, how wonderful to be with, how she loved being with them and doing all kinds of mother-daughter things. When the topic diverted back to her son, her face clouded up in what I read as exasperation. That is justified given the fact that she has an awful lot to deal with. But it was her remark that got me thinking. She said she couldn't help wanting him to be like her perfect girls! Enough said...

I wonder what my next kid will be like. Samarra has been wonderful all these years and we have thoroughly enjoyed bringing up what others consistently point out to be an "easy and lovable kid". What if my next one is a rebel and a renegade? Will I love him/her any less? Will I also join the legions of parents who say that they love their kids equally but secretly curse fate for gifting them with progeny they cannot relate to? I know it has been easy for me to sit in judgment over parents who have openly confided in me that they wished they never had that particular bad egg son or daughter! Now that I am soon going to be faced with raising two kids who will undoubtedly be unlike each other, I have to see how I fare...

For the moment I am leaving such thoughts aside. Here is a series of photos of my little girl breaking out into a smile. If this is not happiness, I don't know what is...

The Curious Incident of the 'Writer' in the Night Time

2008-07-09T09:25:00.000-07:00

What? Don't look at me like I'm delusional! I'm just playing out a fantasy that I hope to convert into reality sometime soon. Don't people play out fantasies all the time? At least mine's a squeaky clean, "sharable" one, heh heh...

I had this dream last night. I was at this book signing. And I was the one signing the books. Many many books. My books! When I woke up, it was 3:00 a.m and I was noisily scratching the head rest of the bed with my right hand, holding an imaginary pen, with the most stupidly satisfied look. I even had a "press conference" face on. The sharply blinking "camera flashes " were the headlights of the cars in high beam (we live on a main road).

But then, someone said that the best way to make things happen is to visualize! So here I am on the cover of "My Book". Sepia tinted. And no, I haven't photo shopped anything. That's my real skin, no wrinkles or discoloration yet, so there! That's my signature ( okay, I have a much better looking signature in real life. Am just not able to get it right even after some 25 times of trying with this wretchedly outdated Paintbrush tool and my jerky mouse, so for the time being, this will do).

Now what comes between the covers... That's the real task...Get working Oormila...

Sleepy time

2008-06-25T08:50:00.000-07:00

There is something about moms and cues. Even when my daughter was as small as 2 months, I knew exactly when she would go to sleep when I had her on my shoulder. I called it "docking". She would be restless and peering all around and then after a while when she locked her feet in the crook of my arm and fitted in like a tiny jigsaw puzzle, I knew she would drift off in less than 3 minutes.

I am the one who usually puts her to sleep. As she grew older, the cues changed. There was no more "docking". It changed to a process which a friend very meanly termed The Parkinson's .Baby would be on your right arm and you had to shiver that arm with oh so slight tremors till the vibrations got to her. Right now what works during sleep time, is a process I have termed the Butt and Cheek Combo. She will be on her side with both hands clamped on your cheeks, pulling at them. Then you pat her "right" butt cheek till lactic acid accumulates in your arms.Ten minutes later, on a lucky day, she will be sleeping.

Teaching other people your kid's bedtime cues can be a nightmare. There is the seasoned grandparent who is convinced that reading Dr.Seuss' Movie version of the Cat in the Hat with animated gusto will "definitely" stop the bawling. Err, excuse me, but the bawling is because you are patting her "left butt cheek". Switch to the "right" one please and throw the Cat in the Hat away. It is a "morning only" book and freaks her out at 9:00 p.m, those photos of the mawkishly made-up Mike Myers (another cue that only mommy knows! ). The touch lamp has to be on medium-dim and the fan has to be at the regulator speed where it will make the faint but certainly audible Ckrrrr Ckrrrr Ckrrrr...

Of late, her father has been putting her to bed. Our second baby is due end of September and with a new one due to arrive on the block soon, number one will have to get used to other people putting her to sleep. Her pop is a fast learner alright and got how the the Butt and Cheek Combo works figured out fairly fast. But kiddo is a smart-ass. She knows exactly how to confuse her dad with mixed signals. So, there are days when I have to walk in on bedtime and fix the process.

I was looking at some old photos that I had shot of pop and daughter over the past two and a half years. Found 3 I thought were interesting. Sleepy time over the years:

Here's one that looks fresh out of a whodunit! :-D

Play-school Log, Day #2

2008-06-12T09:03:00.000-07:00

Today was the real thing.

Yesterday was fine. Parents were allowed in with the kids. The children were given an awful lot of toys of all colors, shapes and sizes. The last time I saw that many toys was in a Kids'r'Us outlet abroad, some 20 years back. The games were lively, animated and thorough fun. Snack time had all parents and kids eating together. Aaah! how heavenly it was to be in play-school! This was not tough at all. The kids bought the whole package.

Today was reality check. Suckers came to the school, all ready to get their hands on those toys, sit with their parents and play those noisy fun games. Instead, they were carted off by the teachers and helpers after being made to say a stiff bye and the lean mean guard with the bristly mustache closed the big iron gates in their faces. Mary had little lamb, blah blah blah..the teacher turned it out...

Then all hell broke loose.

It started as a shrill wail from the first perceptive, intelligent sucker who as a result of millions of years of human evolution, had figured out that this was bad news. It was picked up note for note by another spring chicken who amplified it. Slightly slow greenhorns like my daughter, still hadn't figure out what had happened and watched the wailing chorus with puzzled wonderment before joining in themselves.

Parents were made to stand outside. I managed to find a thin cement parapet on which to rest my tired ass ( I came home with two red ridges on it like a branded ox). After about an hour and a half, the formidable gates were opened and the parents rushed in.

The nursery room was nuts. Twenty five screaming, drooling, tonsils-baring, milk teeth-gnashing, red-eyed, bewildered, frightened kids stood, flaying arms and legs. Teachers with nerves of obvious steel and super-human auditory capacity stood smiling among them like peaceful little oases in this bedlam. The class bully was having a field day running around in the din, poking the crying kids. Some of the children hit notes that would have made Pavarotti take an early retirement. My daughter was there too singing seconds with another bawling kid. The child next to her, a potential Christina Aguilera in the making, hit whistle register!

I picked Samarra up and had the cheek to ask her how her day was. Thank God she is only two and a half and doesn't know any swear words yet! When I asked her why she was crying, she said " Look look! All crying!". Duh, stupid mom, haven't you heard of herd mentality?

We walked out of the play-school. Most kids surveyed their parents with sullen disbelieving looks. Bye bye Innocence. Major lesson learnt today- the world is all about advertising. If they show you toys the first time you meet them, then be in doubt. And the folks to second guess the most are your own! They brought you here in the first place and duped you, didn't they?

I tried to be as enthusiastic and excited about play-school as I possibly could after that ordeal in the nursery. So, on the way back home, ambling along, I tired to make pleasant conversation with my pondering toddler.

"Shall we go to school again tomorrow, Samarra? So many toys, friends! Play-school is so nice!"

"No", she retorted and shot arrows at me with a look that said " You devious, diabolic, deceiving adult, I want a lawyer. I'll sue you for this".

Tomorrow is another day...

#27

2008-06-05T05:21:00.000-07:00

#26

2008-05-30T04:38:00.000-07:00

#25

2008-05-28T04:27:00.000-07:00

Murakami's Ball

2008-05-26T05:10:00.000-07:00

Apart from "High strung! High strung! High strung!", the other thing that most people have said over the years about me is that I have a gift for writing.

"Why don't you write a book? It will sell!" or "You really ought to think about making some money from this 'way you have with words' ".

Truth is, I have thought about it many times. It's not like I have not written books. I have. Three, actually. They were published when I was 11, 13 and 18 respectively.Poems.And trust me, they were not photocopied pages bound and stapled together and called "Book!". They were published by known publishers. My first was called Flowers and Butterflies. No points for guessing what I wrote about. Second was called Burning Candle. And the third ( well, I am not as embarrassed by this one as the other two), was called The Edifice of Love and was mostly poems about the Gulf war and my feelings and experiences as a refugee in the war-zone.

If anyone was to bring those books out in the open now, I would run for cover in embarrassment. Of course, it was all fodder for the press then, cashing in on news about the "prodigy" who wrote 'beyond her age'. But now, aged 30, when I go to family get-togethers and a proud aunt comes up and says she lent a copy of my book to her niece who is in 'College', I die a hundred gruesome deaths. Of course, 11 year olds write about Orange Sunsets and the Ocean and the Moon and their Kid Brother's Antics. And 17 year olds talk about isolation and fear in a war-zone when there is carpet bombing happening hot on their tails. It's only natural. They are certainly not expected to tap the range and intensity of Sylvia Plath or Maya Angelou. I have been told that I am being unfair to myself and seeing things out of context every time I deride what I wrote and published back then. Those were the musings of an adolescent and well, for my age, those were really good poems, they say.

Frankly,I don't care."Read my blog please!" I cry, " but please, don't mention those books! Especially to college going people who are majoring in English".

"Fine", said my brother one day, "Redeem yourself then! Write something NOW. You're 30. That's a good age to be in the publishing world. You've somewhat seen the world and developed a fairly decent style. You're not a spring chicken. Bring out a book now!".

So,I have been thinking. For years now. About what to write...

I can write really good poems having moved theme wise beyond Orange Sunsets and Kid Brother's Antics. But then do I want to be a poet? I really don't know if I can write stories. My family would laugh at this one- they think my head's full of fantastic stories- that old hurt, this festering angst, that unforgivable buffoonery, this nagging regret. If each were developed into a story with fully fleshed characters and scenarios or maybe just one melodramatic character aka Me, jumping from story to story, enduring all of these, it would make for an interesting compilation. Could I possibly write a novel? I am not sure.I studied Criticism and Analysis for donkey's years, then taught the same.Taking the novel apart, dissecting its components and fishing for Symbolism is what I do for a living. So writing my own novel should not be all that hard, right? Well, I don't know if it's that simple...

"Write! Just start!' gushed one website that turned up on Google search, "And inspiration will just turn up on your page. Not the other way round!".

"Writers are people who don't sleep much" proclaimed another site, "Get up an hour early and write the first thing that comes to your head. Even if it is rubbish!".

"Copy your favorite passage from your favorite book. Feel the words, the texture, the tone, and how the author has picked and chosen them" goaded another site.

I think Haruki Murakami is a fabulous writer. I read an article on him that said that he was sitting at a baseball game one day and saw the ball being hit out of the park. That's when he had this epiphany and decided that he could be a writer. I processed the logic- a ball flying high and a man realizing he could write. Made no sense. I guess that's why it's called an epiphany.

Scott O'Dell, who lived by the sea all his life said that hearing the sound of the wind and the surf just told him he was born to write. I marveled at these experiences and decided that I would wait for my epiphany too. So I went up on the terrace, determined to make my personal epiphany happen that very day. I saw an eagle flying low on the horizon, gleaming white and majestic against the setting sun. "This is my equivalent of the Murakami ball!" I gasped, feeling goose flesh all over and rushed down to write. Nothing happened. Maybe it just wasn't the day for an epiphany.

So I waited another 24 hours. It was about to rain and the wind was blowing really hard. The Gulmohur trees in front of my house shed some rusty flowers."Aaaaaaah! My epiphany! This is where my soul gets stirred into being a writer" I closed my eyes and felt the damp smell of the earth. "If this is not my Murakami ball, nothing is!". Half an hour later at the computer, again, nothing happened...

Then, one fine day after many months of reading and mis-reading natural phenomena, other-worldly signs and even entrails while cutting chicken ( Asterix and the Soothsayer?!?) and pointedly looking for signs that I was destined to be a Writer, I had that all important epiphany.Disappointingly, it did not come with any sightings of Eagles, Hares or flying Baseballs. It was just a fleeting thought on a hot Saturday afternoon while hanging some ratty underwear out to dry.Can Bloggers be considered Writers? Blogging is Writing after all. You write, put it out there, people read it, post comments. If you write really well, you get a loyal fan base who like your work and recommend it to other people. You get publicity. Maybe not in the tens of thousands like a regular published bloke, but word certainly gets around. People sitting in far flung regions of the world get to know about your work and talent. Hmmm, so, how is it any different from a guy who sends his work off to a publisher, who then puts it through the printing process and makes a book? You pick up a book and read it. You get onto the Net and read a blog. Same thing, different medium. Okay, so the Blogger does not make the fat dough the way an author does ( I've made 10 rupees from the Advertising on my blog in the past 6 months). Fine, the Blogger does not get coverage on Time magazine center-spread, the T.V interviews or Blog-reading sessions at a fancy book fair in Amsterdam.But the display of talent is the same.

I felt a strange resolution after that epiphany with the ratty underwear.I might write a book in the future or I might not but I am a writer because I write.Blog, diary entry or shopping list doesn't matter. The point is to just write. I don't have to really produce a novel or publish a book to be known as a writer. As a Blogger, I am automatically a writer! Heard that Xh, Prats, Metamatician? We are writers!

A note

2008-05-25T22:01:00.000-07:00

Dear Readers,

For just a Blogger who lives in a back alley in Banaswadi, I got an astonishing number of mails from you over the months asking me why there are no posts and where the hell have I gone? There have been mails of encouragement, requests to put in just ONE post a week if possible. And great demand for my cartoons. Thank you all so much. I feel overwhelmed. In my world of make-believe, I feel like I am some renowned author receiving fan mail. Maybe a Rushdie or a Murakami! :-D

I think that the phrase " I just do not have the time" is absolute bullshit. Everyone has the same 24 hours and 7 days a week. I don't need to introspect about this one at all- the reason I am not posting is because I just can't bring myself to sit down and write. Or make those funny cartoons. I can if I want to, but I am not doing it...

What's really silly is that I keep coming back after every two or three months of hiatus and proclaim in a post " I am back!". Then, after a month or two of good work, close production temporarily and go into a shell again. I realize that such flamboyant statements which are not followed up with effort make me looks ridiculous. Readers are bound to get irritated and then not take me seriously at all.This public declaration is so that I don't lie to myself anymore and make asinine excuses.

I've tried hiding behind several masks- Artistic Depression, Inertia, Writer's Block. It is perversely comforting how fancy words can give you a sense of justification for your laziness.

I know that this looks like one of my "I am back" posts which you will find in my archives. But this is an honest attempt to beat what is really stopping me- Excuses.

Ok, that confession is out of the way now. It is there for me to see and you to see. I am not going to promise a post a day as it might not always be an achievable target. But you can certainly expect two a week at least. That's a promise. Sunil, Dharshi, Munna, Prats, Xh and other friends, thanks for checking on me...

No more Cry Wolf. Zannyleo comes back to life full steam.

With much thanks and love to all my readers out there,
Oormila.

#24

2008-03-07T04:38:00.000-08:00

#23

2008-03-06T03:38:00.000-08:00

Samarra turns two

2008-02-01T00:27:00.000-08:00

We're back! #21, #22

2008-01-21T19:25:00.000-08:00

We were technologically challenged for the past two weeks. The Motherboard of the computer conked out and had to be replaced. That's when I realized that not having Internet access was similar to having life support pulled out. Damn! I live such a virtual life.... Anyway, am back online now. I had been cartooning these past two weeks and shall be uploading the work, so watch this space.Welcome back, loyal patrons! :-D

#20

2007-12-28T09:34:00.000-08:00

#19

2007-12-26T09:45:00.000-08:00

#18

2007-12-25T02:06:00.000-08:00

#17

2007-12-23T10:01:00.000-08:00

The idea for this strip was inspired by what an old friend, Sandeep, had to say about the main character's habit of whining all the time! :-D

#16

2007-12-21T01:11:00.000-08:00

#15

2007-12-20T02:35:00.000-08:00

#14

2007-12-19T05:04:00.000-08:00

#13

2007-12-18T06:29:00.000-08:00

#12

2007-12-17T10:03:00.000-08:00

#11

2007-12-16T09:52:00.000-08:00

#10

2007-12-15T07:11:00.000-08:00

#9

2007-12-15T06:49:00.000-08:00

#8

2007-12-04T06:16:00.000-08:00

The Chinnu-Munna Lazy Afternoon Theories

2007-12-03T07:09:00.001-08:00

All you folks out there who think that life is so pristine and beautiful, you give me apoplexy! And the school of thought that says that everything is wonderful, I can't help but trash that line of thinking. There is so much misery in the world ( as 6th grader as it sounds, it cannot be put in a simpler manner). Wars, hunger, famine, deprivation, death and disease and a million other gross and ghastly things. Those Eternal Optimists who want to talk about the wonder of life and creation, you haven't recovered from the weekend hang over, have you?

From the beginning of civilization, Philosophers have tried to explain the logic of Existence and the Mysterious Reason To Why We Are All Here, in different ways. Religion comes into high relief here with its own motifs on liberation, purgation, salvation, damnation, redemption and many other such big sounding words ending in 'tion'.Each culture has its specific set of interpretations for phenomena and events. Each society has its own norms, rules and theories. Given that only one can be the Absolute Truth, a whole lot of us are wrong, aren't we? I shall end this line of discussion here as I am not fishing for Fatwas. I only want to sketch out the harmless "Chinnu- Munna Lazy Afternoon Theories on Why We Are Here" ( co-thought-about by Munna, my brother and supreme right hand man in crazy musings).

The Chinnu-Munna Theory bases its fundamental argument on what some world religions say : that we are here to atone for the sins of a previous life. In a way, The World is actually a Cosmic Penitentiary. A Planetary Alcatraz. We're all doing time here for whatever we did, wherever we did them. But our theories take it one step further...

Theory One: The Hell Hole

According to our Hypothesis, all of us here on this Planet, are actually Dead ( I read some where that the ABC hit series, LOST also works on the same principle- that the survivors on the island are actually dead and their experiences on the island are their eternal misery). There is no Heaven and Hell waiting for us based on what we do in this life. We are ALREADY in Hell. And how can this not be Hell? Forget the 6th grader thoughts about wars and diseases for a moment. The very fact that we cannot predict what will happen to us the next moment and consequently have zero control over our lives ( as much as we would like to believe that we will keep that dinner appointment next weekend no matter what!) breeds horrible insecurity. Physical death is written for all of us. But when it will come and how is never known. That itself is extreme psychological horror. Nothing is permanent and everything is in a state of change.

Try this interactive part of the Chinnu-Munna theory: Stop for a second.Close your eyes and concentrate... Think.... In this one millisecond, thousands of cells in your body have died and thousands have regenerated ( you're lucky if some of the new guys are not cancerous). Planets have moved positions. Climatic conditions are not what it was a millisecond ago. Millions have escaped the Penitentiary and gone where ever ( by what 'we know' as death) and millions have been born. Everything as we know, it has changed completely from what it was a nanosecond ago. There is no stability, no permanence, nothing concrete to found anything on. Hell, scripturally represented, burns with fire and brimstone and tempting devils. The Chinnu-Munna theory postulates that Hell is the state of Random things happen to Random people where everyone becomes a Creature of Chance, with no explanations offered for anything doled out to anybody. That's what we are in right now...

Theory Two: The Giant Cosmic Reality Show

There's some kind of a giant dish antenna mounted out there sending out transmitted images from every single moment of our lives. It must be invisible; otherwise the hi-fi- sci-fi gadgets that we have put out there ourselves would have sighted this by now. Whoever created all this- Cosmos, Universe and of course, all creatures great and small, is having a beer party with friends, watching us. Each of us is a reality show contestant. If we think the wannabes who come on American Idol and make fools of themselves are pathetic and funny, we have no idea what these unseen Omniscient Eavesdroppers are doing seeing us.Needless to say, they must be laughing through their asses...

Theory Three: Matrix Model

None of this exists! Everything around us is actually an illusion and none of it is actually there in reality. Close your eyes and the so called Reality disappears ( I tried this when I grazed someone's car in traffic. No results ). It is all Maya. The World does not exist. Everyone, everything and every experience is just a simulation- a projection of the mind. Crazy as it sounds, all emotions, reactions, feelings and sensory perceptions are just illusions that we believe are real.

Disclaimer: We do not seek to compete with or come up to the standards of Descartes, Kierkegaard or Nietzsche. We briefly saw the light. But are back in The Penitentiary again. Hello Everyone!

#6

2007-12-02T02:51:00.001-08:00

#5

2007-11-30T02:49:00.001-08:00

#4

2007-11-28T22:51:00.001-08:00

Fields of Gold please!

2007-11-27T22:03:00.000-08:00

What's sorely missing in life, is a soundtrack. Have you ever wondered what a movie would be like if there was no soundtrack? The Titanic would look every bit the messy soggy unfortunate accident that it really was. Jack and Rose would be just two floundering people like the hundreds of others that died drinking sea-water. And who would even remotely think of their romance or feel the dizzy emotions it stirred in movie goers, making it one of the highest grossing movies of all time? Think of The Godfather without the famous soundtrack. Where would the majesty and the aura of Marlon Brando be without the regal soundtrack making him larger than life? Even animated films with their soul searching soundtracks make people weak in the knees ( think Lion King, Beauty and the Beast). In my opinion, movie soundtracks do to human beings what Photoshopped models on hoardings do to young girls- it makes people feel like they live in a crappy reality, filled with nothing more esoteric than the ghastly noises of everyday life.

In 1998, I watched a movie, a modern tale loosely based on Charles Dickens' Great Expectations, that made me gasp.The movie opens with a little boy sitting in a boat. The water ripples, reflecting slivers of sunlight. The boy makes rudimentary figures of a fish with chalk pastels.The waters surrounding him are a lustrous Virdian green...

The story is about a little boy's childhood crush that develops into a full blown obsessive love for a girl he can never have because she is manipulative and never really serious about him. Finn comes from a fishing village. Estella is a spoilt, rich socialite. Their worlds are completely conflicted. He grows up to be a successful artist, aided by an unknown benefactor and even when he thinks he has proven himself to be worthy of her, she marries someone else. Years later, they reunite; she's divorced and he has come back to the fishing village where her mansion used to be...

The movie was a visual delight. The soundtrack was one of the headiest I have ever heard. The emotions were saccharine to the point of being nauseous, with each scene heavily contrived and dripping with drama. White egrets would fly off gracefully at the right moment. Rain would drizzle on cue. The skies would be the right color of Prussian and Gray. The breeze would lift the heroine's hair just enough to show the colour of her eyes and how they were the exact shade of the still waters of the lagoon.... But in spite of all the excesses, the movie was simply a work of art. Death to the critics who widely panned it as cheesy. I loved it! I then read up on Francesco Clemente, the Italian artist who made all the mesmerizing sketches for the movie. I caught a bus, the very same day, to the nearest Art Supplies store and brought my first set of chalk pastels. I produced some good work in the medium. I loved the feeling of the chalk as it moved in an alternating buttery and flaky consistency on the paper. I almost felt like Finn Bell, Ethan Hawke's character in the movie.

Years passed and I got over my aching crush on Ethan Hawke, just like I got over my fondness for chalk pastels. That's till I saw the movie again on T.V, last night. Damn! It was like a brain-washing sequence for two hours. I got sucked in again. Pain, love, betrayal, chalk, fish.. It was one giddy tequila shot. I watched the movie with my mouth open, much to my husband's amusement. When the movie got over I looked at him and said,

" Screw these soundtracks! This kind of drama and poetry is just too idealistic. It doesn't happen in real life does it?"

I must have seemed a little unconvinced by my own words because he said,

"Oh come on, think of our days as Finn and Estella. We certainly matched up!". He winked.

I did a little mental comparative study in real life romantic drama. I thought of the cool Feb evening when Vivek and I were walking down Commercial street, six years ago ( here, for movie style perfection, it could have been a nice sandy white strectch in Bora Bora or the Bahamas with the two of us in sarongs). The moon was full and very bright and I looked up and said, "Oh just look at the Moon! I have never seen it this perfect!" ( Ok, this sounds very movie-ish, so no editing). I looked up and kept gazing at the sky and the stars. Vivek did not respond. When I looked at him, he was smiling ( all this sounds very filmy except for the fact that we were standing next to a dumpster by now and the smell of gassy compost was grossly over-powering). His eyes were shining.Hey wait a minute, they were tears! ( Attention Jack and Rose, we real people in the real world can pull off these stunts too!).

" Oormila, will you marry me?"

Ah! the perfect epiphany. Certainly the most romantic moment of my life. That is, if you cut off the smell of the dumpster and the fact that we were trying not to fall into the sewer while walking and saying all these sublime things about the Moon and love. The traffic was grinding past. Horns were screeching. Just then, an auto brushed past a pedestrian who doled out choice words of abuse for the auto driver's mother and sister. A car, backing out of the lot, spewed an exhaust full of smoke in our faces.

I had tears in my eyes too ( from the smoke).

"Hey watch out for that pot-hole! Careful! Yeah, I'll marry you. Can we walk a little faster? The garbage smell makes me feel like puking!"

It would have been perfect if some Omniscient D.J had played Fields of Gold...

#3

2007-11-26T22:42:00.000-08:00

#2

2007-11-26T07:29:00.000-08:00

Chinnu-Town debuts

2007-11-26T02:35:00.001-08:00

Mia and Samarra, The Dictionary

2007-11-23T02:42:00.001-08:00

Another repeat post. Mia and Samarra. I could write a whole blog on just the two of them. They are so thoroughly amusing and throw up so many opportunities for side-splitting stories...

Mia's vocabulary is limited to Wuff wuff, Brfff, Harff and an occasional sneeze.

Samarra however, adds a new expression to her already sizable word power every day.It is interesting how kids pick up language.My daughter is bi-lingual. I speak to her in Malayalam while her father and the rest of the people in the house talk in English.

Here's a selection of Samarra's pet words and their meanings. Most of her words sound Italian for some reason which I attribute to a prenatal influence from a previous birth where she was possibly Mediterranean.

1.) Mamma-no- Said in a weepy tone, it means, "I want Mamma". Mama-no with a shake of the head means other things less rosy.

2.) Dada-no- Shake head or no shake head, it means " I want my Dada and in case anyone has any doubts, that is my favorite parent"

3.) Mia-no- Said whiningly, this is Samarra's ingenious way of framing Mia. For example, she will poke Mia with a finger and then come running with a loud and shrill "Mia-no!" which means "Mia has hurt ME!". No one takes this word seriously anymore and Samarra has figured out that it is a cry wolf situation.

4.) Shiyoo- See you ( accompanying action- hand shoveling the air with drama)

5.) Kisshy- Kissie ( accompanied by slobbery peck)

6.) Osheet- Oh Shit ( credit for word- father)

7.) Pocky-no - This is a signal for whoever is holding her, to bolt for the bathroom. The window period between the utterance of this word and nature's big potty call is about 60 seconds.

8.) Finsh/ Finni- Once Pocky has been done, this is her declaration that there is no more coming, so will someone please lift her and wash?

9.) Dhonn- When Finsh/Finni has not been heard, then Dhonn is used. Means the same but signifies irritation.

10.) Shu- Nature's small call ( once, I misheard this as Shiyoo and the results were disastrous)

11.) Pish- Piece ( from the Malayalam proverb "Idichu Piece-Aakuka" or to beat someone to pulp. This word is followed by a left hook which is delivered accurately to the jaw).

12.) Mikk- This is her first word early in the morning when she wakes up. Cue for the lazy parents who would like to sleep a little more, to get the glass of milk.

13.) Hungggy!- Get up and get the bloody Mikk now lazy parents!

14.) Haaagg- Hug

15.) Maai Mamma- Self explanatory. Delivered with Kisshy and Haaagg.

16.) Bishigagagaga- Biscuit ( don't miss the Bishi followed by the four ga-s. The number of ga-s is always four)

17.) Shailajajajaja- My friend Shailaja ( don't miss the four ja-s. As in Bishigagagaga, the number of ja-s is always four).

18.) Malam- Necklace( Malam in Malayalam, is the technical word for excreta)

19.) Kamaalamma- Malayalam for kammal or ear-ring

20.) Boushy- U.S President Bush ( credited to my brother)

21.) Koondy- money ( etymology= Gandhi who appears on the note, again credited to my brother). Koondy sounds uncannily like Kundi, the obscene word for the rear, in Malayalam. She will yell this word when I take her to the supermarket and get to the cash counter. "Mamma Koondy! Mamma Koondy!" And invariably the cashier and the five customers standing there with you will be Malayalis...

22.) Commi- Come here. This is one of those command words delivered with a hand to the hip and an authoritative shake of the head.

23.) Finga! Finga!- Anyone using a nail cutter in the house will be confronted with this cry of alarm and pain. But strangely when you cut HER nails she will sit as still as a mannequin.

24.) Brooom!- Car

25.) Baaaash- Bus

26.) Foldon- Fall down

27.) Sholly Sholly!- Sorry sorry

28.) Dumping- jump

29.) Shwoo- shoe

30.) Mwun- Moon

31.) Upshee-no- I want to go upstairs

32.) Downshee-no- I want to go downstairs

33.) Maassath- massage

34.) Mmmm Aaaaah!- response to the Maassaath

35.) Gokka- Affectionate form of address for Gauri, her nanny.

36.) Fie!- High five

37.) Naash- Nice. Always said with a 1000 watt grin.

These days she is trying to construct sentences. Most of them comprise of these words strung together with you having to fill the conjunctions.

For example:-

1.) Mamma Mikk-ano
2.) Dada Pocky-no

Complex constructions would be

1.) Mamma, Dada Brooom! Broom!- Look! Dada's car's just come into the garage.

2.) Dada Foldon Thala Eiii Eiii- Dada was not watching me. I fell down. Now my Thala(head) is hurting. ( Eii Eii = auditory imagery)

3.) Mama Pant-ano Mikk-ano Foldon- Mamma, look, I have spilt the milk all over my pants.

4.) Mamma Osheet!- I have done something really bad, Mamma. Why don't you come check out how bad that is on a scale of one to ten?

The Stuff of Dreams

2007-11-22T04:26:00.000-08:00

A friend called to say that she dreamt about me the other night. I was thrilled to have been a protagonist till I heard what she had to say I was "doing" in her dream. Now that you have read this much, if you want to know what I was up to (every juicy bit), then stay tuned...

I dream even if I take a cat nap. Some of my dreams are like Hollywood Blockbusters, complete with conflicted hero, cocaine caches and car-chases. I make it a point to try and remember a dream as soon as I wake up. It is a tricky enterprise. Trying to remember the details of a freshly dreamt dream is like grabbing at soap suds- they burst all too soon.

I've been fascinated by Freudian Dream Analysis and Jungian Symbolism. For sometime, I had a keen interest in writing my dreams down and trying to decipher them. The results were very revealing. There was indeed a lot of truth to what wise old Freud and Jung had to say after all. For example, I never knew that my recurring dream of a vast and lonely sea many many years back was a pointer to my mistrust of human beings, my withdrawal from others and my stubborn unwillingness to accept that people around me could contribute meaningfully to my life. The sea stood for the renegade in me. As my understanding of who I am deepened over the years, my dreams of the lonely sea slowly faded into visions of a vast ultramarine blue ocean with tiny wrinkled waves. It was almost like a snapshot taken from outer-space of a sprawling water body. It felt immensely peaceful. And what a shock I got when I read that the ocean, in dream symbolism, represented inner peace, resolution and wisdom!

There was one dream that I had for all the 5 years that I was in college- The scene was a dark and starless night sky. A white lighthouse stood on a hill. I sat on the beach, looking at the lighthouse. All the while, I was aware of a dark paranormal presence behind me. The whole dream was spent fighting the urge to turn back and look. At one point, I did swing around and look but I never recollected what I saw. The next thing I was doing, I was running at a speed that would have put Marion Jones to shame...I have tried to dissect this dream many times. My best interpretation, given the situation I was in at that point in my life, is that the Lighthouse stands for clarity and guidance, something I was very much in need of then. I have absolutely no doubt what the "paranormal presence" is. It was my inner gremlin that had taken permanent residence in me for a very long time, helping me to run myself down and doubt my abilities and talents. The sea and the starless night needs no explanation of course- it was my disconnected stance to the world at the time.

On a darkly humorous note, there is one dream that I have even to this day. I hated one of my teachers back in school. My father and I used to argue bitterly and fall out many times over this man. My father felt that I had to respect this teacher no matter what because in the Hindu order of things, the Guru or the Teacher ranked higher than even God and the teacher's wrath could destroy your future ( doesn't matter if ten other wise teachers bless you. You are to aim for a 10/10 vote) . Aged 15, I tried to convince my dad many times that that would be true of teachers who had values and moral bearings like say, Swami Vivekananda or Jesus Christ. But certainly not this man! Besides, the Bhagavad Gita specifically says that to respect someone who did not deserve respect ( whoever the hell he was, be he King or Teacher ) was a Sin. As a teacher myself, I am extremely respectful of my kids' feelings. I am not harsh or unreasonable with them. I am sympathetic. Above all, I do not put them down or hurt their feelings and whenever I feel that I have unintentionally done so, I even apologize to them because I know how terrible it feels to be put down.

Now, my wonderful math teacher from my school days was a tyrant. He never taught us well in class because the whole class went to him for tuitions anyway ( for which he charged a bomb). So Mr. Math Teacher's favorite pastime in class was to pick on and humiliate the students who DID NOT go to him for tuitions.He would write a sum on the board, an outlandish numerical he probably dug out from some hidden journal of Einstein's. He would write it on the board and then look around and ask who could solve it. Then, he would pick out the non-tuition types. First would be me. I would stand up, look at the board and right away admit that I didn't know how to do it. Then he would chuckle a cold chuckle and ask me if I would know how to solve it if he wrote it out in paints or recited it poetically! I was a budding artist back then and this was Mr. Mean Math Teacher's cheap way of putting me down. To this day, I dream of this repulsive old man asking me to get up and solve a crazy sum, followed by a choice insult about my art and writing. It's a recurring dream and obviously represents deep childhood trauma. I am waiting for the day there will be a variation in this dream, like the blackboard falling on his bald head or a class mutiny. Or even better- me actually solving the sum! Now that would give him an instant heart attack!( someone told me he died several years ago and that is sad, because I would have loved him to read this post).

I have had funny dreams too. I am a funny person ( some would raise eyebrows and say this about me, but I mean it in the comic sense of course), so it is only natural that my sense of humor should spill over into my dreamy state as well. One such random dream that I once wrote down in my dream-diary was about me standing in an apple orchard in a leafy skirt. When I smiled, I had no teeth! I remember being very amused by this dream. I had been teaching a selection of Milton's Paradise Lost in class. I had just given my students a heady saga about the War in Heaven, Satan's Expulsion, the Fall of Man and of course, Madam Eve's plight, so I had no doubts where the apple orchard and my unusual skirt came from. I was fascinated by my dentally diminished look though and researched quite a bit about the "teeth" in my dream. Apparently,the vision of falling teeth or having no teeth in your dream symbolizes a terrible fear of embarrassment. I almost choked laughing when I read that one! Due to pressing issues with one of my wards, I was forced to go to class that day only half-prepared and had been praying that if any kid asked me a question, I should be able to recall what I had read while in college and manage a half-baked answer! There was also a Christian scriptural interpretation of falling teeth that symbolized the fact that you were putting too much trust in what man had to say and not God. Maybe the fact that I was teaching Paradise Lost from a critic's point of view than a believer's had something to do with me having no teeth in my dream? Then there was another interpretation from a Chinese perspective. According to Chinese folklore, you dreamt of having no teeth when you said lies. I was in splits after I read that as well- I had just told my students that I would ground all of them if they did not submit a paper. I had been lying "through my teeth" ( cliche was too painfully good to resist!), because I never ground my kids. Of course, many of these interpretations would look like forced extrapolations but I certainly had fun analyzing my toothless grass skirted dreamy stint...

I was all excited when my friend said that she had dreamt of me. I eagerly asked for details. She said that in her dream, she was at my place. Her friends were also there. And all of us were trying to throw her out! I raised an eyebrow but listened on, thinking that good things were to follow after that incident. Then apparently, the scene got ugly with some manhandling happening. In Act One, we were all Oppressors and my friend was being victimized. Damn, whatever did I do to be a fiend in my friend's dream? In Act Two, I was throwing her out of my house when she was begging me for food! Disturbing detail alright. Both of us were in splits. I am a compulsive cook and a generous hostess. If I have friends coming over, nothing short of a four-course spread will do, all of which I cook from scratch. And here I was in her dream like a mean Neo-Nazi, completely misrepresented and maligned. Well, I cannot interpret her dream for her ( technically, I can but then that would paint me or her black, so I am dropping it!). Funny as the whole thing was, I felt a crazy comic pang. Dream Analysis suddenly didn't make much sense in this case. My friend has been to tea parties at my place. Parties where I have certainly not roughed her up and thrown her out. And where I have certainly indulged her. What could my violent streak in the dream mean? I felt that pang again. Something like a Mr. Mean Math Teacher pang. And what could be worse than being on par with him! Someone pass the barf bag...

A Bankable Story

2007-11-20T02:04:00.000-08:00

If there is any place I detest going to, it is the local bank. Even a disgruntled inmate of an over-crowded Bolivian prison would have better manners than the clowns who sit at the desks and call themselves clerks. I tried to avoid them by depositing cheques in the collect facility of their ATM but the service was so great, the cheques got dishonored. So, every month I am forced to make a trip to this joke of a bank, just to deposit cheques.

The clerks know me all too well. I have been walking in and out of their place for over four years now since I manage some minor money transactions for my parents who live abroad. When my parents make trips to India, they even take me along and introduce me to the manager as their power of attorney. I have sat and signed papers there and opened accounts. My folks even call the bank quite often regarding financial matters and keep mentioning that their "daughter" aka me, will come and do the needful on their behalf since they don't live in the country. Besides, this is no World Bank or high flying United Nations fund manager. This is at best one of those "ten big customer and that is it" establishments where they jolly well know every Amar, Akbar and Anthony who has a miserable account there...

Now I am NOT expecting a red carpet to be rolled every time I walk in. I am happy to stand in a queue and be the hoi polloi that I am like everyone else. But what makes me fume, is the humiliation that is guaranteed in some form or the other every time I set foot inside this place. There is the lump of a woman who sits in the foyer under a big board ( like the ones in zoos that says "Orangutans") that says "Inquiry". There will be some ten hapless people in a queue before her waiting on tired legs for over half an hour. That gives her an illusory sense of power. So, she will sip on a coffee, get up and come back some ten times and then superciliously address the ones who stand before her through half opened eyes.

Then there is the woman who sits surrounded by a wall of huge bulky folders on three sides almost like she has been buried alive. Ask her for a pen and she will smirk, ignore you and open one of her fat folders and pretend you just fell down and died. And ironically she sits under the poster that says "Courtesy is our Motto. The Customer is God".

My mother gives me a whole leaf of blank signed cheques every time she comes to India. Every month, I walk into this bank, write out a figure on one of these cheques in order to withdraw money for my aunt and brother for their household expenses. Now this is a routine that I have been playing out for four freaking years! But the most amazing part is that EVERY TIME I approach the clerk with the cheque, he will look at me suspiciously, like I am planning a heist. I certainly don't look like a truant teenager who has forged her mother's signature and is planning to polish off all the money in her account. But he will still look me up from head to toe and start his interrogation:

"Whose account is this?"

"Ummmm, my mother's".

"How are you related to her?" he asks, spectacles teetering on the tip of his nose, squinting and looking up at me.

"I just said that she is my mother"

"Errr, ye...Where is your mother?"

"In Kuwait"

"Why?"

That is when I feel like putting a fist through the glass and landing a thump on his bald head with one of his dusty folders. But I grit my teeth and answer,

"They are based there. My parents work there"

" Why are you withdrawing money from their account?"

By now I am going red in the face because there are some ten others eavesdropping on this conversation and soaking in all the details.

"Ummmm, because they have a house here and there are family members who need to run the household. I am taking the money for them"

The Ten Others who are listening are now convinced that I am a fake. The clerk is still not happy.

" I am sorry, but this is your mother's account. How do I know you are her daughter?". His eyes light up with the brilliance of his question. The Ten Others crane their necks dramatically.

"Here, why don't you speak to her then?" I take out my phone and get ready to dial.

The clerk is suddenly satisfied with his power-play,

"Ok, ok. How much do you want to withdraw. You see, this is all very strange to me, your situation. That is why I have to ask all these questions, you see. Your parents are there. You are here. You want to take money from their account for other people who are living here, you see. Too much complication, you see!".

I would understand if this was a one or a two or even a three time thing. But EVERY TIME I go to this bank, having to answer the SAME questions on the SAME situation is a little infuriating. I mean, if I was indeed the prodigal daughter who forged signatures and made off with her parents' fortune, how come in four years my parents had not called the bank to complain about wiped out funds? Yeah, think about it, Sherlock Holmes...

Then, there was the time my mother sent an urgent e-mail to the manager about a loan she had taken. She got no reply, so she asked me to go meet him and follow it up. ( Believe me, you have to REALLY love your parents in order to do a favour of this magnitude for them!). I took an appointment and landed up. The manager was browsing on the Net when I walked in. I politely asked him if he had received my mother's mail. Whereupon he asked me when she had sent it. Two days back, I replied. Oh, then it would take time to reach, he said. Enlightened about his awareness of technology, I told him that the mail would have reached. Could he please access his mail? That is when he replied,

"All yahoo kind of e-mails arrive on only one machine in our bank. It is on that machine" he said, pointing to one at the far end of the bank where a woman sat, half asleep." That machine is busy now, so you will have to come later".

(My husband thinks I am making all this up for effect and I have stopped trying to convince him.)

The worst humiliation I faced was about a month back. I had gone to the bank for the usual monthly withdrawal with one of my mother's signed blank cheques. And as the Law of Probability goes in the case of all Humiliations, there were some 50 people all crammed into the foyer that day. I stood for two hours ( not exaggerating) in the queue while the clerk had a tea, a phone conversation and a toilet break. Finally, I got to the window and handed the cheque for 10 grand, addressed to myself. The clerk looked at me and for a change, did not ask any questions. He immediately counted the money and gave it to me. I stuffed it into my bag and being in a hurry, bolted for the door. Suddenly there was a huge commotion with shouts of "Stop Stop!". I thought there was a hold up or a robbery and looked around for the culprit. The guard landed a heavy hand on my shoulder and another clerk, almost tripping over her sari, jumped from her seat to apprehend me.

"Over here madam, please come here", the clerk called in a sudden 'Police Voice'.

I walked to the window, completely bewildered.

"Sorry, return the money please. Your mother emptied the account two days back towards a fund. There is no money. Kindly return the cash."

I wanted to yell at the charlatan for his incompetence. Why the hell didn't he check the balance before giving me the money? The guard escorted me out and I made a shamed exit with people giggling behind me...

I went to the bank again today. The same thing. The dreaded monthly withdrawal. But today, I changed tactics. I went to the window, passed the cheque through and waited for the clerk with the chicken's memory to start his inquisition.

And right on cue he started,

" Whose account is this? Your name is not Sobhana Kumary, is it? At the back of the cheque you have signed Oormila. Why are you withdrawing from this account?". His bushy eyebrows curled themselves into hairy question marks.

I laughed. Loud and clear. Then, I started shaking. I just could not stop laughing. I was laughing so loudly and so much, that I was a spectacle. The manager looked at me through the glass cage in which he sat. I waved to him, still laughing. I was shaking my head and laughing, taking a hanky out of my bag and wiping my tears and laughing. The clerk felt a little foolish especially because the Snooping Others in the foyer were looking at him like he was the ass.He quickly cleared my cheque and handed me the money. No questions, no attitude.I stopped laughing as abruptly as I had started. I leaned closer, my head over his glass partition and cross my heart, said in my most intimidating Terminator imitation,

"I'll be back!"

I conquered my fear of the wretched bank today...

Domestic Doldrums

2007-11-19T00:45:00.000-08:00

Friends and family who read my blog, please bear with me about this repeated topic. I am fed up with the domestic help situation at home and all my inspiration for any creative writing is consequently lagging. So kindly tolerate as I blog on this topic one last time before I drop it for good. I shall vent all my constipated ire here and shall never refer to it again, word of honor.

I have been told by umpteen people through the years that my approach to domestic help is completely skewed. To begin with, I pay them handsomely and way above what the neighborhood does. I have been brought up by a Left-inclined mother and more than that, am a chronic humanitarian. I hate the idea of seeing them as another "class" and establishing power demarcations. I have been accused of being too soft, too lenient, too forgiving, too generous and more than anything, too friendly. I have been in a constant state of denial, my counter argument being, "So what if I am a little accessible? My servants respect me and they stay on for a very long time. My last maid has been with me for 8 years now!". Of course, I conveniently skim over the fact that I do half her work most of the time and that she never takes me seriously even if I try and make one of those intense consternated faces, the kind that Nicholas Cage pulls in the movies which get him Oscar nominations.

After 8 long years of turning a blind eye to many of my maid's quirks, I asked her to do something a different way- for example, not hurl the cleaning fluid like vomit into the bucket of water but to "measure out" and pour. That was enough to send her into a lecture on how she has been here for 8 years and how she knew how to do things without me having to tell her. When she left the taps running full blast while washing a spoon ( you could have washed 300 hundred spoons with that downpour), she launched again into a dramatic monologue about how she knew all about washing utensils, having done that for 8 years in my house. Any and every attempt at correction or requesting her to do things with a little more care, was greeted with the same repartee about the "8 year" work experience under my roof. I realized that she had the "8-year itch" of a different sort and fired her much to her surprise and chagrin.

Now, I have a new lady who helps part time with the household chores. Her service has been 5-star quality up to now and I intend to keep it that way. I hardly smile or talk. I hover around her watching her do everything. I put in a word of instruction in a deep controlled contralto tone wherever necessary. And when things are not going according to plan, I resort to my carefully thought out 4-Point Employer's Control-Assurance Tactics, a manual I am putting together.

1.) The Miffed and Muffled Monologue- This has worked for me on two occasions. When the helper does not heed instruction, in spite of pointing out repeatedly, it works when you talk to yourself in a hushed and irritated tone, just audible to the helper. You don't have to curse her, no no! You could curse anything from the bigwigs who appropriate the funds of the Public Works Department to Global Warming, so long as the helper understands that you are in a foul mood. My personal favorite is abusing the brainless Hindi movie I have seen ( Kaho Naa Pyaar Hain, Dhoom 1, 2...)

2.) The Crash-Bang Rearrangement- This has worked for me, when Tactic One has failed. I just jump forward, grab a spare broom and start sweeping the area that has been ignored. Or I take the washed plates out and then clean them again and put them back in the rack with some noise and fanfare. Whatever is done, is done with a crash and a bang so that the helper understands that instructions have been ignored and your B.P is up...

3.) The Faked Hyper-Ventilative Wheeze aka the Guilt-Trip- I have actually tried this as well! I am chronically allergic to dust. When Tactics One and Two failed to produce results, I have pretended to have this dreadful wheeze just to send the helper on a guilt-trip. Today, for example, the lady conveniently forgot to dust the undersides of the couch. So, I did it and started sneezing non-stop. I didn't need to do much acting, to be honest, because my eyes were all red and my breath was coming in dusty gray gasps. Today, the faked hyper-ventilative wheeze was a real one! And the result was that the lady scrubbed the undersides of the beds, the television and the computer table as well...

4.) The Violent Temper Tantrum (at a family member)- This is one of those set-up situations. You call a family member aside and persuade them to be a scapegoat. When the helper comes in, you give instructions for the chores to be done. The moment things start getting done in a slip-shod manner, you summon the family member. And you yell! You can fling abuses ( if your child is not listening), you can have a heated debate. The purpose of this exercise is to make known to the helper that there is a wolf lurking somewhere deep within you and that if rubbed up the wrong way, she shall have to deal with this alternate personality crouching inside.

Roshin, a good friend, was spilling some of his woes on domestic help the other day. His helper, like most of the women top-workers who operate in this area, comes with a supercilious air of entitlement because she knows that we with our big sprawling houses are helpless without her services. "Where's tea" is her opening line, stepping into the house. That would be the day after she washed one of his white Adidas T-shirts with a purple tie and die top that runs color. Or broken expensive Borosil Cookware in her hurry to catch the bus. That's when he says he mentally pictures a Zidane-style head-butt to her forehead followed by a generous donation to go get treated. Any Human Rights activist reading this, please relax. This is just a harmless blog and Roshin and I are both certified push overs. If there is any head butting taking place, it will probably be the maid whacking us. This entire post is about how WE are at THEIR mercy, remember?

But for creative writing purposes, let's say, we added a variation of Roshin's mental head-butting as a 5th point to the Employer's Tactics. What would it be called? The Eric Cantonna Slam plus Third Party Insurance? Beats me! Don't miss the pun...

"The Lady who helps us in running the house"

2007-11-16T02:45:00.000-08:00

I grew up abroad in a plush, sound and dust proofed apartment. Centrally air-conditioned or "climate controlled" to be precise. It never really got "dirty" in the house. My mother would bite my head off if I said that under such circumstances the house did not need much cleaning ( my childhood memories are of her standing and staring at a spotless, shining house in her apron and cleaning gear).But obsessive compulsive cleaning apart, running a vacuum over the carpet once in three days and a light brushing with an ostrich-feathered duster was all it really took to keep the place looking sparkling. The question of a full-time servant never arose.

Cut to present day. I live on a dusty road on which every kind of vehicle tears past 24/7. I might dust the living room first thing in the morning when I get up but it only takes a wretched auto to phut-phut past for a film of fine dust to rise up and invade my living room furniture. And the whole place is back to square one.

I learnt the hard way that it is impossible to look after a hyper-active toddler AND paint AND write AND keep the place looking like a human dwelling without full time help. Of course it wouldn't be so difficult at all if I gave up my interests and my life and all I did was clean house and raise child. I decided to look out for a full time domestic help.

We must have interviewed, employed and dismissed some 5 odd people ( odd as in odd, the adjective). There was an old woman who in a matter of three months usurped power and declared herself the head of the house. Nothing could be done without her "permission". When I brought my new born a brand new crib, she retorted, spitting paan for emphasis,
"What a wayshte! In our village we tie a bed sheet from the beams and put the baby in it and rock it. You spent 8000Rs! Wayshte! Waaaaaaysssshte!".Paan specks flew in the air furiously.

One morning I came to the breakfast table to find that the food had been "rationed" and "portioned" for everyone on their plates. When I asked the lady why breakfast was served in this manner today, she said, with her trademark paan laced smile,

"I gave the rest of the idlis to the construction workers next door. Anyway, what's on your plate is enough for you", she smirked.

To her we were Lakshmi Nivas Mittal clones. We had money to roll up into cigars and smoke. To her, we were the bourgeoisie, moneyed trashy people who went and blew up 500 rupees on shoes! We did insane things like buying cribs for our children for 8000 rupees where bedsheets from beams would have sufficed! How many families could feed their children with that money, she calculated. And she absolutely abhorred the idea of diapers. 11 rupees to just wrap around your bum, shit on and discard? Bloody Bourgeoisie trash couldn't use cloth diapers like the toiling millions in the rest of India? And baby butt wipes? That was sinful. These city people were fallen crap, pun intended!

Anything I spent was viewed as extravagant and anything I brought home was commented upon.

"Why the hell do you have to go buy new underwear?", she would spit, holding up one of my panties with tiny holes in them, courtesy the moths in the cupboard. " In my village, we would use this for a life time. It is in perfect condition!". She positively hated the idea of anyone buying new things. The last straw was having to sneak into your own house! So when any of us went out shopping, we would make a call on the cell to someone at home to leave the back door open. The caller would sneak in while the rest of the folks at home distracted her, stuff the shopping into the bathroom or the cupboard and then go about with a poker face. When Her highness hit the bed, we would take out the new pant or dress. Of course, when you wore it for the first time, she would want to know how it had come out of thin air...

We gave her the sack, swearing that we would keep no servants. A month later, with the whole house in a mess, we were looking out again.

That's when we got the Hysterical Laugher. This one was killer. Everything she said would be followed by an irritating guffaw that even the most trained and practiced hyena could not beat.

"Where are the diapers? Ehhhhhheeeeeeeeheeeeeeeheeeeee!" or

"Shall I keep the chicken out to thaw? Eeeeehhheeeehhhheeeee!".

The worst instance was when she opened the door to let some elderly guests in and she went "Eeeeehhhhheeeeehhhhheeeee!" looking at them. Frankly, I had no problem with the Ehhheeeheees, having a lot of rather strange mannerisms myself. But when the Hysterical Laugher tried to make off with one of my gold chains, I politely asked her to leave.

Two more servants later, we got the girl who currently works for us. Now, she is a gem. A born nurturer, extremely fond of Samarra, excellent multi-tasker, fast learner. You name it, she's good at it. She's been here four months now. We were all so relieved and grateful to have finally found the perfect domestic help, that we went over the top in our demonstration of appreciation and regard for her.

A parenthesis here. I've observed that there is something about the employer-maid dynamics that determines how the power system balances. We are spineless employers. We don't like to admit it, we are in constant denial, but the truth is, we don't have what it takes to give orders. We smile too often, we address them with love. We never call them "maid" or "servant". We introduce them to others are the "lady who helps us with running our home". We buy them new clothes very often, indulge them. We tell them, that it is "their home" and that they should "feel comfortable in every way". So, what we do at the very outset is dig our own grave with regard to power dynamics or as the Malayali proverb aptly says, " Give an opportunity to climb on your head and shit a pile". Now the problem with all of us at home, as employers, is genetic. This overflowing milk of human kindness, this lack of spine gene, has been passed on in dominant form from generation to generation. Diabetes, blood pressure and heart disease have all been recessive, if you look at my family chart. But we wear the "come sit on my head and shit a pile" sign almost like screaming posters!

Our present servant went home for the Diwali break. Said she would be back in two days. We packed some sweets for her family, got her a new dress and sent some good hand-me-downs for her mother and sisters. A week passed. Ten days passed. No sign of the girl. We called a few times in between. Her sister answered the phone like her personal assistant, saying that she would call back. Twelve days passed. Then a call came. She was busy, she said. She would be back in "a day or two depending upon how she was placed"...

My aunt and I conferred. We would cut her salary when she came back. We would not give her any more privileges. We would don new tyrannical avatars. We would not take her visiting anywhere with us when we went out. We listed some 50 more "we wont's", our feelings bruised by her ingratitude and lack of regard for us.

She arrived today afternoon. She looked like she had lost a few kilos. And from her deep tan, looked like she had been vacationing in the canary islands. But her face looked wan and bothered. Her mother was ill, she said. Her uncle was planning to marry her off to some unemployed man. And there were more sob stories. Our genes started playing up. My aunt asked her to sit down. I got her the cordless phone to talk to her sister. I filled the saucepan asking her if she would have coffee or tea ( um, I thought we were the employers?).

After she had tea and was rested, my aunt took me aside. "Err, forget about the salary cutting bit. And being strict". She looked sheepish. "Poor girl!".

My aunt and I looked at each other. And guffawed. We felt like the Kauravas ( The Bad Guys from the Mahabharatha). When the Pandavas ( The Good Guys) won the favour of Lord Krishna ( The Supreme Guy), they swore that they would insult Lord Krishna by remaining seated and not acknowledging His presence when He walked into the court. But for all their planning and plotting, when Lord Krishna made an entrance, the Kauravas, awed by His presence and radiance, automatically rose to their feet and bowed before Him...

There is no debate on who the most influential person in this household is. The "lady who helps us with running our house" wins hands down...

Mia and Samarra- A Case Study in "Enculturation"

2007-11-14T00:14:00.001-08:00

Mia has come to stay with us.

She was one of my brother's five roommates when he was in college. She always had a soft corner for him and I knew that she would choose him in the end from amongst all those strapping young lads. Now that the boys have completed their studies and have taken off overseas to make their fortunes, she's made a permanent shift to our house. Yes, she has moved in with him. The photos are a dead give away, so my attempt at scandalizing snooping relatives who might be reading my blog ( fat chance!), dies a premature death here. Mia is a cocker spaniel. Chocolate and vanilla colored, 4 years old. Lean, lanky, a little low I.Q to be honest, loving and lovable, with an uncanny touch of a goat in her ( am sure some sire among her immediate ancestors had a fleeting love affair with some goat somewhere). Given my brother's soccer craze, she would have definitely been named Beckenbaur, Van Basten or Pele, but being a girl, has been named after Mia Hamm, forward for the U.S National Women's Soccer Team.

I've read that dogs and children make for great combination. Now how great is that combination? Something like the "Aim" at the beginning of a scientific thesis, let me state that that is exactly what I am going to explore in this post...

My daughter Samarra is almost 2 and when I introduced her to Mia for the first time, her instinct was to screech and wrap herself around my legs, appalled at this creature that stood on four legs and billowed hair everywhere. That fear slowly gave way to prodding the dog from behind and showing a clean pair of heels, to pulling her ears and hopping away to safety on top of the couch. Within two days, she was hanging around Mia's neck, much to the dog's discomfiture. In a week's time, she was giving orders and spanking Mia if she was doing something forbidden like venturing into the kitchen.

Being an artist I have a particularly over active imagination that is really the bane of my existence. So, the other day, when I walked in and found Mia and Samarra on the floor, happily watching Meerkat Manor on Animal Planet ( as if they understood everything) I freaked out. It wasn't the program or their interest in it that was strange to me. BOTH Mia and Samarra were on the floor, side by side, in the SAME pose. Mia had two hind legs folded behind her, head craned forward at the television and her two front legs were folded forward in a Sphinx like position. And Samarra, human as she is and difficult as it is to achieve the same contortion, had copied Mia's posture to the t. In fact, Samarra was adjusting and readjusting her toes to carbon copy the Mia-effect! Then Mia felt some itch on her paw, lifted it and started grooming herself with her tongue and teeth. Where upon my toddler proceeded to do the same. That's when I yelled at them and both dog and child jumped up and fled...

An uneventful day passed and I had forgotten about this brief meeting of animal and human worlds, when I caught Mia giving Samarra an affectionate lick. How sweet, I sighed and was about to turn away when I saw Samarra rubbing her nose with Mia's and licking Mia back! I gave the dog a knock on her head and picked up Samarra to explain to her that children should not lick dogs. After my lecture, Samarra breathed out a sugary "Mamma!" and gave me a tight hug... and a lick!

Of course, everyone else in the house found the antics really funny but me being me, got onto the Net to fuel my paranoia. And what better way to get all jittery that to do a Google search. And the results were crazy. There were reports of feral children who had been isolated from all human contact for many years. Some had been brought up by wild dogs and consequently walked on all fours, howled in the night, refused to be clothed and defecated anywhere and everywhere. There were erudite papers about sociologists talking about the first 6 years of a child's life and long essays on developmental scientists' views. There was a clipping about Oxana Malaya of the Ukriane who ran with wild dogs for 9 years and was a perfect canine when it came to habits and mannerisms. There was an Ivan Mishukov in Moscow who had lived with dogs for 2 years and had risen to be the alpha male among them. Closer to home, there were Amala and Kamala in India who had been raised by wolves and had scratched and bitten people when brought back to civilized society.I jumped from link to link till I came to the stories of Mowgli and Tarzan and Romulus and Remus. For some stupid reason, I even smiled a smile of pride when I read about how these legendary feral children had an innate sense of culture and civilization, superior strength and intellect and even super-human powers. From there I jumped to a link that explored the definition of culture and boundary and contrasts and what some scholar in Oxford had to say countering the views of an Anthropologist who sat in Helsinki.

That's when I realized how idiotic it all really was. Mia was just a domesticated family dog, for God's sake. And Samarra was just a curious toddler exploring her world. So what if they both sat like Sphinxes in front of the T.V and watched Meerkat Manor on Animal Planet ( like they understood everything!)? My child was certainly not going to be a Sheena, Queen of the Jungle, swinging from tree to tree clad in leopard skins, communicating with animals . At the most, she might take up Contortionism as a profession and join a circus act. In which case, I will support her as I think it is brave and novel to choose a path less taken...

So, my "Inference" in all this- let both dog and child be. Mia is not the only role model in the house for Samarra. There is my brother, my aunt, me and her father. We aren't exactly style icons but we all wear clothes, have passable table manners and are most certainly toilet trained.

Before I conclude this post, there is a corollary that I would like to add-

The other day, I saw Mia with both her paws on the living room center table, peering at Samarra's picture story books. And Samarra was next to her, pointing out what she thought was essential for Mia's education. Mia greets Samarra by rising on her hind legs and offering a paw in what looks like a stiff English hand shake. And the icing on the cake? Mia was at her bowl of Pedigree dog food the other day WITH A SPOON! She wasn't using it of course but chances are that she will soon! Now I have no idea what the culturation historian in Helsinki or his rival in Oxford would make of this from their Marxist or Hegemonian perspectives but I think my dog is getting humanized!

Ronnie

2007-06-08T21:38:00.001-07:00

Acrylics and Pen on Tinted paper 65X50cms

Death is nothing at all.
I have only slipped away into the next room.
Everything remains as it was.
The old life that we lived so fondly together
Is untouched, unchanged.
Whatever we were to each other,
That we are still.
Call me by the old familiar name.
Speak of me in the easy way
Which you always used.
Put no sorrow in your tone.
Laugh as we always laughed
At the little jokes that we enjoyed together.
Play, smile, think of me, pray for me.
Let my name be ever
The household word that it always was.
Let it be spoken without effort
Life means all that it ever meant.
There is unbroken continuity.
Why should I be out of mind
Because I am out of sight?
I am but waiting for you,
for an interval,
Somewhere very near,
just around the corner.
All is well.
Nothing is hurt,
nothing is lost.
One brief moment and all will be
as it was before.
How we shall smile at the trouble of parting,
When we meet again...

- Henry Scott Holland (1847-1918)

This painting is For Ronnie's mom who is a dear friend of my mom-in-law.

I want to thank all of Ronnie's friends who have written to me saying they loved the works. I am happy to have been able to capture Ronnie for you in full living colour. I am also very touched by those who wrote to me saying that they have taken print outs, laminated them or put the work up on their desktops. If any of you would like high-resolution images of these paintings, please do contact me at o_prahlad@yahoo.com and I'll be happy to send them to you. However, if you would like to use these images for publishing or any other such purpose, you will have to let me know and of course, take prior permission from Deepika :-)

Ronnie and Deepika

2007-06-01T11:42:00.000-07:00

Acrylic and Oils on Canvas paper 65cmX 50cm

I first heard of Ronnie way back in 2002 when Vivek and I were dating. He told me of his brother's close friend who was an ace fighter pilot. Literally Top Gun. And he was a good looker too, a desi Tom Cruise alright! Ronnie's parents and Ken and Vandana dropped in soon after we got married. Mummy had told aunty Jessy that I was a painter and coincidentally, 12 of my paintings were back from the framers that morning, ready to go up on the walls. The series was called the Celebration series and had portraits from mummy's old photos- pictures taken when daddy was alive and these two boys were young fiesty brats. Aunty Jessy said she loved my work. Their house was being built in Mangalore and I had plans in my head of gifting her one of my canvases. I am very possessive about my work and rarely give them away. But aunty Jessy's heartfelt appreciation touched me. I knew what I would give her for her new home...

In 2006, we heard that Ronnie was getting married. He was the only Serrao I hadn't met and having seen Top Gun some 25 times, I was thrilled at the prospect of meeting a real life fighter pilot. But I had just delivered Samarra and we couldn't make it. Plans were made later to visit Mangalore but I kept chickening out at the last minute saying baby couldn't take the travel.

Then, on Jan 18th, a day after his 26th birthday, Mummy called, distraught, to give us the terrible news of Ronnie's crash in Jaisalmer...

I have never met Flight Lieutenant Ronald Kevin Serao. Just heard so much about him. It is strange how someone you don't know at all can touch you. Ronnie was clearly someone who touched the lives of his friends deeply. A glance at his Orkut profile will show how sorely he is missed. Even now, his pals post regularly on his scrapbook, sharing their joy, pain, even asking for advice and blessings. Flight Lieutenant Serrao must have been a truly remarkable being...

I thought about Ronnie and his wife Deepika over the months. I had seen the photos of his last march on the Net. I felt a strange connection to these people I have never met. I was amazed by his wife's composure and her extraordinary strength in that hour of grief. I dont know too many people with such dignity...

I felt that I had do my small bit to honour Ronnie's life and salute Deepika's spirit. I wrote to her offering to paint and she sent me a photo which was very special to both of them. I interpreted it impressionistically and made this canvas, in mixed medium ( pen, oils and acrylics). I rate this my best work to date...

I was listening to "Dosed", by Red Hot Chilli Peppers while making this portrait. It struck me later how relevant the lyrics would be to friends of Ronnie:

I got dosed by you and
Closer than most to you and
What am I supposed to do
Take it away I never had it anyway
Take it away and everything will be okay
In you a star is born and
You cut a perfect form and
Someone forever warm
Lay on lay on lay on lay on
Lay on lay on lay on lay on...

I posted scraps to all of Ronnie's friends on Orkut, inviting them to see this painting on my blog. Again, all people I don't know but people to whom Ronnie meant a lot. He was certainly their "super friendly aviator", from The Zephyr Song...

Flt Lt. Ronald Kevin Serrao's last march can be seen here: http://mangalorean.com/news.php?newsid=38325&newstype=local

Peas in a pod

2007-04-18T10:39:00.000-07:00

Heh heh, we're back...

2007-04-15T00:53:00.000-07:00

After a 4 month Writer's Block which was spent eating, sleeping, doing the couch potato routine and of course painting( because that's my livelihood and I had projects to finish), am back on Arpeggios! That's me with my new Afro hairdo, hail Boney-M, having just woken up from my stupor. Watch this space people...

Mmmpff...

2006-12-22T09:59:00.000-08:00

The Celebration Series

2006-12-19T00:02:00.000-08:00

These portraits, all done with Acrylics, are from my mom-in-law's collection in Chennai. The idea for the series happened one evening when mummy and I were looking through old albums. Most of the photos were shot by daddy who was a gifted photographer. Daddy passed away a long time ago. I felt inspired to capture all of them at a time when they were together and their joy was complete. I appropriately called it The Celebration Series.

Portrait of Mummy.

Here's my bro-in-law as a three year old.

Vivek and bro. One of my favourite paintings .

Daddy was the one who shot all the pics. There were very few of him. I managed to find one photo of him and used it as the inspiration for this portrait.

My bro-in-law. He was a really cute kiddo.

Mummy and Vivek. Vivek is about 10 months in this painting.

Under the Bridge on a bad hair day

2006-12-15T21:16:00.000-08:00

I got my hair cropped to a scandalously short mop the day after this photo was taken. My hair and the undergrowth in my painting look strikingly similar. Hair is supposed to grow downwards. Mine grows up and out and shakes like vine tendrils. The advantage is that it gives me three additional inches of height. So on heels, with two-inches of man-made height with three inches of hair-height and five foot five inches of God-given height, that makes me look 5'10"!

North of the Vindhyas, where it's primarily unadulterated Aryan blood in people's veins, hair grows poker-straight, downwards, like it is supposed to. I am Dravidian and I suppose "upwards and outwards" hair is the result of millions of years of evolution- we had to keep the growth off our shoulders to beat the tropical heat!

Back in College ( Delhi, and that's North of the Vindhyas) where everyone else had genetically straight hair ( unlike the doctored straight hair that everyone seems to sport these days), I was the only one with a wavy-curly mop. I used to sit right in front of my class and my friends would tease me about my hair blotting out the professor from view. I have soft hair that curls at the ends like little cotton wool balls. And when I shake my head even a little bit, I look like a Maple tree.

Like Samson, all my strength is in my hair. I am quick tempered and even mercury is a cheap metal to describe my reactions at times. In fact I'm pure molten lava when I am ticked off. That's where hair also helps to bring the point across. A red fuming face with bulbous eyes and flared nostrils becomes even more intimidating when combined with some wild locks shaking away menacingly. No one will want to get you into that mood again after that vision...

Hair also comes in handy when you are playing a classical piece after years when your skills are on crutches and when the arpeggios you are thrashing out could very well be playing of a baboon. That's when you swing back and throw your curls forward at every crescendo. And when the lull approaches, you lower your hair oh so delicately over your hands. Believe me, with the right lighting and practiced movements, hair can effectively take away the attention from bad piano-playing!

My hair was a make shift mobile for Samarra. I used to tie all kinds of things to my locks and spin on my feet like walking-talking merry -go-round. The routine comes in handy during Samarra's feeding time when distractions are of paramount importance if she is to finish her entire meal.

My new short mop makes me look a few years younger. But like Samson, I feel a little powerless. Now I am all Leo with the roar taken out!

The Operative word

2006-12-15T19:31:00.000-08:00

"Very impressive work! Just look at the beauty of the composition, the choice of such captivating colours. I like the way the textures give the illusion of movement so potently. So, are you professional?"

This is a question I am always asked.

And in reply, I scream, in one big parenthetic shout in my head ( while smiling all the time):

"Bloody fool if you like all that you see- the composition, colours, textures and the goddamn illusion of movement that is apparently so potent, how in blazes does it matter if I am professional or not?".

I have been painting for donkey's years. And "professionally" for the past 5 years or so. Let's look at the three definitions of "professional" that the Dictionary gives.

Definition 1: Professional- A person following a particular profession, especially a learned one.

Now, do I qualify for this? Ok, so I haven't been to art school. But there are those varieties called "self-taught", aren't there, who often end up knowing much more and being more skilled than the ones who have a degree in art and can't tell the difference between a paint brush and a tooth brush? I am not trashing all people with degrees as pseudos, mind you. I am just saying that there are many who parade fancy degrees but have no clue what their subject is about. I personally feel that after many years of hard work, cultivating a deep understanding of the medium through extensive reading, analysis and experimentation, the lines between the "trained artist" and the "self-taught", vanish. Some of the most successful and gifted artists in this country are self-taught anyway. I like the last bit of the definition- "a learned one". In the age of home-schooling and self-schooling, the self-taught artist will soon get some recognition, I guess. Who says that one has to go to university to "learn" anything?

Definition 2: One who earns a living in a given or implied occupation

Ever since I packed my career away in favour of motherhood and home-making ( what a word, I say!), I have been selling my works as a means of income. So definition 2 makes me a professional.

Definition3: A skilled practitioner; an expert.

Err, in all modesty, I have a resume that shows enough awards and recognitions of note to prove that Definition 3 would be appropriate for me.

I had a very interesting experience the other day. A "professional" artist friend came over to show me her new series. It was very good work- a myriad interpretation of "Human Feelings". She had approached a prominent gallery in town with her resume and paintings. She claimed that the owner of the gallery took one look at her and even before she saw the works or her resume, said in a politely catty voice, " You see, we exhibit only professionals".

Now, this lady is from an art school and has a degree. She has been instructing art in a prominent school here. Then what was it that made the clairvoyant gallery owner say she is not a professional?

You see, my friend is a simple Kannadiga lady who wears a sari, a bindi on her forehead and ties up her hair in an unglamorous bun. Sometimes she'll stick a bright orange flower in it too. She is anything but the noodle-strap blouse, flowing Lycra evening wear type.

That brings me to another Definition : Flamboyant. The Dictionary gives four definitions:

Definition 1: showy and dashing in a self-satisfied way

Now had my friend swaggered in there, two hands waving in the air with painted bright red nails, chic-chicking on a chewing gum and click-clicking on stilettos, it would have been a different story.

Definition 2: brightly colored and striking

Designer clothes, preferably the noodle strap and Lycra kind that I mentioned before would have been perfect. Look the Art Nouveu, Avaunt Garde part, whatever!

Definition 3: highly elaborate or richly decorated

Swarowski jewellery or if not that, junk jewelry ( Either you look highly polished or highly trashy. Normal is out. They're looking for socialites or outcasts)

Definition 4: audacious, unrestrained by prevailing standards of propriety

I leave this to the imagination. You can do anything from bringing a gay partner and cootchy-cooing in public to walking in drunk and quoting Kafka and Sartre. Like I said before, normal is out...

Why can't we just look at a canvas and like it or dislike it for what it is? Why do we need the packaging? In my opinion, the artist is a whole package for the gallery. It is not just about the quality and merit of the art, most of the time. It is about the artist's marketability ( read flamboyance) and how well it will all figure in the scheme of things on Page 3.

A Train to Chennai

2006-12-01T22:56:00.001-08:00

What was the big deal anyway? I had survived a war where I had made stressful journeys across four countries, camped in refugee shelters and stayed unwashed for about a week. This was not going to be half as bad.Just a matter of one night. Six hours to be precise. All my feminist studies over the years had made me model myself on a new-age Penthisilia. I looked down on the Rapunzel varieties who waited for men to come and rescue them. So, in spite of my husband voicing concerns about how I would manage three pieces of luggage and an 18 pounder, I poohed-poohed his worries, reminded him smugly of my exalted status as a war-veteran and got ready for an overnight journey to Chennai. By train.

All was picture perfect till we got into the train. It was past 11:00p.m and most people had pulled their berths up and retired for the night. Vivek helped me load all the luggage and I whistled my way to my berth. No 40. And my jaw dropped. As luck would have it, what awaited me was a "side-berth", every Indian traveller's promise of a cramped quarter. No 40, to my chagrin, was an "UPPER-side-berth" too which is the worst nightmare of every Indian mother travelling with a baby. And if all this was not bad enough, the lady occupying the seat below mine had loaded all her luggage into the hold leaving no place for mine.In a classic case of Indian-callousness,she had turned her ample behind towards the aisle and gone off to sleep.

Vivek and I stood there wondering what to do. The train stopped at the station for just five minutes and I asked him to get off rather than try any Bollywood stunts jumping off a moving train. Still feeling like Penthisilia, though not a very confident muscular one, I said I would "handle it".

I stood for a while, analysing the situation. Samarra, thankfully is a Zen-baby and all she did was look as analytical and critical as I did. After a number of excuse-mes, to which I got no response, I prodded the lady and she woke her up from her sweet dreams. I did not make bones about her luggage. I feel genuine pity for obese people and I knew there was no way that lady could have managed to pile all of herself and her luggage on that narrow berth. I poker-facedly asked her to hold Samarra for a minute. I lifted the large suitcase onto the upper berth along with the other two pieces of luggage. That left me with half a berth. I climbed onto the top and the lady passed Samarra up to me. Then, all the fun started...

Indian men are not very tall.The average height of the Indian male is about 5ft 7 inches. The side berths are exactly that length. I am about 5ft 5in and without luggage, am almost a snug fit when reclining on a side berth. Now, with a large suitcase and two overnight bags taking up half the space, I was cramped like a Pygmy squatting in the bushes. I put Samarra next to the wall and tried to figure out a comfortable position for the night, given our luxurious circumstances. My husband, wanting to do his bit in making what he predicted to be a tiresome journey more comfortable for us, had booked us in an AC coach. So I had the AC outlet right next to my left ear blowing cold draughts.Before my nose could stiffen into an icicle, I reached for my sweater which was tied around my waist and in the process of loosening it and restraining Samarra from peering over the edge of the berth and falling on her head, lost grip on the sweater. It fell to the floor of the train.

Murphy's law, I forget the number- A bad situation can only get worse. I looked down in frustration. There was my sweater lying partly on the floor, one sleeve draped obscenely over the obese lady's lower behind.There was no way I could come down and get it. Samarra would do the flying fox number if I budged. As it is, I was having a hard time restraining her from climbing over me and falling over. I had no choice but to reach for the blankets and linen that the train provided in the AC coaches.

Friends accuse me of being anti-Indian.What they don't realise is that I am no slave of the West at all and when an NRI Indian like me comments on things, it is blown out of proportion. Of course it is ok for a resident Indian to crib about power cuts, mosquitos and people taking a crap on the roads. But NRIs have to smile and nod their heads in approval at all that India manifests.I have heard horror stories about blankets provided on Indian trains. From resident Indian friends of course, so you can be assured it is not a stuck-up NRI over reacting. About nose gooey and cockroaches and even about pasted crap. My blanket seemed crisp and ironed well. I pulled it up till my chest. I imagined for a moment, piles and piles of blankets from this train, in a huge Dhobi Ghat, being washed in a one large drum.The slop water. And all the images of nose gooey, roaches and crap. But it was darn cold with the AC shaft next to my ear. I soon pulled the blanket over my head.

That's when Samarra decided to get social. She can get really vocal at times, talking to herself. With all the lights off in the train and everyone asleep, she sounded like the local drunk shouting in the dark. After much shoo-shooing on my part and boo-booing on her part, she finally turned around and in a pose reminiscent of the obese lady's below, went off to sleep. Just when I though that the Heavens had begun to look down favourably on me, and I thought I could finally get some shut-eye, the night light went on. And in the entire train, the light above mine was the chosen one. So there I was like an Egyptian Museum exhibit, spotlight on my face, arms crossed across my chest like Tutankhamen's, feet up against the wall, surrounded by my belongings. Of course, Tutankhamen had treasures, not diaper bags and tins of baby cereal. And certainly much more space than I did! Only thing missing was a sarcophagus.

Around 2 in the morning, I felt two fingers on my bum. I was about to swing a table tennis back hand when the face of the friendly ticket checker beamed at me. He was holding up my sweater. In India, it is ok to prod parts of another's anatomy. It is considered absolutely polite in fact. Thankful and displeased at the same time, I put it on and pushed away the blanket of bug-infested dreams. I went back to my mummified pose with the spotlight on my face. We reached Chennai at 5 in the morning.

Sorry my Indian brethren, but I have no choice but to say that most of you are selfish, unmannered, unchivalrous boors! There were people looking up at me and Samarra stashed up there and not a single human being offered to help us. The women! I expected at least the women to offer some help. At least to hold the baby while I got down. But most of them bustled about their business, getting their luggage together, hiring porters. The few who did look up at us, smiled and said cootchey-coo to the baby. Fat help that was...

I waited for the area around us to clear. Finally, when most people got off, I jumped off the berth. Samarra was peering over the edge and I got her down. I was suddenly in Penthisilia mode again. I kept her on a lower berth while I quickly got the other stuff down.There were were a few people on the train watching us like we were on reality T.V or something. And smiling in appreciation. Fat help that was...

I had a bag on each shoulder and holding Samarra, pushed the large suitcase with my KNEE. I did this till we reached the entrance of the compartment. An elderly couple, their son and wife all wished us good morning. Fat help that was...

At the door, a young man, like a Godsend, offered to carry my luggage down. He held baby for me while I unloaded the smaller bags.Of course, if he had not been there, my Plan A was to position the suitcase on the edge of the door and kick it full force onto the platform.And throw the overnight bags down as well. And Heaven knows I would have done that given the wonderful people around me and their helpful attitude.

Indians suck when it comes to being chivalrous. I have been on buses where young, able bodied donkeys occupy ladies' seats and suddenly get cataract and incurable blindness the moment women get on. There is no concept of giving seats to the elderly. Even worse, I have seen pregnant women standing while men sit, picking their noses and enjoying the scenery. Who knows, maybe the sight of a fellow Indian crapping on the road side. The crapping Indian is staple Indian scenery after all. Time Magazine rated many cities in India as ranking among the rudest places in the Solar System. So there, now you can't call that the prejudiced view of a Non-resident Indian who has seen better manners. You have it from a credible source.

An Orkut Story

2006-11-26T17:11:00.000-08:00

I have suddenly become severely addicted to Orkut. Initially it was a twice-a-day fix but over time, the frequency of my addiction has drastically increased. Now I need it on an hourly basis. It is the natural fallout of being holed at home in a predictable routine with minimal links to the outside world. One discovers a small release that gives a definite high and before long, one is hooked.

Before anyone from a different geological timescale reads this and jumps to any preposterous conclusions, let me assure you that Orkut, although it sounds like over the counter medication, is no Central Nervous System Depressant or Dopamine. It is a networking site where you get to keep in touch with your pals from all over the world and also get to make new ones through this existing web of friends. The best part is that you get to track down pals you haven't seen in years by simply doing a search for them on the site. If they are registered, and the probability of that is high, considering that the site has over 3.4 million users, it is happy reunion time. I am hooked like a fish on a bait!

My husband is a computer games enthusiast and weekends are the only time that he gets to indulge in the number one passion of his existence. That's where I come in like a royal spanner in the works. When he goes off on a bathroom break, I pounce onto the computer, click the Exit button on his game in one slick move and log onto Orkut and see which friend has "scrapped" me or in other words, sent me a message. If there is enough time in the one minute that it takes for the man to finish up and return, I will have scrapped a friend or two too. Before he's back, I will have restored his game and left the screen looking like it did. With a slight difference. I would have forgotten to click on the "Save" button of his game and he will be left back on square one after having painstakingly plodded through several impossible levels like the Norse God of Games that he is. So, weekends are quite painful for my husband with my Orkut addiction looming large.

16 years back, while in exile in India during the Gulf War, I made it to the finals of the Kerala State Youth Festival Art competition. There, I was introduced to the art prodigy of our generation, Kavitha Balakrishnan. She of course, won first place and I was placed fourth, I think. Over the years, both of us were featured in the media quite often: she was the art prodigy and I was the writing prodigy. Kavitha Balakrishnan and Oormila Vijayakrishnan. Nice alliteration. We never met after that competition. Till two days back. On Orkut.

Then there was my friend and chief competitor, Vidya Nagarajan, back in school who beat you out of the gold medal by a mark and a half. I tracked her down after 16 years on Orkut too. And a long lost pal in the U.S. And another one in Sweden. So, Orkut for me has become one large fishing net where I find old contacts. Where I get to be some kind of modern day Hercule Poirot, tracking people down...

The site's a great space for the most part. But like the rest of the Net, it can also be a funny place to be, at times. Like the weird scraps you get from people you have never met before whose idea of showing interest is sending you scraps like "I want to friendship you" or " I interesting in friendshipping you" or some other ingenious grammatical usage of the sort. So even when you look forward to meeting genuine people with honest intentions of friendship, your antennae are always up and buzzing to filter out the trolls and weirdos who might message and be potential harassers.

I had the most ridiculous experience the day before. A journalist I have never met, messaged with an offer of friendship. I went to his profile, read what he had to say about himself and made a sketchy judgement. On Orkut, the "scraps" that you send people are public and you can eavesdrop on the conversations they are having with others. That's also a way to ascertain what kind of people they could be and if they are worth adding to your network. So this particular person seemed to have serious concerns in life and after deciding that I had second guessed enough, gave him the green signal and added him to my friends. We sent each other a few scraps about art. Then he sent me a message in my mail comparing Nebulae ( a topic I had chosen for a canvas) to bunches of grapes and then, some clusters called Cassia Fistula.

As I said before, on Orkut, there are dirty people lurking around who show their perverse sides once then obtain your trust. I freaked out. Fistula! Disgusting! How awful! What kind of pass was he trying to make? Talking about "grape clusters" and fistula, obvious references to hemorrhoids and creepy diseases of the urino-genital system! I was frothing, foaming and fuming. Unfortunately I have always lived my life by the rule of the jungle: Kill first, then think and was contemplating sending the man a scathing mail when my husband suggested that we do a google search for Cassia Fistula before lynching the guy.

The search result had us silent for a moment and then in splits. Turned out that Cassia Fistula is the botanical name for a deciduous tree that is famous for its "golden shower" flowers or in other words, flower clusters that look like Nebulae! And in a dramatic twist, also found an article that talked about the Divine Ratio and the Golden Mean. And how bunches of grapes were another of natural examples for extra terrestrial phenomena like Nebulae. So the poor journalist was just stating some facts and very academic and interesting ones at that!

That had me thinking about trust and faith in the milk of human kindness. The Net has become our only access to the outside world. A world in which many people you meet are people you don't know at all. I have become the Queen of Second Guessing as I progressively become a Net addict. Of course, that gets me into idiotic situations like this where I look like a crowned ass. I wiped the sweat of foolishess off my forehead and sent the journalist a thank you scarp for his academic and intelligent evaluation of my work. And smiled a ridiculous smile of relief that no one is going to know about my paranoid interpretation! :-D

Art and Blinders

2006-11-24T22:27:00.000-08:00

Being a self taught artist, I've worked in various styles over the years as a teenager. In the past ten years or so, I have slowly evolved my own language and my own sense of style.

I hate to define my work in terms of -isms but I suppose the world views it that way and it is important to finally have an Artist's Statement that says what you and your work is all about. In precise professional terms. So, if I have to fit my work in an -ism, I would grudgingly say that I am an Oscillating Impressionist-Expressionist. Sometimes, I am concerned with the visual beauty of things and that is where my light, airy interpretation of things comes in and I go full swing, simply and harmonically to being an Impressionist. And when I decide to create from the subconscious and my subject matter is an emotional response, I become an Expressionist. Looks like I have coined my own art term there. Spoofs apart, I gravitate more towards being an Expressionist. My work uses colour and composition as tools of emoting. Over the years, I further narrowed down my work to what really calls me. More than the pure aesthetically pleasing impression of a subject, I am concerned with the feelings and emotional reactions the piece elicits.

A question that I have addressed over the years without satisfactory answers is why does an Artist, when he turns professional and is aiming for commercial success, have to stick to one style? By Artist, I am using a broad term- one could be a musician, painter or writer. But let's stick to artists here for the time being. Wouldn't a work in screaming green, blue and yellow by Da Vinci seem a little jarring, now that we have type cast him as one who produces brooding, evocative work in sepias and browns? Could it be possible that Dali felt like making something other than Surrealistic nightmares and felt like painting a simple rose for Gala, without symbolism, myth and metaphor?

A friend told me that an artist ceases to be an artist the day he turns "professional". I thought the statement was presumptuous. And powerfully true. I don't like to paint sceneries unless I have an expressionist take on them. But a realistic rendition? No sir, not my style, I say. I do portraits but again, the strokes are Expressionist. I love Figurative art and all the works I produce are Expressionist. When I go to the houses of friends who have the work I did as a teenager, up on their walls, I cringe. Because it was an experimental phase when I dabbled in all forms and all styles and was a free spirit. And now that I have what I call "my own language" and "my signature style", I can't identify with that unfettered past anymore. I don't know if it is a good or bad thing. That is what puzzles me.

I know of a famous artist ( not mentioning names here!) who put up a painting in a public space. A piece that was completely different from the body of work he normally produces. He smartly took the money and did not sign the work. Simply because he was someone with "name and reputation" and had his "signature style" out there by now. And this commission, which was done purely for money, would have had critics and art hawks questioning why this piece was not in accord with his "blue phase" or "orange phase" or whichever portion of the colour wheel he was on at that point in time. This, I would think, is a prime example of how commercial success really kills the artist. He no longer paints from the heart. The creative process suddenly becomes a very "aware" one, limited by expectations, results and reputation.

Which leaves me with the question I started with- does commercial success kill the artist in the sense that it puts blinders on his creative self and all his subsequent work is then a process that is streamlined in one direction?

Mirrors and Headlamps

2006-11-20T23:07:00.000-08:00

I was in the changing room of a store pulling up a pair of corduroys when I noticed a big cellulite ridden bum sagging away in the mirror in front of me. Whose terrible behind was that, I thought out loud? Can't that stupid woman close the door and then take her pants off? That's when it struck me that the bum was mine, reflected in one of those weird angled mirrors that lets you stare ahead at your own back view. I sat down for a moment, corduroy pants at my knees. How in blazes did that part of me get to looking that bumpy and amorphous?

By the time I recovered from the shock of being the owner of the bulging bean-bag bum, I thought I would do a little more snooping. Turned around and had a look at other bits of me. Everyone looked like they had headed a little south from where I had seen them last. Back muscles, neck muscles, arms, the twins. Everybody! A friend had told me that childbirth does that to you. The ageing process is suddenly accelerated. Skin loses its elasticity from the weight fluctuations, the stomach looks like an estuary photographed from above and the behind looks like a detailed road map of Manhattan. The visual tour was a little too much for me. I quickly pulled on my pants and left the store in a state of blissful denial. This is the problem with changing rooms in big, plush stores, I told myself. They have too many lights, too fine carpeting, fancy fans, sexy background music and and standing in there, contrasted against all that finery makes you look like a sorry excuse of Nature. There was nothing wrong with me. I am sure if I looked at my behind in the soothing light of the lampshade at home, it would look as burnished as a baby's bottom. So there.

It struck me with a sense of panic that I had slowly begun the descent into the Geriatric state.

At a beauty store last week, I was looking at some shampoos when a sales girl, a young thing in her early twenties, sweetly asked me " Anything else ma'am? Foundation, Eye-shadow, Blusher? Maybe some Wrinkle-lift cream?". My smile dropped two floors and splotched in an ugly mess like a rotten mango. Wrinkle-cream? What did she think I was, 87 that I needed Wrinkle Cream?!? "I don't use any such fancy things", I said coldly. She was quite thick I guess, not detecting the thick displeasure in my voice and swinging the magnifying mirror towards me ( another irritating invention like the headlamps they put in changing rooms), said " After 30, ma'am, we get crow's feet and laugh lines and the start of wrinkles. See for yourself". I was horrified at her brashness. If that wasn't bad enough, what stared back at me from the mirror was even more alarming. Forget crow's feet, the stuff around my eyes looked like some disgusting cellular-webbing straight out of a B-grade Hollywood Creature-movie. There was something like Satan's pitchfork running across my forehead, the sunspots looked like utility ditches and the surface of the skin was like a grapefruit peel. I grabbed my shampoo and ran.

Back home, I got onto the Net. And clicked on the first of 29,700,000 results for "Ageing". None of it was pleasant. There were attempts to make the process easier for people by calling it "an ascent to wisdom" and "lines of maturity" and "respectable state" and what not. Then there were the cold, clinical articles that talked about immobility, instability, incontinence, imapired intellect and many such intimidating "i" worded things. There was an article on Adult Diapers, Walking Sticks and Wheelchairs.

The better part of my morning was spent on reading what other women did in their sword fight against age. Plastic surgery, Botox, Yoga. I read that Sophia Loren's statistics are virtually unchanged to this day. It amazed me to see the queries that women sent to experts to ask questions about hanging onto their good looks. It struck me that if Ponce De Leon had been alive today, there would have been many a rich matron who would have funded his expeditions in search of the Fountain of Youth.

When my husband came home, I asked him a few casual questions about the computer. What did this icon and that key do? How did google work as a site? Finally steered the conversation around to what I REALLY wanted to know- "how to delete the History" from the computer. God alone knows what the man thought ( perhaps the bored housewife was surfing porn or flirting with some online boys?) but being too trusting and inherently decent, simply told me how to do it. The last thing I wanted anyone to find out was that I was looking at " Stop the Ageing Process", "Everlasting Youth" or some such fantastic rubbish. I was just another woman who had picked up a nice sturdy straw-sword in my crusade against Ageing.

Pssst. Don't tell anyone but I went snooping back to the store with that young-thing sales girl and got something called Recova. Supposed to keep the wrinkles at bay. Heh heh. Shall post some before and after pictures in a while. You tell me how it has worked...

Landmark

2006-11-19T07:13:00.000-08:00

Yesterday,I had the privilege of attending the Landmark Education 2006 graduate event "Living Powerfully, a life that defies the predictable".

I am a graduate of the Landmark Educatiob Forum and in 2003, did all three courses of their Curriculm for Living programs. It has been one of the most powerful experiences of my life.

The event was for all graduates of the program. It was awesome sitting with 4000 plus graduates of the Landmark education Forum in a huge stadium listening to the motivating words of the speakers. I came away feeling transformed and radiant as I always do when I attend their programs, with some powerful insights about how I can live my life with greater control and produce tangible results. Of the many many points I noted down during the event, here's one that really called me-

One thing I realised was that you will always have what is called your "current circumstances". It may be one set of scenarios today and another set tomorrow. Today you may be a student with family obligations who is low on funds wondering how you will pay for higher education. At another point in life you may be a wife and mother wondering how you will keep alive your intellect and interests while caring for your family. But no matter what, you will always have "current circumstances". So, citing "current circumstances" as an excuse for not doing something is not empowering. The time to do anything is NOW. The concept of "sometime, someday" gets you nowhere. There will be no point in life when all is favourable and conducive.

At Landmark, I did not hear a single thing that I had not heard before. Everything that is spoken there has been said for ages. But then, what is it about Landmark that produces powerful changes in people and gets them to do the unimaginable? Make ground breaking results happen?

It is the "technology" that is imparted there that helps one "sustain" the results prouced. And that is something that has to be experienced and just cannot be said in words!

( You can read more about Landmark Education Forum and what the foundation is all about at www.landmarkeducation.com)

Up close and personal- The Christ Series

2006-11-16T22:16:00.000-08:00

An artist is a tortured soul, to quote a cliche. If the mood-swings and the confused thoughts are not bad enough, there are the critics to face and their incredibly ingenious interpretations. I am slowly working on cultivating a thicker skin. Here are what some had to say about my work on Christ.

In the Wilderness

This was the first of the three paintings. My Satan was initially a very glamorous guy with a heart shaped face and bat's wings. Then, I got some inputs from friends who said that he wasn't "scary" enough. His wings looked like Chrysanthamum petals and with his theatre mask face, he looked comical, almost foolish. I started sweating bullets. Here was Christ, all noble and exuding divinity. And Satan looked straight out of Cartoon Network. No wonder Christ never got tempted by this buffoon. It was too much of a contrast and just would not work within this painting. So, I got to work on Satan. I cut off his wings, gave him a morphed face with some smokey effects and put some black behind him so as to make him more sinister. Then, I "tested" him out on people. On a scale of 1 to 10, they rated him an 8 in terms of scary, mean guy and tempter. That was great in my books. My initial Satan was no more sinister than Mickey Mouse. People would have liked to make friends with him. To the smart aleck who asked me what the "platter" behind Christ's head is, let's talk after you have checked out some Classical representations of Christ.

Father, Son and Holy Spirit

I got to hear lots of interesting things on this painting. There was one guy who wanted to know why God was represented as a "nuclear explosion". Another person was not happy with the bird. Were the gray shades on the Dove supposed to represent Sin or the fact that life aint all black and white (wow, this guy could give critics a complex, I say). Why did Christ look like a Super Hero? I had some lame answer or the other for all the lame queries. The best question was " Why is Christ looking that-a-way and not this-a-way?". I rested my case on that one.

Sermon on the Mount

According to my research, there was no mountain, just a group of hills in the area where Christ gave the sermon on the mount. One person was damn mean and asked me if he had borrowed Mother Mary's shawl that day because Mother Mary is the one who is portrayed with the blue black shawl. I had kittens on this one too but thankfully,I discovered that Da Vinci has represented Christ with a blue shawl. So if Florentine masters can do it, so can Banaswadi upstarts. To the person who asked me if the guy with the closed eyes is sleeping through Christ's sermon, duh, he is not. Sometimes you close your eyes when you are touched and are imbibing something with respect and devotion. That's what that guy is doing, ok. Somehow, this painting has not photographed well at all. And no amount of messing around on Photoshop is approximating it to what it looks like in real life. So hope you people will go to Goa and check it out on the gallery wall :-)

Artists at Work, Samarra and Moi

2006-11-16T20:55:00.000-08:00

Hallelujah! Hallelujah!

These got sent off to St.Francis Xavier's Cathedral in Goa late last night. It was a very emotional moment for me. My first big break in India. My first big promotion from street side artist to two-bit Michelangelo. Now I can die knowing that I did get to put up my work in a significant place!

This series was done at break neck speed. It was all providential, how I got this offer, really. I was reading, I swear, Sarah Hall's 2004 Booker Prize nominated "The Electric Michelangelo" when I got a call from a wax sculptor friend, late at night. He is Shreeji Bhaskaran, India's first wax sculptor and he had been commissioned by the Cathedral to make the Last Supper for the new Gallery of Contemporary Christian Art that was opening at the Cathedral on the eve of the feast. He put in a word for me, the kind soul that he is and asked me if I had any work on Jesus. I couldn't believe my ears! I said I did not have any canvasses on Christ but I sure could make a few! This is the biggest Cathedral, arguably, in India which gets at least a 1000 visitors a day and what an honour it was to be asked to paint a series on Christ.

I want to acknowledge the wonderful people in my life who made this dream possible for me- my doll girl Samarra for being the Zen angel that she is. She was zero trouble as always and I could concentrate on my work without having to bother about bawling and tantrums. My better half, Vivek, who is willing to run around for me even in the middle of the night if it means getting an outlet for my interests. My mom-in-law, Aruna, for all the encouragement, strength, support and love she gives me unconditionally and for her slogan of "Go Women!". She's a true feminist. My folks in Kuwait, for their mails and calls that kept me going when I thought I could not meet the deadline and despaired. My bro, Munna, my aunt Susheela for all the gooides they kept pampering me with. My friends and critics ( even the slightly jealous ones who kept nit-picking) who gave me inputs and suggestions. All the wonderful people who came on the day of the preview party at home and were a part of my happiness. Most all, thanks to Shreeji and his family for being so magnanimous, going out of the way to get me this chance and making all arrangements for transporting my art work to Goa. God bless everyone!

I'll be putting up each work seperately once Blogger stops acting manic-depressive and I am able to post again.

Technical Problemo

2006-11-15T21:03:00.000-08:00

Blogger has been a pain in my A*** the entire day! Haven't been able to upload a single picture of my paintings! Am tearing my hair in frustration. Well, not all of it. I'll be 30 next year and post 30,I read, hair really starts to thin out. So, these days, I tear hair judiciously. I'm trying nails for a change. They grow back, though slightly slower, at any age...

Christ in the making

2006-11-04T20:36:00.000-08:00

I haven't been able to post regularly because I have been up to my eyes in paint. I am working feverishly on my series on the life of Christ for St.Francis Xavier's Cathedral in Goa. I'm doing a set of three works that depict the Temptation in the Wilderness, The Sermon on the Mount and a symbolic representation of The Father, The Son and The Holy Spirit. It has been gruelling and so extremely fulfilling at the same time!

I am sending these off on the 15th. It used to be very painful in the past, parting with my work. But now, I have become a seasoned mother, seeing my children fly the nest every once in a while. I keep photos of them. I look at them regularly, wonder how they are faring in their new homes and if they are "happy". These are going to a Catherdral, so they are certainly going to be well looked after and contented...

Poor Satan. What a fate to be maligned and bitched about for ever and ever more,Amen. I sympathize with Satan, you know. He was just an Equal Rights kind of guy, a Champion of Democracy. And for that he got pummeled and shoveled out of Heaven. In today's context, how would he have been any different from Nelson Mandela or an Aung San Su Kyi? They also fought against dictatorship of different kinds, didn't they?

Oooh, this is controversial territory. I remember Dr. Subbu teaching us Paradise Lost back in college and how the class was divided about who the true hero of Paradise Lost is. What a free for all that was! There were some of us who maligned "God" of the Old Testament for being a cruel God, saying that one who could create a place like Hell for people who did not worship him and accept his authority without question was indeed Fidel Castro's second cousin. Then there were those who got apoplexy listening to that and were convinced that we would soon be joining Satan in Hell for our audacity. Personally, I was blurred about the existing definitions of God and Hell and Heaven and Satan and all the stock words in coinage since kingdom come. It is difficult to analyze without prejudice. But, I gravitated towards Satan's side, I must confess. My take was that if he was indeed out of line, maybe God could have hired some heavenly bouncers and given him a thrashing to discipline him. Nah, I take that back, even that sounds terrible! But frying the poor guy and his friends in fire and brimstone and changing his appearance, boarding and lodging permanently was just not done. It was a gross violation of human rights.

Jokes and academic debates apart, I have absolutely no questions about the purity of Christ. It's been my privilege to make this work on the Lord. So, please, I don't want to see any protestors on my lawn brandishing "Burn in Hell" placards!

My paintings will be up here by 15th morning, so watch this space!

Horoscopic Temptations

2006-11-02T01:55:00.000-08:00

I have been toying with the idea of taking a look at my horoscope. One part of me is dying to know what has been predicted for me by the unique planetary alignment at the time of my birth. Will some rich relative on the verge of kicking the bucket decide to make me his heir after miraculously forgiving my abominable sin of wearing low-rise jeans that flaunt the butt-crack? Will some Hollywood Director chance upon my blog during coffee break and ask me to write the screenplay for the movie of the millennium? And also send me tickets to California? By First Class? With Penthouse accommodation and car on arrival? Caviar and Champagne later? (And so the dream unfolds infinitely on...).

My rational half, which staunchly believes in free will, protests against such a weakness as wanting to know the future. It boasts the courage to take each day as it comes with the sublime and the stinking. Besides, there is also the clammy fear of finding something scary in your future- stock market bunglings, brain tumors, psychotic lovers. Even more scary than finding something scary is to find nothing great at all. Imagine being told that you will spend the rest of your life in stalemate, swatting flies and that the biggest achievement you will ever have is the 49% you scored in a Math paper, ten years ago? Thus, better to stay in hallucinatory dreams and hopes of imagined greatness than to have them confirmed or negated. Let sleeping dogs lie, in my opinion.

Most people would laugh at me. Because I would be one of the few people in my community who have not had a look at this "sacred piece of information" by now. The first thing that is written on the birth of a child is his natal chart. It will have a detailed account of the main events in his life, with comprehensive interpretations of his choices, actions, decisions and their consequences. Many of my relatives are firm believers in the horoscope and many an astrogloger makes a fat buck off them on a regular basis, reading their natal charts and predicting such things as when to build a house, when to change jobs, what to wear to the next job interview and what sort of transportation to take to the venue. Wonder of all wonders, it will even tell you whom to marry!

I am not refuting that astrology is a science. Crudely put, we are all made up of matter and the planets do have some kind of pull or push on us depending on the variations in our chemical compostions. From what I have read on the subject, there is some serious gravitation, levitation and manipulation involved. I am just against slavishly living my life according to what is predicted for my future. Take for example, this uncle of mine who does not go out on Tuesdays as he is just not a Tuesday-guy as per his horoscope. He wears a fat onyx on his index finger and yellow on Wednesdays and eats lentils cooked in clarified butter for good luck. He also does not operate machinery or have anything to do with dogs as both augur trouble for him, according to his horoscope. It is a pain when he visits. He will fidget in the car since it is "machinery" and during every car ride, he is covinced it will crash. As for dogs, he freaks out so much around them that even the most docile mutt will get agitated and will contemplate taking a swipe at his butt.

A few years back, I heard this true story. A man went to his astrologer to have a look at his natal chart before taking some important decision. The astrologer went ashen faced; he saw a terrible disaster in the man's immediate future. He said that the man would be involved in a car accident and would sustain terrible injuries. His wife almost got a cardiac arrest hearing this ( wonder if that was predicted for her). She would not let him out of the house and every minute of every hour of every day, they bit nails and tore hairs together about this Godawful thing that was foretold for him. He took leave from work and stayed at home in this wonderful state of paranoid hysteria for about six months. Then one day, he fell down the stairs and broke bones and injured his spine.

So where is the car and the crash as was predicted? Here's the creepy climax- he had stepped on his son's toy car at the top of the stairs and that was what had brought him whizzing down to his doom...

So there is truth to astrology after all and in the hands of a skilled astrologer, the predictions can be amazingly accurate. Which brings me back to the point I made- ignorance is bliss in these matters for sure.

I pity relatives who are so cramped that they have to consult the horoscope for the tiniest of tiny matters. But if there is anyone I detest, it is the relatives who go to astrologers with YOUR birth details to find out what YOU have in store. Then, they snoop around you with raised eyebrows and knowing looks. Most of the time, you cannot even say if it is awe or fear. Perhaps they have found out that you are bi-sexual or that you used to have a whiff of pot once in a while? These damned horoscopes can also tell your past! Of late, two or three people in my family have been fidgeting around me and have been dropping broad hints about my horoscope and about "the time having come" or something as enigmatic and irritating as that. Thankfully, they are smiling, so I know they haven't seen that I shall shed blood or do time.

My aunt let slip that it has to do with "writing" and "being read by many all over the world". As much as I want to believe it is about a Best Seller in the making that will be gunning for the Booker a few years from now, I have a weird feeling it could be my humble blog. Well, I am "writing", so the first part is true. And since it is on the Internet, I am sure three people in Zimbabwe, two in Australia, ten in Bangalore and six in the U.S can be considered a world wide reader base. Three plus two plus ten plus six equals many people. So there is part two of the prediction.

Actually, there is a way of knowing for sure if the prediction is about my blog or some serious contribution to Literature that lurks in my brain at the moment, waiting for the right time to be born. You see, I have my horoscope which was written at the time of my birth, sitting in my locker. It has been lying there for the past 29 years.

I have never read it.

"Watch and pray so that you will not fall into temptation. The spirit is willing, but the body is weak." -Matthew 26:41

First Face

2006-11-01T03:40:00.000-08:00

Finished a few faces in the new series I have begun in charcoal. Shot one and here it is.I have tried to blend realism with a faint touch of Modiglani-esque distortion. I am crazy about Modigliani. There is something dizzy about the ways he skews some of his portraits.

My faces, for a change, are not portraits of any people I know. I am simply putting blunt end of charcoal to paper and experimenting with what emerges. So, resemblance to anyone dead or alive is purely coincidental. However, if you think any of my work resembles you or maybe your girlfriend and would like to have it up on your or her wall, well, you know what to do. Leave a comment and I'll get back to you with the price, heh heh...

Some Bull

2006-10-31T08:43:00.000-08:00

Aaah, yet another important lesson that I really have to learn is that I should not make bombastic declarations in the heat of an improved mood or feeble flash of energy like "I will put up a blog entry tonight no matter what" because after a particularly hard day of chores and baby-work when all you want to do is get some shut-eye, that resolution then hangs round your neck like a millstone, becoming a matter of honor and when you are reluctantly sitting in front of the computer like I am right now, uninspired, full-bladdered, itchy-eyed and bad tempered, picking zits, tiny chin hairs and overgrown eyebrows for ideas, and nothing arresting is coming out of it all except that irritating spasm that you intermittently feel in your calf from shifting on a folded leg, all you can think of is how to keep this stupid exercise going with a few more words strung together, keeping intact the logic of the sentences looped, so that the reader ( if there is anyone out there in the first place!) will think you have written a creative piece of Hysterical Realism when all you have done is serve some steaming hot bullshit in the from of a post at 10:37 p.m when all your neurons have shut down for the day and your better sense is telling you to admit you have Writer's Block tonight and thus hit the sack immediately rather than make an ass of yourself rambling on any further.

Mission accomplished.

Sid, Christ and Resolution

2006-10-31T02:33:00.000-08:00

Here's my version of my friend Sid. He looks so much like Christ- the hair, the beard, the same compassion in his eyes. Christ, I think, was one of the sexiest guys who ever lived...

I'm working on two series simultaneously- the Faces one and now, one on Christ. A real good offer hangs above my head and I've been asked to do a 4 canvas series on Christ. I'll talk about the project once it has been completed but all I can say at the moment is that I am ecstacic because this could mean that big break that I have been looking for...

I've been itching to write. In fact, I have three blog posts completed and ready. Unfortunately it is all in my head as of now, the way Sanjaya would have recited the entire Mahabharatha to King Dhritarashtra. By the time I reach the comp at the end of a busy day, I am drooling away to sleep on the keyboard.

I shall put up an entry tonight no matter what. Hope the Californian Governor hasn't patented this but "I'll be BACK"!