Diwali

The festival of lights is louder than it is bright, or so it seems to me at the moment. Stepping ouside right now would mean inhaling fumes upon fumes of goodness knows what, and also realising that all that visual extravaganza (and cacophony) in the skies is the spewing forth of so much toxicity into the air. There's been a haze like mist outside since the fireworks started this evening, and by tomorrow morning, as happens every year, there will be a fine layer of ash/smoke dust everywhere. I wonder what happens to all those chemicals released. After the visual fest, do we really care? They'll probably fly about and chase each other, or just find their way down your throat. I don't think that harmless-looking, colourful little round ball comes with a disclaimer about things like noxious fumes, air or noise pollution. About a million or so of them thrown into the air in one night though must be leaving that nice blue sky gagged, choking and spluttering with indignation.

Lights and colour are pretty enough, and I think the diyas have an air of quaintness and serenity like no other. That spectacular display in the air cannot hold a candle to the tiny flame flickering in the the earthen lamp. The latter doesn't come attached with noise unbound, and toxicity unleashed, which is a quiet blessing.
Some pictures from this year's celebrations:

The last one's courtesy Ju (www.mphilchronicles.blogspot.com). Thanks!

Sohra

I recently went to Sohra on an impromptu visit. It didn't disappoint. Fortunately, it was a bright and clear day, unlike most days when Sohra is enveloped in a blanket of fog and the various viewpoints only look out into a thick, endless whiteness. For a little while, there was only mist around, especially at U Khoh Ramhah, but it soon cleared up remarkable well, and I could look out into the valley, and see the plains of Bangladesh in the distance. I missed out on seeing Ka Nohkalikai, but managed to see Ka Nohsngithiang. These waterfalls are a different picture in summer, having the life and vigour of the famed rains. Nonetheless, the cliff views were awesome.

Thankarang Park, which is otherwise filled with sightseers, was perfectly quiet. It wasn't the season for tourists, I was told. I had it all to myself, which I couldn't help revelling at!

The town itself looked idyllic, peaceful. I wish I'd gotten more pictures, especially of the old church, steeped in history, and the facade of the town in the distance as one first sees it. I couldn't visit the heart of town. This square is quite picturesque, I thought. Notice that the clouds are never far, or long gone!

Nothing

It's 2:40 am and I don't know what I'm doing. Read The Tempest, whiled away sleepless time well past my usual hour; some soft music playing, a conversation, a game of free cell, a packet of sweet-salty chips. Fit of inspiration (also of madness) to be doing this. Guilt, and other things. No words or witticisms come to mind. Just an itch to touch these keys. That's all.

PC

My first day of using the new comp. Ah. Joy. Even if by ‘using’ I mean clicking arbitrarily on stuff which I’d never use, just to make sure they exist. Opening folders at random, browsing through the usual preinstalled stuff. It’s awesome. This screen is beyond description. For one, it’s HUGE and FLAT, especially in comparison with my old one- which looked like something out of those late-eighties movies- small, dusty white, box-like, with a giant backside that protruded way out. The screen itself bulged importantly like part of a hemisphere at the front. Yes, it was an ancient, pompous old thing, but I give credit where it’s due. Though physically worn out (and here I should add the following: the mouse was held with tape at the back to prevent the ‘rubber ball’ from falling out, half the keyboard’s keys were stuck or extremely inconsistent with their functioning-resulting in several frustrating sessions at Word or Chat, the CPU was dust-ridden and would would decide to loudly whirr and splutter and hurl abuses at random, the remedy of which was to stick in a bit of cardboard at the back where the fan was, upon which it would give a frightening creak, and be subdued into silence again, the hard disk crashed once, the USB ports were unreliable and virus-contagions, the system itself was cranky), it was still a loving companion. And despite all I said, it’s still working tolerably fine, and is in fact now used by my sister, who I think won’t be too pleased to read this.

But of course I exaggerate. It is actually a robust, resilient thing. And it continues to work.

This one gave me quite a scare on first being switched it on. It registered a blank. Monitor wanted to sleep, or something. There was only a shrill, resolute beep emerging from the CPU which wouldn’t stop. After I pulled all the stops (well, yeah) I managed to get it fixed, and it’s fine now. And I’m petrified that it’ll go bonkers again. So I’m taking extra care, and am having difficulty typing because of this plastic sheet which I don’t want removed for fear of dust settling in between the keys (what help that could possibly give to the afore-said I don’t know). Also covering the monitor with two layers of protection- the sheet of paper it came in, and my own curtain-turned tablecloth-turned monitor cloth. And I’ve left the speakers in their little polythene covers. They look repressed, but I couldn’t care. The dust in this place wages war every single day. It’s the least I can do.

More on this later.

Yet To

What a strange medium: unread, unseen, yet giving me a strange satisfaction...

Eating My Words

I’m compelled to retract my statements, not unwillingly. Mrs. Dalloway isn’t inscrutable anymore. On the contrary it makes utter sense, in such an unusual, dazzling way that I’m awed. It flows with a flourish yet doesn’t explain itself easily, but now, having read into it with more insight and information than at that first helpless reading, I am pretty convinced Woolf was pure genius. I insist I’ve not been too severely influenced by critics and commentators, but all that reading did put things in a context. The book’s a good read. It’s an even better second read.

Woolf?

I can’t seem to get through more than two paragraphs of Mrs. Dalloway at a time. It’s inscrutable! I thought after seeing The Hours last week, I’d be more comfortable. (Yes, I’d never bothered watching it before). Well actually I didn’t expect the movie to make the book easier for me (it wouldn’t have done that in any case), I merely wanted something to get me interested enough to start struggling through that morass of a text. I know zilch about Woolf. I plead complete ignorance. I can recall the number of times I’d heard that name pre-Third Year, before it kept popping up in lectures on Modernism and text lists. The first was when I’d read about Elizabeth Taylor and her role in Who’s Afraid of Virginia Woolfe? or something like that. I'm still not sure whether it is the same Woolf or not, and remember getting confused on that count because I recall the role being slammed as scandalous, lurid, wanton. The second is seeing the book To The Lighthouse on someone’s M.A. reading list. Was faintly interested, then forgot about it. More recently I came across this picture on the net by pure accident and thought she looks extremely intellectual, sophisticated, smart. Nicole Kidman’s prosthetic nose fell into place. Then I learnt she killed herself. After having been absorbed by Sylvia Plath, who did the same, it’s getting more and more intriguing. I don’t know what the definition of Woolf’s ‘madness’ was but to think that she was capable then of writing a book such as this is astounding. I’m not lauding the book. I haven’t read it yet. But then I saw her name in a list of literary ‘giants’ who were snubbed for the Nobel, and taking that as my standard, I’m willing to expect great things from Woolf. And I know once I’ve read the book and the mountain of critical material one is expected to read alongside, I will have understood better, as invariably happens and will wonder how presumptuous I was to speculate so much on something I know absolutely nothing about, and that too after a mere 5 odd pages into it. But I’ve been warned that one has to read the text twice to really understand it, and as things are going, that doesn’t look like too pleasant a prospect.

Woe is me. I say 'text' instead of 'novel' or 'book'. I anticipate critical essays to act as concomitant reading material. i don't take the book as it comes. It's arduous, and a huge pain sometimes, to know you have to read a book, with the pressure of finishing it before a stipulated time. I like to read my book with a mug of tea; plonked on the bed facedown; in the car during traffic jams; on the terrace before the sun goes down; on a mura next to the heater in winter...not with a stubby pencil underlining parts that seem important, from a purely examination point-of-view. I think I started Mrs. Dalloway from that angle. Oh let the first reading progress into a 'reading-for-pleasure' one.

The Sun Also Rises

The sun rises early here. People wake up early, post World-Cup; or at least the early morning swimmers tell us that. Untiring and energentic, most of them. The water is lovely. Your body tingles with freshness. Goodbye Shillong. See you in a couple of months.

Face the Music

I heard a mellifluous sound. Honeyed and toned, like smooth syrup down your throat. It oozed out of nothing, trickled into a series of sweet melodies, and then completely swallowed up the air in a single, intoxicating note. I was awestruck.

The next moment a whole choir of voices resonated through the hall, carrying the same melody, but in a rich ensemble of voices that struck the air forcefully yet flawlessly; powerful and enrapturing. A more captivating harmony of song I had never heard before. My mind reeled. I forgot myself.

I stepped into the light. It was bright. The glare and the vast interiors of the hall blinded me and before I knew it, I tripped down a step and fell flat on my face with a loud thud that was so out of place in this ambience I could have hit myself on the head till it hurt; if the pain of the fall hadn’t already done that.

The song abruptly ended. Fifty heads immediately turned in my direction, almost, I realized, with the air of trained soldiers ever alert, ever vigilant. I was the intruder. I awkwardly picked myself up, straightening my clothes. Colour rose in my cheeks. I could feel fifty questioning eyes, fifty annoyed people, annoyed voices demanding explanation for a ruthless assault on the evolution of an ethereal music. I immediately wished I had stayed back a minute longer. Fifty plus one, I noticed, amid my flushed deportment, a large man, arms still midair in an incomplete act of conduction. He had a frown over his bushy eyebrows, and the next second his arms dropped. “Yes?” he asked, in a terse tone, and I read Growing Irritation all over his face. He very well could have said What the Hell do You Want in the Most Menacing Tone in History; it wouldn’t have reduced me to a half-wreck the way his mono-syllabic query did.

My feet took me a few steps forward. Grrr. I hate it when body parts don’t listen to you. But in this case it may be that they could not discern any cerebral output; I was paralyzed with embarrassment anyway; that they decided to act on their own.

“Annhh”, was my pitiful reply, minutes too late. I desperately racked my brain for...words.

“Hmm?” he persisted.

“Uh…” I answered.

My tongue seemed knotted. It couldn’t have been just me. The conductor must have that effect on people, or so I hoped.

A shuffling of feet, peeved murmurs and a general whispering arose from the fifty. They were standing in rows of ten, closely packed, one row above the other. I got a hold over myself and cleared my throat. It was more like a raspy, apologetic cry for permission to explain myself.

Finally: “I was in the back, didn’t mean to…fall. Of course, I didn’t mean to fall. Ha-ha. I mean I didn’t mean to…come in till it was finished. The song, I mean. Come in till the song was finished. Yes?” I had no idea why I ended my pathetic speech with a reiteration of his welcome to me, if such it can be called.

One bushy eyebrow raised itself so high up it would have disappeared into the conductor’s hair, save for the fact that he didn’t have much of it. His receding hairline only served to accent the gigantic frown across his broad, shiny forehead. I sensed the fifty getting more and more irritable. I tensed up again. The conductor then barked, “Well it’s not!”

“Huh?”

“It’s not!”

“What’s not?”

“The song. It’s NOT finished. You may leave”. This, in a tone of restrained exasperation.

I scurried away. Darted out of sight. Left the interiors of the well-lighted hall. Well, I thought, legs still shaking, I still got to hear, live, music that was quite something else, human voices in unison past compare. Though wielded by a veritable army headed by a Ring-master who can scare the living daylights out of anyone, I appreciated the music. And no, it’s not me just trying to get out of embarrassment. It was surreal. The music, I mean. Slowly the melody came back to my head. I hummed as I walked down the road, a spring in my step. I forgot myself.

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This was written around two years back. The original intent with which I started is not so clear, which is why I ended it as I did. Anyway, if it does deserve this space, is is under the vaguest of categories: sort of an undefined short story. Problematic, but no problems.

About A Cat

Pickles has really grown. It seems like she was born just the other day. She is more playful than any of her older siblings. She is a cat if ever there was one, and I mean more credibly feline, and comparable to her jungle cousins. She started her threatening tiny growls when she was much smaller, whenever she was engaged in a piece of food. It was terribly amusing then, seeing this little creature guard its meal so viciously and bravely, in the company of large humans. I thought she was being playful but my father said she was born wild. I see the truth of that now. She is the first cat we’ve owned that bites, scratches, growls and never ever purrs, not even when we fondle her. She actually detests it because our petting is met with furious assaults; her claws holding on to the target, teeth sunk into the flesh, and hind legs wrapped around it, in an irate display of resolve.

Sometimes these displays are results of playfulness, which is, I can say, plenty. Pickles responds to tiny alien noises like bed sideboard-scratching, ground finger-tapping, leaf-rustling and of course, annoying insect windowpane-buzzing. She sees a finger wagging at a distance and stealthily inches forward in a strained posture so amusing to watch, ears perked up, and eyes keenly fixed. Her limbs move constantly as she prepares to attack. Target provokes a little more and she charges in a swift motion. She hops into the air with her paws up before she even reaches it, does a comical skip, and then all of a sudden recoils and vanishes into some hidden space, ready to be an observer again. It’s a vastly entertaining act. Fly-catching is another one of her favourite pastimes. Be it against a window or in the open, Pickles is adept at snapping with her little jaws and jumping around to catch hold of the poor creatures, and when she finally gets them, which is more often than not, it is a haughty little cat that gnaws the butchered victims, which I doubt even taste good.

Of late, Pickles is starting to lean towards the universal cat routine of sleeping three-fourths of the day. Early in the morning, she gingerly hops into any of our beds and eases her way deep into the blankets where she nestles in extreme complacency. Many a time I have proceeded to make the beds when a little lump in the bedclothes catches my attention; which turns out to be a lazy, content little cat whose eyes look up in disdain and displeasure as I invade her ‘territory’. One of her favourite spots is atop the monitor of the PC, where she likes to settle seemingly because of the warmth. It’s extremely irking to have a smug little kitten doing a Garfield Gaze on you while you are busy playing Free Cell.
Due to Pickles’ wild ways which have resulted in scratches and grazes on all our limbs, her one-time extremely poor toilet-habits which are threatening to recur any day (much to my mother’s chagrin) and which still bring back revolting memories, the fact that she is female (chauvinism in the lowest form) and will inevitably spawn a brood of others like her and add to our burgeoning cat population, and finally, three new kittens from the mother cat which are indescribably cuter and which we long to keep; that are making her days in our house numbered. Granted, she may not be as adorable and goofy as Buzzo, as bovine and steadfast as Dobby, as dumb (?) as Pussy with no name or as pretty as the new batch of kittens but she is all the same the fiercest, most detached and looniest pet we have had. Pickles sure added a lot of spice throughout her reign and hopefully she will continue to do so wherever she happens to land up in.

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I wrote this around two years back. There's a 'Salem' as well now and Dobby's carrying again.

Untitled

Fettered hand in the nude yellow glow
Struggles to break free, and lift
its contained self in an arm
stretched to the sky.

Anxious mind plaqued by a hazy
fear of the unknown, a ubiquitous
dark, dim, dull pain shadowing the
bright light that otherwise is.

But it emerges, stronger, and banishes
the speckle on the sense;
Having partaken of goodness, the taste

of freedom lingers still.

The French Connection

Lachaumiere is a picturesque locality somwhere in the middle of Shillong- a kind of mid-point between Laitumkhrah and Police Bazaar. Pretty houses line the narrow roads that climb up gentle slopes and descend meanderingly, in the way that's typical of Shillong. Quiet and dignified, this residential area spans the entire space from the slope leading up to the Loreto gate all the way down to the old Secretariat, very near AIR. The cross-section at the top of the hill next to the said gate is a vantage point of sorts: a three pronged-fork as well as a peak with what would have been a commanding view wasn't it for the large school wall and numerous residences around it. An air of calm, perfumed with the scent of pine and eucalyptus from the Loreto playgrounds hovers over the place.

It seems that somewhere during the British Raj, a king of Dhaka (under Assam then, now in Bangladesh) had, for his summer house, a little house right atop the hill, adjacent to Loreto, then a school for the daughters and wards of British generals. This king had a French lady serving his household, presumably a governess for his children. Of course, this abode could not hold a candle to his opulent palace back home and so the mademoiselle named it Lachaumiere, the French equivalent for 'Thatch-House'. Perhaps it was such then. What remains now is an Assam-type house where that used to be; sold by the royal, no doubt, long ago. And of course the name remains to this day, spelt and pronounced differently, but no less French, and all the more exotic.

It seems I'm only posting once a month then. It wasn't really intended, just circumstantial. Though I guess I owe this some kind of regularity since I started it... anyway, it's been a busy month. The weatherman can't seem to make up his mind in this place, but I'm not complaining. At least it's been mellow; the hot days haven't really arrived. The work load is increasing, and the pressure is mounting. It's hard keeping up at times. At others, it's just easier to take. Or I make it so. Sorry this seems a little cryptic. Or not. To me, I guess. Sorry for this nonsense. Later.

A Thing of Beauty

I got a bouquet of flowers for a gift yesterday! It was the first time someone had gifted me one, and I hardly know her! But I guess the sentiment counts, and the scent... while walking down CP, I felt like one of those beauty queens newly bestowed with a title and trying to strategically balance a huge bouquet on one hand, while fingering the precariously-placed crown with the other. Minus the beauty-queen part and the crown. But I did attempt it, along with the stiff hand-wave at delighted audience. I sniffed and savoured whiffs of sweet, sweet flower fragrance- rose and gladiola and... mustard-flower? Some pretty yellow specimen. Exuberant about it on the metro . Blah to what people must have thought. I know it's no biggie... I just happened to love flowers... and to turn twenty the day I got them. Thanks Jenny!