Food for thought -- about rural India

"...On average, 17,000 farmers have been committing suicide every year, for the past 15 years on the trot. Can you believe it? Most of us wouldn't know this fact. Why? Because, our great Indian media, the world's biggest media, are not interested in reporting this! Why? Because they are more interested in covering fashion week extravaganzas. They are more interested in ‘why team India was not practising when Pakistanis were sweating it out in stadium on the eve of the match?' They are more interested in Poonam Pandey...."


Read some more in the same vein, hard hitting and chillingly scary, here

In Memorium

Of all the things in life, ways death is the fastest. And someone you have known for years, someone who has been part of the trials, tribulations and (minor) triumphs of a substantial and important part of your life, can go in a "poof", literally in the blink of an eye. And yeah, however much you remember the good times spent together, however much you cry (or however much you pray) there are no lifelines or second innings after death has come calling.

Yes, he is gone and this has been so bloody fast, a realisation that still hasn't sunk in, even as countless old memories cascade through me and grief assails me, at odd times for odd reasons.

The most painful memory is his constant ill-health (he was prone to asthma attacks) and thinness. Something that used to bother me a lot, something that I used to blame his lack of appetite for, something that he used to overcome again and again through a sheer bloodyminded stubbornness and the intent to live up his life.

Another enduring memory is his fastidiousness in trying to understand whatever interested him. He was a great note-taker and would fill diaries and notebooks (and bar napkins) with beautifully scripted notes, capturing the essence of our conversations on all and sundry -- advertising and corporate communications, the location of various eminent Shiva temples, what he should eat to put on weight, various quotes dealing with corporate life, sensational one-liners for Tee-shirts and (intermittently for as long as I have nursed entrepreneurial ambitions and with increasing frequency for the last year or so) answers to "how to start something of our own"...

In his opinion, I was a great talker, passionately genuine and capable of convincing people. Maybe it was just because he was one of the most considerate listeners I have ever met -- full of empathy and understanding and someone who saw potential and uniqueness in everybody. Either way -- a lot of our time used to be devoted to planning road trips and incidentally it was he who introduced me to Srisailam. I have vivid memories of each of three trips we made to Srisailam together -- the first time by bus, the second by my Bullet (with him as a very alive and "in my ear" pillion rider) and the third in blazing Mid-May heat in his car. Srisailam and our many experiences (viewpoints on the stretch to Eaglepenta, my Obelix like ascent of the Paatalganga Ghat, coracle rides on the reservoir, Shikaram, Sankaracharya Ghat, etc.) apart, he also introduced me to Uma Maheshwaram -- one of the famed entrances to Srisailam and a place where a Jatara happens every year. A Jatara we both had planned to -- and failed to -- attend numerous times.

Then there are other memories too, of hiking and monkeying around in Narsapur forest and near Shamirpet Lake and (a lot earlier, going back to my MBA days) in the glorious boulder strewn grassy open expanses beyond Hayathnagar.

Looking back, I am not surprised to recollect that he was among the first to read my diaries (and the ravings in them) and my poems. And that he was again among the first to read the manuscript of Moving On -- speaking of which, he somehow made it to the book release event though he was in the midst of Ayyappa Deeksha.

I could go on and on, the memories seem endless and enough to fill a book. I could go on and on, but the fact remains that I couldn't spend much time with him or be of any help to him in his last days, when he was ailing.

I could go on and on, but its pretty evident that however deep my grief be, its not even a drop in the ocean of grief that his family finds itself in.

I do know that I will miss him for the rest of my life. And I know that I spent some of my best years adventuring, raconteuring and experiencing life with him.

I also know that in my own way I will never get over this loss; mostly because of the kind of person I am and also because of who he was -- a treasured batchmate, a long-time room-mate and a very, very close friend, one of the most private and yet liveliest people I have been fortunate enough to know.

And I know that when my turn comes and I land up in heaven (hopefully) Chandra Mouli will in his part school-monitorish, part hrvisionary mentorish way give me a guided tour of the place and introduce me to its highpoints, the way he did it for me when I arrived in Hyderabad.

I am not Jewish, and there is no Kaddish (or its Hindu equivalent) known to me. But I have been praying since 20th April, 2011 that my late departed friend's soul merge with Shiva. And find solace in Kailash.

Om Namah Shivaya.

Untitled

When all airs die
when all waters die
when only land's left -- lonely -- living a lie

Will you mourn then, O time?
Your Kaddish reverberating
the eternal requiem for silence?

The other Shiva Deeksha(s)

An early memory that has frozen itself onto my being is that of seeing multitudes of unshaven, bare-feet men (for some surprising reason -- mostly young) clad in ochre / saffron -- with a bamboo pole laden with kalashes of water on their shoulders walking at a fast clip chanting "Bol Bam", "Bol Bam" and "Har Har Mahadev", headed on a pilgrimage for a famous Shiva temple at a place called Ghogar in Odisha. This used to be in the month for Shravan, i.e. during the rainy season.

I don't remember much detail, but I believe the idea was to get to the temple in a day's march (the distance was around 30 kms)and I guess this desire itself was enough to power the pilgrims through what must be a pretty strenuous hike / padayatra. I don't know if the actual march to the temple was preceded by prayers / Deeksha for a certain number of days, though I do remember (when I was relatively older) how some of my friends would be unshaven and mention that they have a trip to Ghogar (though there was no mention of a padayatra) coming up soon...I also have faint memories of a family trip to Ghogar (by car) with my Grandmother :-)

Closer home, speaking of the Deccan and my trips, another similar memory is the sight of motley bunches of people walking up the Ghat road to Srisailam (again bare-feet but not dressed in any particular way) -- while I was riding up on the Bullet. I didn't stop and ask them any questions and nor did I find out about them from others but I do remember being pleasantly surprised to see some of the people with the topi that is used by most Marathi villagers.

Later on, I came to know that many still continue an age old tradition of walking to Srisailam for darshan coming from distances near (Achampeta, Nagarkurnool, Kurnool, Guntur) and far (other places in AP, Maharashtra and Karnataka) by planning it in such a way that they take a Deeksha of 40 days and are in Srisailam on the 41st, culminating it on Maha Shiva Ratri. This is an age old family tradition indeed from the days before we had states and from the times when an entire family could take off on with nothing more than faith and (in the case of first-timers) rudimentary knowledge and what-to-do-and-where-to-stay-eat based on the hearsay of those who have been there and done that earlier.

This is the Shiva Deeksha, surprisingly not very well known (though I am told that the Srisailam Devasthanam Board is popularising it through booklets, et al)

This Deeksha or that Deeksha (the rotten-fish-stinkingly-rich, you-can-smell-me-a-thousand-kilometers-away-stinkingly-rich, thousands-of-crores-stinkingly-rich son of an ex-CM of AP sat on what was a political show of strength clutching a mineral water bottle for a day and called it a Deeksha) this God or that God, this much distance or that much distance, this many days or that many days, what does the pilgrim get out of it?

I don't know, maybe it is peace. Or it is the satisfaction of ringing solid, mettled and true (to tradition and that whole set of thinking each family has, called "it should be like this", "we are like this"). In my case, its a nice, new experience and some old-fashioned calm, bliss and happiness, of connecting with my roots :-)

And oh, the ultimate Deeksha? Kailash Mansarovar of course, now that would BE something indeed!

Where the roads have no name

An old ride log, Circa 2005

For once, there was a reason for me to ride. A very close
friend had become a father and was at Nagarkurnool at
his in-laws and I had a self-felt obligation to go and visit. I
had to work on Saturday, so packed my Cramsters and
went to office directly, pushed off at 13.30 hours,
skipped lunch and there I was at 14.15 hours on the
Kurnool stretch of N.H.7.

This has been a very, very hot summer in the Deccan
and the ride was a bit like going upstream a hot river
of air, and within half an hour I was already feeling
the salt from my sweat granulating on my arms, neck
and eyebrows, while the heat from the engine was
making my legs feel like they were being barbecued.

Couldn't take it after a point and anyway I had to get
a drink of water to rehydrate my system so stopped at
Shadnagar for some water, pulled up (was it coincidence?)
in front of a liquor shop, decided to treat myself to a Beer,
bought some water sachets and pushed off in 15 minutes.

I had to take a left turn at Jadcherla and even in my
highly disoriented state (heat does that to me) I managed to
negotiate the two turns -- after the aforementioned left -- properly
and was finally out in the interiors.

This stretch to Nagarkurnool is amazing (or maybe I find all
stretches amazing) with the vistas comprising of the usual
small land-holdings, amazing outcrops of rock formations and small
hills, so I was riding blithely, happy to be on the road, the
enervating heat notwithstanding.

The road isn't as good as most interior roads in Andhra
Pradesh, but it is flanked by lots of brick kilns and has
Mango trees lining it for 10 - 15 kms at a stretch and I
could also notice that most of the fields around were tilled
and ready for the rains.

Not surprisingly, there weren't that many patches of green
and the presence of one indicated that it was the bastion of
some progressive / rich / hardworking farmer. Mahboobnagar,
incidentally accounts for some of the most drought-affected villages
in Telengana, with entire villages where people have simply
migrated to far off cities like Mumbai in order to earn a
living.

And yet, most of the fields I passed had somebody or the other
at work, usually a lone farmer bunching up and setting fire to
whichever crop he had nursed and seen withering to death while
the concentric patterns in the fields seemed like a Rangoli of
sweaty toil, drawn to charm a proper Monsoon.

A bit into the ride, I noticed a patch of verdant green besides
the road, four small rice fields besides and draining into each
other with the usual Pond Herons and Egrets standing out in their
spectacular whiteness amidst the greenery and a couple of Crow
Pheasants walking along on the bund of a field as if
it were the high wire in some circus.

I had high hopes of taking some good photos on this ride and since
the birds were anyway behind a convenient blind, killed the engine
and pulled out my SLR to do some cat-footed stalking.

By the time I am close enough to chance a shot with my inadequate
lens, the birds have wised up to me and are daintily
walking away but I still manage a couple of decent shots
before they get worried enough to fly off into the nearby trees.

Its back on the road for me now and I am riding with the SLR
slung over my back, hoping to surprise some heat-sapped bird
(I had never been so close to a Crow Pheasant) and mentally
calculating apertures and shutter speeds whenever some bird
would actually fly past at almost arm's length.

The heat was bad as ever, so I stop to empty 4 water sachets,
take another two odd shots of the vistas after loading another
roll of film and stuff everything back into the Cramsters, light
a smoke and drink in the solitude.


I finish the smoke and start again, wondering why the exhaust's note
seems a bit hollower than usual, pull into some shade and check
the engine oil, breather pipe, cylinder head etc., find nothing
amiss, blame it on the heat and ride on again.

I take the left fork at Bijnapalli, wondering why I haven't yet
managed to ride to quaint Wanaparti with its history of a quixotic
Reddy king who used to rob the Nizam's treasury, powered by his
loyal retinue of African soldiers (there's a place in Hyderabad
called A.C. Guards, meaning African Cavalry Guards), but then, that's
a road I am not taking now either -- Wanaparti is on the right
fork after all.

A bit ahead, riding up a small incline, I am suddenly in a fine
drizzle of rain and surprised to see the road completely wet
with rain, and before I need to resort to packing the camera,
I have ridden out onto a dry stretch again.

Another 20 odd minutes of riding and I am in Nagarkurnool and C
is waiting by the road, pulling his usual antics on seeing me
and naturally asking me the usual questions doubting my sanity.

A quick wash and a visit to the hospital to see the newborn and
we are now headed for a dhaba in a car (with C's brother in law),
sitting down to a repast of roasted groundnuts, fiery mutton curry, a
salad of onions laced with Chilli powder and of course some very
welcome Beer.

But I first emptied four glasses of lemonade (self made there on
the Dhaba table) all in an attempt to rehydrate some more.

The talk was of course about the "situation" in Nagarkurnool
and nearby Mananoor where there had been an attack on an Armed
Police Outpost just the evening before. And being the lazy bum he
is, that was reason enough for C to say that we should just chill,
drink more Beer and stay in the shade the next day.

I just had two Beers, and was already planning a ride to Rollapadu
the next day, though these guys were trying their best to dissuade
me from venturing out in "the risk".

Back at C's in-laws place, after a nice dinner of Egg Curry, Pappu
and Rice, we slept on the terrace and I had managed to wheedle a
promise from C to stir out at 5.00 in the morning to do some
exploratory rides before it got too hot for him.

At around 4.00 in the morning a thundershower had sent us
scurrying down and I then true to form, I overslept, managing
to wake at 9.00 and set out at 10.30 after a detailed
confabulation with C's brother in law and a piece of paper on
which I had jotted down the names of villages that Lonely Planet
doesn't show; with a very basic plan -- to head
for Nandikotkur (and Rollapadu Bird Sanctuary) via Lingal,
Kolhapur and Pagdyala.

But then I was also equally keen to go again to Uma Maheswaram
(this is one of the entrances to Srisailam from the days when
the roads really had no name) a Shiva temple set in the sides
of a horse-shoe shaped spur of the Nallamalais, so I decide
to ride till there and then ride ahead depending on what
information I get.

Of course, there was another reason for doing this, I had
forgotten the piece of paper with my route map back at Nagarkurnool.

It was amazing weather for a change, cloudy and overcast and
I was blessing myself at being spared of the heat. Somewhere
25 odd kms from Nagarkurnool, I stop amidst literally a sea
of cattle, and ask for directions, lend a receptive herdsman
a smoke and realise I am at some cattle fair. I do not
manage to get any proper directions, so I decide to ride on,
wondering how my footrests are caked in cow-dung, reach and ride
through Achampet, and finally am besides Uma Maheswaram.

Its too cloudy for taking any photos (and I have been
here twice before) and I am itching to ride in
the Ghats so I chuck the idea of taking the detour to
Uma Maheswaram and continue on to Mananoor.

I reach Mananoor and pull out my maps and am told that what
L.P. shows as a road is basically non-existent
and what L.P. indicates as a bridge over the Tungabhadra
beyond Kolhapur is in fact a river crossing. I cross check with
the Forest Department person at the checkpost and he tells me
that the best way to Rollapadu is via Kurnool. But it is already
around 1.30 by this time and I have no leave for the next day.
Meanwhile, the Forest Department person realizes that I have
a bike and asks me to ride to Nandikotkur via Dornala!

I am not really sure about what I should do, so start and head
for Srisailam, after 20 odd kms realize that the skies are even
more overcast than before (I had no rain gear with me) and I had
been seeing police patrols all along, so somehow make myself
stop and reassess the situation.

Riding through Dornala would be fun thanks to the heavenly
ghat stretches but it was a wee bit too dangerous considering the
situation and moreover I would just be plain pissed if I reach a Bird
Sanctuary at dusk!

So my options were now limited to either riding back via
Nagarkurnool (and more Beers with C) or riding back on the
Dindi road to Hyderabad.

But then, I wanted some more thrills, so I resurrected the original
plan of the morning, deciding to try the mystery roads to Kolhapur. I
ride back, stop at Mananoor and tell the Forest Department
person that I am riding back to Hyderabad and then finally get
onto the road to Lingal by turning left at the "Ambedkar Statue"
at Achampet.

It is around 2.30 in the afternoon now and I am truly headed for
the boondocks. Mystery roads have always fascinated me
and I do love negotiating bad roads, plus because I was
riding through what is classified as "scrub forest" I was counting
on encountering some Black Buck, peacocks, et al. The Black Buck
is Andhra Pradesh's state animal and has managed to become
something akin to a pest in Kurnool district, thanks to the
fact that it no longer has any natural predators out here.

The road is really bad, even for an interior road and the skies are
still overcast but as usual there are the silver linings. For one,
I am riding through small hamlets where colourful Lambada
women seem to be selling everything from mangoes to
honey to petrol on the road; for another I am riding
parallel to what would be a spur of the Nallamalais till
I finally reach Lingal. The place is spelt "Lingala" on
the milestone and is a sprawl of pucca buildings shadowed by
scrub covered hills. I ask for directions to Kollapur, am told
I am on the wrong route, that I should turn
back and head for Wanaparti, I persist and then am told
to take the next turn to the right and am also told that
there is no road for the next 6 odd kms and thereafter the
road is "illage vuntadee".

So I turn right at the next turn and realize that I am riding into
some street of Lingala, stop a passing truck and get better
directions, turn back and head straight from where I had turned
sometime back.

5 odd kms of "chalta hai" roads get me to another small village
and I am wondering if I am on the right road at all, so stop to
check with a "Maxi Cab" driver. We confer and it turns out I haven't
got lost yet, after all.

So I push off again and the real fun starts now. This is where the
roads really have no name, and by the by the road just ended, the
metalled stretch just petering into a jungle road! Evidently, now
I was into scrub forest, and there were lots of small hillocks
all along the road. The road itself was mostly gravel, badly potholed
and had stretches which could easily double up as Buffalo wallows
when it rains. My bike was wobbling all over the place, the gravelly
stretches were pretty easy, but the mud sections were a pain in the
butt, one never knows which is the level portion and which is a pothole!

But there were any number of colourful birds which I
just photographed in my cranial hard disk and then all of a sudden,
I am on a flat stretch and see 4 Black Buck around 500 metres off!
I kill the motor in a flash, but they have heard the sound and
by the time I can bring the side stand down, they are off!

So it is the road again for me, mostly 2nd and 3rd gear and once in
a while going into the fourth, soon needing to gear down when
the road takes a turn for the worse, getting caught up in stretches
of fine sand that had lesser purchase than beach sand, headed on,
not really knowing where!

Finally, it had to happen and I am at the bottom of some small hill,
a nice "offroading" destination in fact, but also the end of the
road. Evidently, I had take a wrong turn somewhere, so I double back
and ride on, reach a fork and get onto the road relatively more
traveled by.

A bit more of the same gearing up and down and slipping and sliding
in the sandy stretches and I am now at a one-street village, and
surprised to see a RTC bus! Holler up at the driver and ask him where
he is coming from, he hollers down and says from Kolhapur and I am
like, wow! I am still not lost after all!

The next 10 odd kms were more or less a repeat of the same
situation but now I was being clever and looking out for the
bus treads and sticking to the road more traveled by. And yet
there was a stretch which seemed more like the bund of a dried
up lake, with thorny scrub on both sides and a tunnelway that
couldn't have been more than 5 feet high, must say I had fun,
ducking to avoid the thorn, all the while wondering how could
the bus make it through this?

The answer was available at the fork, there seemed to be a
bypass to this forest highway which nature is converting
into a safe tunnel for all its denizens -- nothing but the
smallest route through what were once someone's fields.

By my calculations I had by this time already done some
40 odd kms of these roads and I was either lost or should
break out on a metalled stretch soon. It was in a way getting
a tad worrisome, I mean I was alone after all, and what do I do
if I have a puncture or if a herd of Black Buck attack me?

Seriously speaking, it sure was getting a bit late, and I
was wondering if I should call up my office and ask for leave
the next day (incidentally I was out of cell coverage all the
way from Jadcherla), my butt was by now yelling blue murder,
my wrists, elbows and shoulders were feeling the way they
usually feel after three continuous days on the road and I
was really getting more and more disoriented by the moment.

I am riding through yet another village now, stop on seeing what
looked like a school or some quasi-government building, walk in
and ask where I am, where Kollapur is. For the next 5 odd
minutes, almost everyone there has his own version of my
latitude and longitude and while one says take the left
after you are out of the village, the other says take right
and so on and so forth.

I am luckily used to such situations, so I light a smoke and ask for
some water to drink, wait for the excitement to subside and then ask
again. This time I gather that I am almost out of the bad stretches
and that the road gets pucca in another 2-3 kms.

For once, I have got perfect directions and within 3 kms I am on a
metalled road and promptly caught up in a traffic jam of sheep. I
love such moments, the herdsmen will act as if they are really sorry
for you, but in reality don't care even two hoots, the sheep will
panic if you honk, so makes ultimate sense to wait them out, after
all they do have right of way here.

I ride another 15 kms of interior roads, lined with thorny scrub,
negotiate 2 forks through gutfeel and finally I can see a chain of
hills on the horizon, the road straightening and a milestone
saying "Kollapur 5 ". And then I crest a rise on the road and see a
fairly-sized town, nestling on the sides of a hill-range. Soon, I am
riding into Kollapur, through a couple of markets where I sensibly do
not ask for directions and then finally stop another Maxi Cab driver,
ask him to pull over, spread my maps over his Jeep's bonnet and we
confer. Naturally, he tells me what everyone has been telling all
over, that there is no road across to Pagdyala, that there is a river
crossing on which people "go on" boats and that if I wanted to go to
Nandikotkur I should join N.H.7 at Kothakota, ride on to Kurnool and
then I will be at Nandikotkur.

I wanted a look at the river-crossing and was even
then contemplating a fast clip to Nandikotkur (it was just
5.30 or so) so I ask directions to the same, am asked to
turn right and then left and then right; I do exactly that
and find myself on a road with a couple of Autos coming from
the other way, laden with "Sintex" tanks full of water.

Aha, they are coming from a source of water,
they are coming from the river is what I tell myself,
I ride on telling myself I am not far
from a photographic oasis now, I ride on and
I ride on, but there is no river in sight.

I did pass a decent-sized lake / huge pond with around
15-20 coracles on them and many people on the
lake / pond shore.

This meant that I had taken a wrong turn somewhere
again, but there was a lovely straight and empty road
in front of me and before I could even say "help" there
was a gent besides me, I flag him down and ask him the
by now stock questions.

I am told, I asked the wrong questions and that I should
have asked for directions to Sangameshwaram, that's where
the river crossing is and that it is basically dependent on
boatmen in Coracles, and that I can simply follow this road
and will link up with the Kurnool road at Pebbair!

By now it was getting to be a "light and pattern show" time
in the skies, the western horizons now no longer overcast,
the sun hidden by a deep bank of clouds, with shafts of light
piercing through, crimson, orange and blindingly golden in turns.

So I say goodbye and thank you to my "Margadarasi" and proceed
to ride on, the road is straight and lovely, with herds of
sheep and cattle on either side and in front of me is a temple
rising sheer. I ride on, stopping by to take a shot of sheep
dotting the red vistas, stopping on a bridge to take a shot of
a disused one just below till finally I am in a small town
from where the temple rises sheer.

The temple did make a pretty sight, especially because it
was limned against an impossibly beautiful sky of cotton wool
clouds, so I take some time in enjoying its beauty and am
told by the people who stop by, that it is the Venugopalaswamy
temple, relocated to this place 25 years back to save it from
some irrigation project.

The main entrance to the temple is guarded by a huge
swarm of rock bees, so going in is ruled out, and I start off
again, promising to be back soon. This town / village is
incidentally Jatprole.

Now the temple is again rising sheer, but behind me,
I stop to compose a perfect shot of my chromed "alter ego"
against "God Lit" skies, get lucky with a small bird which
was so intent on getting its daily dose of nectar that it let
me almost catch it (still need to identify it), move on and stop
again at a "Cuddapah Slate" mine where I spent an amazingly
peaceful 15 minutes doing nothing and finally rode out again,
taking some more shots, this time of an amazingly beautiful
sunset (on a pond of all things!) and then rode on to
Pebbair with the usual bugs and crawlies getting into my
eyes and ears and nose.

Pebbair to Hyderabad is 155 kms of roads I know pretty
well, so I decided to take it easy and relive the ride while
giving my butt some much needed respite. Stopped at a Dhaba a bit
before Kothakota for my dinner (6 phulkas and toor daal fry), allowed
myself a Beer, bandied about with an inquisitive wise-ass who
wanted to know what the mileage of the bike was, what I was
doing on these roads with a camera, where I was born, what I do
for a living, if I am married, etcetera, etcetera. I call up my
brother and C and tell them that I am still in Andhra Pradesh and
that I was just taking it easy and will be reaching home
before midnight.

The last stretch, the home run, was fun as usual, I do love
riding in the night; somewhere on the way, my indicators and
speedo display lights gave up, but all in all it was some
ride indeed.

Exile, reclusion and the yoke of being a "writer"

I have always wondered how much of being a good / exceptional / great writer is about the actual output of work and how much of it is the attitude / approach / philosophy of the writer.

After all, there are those who write reams and reams of what is barely passable without more or less any effort apart from what goes into a job, with drudgery that is routine; and then there are those who approach their writing as the acme of their very existence -- slogging it out mentally (and physically) on rewrite after rewrite to come up with one (in their own standards) "passable" page or paragraph.

Then again, there are those who are so enmeshed in and haunted by the very idea of writing something exceptional that they never get down to the routine or work at making the routine better :-) When not brooding with Heathcliffian miens or intent on drunken ruin like the painter in "The Last Leaf" such people make for great literary conversationalists and are most of the time voracious readers -- the type who will vitriolically tear apart any writing that is not "great". Speaking of readers, I personally am of the opinion that a "great" reader is just a "great" writer who decided to be lazy (for life?) and also couldn't deal with the "this is getting too personal" stage when it came to splattering everything out in ink...

Or for that matter, when it comes to shaping the writer, moulding that mettle, what matters the most? Pain, suffering, dispossession, identity crises, which of this is the truest of the crucibles :-) ?

I am not being rhetorical but neither do I have the answer. Roberto Bolano seems to make a really strong case for Exile, read it all here

I liked this bit a lot; maybe because I keep thinking of getting away from it all, even now and write as if I was condemned to it :-)

"What does a politician do in prison? What does a lawyer do in the hospital? Anything but work. What, on the other hand, does a writer do in prison or in the hospital? He works. Sometimes he even works a lot. And that’s not even to mention poets. Of course the claim can be made that in prison the libraries are no good and that in hospitals there are often are no libraries. It can be argued that in most cases exile means the loss of the writer’s books, among other material losses, and in some cases even the loss of his papers, unfinished manuscripts, projects, letters. It doesn’t matter. Better to lose manuscripts than to lose your life. In any case, the point is that the writer works wherever he is, even while he sleeps, which isn’t true of those in other professions. Actors, it can be said, are always working, but it isn’t the same: the writer writes and is conscious of writing, whereas the actor, under great duress, only howls. Policemen are always policemen, but that isn’t the same either, because it’s one thing to be and another to work. The writer is and works in any situation. The policeman only is. The same is true of the professional assassin, the soldier, the banker. Whores, perhaps, come closest in the exercise of their profession to the practice of literature."


And oh yes, don't miss the poetry!

"In one fragment, Archilochus doesn’t hesitate to admit that in the midst of battle, probably a skirmish, he drops his arms and goes running, which for the Greeks was undoubtedly the greatest mark of shame, let alone for a soldier who has to earn his daily bread by his courage in combat. Archilochus says:

Some Saian mountaineer
Struts today with my shield.
I threw it down behind a bush and ran
When the fighting got hot.
Life seemed somehow more precious.
It was a beautiful shield.
I know where I can buy another
Exactly like it, just as round."

Oh, to be born an island! Or in an age when there was far more time and far less things that needed to be done

Midway musings

I really don't know where I am headed.

Or where I started from, for that matter.

You see, peculiarly enough both the beginning and end of this journey is me; maybe when I arrive, I will be a more footsore me, maybe when I reach, I will be a better me, but then isn't that a natural progression in life?

That we get better, wiser, tireder(??) with age?

Yes, I said "age". I am sure you will agree, 40 days would constitute an important factor of "time /age", being 1/10 of a year after all!

Lately, I have realised that I don't have a very good equation with time, and that I absolutely abhor summer. And though (I am sure) I will continue to be under the attack of delusions and imaginations (how real is poetry, anyway?) I do realise that however much I live within myself, the other will be time.

Sometimes holding a mirror to my face.

Sometimes brushing by as a cat's paw, redolent with deja` vu, leaving me flummoxed and then making me chase after it, to decipher meanings and craft words...and make sense of memories.

Sometimes like an endless road that just loses itself into the horizon.

Which means even if I do nothing, time will move and I would have journeyed, in terms of time.

So, this journey then; though in many ways not a patch on the toil and hardships of the real Deeksha, I do feel like a pilgrim and as day follows day in the march of time, there is progress too and I am now midway.

"Does the stillness of this silence say
that there's no beginning and no end -- here midway?"

Tripping on :-)

Shiva Temple, Palakolu

Knees grating on the cold granite
feet getting numbed by my weight,
I marshal thoughts into coherence
mumbling more than one early morning prayer.

Why do I get drawn, moth-like
to these crowds, babel and mock devotion that I disdain?
Why do I pronounce shlokas in English
and yet don't pray for visas to lands abroad?)

The digital camera grasped crab-like,
I compose and shoot the temple spire in diffused light
to wonder as hundreds of pigeons get aflutter –
was it because I uttered "Om Namah Shivaya"?

(Why can't we who live lives, time our joys right?
Of what use, blessings of sacred rice that slide off a tonsured pate?
Or an ardent, desirously male devout gaze
that's not a spell-binding hymn that Shakti can hear?)

The day the cup came home

A billion dreams.

28 years of yearning.

And then, the cup came home.

The first two lines are advertising copy. But surprisingly for once, the third one came true and after having failed to live up to its potential (real and hyped) time and again, the Indian cricket team displayed the skills, focus and the cojones to win the games that counted.

And thus, the cup (the World Cup of Cricket!!) came home. Bringing with it joys, celebrations and euphoria for millions -- cricket purists, jingoists and rednecks masquerading as lovers of cricket and those who don't know nothing about cricket.

In other words, the cup has given almost every Indian a reason to smile about, and that (in itself) is something to be happy about. Especially these days when we as a country have so less to celebrate and have almost no "real" heroes, have no one who we can look up and believe in.

Because, essentially that's what a fan is all about -- the belief. Though there are extremes here like elsewhere in life and on the one hand you have the jingoists and rednecks for whom a cricket match is just another platform to let loose and be a nuisance and on the other you have the technically and statistically minded for whom such matches are just another opportunity to show off their superior knowledge.

Because, essentially that's what a fan is all about -- the belief. That uplifts and leads to a single-minded focus on the game and keeps so many vexations and problems at bay, keeps cynicism at bay...

When India first won the world cup, I was barely 10 and from what I remember, I don't remember much about it; apart from some cricket related questions in General Knowledge at school and a spike in the interest for cricket (was it then that I started playing cricket more than Gilli Danda?) the event did not cause too many ripples in my secludedly bucolic childhood.

Apart from the fact that I was 9 years and something, there were two other reasons for this; one -- we didn't have TV at home, two -- we did not have a computer either (and there was no Cricinfo, anyway)...

I know, all the three factoids above are a bit hard to believe, but yes, they are true.

This time around, it was different and I left work early, scorched my feet on the afternoon sun-baked road, and got home with more than one prayer on my lips. And then the prayers continued (through most of the India innings) till we won the match, as I had believed we will.

And, then the cup came home.

P.S.-- Speaking of cricinfo, there's this lovely article on cricket by Wright Thomson. I found parts of it quaint and I am wondering how he communicated so well with the cab driver and his sons and I am sure this is the first such article on cricket in India with so many Americanisms but I guess he puts thing perfectly with the title itself -- In Tendulkar country