RIP

Aamaar holo shuru ... Aamaar holo shaara ...

I have a beginning ... I have an end now

RIP

this is the end of innocence

RIP

hide n seek

ever played this game? or had it played on you?

you found a really really good hiding place. really really really good.

little scary.

but not unlike the other places you had found earlier.

you crouch. foetal position.

you can hear the countdown ...

5 day

4 day

3 day

2 day

you wait ... bated breath ...

hush ...

now??????

no no ... not yet ...

you strain to listen ...

you can't hear a thing ...

meanwhile its getting darker ...

you start getting slightly worried ...

it can't take so long ...

were you too smart?

nah ... the fun of hiding is in being caught ...

did something happen to your mate?

oh silly me! imagine me playing this game when he needed help!

you venture out ...

everything is silent ...

quiet ...

you call out ... no reply ...

no sign of your mate ...

you search and search and search ...

call again and again ...

leave messages around ...

the echo point is no good ...

call, call ...

you start crying ...

now you are tired ... and lost ...

that's when it sinks in ...

no one is looking for you really ...

he left the game long time back ...

he found it silly ... twisted ...

a toxic waste of time ...

he had said he did not want to play it for too long.

but you had thought he will start to like it too.

the way you did.

you feel stupid ...

you always went looking when he hid ...

maybe he will come ... you hide again ... you don't know where to go to look for him anyway ...

this game has taken a lifetime ... it has taken your life ...

now hide little one ... play smart ...

how foolish it will look!

you hid ... but no one came to find you ...

Shetta - Our Shetty Boy

Shetta this one is for you. All the things I miss. All the things you did that made the roughest time in my life, the smoothest too.

The first morning in Dubai I opened my eyes to see a new friend.
You took me sightseeing in Deira. I chased birds and Astro was there.

Shetta all those old newspapers you used to collect for us. :-) I used to save the Su-Do-Ku.

It took just one SOS call and you gave me a home and a one-man family. Little less conversation, a little more action please always.

Starting from giving up your room, cupboards, drawers, bathroom; sleeping on the sofa with that thin green rug.

Taking care whether I reached or not. Whether I got a cab or not. Whether I was ill. Whether I had pain or not. Whether I am crying. Whether I am stressed. You lavished a wealth of caring.

Snatching utensils from my hand.

Endless trips to supermarkets.
Veggies, sanitary napkins, phone cards, phone cards, phone cards.

Spinney’s DVD stocking up. 2 action for you, 1 ‘arty’ movie for me.
Jason Statham back to back.
In fact, why only Jason Statham, any movie with loads of action, guns that are drawn quick and fired even quicker.
You won’t believe that training is helping me now. :-)
Undercover horror movies. (You cowered even more than the female leads)

Fighting over a 5 day old dish I had cooked. I wanted to throw it, you wanted to eat it.

Taking me for Pani Puri to Karama.

Dropping me to driving school.

Letting me be the haddi between you, Janis and Astro.

Arranging the beers and then saving all the leftover dregs in the bathroom so I can condition my hair.

For giving me great advice and greater courage.

For never ever judging. For putting up with all my judgements and anger that one time.

For being the compulsive cleaner that you are.

For quiet weekends where our kitchen table became our cybercafé.

For the most potent, brain blowing, eyeball-popping, extra strongest, sugariest, milkiest tea on the planet.

For always wishing so much for Anand. Yet for never pushing me.
For being there for both of us.

For calling me ‘Ma’. :-) You were all the children I will probably never have.
At least I heard the word.

For helping me pack and those endless Post Office trips. Backbreaking! Man! How we managed that morning. It was madness.

For telling me how much you miss me. For Janis also telling me how much you do miss me.

A father, a mother, a brother, a friend. I will always remain very happily in your debt. :-)

Be Unforgettable

We spent a year together. Well, almost.

Every day he ferried me to and from work.

Making my first days – actually every day - in a strange new place so very smooth and fun. Going out of his way to pick me up or drop me.

Showing me landmarks, pointing out things I could do.

He never made me feel that he is doing me a favour.
(I don’t think he thinks that still.)

What he does think and never tires of pointing out
is that he is the handsomest chauffeur ever.

Thanks to him, I have a new name. Dhoom2.
(And 'parcel' thanks to Radhi.)

Thanks to him I love Hindi film music now.
Even the whacky ones. (Ay hip-hopper playing in my head now)

So Sam. Here it is.

Thanks for stopping for Hardy’s burger every time I got a craving.

Thanks for letting me use and abuse your booze license.

Thanks for letting me come with you guys for movies.

Thanks for making me feel that I was not alone.

For being a phone call away. For being a shout away. For lunches and binges. For advice. For buying tissues when I did not know that you knew I was in the dumps. For the best khichdi in Dubai. For being the first at my farewell. For demanding a blog post about you. For always being there. For just being.

Unforgettable, that’s what you are. Too.

PS: And thanks to Radhi for always being my friend too. For always letting me sit up front. For all the late night co-ordination. ;-) I think if I had stayed longer you would end up being my best friend.

Metamorphosis

I worry. No one knows what is happening to me.
No one has noticed I am changing.
I read kafka's metamorphosis once. Wrote a paper on it too.
Something along those lines, but my worry is less existential and symbolic.
It's mundane.

Am just worried about things like my hair colour.
I wonder if anyone noticed that its different.

My little friend noticed a mole in my eye the other day.
I was glad. It's new.

I wonder if I should point out
that I am wearing a new eye shadow or perfume.

I worry people will forget that i love to be cuddled to sleep.
More worried that I am too.

I have already forgotten sitting on laps, breakfasts, being called silly names.

I don't think anyone has taken a picture of me in a long time.
Not even on new mobilephones.

I am being lost.
Fading into the background.
Obliterated by dancing figures in the profit sheets,
the din of local train, by alcohol numbness and cigarette haze.

Focus now. Zoom in please.
I am here. Hold me. Don't let me go. In the corner of your eye. Don't blink.
Just behind your back. Turn Around.

A little to your side.
Here I am ... a gaze beyond your deaf stare and a sweet nothing whisper beyond your blank ear.

Part of all the bad things you don't want. Scandals. Guilt. Mistake. Moneylessness. Homelessness.

Part of all the good on your backburner. Your welling love. Your poetry. Your madness. Your passion.

I am worried.
You are losing yourself.
I see from the corner of the eye. The sofa between us growing.

On laziness and sloth

I have not been writing. I don’t know why. But I have resolved to get the better of myself. It’s the old game again. No. :-) Not meeting meeting.  That one I play at work. It’s the other one. It’s Rachanah v/s Rachanah. Well, no one can get the better of me but myself. Bet you are thinking you can. Well of course you can, if ‘I’ let you. :-)

There are so many things I want to write about. Every night between that magical state of half waking and half sleep … when I am happily relinquishing the day, smiling at small jokes, reliving small moments of tenderness, making little notes for the next day, forgiving anger in me and others, and generally cheerleading myself saying ‘you did good girl’ … this is the time when I get most of my blog thoughts. But I have been lazy. I think to myself ‘Man this one is so good … I will never forget this.’ ‘Or this one is so close to my heart, I am bound to get it right.’ I wake up in the morning. I remember I had a great thought but damn if I could remember what it is.

Now I should hardly be uploading this. But I better. As a lesson to myself. At least that will spur me on to ‘write’ something real the next time. Sorry for cheating you though.  If its any consolation, this is real too.