When I Opened My Eyes This Morning

When I opened my eyes this morning

(Most people wouldn’t call it morning)

There was a bullet in me.

So I didn’t sit up, or turn over.

I lay with my eyes open and the day

Breathed around me,

Inhaling light, exhaling shadows.

I bled beautifully, needlessly, profusely.

There was no pain. There was no wound.

I did not know where the bullet had lodged itself.

It may have been my rib-cage,

My thigh, my wrist, my brain.

They shouted, “That is art!” and clamoured for a better view.

But it wasn’t.

There was no pain. There was no wound.

To and From

I run,

Mostly from things.

I run from people, lest I bump into someone
and hurt them,
Or, get hurt.

I run from responsibilities, lest they become
nothing but an anglomeration
Of burdens and liabilities.

I run from love, lest
It happened to me.

But all I wanted was to run to something,
That something being something like you.

Listen Up, Girls!

1. Guys hate those who flirt cheaply.
So, that means girls like 'cheap flirting'? Or is this an excuse for weird jealous possessiveness? What IS 'cheap flirting' anyway?

2. Guys do cry.
Breaking news! A guy was spotted CRYING in the streets downtown! I repeat, he was CRYING!

3. It's not just the looks guys fall for, they also like girls who are not so pretty.
Thank you for giving more women body-image issues.

4. If guys care about you, they will overlook your bad traits.
And this is reassuring how? Isn't it better if the person accepts you for your good traits as well as the bad?

5. Guys love it when you smile.
Unless you are the Grinch. Thanks Mr. Obvious.

6. Guys don't like it if you talk about your ex-boyfriends.
And girls LOVE it when guys tell them about all the girls they've slept with.

7. Guys are hesitant to talk to a girl they like.
Because girls are actually Charizards in disguise and will incinerate any guy who comes near. I thought that both girls and guys are shy/awkward in the presence of the person they liked.

8. Guys don't like it when you play hard to get.
So girls, always say yes to anything guys ask you. Seriously, there would be so much lesser rapes/sexual harassment/violence against women if they just said yes to all the stalkers and lechers. Why should it matter whether or not the girl is at all interested.

9.Guys like it when you can stand up for yourself.
Wait, isn't this contradictory to the previous tip? Also, a backbone is an admirable quality in all human beings.

10. Guys want someone to listen to them.
Gee, I didn't EVER think of that.



Why do these tips at all exist? Are they attempts to break the dichotomy between young-adults of the two genders? Aren't they back firing and re-emphasizing the duality itself? Isn't this yet another way of cementing the stereotypes? Isn't it a way of saying that girls will never understand guys (and vice versa) unless they are tabulated and spoon fed into their brains? Isn't it trying to establish heterosexuality as the only acceptable norm?

Most of the points in these so-called tips can be applicable for both men and women. I don't see the reason why these should be split up into "guys want girls to know" and "girls want guys to know" categories. Everyone, irrespective of their genders like a mature, sensible, happy person. Both genders expect the other person to care about them and accept them for who they are. Everyone wants someone to listen to them, without judging. It's weird how gender-stereotypes are reinforced everyday. In the end, we all want the same thing - love.

It's a debatable issue and I too am grappling with possible answers and outcomes. Till we find them, a little sense would really be appreciated.

It's That Easy, and That Hard

Write-Club. A club for writing. Right, Left, Democratic...Whatever. Some strangers, well, maybe not-so-strangers, coming together to write for writing's sake.

Topic: Write a story with each of the following words, in 144 characters.

Words: Change, Bottle, Flavour, Wheel, Master, Left



"No change!" he told the relentless beggar. The beggar promptly pulled out a bunch of ten-rupee notes.(Characters 102)

He gazed out helpless out of the taxi window, missing one turn after another. Unfortunately he had forgotten the local vernacular for left.
(Characters 143)

They leered towards her in the dark, she seemed to be asking for it. She just gripped the broken Budweiser bottle tighter.
(Characters 123)

Suddenly, all their toothpaste tubes were missing their caps. Later they were found as wheels on their little son's toy car.
(Characters 123)

Dark, inviting eyes. Soft, smooth lips. Her heart was still racing as she stepped out of the cabin of her grammar master, face flushed.
(Characters 134)

The menacing prison guard stepped forward with the hemlock. He looked up and smiled, "Are there more than one flavour?"
(Characters 118)

Dream

I Have a Dream

I'm one of those notorious link-hunters and not very surprisingly, one day I found myself reading about a technique called 'lucid dreaming'. Control your dreaming, it said, by following these easy instructions.

Well, if I could control what I dreamed about, it wouldn't be even half as interesting. 

The Conversationist

A conversation is like a game of table-tennis. To have a good one you need a good opponent who can give you a good rally. Yes, you need to listen, but you also have to actively participate. It never works otherwise. It's not a passive situation where you can take a backseat and let the other take all the responsibility of driving the tete-a-tete. A conversation is not a seminar, it is not a lecture, it is not pep-talk. There are reasons why those are not synonyms for conversation. A conversation needs nuances, it needs agility, it needs response.

X: Hey, what're you doing?

Y: Nothing much, just watching Perfume, the Story of a Murderer.

X: What's that?

Y: You know that movie where the protagonist makes perfumes from women's bodies after killing them?

X: No...

Y: Erm... The one where he was born with an extraordinary sense of smell...

X: No...

Y: You should watch it.

X: Okay.

Y: Do you want to download it? I can send you a link...

X: Maybe later.

Y: ...


How would you rate this conversation? I'd give it a maximum of 3 on a scale of 10. Do you know how this could have been a good conversation? Like this -
X: Hey, what're you doing?


Y: Nothing much, just watching Perfume, the Story of a Murderer.

X: What's that?

Y: You know that movie where the protagonist makes perfumes from women's bodies after killing them?

X: No... What's the story like?

Y: It's really weird! This guy is born with an extra sensitive nose and he's bent on making the best perfume in the world...

X: So why is it called a story of a murderer?

Y: Because he kills women to steal their body fragrances...

X: Woah! That's psycho!

Y: Do you want to download it? I cam send you a link...

X: Yeah why not? It's bizarre though...
Y: Well, do watch it and tell me how you liked it.

X: Will do...


Now that's more like it, isn't it?

Good conversationists are hard to find these days. I happen to be one of those people who find a good conversation highly erotic.

Mahalaya

1500 kilometers from home, some Bengali youths gathered on the fourth floor of the Academic Building of their University at 0400 hours on 15th October 2012. They came in varied attires and night clothes, some yawning, some rubbing their eyes, but all of them intent and excited, for one thing. That one thing was the elocution of Mahalaya.

They didn't have the authenticity of the Akashbani live telecast of the Mahalaya programme. All they had was pure devotion, to the tradition of beginning the best time of a Bengali life - Durga Puja.

For those unfamiliar with the concept of Mahalaya, it is the day when Maa Durga defeated the evil Mahishasur, restoring the world to peace and prosperity. Seven days from this day, the epitome of the good over evil will be worshiped. It is also the homecoming of the victorious, and us mortals rejoice in it to extents a non-Bengali cannot ever comprehend. Maa Durga is not just a deity who defeated evil for us, she is our very own mother and beloved daughter at the same time. The entire battle of Maa Durga and Mahishasur has been retold many times, but this particular rendition by Birendrakrishna Bhadra and his team is aired on the radio every year for all. It is an unwritten custom for many of us that we listen to it religiously, because if not anything, it is a beautiful form of elocution art.

Durga Puja has always been an integral part of my life, like all other Bengalis. This year, away from home, I feel the significance all the more. I can hardly wait to go back. Puja is not just a time for worship and prayer, it is also the time when families get together, friends re-unite and everybody is offered a piece of happiness. 

Every year, Puja brings new hopes. Hopes of conquering evil. Hopes of regaining lost strength. Hopes of a better day. Every year, Maa Durga saves us from the lurking demons -  ones we encounter every day, on the road, in our workplaces, in our homes, inside ourselves.

This year, Mahalaya not only sets off the homecoming for Maa Durga, it marks the homecoming for me too. I'm going home. 

Love and...

Here's my take on the mother of all cliches -

Love is like flying a kite. Sometimes you get cut.

Love is like flying a kite. If you catch the right wind, you can soar to heights you never thought you could.

Love is like flying a kite. It's no fun if there's no distance between the kite and the flier.

Love is like flying a kite. If you pull the string too taut, it breaks.

Love is like flying a kite. It doesn't cost much.

Love is like flying a kite. Even if you don't have your own kite, it is still a happy sight.

Love is like flying a kite. You need practice to get it right.

Love is like flying a kite. It can leave you totally breathless.

Kaleidoscope

Kaleidoscopes have always fascinated me. They are so simple, yet so beautiful. When I was a kid, I spent hours on end just rotating the cardboard tube and looking at all the myriad designs forming inside the cone. I think I still have one back at home. I wonder who invented these.

I like to think of my life as a kaleidoscope. It's made of a lot of ordinary simple things, but it's still beautiful.

The friends who are so weird that you can't live without them.

My family which is the reason I'm this crazy.

The roads I've walked, drove and passed.

The college that ground the brains out of me.

The skeezes who made me realize my own worth.

The poems I read but never understood, only my skin was left in goose-pimples.

The fairs I've been to and got lost.

The cats I cuddled on the road.

The last benches we carved our names on.

The wallets I lost, and lost more than money.

The best friend I found in my boyfriend.

The scars on my legs when I was learning to cycle.

The tears I wept that nobody knows about.

The burps that scandalize but also amuse my buds.

The flowers I picked from a far away hillside and pressed between books.

The autumn sky with clean white cotton clouds.

The smell of a brand new book in a musty store.

The vapours of a plate of warm khichdi on a rainy afternoon.

The old house with vines growing on its walls that I once called home.

The wind that blew tiny leaves in my face and hair.

The forks of lightning I viewed from an open terrace.

The make-believe stories I played out.

The reality which had once become make-belief.

The dates that went bad.

The movies that made me laugh and cry and swear.

The times I loved and lost, but learnt to love again.
  

To all those bits that make up my kaleidoscope every day -

Just Like That

Yesterday was my 22nd birthday. It passed just like that. Being twenty two doesn't feel any different from being twenty one. I don't feel any older, smarter or stronger. It wasn't a landmark point of my life.

It's funny how such dated days never brought any real significance to me. As for my birthdays, that one day in the year that's all, legitimately and irrevocably mine, they just seem to pass away like every other day. I wouldn't say they pass badly, but if you were to make a graph with a time line of a week before and a few days after, there wouldn't be a hike nor a dip in the line parallel to the Y-axis.

I don't remember having parties for my birthdays. There wasn't cake or candles or friends or food. Neither did many people wish me. I felt happy distributing sweetmeats to classmates in school and that was about it. If there's anything that Facebook has done good, it's its birthday reminder that makes some 99 odd people wish me on my wall.

In comparison to all that, this year 1st October was nice, if not anything else. Some of my friends did call me up at twelve to wish me. My boyfriend sent me a really beautiful e-card and posted a picture of a cake on my wall. We also skyped after ages. It was sweet. My best friend, also known as Methodist of Madness and a number of my hostel mates hugged me and stuff. We watched The Hangover II which probably wasn't a great idea, because that movie is freaky! The morning and afternoon were drab because the university campus was closed due to a Telengana strike. However then we got The Pirates of the Caribbean marathon started and things started to look up. The day ended with "happy birthday" sung by me best friends with two slices of cake and a candle. My other two best friends actually cooked for me! Cheese sandwich and scrambled eggs! No one's ever done that for me! I was overwhelmed.

And I was happy, just like that.

Independence

I've known a lot of clingy people. Sometimes, it cannot be helped because it's in there very nature. They are like creepers, they cannot survive without a support. There's nothing wrong with asking for help, but it is the whiny clingers that I can't handle.

These clingers will refuse to believe in independence as a good thing. They want you to accompany them everywhere: shopping, travelling, business and even the loo. 

However, it is the ones who can't think for themselves that lack the real independence. These people are so shallow that you probably couldn't drown a fly in them. Very easily influenced, these people are. Also they will take rash choices and make the worst kind of blunders, leaving you and me to get them back into shape. It's kind of difficult to explain this kind of intellectual bondage or superficiality. All these people will care about are clothes and shoes and looks, about how they look, about how to heckle others for attention and about what people think of them. They are incapable of thinking beyond the mundane existence. In fact, I feel they are incapable of any kind of independent thought whatsoever. They cannot even decide what they want to order at a restaurant. 

I really cannot understand this. How can you be like that? How can you not know what you want? How can you not understand what you feel abut a certain issue? I'm sure if you give it enough thought yourself, something will come out of it. May be these people are afraid of thinking alone. They are afraid of the consequences of their independent action, stemming from their independent thoughts. 

Being independent has nothing to do with having a lot of money, power and good looks. It's about the courage to think for yourself. It's about the courage to take your own decisions. It's about making your own choices. It's about the courage to be yourself, honestly, simply, with all your talents and shortcomings and qualities and flaws.

I consider myself independent in this context, do you?

God(dess)

My boyfriend gave me a book as a goodbye gift when I shifted to Hyderabad. It is called My God is a Woman. Honestly the book itself isn't as smart as its title which was the aspect that interested me the most.

Who is God?
Where is God?

Is it god or God?
Is it a 'he' or a 'she'?

As an India and a Hindu by birth, it's difficult for me to grasp the concept of a single masculine god, because for us there isn't one. We have an absolute array of deities (not gods, mind you) both male and female. But this post will not deal with religion per say, as that would be a separate topic altogether.

What I do want to talk about is the concept of GOD, assuming that it a singular entity.

How do you define God? Gamers use phrases like god-of-the-game. We often say an impressionable personality to be god-like. Hotbods become Greek-gods. But who is he/she? What does he/she look like? How old is he/she?

Where does god exist? Is god a concept or a reality? Would he/she continue to exist without the human consciousness? Where is this being, if he/she exists at all? Where do they live? Is it really possible for a single being to create, control and charter the entire universe?

I've always also wondered whether God is male or female. The primary public instinct is to think of this apparently all-powerful being as a man. At least, the newer religions that are primarily monotheistic propagate this viewpoint. I had gone to a Catholic Missionary school all my life. When I was young, I didn't mind the prayer services and attending the masses. Later I started to feel a conflict within me, because, even if my family isn't very religious at all, I had entirely different notions about God and divinity than what we heard in school.

All this questions and queries should suffice to indicate my agnosticism. And these questions stem from a confused childhood. I didn't know what to believe. My parents did not force me to be religious. I'm a non-follower of rituals, idolatry and scriptures. Yet, I'm not entirely decided about God. I don't know if they are real. I don't know what they are. And I like it this way.

But there is something I do know: My god is a woman.

My god is my strength. My god is my will power. My god is my good judgement. My god is my trust. My god is my honesty. My god is my endurance. My god is my gratitude. My god is my generosity. My god is my sense of justice.
No, I haven't met my god yet. I'm in her pursuit.  

Eternity

Time is considered a dimension. It's one of the most relative things I can think about. 

Eternity is a very weird thing. As humans it's impossible to grasp it's meaning, as the span of our consciousness is limited. However, all of us will vouch that we have felt it at some point or another, in some form or the other.

Time, for me, stretches into eternity when I'm waiting. Wait does seem to stretch itself out, doesn't it? 

Times when I wait for friends to arrive so that we can go shopping or whatever. 

When I wait for the two hour classes to end. 

When I wait for the sun to go down. 

When I wait for that special call. 

When I wait for the washing machine to finish churning my clothes into a soggy mess.

When I wait for the night to break into light.

When I wait for the food to be served while my stomach rumbles and growls.

When I wait for the download to finish.

When I wait for the power to come back on.

When I wait for the vacation to go home.

Even if we say that some of our waits never end, that they are for eternity, they actually do end when we do. It's a good thing that we don't get to experience the real eternity. It would've been mega boring to wait for that long.

Co-ordination

Clumsy. Klutz. Uncoordinated. That's me.

Sometimes I have trouble coordinating my left and right feet to go the same way. When I was younger, I frequently tripped over my own feet, without any apparent reason. I have a number of scars on my legs (and some also on my arms) to prove that.

At others, I have trouble coordinating my eyes and hands. My eyes are probably seeing that the object is coming towards me from my right, while my arms, with a mind completely of their own, make a grab either diametrically to the left, or on better occasions a little towards the center. No wonder I didn't make it any organized sports teams.

But I can live with that.

What really bothers me is that at times I cannot seem to coordinate my thoughts and my speech. I know what you're thinking. What a retard, right? Well let me explain briefly that it is not so. I have no problems getting my thoughts down on paper. But you ask me a question and I fumble. It's not that I don't know what to say. Usually I know exactly what I want to say. But my tongue too seems to have a separate brain from my thoughts-brain. And they just don't like each other. Often I get this feeling that even while I'm saying something, out loud that is, my brain has already thought twenty steps ahead, and I lose track of what I am currently saying. Which is definitely weird, I admit.

Talking too needs practice, like catching a ball and dancing to steps. I'm afraid I've never had much of that. Most of my conversations have been ones with myself. I know people who do not like IMs and texting. They would rather have a face to face encounter. I, on the other hand, feel comfortable with written words. Probably that's why I'm also a fast reader.

Not talking often enough might have made me an uncoordinated speaker, but that is also the reason I can write, the little whatever I can.

Best Friend

Whenever I come across posts and comments like "A good friend will ask you to share your lunch, a best friend will have eaten it already", I do wonder if that's what a best friend is all about.

We've all had "best friends" back in school. We'd always stick together, eat lunch together, walk home together, spend hours on the phone talking and giggling nonsensically. All those slumber parties, all those little notes passed in class. Our birthday parties would be incomplete without the best friend. We'd wait till they arrived before cutting the cake and blowing out the candles. They'd understand us like no one else.

As we get older, it starts to change. It would become about secrets. Trust. They'd be the first to know about our crushes. We'd spend hours talking about how cute the crush was and why they didn't like us back. Later when we'd get into relationships, all the boyfriend troubles would be whined about to the best friend. That's how it's always been.

It's sort of sad that I cannot remember having someone like that until a long time. I never left completely understood by another individual. No one seemed to share my interests. Also, I never really felt the need for a so-called best friend.

Yet, I've found some truly valuable friends in the most surprising ways. They have changed the entire definition of "best friends" for me. Now I know it's not about being similar, or even sharing similar interest. It's more about how much you can count on the other person. It's about how much you can be at peace with them. It's about how silences are no longer awkward. How you cannot stay mad at them even if they are annoying your guts out. They've taught me that girls and boys can be friends, and stay at that. They've taught me that age and sex don't matter.

I call them my precious friends.

P.S. This also includes my mother. And also my boyfriend.

Amateur

If I was asked to list things I'm good at, I'd be lost. It's easier to list things I can do. I can certainly do a lot of things, but I don't know if I'm good at any of those.

I write.
I sing.
I paint.
I'm into art and craft.
I can dance if I want to.
I collect stamps.
I read.

But I wouldn't call myself an expert in any of these fields. Maybe I have low self esteem, but it's true. At best, I am an amateur.

I like it though. I like thinking of myself as an amateur rather than an expert, because it keeps my options of improving and learning new things open. I like not being satiated with what I am. This way I can pardon myself more easily, can start again without embarrassment or shame. It wouldn't worry me much if I sucked at something, because I would always know that I would be starting as a novice.

I like being amateur at this.

The Blackbird

Okay, so it was just a crow. But it is worth writing about.

Today I saw a crow outside my hostel room window. And this is significant because there are NO birds in the campus. With the number of trees here, the lack of aviary life is unpleasantly surprising.

I was very excited to see my campus full of large trees. I was sure there would be like a zillion type of birds here. It's appalling that I've seem no, I repeat, NO birds other than some incessantly cooing pigeons. I think it is the lack of birds that makes the campus so eerily quiet once the dusk sets in.

However, there are a lot of butterflies. Apart from the fact that they don't sing, or make any kind of noise at all, their sheer variety almost makes up for the scarcity of the twittering, chirping and yes, sometimes cawing things.

There are two Flame trees right outside my window and if I get up early in the morning, I can be witness to this spectacular, multicoloured swarm of butterflies among the leaves. There are all possible colours imaginable, and many that aren't imaginable. Blue, red, pink, yellow, mauve, bottle green, vermilion and god knows what.

It sure is a pretty sight. But I still miss the birds.

Two Thousand and Five Hundred Miles Away From Home

I’ve spent over a month in the new city, in the new campus, in the new university and things could not have been more different. This might be a good time to confess that I’ve never been away from home for this long before.

Overwhelmed. That is the first feeling I could sift out of an entirely disarrayed mind. How was to fend for myself here?

Then came the familiar feeling of wanting to withdraw into my turtle shell and escape. But turtles are also known for their grit, so I stayed on.

Problems loomed large before me and I felt like an ant before a sand dune. Dear Lord! They assigned me a room on the fifth floor? And there’s no lift? How was I to survive climbing up and down this real-life sand dune for umpteen numbers of times every day for the rest of the semester? Why weren’t there any water dispensers on my floor? Do I really have to go all the way down to second floor to get drinking water? Oh why does my cupboard not close precisely?

For a few days i didn’t know what to eat and where to get it. The food was so alien to my taste buds that a just lived off bread and cheese for a few days. Then there was the indigestion. How my alimentary tract burned!

And I haven’t even started on the language yet. It is astonishing how narrowly regional we are. The only word I understand in Telegu is ‘Amma’. It was scary to think that I will not be able to communicate my needs, and my Hindi abysmal.

I have to do my own laundry, iron my clothes myself, and make breakfast on my own. Apart from that, I have to do the shopping, fixing, cleaning by myself as well. Did I mention the lessons and assignments and deadlines? I guess you would have got the drift by now.

But I’m not going to crib about this. I’m going to put all of it in a box and seal it up with tape, because I’ve begun learning a precious few things that home couldn’t teach me all this while.

Que sera sera.

The Non-shopaholic

Believe me or not, I don't enjoy shopping.

I've noticed how others go crazy over sales and some of them must shop every season or they go into spells of morbidity that are too much to take. Compulsive shopping is something quite alien to me. At times, people even view this as a disorder. "What? You don't like to shop? And you're a girl?" they say to me. Ignoring the particularly overtly sexist overtones, I find myself strangely disinterested in indulgent-shopping.

It's not like I don't shop. There are loads of items of daily need that must be purchased: soap, toothpaste, pens and stationery. However I cannot share the sentiments of some of my friends who feel filial loss if they fail to participate in the ongoing sale season.

My shopping is limited to requirements. If I don't need a new pair of shoes, I don't feel like buying one. Unless my watch stops beyond repair, the prospect of buying another simply does not occur to me. Likewise, If there's no definite purpose, I hate hanging out in malls, looking at stuff I'm never going to buy (or need for that matter) in large glass windows.

Recently I'd been to the shoppers' heaven in Delhi, Janpat, with a friend. There was so much on sale - silver earrings, multi-coloured scarves, hoards of bags of all sizes, shoes, trendy tshirts, home decor and what not! My friend reckons I'm the only person who went in and out of Janpat without having bought anything. It was weird.

Yet, there is one place my inner-shopper comes out - a book store. I spend my entire year's savings in the annual bookfair in my city. I could spend all day in a book store, be it in College Street (the book lovers' paradise in Kolkata) or the fashionable Starmarks in South City Mall. I never run out of the need to but books. I buy books I don't need  and badly need, books I like and highly detest. Only when I come home laden with books that weigh more than myself do I have that glowing smile on my face like Isla Fisher in Confessions of a Shopaholic.

I wonder what this makes me, a bookaholic perhaps.

On Visiting the National Capital

New Delhi. The Washington DC of India.

Smooth, wide roads.  Numerous fly-overs. Manicured gardens. Extensive shopping malls. Historical buildings. Ginormous university campus. One-minute service Metro.

For an all time Calcuttan like me, it was overwhelming.

Delhi is so much bigger than Calcutta. It has so many things my home town doesn't: discipline, cleanliness, space, luxury, fashion...

When I got back, however, I realized Delhi will never have something Calcutta has: Dark, steel-grey, heavily rain-laden monsoon clouds.