A conversation

Earthquake hits Japan on 11th March 2011, followed by a 10 meter Tsunami wave. While I mostly remained numb and nonchalant about the disaster, a conversation that was somewhere buried inside started surfacing, bringing in images I had never seen.

I sit holding my writing pad, in which my datasheets are struggling, for the wind from the sea is hard. I try to concentrate on the couple of fishermen who are playing cards after their days work. I clear my throat and interrupt their conversation,
"So, do you think there has been any change in the fish catch after Tsunami?"
There is the standard answer which most researchers get, "Tsunami took everything from us. Now even the fishes have become scarce. It is all due to Tsunami!"

Gazing into the past one of them started telling me, "You know Madam, just a few days before Tsunami hit the coast of Tamilnadu, I sat just like this with my friends playing cards. I don't remember what we were talking about, but someone asked, which element of nature would be so dangerous as to destroy the earth?"


"I thought for a while and told them, it should be water. The sea which gives life has the strength to take it too. And just after that came this huge wave splashing on us, taking away whatever we called our future. In one minute we lost everything. And everyone called it Tsunami. We came to know it then, that there was something called Tsunami."


"For all we knew is that the sea was our mother. Each day she gave us our food. All we know is the sea. But after the Tsunami we understood her strength. The one that gives us life can take it too."


That respect for the strength of nature from an illiterate yet experienced man, still baffles me...

Tea-ho-lism

I should have realized this long back, but I ignored it all the way long.

As I left Dementor behind and ran towards my usual tea fellow, I was feeling a lack of enthusiasm for the day. Dementor later told me, “You are addicted to tea! This is not good. What will happen if you don’t have your morning cup of tea?”

I was cheerful after having my tea, so I gleefully answered, “I can’t work, will just feel sleepy.”

I blindly ignored what came next from Dementor, though this time I didn’t have an earphone to plug in.

But the day I decided to quit my early morning tea, is when I realized that I was a Tea-ho-lic!

I would have had a healthy breakfast, ample water and yet as I started the day’s work, I would feel a certain kind of dullness, some drowsiness. Something constantly told me, ‘I don’t feel fresh!’

Each time I cross the tea shop close to my bus stop, my legs long to turn towards the shop. I know, I can’t dare go in, even with an excuse of reading the newspaper, for the shop owner knows my weakness and would coax me with a cup of tea.

So, I started thinking, when did it really start?

It was probably when I entered the small tea shop outside my college in the interiors of Tamilnadu, that I first got hooked on to tea. It’s more than tea actually. It’s about the owner, his family, the ambience of the shop, and his usual customers that makes my day ‘fresh’!

I remember sitting in the shop of Siddharkovil, a village situated along the highway connecting Nagapattinam. I knew the tea shop owner very well. And so did I know his wife, and their two children; a young girl and an elder son, who was still in college. They had a set of usual customers, which included old men, kicked out by their daughter-in-laws, to old sages who in their search for nirvana, had settled with begging and usual woman folk who at times took a snack break. Every conversation is interesting here, no matter what the topic is about. And moreover, I found a great deal of local information; the weather, local political situation, village gossip, views about the outside world, so on and so forth. I have sat in these shops gulping tea after tea, not for the mere taste of tea, but for my interest in people and their views.

Then, my early mornings used to start with a cup of tea and couple of aged men for company smoking heavy cigars made locally. It gave a nice smoky ambiance to the place, though mostly I choked to its effect. If I were lucky, a group of wedding or ceremony attendees would folk in, and the so far dull conversation about the milk price and the amount spent on rearing a cow, would turn into cheerful gossip about who was getting married to whom, or how the girl looks too aged for the boy!

Life is constantly active in here, though for the outside world it might be rather dull. There is some amount of activeness that comes from the owner’s pet, which I can’t ignore. Some times a cat eerily shadowing the room, and at times giant dogs sleeping under the table, to hen that pecks under your feet, and surely not forgetting the lazy goats! They just make the whole picture complete.

All this matters so much that, when I finally went to one of the tea states of India; Assam, I didn’t quite enjoy the aroma or taste of black tea, which gave an aftermath of stained teeth! And realizing that I can adjust with coffee under circumstances, I don’t understand my addiction. Though given a choice, I would prefer to make my own tea, with the same tea powder and the exact precision of the tea and milk, with a tinge of ginger for flavor.

Looking back on my exercise in learning to make ‘my perfect’ tea, the company I had had while drinking the tea, and the endless conversations with people strange and common, friends and foes; I have come to believe… that tea is just my excuse!

Just another old labourer...

In the early morning mist, he sits on the wobbly looking wooden bench and waits for the owner to open the grocery shop. A look at him would make one imagine his age to be crossing the late 60's. His cheeks were sunken, probably because there were no teeth to support them. Even his eyes looked heavy with a sort of crowded numbness towards the world. 

Each day, as I stood waiting for the school bus, I got a glimpse of his early morning routine. This aged man, I found out, worked as a laborer in a grocery shop that was situated in an almost unknown village called Thenur in Palakkad district. Each morning he would ride his cycle and come to the shop, and would muse to himself during his waiting periods. I have never actually seen him in any sort of conversation with anyone.

As soon as the shop owner opens, this old man, gets ready for the days work, carrying and arranging the vegetables for the customers. It came to my notice almost on the first day that, for his old age he had had a physique that any young man would crave for. With absolutely no fat bodies hanging around his arms or necks, its admirable to observe the shaped muscles that forms his biceps!

This scenario of his everyday trivia is just a prelude to, what I would say my favorite part of his day.

 When he finishes work with the vegetables, he drags a stool and settles himself cross legged on it. With his dhoti pulled over his knees, one can hardly ignore the toned calf muscles. And just out of nowhere, a big male dog appears near him and looks over his face. Probably this dog was in the same place the whole time, but together, the old man and the big male dog come across as rather 'enlightened' companions, who could ignore the world around them in each others company. 
Satisfied with a meager touch of affection, the dog settles himself close to the his legs, giving a deep yawn.  
Life is still, life is slow here, in a village. Probably the old man and the dog never will understand the meaning of the much overrated word, 'busy' and yet life goes on...

The old man pulls out a beedi (local cigar) and lights it up with a matchstick. 
There is a sense of freedom in those pair of aged eyes, that I admire each time I see him smoke. It is the freedom that is not from the smoke that has clouded his head, but rather from the head that irrespective of the clouding smoke, remains free...

For all I know, this could well be my clouded imagination. But I would certainly like to believe in the freedom that a rugged old man enjoys!

Across the Bridges

Supriya told me half gushing with pride, “About 12 cabinet ministers are coming, and the Chief Minister himself will be present to inaugurate!”

And later Ajay asked me, “Ma’am will you be coming for the inaugural function on Saturday?”

So I thought aloud, “What is all the hype about?”

It was in a rather emotional tone that Supriya and the History teacher together told me the story about the now famous, Mayannur Bridge.

It all started during the post independence time, when the people of Palakkad district wanted a link way to the district of Thrissur. These two districts are cut by Bharathapuzha, the river that stretches across the Palakkad district. While it took millions of strikes and hartals to finally establish the foundation of the bridge in 1997, the bridge itself got fully constructed in 2011, and its inauguration was the talk of the town!

“They have erected tents and pandals on the dry river bed!” said Supriya. “There’s going to be a procession and also concerts and dance programs.”

“People just want a reason to celebrate”, I scorned.

“No, it’s much more than that”, started Supriya. “When my father dropped me in the small village of Mayannur to do my graduation in a college at Ottapalam, each day I had to cross the river to go to the other side. The local ferry though helpful and time saving, was no more than an inconvenience as most of the passengers get in and out wet as the umbrellas they were holding. At times when the river bed is almost dry for the boats to ferry around, we had to walk. We had to then walk in places with chest deep water. Can you imagine going to college in wet clothes?”

“The bridge is a big thing madam”, she sighed with hint of joy.

I was engrossed in the imagination of past times and dreamily smiled at her saying, “I would like to go across the bridge once.”

She invited me to her house adding, “Now when people of Mayannur village come to shop at Ottapalam, the shopkeeper tells them that they are related, for now they go across the bridge!”

As the hopes for a quick development hovers around the small town of Mayannur, and the property investor tighten their belts, I wonder…

Is the bridge strong enough to hold on to the future changes?

Indira

There are some places which makes such sharp impression on you, that you end up feeling, you had never left the place after all...


As I shivered through the road with my bag, and huffed in the early morning mist, I reached, what I would call one of my 'favorite turns'. I am slightly disoriented when it comes to places, contradicting my love for traveling to different places! And this turn has been one of the toughest one for me. The temple just close to the turn is my landmark.
I leave the early morning traffic behind me and take the turn.
Like always, I have the 'happy' feeling inside me. There is M S Subhalakshmi singing Suprabatham in the background and as I look at the lane ahead, I can see a long road with a lot of turns that cuts it in between. Everything is suddenly quiet, as if I have entered into a sleepy little town, that was mostly a part of my imagination than the reality in front of me. I can clearly hear the broom being used somewhere in the next lane, and dogs walking too actively for their owners.
As I walk past this, through the trees that is sparsely stretched across the road, the morning sunlight fall on to the road of dried leaves...

And I enter S B I Staff Colony

Antidote?

‘Disgusting! Thoroughly disgusting!’, I thought to myself.

It had been over a week that I had started feeling weak. So when my aunt told about a doctor whom I could visit, the only question I asked was, if he was old. With experience and ‘no’ antibiotics in picture, I made my way to the doctor with my parents for company.

As the rickshaw made a good attempt to pull itself through the steep stone filled path, making out heads meet the roof of the rickshaw, I started wondering if at all the visit would be fruitful. Finally after the whole effort of getting out of each ditch in our path, we reached, what the driver told the wall of the doctor’s house. As we turned to look for an entrance, I saw a small gate little high up. I opened this gate to see a beautiful little patch of garden. It seemed quite neat and tidy. And much to my satisfaction, the garden faced an aged house. I stood mesmerized by the whole ambience, as a frail looking old man came out from the house, probably hearing the creak from the gate I opened. He motioned us to the next room.

My already existing dizziness seemed to increase with the whole ‘old and mature’ effect of the surrounding. I have heard them say, ‘First impression is the best impression’. This would probably be one of those impressions which would stay with me. ‘The doctor’s torn shirt’, which made me like him instantly. Truthfully, I know I would never come across a doctor (with a MBBS degree) wearing a shirt with an evident ‘torn’ patch on the right sleeve. I tried to concentrate on his lip movements, but I couldn’t make out a single word that he uttered, until my mother helped me out. I was a little bit taken aback when he held my hands to check my pulse. Not for anything but it had been long, and I might as well say, really really long, since a doctor took the patience to hear my pulse for one whole minute. And as the doctor wrote my name on the prescription sheet, I couldn’t help looking at his hands shiver with weight of his age, which would probably be close to seventy.

I couldn’t hold on my curiosity for long. So I slipped away in-between the conversation, to look around. The garden outside was quite neatly arranged, with same plants planted in rows, so that when the flowers grow, it will be all of one color. As I walked ahead, I couldn’t contain stealing a glance inside the room next to his ‘office’.

What I saw was surely a room, but looked more like a passageway. In that was a couch, where in my imagination sat the doctor reading or simply thinking. Next to it was a sofa, with a small pillow, which I could make out, was used recently. Probably we woke up the doctor from his nap, I thought to myself as I stepped in. As I looked around, making million excuses and reasons in my head for entering his private room, my eyes fell on the wall with old photographs. Before I could make any sense out of my actions, the urge of curiosity pulled me in and I stared at the photographs of what I imagined to be the ‘young doctor’. The passageway like room turned to the left to make another room. And as I peeped inside, I could see a ‘blue’ colored idol of Krishna, with other Gods, on the far away end of the room.

I sighed deep. Everything was neat. Everything was where it should be. The bed spread on the small cot was without any creases. That could be the well known sign of ‘loneliness’, I thought to myself. I turned to leave and outside I saw the rickshaw driver who was waiting for us, giving me ‘you-are-weird’ looks. 

Even as I was thinking of writing this on my way back, I knew I would get stuck on a conclusion for this thought.

Do I really need to conclude an old man’s story? Can’t I just leave it to him and the wonders of imagination?

Hostel mate

S Sitara Khatum; I had met her in an unimaginable circumstance. After all staying in 'Priyanka's Working Women's Hostel' wasn't quite something I could imagine for myself.

 A women just entering her sixties, she had views and thoughts that surely lacked in any of the hostel mates I had spoken to. Finding herself a bit odd for her age, to be in a hostel filled with young bubbling girls, she frequently found refugee in my room. I didn't mind an aged company with me, for only with them can I share experiences. 

 We discussed all different topics we could think of. Finding my curiosity revolving around the wildlife, culture and people of Assam, we would sit to chat after her namaz in the cramped hostel room. We spoke about food, we spoke about lanterns, we spoke about places... yet we never got too personal with each other. We never forced our opinions on each other. We found momentary company which turned out a rival to our boredom.

 What fascinated me most about her talks was the way she described the British Assam, she had seen as a child. She spoke of the river canals that were so clear then that one could see the green grass below and fishes could be caught by hand. She described to me, how her father had taught her to catch a fish with hooks. I was thoroughly awed and impressed by the recollection of such minute details of her past. How much of change has she seen through her lifetime and how much of effect has it had.

The old forest bungalows, she told me, were built on top of logged tree trunks. I let my imagination flow and get a view of the Assam I would never see, for now those pillars of trunks holding the bungalow had been converted into an office in itself. Her face used to sadden with pain that the modernization has bought.

After she left that particular day, when she gave me many information about Assam, I jotted it down on my dairy. We exchanged phone numbers that day, though we knew, we wont be calling each other. It wasn't that we weren't going to see each other again but as a matter of fact, we didn't see each other after that night. 

Soon and quite suddenly I shifted my place and never got a chance to say goodbye to her. I am sure it wouldn't matter much for each of us and we could move on with life. But, what we moved on with was carrying some memories of people and places we would never see...