Beloved

"There is a loneliness that can be rocked. Arms crossed,knees drawn up;holding on, this motion, unlike a ship's, smooths and contains the rocker. It's an inside kind-wrapped tight like skin. Then there is a loneliness that roams. No rocking can hold it down. It is alive, on its own feet going seem to come froma far off place."
Toni Morrison's Beloved

Nothin more than a shadow which i once touched in my hallucination,
nothin more than a name that echoes over and over again,
nothin more than a figment of a rain dropthat fell in my dream,
nothin more than a life that was taken forever,
nothin more than the death which i experienece as a deja vu...
You are nothin more than my imagination which is as or less farcical than reality.....

McDonalds is an MNC right?

After my usual colaba meandering, I went to the V.T McDonalds to grab a quick bite before the movie at Sterlings...As it happened, I was waiting for my potato wedges to come and there was a foreigner woman (I really could not figure out which country was she from, really curly cropped hair and dark skinned and she could not converse in English) trying to figure out what to order...This "gentleman" at the counter of McD apparently tried to help her...And for some wierd reason he had a sly smile on his face and that he exchanged with his colleague standing at the other side. This woman came to the counter and said "Chicken Mcgrill" as she tried to recall what she had decided from the menu above...And bang this is when it happened...After the lady's request, the guy "repeated" the order saying "Teri maa ki"......
My first reaction was an urge to slap him, second urge was to create a scene over there... But then I took a seemingly cool decision (its one of the crappiest decision i ever took) that I will directly go to a higher authority and file complain agaisnt the staff..
Anyways, the larger picture is what the fuck is happening?? And here we are not even talking about an Indian company, McDonalds is a fucking MNC....How can we behave like this with the people who come as guests in our country....Forget about the taxi-valas, retailers,museums etc.exploit the foreigners to the hilt in terms of finances... Thats a story for another day...here we are talking about a company which has branded itself as a family place...

A little miracle is all I need,
A real dream is all I breathe.
I hear a perpetual knock on my door.
The sounds of chime doesnt depend on air.
The lines get blurred and I delete them often.
Even then they come back at many times.
A deep sleep is broken by harsh silences.
I get up and pretend to walk in my sleep.
I put my words on paper,
and see them all in front of my eyes.
I soon know about your ignorance,
when you burn them alive.
The words look sombre and listless,
even they need a miracle to fly.

My summers have just begin,
But there is craving for the chilled air now...
The sunshine looms large,
I want to go back to the moon.
The light is harsh on my eyes,
There is nothing soothing like the stars..
The rays build a vaccuum around me,
I feel starkly isolated.
The loneliness of the night lets me dream,
This bright day is tearing me apart.

Scared?

My roomies clearly hate me for being so short tempered and for snapping at everybody who tries to be even a little smart...May be its something to do with my insecurities or may be with the feeling of being a vulnerable 'single in the city'....The recent murder at Bandstand for refusing to pay Ganpati chanda has almost gripped everyone (atleast my roomies) with fear...As it happened, today almost four tall well built (scary looking) guys came to our house to ask for Ganpati chanda.

I outrightly refused to pay them. When they refused to budge, I asked them where had they come from.They said this chanda is for the Ganpati of the west area.I didn't even understand what they meant by 'west area' cuz we live in Lower Parel east.Anyways, so one of roomies overheard the conversation and quickly jumped to pay them some money. That's when we started rant against each other as she said that what if they murder us if we don't pay the money.....I was taken aback at the bizzare sound of that sentence....I shouted my lungs out, "If fifty people come asking us for chanda on Ganpati for each different nooks and corners of the area then are we gonna pay them. And more importantly, are we gonna pay them cuz we live on fear?"...She argued saying that we live alone...It would have been different if we were staying with our families.But my question if some fucking psycho can murder somebody on the road then is there any guarantee that thay can't break in to murderpeople even if there are twenty people in the house.How can we keep getting exploited only on the basis of fear.

I know of a person who has stopped following her daily ritual of going for a morning walk in Joggers park,Bandra because she just can't get over the murder that took place ther some days ago...Again my question is for how long are we gonna change our life course just because of fear...

Even if we are not turning ourselves into heroes, lets not fool ourselves of being martyrs by succumbing to the most irritating thing on earth, Fear...

My roomies won't let me argue with the taxi vala even if he is being a complete asshole just because we are girls and we shouldnt argue with him as 'things can turn nasty'...I mean,how ridiculous is that!

May be I am being impulsive or as I said its my own insecurity ...but whatever... the only thing I Refuse to do is.... live in fear...

Exception-Making

“ I HAVE NO ANSWERS…EXCEPT THAT PERHAPS IN THIS PATTERN OF LIFE, I WAS FOR A MOMENT EXCEPTION MAKING.”
....a friend

CrackUp

The leaf never remains the same,
It changes color with changing season.
It tries hard to stick to the branch.
Sometimes it breaks down,
Sometimes sustains with a crack up.

The shell gets weaker by each blow.
Its hurt increases with every pressure.
It tries not to split in pieces
Sometimes it breaks down,
Sometime survives with a crack up

LiFe

Should I pull apart the moments?
Or should I count the uncountable moments?
How do I figure out life?
Is it the cluster of moments?
Seems antithesis to life…
No blacks.
No whites.
So death can never be an antonym to life.
Possibility of two merging together,
That’s the zone where breathing begins.
It’s a phoenix everyday,
Grandeur out of the ashes.
Smoke feels the throat,
Eyes burn with ashes,
Yet grandeur makes up for it.
Life after death,
With traces of death.
Death is a moment.
Life is a moment.
How do I find a difference?
ME

poem

A touch that feels the skin,
There vanishes the pain of anatomy.
But the pain of soul still stays.
It feels the blood, only to cut it apart,
As it pierces through the body.
A nerve catches up with life,
The blood flows faster.
The music of cacophony is heard.
This is what the dreams are made of;
This one is a dream of hell.
Heaven seems a speck.
The hand that touches feels compassion,
The intense throbbing goes to waste.
Throbbing might break the nerve one day.
Its an endless deep abyss that’s needed,
Not a narrow tunnel.
A story ends. Alright
Life entwined keeps it alive.
This story is a death of stars
Unheard passions rush like blood to the head,
Loud they scream and cry,
As they get naked in front of hollow eyes.
ME

Ivory Tower

The ivory tower has lost its sheen.
Its glasses are cracked,
And I am tempted to break them.
Eyes had been satisfied with a glance,
But now the tower looks submerged.
Almost like a mirage.
There is not a drop of water,
But a flood seems inevitable.
The road that led me to the tower,
Has gone the other way now.
I kept looking thorugh the window,
Could hear your cracked and dry hearbeats.
I wanted to break open the gate...
It was intriguing and I held my breath.
I tried to break leaves from the tree outside,
They were brittle and collapsed in my hand.
I rubbed it in my palm the entire day.
Waited and like a mad woman at times.
But now the tower scares me.
And I am tempted to break the glass.
I know you are sleeping
In the dark corner of the tower
And I will have to find you.
Are you free inside the tower.
Or am I bound sitting in the air outside it.....
ME

LeT LoVe IN by Goo Goo Dolls

"You wait, wanting this world
To let you in
And you stand there
A frozen lightIn dark and empty streets
You smile hiding behind
A God-given face
But I know you're so much more
Everything they ignore
Is all that I need to see
You're the only one I ever believed in
The answer that could never be found
The moment you decided to let love in
Now I'm banging on the door of an angel
The end of fear is where we begin
The moment we decided to let love in
I wishWishing for you to find your way
And I'll hold on for all you need
That's all we need to say
I'll take my chances while
You take your time with
This game you play
But I can't control your soul
You need to let me know
You leaving or you gonna stay
You're the only one I ever believed in
The answer that could never be found
The moment you decided to let love in
Now I'm banging on the door of an angel
The end of fear is where we begin
The moment we decided to let love in
There's nothing we can do about
The things we have to do without
The only way to feel again
Is let love in
There's nothing we can do about
The things we have to live without
The only way to see again
Is let love inhear mewanting this world to let you in
You're the only one I ever believed in
The answer that could never be found
The moment you decided to let love in
Now I'm banging on the door of an angel
The end of fear is where we begin
The moment we decided to let love in "

Marquez....

"She kept watching him even when she was through cutting onions and she kept on watching until it aws no longer possible for her to see him because then he was no longer an annoyance in her life but an imaginary dot of the horizon of the sea." Man with the enormous wings

Words

"A place does not merely exist, it has to be invented in one's imagination." Shadow Lines

"She had not got it herself,she always envied - a sort of abandonment, as if she could say anything, do anything." Mrs Dalloway

"Lord I was born a ramblin man, tryin to make a livin and doin the best I can.and when its time for leaving, I hope you will understand, that I was born a ramblin man." Alman Brothers


"In the depths of my winter, I finally learned there was in me an invincible summer." Camus

"It was like having the clothes torn off his body and the shame was not , that his body was exposed but that it was exposed to indifferent eyes." Fountainhead

"If I found a job, a project,an idea or a person that I wanted-I'd have to depend on the whole world. Everything has strings laeding to eveything else. We'r all so tied together.We'r all in a net,the net is waiting and we'r pushed into it by one single desire. You want a thing and its preciuos to you. Do you know who is standing raedy to tear it out of your hands? you cant know,it may be so involved and so far away but someone s raedy and you are afraid of them all. And you cringe and you crawl and you beg and you accept them-just so they will let you keep it and look at whom you come to accept." FH

Who is the other?

WHO IS THE OTHER? Somewhere lost track between fiction and "reality"...anyways here it is....


“Finally, after a long hiatus...I am happy for you”, said her mother. She replied, “I know mom”. With a childlike innocence she added, “He is a nice person”. “I am sure he is. By the way what’s his name”, asked the mother. “Iqbal”, she replied. “Iqbal...Is he a Muslim?”

Then came the horror on her face, which seeped in her voice and could be felt across the other end of the telephone. It was as if somebody had just given her the news of an incurable ailment of a very dear one. Her mother made her feel as if this time she wasn’t seeing “one of us”. She did not understand the category, if it was just confined to being a Hindu or being a human. She was getting used to the bizarre reactions that buzzed after she uttered his name as the guy she was involved with. Revulsion in her mother’s voice made her strongly realize that she was with a guy whose identity is larger than life and is an embodiment of confusion, error and prejudice which illicit mixed emotions of hatred, terror and acerbic reactions from people around her.

She heard the tinkling of the wind chime hung outside the carved door of the main entrance. She wasn’t sure of the wind but she waited till she could hear the doorbell. She rushed to open the door. He understood what had happened when he saw her red and moist eyes. He wanted to hold her and avoid her at the same time. It was a difficult line that he walked, not pouncing on those who called him the “other” and not pampering those who pity him as an underdog. “I am a terrorist”, he said half jokingly, but the cynicism shattered the glass, cut across through and slapped her face and some other faces. But only she could hear the crackle and only she could feel the pain.

She knew that he had not eaten anything as it was his first roza. He had told her how angels come to look after them when they fast on auspicious days of Ramzan. It brought a faint smile to her face, when she was reminded of being told by him that she was his angel. She knew that “his” god was the nucleus of his heart but the atoms were only filled with a universal longing for love. She affectionately watched him. A splendid silence filled the room as they looked in each other’s eyes.

She sat on his lap and they embraced each other. She felt his hand roving through her body and as she closed her eyes, a “Kashmiri jehadi’s” unrecognizable face filled the darkness. She opened her eyes, looked at him desperately and hurriedly sealed his lips with a fervent kiss.

This time when he closed his eyes, myriad of glimpses passed through. He saw his parents who claimed to kill themselves if their daughter married a Hindu doctor who she was in love with for eight years. He saw how he had told this girl who was in his arms at the moment, that they will break up if they “seriously” fall for each other. He saw how out of 50 odd college students on hunger strike, only two, including him, were picked up to spent a night in jail because their names ended with Khan and Mustafa. He saw an invisible wall which was staring at him in the face, ready to rip him apart, the day he decided to cross it and venture into the “other” land.

He picked her up in his arms and took her to the bedroom. For a moment, she felt like tearing apart his body to wade through his soul and see if something is encrypted on it which makes him the “other”, the villain of a heinous story or a figure who needs pity.

They lay in each other’s arms quietly, staring at the ceiling and feeling the warmth of naked bodies and inhibited hearts. They saw the moonlight and eclipse alternately and sometimes simultaneously and wondered who the “other” is….

Black hole

A hand that wants to feel the sigh,
comes out empty with nothing but a black hole.
The panting sounds heavy, sounds like a chant.
Heartbeats can be heard but nothing can be seen.
A holocaust appears waiting to get destroyed.
Nada can be felt but cant be destroyed.
All the men are engulfed in the nada,
and the feeling of a common streak fails to console.
The blood and swaet are all the same,
each trickling down the numb face,
evaporating gradually.
The fry leaves fall from the face,
and a new face appears with each changing season.
The old leaf becomes a black hole.
And the hand that wants to feel the sigh,
comes out empty with nothing but a black hole.
ME

Deep blue Ocean

I thought was the deep blue ocean.
The deep blue ocean where I always wanted to float.
I felt naked and then the water was all over me.
It was really deep blue.
I was floating but going deeper.
Though the skin was corroding,
I still thought that this was the deep blue ocean.
The mermaid swam by my side,
she smirked seeing me submerged.
I still believed that it was the blue ocean.
She went far ahead and showed me her claws and laughed.
I felt my skin dissolving.
I thought that this was the ephemeral moment,
but I started to feel it all.
I wanted to be numb,
but the skin kept corroding.
I wanted to hear the loud silence,
but deadening quiet cacophony was all I coul hear.
It still was the deep blue ocean.
I saw an oyster near by.
When I touched it, it burnt my eyes.
I was blind to it all,
but could feel that it was the deep blue ocean.
There was no skin left now,
the noises surrounded my slithering bones.
I could hear a laughter of sarcasm.
Or was it the satisfaction to kill someone.
I could not be sure.
But I chose to think that it was indeed the deep blue ocean.
ME

Shootout At Railways

Well, this one is an eye opener in context of the biggest money making organisation of the country i.e. GOVERNMENT...The story goes like this...One of my really special ;) friends asked me for a little help which he thought I will easily oblige to with my Press card...He wanted to shoot at a railway station for about half an hour for a short film that he is making...But it wasn't really a cake walk as we thought ...I tracked a Railway PR's number...Then got to know through a railway journalist that the rules have changed from 1st of June for shooting a film (proper film, documentary, short film, super short film, mobile film...whatever)...Now you need to shell out COOL 1 LAKH RS to shoot for a day at the good old railways...Well, I still thought life cannot be so unfair...My determination to help my friend grew stronger...I advised him to procure a letter from his law college where he is still studying...But my railway PR friend told me..."Cannot happen boss...we need a letter from FTII Pune or something like that"...Basically from a media school....Now, my friend has already passed out of his media school in Mumbai.....
Well, so now we are exploring all bizzare ideas like involving some TV journalist in this or may be rope in a student of a media school to get involved and help us in this situation....
And for the reason why I m so keen on helping the friend....Well ;).....Anyways, railways killed one chance I had to impress him...Damn...

Wanted: Disaster Manager

Ha...That was such an exciting morning. Got up to see that I was sitting on a beautiful seat like a queen in middle of a stunning lake.It took me about five minutes to actually realise that I was in my 1BHK in Lower Parel, Mumbai and the lake wasn't exactly that.It was actually amalgamation of a tap left opened at night, clogged drainage of the bathroom and my super bad luck....WOW...And the matresses were drenched and the BMC guy got lucky in the morning with 50 bucks income for dragging the useless mattresses.
Anyways that was just one part of the day, the other part was about noone else but the Boss of Indian film producers himself.Well, so somebody cracked a news about the two tycoons joining hands for setting up swanky multiplexes around.Hmm, so what connection do I have with all this.As I do not have secret sources planted at those corporats' home and office(as I really haven't cracked any idea to get news through these god sent secret agents called "sources") so basically my superiors made my life hell by various techniques.
Anyways, that was some day..dealing with water, flood, plumber, watchman, bai, BMC guy, film producer, India's richest corporate and my boss..Some day man....

As U like it MR.director

Well, one of the widely known high profile Bollywood producers has an interesting way of giving interviews and quotes.At the risk of being sounding 'gossipy', I have to say that that he very strongly believes in the concept of a ghost writer...or in his case, a ghost speaker.So whenever I feel the need for his "esteemed" quotes for a story in my paper, I give a call to the person whose phone is accessible and who is the only way to "reach" the producer....

Now how the process goes is like this, I call up, ask my question and bang! I am taking down the quote from the superflous person on the other side of the receiver, the ghost speaker..The questions never even reach our dear producer but mind you, the quotes are from him....even when he doesn't speak! ...But I happily write the really amazing and well articulated quotes from the ghost speaker and give the credit to Mr.Producer....because nobody is really interested in the name of the ghost speaker even when he is at a pretty high position in the company (yeah dats another fact) and speaks brilliantly....But the glitz is missing in the name....For my readers, anything!!!!....quite weird....well... how do I convince myself...May be the producer's spirit resides in the spirit of the ghost speaker....now this is as absurd as I can get....bad sense of humour....but all original :p

When Pritish Nandy became British Mandy!

The other day I did my first feature story on film schools in India including Whistling Woods...Well....My desk team is pretty efficient I must say...( I hope you can sense the sarcasm )...Anyways...So Mr Pritish Nandy 's quotes were produced intact but his name became British Mandy due to an automatic spell check done by the desk team and ofcourse coupled with lack of tea or coffee intake or anthing that rescues when you want to doze off at a wrong time...so hats off to my desk team (SARCASM is pretty eveident here I guess)...Yeah so, Mr Nandy thought that it was somebody's mischief...I had to convince him at last that it wasn't the case ...just that my organisation is an interesting place.....:)