What's cooking?

If you're single, try like hell not to live an an apartment with married people around you.

Look at the state I'm in.

The lady next door has been cooking Mallu food since 12 o clock and I'm going nuts over here. The smells of the dishes keeps wafting over into my drawing room, through my kitchen window. I actually spent 10 minutes in my kitchen, savouring the many different smells drifting into my house.

A Half hour back, I smelt Kappa being cooked. Then there was the mashed onion and green chilly chutney. Now there's a distinct smell of 'Pappadum' being fried, overridden by the overpowering smell of my favourite 'Thiyal'.

And all this while I'm watching 'Red Beard' by Kurosawa. Sorry Akira, It's not that you aren't good. It's just that the neighbour's wife's cooking is better.

Suddenly, arranged marriage doesn't seem that bad an idea after all.

Crash into me - Dave Matthews Band

You've got your ball
You've got your chain
Tied to me tight
tie me up again
Who's got their claws
In you my friend
Into your heart I'll beat again

Sweet like candy to my soul
Sweet you rock
And sweet you roll
Lost for you I'm so lost for you
You come crash into me
And I come into you
I come into you
In a boys dream
In a boys dream

Touch your lips just so I know
In your eyes, love, it glows so
I'm bare boned and crazy for you
When you come crash
Into me, baby
And I come into you
In a boys dream
In a boys dream

If Ive gone overboard
Then I'm begging you
To forgive me
In my haste
When I'm holding you so girl
Close to me
Oh and you come crash
Into me, baby
And I come into you

Hike up your skirt a little more
And show the world to me
Hike up your skirt a little more
And show your world to me
In a boys dream.. in a boys dream

Oh I watch you there
Through the window
And I stare at you
You wear nothing but you
Wear it so well

Tied up and twisted
The way Id like to be
For you, for me,
come crash into me

Hit the road George

My lungs are screaming in delight. I've partly stubbed out my tobacco addiction and opted for a new and better one. One I used to indulge in when I was in school. Running.

After 2 years of complaining that Bangalore doesn't have a nice place to run, (Cubbon Park is too far away and dangerous cos I like to run in the evenings. The last time I tried, I was approached by 3 faggots and a eunuch) I slipped on my running shoes and hit the road.

I'm a dirt path kind of jogger so it takes me a little time to get used to the rather unyielding macadamized roads. So different from the Lodhi Garden track I used to run on in Delhi.

And since I don't have friends to run with here, I bought myself one. A Sony Ericsson 710i. The perfect companion I must say. Not only is it a phone, a walkman and an FM receiver, but once you fill in your details, like size and weight, the pedometer inside tells you how far you've run and how fast. It even tells you how many calories you've burnt.

A program inside also shows you a graph that plots your last 10 runs telling you how much better you're getting at it. The day before was 2.4km at Max speed 20kmph, average 7 kmph. Yesterday was 4.4km at max 27.9kmph and average 10kmph. (There's a part where there is a pack of dogs just waiting for me to make some sudden moves. So I have to walk that bit. Brings down my average. :)

My muscles were aching after the first run but now I'm aching to get on the road again. Seem to schedule my whole day around the run. My craving for that moment of clarity at the end of a run has replaced my craving for a cigarette. My 'runner's high' is definitely better than the first cigarette high.

I'm feeling more alive now than I ever did. :)

Quote

To me, there is nothing more revolting than the stench of mediocrity.

Huzoor is Kadar Bhi Na

I chanced upon a friend's profile on orkut after he had added a video on his page. It was from Shekhar Kapoor's 'Masoom', featuring the song 'Huzoor is Kadar Bhi Na'. The video triggered off memories in my head. Of a time when I can remember coming back from play and smelling pakoras and kababs in the kitchen, telling me that there was a party about to happen.

They usually were grown up parties with aunties wearing sarees, perched in a single line on a sofa. And uncles in suits nursing their drinks (almost always whisky) with napkins in their hands. With conversations which didn't contain obscenities. With plates of cold pakoras brought to my room, after it had done a half hour stint with the guests. With the customary parade in front of the guests to the tune of "Arrey. Kitna bada ho gaya hai! Main to pehchaan hi nahi pai" (He's grown so big. I can't even recognize him.

My father is an IPS officer, so all parties were sedate, somber occasions, unless batchmates were involved. In which case, the party would get livelier as the night progressed. There'll be leg pulling, back slapping and to the mock horror of the ladies present, revealing of secrets from their days in training.

I'd sit in my room, hearing the conversations and laughing at the jokes. There wasn't much to do in those days, besides watch Doordarshan. And I hated Chitraaar. By the end of the evening, the uncles would gather and sing songs. often number from when they were in college.

I used to love every minute of it.

The parties nowadays seem soul-less in comparison.

Trek that!

"Never has so much been owed to so many by one person for so long". My take on Churchill’s take on WW2.

Let me explain. I owe K, N and P a story. One I’ve been carrying in my head for a long time. I owe them this one tale. For I have nothing more substantial to offer.

I hate reducing people to mere letters. In just one post, a capital person becomes a capital letter.

And so I shall reduce them further to the names they were thrust upon by a circle of sleepy people waiting for the trek to start.

What trek? You ask. Let me begin from the beginning.

Do you know what sobriety can do to you?

Drunkenness can make you take off for distant lands with strange people you just met, making for great stories to tell over your next drink. But sobriety is a shade more unforgiving.

And so it was that four OH-less days found me testing the peripheries of my patience. Out of sheer boredom, I watched ‘Friends’, cleaned plates, folded counterpanes, rearranged books and fluffed pillows. And finally, after running out of things to do to keep the devil from setting up shop in my head, I opted for a “night-trek” out of the city.

What’s ironic is that an organized, one-day trek is something I wouldn’t even dream of going for, even if I was under the influence. And here I was, as sober as sober can get, looking forward to the damn thing.

A trek normally means that you carry the usual suspects. Water container, Petzl head lamp, cooking gear, tent (which one I take depends on the altitude), sleeping bag, change of underwear, toiletries etc. etc.

But this was a night trek. What do you carry on one of these? The mail from N asked me to carry a torch and warm clothes. My day-pack felt light with just these in it. You don’t feel like you’re off on a trek unless the straps on your backpack, bite into your shoulders. For once, the heavier the burden, the lighter you feel. And so I stuff it with dozens of mars bars, Bar-ones, two bottles of water and a windcheater. Slightly better.

RV is at Mallya Hospital. That is the first time that the extent of my folly first began to dawn on me. If it wasn’t for the fact that I was in the company of three extremely charming, intelligent women, I’d have bolted at the sight of the motley crew that was to be my group.

Now came the most difficult part of the trek. The ride to Kalwarbetta, in a bus full of geeks of the unbearable kind.

Who cares where they come from. Call centers, software companys, BPOs, they all breed the same sort. I’ve nothing personally against techies. I respect the fact that they can do something I realized I could never do. But they try so hard to be cool. Like, for instance, the conversation about the Grand Canyon that was ensuing between two such specimens on my right. It wasn’t even an earnest conversation. They were speaking too loud.

Here’s what they said, followed by what they meant to say.

What they said:

“Have you been to the Grand Canyon?”

“Yes! It’s so amazing no?”

“I know. The view took my breath away”

What they meant:

“Let’s tell them we’ve been to amreeka”

“Ok! Let’s talk about the Grand Canyon! That should impress them”

“Yeah Let’s”

That’s why I dislike techies. They try too hard.

I look out of the window and zone out. P next to me is silent. Reaching Yellahanka. I point out the aircrafts on the runway to P. I love watching aircrafts. Wanted to be a pilot for as long back as I can remember. I wanted to be the co-pilot of the ‘bhaiya’ who lived next door. Very close family friends. He’s just joined the Air Force and I’d promptly joined his fanclub. My sister, not wanting to be left out, wanted to be the air hostess. I’d tease her and tell her the airforce doesn’t have air hostesses. And she’d run around crying till someone’ll tell her they have. Spoilsports. Couldn’t I just share one passion with my hero. Instead of sharing it with my sister.

But we did. We used to model aircrafts out of balsa wood kits. I still do now. Makes me feel less of a jerk for letting myself be talked out of pursuing my passion. Gullible George. Think I’ll opt for that name. They’re asking me to add an adjective to my name beginning with my initial.

Wait! When did this happen? We’ve reached? Apparently. Cos I’m standing in a circle with the lot of them. I remember the names of my group. The rest I sieve out. Nitwit N, Klumsy K, Perfect P registers. I decide to play along. Gullible George it is.

I light up a cigarette. Have to rebel don’t I? Just have to be dickhead who lights up before a trek. But I needed it. I’ll need a bottle too if they want me to join them in the funny exercises they are doing. Over my dead body.

The trek begins. The night air feels good. I look up at the cloud crowned mountain I’ll be climbing. More likely, the mountain that’ll allow me to climb it. Heard that from Edmund Hillary. People asked him how he felt about conquering Mount Everest. He simply said that he didn’t conquer it. She let him climb her. So true.

The first stretch is good. It’s drizzling in spurts. I feel the familiar pull in my calves and rise in pulse. Looks like this is going to be an interesting climb after all. I begin to regulate my breathing. In through my nose, one step, out. Never breathe through your mouth while climbing. You lose heat and energy that way. Could be potentially dangerous if you’re trekking high-altitude.

P’s wheezing in front of me. I start to tell her that she should take smaller steps and not breathe through her mouth. But I’ll sound preachy. I hated it when people told me how to do stuff. She would resent it too. I’ll tell her when she’s tired. People are more receptive to advice then.

The gradient increases. I’m taking a lung full of air in every breath. Adrenalin’s pumping. I feel the need to charge up the slope, but opt to stick with P and N. My schooling in the hills have made climbing second nature. But now the smoking and abuse is beginning to tell.

At one point P tells me she can’t climb. I’m telling her to get to that knoll, then the rock up ahead, then the bush just 5 paces away. A climb is easier if you break it into small sections. She yells at me saying she can’t climb and she won’t. But she does anyway. I remember my first trek. Hated it till I got to the top. N’s being helped up by one of her classmates in college who happens to be one of the guides on the trek. What a place to meet. Should write a hindi movie on these lines.

And suddenly we’re there. ‘There’ is a small clearing near the summit, enveloped in a cloud. It’s cold. Colder than I thought Bangalore could ever get. Probably because of the wind that’s blowing and howling like a banshee. I walk around in a dream. There’s a small ruin of a part of an old fort, made of granite slabs. I’d get a slightly uneasy feeling as I walk towards it. Can’t put my finger on the feeling. I decide not to tell anyone about it. The rocks are the only surface they can sit on that’s not really wet and muddy. Wouldn’t want to freak them out.

N says she sees a ghost. I’m laughing at it. But the uneasiness is still there. K’s shivering with cold. I’m feeling sorry for her. I give her my windcheater. My sleeveless fleece jacket ‘s warm but my arms are cold. K’s still cold. Now she’s wrapped up in an assortment of clothes donated by the group. She’s bent over. She must really be suffering. Doesn’t seem the kind who’ll sham.

P and I smoke. Watching a bunch of nitwits trying to start a fire with 30kmph winds and a bunch of wet sticks. Fat chance. The rest of them decide to play a series of ridiculous games. It’s a picnic for them. I’m waiting for dawn. And there seems to be no sign of it. Watch says 6:00 but still no sign.

The geeks want to go. I’d rather stay and watch the sunrise. What’s the point of toiling all the way to the top if you don’t. But it wasn’t to be. 6:15 and the sun’s missed his appointment. We decide to descend.

Halfway down and the cloud clears. The sight nearly took my breath away. A congregation of bare hills being caressed by scattered sunbeams fighting their way through an army of clouds. Like spotlights on a stage, they move over the north face and then the south. Now this boulder has his 10 seconds of fame, now that tree. I can see the beams, like light from a giant disco-ball in the sky. This is the moment I’ve been waiting for.

Somehow the entire trip has managed to redeem itself at the end. The ledger book in my head has balanced itself.

I come back a better man.

North to South

An observation:

"The Ladies down South have more down South than up North. Whereas the ladies up North have more up North than down South"

Kallu shoppu!

Mallus have a predisposition towards alcohol. I can't tell what it is about the race that makes them make a beeline for the 'kallu shop', come 6 o clock. Combine that with the genetic predisposition towards humour and tragedy, and you have a heady cocktail that makes you want to laugh and cry.

Take for example, local arrack. Made with dates, battery acid, watered down poison and probably even a biological waste, this deadly dram packs a punch. Often enough to send you straight to your maker or at best, leave you blind.

But in the spirit of Mallu humour, the locals have given them names. Not lukewarm stuff like 'Narangi' (Orange), or Godfather like the country liquor you find up north. These are named with tongues firmly planted in the cheek. Here are a few examples, with the translation. Judge for yourself:

Madal Chari (Lean against the wall): You'll need a wall to prop you up after one drink
Manavati (Bride): You'll be shy and quiet after one drink
Poste Keri (Climb up the post): You'll feel like you've climbed up a lamp post after one drink
Pulla Nakki (Lick Grass) You'll be on the ground licking the grass after one drink
Jet Airways: It's difficult to get down after one drink

and the one that takes the cake

Yesh Christu (Jesus Christ): You'll only wake up after three days

The Itchy and Scratchy Show

My baby

That's my darling Sophie. Sophie with white socks on all four feet. Sophie with the perfect diamond on her back. Sophie of the 'wow wow wow' song. Sophie of the kidneybean dance(You have to own a Boxer to get that one). Sigh! I miss her so.

Presenting the Panipuri Principle

The Panipuri principle states that "The second plate of Panipuri is never as tasty as the first".

This principle actually extends to everything in life but I call it that because the realization came to me when I was on my second plate of Panipuri.

Hum Log

I wish love was like Doordarshan. The old Doordarshan.

Back when you had to wake up early to see the colour bars beeping at you on the cathode tube which took a minute to come on. And then sit through a lifetime of silence, only to see the the 'Vertigo'-inspired opening sequence logo, morph into the Doordarshan logo, come to whet your appetite for the drama that was scheduled, loosely, to unfold on the colour TV.

You had to sit through 'Guru Sachi Bani' to get to the good stuff. Like 'Jamie and the magic torch' and 'He-man' (Admit it, you drooled over Teela's tits, didn't you?). Just to get to the 'Mickey and Donald Show' and the crowning glory "Spiderman". And then, in the evening, you came home from play early enough to see the credits of 'Krishi Drashan' and watch the 'Nirma' commercials before the 'Feature Film' began.

Back when you made do with the only one channel you had. Back when you climbed terraces and braved vertigo to turn the Ariel a quarter inch so the reception was less snowy. Back when the whole family was nothing but a relay for 'Not yet' turn it clockwise' or 'STOP STOP! Awww! Go back it was better a second ago'.

Back when, like your folks, you made do with one. Partner or channel. For better or for worse.

Now you've got a remote-full of channels. One to satisfy every whim. There's one for every religion and sexual inclination. Two for every musical choice. Three for every language and four movie channels shovelling every sort of international drivel into your home.

Love's like than now too. With a number of women you can flick through without feeling that commitment towards. Just press the 'Next' button to let the new one through.

But think about it.

With all this choice, do you really have a choice?

Dead Beat

I think we spend the first 28 years of our lives collecting ghosts, only to lay them to rest in the latter half. You collect experiences that when re-lived turn out to be duds. And that thing you once held sacred, dies a mortal death, coughing its last breath in your head.

Take for instance Kovalam. I first came to kovalam when I was 24, out of work and directionless. I had just chucked two lucrative careers, one as a Manangement guy and another as a Software Engineer because it didn't do anything to me. I was broke and knew only this that I didn't want to see the new century dawn in Delhi, where I lived. So me and another equally directionless friend decided to watch the year 2000 dawn in Kovalam. I don't recall why we chose the place but we did. So I freelanced and wrote a script for a Management Institute, shot it, pocketed the 10k and pushed for Kovalam in the December of 1999.

It was a scene right out of a dream. A lighthouse completed the picture with its presence at the end of a pristine, crescent shaped beach. The shacks were lean-tos put together by tying logs of wood together with a thatched roof of plaited palm leaves. There was always fresh seafood and Rum with fresh coconut water.

I had the time of my life. Went snorkeling, boogie boarding, lay about in the sun doing nothing. I found love and lust in the arms of an older woman. In just 4 weeks, I became a beach bum, surfer, gigolo, artist, photographer and writer. I found my calling in this land with no calling.

I went back last year. After I quit my post at Grey. It had a concrete walkway. The shacks sported brick walls. The water was dirty. You could get a Fillet Mignon in one of the shacks. It was a disaster. I buried Kovalam in my head that night.

And now Aerosmith.

I first heard Aerosmith when a friend bought the album 'Pump'. Back when I was in school. 'Love in an elevator' and 'Janie's got a gun' made it to the top of my charts the moment I heard them. Then came 'Get a Grip'. I loved it so much, I begged my uncle in the US to send me an original Geffen tape, along with the Peart Jam '10'. I knew every song by heart. The foreign tapes even had lyrics in the covers. I covered them with scotch tape and pasted them up on my wall. The intro to 'Eat the rich', I even now consider unparalleled. This album cover the gamut of emotions i traversed in my college years. 'Crying', 'Crazy' and 'Amazing' were my best friends.

So with much expectations I went to see them perform, just last week in Bangalore.

I was left cold. This was the first time I left a concert with my voice intact.

I buried Aerosmith in my head that night.

The SWAT team

They’re in all the shops. Even the corner provision store has it. The malls are stocking it like it’s the hottest thing since sliced bread. You can’t cross a traffic light without setting eyes on someone selling it to people in cars. I walked into a friend’s house and was accosted by one lying on the table. Why do people want to buy it? I don’t understand.

You can buy an ‘All-Out’ or a ‘Good-Night’ mosquito repelling machine for 120 Rs. And these things can work all night, night after night for over 60 days, keeping the swarms at bay.

Then why should someone spend 75 Rs. and buy an electric mosquito swatter? These Chinese made, electric swatters look like badminton racquets and carry enough electricity in the mesh to instantly fry any insect to a crisp. Swipe it at a healthy mosquito, and with a loud snap, it’s a late mosquito. Just like that.

If it was efficient mosquito extermination you wanted, this surely isn’t what you would buy. Imagine the time and energy you’ll have to spend chasing down every mosquito in the house.

I believe people buy it only for the perverse pleasure of watching the mosquitoes fry. Like playing god to a world of smaller creatures, you decide which one shall escape and which shall perish. One friend I asked claimed it was “therapeutic, like bursting bubble-wrap”.

Really? Then why stop at mosquitoes? Move on to squirrels. And with a larger surface area to inflict pain upon, you should feel even more relaxed when you’re done torturing it.

Friend flinches. But I plod on. “Why not rabbits? And after you’re done torturing it, it’ll even make a good dish.”

I went home perplexed. It’s ok to zap insects and ants and mosquitoes but things higher up in the order are taboo? So guilt about killing a being is directly proportionate to the size of the creature? You’ll stomp an ant and swat a fly in a heartbeat, whack a rat with a hint of hesitation, think a little before kicking a dog, avoid having to bludgeon a monkey and say no to shooting a tiger?

Seems rather cockeyed to me.

Hmm! How much did you say they cost?

Counter-feat

Last weekend, I had installed a stat counter on my blog. This nifty little piece of code helps me keep a track of the number of people reading my blog.

The maximum number of comments I’ve ever had to a post is 6. And that too since a friend linked her blog to mine. So imagine my surprise when the counter tells me that since last week, 197 people have visited my blog. Damn! And I thought I was as alone out here as Jonah in the Whale’s stomach.

And though I’m elated, something doesn’t quite add up. 197 visitors and just 1 comment? That is really appalling.

Why do these voyeurs not leave even a vowel behind as a sign of their visit?

Most movies have the often hackneyed scene where a parent walks into a child’s room at night and upon seeing the child asleep, gazes at him/her with adoration and then tiptoes out after either planting a kiss on the sleeping body, or covering it with a sheet that’s been flung aside.

My ego will love to believe that this is the case here too.

But I’m not an angel by any stretch of the imagination. And considering the nature of my posts, it’ll be more like walking into my room and silently watching me play with myself. A very unsettling experience, to say the least.

No wonder I don’t get any comments.

Culture Vulture

This is a short story I began writing but I didn't know how to finish it until a very dear friend told me I'd already finished. Thank you Karan Manveer Singh. You're the coolest. Bro! Rock on.

Carry on Carrion!

A Vulture sat with a bad taste in his mouth. He’d picked it up from a dead buffalo down at the slaughterhouse. The thought must have troubled the buffalo for quite a while for it to have permeated through to its liver. For it was the liver that the Vulture had feasted on for Brunch.

Buffalos are anyway given to long periods of contemplation. They’ll chance upon a newly grown thought and then chew on it for an eternity. That’s why they are considered the thinkers of the four-legged kingdom.

And since the languages of flyers differ from that of non-fliers, the Vulture was only able to make out that the thought was a bad one. And it was beginning to give him a stomach ache. He sauntered over to his best friend who was sitting on the top branch, eyeing the discarded eyes of a calf.

“What do you do about a bad taste in your mouth?” asked the first Vulture to his friend. “You neutralize it with a good one. Everybody knows that” replied his friend. “Serves you right for eating liver anyway.” You should leave it for the thick-skinned Pariah Kites. Us sensitive kinds must lay off the violent victuals. Didn’t your parents teach you that?”

“The guts of the cat
The udders of the cow
The spleen of the thing
That goes ‘Bow Bow’

The gizzard of the lizard
The camel’s hump
The nuts of the squirrel
These all shall you dump

The buffalo’s liver
Is a strict no no
As are the heart of a man
And a monkey’s toe.”

Don’t you remember?” said his friend launching into the famous violent-victuals lecture.

“We have been eaters of dead animals for millions of years, unlike the Kites who began just a few thousand years ago. We’ve developed very sensitive taste-buds. That is why the elders have listed down the things we should eat and those we shouldn’t. Junk thoughts can kill you. You must be more careful in future.”

“But we used to eat every part of the animals earlier” said the Vulture “We never cared about the carrion’s delicate parts.”

“Those were better times” said his friend. “The animals mostly died of natural causes. Not the violent deaths common today. It’s difficult to know how a body died nowadays. And by the time you find out, it’s often too late. Look at ‘Suicide Sam’. He flies at those iron birds every time they come screeching down. Just because he ate the heart of a human who jumped off a cliff. These are dangerous times. And if we want carry on eating carrion, we’ll have to learn to adapt.”

“But I’ve been nibbling the so-called violent victuals every once in a while” Said the Vulture. “It gives an interesting layer to lunch. I’d grown used to it. A dash of despair and a glob of greed goes down very well with a meal sometimes. It’s just this particular buffalo that seems to be troubling me. I can’t seem to put my beak on the emotion.”

“I’d stay away from them if I were you” said his friend before he launched his large ungainly frame down towards the eyes he had been eyeing.

But the Vulture could now feel the effects of the buffalo’s thoughts wearing off. And there came upon his person, the urge to feel that exotic thought again. It had begun with a tingling in his tongue and had run down his rather long neck until it had covered his entire body. The texture of the thought had been close to that of greed, without the taste of adipose. It also had the lingering flavour of longing without the bitter-sweet undercurrent of love.

Without a pause, he flew back to the slaughterhouse.

Beat this

A poem by Gregory Corso, one of the writers of the Beat Generation. I list this poem among the foremost in my list of 100 best poems. Also, you just have to love a generation that made blue jeans cool and spawned the likes of Kerouac and Ginsberg. Or did they spawn the generation?

The Whole Mess... Almost

I ran up six flights of stairs
to my small furnished room
opened the window
and began throwing out
those things most important in life

First to go, Truth, squealing like a fink;
"Don't! I'll tell awful things about you!"
"Oh yeah? Well, I've nothing to hide... OUT!"
Then went God, glowering and whimpering in amazement:
"It's not my fault! I'm not the cause of it all!" "OUT!"
Then Love, cooing bribes: "You'll never know impotency!
All the girls of Vogue covers, all yours!"
I pushed her fat ass out and screamed:
"You always end up a bummer!"
I picked up Faith Hope Charity
all three clinging together:
"Without us you'll surely die!"
"With you I'm going nuts! Goodbye!"

Then Beauty...ah, Beauty-
As I led her to the window
I told her: "You I loved best in life
...but you're a killer; Beauty kills!"
Not really meaning to drop her
I immediately ran downstairs
getting there just in time to catch her
"You saved me!" she cried
I put her down and told her: "Move on."

Went back up those six flights
went to the money
there was no money to throw out
The only thing left in the room was Death
hiding behind the kitchen sink:
"I'm not real!" It cried
"I'm just a rumour spread by life..."
Laughing I threw it out, kitchen sink and all
and suddenly realized Humour
was all that was left-
All I could do with Humour was to say:
"Out the window with the window!"

Heaven and Hell

A quote I came up with last night. Forgive me if it sounds corny but I love playing with words.

"Heaven is where the right are left alone. And Hell where the ones left are set right"

Hmmm! I don't know what I think of this one. Slept over it and in the morning didn't feel too bad about it. Comments and suggestions are welcome.

I R connoisseur

If I’m given a book, any book, written by one of my favorite writers without a cover, I should, in eight out of ten tries, guess the author. The knack to doing this lies in knowing the writer and his style. If you depend on the story line or the plot, you might be led astray. For all writers take a break from their genre every once in a while.

You have to delve into the sentences. For it is here that the fabric of the writer’s style is woven. First you spot one use of a term or phrase that seems to ring a bell, albeit faint. Then as you move along, the sentences unravel to give you clues to his unique writing style. And soon, a paragraph or a page later, it strikes you.

I love architecture, though I know nothing about it. But like a good artist, and here I use the term liberally, I can tell a monstrosity from a work of art. No matter what the medium.

I passed one not 15 minutes ago. Driving down the Vidhan Saudha road, at the crossing I beheld what looked like a series of tall periscopes towering over the surrounding landscape. The traffic light let me dally enough to assess the building. Made with concrete slabs, this series of seemingly different periscopes, on closer inspection, turned out to be one building. I marvelled at the fragmented windows that covered the front façade of the building. I was taken in by the almost careless way the concrete slabs came together.

Corbusier came to mind. The series of windows, seamlessly guided the eye to the top of the building without giving away the point of union between two floors.

But this building had none of the socialistic trimmings that Corbusier reveals in his buildings. It had a more somber, almost evolved feel. Like a Corbusier who had realized the frivolity of frills, and left the soul intact.

Corbusier ruled out, I looked to see if it was a wannabe. There are buildings I have seen in Chandigarh that have been made post Corbusier, aping his style. And very badly, may I add. They seem to have skirted the little bursts of genius that Corbusier added to the otherwise somber ensemble that his buildings make.

Consequently, though you can’t find anything fundamentally wrong with the building, you refuse to find anything right with it either.

This building, on close scrutiny, divulged no ugly secrets. It was well thought of. And well executed. It seemed the making of another mind altogether. But in my head, I fancied they were bound by ideology.

And So I headed to the office on a Saturday to research this genius. I struck gold on the 5th Google. Charles Correa, one of India’s greatest architects. And someone who’s work I marveled at every week when I visited the British Council Library in Delhi.

And so while I write this post, my chest swells with pride. Knowing that I spotted a work of art hidden among other concrete monstrosities. Like a true connoisseur. And each time I pass it, I will wink at it and smile. Secure in the knowledge that I at least, know it’s true worth.

Write for your life

The words have been swirling around in my head for some time now. But refuse to get flushed down into my bloodstream. Refuse to find their way to my fingertips and spill over onto this blog. They're probably clogging up somehwere.

I can feel an alliteration arrested near an artery. An idiom idling in my adam's apple. And if I hold my breath, I can hear my heart steadily thumping out an SOS. "WRITE" it says. "Write for your life".

What else is a writer's worth but a few well chosen words strung together with a string of logic to keep them from falling off? If that be the truth, and currency the measure, I would have to declare myself bankrupt.

And so, like a person who's just seen his cholesterol test report, I step out gingerly to jog my self back to a more acceptable shape. As a wordsmith.

I have been writing. But meaningless stuff like advertisements. For that is my trade. I am a pimp of attractive headlines. A seller of a voluptious bodies of sentences of high-falutin words made up to sound interesting. I'm the guy who writes gibberish like "We bring good things to life", and "Impossible is nothing". And I haven't even written anything that interesting.

I'm the 'Beena Mausi' who parades Lata, Neena, Ritu and the rest of the dirty dozen before podgy business men, not the slick Russian tout with a harem of 4 digit damsels.

Like junk food, junk writing can kill you. And I've been stuffing myself with it for 4 months. Now it's time to turn back to healthy writing. The sort that lets you sleep without reaching for the leftover Old Monk.

And so I find my feet again. Slowly but surely.