The Working Class Life

4th May, '09

I sit on my couch, pulled outside my front door, with the world illuminated by nothing but moonlight, since there has been no electricity at my place for 8 days now.

In a country where generators are the major source of electricity, a failed generator can shove one's normal, routine life into darkness. Since light is the greatest gift of electricity to mankind, routines need to be rearranged to suit the availability of natural light. Meals, preferably are cooked during the daytime, showers are taken earlier in the day, so one can utilize the cool water before the sun is overhead to make it warm, even one's day begins earlier since sleeping in the heat is not much fun. Appliances dependent on electricity for their functioning like the television, refrigerator, laptop, mobile phones and the microwave become non-existent. Instead, neighbours walk over to each other's houses to convey messages, and impromptu gatherings become the pastime of the day. Clothes are hand-washed and sun-dried giving them a strange freshness, and food is always freshly cooked for storage is impossible. The evenings are filled with the sound of chatter and community dinners in candle light. Finally the day ends with rubbing oneself with insect-repellent and sleeping under the stars, gazing at a world bathed in moonlight.

Of course, this kind of a lifestyle has its disadvantages. For one, warm beer can taste awful. Also, it's not much fun writing when all you can see is the battery of your laptop blinking at you threatening to go off at any moment. But neither of these problems are exactly daunting. There are alternatives for both. But there are other problems that a situation like this brings which have no alternatives except finding a place that has electricity, like charging one's laptop and phone from time to time for use and of course the availability of internet.

Yet, these 8 days have been quite an experience, one that I had never imagined coming my way, to my doorstep. It has shown me a side of life whose glimpses I have seen many a time, in road-side dwellings and ghettos, even in the movies, but one that I maybe would've never known for myself otherwise.

The Rain Story

18th April, '09

I danced in the pouring rain tonight.

I remember running in the rain, with friends and green grass and grey skies. Three girls, celebrating their youth; We ran in circles, or large figures of eight, the exuberance of the rain doubled by the joy of being together. It was a freedom never felt before. A kinship I had never had. A moment shared by kindred souls.

I remember walking in the rain, bicycles half-drowned in the water-filled streets. Walking was not a choice anymore. School was just over and we had to get home through the flowing water. We strutted through the mud-filled streets, not half as embarrassed as we should have been, to be pushing our bicycles through water that came till our knees, in the pouring rain. Muck and filth were of no consequence, whatsoever. We were enjoying our little self-chosen adventure. It was only when we got home that we realised that we had collected a lot of our city's garbage in our soaking wet socks.

I remember chasing in the rain; Paper boats that my grandpa ungrudgingly made for me, being raced down the streets of my childhood, on our own little rivulets. Me and my friends, with only one goal in mind- keeping our boats afloat was more important than anything else to us. So we ran after them, with chappals and mud-splashed clothes, yelling, pushing, as fast as our little legs would carry us, part of the element in every sense. It was the age when one ran as fast as the boys one knew and fought just as hard. The freedom of one's childhood will rarely come again.

I remember musing in the rain. As I sat at my grandpa's old iron barred window, taking in the rhythm of the rain, the words came to me, as fast as the drops; A feeling, a surge in the lone dark room, filled my mind and I had to let it out on paper. And before the rain had stopped, I had written my first poem-

The rain the beautiful rain,
comes inside from the window pane,
it's only water wet and plain,
the rain, the beautiful rain.

A moment of such beauty, irreplaceable by any other, I had attained just then. I didn't know it then. But I know it now. And I will know it each time I am in the rain.

I danced in the pouring rain tonight.

Coming Alive

5th April, '09

I wake up suddenly, to the sound of the whistling wind outside my window. It is skimming through the trees, like spirits dancing on a full-moon night. I can hear the trees sighing, thankful for the respite from the summer's heat. I can see my backyard in my mind's eye, bathed in moonlight, leaves rustling, a piece of paper flying in circles, yesterday's clothes on the washing line, suddenly come alive. I tingle as I lie on my bed. I want to run out and embrace the wind, I want to be part of its madness. Suddenly, life feels lighter. All the dullness has been washed out of it. I feel one with the universe, I feel a warmth inside of me. Suddenly, I feel alive.

Saplings of Life

4th April, '09

I planted a few seeds in my new kitchen garden. Actually it's hardly a garden, just a little plastic box filled with mud, sitting next to the window so it can catch a few rays of sunlight. Yet when I woke up this morning and saw some tiny green saplings peeping out of the mud, I was overjoyed. I know now that they will grow into little plants that will help nourish my body and mind, a repayment much greater than the few drops of water I sprinkle them with each day. They give with no thought about whether I deserve their yield, whether I have worked for it. And I have not. I am just playing my tiny part in this whole cycle of life, I am the planter of seeds, nothing more, akin to the birds, the animals, that do it every day.

I will probably never have what they have, these saplings, but I hope to some day; this ability to give,without the expectation of anything in return, without once measuring whether the receiver deserves as much. Also, I hope to someday have their clarity of purpose, so imbibed into their existence that it demands no
thought, something that pervades their very being, they live to pass on their energy, either to another being, or just back into earth, from where they came.

Flight of the Phoenix

17th March, '09

Words on an empty summer's day,
Words of an empty, waveless bay,
Words they form just voiceless sound,
by the definition of my words, I seem bound.
Fear is sitting like a ticking time bomb,
waiting for the instant to burst into song,
Immortal I lay, for death is not new,
my hopes are not high, but my dreams are not few.
But the bomb ticks on, a soundless word,
a rhythm recurring, by my fear incurred,
Yet I walk on, my head held high,
Yet my neck stretches beyond the sky,
A wordless silence, by words it is drawn,
A courage, of fear, of courage, is born,
Undying love and love undone,
A life of regret and a life of fun,
I carry on, on a bed of words,
the freedom of a wave, the flight of a bird,
I carry on, my footsteps noiseless,
Dissolving into the Sun, each day I am less.

Musings by The Water Closet

3rd March, '09

As I grew up, my summer vacations of many consecutive years were spent at my grandparents’. Every day of each vacation was marked by leisure and routine, one affording as much relaxation as the other. I would wake up each day to my grandmother bustling around in the kitchen, the smell of hot coffee wafting through the air, the sound of a crisp newspaper being methodically read and folded away page by page by my grandfather, and the sound of ‘ Vishnu Sahasranaamam’- a religious chant comprising of the 1000 names of Lord Vishnu, drifting from the transistor. By the time I would be out of bed and have brushed my teeth, a hot cup of ‘Horlicks’ would sit waiting for me at the dining table. My grandma would sit with me while I would drink my milk, either cutting vegetables, or cleaning out the rice, or performing some other such minor task. The idea was always to watch over me, so I would finish all of the milk. We would chat about this and that. She would tell me about my grandpa’s latest faux-pas and we would both giggle as he would try in earnest to justify himself. Then she would persuade me to go finish my bath.

The rest of the day carried on in the same fashion. My grandma finishing up her cooking and chores at the times she had scheduled for them during the day, amidst bits of conversation, laughter and story-telling. My grandparents and I would play Scrabble, or ‘Daaya-Katte’, an Indian game similar to Ludo every evening, before my grandma would begin cooking dinner. My grandpa and I would water the plants and pick the flowers for the next morning’s puja before we all ate our dinner and went to bed.

For many years when I would think back about the number of jobs my grandma used to accomplish in a single day, always with a cool mind, without ever a sign of a huff or a puff, I would be astonished. I wondered what kept her so composed, so calm, so satisfied. But lately, I have begun to feel the same calmness, the same composure when I am bustling about my house. The washing the cleaning, the cooking the dusting, they all give me peace. They give my hands something to do while my mind is musing over life’s happenings.

I like to clean my bathroom myself. A wretched job, though it seems, there are many advantages to doing it oneself. Amidst the water and suds, there is a feeling of infinite satisfaction, a feeling of bringing forth purity and cleanliness. Its mechanical nature is almost meditative so that once one has developed a method of doing it, the hands can work, while the mind contemplates. I have wrestled with many of my life’s truths standing next to the water closet. Many of my decisions have gotten cemented and many ideas have been born at that exact location. It is a place of great potential.

In the kitchen, I am constantly experimenting, or trying to better an experiment. A dash of this, a slice of that, a pinch of something else, and voila! I feel like an artist. My day is made. My self-esteem is soaring once more.

The more corners I get cleaned, the more dirt I accumulate, the more recipes I invent, the more satisfied my day is. But I wonder, if like my grandmother, I can ever do this every single day. I have my days of laziness you know, days on which no amount of filth can get me to budge from a book or my computer, days on which, two slices of bread and a fried egg are as artistic as I can get. Also, I have days when these chores seem like the useless drudgeries of life, diverting one away from one’s main purpose and occupation.

So, how did she do it, I still wonder? How did my grandma do it for so many years, never once, faltering, never once complaining? I doubt I’ll ever know, or feel the same way. However for the days that I do, I treasure my musings by the water closet.

The Monster with Many Heads

21st February, '09

The ‘Shri Ram Sena’, they call themselves. They believe they are preserving the core of Indian culture and values, which according to them are chiefly Hindu. They want to achieve this by physically assaulting anybody who tries to venture into the vast arena of any other culture. This could include one’s clothing, behaviour, choice of friends, choice of hang-outs, or even one’s participation in an occasion like Valentine’s Day. Their target has mostly been women so far. And these remain the facts of the matter.

This makes me think about a few things.

Firstly, the matter of culture. Often people refer to it as something stagnant sitting in the corner of the room that one can decide to grab and instil into one’s lifestyle any time they choose. Can culture be as forced as that? My grandmother often told me stories about our mythology, our festivals and our traditions. She sang me songs and cooked me food that had come down to her through generations before her. She shook her head when she saw me in a pair of pants. She hated it when I would cut my hair. Yet at the end of the day, she let change into her house, albeit through the back door. And all of that today is my culture- the stories, the songs, the recipes, the traditions, but also the jeans and the short hair. That’s what culture seems like to me- something that’s an accumulation, a transformation, an amalgamation; something that just lets life run its course.

So, what’s all this uproar about Western culture invading Indian culture, I ask? Every Indian today is mixed-up, desperately trying to strike a balance between what is essentially Indian and what is Western; the former being what was passed down to him as culture, and the latter, what he sees around him as culture. We want globalisation, but we also want tradition. We want technology but we also want the old ways. It is a constant war, of choices, of ideals, of outlooks and as a result, of lifestyles. All one can do is to be Indian in one instant and transform into a non-Indian in the next. It’s an impossible choice to make. The only way is to just be.

Secondly, the matter of Indian culture being essentially Hindu. India has long been the country of diverse faiths and religious ideals. You have all heard the rest of the argument, about equality, about secularity, about democracy- big words thrown around to give weight to a discussion. But these words actually form the core of each of our lifestyles. For example, Hyderabad would not be Hyderabad without its Biryani and its Charminar, the Shalwar Kameez is an integral part of Indian clothing and English is as important an Indian language today, as any other. Indian food, Indian clothing, Indian architecture, Indian languages, Indian traditions, these are all a concoction of all the different religions of India. Culture is very often an offshoot of religious beliefs and so Indian culture belongs to all the religions which have resided in India. It is organisations like Shri Ram Sena which try and divide us Indians in the name of religion to feed their vested interests. They use religion and the name of God to push themselves ahead politically. Their methods are devoid of any principles or values. All that dwells there is a hunger for power.

Finally, the issue of the female gender always having to carry the gargantuan weight of terms like culture, heritage, tradition (I am not even going to begin with terms like chastity and purity); another issue that has been beaten to the ground by feminists before, but I must have my say. It has always been very convenient for men to throw this load upon our shoulders and carry on with their lives as they please. They wear, speak and eat change as suits their convenience but cannot tolerate it when change invades our female lives. Very often it is a matter of convenience, but it could also be a matter of choice and of one’s identity. I feel like wearing a bindi and flowers in my hair, but only once in a while, when I’m in a mood for it; just like he chooses to wear his Kurta-pujama on occasion. And these are just the trivial choices, I'm talking about. So, why should my choices and moods be restricted more under the name of culture? Many Indian men today understand and respect this choice, but there are still a few who under the pretext of being the saviours of Indian culture (like the ones belonging to Shri Ram Sena who went around brutally beating up girls standing near or sitting inside pubs)try to dictate women's lives.

Shri Ram Sena, what are they trying to do? Make time go backwards, reverse 'change' as a phenomenon, restrict individuals' choices, feed religious hatred into our minds; I don’t see anything positive in what they are trying to do. They are walking the exact same path as the 'Taliban'. There is an irony in that comparison; two severely religious groups, fighting against each other, but their tenets and the resultant actions are the same; two religious groups unleashing intolerance and control over their people in the name of religion. Like I said earlier, all it is, is a fight for power and nothing else. Hinduism seems to have finally made its way under the label of 'fundamentalism' thanks to cults like the Shri Ram Sena. It hounds us all, this monster with many heads.