Agartala And Back

When you sit in a small 22-seater or a 14-seater aircraft, there is always an eerie feeling. The same you experience when you sit on a helicopter, especially going by the number of crashes. So many famous people have died in these helicopter rides. I am not famous but I have my heart waiting in my mouth whenever I sit on a small plane. And now that I am back from the godforaken place of Agartala, I am oh so relieved.

Not that I have anything against this north eastern state capital of Tripura. It is so green and so laid back and seemingly safe despite being officially declared a "hyper sensitive" area because of the increase in insurgents operating in the state. My one-and-a-half day tour of the place was packed with a visit to a newly opened university and a visit to some local sight seeing addresses, including the oldest school in the north eastern region, the Umakanta Academy establshed in 1890.

But my journey from Calcutta itself was an amusing one. The team I was tied up with at Calcutta was a group of versatile five. The oldest a 54-year old gentleman, was reticent to the core. His only words to me were, "Do you speak English, sorry Bengali?" He was paired off with the elderly lady of the group and who by the end was labelled "aunty" by the rest of us. She took care of each one of us, right from packing our breakfasts to suggesting what we should do at every step. Sometimes the dictats were marred by irritation at our non-plussed attitudes to them. But aunty and reticent man got along well, because he never said no to the machinations of her mind.

That left the three of us out from her loop. We took delight in segregating ourselves from the duo. And whenever she got the chance, she took a jibe at our waywardness, tinged with a bit of prank. "Oh you are so organised," she remarked at my pen and notebook. "You must have a pen and a paper always," for those that had none. But she was quick to arrange it for the others. When the day got over and had we had a fill of touring the campus and meeting a few students, she suggested we all spend another two hours at the hostel interacting with the rest of the students. Of course, she got a vehement NO. We were looking forward to wrapping up tiresome day with a chilled glass of beer and wasn't going to let her throw a spanner on our plans. Later that evening, when we called reticent uncle to join us, he sweetly declared he was a teetotaller. Aunty said she doesnt drink at all, but an hour later called to ask if there was "some whisky". We missed a golden opportunity to see aunty let her hair down.

The next morning, aunty dressed in a starched sari and uncle in clean checked shirt, washed and looking fresh were ready to vist the famous temple in the region, the Tripureswari temple. We decided we wanted to visit the wild life santuaries instead. But she had her way again and we followed her car and drove an hour and a half to see a red temple and a pond where devotees were washing themselves, a al mini Ganga. But we managed to make her heart skip faster as we took our time to reach the temple, taking photographs on the way, yapping, laughing - the phone kept ringing to tell us that our car was out of her purview. I am sure she prayed for the atonement of our sins too.

And she even took back home the bouquets we got a day before. I had forgotten about it until I saw her walk out with it from the hotel to the airport. Back at Calcutta and heading towards the exit, "I love pulling the trolley," she said. And so, trip over, I bade them all an honourable goodbye and I am glad I am back in sada dilli.

The Ages

My grandmother, at 80-plus, has a habit. She loves to prod and goad and ask innumerable questions the moment you introduce someone to her. So what is the name of your clan? Name your family members? Who all are married? The queries go on... Over the years, I have met people her age and I find they all share this habit. They are all friendly, and to a fault.

My old neighbour in Sarojini Nagar was one such man. He lived with his son and daughter-in-law and two granddaughters. Everyone seemed to pay him a deaf ear, for reasons not far to seek. I dreaded opening the door every morning to pick up the newspapers because he would be standing, waiting for the sound of the door creaking. Soon I would hear a, "May I come in?" He loved to discuss the morning paper headlines with us. It became a pain, so one fine day we decided to be rude. "No you may not come in".

My current neighbour is another old man, who walks about with dark goggles even at night and a walking stick. The dark goggles is because he had a cataract operation a few months back. Now it is a permanent feature on his face. Some days, I get a fright as I would see him standing outside in the dark at the the door waiting for a tete-a-tete. He will not press the bell with his fingers but he would be aiming for the bell with his walking stick and he would attempt many flings before he finally hits the bell.

"Suna hain dengue huwa hain kisi ko is ghar main? (Heard someone got the dengue in this house)", he recently asked me. The moment I said yes, he started telling me how I should be plucking these certain leaves from a tree nearby and boiling them and feeding the patient. He said James, another neighbour, got cured after he drank this same herb water. I told him that my patient was in a hospital which does not allow any food from outside and that the hospital was A-one and was taking good care of the patient. But he refused to listen. He wanted to show me the tree. I had to lie that I was in the middle of cooking. Sometimes, I run out of excuses. I have to endure his talks which range from food, his grandchilren to his village near Banaras.

We crave for company at every stage in life, but what we do not realise is how desperate this craving becomes especialy at old age. I am insensitive and find old people inherrently funny. And I dont want to live up to 80 years but I know, in time, the boot would be on the other foot. The cyle of life, alas!

In Anticipation Of Winter

There is something inxplicably romantic about winters. I love foggy and rainy afternoons, and I am not a pessimist. I also love chilly nights and mornings. And I love the scent of winter tree flowers, more potent, as you drive along Race Course Road and Prithviraj Road.

So I have reasons to be depressed. I read a report that said the degree of coldness is going to decrease with each year. Global warming is my layman explanation. More depressed was when I was at the mall a few months back and winter clothes were on sale at the height of summer. The reason, the saleswoman told me, was because Delhi is going to be warm this winter. I don't want to believe anyone and continue with my fascination for snowy landscapes and barren trees and fireplaces inside houses. In the clutter and worry and stress for all things routine, these thoughts bring a sense of comfort to the mind.

Winter in the hills is holiday time. For three to four months in a year, the schools and colleges are shut and the streets wear a bare look. But it's also the time when Christmas and the New year add the tinge of cheer. December brings an altogether different feeling.

There is fresness in spring, warmth in summer, change in autumn and chill in winter. But I guess I will always remain biased to winter, and find warmth in its chill and fullness in its emptiness.

Come October

I thought it was the swine. Sister and rommie were down with fever. And while one recovered, the other was hospitalised with dengue and typhoid. I was mother hen for a week. No complaints there but I had my first brush with a dengue patient up, close and personal. The skin had rashes like allergies and I kept glued to the platelet count reports every morning. Thankfully for our ever cheerful patient, she beat the dengue and the typhoid and came home after seven days. Lolo says people die of snake and shark bites down under and here we have to battle the teeny weeny moseys. Now we have installed the most powerful mosquito repellants in the house - a three-in-one All Out -to kill dengue, malaria and chikungunya. Hope they work.
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Diwali was fun. We had lunch at Dilli Haat at the Naga Stall and digged on smoked pork with akhuni or fermented black beans and rice. Then we bought diyas to light up the house and my sister tried her hand at drawing up a rangoli which looked like the strangest rangoli I have seen in my entire life. But our house looked the brightest towards the evening. Then we headed off to our special invite of the night at our dear friend Yashu's who had arranged dinner and drinks for us. The evening was called the 'Charge of the mini skirt brigade'. No explanations there.
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My infamous Mrs B's obsession with me hasn't died down. First she called me out of the blue to apologise. She said, "please forgive me for whatever I have done to you and come and stab me." I didn't how to react but must admit, thawed a bit. Two weeks later, she called me in my office landline. She has got the verbal diarrhoea laced with malice. She wants to talk to my boss to malign my reputation. People have so much time on their hands. But how does one treat mad dogs. I have been adviced to just ignore her and not give her her drugs - my reactions. Now she will become more insane than ever. Ya-hoooo!

Facebook Juju

I was watching American talk show Conan O'Brien sometime back and he was giving a funny award called the Audiency Award. He picked up various people from his show for their uniqueness. One such awardee was a fan who had more than 2000 friends on his Facebook. But he got the award not just for that reason. The other reason was actual friends = none.

So that brings me to my Facebook discourse. Wonder why some people are averse to Facebook. I think it's better than all the other social networking sites such as Orkut or Linked In. I get Linked-In invites every other day but it goes to my spam without a second thought! And Orkut is just off putting. Don't know why.

I love facebooking. And I have been able to discover so many long and lost friends, friends who had literally gone out of my orbit. So, I was pleasantly surprised when I found my first roomate, someone I had shared a heart and a home when I came to Delhi in the early ninetees. After a decade of lost communication and lost love, we made up and became friends all over again. Now I know what's on her mind next!

And the other thing I love is going through the photos. You know, revelling in the cheap thrill that someone has put on so much weight than someone else or better still, me! Oh and I also get to check on my siblings and what they are up to. A cynic friend said "people abroad are so lonely, they are either online 24X7 or either facebooking". Well, better than being lonely I think. Perhaps she has no facebook friends hee hee hee...

Someone said there is an article saying that the fastest growing demographic on Facebook was the 35+ age group. Good news as Facebook has just topped 300 million users. Just hope and pray the site doesn't crash!

XY Factor

Eunuchs continue to fascinate me. Tonight I was watching the Indian remake of Moment Of Truth or Sach Ka Samna, the TV progamme which even got Indian Parliamentarians laying aside national issues and debating heatedly on things such as why publicly admitting to sleeping with many partners can be bad for the moral health of society. Indian politicians think they also have the right to moral policing. But of course the voices of politicians crying hoarse over truth was silenced by one sane judge who ruled that there is a purpose why the TV remote was invented. If you dont like a channel, you either switch off the TV or surf channels. Coming back to the eunuch, the participant was a Lakhsmi, born male but eunuch by choice. And she had big breasts. Laksmi could pass off as any woman if not for her vocal chords. But that apart, I watched her on the show and felt a sense of admiration for her. And it led me to a series of thoughts in my mind.

I didn't grow up seeing eunuchs in my neighbourhood. I had only read about them. It's only in the city that I began to see them from close quarters. In the neighbourhood when a child is born or someone gets married, they come in droves to sing and dance. Singing and dancing is their main livelihood and they go back happy with cash and food, blessing one and all. Nobody wants to incur the wrath of the eunuchs or hijras because people believe that there is no escape from the hijras' cursing tongue. So people give in to their demands and they thrive on this fear.

Whenever my car stops at a red light, there is invariably one hijra from among the group that knocks on my windows to seek alms. Whenever I see one, my hand automatically turns to the window and I roll it up. There is an unexplained fear for the hijra. I don't know what it is. Maybe the fact that they are not fully women and have the strength of a man, maybe the thought that they could be a man disguised as a woman to rob you, maybe the fact that they are such mysterious people. My very limited research on hijras say they are either castrated or born deformed or some opting to become one in the face of abject poverty. Still they are gays to me, unique gays.

Laksmi today broke many myths of the hijra to me. I realise it's all a question of acceptance and accomodating the odd one out among us by erasing the irriational fear plagued in the mind. But if normal gay men and women in our society still struggle to fiind a place and continue to live in the closet, hijras have a long way before they are welcomed into the mainstream.

Gays or lesbians, hijras or enunuch, everyone is a little different than the other. But human beings we all are. And I guess I am as equally concerned as them about fairness and justice. I have just removed one darkness from my heart.

Bye Bye Theory

“Guys… listen…” All heads turn to the feminine voice. We are about to witness a lecture on alfresco, currently the bane of our existence. But Sanj does it with conviction and fervor. I am yet to meet someone literally married to work and I wish I could emulate some of those qualities.

In life, we come across many people. But the workplace is such where you know who blows the competition away. That is why the young team members fear Sanj because of her level of consistency. But the world is also such that when one member of that close group, in which you often bicker, leaves it also leaves a dent in the emotion. I guess that’s why we all are human beings. We crib, we fight, we have our ups and downs, but there is a bond that develops, albeit unexpressed.

Saying bye to someone is always laced with a tinge of sadness. It’s the idea of missing the presence of someone whose presence you often take for granted. And for the one who leaves, it’s a form of uprooting yourself from a place you had called home. That is why Sanj’s leaving today is a form of prelude to me, to my moving to a different country, where all things familiar – from the shops next to my house to the people next door to the sounds of the vegetable vendors or the kabari wallah next to my windows – will be a thing of the past.

It is indeed difficult to erase certain things that have found their home in the heart. But there is nothing one can do except, accept the fact that in life, change is inevitable. Good luck Sanj!