Very few things we do these days without looking at the watch every now and then. The deadline at work, the hurry to get home, the eagerness to finish a chore on time -- really, when was the last time you told yourself: "Ah, today I have all the time in the world!"
This Sunday though, for a change, I had all the time in the world as I invited eight friends over for lunch and cooked for them. It was a pleasure to watch them sitting in a circle around the dining table and drinking chilled beer and discussing movies and stuff while I prepared egg curry, dum aloo and rice in the kitchen. One of them had brought puris, another had got rasam and yet another salad. It was going to be one nice meal.
Before we sat down for lunch, I helped myself to three -- or was it four? -- large Bacardis. It was a way of rewarding myself for having done a good job in the kitchen. Those who know me well know that when I have guests over and when alcohol flows, I become the DJ. And so I let Kishore Kumar loose on them: Piya Ka Ghar, Khatta Meetha, Sitamgar...
Finally, some of them started looking at the clock. They had to leave soon. Lunch was served. Even as they ate, four of us, including Baradwaj Rangan, who shares my love for the 1970's and 80's and the unforgettable music created during those decades, lingered over our drinks.
The Kishore Kumar song playing in the background was: Pyaar pyaar pyaar pyaar, pyaar tu karle / chaar chaar chaar, aankhen chaar tu karle. It is from a film called Suraag, a thriller starring Sanjeev Kumar that I watched on Doordarshan many, many years ago. The storyline is long forgotten, but the thrill and the song remain fresh in my mind. For many years, I tried to get hold of a DVD of the film but in vain. The absence of this movie from the shelves of music stores began to get mysterious. Finally, the mystery was unravelled by the director himself. "You will not find a DVD because I never sold the video rights. The print must be lying somewhere here in Madras," Jagmohan Mundhra, best known for making adult movies, told me one afternoon in 2007. It was a revelation for me that Suraag was his movie -- in fact, the very first film he directed. I begged him to collect the print and sell the video rights so that I could watch the film again. Mundhra, who was in his mid-fifties at the time, said he would do something about it.
So last Sunday, as the song played in the background, I boasted to my friends about my long meeting with Jag Mundhra and told them that I was planning to message him on Facebook and ask him to release Suraag on video (Mundhra and I went on to become Facebook friends).
"But dude, isn't he already dead?" Baradwaj asked.
"Can't be. He is on the list of my Facebook friends. Only the other day I saw someone tagging him."
"No dude, he died last year," Baradwaj said, as he got up to run a Google search on my desktop. Jagmohan Mundhra was indeed dead. The news didn't hit me hard because I was somewhat drunk. The news was stale anyway.
After the last of the guests left, I went off to sleep and woke up at nine in the evening with a crippling headache. Even then, the first thought that crossed my mind, as I woke up, was: Is Jagmohan Mundhra really dead? This time I ran a Google search myself on my netbook. He was indeed dead. I felt very sad.
As I read online the belated news about his death, more bad news awaited me in the form of accompanying links. Navin Nischol was dead too, and so was art director Samir Chanda, who I had met on the sets of Guru -- which happened to be the offices of the New Indian Express -- as recently as in 2006. It was Mithun Chakraborthy who had introduced me to Chanda, a man barely in his forties, who shyly shook my hand. He was dead too!
All these people died last year -- in 2011 -- and I did not even know about it! For that matter, it was only today that I got to know that Yunus Pervez is also no more -- he died in 2007. It is bad enough not to know when people die, but worse when you confidently believe that they are still alive while the rest of the world has already paid their last tributes. Such confidence stems from ignorance and it may not be such a bad thing after all -- people like Navin Nischol or Yunus Pervez can never be dead for the members of my generation because they defined that generation.
But how come I didn't get to know about their passing on? What was I doing in 2011? Now I remember what I was doing. I was too busy looking at the watch.
Tuesday, April 10, 2012
Tuesday, April 03, 2012
Tamarind, Sweet And Sour
This evening the call finally came: that Tamarind City, my portrait of Chennai, is out of the press. A copy should reach me in a day or two, and the book should be hitting the stores in about ten days.
Unlike Chai, Chai, whose draft got transferred straight from my head to the printing press without being subjected to rewriting or even editing, Tamarind City is the result of hard work. One could have always worked harder, of course, but there is no end to it: at some point you have to tell yourself, "OK, this is it. I can't work any harder."
For a year and a half until the end of 2011, I had hardly any social life -- or personal life, for that matter -- to speak of. Almost every waking hour outside the office was spent working on Tamarind City. During these dark months, when I was blind to everything else in this world except the laptop screen, the possibility of my seeing or holding the book in published form seemed remote. Very remote. It would feel as if the book would forever remain a word document on my computer.
Today, that remote possibility has become reality. Tamarind City is no longer an idea in my head: it has finally taken the shape of a book that will reach the bookstores in less than two weeks. Considering all the struggle that went into its writing, I should have been elated when I got the call this evening. But far from it. It doesn't matter anymore.
I have realised by now that if I want to be a writer, my entire life is going to be one long struggle, and that it would be stupid to celebrate the end of one struggle without realising that another round of struggle is waiting round the corner.
At the moment yet another unwritten book is staring me in the face. It's an ambitious book: a portrait of present-day Calcutta. I don't want to spend two years writing it: I will be too old by the time it comes out. At the same time, I cannot afford to spend sufficient time in Calcutta because I now have a job that is going to keep me firmly anchored to Chennai. On top of it, I seem to be enjoying the job, as a result of which I find the sensations of Calcutta fading and the memories blurring.
I am, however, determined to set the Calcutta book rolling before I feel good about the publication of Tamarind City. I find overlaps more assuring than long gaps.
Unlike Chai, Chai, whose draft got transferred straight from my head to the printing press without being subjected to rewriting or even editing, Tamarind City is the result of hard work. One could have always worked harder, of course, but there is no end to it: at some point you have to tell yourself, "OK, this is it. I can't work any harder."
For a year and a half until the end of 2011, I had hardly any social life -- or personal life, for that matter -- to speak of. Almost every waking hour outside the office was spent working on Tamarind City. During these dark months, when I was blind to everything else in this world except the laptop screen, the possibility of my seeing or holding the book in published form seemed remote. Very remote. It would feel as if the book would forever remain a word document on my computer.
Today, that remote possibility has become reality. Tamarind City is no longer an idea in my head: it has finally taken the shape of a book that will reach the bookstores in less than two weeks. Considering all the struggle that went into its writing, I should have been elated when I got the call this evening. But far from it. It doesn't matter anymore.
I have realised by now that if I want to be a writer, my entire life is going to be one long struggle, and that it would be stupid to celebrate the end of one struggle without realising that another round of struggle is waiting round the corner.
At the moment yet another unwritten book is staring me in the face. It's an ambitious book: a portrait of present-day Calcutta. I don't want to spend two years writing it: I will be too old by the time it comes out. At the same time, I cannot afford to spend sufficient time in Calcutta because I now have a job that is going to keep me firmly anchored to Chennai. On top of it, I seem to be enjoying the job, as a result of which I find the sensations of Calcutta fading and the memories blurring.
I am, however, determined to set the Calcutta book rolling before I feel good about the publication of Tamarind City. I find overlaps more assuring than long gaps.
Sunday, March 25, 2012
A Book Launch That Almost Happened
The news of the Bengali actor Soumitra Chatterjee being awarded the Dadasaheb Phalke Award brought back some memories.
In December 2009, Chai, Chai had just been published and I was in the middle of promoting the book in various cities. I had already done Chennai, Bangalore, Mumbai and Pune, while Delhi -- the final city on my itinerary -- remained to be covered. As for Calcutta, I was still in two minds whether to have a reading there -- one reason being I was yet to find a local celebrity who could read from the book.
Books launches can be a pain for a first-time writer. If the book happens to be doing well, the bookstore will gladly give you space for the launch, while the publisher will pay for the cookies and the coffee and make sure that a few dozen copies are available at the store during the function, but the onus of finding a celebrity to launch the book or read from it lies squarely on the author. Things change when the writer becomes a celebrity, but there could be several long years standing in between the first book and that book.
I had a tough time finding celebrities in cities alien to me. For Mumbai, a friend had suggested the name of a particular theatre actor, known for his powerful personality and voice. "If I put in a word, he will definitely do it for you. Consider it done, brother!" my friend assured me. I jumped with joy: the theatre actor, who played a key role in a path-breaking TV serial in the late eighties, was my hero once upon a time. Every boy in my class idolised him, and now the same man was going to read from my book -- unbelievable!
I dialled the number of my idol and had a brief chat with him. He was extremely warm and courteous. He said he liked the idea of Chai, Chai and asked me to courier a copy, which I promptly did. Ten days later, he called. "Bishwanath, I would like to do it for you," he said very politely, "but you know, I get paid for lending my voice. Usually it is Rs. 50,000 for 30 seconds. I hope you understand."
I instantly lost interest in him and wanted him to hang up so that I could make calls to arrange for another celebrity. But he wouldn't let go of the phone: he spoke to me for 45 minutes, lamenting how theatre artists of today are not as dedicated and well-read as those from his generation. Forty-five minutes! -- he had wasted voice-time worth Rs. 45 lakh on me. And yet he did not want to spend 10 minutes reading from my book.
Eventually, it all worked out well. But as far as Calcutta was concerned, I still couldn't think of a celebrity.
"Why don't we try for Soumitra Chatterjee?" my wife asked.
"Why should he bother reading from my book? He is too big," I protested.
"What's the harm in trying," the wife, always optimistic, retorted. She went on to assign a friend to speak to Mr. Chatterjee and work on him into agreeing to read from the book. The friend called back, ecstatic, saying that Mr. Chatterjee was open to the idea but did not want to commit without having a word with the author.
I became very nervous. Soumitra Chatterjee, a household name in Bengal and the favourite actor of Satyajit Ray -- why should he bother reading from the debut book of a writer he does not even know remotely? The very thought of sitting next to him embarrassed me deeply and I abandoned the idea, much to the irritation of my wife and her friend.
"Let's try other options," I told her. On the advice of my own friends in Calcutta, I sent text messages to Moon Moon Sen, who never replied, and to singer-director-actor Anjan Dutt, who instantly called back asking, "Why do you want to speak to me?"
Now I am a huge fan of Anjan Dutt: he is a nostalgia specialist whose songs have made me understand Bengalis better, and nothing could have worked better for Chai, Chai in Calcutta than him reading out passages from it. But he seemed too busy to commit on the date I had in mind. Each time I called him, he would say he was trying his best to be free on that day. After four or five calls to him I gave up the idea of going to Calcutta.
"Not all is lost," the wife said, "You can still call Soumitra Chatterjee."
I finally listened to her and called Soumitra Chatterjee's mobile number. The conversation went exactly like this:
"Am I speaking to Mr. Chatterjee?"
"Yes."
"Good morning, sir. I am so-and-so who has written a book called Chai, Chai. I am launching the book in Calcutta on such-and-such date, and I would like you to read from it."
"OK, fine," he tamely agreed. "You mark the passages you want me to read."
I was surprised as well as thrilled -- more surprised than thrilled. I mean, how can Soumitra Chatterjee agree so readily?
"Are you sure, sir?" I asked. "I was hoping that you read the book and choose the passages yourself. Can I please send the book to you?"
"OK, send it," he replied lifelessly.
"Great, sir. Can I have your postal address, please?"
"OK, fine. Note it down then. But did you by any chance want to speak to Soumitra Chatterjee?"
"Er, yes."
"I am not Soumitra Chatterjee. I am his son Saugato Chatterjee."
"I am so sorry, sir, I am really sorry. I actually meant to speak to your father."
The voice on the other end fell silent. I could sense the hurt. The awkwardness made it easier for me to hang up.
Two days later, I spoke to the legend himself. This time, it was a lively voice that greeted me, and he did not ask me to mark passages but instead asked to be excused -- that's what you expect of a real celebrity.
"I am so sorry, I am going to be in Nagpur on that day," the Soumitra Chatterjee told me.
"But I would still like you to read the book. Can I please send it to you?"
"By all means," the legend replied. "Here's my address, note it down."
To tell you the truth, I don't quite remember whether I actually sent a copy of Chai, Chai to Soumitra Chatterjee. But I distinctly remember telling myself, "Fuck it, enough of launches. Now get down to working on your next book." And so I opened a fresh word document and wrote the first few paras of Tamarind City.
In December 2009, Chai, Chai had just been published and I was in the middle of promoting the book in various cities. I had already done Chennai, Bangalore, Mumbai and Pune, while Delhi -- the final city on my itinerary -- remained to be covered. As for Calcutta, I was still in two minds whether to have a reading there -- one reason being I was yet to find a local celebrity who could read from the book.
Books launches can be a pain for a first-time writer. If the book happens to be doing well, the bookstore will gladly give you space for the launch, while the publisher will pay for the cookies and the coffee and make sure that a few dozen copies are available at the store during the function, but the onus of finding a celebrity to launch the book or read from it lies squarely on the author. Things change when the writer becomes a celebrity, but there could be several long years standing in between the first book and that book.
I had a tough time finding celebrities in cities alien to me. For Mumbai, a friend had suggested the name of a particular theatre actor, known for his powerful personality and voice. "If I put in a word, he will definitely do it for you. Consider it done, brother!" my friend assured me. I jumped with joy: the theatre actor, who played a key role in a path-breaking TV serial in the late eighties, was my hero once upon a time. Every boy in my class idolised him, and now the same man was going to read from my book -- unbelievable!
I dialled the number of my idol and had a brief chat with him. He was extremely warm and courteous. He said he liked the idea of Chai, Chai and asked me to courier a copy, which I promptly did. Ten days later, he called. "Bishwanath, I would like to do it for you," he said very politely, "but you know, I get paid for lending my voice. Usually it is Rs. 50,000 for 30 seconds. I hope you understand."
I instantly lost interest in him and wanted him to hang up so that I could make calls to arrange for another celebrity. But he wouldn't let go of the phone: he spoke to me for 45 minutes, lamenting how theatre artists of today are not as dedicated and well-read as those from his generation. Forty-five minutes! -- he had wasted voice-time worth Rs. 45 lakh on me. And yet he did not want to spend 10 minutes reading from my book.
Eventually, it all worked out well. But as far as Calcutta was concerned, I still couldn't think of a celebrity.
"Why don't we try for Soumitra Chatterjee?" my wife asked.
"Why should he bother reading from my book? He is too big," I protested.
"What's the harm in trying," the wife, always optimistic, retorted. She went on to assign a friend to speak to Mr. Chatterjee and work on him into agreeing to read from the book. The friend called back, ecstatic, saying that Mr. Chatterjee was open to the idea but did not want to commit without having a word with the author.
I became very nervous. Soumitra Chatterjee, a household name in Bengal and the favourite actor of Satyajit Ray -- why should he bother reading from the debut book of a writer he does not even know remotely? The very thought of sitting next to him embarrassed me deeply and I abandoned the idea, much to the irritation of my wife and her friend.
"Let's try other options," I told her. On the advice of my own friends in Calcutta, I sent text messages to Moon Moon Sen, who never replied, and to singer-director-actor Anjan Dutt, who instantly called back asking, "Why do you want to speak to me?"
Now I am a huge fan of Anjan Dutt: he is a nostalgia specialist whose songs have made me understand Bengalis better, and nothing could have worked better for Chai, Chai in Calcutta than him reading out passages from it. But he seemed too busy to commit on the date I had in mind. Each time I called him, he would say he was trying his best to be free on that day. After four or five calls to him I gave up the idea of going to Calcutta.
"Not all is lost," the wife said, "You can still call Soumitra Chatterjee."
I finally listened to her and called Soumitra Chatterjee's mobile number. The conversation went exactly like this:
"Am I speaking to Mr. Chatterjee?"
"Yes."
"Good morning, sir. I am so-and-so who has written a book called Chai, Chai. I am launching the book in Calcutta on such-and-such date, and I would like you to read from it."
"OK, fine," he tamely agreed. "You mark the passages you want me to read."
I was surprised as well as thrilled -- more surprised than thrilled. I mean, how can Soumitra Chatterjee agree so readily?
"Are you sure, sir?" I asked. "I was hoping that you read the book and choose the passages yourself. Can I please send the book to you?"
"OK, send it," he replied lifelessly.
"Great, sir. Can I have your postal address, please?"
"OK, fine. Note it down then. But did you by any chance want to speak to Soumitra Chatterjee?"
"Er, yes."
"I am not Soumitra Chatterjee. I am his son Saugato Chatterjee."
"I am so sorry, sir, I am really sorry. I actually meant to speak to your father."
The voice on the other end fell silent. I could sense the hurt. The awkwardness made it easier for me to hang up.
Two days later, I spoke to the legend himself. This time, it was a lively voice that greeted me, and he did not ask me to mark passages but instead asked to be excused -- that's what you expect of a real celebrity.
"I am so sorry, I am going to be in Nagpur on that day," the Soumitra Chatterjee told me.
"But I would still like you to read the book. Can I please send it to you?"
"By all means," the legend replied. "Here's my address, note it down."
To tell you the truth, I don't quite remember whether I actually sent a copy of Chai, Chai to Soumitra Chatterjee. But I distinctly remember telling myself, "Fuck it, enough of launches. Now get down to working on your next book." And so I opened a fresh word document and wrote the first few paras of Tamarind City.
Friday, March 16, 2012
The Blogger Interviewed
Blogadda interviews the man behind Ganga Mail:
Q: When and why did you start blogging?
I started blogging in October 2005. Some of the people who read me in the New Sunday Express suggested that I should start a blog. At the time I wasn’t very sure what a blog was – I only had a vague idea – and wondered if sane people ever blogged. They then showed me some of the popular blogs and I told myself: ‘I too have things to say – things I can’t always say in the paper – so why don’t I start a blog of my own?’
Q: What topics do you generally blog about?
I try to blog about things that matter to people; and very often, it is the smallest of things that matter the most. If I were to write about a trip to Switzerland, people may like it and say nice things, but if I were to describe a visit to my hometown after several years, it would instantly strike a chord because most working people invariably leave their hometowns behind. The idea is to strike a chord. When they read me, they should wonder, "How is he able to read our thoughts so accurately!" That’s the truest reward for a writer.
Q: Do you ever get stuck when writing an entry? What do you do then?
Occasionally, yes. Usually I sleep over such entries, which is easy because most of my posts are written post-midnight. I revisit them the night after and if they are worth it, I try to salvage them. Or else I click on the ‘delete’ button. Deletion of drafts is more frequent now, because these days I am very conscious about what I write – maybe because I am now older, married, a published writer and hold a fairly respectable position in a highly respected newspaper, and know far more people than I ever knew. This was not the case in the initial years, when I expressed my thoughts with utmost honesty without an invisible force trying to restrain me. Maybe I should go back to my old ways, because Ganga Mail earned a distinct identity because of the honesty.
Q: Why did you name your blog as 'On The Ganga Mail'? Explain us your thought process while deciding the name.
The blog, incidentally, was called 'Thought Process' when I started it. I was not very happy with the title, but at the same time I wasn’t quite sure if people were going to read my blog so I did not bother changing it. In 2004, I had spent two months in Uttar Pradesh covering the Lok Sabha elections, and during that period I happened to spend considerable time on the banks of the Ganga – Rishikesh, Haridwar, Kanpur, Allahabad. It struck me how the Ganga was symbolic of a train, originating from Gangotri and terminating at the Bay of Bengal – when the train starts its journey, the coaches are almost empty and clean but as it travels further down the Hindi heartland, it gets crowded and dirty. And so I wrote a travel piece, headlined 'On The Ganga Mail', likening the Ganga to a long-distance train. I fell in love with the headline (I had myself given it) and adopted it for the blog once I grew weary of 'Thought Process'. After all, I grew up by the Ganga – that’s my truest identity.
Q: We have seen you craft many short yet beautiful poems on your blog. What inspires you to write a poem instead of a post? Which poem of yours do you like the most and why?
Those poems were written mainly to impress certain women I knew back then (let me hasten to add that I was a bachelor at the time). I can’t say for sure if those women were impressed, but yes, I was myself quite impressed with some of the poems I wrote, especially Dream.
Q: Tamarind City, based on Chennai, is your next book expected to hit the stands in April. The day you completed writing this book was also the day you completed 11 years in the city. Tell us more about this book. Sum up your stay of 11 years in Chennai.
There are several books and travelogues about Delhi, Bombay and Calcutta but practically none about Chennai, which happens to be older than the other three cities. Chennai was born in 1640, Calcutta only in 1690 – Delhi was still a medieval city back then, known by the name of Shahjahanabad, while Bombay was only a group of Portuguese-controlled islands. So I thought it was about time that someone cleared the fog of ignorance shrouding Chennai and presented the city, in the form of a book, to readers across the country, and perhaps the world. As for my stay of 11 years in the city, all I can say is that whatever little standing I enjoy as a writer today is because of Chennai. It has let me be.
Q: You are currently working as the Deputy Editor at The Hindu. Did you ever think of becoming an author earlier, when you were starting your career with journalism? What thoughts triggered Chai, Chai, your debut book?
I always wanted to be a journalist because of the power it gives you to reach out to the masses. Also as a journalist, you can walk in just about anywhere – from the local police station to a minister’s house. Even if they want to throw you out, they will do so very politely. I also wanted to be a writer – Khushwant Singh was my hero back then! – but that was more of a dream which I wasn’t sure would ever come true. For a long time, I was only a reporter, a political reporter. Only after I moved from Delhi to Chennai in 2001 that I realised, thanks to the reader response, that a good and engaging piece of writing is all that counts – doesn’t matter whether you are writing about politics or hospitals or travel. And so I started working on my craft. In 2006, I was approached by the publishers, who wanted me to do a travel book that was different. That’s how the idea of Chai, Chai was born.
Q: As a Deputy Editor, there might have been times when you wanted to publish some stories, but could not. What are the reasons editors have to face such situations? What did you do, when you were in such or similar situations?
There has never been a situation when I wrote something or wanted to write something that was not considered publication-worthy. As a responsible newspaperman, I have a fair idea what is publication-worthy and what is not.
Q: Travelling seems to be something very close to your heart. So far, which trips have been your most cherished ones and what memories did you collect from them? Are travelling and discovering places therapeutic for you?
If you don’t travel, you continue to live in a well. Having said that, let me also add that mere globe-trotting does not make you the most enlightened person on earth. You may go to Paris and see the Eiffel Tower but if you don’t mingle with Parisians and visit the cafes – like Hemingway or Henry Miller did – all the money you’ve spent on the trip has gone waste and you will continue to live in the well. Travelling is not about sightseeing, but knowing and understanding the people. People define a place, after all, and not monuments. Sri Lanka does not have an Eiffel Tower, but the cheerful nature of its people – typical islanders – in the face of a prolonged strife is a monument by itself. I shall never forget the trips I made to Sri Lanka in 2004 and 2005. Meeting new people is not just therapeutic, it is an education.
Q: We also notice your great interest in Hindi movies and songs. Which is the era that you like the most, when it comes to watching movies? What do you find lacking in “today’s cinema”, and what do you enjoy the most about it? Share some of your favorite movies and songs.
Songs and movies from the 1970’s and 80’s work best for me, and that’s because I grew up in that era. But I have nothing against today’s cinema. They make pretty good movies, some of which I watch. But as far as film music goes, I would say the 70’s and 80’s was the golden era – their songs are not counted as oldies but as classics, be it Hindi or Tamil. The songs of Kishore Kumar and R.D. Burman are food for my soul – they make me feel happy that I am alive.
Q: Ganga Mail was born out of loneliness – the unmarried man that you were in 2005 said this. Ganga Mail made you write some posts that were honest and free of the fear of being judged and also made you learn the art of finding a story from an experience. Tell us how Ganga Mail has helped you evolve as a person and what did it teach you? Does your family follow your blog?
Ganga Mail records my life from the age of thirty-five, when I started blogging. It has served as my personal diary, my companion, my conscience-keeper, my spokesman, my confession box. It made me accountable to myself – considering that whatever I wrote was in public domain. That’s how the evolution began – as a person and a writer – because Ganga Mail became a tool for introspection. You don’t grow unless you introspect. Yes, my family – whatever the word stands for – follows my blog.
Q: You created a character named Shivani in 2009 on your blog. What was the purpose behind sharing her fictional story? Was her story inspired by a real character or a situation that you experienced or observed?
Shivani is based on a real person. One evening I happened to be chatting – online – with someone I’d known socially for a long time. This was in February 2009, as far as I can recall. During the course of our conversation, she asked me (I forget the context): "But how well do you know me?" I told her that I knew her well enough to write a lengthy piece on her. The fact is that I hardly knew her, but it wasn’t difficult at all to imagine the story of a woman her age – she was nearly forty then. All married Indian women who are forty have nearly the same story. They would have spent their entire lives being a dutiful daughter, a dutiful wife and a dutiful mother. It’s only when they reach the age of forty or so – when the children are grown up – that they finally get time to introspect and look back at their lives. The Shivani blog sought to capture that introspection, and that is why it struck a chord with readers, including my friend who kept wondering how I knew her so well.
Q: What is your series – 'Life in a Metro' – in the national daily, The Hindu, all about? What kind of stories do you share there? How long have you been writing this column?
It was a slice-of-life column I wrote for nearly 10 months. I stopped it last week, in spite of the popularity it seemed to have attained in a short span, simply because I did not have the time. Column-writing is a full-time commitment, which you can’t afford when you have pressing demands at work or when you’ve signed contracts to write more books.
Q: There are dozens of people who loathe the way Indian journalism has turned out to be. Being in this profession, what are your thoughts on the way the industry operates? What are the strong and weak points of this industry, according to you?
Journalism is no longer the same ever since television turned 24/7. Today, much of what you see or read is sensationalism and not journalism.
Q: Do you promote your blog? What promotional techniques work best for you and why?
No, I don’t promote my blog.
Q: How important is it for the blogger to interact with their readers? Do you respond to all the comments that you receive?
Writing a post can be enervating. Once you have finished saying what you wanted to say, you just want to move on. Which is why, even though I value the comments and cherish them, I find the thought of revisiting the subject by way of replying to comments too tiring. This may not be the right thing to do, though, and ideally I should acknowledge every comment I receive.
Q: What do you find to be the most gratifying aspect of blogging?
The fact that you get published instantly. Also, blogging can be a good net practice for real writing – I mean writing books. It helps you practice your strokes, build your stamina and evolve a style of your own. Moreover, reaction of the readers tells you whether you are headed in the right direction. If your posts are readable, your books are most likely going to be readable too – provided you don’t get carried away too much by the praise your posts receive.
Q: How, in general, would you rate the quality of Indian blogs? Share your favourite five blogs.
Some of the blogs are really, really good — there are people who make me wish I could write like them. Unfortunately, of late, I have hardly been looking up people’s blog, mainly due to paucity of time. But every now and then, I read Diptakirti’s Calcutta Chromosome and Desi Babu’s Peanut Express. I identify with their style of writing – simple yet profound.
Q: What is your advice to someone who wants to start a blog?
Just be yourself. Don’t pretend to be someone you are not. Write from your heart – and soon you will evolve a style of your own.
Q: Do you earn revenue through your blog? How does one go about it?
I am yet to earn money from my blog. It’s been three years since I put ads on the blog, but the revenue is yet to cross the 100-dollar mark (you get paid once your earnings cross 100 dollars). Last time I checked the figure was still hovering around 60 dollars. Yes, once I did get paid 150 dollars for placing the link of a US-based website on the sidebar. I bought a tennis racquet with that money. Subsequently, I got similar offers from a few other websites, but it is no fun meddling with your template for small sums.
Q: According to you, what is the future of Blogging?
I think Twitter has done some damage to the blog. In the sense that – to give you an example – earlier you read Amitabh Bachchan’s blogs, but now you follow his tweets. But the damage is limited. There will always be a readership for good writing, and more and more bloggers – the ones that write well – will find their works being published in print.
Q: Let’s conclude off with a few favorites.
Color: Black, white.
Movie: The Departed.
TV Show: I don’t watch TV.
Book: Tropic of Cancer.
Time of Day: Post-midnight.
Your Zodiac Sign: Capricorn
Thank you Bishwanath for taking us through this journey. Every stopover in this journey taught us something. We are sure our readers felt the same as well.
Q: When and why did you start blogging?
I started blogging in October 2005. Some of the people who read me in the New Sunday Express suggested that I should start a blog. At the time I wasn’t very sure what a blog was – I only had a vague idea – and wondered if sane people ever blogged. They then showed me some of the popular blogs and I told myself: ‘I too have things to say – things I can’t always say in the paper – so why don’t I start a blog of my own?’
Q: What topics do you generally blog about?
I try to blog about things that matter to people; and very often, it is the smallest of things that matter the most. If I were to write about a trip to Switzerland, people may like it and say nice things, but if I were to describe a visit to my hometown after several years, it would instantly strike a chord because most working people invariably leave their hometowns behind. The idea is to strike a chord. When they read me, they should wonder, "How is he able to read our thoughts so accurately!" That’s the truest reward for a writer.
Q: Do you ever get stuck when writing an entry? What do you do then?
Occasionally, yes. Usually I sleep over such entries, which is easy because most of my posts are written post-midnight. I revisit them the night after and if they are worth it, I try to salvage them. Or else I click on the ‘delete’ button. Deletion of drafts is more frequent now, because these days I am very conscious about what I write – maybe because I am now older, married, a published writer and hold a fairly respectable position in a highly respected newspaper, and know far more people than I ever knew. This was not the case in the initial years, when I expressed my thoughts with utmost honesty without an invisible force trying to restrain me. Maybe I should go back to my old ways, because Ganga Mail earned a distinct identity because of the honesty.
Q: Why did you name your blog as 'On The Ganga Mail'? Explain us your thought process while deciding the name.
The blog, incidentally, was called 'Thought Process' when I started it. I was not very happy with the title, but at the same time I wasn’t quite sure if people were going to read my blog so I did not bother changing it. In 2004, I had spent two months in Uttar Pradesh covering the Lok Sabha elections, and during that period I happened to spend considerable time on the banks of the Ganga – Rishikesh, Haridwar, Kanpur, Allahabad. It struck me how the Ganga was symbolic of a train, originating from Gangotri and terminating at the Bay of Bengal – when the train starts its journey, the coaches are almost empty and clean but as it travels further down the Hindi heartland, it gets crowded and dirty. And so I wrote a travel piece, headlined 'On The Ganga Mail', likening the Ganga to a long-distance train. I fell in love with the headline (I had myself given it) and adopted it for the blog once I grew weary of 'Thought Process'. After all, I grew up by the Ganga – that’s my truest identity.
Q: We have seen you craft many short yet beautiful poems on your blog. What inspires you to write a poem instead of a post? Which poem of yours do you like the most and why?
Those poems were written mainly to impress certain women I knew back then (let me hasten to add that I was a bachelor at the time). I can’t say for sure if those women were impressed, but yes, I was myself quite impressed with some of the poems I wrote, especially Dream.
Q: Tamarind City, based on Chennai, is your next book expected to hit the stands in April. The day you completed writing this book was also the day you completed 11 years in the city. Tell us more about this book. Sum up your stay of 11 years in Chennai.
There are several books and travelogues about Delhi, Bombay and Calcutta but practically none about Chennai, which happens to be older than the other three cities. Chennai was born in 1640, Calcutta only in 1690 – Delhi was still a medieval city back then, known by the name of Shahjahanabad, while Bombay was only a group of Portuguese-controlled islands. So I thought it was about time that someone cleared the fog of ignorance shrouding Chennai and presented the city, in the form of a book, to readers across the country, and perhaps the world. As for my stay of 11 years in the city, all I can say is that whatever little standing I enjoy as a writer today is because of Chennai. It has let me be.
Q: You are currently working as the Deputy Editor at The Hindu. Did you ever think of becoming an author earlier, when you were starting your career with journalism? What thoughts triggered Chai, Chai, your debut book?
I always wanted to be a journalist because of the power it gives you to reach out to the masses. Also as a journalist, you can walk in just about anywhere – from the local police station to a minister’s house. Even if they want to throw you out, they will do so very politely. I also wanted to be a writer – Khushwant Singh was my hero back then! – but that was more of a dream which I wasn’t sure would ever come true. For a long time, I was only a reporter, a political reporter. Only after I moved from Delhi to Chennai in 2001 that I realised, thanks to the reader response, that a good and engaging piece of writing is all that counts – doesn’t matter whether you are writing about politics or hospitals or travel. And so I started working on my craft. In 2006, I was approached by the publishers, who wanted me to do a travel book that was different. That’s how the idea of Chai, Chai was born.
Q: As a Deputy Editor, there might have been times when you wanted to publish some stories, but could not. What are the reasons editors have to face such situations? What did you do, when you were in such or similar situations?
There has never been a situation when I wrote something or wanted to write something that was not considered publication-worthy. As a responsible newspaperman, I have a fair idea what is publication-worthy and what is not.
Q: Travelling seems to be something very close to your heart. So far, which trips have been your most cherished ones and what memories did you collect from them? Are travelling and discovering places therapeutic for you?
If you don’t travel, you continue to live in a well. Having said that, let me also add that mere globe-trotting does not make you the most enlightened person on earth. You may go to Paris and see the Eiffel Tower but if you don’t mingle with Parisians and visit the cafes – like Hemingway or Henry Miller did – all the money you’ve spent on the trip has gone waste and you will continue to live in the well. Travelling is not about sightseeing, but knowing and understanding the people. People define a place, after all, and not monuments. Sri Lanka does not have an Eiffel Tower, but the cheerful nature of its people – typical islanders – in the face of a prolonged strife is a monument by itself. I shall never forget the trips I made to Sri Lanka in 2004 and 2005. Meeting new people is not just therapeutic, it is an education.
Q: We also notice your great interest in Hindi movies and songs. Which is the era that you like the most, when it comes to watching movies? What do you find lacking in “today’s cinema”, and what do you enjoy the most about it? Share some of your favorite movies and songs.
Songs and movies from the 1970’s and 80’s work best for me, and that’s because I grew up in that era. But I have nothing against today’s cinema. They make pretty good movies, some of which I watch. But as far as film music goes, I would say the 70’s and 80’s was the golden era – their songs are not counted as oldies but as classics, be it Hindi or Tamil. The songs of Kishore Kumar and R.D. Burman are food for my soul – they make me feel happy that I am alive.
Q: Ganga Mail was born out of loneliness – the unmarried man that you were in 2005 said this. Ganga Mail made you write some posts that were honest and free of the fear of being judged and also made you learn the art of finding a story from an experience. Tell us how Ganga Mail has helped you evolve as a person and what did it teach you? Does your family follow your blog?
Ganga Mail records my life from the age of thirty-five, when I started blogging. It has served as my personal diary, my companion, my conscience-keeper, my spokesman, my confession box. It made me accountable to myself – considering that whatever I wrote was in public domain. That’s how the evolution began – as a person and a writer – because Ganga Mail became a tool for introspection. You don’t grow unless you introspect. Yes, my family – whatever the word stands for – follows my blog.
Q: You created a character named Shivani in 2009 on your blog. What was the purpose behind sharing her fictional story? Was her story inspired by a real character or a situation that you experienced or observed?
Shivani is based on a real person. One evening I happened to be chatting – online – with someone I’d known socially for a long time. This was in February 2009, as far as I can recall. During the course of our conversation, she asked me (I forget the context): "But how well do you know me?" I told her that I knew her well enough to write a lengthy piece on her. The fact is that I hardly knew her, but it wasn’t difficult at all to imagine the story of a woman her age – she was nearly forty then. All married Indian women who are forty have nearly the same story. They would have spent their entire lives being a dutiful daughter, a dutiful wife and a dutiful mother. It’s only when they reach the age of forty or so – when the children are grown up – that they finally get time to introspect and look back at their lives. The Shivani blog sought to capture that introspection, and that is why it struck a chord with readers, including my friend who kept wondering how I knew her so well.
Q: What is your series – 'Life in a Metro' – in the national daily, The Hindu, all about? What kind of stories do you share there? How long have you been writing this column?
It was a slice-of-life column I wrote for nearly 10 months. I stopped it last week, in spite of the popularity it seemed to have attained in a short span, simply because I did not have the time. Column-writing is a full-time commitment, which you can’t afford when you have pressing demands at work or when you’ve signed contracts to write more books.
Q: There are dozens of people who loathe the way Indian journalism has turned out to be. Being in this profession, what are your thoughts on the way the industry operates? What are the strong and weak points of this industry, according to you?
Journalism is no longer the same ever since television turned 24/7. Today, much of what you see or read is sensationalism and not journalism.
Q: Do you promote your blog? What promotional techniques work best for you and why?
No, I don’t promote my blog.
Q: How important is it for the blogger to interact with their readers? Do you respond to all the comments that you receive?
Writing a post can be enervating. Once you have finished saying what you wanted to say, you just want to move on. Which is why, even though I value the comments and cherish them, I find the thought of revisiting the subject by way of replying to comments too tiring. This may not be the right thing to do, though, and ideally I should acknowledge every comment I receive.
Q: What do you find to be the most gratifying aspect of blogging?
The fact that you get published instantly. Also, blogging can be a good net practice for real writing – I mean writing books. It helps you practice your strokes, build your stamina and evolve a style of your own. Moreover, reaction of the readers tells you whether you are headed in the right direction. If your posts are readable, your books are most likely going to be readable too – provided you don’t get carried away too much by the praise your posts receive.
Q: How, in general, would you rate the quality of Indian blogs? Share your favourite five blogs.
Some of the blogs are really, really good — there are people who make me wish I could write like them. Unfortunately, of late, I have hardly been looking up people’s blog, mainly due to paucity of time. But every now and then, I read Diptakirti’s Calcutta Chromosome and Desi Babu’s Peanut Express. I identify with their style of writing – simple yet profound.
Q: What is your advice to someone who wants to start a blog?
Just be yourself. Don’t pretend to be someone you are not. Write from your heart – and soon you will evolve a style of your own.
Q: Do you earn revenue through your blog? How does one go about it?
I am yet to earn money from my blog. It’s been three years since I put ads on the blog, but the revenue is yet to cross the 100-dollar mark (you get paid once your earnings cross 100 dollars). Last time I checked the figure was still hovering around 60 dollars. Yes, once I did get paid 150 dollars for placing the link of a US-based website on the sidebar. I bought a tennis racquet with that money. Subsequently, I got similar offers from a few other websites, but it is no fun meddling with your template for small sums.
Q: According to you, what is the future of Blogging?
I think Twitter has done some damage to the blog. In the sense that – to give you an example – earlier you read Amitabh Bachchan’s blogs, but now you follow his tweets. But the damage is limited. There will always be a readership for good writing, and more and more bloggers – the ones that write well – will find their works being published in print.
Q: Let’s conclude off with a few favorites.
Color: Black, white.
Movie: The Departed.
TV Show: I don’t watch TV.
Book: Tropic of Cancer.
Time of Day: Post-midnight.
Your Zodiac Sign: Capricorn
Thank you Bishwanath for taking us through this journey. Every stopover in this journey taught us something. We are sure our readers felt the same as well.
Sunday, March 11, 2012
The Return Of Ganga Mail
Does anybody even miss my posts?
I guess not. Just as I simply do not have the time or feel weary to write new posts, I am sure erstwhile readers of this blog would also have grown weary of checking for updates. As long as they remember me, good enough.
I can't even recall the last time I wrote a post because I wanted to write a post. Perhaps a year ago? This is not to say that I have nothing to write about any longer. In fact, to the contrary. I have so much to say these days -- on the same subjects I've always written about -- just that I find it too intimidating to transform those thoughts into 1000-word pieces. I find myself devoid of the time and energy. Have I grown old?
But all this while that I was away from the blog, I've been zealously pursuing my interests -- the ones listed on my Blogger profile -- just that I didn't feel compelled to write about them. I either thought "Why should people be interested?" or "What will people say?" But considering that Ganga Mail has remained in business because it always thumbed its nose at these questions, I should be less tight-arsed about expressing my thoughts. Not every piece needs to be perfect -- as long as it is truthful and honest.
So, ladies and gentlemen, this post marks the return of Ganga Mail. The thoughts will flow, as ever, irrespective of what you think of them. The Ganga, after all, has no choice but to flow -- the choice is yours, whether to call it polluted or to bathe in it in order to seek salvation.
I guess not. Just as I simply do not have the time or feel weary to write new posts, I am sure erstwhile readers of this blog would also have grown weary of checking for updates. As long as they remember me, good enough.
I can't even recall the last time I wrote a post because I wanted to write a post. Perhaps a year ago? This is not to say that I have nothing to write about any longer. In fact, to the contrary. I have so much to say these days -- on the same subjects I've always written about -- just that I find it too intimidating to transform those thoughts into 1000-word pieces. I find myself devoid of the time and energy. Have I grown old?
But all this while that I was away from the blog, I've been zealously pursuing my interests -- the ones listed on my Blogger profile -- just that I didn't feel compelled to write about them. I either thought "Why should people be interested?" or "What will people say?" But considering that Ganga Mail has remained in business because it always thumbed its nose at these questions, I should be less tight-arsed about expressing my thoughts. Not every piece needs to be perfect -- as long as it is truthful and honest.
So, ladies and gentlemen, this post marks the return of Ganga Mail. The thoughts will flow, as ever, irrespective of what you think of them. The Ganga, after all, has no choice but to flow -- the choice is yours, whether to call it polluted or to bathe in it in order to seek salvation.
Friday, February 17, 2012
Denizens Of Darkness
As Uttar Pradesh goes to the polls, Bishwanath Ghosh revisits its biggest city, Kanpur, and speaks to a disillusioned citizenry that knows nothing is going to change — even if the mills have given way to malls.
I found it a little strange at first to hear the name of Kanpur being announced at the Delhi airport. I had never flown to Kanpur before, even though I was born in the city 41 years ago, and spent the first 22 years of my life there and after that have been paying the annual visit home. Kanpur is a city you take the train to — that's how I always saw it — and now, for the first time, I was flying into it.
The New Delhi-Kanpur-New Delhi service of Air India was started in 2005 at the initiative of Union Minister Sriprakash Jaiswal, who represents Kanpur in the Lok Sabha. But the sector turned out to be far from lucrative — on the inaugural day, I am told, only two people flew from Kanpur to Delhi, one of them being Jaiswal himself — and since then, from time to time, the service has either remained suspended or the sector altered in the hope of attracting more passengers.
So when the familiar female voice at New Delhi's T3 announced, "Air India announces the departure of its flight to Kanpur", a part of me kept wondering if this was real. My doubts were firmly laid to rest once I boarded the bus to the tarmac: the man standing next to me fished out a tin box of pan masala from his pocket, tore open the metal seal and threw it on the floor of the bus, and dropped two large spoonfuls of the contents into his eagerly-open mouth. In the plane, he used the sick bag as a spittoon. I knew I was going to Kanpur.
Kanpur is the city of pan masala. Every other moment you see someone tearing open a pouch of pan masala and emptying the contents into his mouth — just like the autorickshaw driver did when I approached him after a longish walk out of the airport, after having personally extricated my bag from the belly of the aircraft. My father, when he heard I was flying down, had asked me, "Should I send the car? I am not sure if you will find transport from the airport." Not wanting to bother him, I had replied, "Don't worry. I am sure there will be taxis." He was so right: no conveyor belt, no taxis. I did, however, spot a couple of Mercedes, three SUVs, and several cars fitted with the red light on their roofs — all waiting for passengers who had just travelled with me. Kanpur treats the moneyed and the powerful quite well. The lesser mortals have to fend for themselves — including finding a transport even at the airport.
***
Once upon a time there were mills, now there are malls. The malls stand like mirages on the mess that Kanpur is today. Roads are stripped of asphalt, power-supply is erratic, almost all the industries that the city took pride in have shut down, crime rate is high, traffic is chaotic, pollution at its peak. But people no longer complain. They have long grown inured to hardships. And this is Kanpur, the largest city of Uttar Pradesh, the state that has given seven Prime Ministers to India.
"Earlier, people voted for candidates. Now they vote for the caste of the candidates. A Yadav votes for the Yadav, a Brahmin votes for the Brahmin, a Thakur votes for the Thakur. No one talks about development — it does not seem to matter anymore," Anil Khetan, who runs Current Book Depot on Mall Road, tells me.
Anil, who is 53, has seen better days in Kanpur. His father, Mahadeo Khetan, started the bookshop in 1952: back then, Kanpur was the Manchester of the East and a citadel of the trade union movement. In fact, the Communist Party of India was born in this city, on December 26, 1925. For four terms until 1977, Kanpur was represented in the Lok Sabha by a trade unionist, S.M. Banerjee. "Even when Banerjee babu went to file his nomination papers, fifty to sixty thousand workers would march behind him. Today you won't find more than ten thousand people in Rahul Gandhi's meetings," Khetan said.
Khetan's father was associated with the Communist movement all his life and Current Book Depot was the sole distributor, in Uttar Pradesh, of Mir Publishers of the erstwhile USSR. The printed-in-USSR books have long disappeared from its shelves: I managed to find a collection of Chekhov's stories back in 1999. "Globalisation destroyed Kanpur," Khetan said, "it led to the closure of all the mills, which in turn led to unemployment and illiteracy — political parties are now feeding on them. Today if you take the IIT out of it, Kanpur will have nothing to boast of."
***
The presence of the Election Commission is being felt strongly in Uttar Pradesh — in the absence of political posters and banners. If you don't read the papers, you won't even know the state is going to elections. The walls are clean; no booths playing speeches or campaign songs. The most colourless elections the state has ever seen.
"Without the posters and banners, most people don't even know who the candidates are," Kumar, the veteran press photographer, told me. "One good thing about this is that candidates who have been visible in the public for five years will have an advantage. Those who show their faces only during elections will have a tough time."
I met Kumar at the Kanpur Press Club. In 1993, when I started my career as a journalist in the city, I had voted in the office-bearers' election. Kumar is now the secretary of the club, and every journalist walking in stops by to touch his feet: it's the Kanpur culture, to touch the feet of seniors. Since I am a visitor, I am served with tea.
People like Kumar know Kanpur and its politics like the back of their hands. Yet, when I ask him what this year's chunavi mudda — election issue — was, he falls silent and starts thinking.
"There is no issue as such," he tells me.
"Still, the candidates must be making promises?"
After thinking for a while again, he says: "Usually they talk about getting the mills reopened."
All the five mills run by the National Textiles Corporation (Swadeshi Cotton Mills, Muir Mills, Victoria Mills, Atherton Mills and Laxmi Ratan Mills) and three run by British India Corporation (Elgin Mills 1 and 2, and Kanpur Textiles) have long shut. Only the BIC-run Lal Imli manages to keep up five per cent production.
"When Atal Behari Vajpayee came here before he became the Prime Minister, he said, in his inimitable style, that the day his government came to power, smoke would rise out of the chimneys with the first ray of the sun. Nothing of that sort happened," Kumar smiles.
***
The mills began to close at a time when a bigger movement was sweeping through Uttar Pradesh — the Bharatiya Janata Party-supported movement for the construction of the Ram temple in Ayodhya. It was to alter political agenda in the state for the next two decades, brushing aside the issue of closure of mills and the plight of workers rendered jobless. Today, it is too late: even workers laugh when they hear promises about restarting the mills.
"Not only Vajpayee, even Sonia Gandhi, Manmohan Singh — they all made the same promise about smoke rising from the chimneys," says Prakash Chandra, who once worked as a weaver in Elgin Mill No. 1. "Chimney se to dhuaan nikla nahin, hamara dhuaan nikal gaya (smoke never came out of the chimneys, but our life went up in smoke.)"
Prakash Chandra, now 48, pulls a cycle-rickshaw for a living. When he has earned enough for the day, he parks the rickshaw at home and comes to the mill, where, outside the gate, he and his fellow workers have been staging a sit-in for many years now. '3176 days', says a signboard indicating the duration of their ongoing protest.
"Each time Sriprakash Jaiswal (the Union Minister and MP from Kanpur) wins an election, he comes here to receive garlands and make promises. And then he disappears for the next five years. He is going to come again very soon, along with the candidate from this constituency. And then he will disappear again," Prakash Chandra says.
Mohammad Naseem, a fellow protestor, chips in: "We gave our best years to this mill. When it closed down, we had young children at home to feed. I made my son work even when he was a child, when he should have been out playing. But I had no choice; we needed that extra money to survive."
He continues: "Now what is left of my life? I am 55 now. Even if the mill restarts, I won't have many years. Many of the workers have died over the years. Some died while they were sitting right here. One day, I will also die like that."
Published in The Hindu Sunday Magazine, February 12, 2012.
I found it a little strange at first to hear the name of Kanpur being announced at the Delhi airport. I had never flown to Kanpur before, even though I was born in the city 41 years ago, and spent the first 22 years of my life there and after that have been paying the annual visit home. Kanpur is a city you take the train to — that's how I always saw it — and now, for the first time, I was flying into it.
The New Delhi-Kanpur-New Delhi service of Air India was started in 2005 at the initiative of Union Minister Sriprakash Jaiswal, who represents Kanpur in the Lok Sabha. But the sector turned out to be far from lucrative — on the inaugural day, I am told, only two people flew from Kanpur to Delhi, one of them being Jaiswal himself — and since then, from time to time, the service has either remained suspended or the sector altered in the hope of attracting more passengers.
So when the familiar female voice at New Delhi's T3 announced, "Air India announces the departure of its flight to Kanpur", a part of me kept wondering if this was real. My doubts were firmly laid to rest once I boarded the bus to the tarmac: the man standing next to me fished out a tin box of pan masala from his pocket, tore open the metal seal and threw it on the floor of the bus, and dropped two large spoonfuls of the contents into his eagerly-open mouth. In the plane, he used the sick bag as a spittoon. I knew I was going to Kanpur.
Kanpur is the city of pan masala. Every other moment you see someone tearing open a pouch of pan masala and emptying the contents into his mouth — just like the autorickshaw driver did when I approached him after a longish walk out of the airport, after having personally extricated my bag from the belly of the aircraft. My father, when he heard I was flying down, had asked me, "Should I send the car? I am not sure if you will find transport from the airport." Not wanting to bother him, I had replied, "Don't worry. I am sure there will be taxis." He was so right: no conveyor belt, no taxis. I did, however, spot a couple of Mercedes, three SUVs, and several cars fitted with the red light on their roofs — all waiting for passengers who had just travelled with me. Kanpur treats the moneyed and the powerful quite well. The lesser mortals have to fend for themselves — including finding a transport even at the airport.
***
Once upon a time there were mills, now there are malls. The malls stand like mirages on the mess that Kanpur is today. Roads are stripped of asphalt, power-supply is erratic, almost all the industries that the city took pride in have shut down, crime rate is high, traffic is chaotic, pollution at its peak. But people no longer complain. They have long grown inured to hardships. And this is Kanpur, the largest city of Uttar Pradesh, the state that has given seven Prime Ministers to India.
"Earlier, people voted for candidates. Now they vote for the caste of the candidates. A Yadav votes for the Yadav, a Brahmin votes for the Brahmin, a Thakur votes for the Thakur. No one talks about development — it does not seem to matter anymore," Anil Khetan, who runs Current Book Depot on Mall Road, tells me.
Anil, who is 53, has seen better days in Kanpur. His father, Mahadeo Khetan, started the bookshop in 1952: back then, Kanpur was the Manchester of the East and a citadel of the trade union movement. In fact, the Communist Party of India was born in this city, on December 26, 1925. For four terms until 1977, Kanpur was represented in the Lok Sabha by a trade unionist, S.M. Banerjee. "Even when Banerjee babu went to file his nomination papers, fifty to sixty thousand workers would march behind him. Today you won't find more than ten thousand people in Rahul Gandhi's meetings," Khetan said.
Khetan's father was associated with the Communist movement all his life and Current Book Depot was the sole distributor, in Uttar Pradesh, of Mir Publishers of the erstwhile USSR. The printed-in-USSR books have long disappeared from its shelves: I managed to find a collection of Chekhov's stories back in 1999. "Globalisation destroyed Kanpur," Khetan said, "it led to the closure of all the mills, which in turn led to unemployment and illiteracy — political parties are now feeding on them. Today if you take the IIT out of it, Kanpur will have nothing to boast of."
***
The presence of the Election Commission is being felt strongly in Uttar Pradesh — in the absence of political posters and banners. If you don't read the papers, you won't even know the state is going to elections. The walls are clean; no booths playing speeches or campaign songs. The most colourless elections the state has ever seen.
"Without the posters and banners, most people don't even know who the candidates are," Kumar, the veteran press photographer, told me. "One good thing about this is that candidates who have been visible in the public for five years will have an advantage. Those who show their faces only during elections will have a tough time."
I met Kumar at the Kanpur Press Club. In 1993, when I started my career as a journalist in the city, I had voted in the office-bearers' election. Kumar is now the secretary of the club, and every journalist walking in stops by to touch his feet: it's the Kanpur culture, to touch the feet of seniors. Since I am a visitor, I am served with tea.
People like Kumar know Kanpur and its politics like the back of their hands. Yet, when I ask him what this year's chunavi mudda — election issue — was, he falls silent and starts thinking.
"There is no issue as such," he tells me.
"Still, the candidates must be making promises?"
After thinking for a while again, he says: "Usually they talk about getting the mills reopened."
All the five mills run by the National Textiles Corporation (Swadeshi Cotton Mills, Muir Mills, Victoria Mills, Atherton Mills and Laxmi Ratan Mills) and three run by British India Corporation (Elgin Mills 1 and 2, and Kanpur Textiles) have long shut. Only the BIC-run Lal Imli manages to keep up five per cent production.
"When Atal Behari Vajpayee came here before he became the Prime Minister, he said, in his inimitable style, that the day his government came to power, smoke would rise out of the chimneys with the first ray of the sun. Nothing of that sort happened," Kumar smiles.
***
The mills began to close at a time when a bigger movement was sweeping through Uttar Pradesh — the Bharatiya Janata Party-supported movement for the construction of the Ram temple in Ayodhya. It was to alter political agenda in the state for the next two decades, brushing aside the issue of closure of mills and the plight of workers rendered jobless. Today, it is too late: even workers laugh when they hear promises about restarting the mills.
"Not only Vajpayee, even Sonia Gandhi, Manmohan Singh — they all made the same promise about smoke rising from the chimneys," says Prakash Chandra, who once worked as a weaver in Elgin Mill No. 1. "Chimney se to dhuaan nikla nahin, hamara dhuaan nikal gaya (smoke never came out of the chimneys, but our life went up in smoke.)"
Prakash Chandra, now 48, pulls a cycle-rickshaw for a living. When he has earned enough for the day, he parks the rickshaw at home and comes to the mill, where, outside the gate, he and his fellow workers have been staging a sit-in for many years now. '3176 days', says a signboard indicating the duration of their ongoing protest.
"Each time Sriprakash Jaiswal (the Union Minister and MP from Kanpur) wins an election, he comes here to receive garlands and make promises. And then he disappears for the next five years. He is going to come again very soon, along with the candidate from this constituency. And then he will disappear again," Prakash Chandra says.
Mohammad Naseem, a fellow protestor, chips in: "We gave our best years to this mill. When it closed down, we had young children at home to feed. I made my son work even when he was a child, when he should have been out playing. But I had no choice; we needed that extra money to survive."
He continues: "Now what is left of my life? I am 55 now. Even if the mill restarts, I won't have many years. Many of the workers have died over the years. Some died while they were sitting right here. One day, I will also die like that."
Published in The Hindu Sunday Magazine, February 12, 2012.
Sunday, January 29, 2012
Tamarind City
A city is a lot like a woman. You may fall for it because of a certain physical attribute — the eyes, the smile, the dimple — but it is the chemistry you develop over time that eventually makes you stick to it.
Millions of people visit Agra every year to see the Taj Mahal, but how many choose to settle in Agra just so that they can have a glimpse of the architectural wonder on their way to work every day? Mumbai, on the other hand, can be very harsh on its citizens, yet people who have spent a few years in the city almost always talk of it fondly — that's chemistry. That's what happened between me and Chennai.
When I came in January 2001, I had no idea I would end up spending eleven years here — and god alone knows how many months or years more. I came here more as a tourist-journalist, who wanted to experience Chennai and use it as a base to tour the whole of south India in the next three or four years before returning to Delhi to settle down there.
Then something happened. Just the way I had discovered Chennai as a conducive place to be in, Chennai also discovered the writer in me. Thus began a lasting love affair, the result of which is Tamarind City, whose cover pages I am finally able to share with you today.
The book is a tribute to the city I've called home for eleven years now — the city that nourished me as a writer and at the same time let me be (Chapter 5 is titled 'Sex and the City'). I hope it is liked by readers and reviewers alike.
Monday, January 16, 2012
Pongal Diary: Eleven Years In Chennai And A Book
For nearly two months I slept with them — books, notebooks, various pens, newspapers and the laptop, which formed a heap on wife's side of the bed. No matter how often I changed the sheets, the books and the notebooks would grab their place sooner than later, leaving very little space for me. At nights when I turned to the side while sleeping, I would often find my knee placed on the cold, glossy cover of a book.
On Sunday morning, the morning of Pongal — the date is relevant here too: 15 January 2012 — I decided to clear up the mess. It took a couple of hours to make the bed look like a bed, after which I prepared myself a decent meal: rice, bitter-gourd sambar and raddish-carrot-tomato salad. In between, I also mopped the entire house (someone in the maid's family always happens to fall sick when wife is not in town).
Finally, at two in the afternoon, I poured myself a glass of pre-lunch wine and lit up a cigarette and lay down on a fresh sheet. The bed smelt good. I felt good. For once, my laptop was not on. From the bed I looked outside the window. I could see the sky and a coconut tree, its leaves a sparkling golden in the gentle sunshine. A beautiful day for Chennai! — you have the sun out, and yet cold enough for you to keep the fan on low speed. An ideal day to be outdoors — maybe in Mahabalipuram or on the Marina. But I was happy to be indoors, resting my back on the same bed on which I had just finished writing my book on Chennai.
It is one thing to be working on a book, quite another to actually finish it and mail the manuscript to the publisher. I had been working on the book for two years now — chunks of it were written in Chennai, in Kanpur, in Gurgaon and in Kolkata, but it was on this bed that I finally wrapped it up and clicked on the 'send' button.
Wrapping up can be as painful as writing a fresh book, especially if you happen to be the kind who is deeply embarrassed rereading the chapters that were completed long time ago and wants to rewrite them all over again. And so, for those two months, the bed served as a torture chamber as I wrote the unwritten chapters, rewrote the already-written chapters and at the same time went to work to justify my salary.
On Sunday afternoon I was a peaceful man. I had finally managed to dispatch nearly one lakh words. The unwritten book no longer tormented me: I had finally written it. And so I looked out at the gentle sunshine and told myself what a beautiful day it is. That's when another thought struck me: have I not just completed eleven years in Chennai!
It was on 15 January 2001 that I first set foot in Chennai, little knowing that I would end up staying this long. The book — called Tamarind City, to hit the stands in April — intends to be evidence, hopefully lasting, that I spent the best years of my life in the city.
On Sunday morning, the morning of Pongal — the date is relevant here too: 15 January 2012 — I decided to clear up the mess. It took a couple of hours to make the bed look like a bed, after which I prepared myself a decent meal: rice, bitter-gourd sambar and raddish-carrot-tomato salad. In between, I also mopped the entire house (someone in the maid's family always happens to fall sick when wife is not in town).
Finally, at two in the afternoon, I poured myself a glass of pre-lunch wine and lit up a cigarette and lay down on a fresh sheet. The bed smelt good. I felt good. For once, my laptop was not on. From the bed I looked outside the window. I could see the sky and a coconut tree, its leaves a sparkling golden in the gentle sunshine. A beautiful day for Chennai! — you have the sun out, and yet cold enough for you to keep the fan on low speed. An ideal day to be outdoors — maybe in Mahabalipuram or on the Marina. But I was happy to be indoors, resting my back on the same bed on which I had just finished writing my book on Chennai.
It is one thing to be working on a book, quite another to actually finish it and mail the manuscript to the publisher. I had been working on the book for two years now — chunks of it were written in Chennai, in Kanpur, in Gurgaon and in Kolkata, but it was on this bed that I finally wrapped it up and clicked on the 'send' button.
Wrapping up can be as painful as writing a fresh book, especially if you happen to be the kind who is deeply embarrassed rereading the chapters that were completed long time ago and wants to rewrite them all over again. And so, for those two months, the bed served as a torture chamber as I wrote the unwritten chapters, rewrote the already-written chapters and at the same time went to work to justify my salary.
On Sunday afternoon I was a peaceful man. I had finally managed to dispatch nearly one lakh words. The unwritten book no longer tormented me: I had finally written it. And so I looked out at the gentle sunshine and told myself what a beautiful day it is. That's when another thought struck me: have I not just completed eleven years in Chennai!
It was on 15 January 2001 that I first set foot in Chennai, little knowing that I would end up staying this long. The book — called Tamarind City, to hit the stands in April — intends to be evidence, hopefully lasting, that I spent the best years of my life in the city.
Saturday, December 10, 2011
Life In A Metro: Goodbye, Guide
The death of Dev Anand has left us with two important lessons
When I got a call from my brother unusually early in the morning last Sunday, I was naturally alarmed. It turned out to be bad news not for me, but for my generation. When someone like Dev Anand dies, you realise that the earth has been spinning all this while even though it appeared stationary, and that someday it will be your turn.
You didn't expect – rather you didn't want – someone like Dev Anand to ever die. He began acting when my father was a toddler and my mother wasn't even born. And then it was my turn to grow up with him. How can I ever forget the thrill of watching Johny Mera Naam in the theatre, sometime in the late nineteen-seventies? As long as Dev Anand was alive, I felt I was safe, my family was safe. But last Sunday, the protective wall – someone whose presence I had taken for granted – was gone. I feel vulnerable.
But then, as Dev Anand sang, “Main zindagi ka saath nibhata chala gaya.” Life is a game which has its rules; whether you win or lose you have to play along, something he did with gusto. As one ponders over his passing away, one can't help think of the two lessons that his life has left us with.
One, never say die. I have never had the chance to meet or speak to Dev Anand, but fellow journalists who have interviewed him tell me how infectious his energy was. He could liven up your day even over the phone. People often console others – and even themselves – saying that age is just a number, but Dev Anand demonstrated that. Age might have shrivelled his skin but it could do nothing to deplete his energy. A lesser mortal would have faded away long ago and led a quiet retired life, occasionally going down memory lane whenever a journalist visited.
But words like ‘retirement' and ‘inactivity' did not exist in Dev Anand's dictionary. It was simply impossible to imagine him on a wheel-chair or lying on a hospital bed. Always agile, alert and flashing that trademark smile with a glint of mischief in the eyes – that's probably how he was in his last moments before death came. All this, in the face of rejection. The audience long stopped going to the theatres to watch his films. They would rather travel long distances to watch him, at some event or the other, but not his films.
Yet, Dev Anand soldiered on with the same enthusiasm he had stepped into Bombay 65 years ago – discovering new faces, scouting for new locations, to make yet another film that nobody was going to watch. So that's one lesson: if you have the enthusiasm, even advancing age and adversity cannot stop you.
Lesson no. 2: Never fall in love with your own style. Dev Anand, as an actor, worked best when someone else directed him. Some of his most memorable films – Guide, Johny Mera Naam, Tere Mere Sapne, Jewel Thief – were directed by his younger brother, the talented Vijay Anand. The only big hit that Dev Anand himself directed was Hare Rama Hare Krishna, and that was a good forty years ago. Since then, he had been trying to recreate the magic of Hare Rama Hare Krishna, giving himself the central role,his trademark mannerisms intact,but each time he failed miserably. He might have remained evergreen, but his storytelling looked dated.
One need not cow down before age, which he never did, but one must acknowledge age, which Amitabh Bachchan wisely did. Amitabh Bachchan, had he been Dev Anand, would have started directing himself to keep the angry-young-man image alive and would probably be busy making The Return of Amar Akbar Anthony at the moment. But he reinvented himself in the late 1990s by becoming the young old man and staged a dramatic comeback into the hearts of the audience.
But who knows, perhaps it was his love for his own style that gave Dev Anand the endless reserve of energy to live life to the fullest – till death plucked that evergreen leaf of Hindi cinema.
Published in The Hindu MetroPlus, December 10, 2011.
When I got a call from my brother unusually early in the morning last Sunday, I was naturally alarmed. It turned out to be bad news not for me, but for my generation. When someone like Dev Anand dies, you realise that the earth has been spinning all this while even though it appeared stationary, and that someday it will be your turn.
You didn't expect – rather you didn't want – someone like Dev Anand to ever die. He began acting when my father was a toddler and my mother wasn't even born. And then it was my turn to grow up with him. How can I ever forget the thrill of watching Johny Mera Naam in the theatre, sometime in the late nineteen-seventies? As long as Dev Anand was alive, I felt I was safe, my family was safe. But last Sunday, the protective wall – someone whose presence I had taken for granted – was gone. I feel vulnerable.
But then, as Dev Anand sang, “Main zindagi ka saath nibhata chala gaya.” Life is a game which has its rules; whether you win or lose you have to play along, something he did with gusto. As one ponders over his passing away, one can't help think of the two lessons that his life has left us with.
One, never say die. I have never had the chance to meet or speak to Dev Anand, but fellow journalists who have interviewed him tell me how infectious his energy was. He could liven up your day even over the phone. People often console others – and even themselves – saying that age is just a number, but Dev Anand demonstrated that. Age might have shrivelled his skin but it could do nothing to deplete his energy. A lesser mortal would have faded away long ago and led a quiet retired life, occasionally going down memory lane whenever a journalist visited.
But words like ‘retirement' and ‘inactivity' did not exist in Dev Anand's dictionary. It was simply impossible to imagine him on a wheel-chair or lying on a hospital bed. Always agile, alert and flashing that trademark smile with a glint of mischief in the eyes – that's probably how he was in his last moments before death came. All this, in the face of rejection. The audience long stopped going to the theatres to watch his films. They would rather travel long distances to watch him, at some event or the other, but not his films.
Yet, Dev Anand soldiered on with the same enthusiasm he had stepped into Bombay 65 years ago – discovering new faces, scouting for new locations, to make yet another film that nobody was going to watch. So that's one lesson: if you have the enthusiasm, even advancing age and adversity cannot stop you.
Lesson no. 2: Never fall in love with your own style. Dev Anand, as an actor, worked best when someone else directed him. Some of his most memorable films – Guide, Johny Mera Naam, Tere Mere Sapne, Jewel Thief – were directed by his younger brother, the talented Vijay Anand. The only big hit that Dev Anand himself directed was Hare Rama Hare Krishna, and that was a good forty years ago. Since then, he had been trying to recreate the magic of Hare Rama Hare Krishna, giving himself the central role,his trademark mannerisms intact,but each time he failed miserably. He might have remained evergreen, but his storytelling looked dated.
One need not cow down before age, which he never did, but one must acknowledge age, which Amitabh Bachchan wisely did. Amitabh Bachchan, had he been Dev Anand, would have started directing himself to keep the angry-young-man image alive and would probably be busy making The Return of Amar Akbar Anthony at the moment. But he reinvented himself in the late 1990s by becoming the young old man and staged a dramatic comeback into the hearts of the audience.
But who knows, perhaps it was his love for his own style that gave Dev Anand the endless reserve of energy to live life to the fullest – till death plucked that evergreen leaf of Hindi cinema.
Published in The Hindu MetroPlus, December 10, 2011.
Sunday, December 04, 2011
A Ghost In Hong Kong
I had barely flung myself on the bed, after three hours of waiting at the airport and another five on the flight, when my eyes fell on the large LCD screen facing me:
“Dear Mr Ghost: Welcome to The Mira Hong Kong. Thank you for choosing to stay with us.”
How I wish I were Mr Ghost. I wouldn’t have to endure long hours in a plane or spend hard-earned money in order to travel the world (though this trip didn’t make me any poorer because I was a guest of the Hong Kong Tourism Board, and the journey from Chennai took barely five hours).
Nevertheless, I was quite pleased with what I saw on the screen and got up to fiddle with the remote, when I found a cordless keyboard. Ah, so I could check email and Facebook on the big screen! Then I noticed a welcome-envelope waiting to be opened: it was addressed to Mr Bishwanathan. Meanwhile, I had arrived in Hong Kong barely an hour ago on a boarding pass that identified me as Mr. Gosh.
Never mind. My name didn’t matter now. For the next five days, I was going to be a nameless tourist, one of the tens of thousands who come to visit the former British colony every year. This year the arrivals crossed the unprecedented one-million mark, and the tourism board is now eager to exploit the Indian market, even though the number of tourists going from here has already doubled compared to last year.
The five days were roughly divided into two activities: looking up in amazement at the high-rises that define Hong Kong and looking down at them in equal amazement from even greater heights — even as one kept hopping between Kowloon peninsula and the islands of Hong Kong and Lantau. These are the three regions that primarily comprise the tourist’s Hong Kong.
My discovery of Hong Kong began that evening with a visit to Sky100, the observatory on the 100th floor of the world’s fourth tallest building — the newly-opened 108-floor International Commerce Centre in Kowloon. The elevator propels you the 100th floor in 60 seconds, and there you are, treated to a 360-degree panoramic view of the city — far more mind-boggling than a pair of human eyes can take.
So this is Hong Kong, I thought to myself as I watched from behind the glass wall a neat arrangement of yellow lights spread out below — one of the very few non-Western cities you somehow get to hear of right from childhood, even if you were not particularly fond of the atlas; where the British planted the Union Jack in 1841 and withdrew from as recently as 1997, returning it to China.
Due to the 156 years of the occupation, Hong Kong is today part-British, part-Chinese — a classic example of East-meets-West. Ninety-five percent of the population is Chinese, but the official language is still English; residents can hold British passports until 2047; the Hong Kong dollar remains in circulation and is convertible.
I was now going to spend some of those dollars, for next on the itinerary was a visit to the Hong Kong Wine and Dine Festival, a recently-begun annual feature that takes place by the Victoria Harbour. Rosanna, my feisty but friendly Chinese guide, had already pointed at the venue from Sky100: from that great height it had looked like the ultimate party place, right next to the harbour on whose still surface the occasional boat was leaving a temporary scratch.
But at the festival venue — which was jam-packed, resembling a college carnival — the view of the waterfront had been blocked by countless stalls set up by wine companies from across the world. Fine wine is lost on me — I can only tell the red from the white. But the sun was long down and I needed my drink, and at the same time I was very hungry. Since my arrival I had been surviving on bread and cheese.
As I went searching for my kind of food so that I could drink (even if wine), two young Chinese students accosted me. They wanted my feedback about the festival. I patiently answered all their questions (asked in broken English) and they took a picture of me with their iPad.
“Now, can I ask you something?”
“Yes, yes,” the boys said.
“Is there any stall where I can get vegetarian food?”
“What food?”
“Vegetarian?”
The boys looked at each other in bewilderment. They hadn’t heard of the word. “Sorry sir, I don’t know what you say.” They were red with embarrassment.
Fortunately, I found a French stall selling cheese croissants. I bought a half-a-dozen of them. The rest of the evening I drank red wine and ate cheese croissants and admired the young women of Hong Kong who stylishly held their (plastic) wine glasses as if they were in a Page-3 party. This was of course a Page-3 party, only that the guest list was multiplied by a thousand.
Back in the hotel, located on Nathan Road, I felt hungry again and set out looking for Indian food. I walked a considerable length of the road and after a few left and right turns, came upon Jordan Street, where I found the Bombay Indian Restaurant. The owner, a salwar kameez-clad Punjabi woman who said her family came to Hong Kong some 20 years ago, sat on the pavement calling out to potential customers. A young woman in jeans, presumably her daughter, waited on the tables.
“Spicy or non-spicy,” she asked me in accented English as I ordered daal makhani and naan.
I thought for a moment and said, “Spicy.”
The next morning I was at the Kowloon Cricket Club, to watch a match of the Hong Kong Cricket Sixes, an international six-a-side, five-over-each tournament that the club has been hosting since the early 1990s. In terms of brevity and entertainment value, this format can rightly be called the father of Twenty20. But since I gave up watching cricket ever since Twenty20 walked out of the pavilion, I couldn’t tell, under the harsh sun, who was bowling and who was batting. As many as 12 cricket-playing nations were participating in the tournament this year, and outside the Club, a large number of Pakistanis were waiting to catch a glimpse of their favourite cricketer. There was a flutter when Sanath Jayasuriya walked in. I just about managed to take a picture of him: I had never imagined I would spot him in, of all places, Hong Kong.
I had half a mind to watch Jayasuriya bat — live — but it was time to head to Disneyland. Even if you are young at heart, Disneyland isn’t quite the place for you to spend an entire evening unless you are taking your children along. But what do you do when you are deposited there and you don’t know your way back? You have no choice but to sit back and enjoy.
But to tell you the truth, I enjoyed Disneyland. Not just because of the Halloween parades that can blow one’s mind or because of the breathtaking toy-train trip that takes you along the circumference of the fantasy land, but mainly because of the Space Mountain ride. It is a gut-wrenching roller-coaster ride that takes place in total darkness, as if you were negotiating invisible curves in space at the speed of an aircraft. Unknown to you, cameras capture your expressions during the most stomach-churning moment of the ride, and the evidence of your fearful self is shown to you once you step off the roller-coaster. But the picture is not part of the deal: you need to buy it, for a steep price. Welcome to Hong Kong.
*****
“See my new boots! How are they?” asked Rinku, my fellow Indian traveller.
“Awesome!” I said. I had to say that. She had spent 2,500 Hong Kong dollars to buy four pairs and was wearing one of them now.
And so we set off for Lan Kwai Fong to party. We had had a long day – and what a day.
The morning had begun on the island of Hong Kong. It was this island that the British had first taken in 1841 before they went on to expand their control to the Kowloon peninsula, and finally more areas north of the peninsula and also some islands, which they chose to call the New Territories. Collectively they came to be called Hong Kong. The island is, therefore, home to the city's colonial heritage and our host, the Hong Kong Tourism Board, put us on an open-top bus for a heritage tour of the city.
But when your eyes are blinded by the dazzle of the high-rises, how can you look out for humble heritage, which would probably be too embarrassed to show its face? So I sat back on my seat on the roof of the buses and enjoyed the carnival of the high-rises, each eager to kiss the sky first, as the bus snaked through the all-important roads of Hong Kong. If the dictionary doesn't define the word ‘opulence' for you, Hong Kong will. And I also realised: a concrete jungle may not look beautiful, but it can certainly look elegant.
We alighted at Peak Tram terminus on Garden Road. We were to take the tram right up to the Victoria Peak, now called just The Peak, which became the summer getaway for the colonial rulers ever since Governor Richard MacDonnell built a residence there, in the late 1860s. After tram service to the Peak began in 1888, the hill became an exclusive residential area for Europeans and remained out of bounds for locals for a number of years. Even today, the hill is home to the last of the fast-disappearing colonial bungalows in Hong Kong. The tram we take is new, but the route is 123 years old – a steep vertical climb right up the hill.
The moment we alighted we got sucked into a massive multi-storied steel-concrete-glass structure. We were on the Touristy Peak and not the Victorian Peak – but it was The Peak nevertheless. Souvenir shops, shopping malls, eateries, even Madame Tussauds gallery – the building contained it all. But it was the roof that mattered most: from there you could see all of Hong Kong, and even Kowloon. A sight to die for. A concrete jungle can also look beautiful.
After lunch at The Peak we drove to Ocean Park. The entertainment park, spread across 870,000 sq m of land, has a mountain standing in between and to get to the summit you have to take the cable car. As the cable car trundled high above the South China Sea, one could see the sun bowing out for the day, disappearing slowly into the sea. Against the fading sun was the silhouette of the roller-coaster which was to soon scare the life out of us. It was at Ocean Park that Rinku and I hatched the plan for Lan Kwai Fong.
The idea was to have a drink and stroll around the Soho of Hong Kong. But it turned out to be the night of Halloween, and, emerging out of Central station, we found that the whole of Hong Kong had descended on Lan Kwai Fong. To get to Lan Kwai Fong from the station, otherwise a two-minute walk, took us nearly two hours. Once she realised that Lan Kwai Fong was so near and yet so far, Rinku took off her Hong Kong boots. “They pinch,” she said and put them into her bag. Out came the humble Indian chappals.
Once in Lan Kwai Fong, we broke off from the unending procession and squeezed ourselves into the little space that was available on the pavement outside Hard Rock Caf̩. There, clutching cans of Guinness, we watched the young of Hong Kong go past, thousands and thousands of them Рit was the wedding of Grotesque and Grace. It's a night I am not easily going to forget Рenergy meeting imagination and the two of them saying hello to the no-holds-barred spirit.
The people of Hong Kong are a happy lot. According to Rosanna, our Chinese guide, the city-state made a net profit of 2,000 billion Hong Kong dollars from the stock exchange in 2010. The benefits were passed on to the people: every citizen over the age of 18 received 6,000 Hong Kong dollars from the government as ‘lucky money', and those above 65 got 3,000 dollars extra.
The next morning, we were at 1881 Heritage, one of the most expensive hotels in Hong Kong which, once upon a time, was the headquarters of the marine police. Such is the hotel's heritage and snob value that couples getting married and youngsters who've acquired a prestigious degree come to pose against the handsome colonial building. As if a degree or a marriage certificate is not valid until the photograph outside the hotel has been taken.
On the final day, in the island of Lantau, we took a stunning 5.7 km cable-car ride to the village of Ngong Ping, where a 34m Buddha sits on a hill. The spectacular 25-minute journey provides a panoramic view of the Buddha statue, the flora and fauna of the North Lantau Country Park, Tung Chung Bay and the airport. The Ngong Ping Piazza, opened last year, is lined with statues of the Twelve Divine Generals. And from there, it is a 268-step climb to nirvana. What a peaceful way to end a journey.
Published in The Hindu MetroPlus, December 3, 2011.
“Dear Mr Ghost: Welcome to The Mira Hong Kong. Thank you for choosing to stay with us.”
How I wish I were Mr Ghost. I wouldn’t have to endure long hours in a plane or spend hard-earned money in order to travel the world (though this trip didn’t make me any poorer because I was a guest of the Hong Kong Tourism Board, and the journey from Chennai took barely five hours).
Nevertheless, I was quite pleased with what I saw on the screen and got up to fiddle with the remote, when I found a cordless keyboard. Ah, so I could check email and Facebook on the big screen! Then I noticed a welcome-envelope waiting to be opened: it was addressed to Mr Bishwanathan. Meanwhile, I had arrived in Hong Kong barely an hour ago on a boarding pass that identified me as Mr. Gosh.
Never mind. My name didn’t matter now. For the next five days, I was going to be a nameless tourist, one of the tens of thousands who come to visit the former British colony every year. This year the arrivals crossed the unprecedented one-million mark, and the tourism board is now eager to exploit the Indian market, even though the number of tourists going from here has already doubled compared to last year.
The five days were roughly divided into two activities: looking up in amazement at the high-rises that define Hong Kong and looking down at them in equal amazement from even greater heights — even as one kept hopping between Kowloon peninsula and the islands of Hong Kong and Lantau. These are the three regions that primarily comprise the tourist’s Hong Kong.
My discovery of Hong Kong began that evening with a visit to Sky100, the observatory on the 100th floor of the world’s fourth tallest building — the newly-opened 108-floor International Commerce Centre in Kowloon. The elevator propels you the 100th floor in 60 seconds, and there you are, treated to a 360-degree panoramic view of the city — far more mind-boggling than a pair of human eyes can take.
So this is Hong Kong, I thought to myself as I watched from behind the glass wall a neat arrangement of yellow lights spread out below — one of the very few non-Western cities you somehow get to hear of right from childhood, even if you were not particularly fond of the atlas; where the British planted the Union Jack in 1841 and withdrew from as recently as 1997, returning it to China.
Due to the 156 years of the occupation, Hong Kong is today part-British, part-Chinese — a classic example of East-meets-West. Ninety-five percent of the population is Chinese, but the official language is still English; residents can hold British passports until 2047; the Hong Kong dollar remains in circulation and is convertible.
I was now going to spend some of those dollars, for next on the itinerary was a visit to the Hong Kong Wine and Dine Festival, a recently-begun annual feature that takes place by the Victoria Harbour. Rosanna, my feisty but friendly Chinese guide, had already pointed at the venue from Sky100: from that great height it had looked like the ultimate party place, right next to the harbour on whose still surface the occasional boat was leaving a temporary scratch.
But at the festival venue — which was jam-packed, resembling a college carnival — the view of the waterfront had been blocked by countless stalls set up by wine companies from across the world. Fine wine is lost on me — I can only tell the red from the white. But the sun was long down and I needed my drink, and at the same time I was very hungry. Since my arrival I had been surviving on bread and cheese.
As I went searching for my kind of food so that I could drink (even if wine), two young Chinese students accosted me. They wanted my feedback about the festival. I patiently answered all their questions (asked in broken English) and they took a picture of me with their iPad.
“Now, can I ask you something?”
“Yes, yes,” the boys said.
“Is there any stall where I can get vegetarian food?”
“What food?”
“Vegetarian?”
The boys looked at each other in bewilderment. They hadn’t heard of the word. “Sorry sir, I don’t know what you say.” They were red with embarrassment.
Fortunately, I found a French stall selling cheese croissants. I bought a half-a-dozen of them. The rest of the evening I drank red wine and ate cheese croissants and admired the young women of Hong Kong who stylishly held their (plastic) wine glasses as if they were in a Page-3 party. This was of course a Page-3 party, only that the guest list was multiplied by a thousand.
Back in the hotel, located on Nathan Road, I felt hungry again and set out looking for Indian food. I walked a considerable length of the road and after a few left and right turns, came upon Jordan Street, where I found the Bombay Indian Restaurant. The owner, a salwar kameez-clad Punjabi woman who said her family came to Hong Kong some 20 years ago, sat on the pavement calling out to potential customers. A young woman in jeans, presumably her daughter, waited on the tables.
“Spicy or non-spicy,” she asked me in accented English as I ordered daal makhani and naan.
I thought for a moment and said, “Spicy.”
The next morning I was at the Kowloon Cricket Club, to watch a match of the Hong Kong Cricket Sixes, an international six-a-side, five-over-each tournament that the club has been hosting since the early 1990s. In terms of brevity and entertainment value, this format can rightly be called the father of Twenty20. But since I gave up watching cricket ever since Twenty20 walked out of the pavilion, I couldn’t tell, under the harsh sun, who was bowling and who was batting. As many as 12 cricket-playing nations were participating in the tournament this year, and outside the Club, a large number of Pakistanis were waiting to catch a glimpse of their favourite cricketer. There was a flutter when Sanath Jayasuriya walked in. I just about managed to take a picture of him: I had never imagined I would spot him in, of all places, Hong Kong.
I had half a mind to watch Jayasuriya bat — live — but it was time to head to Disneyland. Even if you are young at heart, Disneyland isn’t quite the place for you to spend an entire evening unless you are taking your children along. But what do you do when you are deposited there and you don’t know your way back? You have no choice but to sit back and enjoy.
But to tell you the truth, I enjoyed Disneyland. Not just because of the Halloween parades that can blow one’s mind or because of the breathtaking toy-train trip that takes you along the circumference of the fantasy land, but mainly because of the Space Mountain ride. It is a gut-wrenching roller-coaster ride that takes place in total darkness, as if you were negotiating invisible curves in space at the speed of an aircraft. Unknown to you, cameras capture your expressions during the most stomach-churning moment of the ride, and the evidence of your fearful self is shown to you once you step off the roller-coaster. But the picture is not part of the deal: you need to buy it, for a steep price. Welcome to Hong Kong.
*****
“See my new boots! How are they?” asked Rinku, my fellow Indian traveller.
“Awesome!” I said. I had to say that. She had spent 2,500 Hong Kong dollars to buy four pairs and was wearing one of them now.
And so we set off for Lan Kwai Fong to party. We had had a long day – and what a day.
The morning had begun on the island of Hong Kong. It was this island that the British had first taken in 1841 before they went on to expand their control to the Kowloon peninsula, and finally more areas north of the peninsula and also some islands, which they chose to call the New Territories. Collectively they came to be called Hong Kong. The island is, therefore, home to the city's colonial heritage and our host, the Hong Kong Tourism Board, put us on an open-top bus for a heritage tour of the city.
But when your eyes are blinded by the dazzle of the high-rises, how can you look out for humble heritage, which would probably be too embarrassed to show its face? So I sat back on my seat on the roof of the buses and enjoyed the carnival of the high-rises, each eager to kiss the sky first, as the bus snaked through the all-important roads of Hong Kong. If the dictionary doesn't define the word ‘opulence' for you, Hong Kong will. And I also realised: a concrete jungle may not look beautiful, but it can certainly look elegant.
We alighted at Peak Tram terminus on Garden Road. We were to take the tram right up to the Victoria Peak, now called just The Peak, which became the summer getaway for the colonial rulers ever since Governor Richard MacDonnell built a residence there, in the late 1860s. After tram service to the Peak began in 1888, the hill became an exclusive residential area for Europeans and remained out of bounds for locals for a number of years. Even today, the hill is home to the last of the fast-disappearing colonial bungalows in Hong Kong. The tram we take is new, but the route is 123 years old – a steep vertical climb right up the hill.
The moment we alighted we got sucked into a massive multi-storied steel-concrete-glass structure. We were on the Touristy Peak and not the Victorian Peak – but it was The Peak nevertheless. Souvenir shops, shopping malls, eateries, even Madame Tussauds gallery – the building contained it all. But it was the roof that mattered most: from there you could see all of Hong Kong, and even Kowloon. A sight to die for. A concrete jungle can also look beautiful.
After lunch at The Peak we drove to Ocean Park. The entertainment park, spread across 870,000 sq m of land, has a mountain standing in between and to get to the summit you have to take the cable car. As the cable car trundled high above the South China Sea, one could see the sun bowing out for the day, disappearing slowly into the sea. Against the fading sun was the silhouette of the roller-coaster which was to soon scare the life out of us. It was at Ocean Park that Rinku and I hatched the plan for Lan Kwai Fong.
The idea was to have a drink and stroll around the Soho of Hong Kong. But it turned out to be the night of Halloween, and, emerging out of Central station, we found that the whole of Hong Kong had descended on Lan Kwai Fong. To get to Lan Kwai Fong from the station, otherwise a two-minute walk, took us nearly two hours. Once she realised that Lan Kwai Fong was so near and yet so far, Rinku took off her Hong Kong boots. “They pinch,” she said and put them into her bag. Out came the humble Indian chappals.
Once in Lan Kwai Fong, we broke off from the unending procession and squeezed ourselves into the little space that was available on the pavement outside Hard Rock Caf̩. There, clutching cans of Guinness, we watched the young of Hong Kong go past, thousands and thousands of them Рit was the wedding of Grotesque and Grace. It's a night I am not easily going to forget Рenergy meeting imagination and the two of them saying hello to the no-holds-barred spirit.
The people of Hong Kong are a happy lot. According to Rosanna, our Chinese guide, the city-state made a net profit of 2,000 billion Hong Kong dollars from the stock exchange in 2010. The benefits were passed on to the people: every citizen over the age of 18 received 6,000 Hong Kong dollars from the government as ‘lucky money', and those above 65 got 3,000 dollars extra.
The next morning, we were at 1881 Heritage, one of the most expensive hotels in Hong Kong which, once upon a time, was the headquarters of the marine police. Such is the hotel's heritage and snob value that couples getting married and youngsters who've acquired a prestigious degree come to pose against the handsome colonial building. As if a degree or a marriage certificate is not valid until the photograph outside the hotel has been taken.
On the final day, in the island of Lantau, we took a stunning 5.7 km cable-car ride to the village of Ngong Ping, where a 34m Buddha sits on a hill. The spectacular 25-minute journey provides a panoramic view of the Buddha statue, the flora and fauna of the North Lantau Country Park, Tung Chung Bay and the airport. The Ngong Ping Piazza, opened last year, is lined with statues of the Twelve Divine Generals. And from there, it is a 268-step climb to nirvana. What a peaceful way to end a journey.
Published in The Hindu MetroPlus, December 3, 2011.
Saturday, November 19, 2011
Life In A Metro: Death Of The Dictionary
Who needs a doorstop of a book when a right click is right at hand?
The first dictionary that I ever owned was won by me in a drawing competition at school. It was the first prize, a miniature dictionary bound in red, which I still preserve. Below her signature the principal had inscribed the date, '17.11.79' – which means I was nine years old then, most likely in the fourth standard. For many years after that I did not need another dictionary: the 5,000 or so entries in that tiny gem were more than sufficient to define the world I lived in.
I vaguely remember buying a dictionary much later, perhaps in high school, though I have no particular memories of it, which is very strange. All I remember is that I bought it only to prevent my prized possession from being shredded to pieces. But once I became an adult and decided to make a living out of the written word, I began to invest in voluminous dictionaries – the heavier the better. It was as good as bringing home a teacher who would look over your shoulder while you read a book or wrote a report, and at other times would sit patiently on your desk.
There is something venerable about the dictionary. It's a sage, grandfather, headmaster, teacher, judge, cop – all rolled, rather bound, into one. It's an institution by itself and perhaps the only thing in the world that is capable of making anyone, no matter how educated and accomplished, feel small. After all, the dictionary always knows something that you don't.
Of all the dictionaries I possess today, my favourite remains the One Hour Wordpower Dictionary, co-published by The Sunday Times of London. Simply because it was the first purchase I made after arriving in Delhi to join PTI as a probationary journalist, way back in 1994. I had bought it from a bookshop on Janpath; its pages have since yellowed and I don't think it's still in print. I also like it because it does not follow the International Phonetic Alphabet symbols for pronunciations. If you want to know how the word 'jugular' sounds, it simply tells you: jug-yoo-la. Subsequently, from a book fair in Pragati Maidan, I bought the BBC English Dictionary. And then many more. It is a different matter that most of them remained untouched, their pages accessed only by particles of dust.
Today, the dictionary-buying days are way behind me. I no longer need one. Why just me? When was the last time you actually reached out for one? Haven't you been right-clicking on words all this while? But remember, each time you right-click on a word, the sale of dictionaries drops by one percent – okay, I just made up that figure, but I can't be way off the mark. A distributor told me the other day that bookshops were indeed recording a decline in the sale of not just dictionaries but reference books as a whole. Reference books, he said, are fast migrating to the textbook category and it is just a matter of time before general bookshops stop stocking dictionaries and encyclopedias.
I am not shedding a tear. But one fear grips me every now and then: what if I am asked to write a test in written English, with nothing but a pen and a few A-4 sheets at my disposal? I will stand completely exposed! To begin with, I wouldn't know how to spell ‘manoeuvre' (I actually had to dig out a dusty dictionary to type out the word for your benefit because spellcheck gives only the American spelling). I wouldn't even know whether it is ‘focused' or ‘focussed.'
Since I've already crossed the age of 40, it is unlikely that I will ever be asked to write a test again, but you never know. Imagine a 40-year-old journalist not knowing how to spell ‘manoeuvre'. The horror it will evoke, according to me, will be just as bad as the one that will strike you when you arrive in a strange town to find your mobile phone missing. You can't even call your wife to inform her about your plight because you never felt the need to remember her number. You are as good as a lost child who remembers what his home looks like but doesn't know how to get there. So much for the dependence on gadgets.
Published in The Hindu MetroPlus, November 19, 2011.
The first dictionary that I ever owned was won by me in a drawing competition at school. It was the first prize, a miniature dictionary bound in red, which I still preserve. Below her signature the principal had inscribed the date, '17.11.79' – which means I was nine years old then, most likely in the fourth standard. For many years after that I did not need another dictionary: the 5,000 or so entries in that tiny gem were more than sufficient to define the world I lived in.
I vaguely remember buying a dictionary much later, perhaps in high school, though I have no particular memories of it, which is very strange. All I remember is that I bought it only to prevent my prized possession from being shredded to pieces. But once I became an adult and decided to make a living out of the written word, I began to invest in voluminous dictionaries – the heavier the better. It was as good as bringing home a teacher who would look over your shoulder while you read a book or wrote a report, and at other times would sit patiently on your desk.
There is something venerable about the dictionary. It's a sage, grandfather, headmaster, teacher, judge, cop – all rolled, rather bound, into one. It's an institution by itself and perhaps the only thing in the world that is capable of making anyone, no matter how educated and accomplished, feel small. After all, the dictionary always knows something that you don't.
Of all the dictionaries I possess today, my favourite remains the One Hour Wordpower Dictionary, co-published by The Sunday Times of London. Simply because it was the first purchase I made after arriving in Delhi to join PTI as a probationary journalist, way back in 1994. I had bought it from a bookshop on Janpath; its pages have since yellowed and I don't think it's still in print. I also like it because it does not follow the International Phonetic Alphabet symbols for pronunciations. If you want to know how the word 'jugular' sounds, it simply tells you: jug-yoo-la. Subsequently, from a book fair in Pragati Maidan, I bought the BBC English Dictionary. And then many more. It is a different matter that most of them remained untouched, their pages accessed only by particles of dust.
Today, the dictionary-buying days are way behind me. I no longer need one. Why just me? When was the last time you actually reached out for one? Haven't you been right-clicking on words all this while? But remember, each time you right-click on a word, the sale of dictionaries drops by one percent – okay, I just made up that figure, but I can't be way off the mark. A distributor told me the other day that bookshops were indeed recording a decline in the sale of not just dictionaries but reference books as a whole. Reference books, he said, are fast migrating to the textbook category and it is just a matter of time before general bookshops stop stocking dictionaries and encyclopedias.
I am not shedding a tear. But one fear grips me every now and then: what if I am asked to write a test in written English, with nothing but a pen and a few A-4 sheets at my disposal? I will stand completely exposed! To begin with, I wouldn't know how to spell ‘manoeuvre' (I actually had to dig out a dusty dictionary to type out the word for your benefit because spellcheck gives only the American spelling). I wouldn't even know whether it is ‘focused' or ‘focussed.'
Since I've already crossed the age of 40, it is unlikely that I will ever be asked to write a test again, but you never know. Imagine a 40-year-old journalist not knowing how to spell ‘manoeuvre'. The horror it will evoke, according to me, will be just as bad as the one that will strike you when you arrive in a strange town to find your mobile phone missing. You can't even call your wife to inform her about your plight because you never felt the need to remember her number. You are as good as a lost child who remembers what his home looks like but doesn't know how to get there. So much for the dependence on gadgets.
Published in The Hindu MetroPlus, November 19, 2011.
Friday, November 11, 2011
Life In A Metro — The Lingering Taste Of Birthday Cake
We are so focussed on the future that we often forget to relish the present. And before we realise, a year has gone past
Nostalgia is a recurring theme in this column and not without reason. I believe that nostalgia is your only true wealth, which makes you feel rich until the last breath, while everything else is transitory and temporary – here today, gone tomorrow! If your story is that of rags to riches, you can tell people: “You know, once upon a time I used to hawk vegetables on this very road.” If your story is that of riches to rags, you can tell those who are still around to listen, “You know, once upon a time, I used to own half the houses on this road.” In both cases, the memories warm your heart – irrespective of whether you are presently a prince or a pauper.
Nostalgia would not have been such a precious commodity had Father Time taken his sweet time in passing – so much so that you craved for the new day to break. But even as you blink, a day has passed. Now we all know that time flies and all – is there anything new in what I am saying?
Nothing really, It's just that the cruelty with which time flies past hits you hard as you approach certain personal milestones of your life, and makes you wonder whether it's worth leading a life when dates only stand for deadlines and delivery and when holidays are looked forward to so that you can catch up on sleep. Our minds are so focussed on specific dates that we often forget what month of the year it is – I mean, you may know what month it is but in a very clinical way without a feel for it. When realisation strikes, you are a year older.
Realisation struck me this morning when I was writing out a cheque for the newspaper vendor, who rang the bell early this morning. I put down the date as 10.10.11, when he reminded me, “Sir, it should be 10.11.11, but never mind, it is still valid.” It then hit me: ‘11' stands for November, which means next month is December, when I celebrate my birthday!
Now wasn't it just the other day – really just the other day – when I celebrated my birthday? I can never forget last year's birthday because I turned 40 and had celebrated the milestone by inviting each friend I have in the city. The taste of the cake still lingers in my mouth; the noise that is created when some 50 people gather in a hall is still ringing in my ears; many of the gifts I received are still to be opened; people are still commenting on the pictures of the party on Facebook; and I am still calling myself 40, happy in the knowledge that there are many more months to go before I turn 41.
But what is this: the time has already come! The prospect of turning 41 does not pain me so much as the fact that 12 months are about to pass without my even realising it. Father Time gave no notice, he just sent a last-minute alert in the form of the newspaper vendor. What was I doing when these months were passing by – why didn't I notice?
I guess I am yet another victim of the devil called deadline. My eyes are so perpetually fixed on a future date on the calendar that I miss out on today. What a pity that I listen to this song almost every day but am yet to get its import – it's an immortal song written by Gulzar, set to tune by R.D. Burman and sung by Kishore Kumar, from the film "Gol Maal":
Aane wala pal,
jaane waala hai
Ho sake to isme,
zindagi bita do
pal jo yeh jaane waala hai…
The moment that is arriving
is already about to leave
why not spend a lifetime in it
for it is about to leave.
Published in The Hindu MetroPlus, November 12, 2011.
Nostalgia is a recurring theme in this column and not without reason. I believe that nostalgia is your only true wealth, which makes you feel rich until the last breath, while everything else is transitory and temporary – here today, gone tomorrow! If your story is that of rags to riches, you can tell people: “You know, once upon a time I used to hawk vegetables on this very road.” If your story is that of riches to rags, you can tell those who are still around to listen, “You know, once upon a time, I used to own half the houses on this road.” In both cases, the memories warm your heart – irrespective of whether you are presently a prince or a pauper.
Nostalgia would not have been such a precious commodity had Father Time taken his sweet time in passing – so much so that you craved for the new day to break. But even as you blink, a day has passed. Now we all know that time flies and all – is there anything new in what I am saying?
Nothing really, It's just that the cruelty with which time flies past hits you hard as you approach certain personal milestones of your life, and makes you wonder whether it's worth leading a life when dates only stand for deadlines and delivery and when holidays are looked forward to so that you can catch up on sleep. Our minds are so focussed on specific dates that we often forget what month of the year it is – I mean, you may know what month it is but in a very clinical way without a feel for it. When realisation strikes, you are a year older.
Realisation struck me this morning when I was writing out a cheque for the newspaper vendor, who rang the bell early this morning. I put down the date as 10.10.11, when he reminded me, “Sir, it should be 10.11.11, but never mind, it is still valid.” It then hit me: ‘11' stands for November, which means next month is December, when I celebrate my birthday!
Now wasn't it just the other day – really just the other day – when I celebrated my birthday? I can never forget last year's birthday because I turned 40 and had celebrated the milestone by inviting each friend I have in the city. The taste of the cake still lingers in my mouth; the noise that is created when some 50 people gather in a hall is still ringing in my ears; many of the gifts I received are still to be opened; people are still commenting on the pictures of the party on Facebook; and I am still calling myself 40, happy in the knowledge that there are many more months to go before I turn 41.
But what is this: the time has already come! The prospect of turning 41 does not pain me so much as the fact that 12 months are about to pass without my even realising it. Father Time gave no notice, he just sent a last-minute alert in the form of the newspaper vendor. What was I doing when these months were passing by – why didn't I notice?
I guess I am yet another victim of the devil called deadline. My eyes are so perpetually fixed on a future date on the calendar that I miss out on today. What a pity that I listen to this song almost every day but am yet to get its import – it's an immortal song written by Gulzar, set to tune by R.D. Burman and sung by Kishore Kumar, from the film "Gol Maal":
Aane wala pal,
jaane waala hai
Ho sake to isme,
zindagi bita do
pal jo yeh jaane waala hai…
The moment that is arriving
is already about to leave
why not spend a lifetime in it
for it is about to leave.
Published in The Hindu MetroPlus, November 12, 2011.
Friday, November 04, 2011
Life In A Metro — Hong Kong Diary
Jottings from a trip where the best of the West met the best of the East
When you are visiting a foreign country as a tourist, it is one thing to check into a posh hotel and pore over the brochures handed out by the tourism department, and quite another to read the newspaper the next morning. The brochures invariably take you to fantasy land, where everything is perfect and where anything unpleasant safely belongs to the past – a place you would love to settle down if the laws permitted and if you had the cash. The newspaper, on the other hand, tells you the truth – though in some countries you may have to read between the lines.
In the case of India though – and I am not ashamed to say this – truth kisses you long before fantasy can take you in her embrace. It is not at all surprising, therefore, that the foreigners who adore India happen to be the ones in search of truth. But then, India is also a country where reality often fuses with fantasy: on one hand you can get fleeced or have your pocket picked, but on the other you will find total strangers inviting you to their houses for a meal.
Right now, though, I am going to talk about Hong Kong, where I spent five days recently at the invitation of its tourism board, which is eager to draw to tourists from south India. (A detailed account of the trip will be presented in the travel pages in the coming weeks). As you drive from the airport into the city, the first thing that will strike you is the flawlessness about Hong Kong – everything is in order. And once you get into the city, you will also find it an exciting place to be in. Hong Kong, after all, is a king-sized and far more vivacious version of London. Here, the best of West meets the best of East. But then.
On the very first morning that I woke up to in Hong Kong, I was greeted by a rather distressing piece of news. Axe hangs over private historic homes on Peak, screamed the lead headline of South China Morning Post, the largest English newspaper in Hong Kong and one of the most respected in the whole of southeast Asia. The Peak, once known as Victoria Peak, is a mountain that today overlooks the high-rises of Hong Kong. It used to be the summer capital of the colonial rulers and is still home to old bungalows, some of which have already been turned into high-rises while the remaining are awaiting such transformation, much to the concern of heritage enthusiasts.
“Heritage advisers said the government should make an effort to preserve those (houses) that were reminders of key public figures who contributed to Hong Kong’s development, or reflected the life of early residents,” the newspaper reported. It remains to be seen who wins eventually, the heritage advisers or the skyscrapers – though one knows the answer already.
The morning after, another piece of alarming news: Hong Kong is worried by the “growing youth drinking problem” and the government is urged to raise either the duty on alcohol or the legal age for drinking. There was a crime story too: that of a law student allegedly locking up and assaulting his girlfriend for three days to force her to reconcile with him. The reconciliation effort, however, landed him in jail, though he was released subsequently on bail.
And the morning I checked out of the hotel, I read, over breakfast, a piece of news which the newspaper thought should worry Hong Kong. According to the paper, the examiners for A-levels as well as Hong Kong Certificate of Education Examination had blamed students for their “narrow-mindedness”, “immaturity” and “bad grammar.” One can understand the bit about poor grammar, but immaturity and narrow-mindedness? Welcome to Hong Kong.
Yet another headline on the same day, same page: Flasher strikes again in Sau Mau Ping. Oh well, even paradise must have its share of problems. Hong Kong is one such paradise.
Published in The Hindu MetroPlus, November 5, 2011.
When you are visiting a foreign country as a tourist, it is one thing to check into a posh hotel and pore over the brochures handed out by the tourism department, and quite another to read the newspaper the next morning. The brochures invariably take you to fantasy land, where everything is perfect and where anything unpleasant safely belongs to the past – a place you would love to settle down if the laws permitted and if you had the cash. The newspaper, on the other hand, tells you the truth – though in some countries you may have to read between the lines.
In the case of India though – and I am not ashamed to say this – truth kisses you long before fantasy can take you in her embrace. It is not at all surprising, therefore, that the foreigners who adore India happen to be the ones in search of truth. But then, India is also a country where reality often fuses with fantasy: on one hand you can get fleeced or have your pocket picked, but on the other you will find total strangers inviting you to their houses for a meal.
Right now, though, I am going to talk about Hong Kong, where I spent five days recently at the invitation of its tourism board, which is eager to draw to tourists from south India. (A detailed account of the trip will be presented in the travel pages in the coming weeks). As you drive from the airport into the city, the first thing that will strike you is the flawlessness about Hong Kong – everything is in order. And once you get into the city, you will also find it an exciting place to be in. Hong Kong, after all, is a king-sized and far more vivacious version of London. Here, the best of West meets the best of East. But then.
On the very first morning that I woke up to in Hong Kong, I was greeted by a rather distressing piece of news. Axe hangs over private historic homes on Peak, screamed the lead headline of South China Morning Post, the largest English newspaper in Hong Kong and one of the most respected in the whole of southeast Asia. The Peak, once known as Victoria Peak, is a mountain that today overlooks the high-rises of Hong Kong. It used to be the summer capital of the colonial rulers and is still home to old bungalows, some of which have already been turned into high-rises while the remaining are awaiting such transformation, much to the concern of heritage enthusiasts.
“Heritage advisers said the government should make an effort to preserve those (houses) that were reminders of key public figures who contributed to Hong Kong’s development, or reflected the life of early residents,” the newspaper reported. It remains to be seen who wins eventually, the heritage advisers or the skyscrapers – though one knows the answer already.
The morning after, another piece of alarming news: Hong Kong is worried by the “growing youth drinking problem” and the government is urged to raise either the duty on alcohol or the legal age for drinking. There was a crime story too: that of a law student allegedly locking up and assaulting his girlfriend for three days to force her to reconcile with him. The reconciliation effort, however, landed him in jail, though he was released subsequently on bail.
And the morning I checked out of the hotel, I read, over breakfast, a piece of news which the newspaper thought should worry Hong Kong. According to the paper, the examiners for A-levels as well as Hong Kong Certificate of Education Examination had blamed students for their “narrow-mindedness”, “immaturity” and “bad grammar.” One can understand the bit about poor grammar, but immaturity and narrow-mindedness? Welcome to Hong Kong.
Yet another headline on the same day, same page: Flasher strikes again in Sau Mau Ping. Oh well, even paradise must have its share of problems. Hong Kong is one such paradise.
Published in The Hindu MetroPlus, November 5, 2011.
Monday, October 24, 2011
The Mind Of A Doctor
Thanks to my hypochondria, which is getting worse with advancing age, I have a new fantasy these days: to romance a doctor. That way, I could kill two birds with one stone -- get the woman's attention as well as assurance ("No baby, nothing is wrong with you! You are just fine, trust me!").
Romancing a doctor is quite different from marrying a doctor. When you marry a doctor, your home becomes a mini-hospital and all your vices are junked into the bin. No smoking, no drinking, no junk food, eating on time, sleeping on time -- everything that makes you feel alive is snatched away from you overnight. But when a female doctor chooses to romance you, she is well aware of your vices and is largely accepting of them: in fact, through you, she gets to see or lead the wild side of life which her professional conscience otherwise prohibits. For example, when you light up a cigarette, she may even take a drag or two, but at the same time she is likely to warn you, "Enough, this is the last cigarette you are having this evening. You can have the next one after dinner."
Experience, however, has taught me that the longer the romance rages, you begin to see more of the woman and less of the doctor. "Baby, nothing is wrong with you" becomes "Fuck you, go and die for all I care." Even then, I continue to be fascinated by women doctors -- at least the idea of them. It is not at all same as having a male doctor as a close friend.
If you call up a male doctor-friend, who is aware of your hypochondria, late in the night and tell him that you are experiencing a mild pain in the chest, he is most likely to tell you, "Have two glasses of water and try going to sleep. I don't think anything is wrong. If the pain still continues, go to Apollo tomorrow morning and get an ECG done. After that we will see."
But try calling a doctor-girlfriend to break the same chest-pain news and her first reaction, if it is within her control, would be, "Wait, I am coming!" Actually, the very fact that you have a doctor-girlfriend is good news: she would not have come anywhere close to you and have chosen to admire you from a distance if you really were a storehouse of diseases (which a hypochondriac thinks himself to be). And when she tells you, "Fuck you! Go and die", she is actually giving you a fitness certificate.
Which is why women doctors (or 'lady doctors') fascinate me. Each time I happen to find myself being examined by one, a barrage of questions assault me: Is it possible that she likes me? Does she wash her hands before she eats? Does she hog whenever she sees good food? Does she lust for men, knowing fully well what lies inside the human body? Does she have sex once she returns home from the hospital? If she does, does she analyse medically, in her mind, the whole act -- from arousal to orgasm? While kissing her lover, isn't she deterred by the fact that she is actually letting her mouth into a beehive of bacteria? Does she cry when a loved one dies, even though she knows, more than anyone else, that death is inevitable? Does she cry at all?
Strangely, these questions don't spring up in my mind when I am being examined by a male doctor. Maybe because I know that men are men, no matter what profession they are in. They are always guided by basic instincts. Women, on the other hand, are always conscientious and sincere. To imagine that they could have a naughty side when they are not examining a patient with a stern look on their face -- that can be titillating.
The other day, at a small gathering, I happened to meet a young doctor. She was specialising in, of all things, oncology. The hypochondriac in me wanted to stay miles away from her, lest she detect some strange growth on my body. Fortunately, by the time she pulled a chair next to me -- she turned out to be a reader of Ganga Mail and wanted to have a chat -- I had had two drinks to feel brave and philosophical.
"Sir," she began, "I have always wanted to tell you one thing. Please smoke and drink less, so that we can keep enjoying your writing."
"One will remain healthy as long as one wants to. It is all in the mind, you see. The mind is the most powerful human organ, which no doctor can touch or feel." It was the alcohol talking.
"Oh sir, it is pointless to argue with you intellectual types," she smiled. She looked shyly at the glass of beer she was holding.
"Tell me one thing," I said, "you have worked on cadavers, right?"
"Of course!"
"So you know how a man looks after death."
"Of course!"
"And you also know what is inside a human body -- the intestines, the organs, and so on."
"Of course!" she laughed, wiping the froth from her upper lip as she took a sip of beer. "Why do you ask all this?"
"I will tell you why. Suppose you are with a man, someone you like. Imagine a situation when you are standing or sitting very close to him. Are you going to be aroused, or are you going to think of all that is inside him -- the bones, the intestines, the organs?"
"Well, sir," she said, "it's like this. My brain will know what all is inside him, but my heart and eyes will see what is outside."
Romancing a doctor is quite different from marrying a doctor. When you marry a doctor, your home becomes a mini-hospital and all your vices are junked into the bin. No smoking, no drinking, no junk food, eating on time, sleeping on time -- everything that makes you feel alive is snatched away from you overnight. But when a female doctor chooses to romance you, she is well aware of your vices and is largely accepting of them: in fact, through you, she gets to see or lead the wild side of life which her professional conscience otherwise prohibits. For example, when you light up a cigarette, she may even take a drag or two, but at the same time she is likely to warn you, "Enough, this is the last cigarette you are having this evening. You can have the next one after dinner."
Experience, however, has taught me that the longer the romance rages, you begin to see more of the woman and less of the doctor. "Baby, nothing is wrong with you" becomes "Fuck you, go and die for all I care." Even then, I continue to be fascinated by women doctors -- at least the idea of them. It is not at all same as having a male doctor as a close friend.
If you call up a male doctor-friend, who is aware of your hypochondria, late in the night and tell him that you are experiencing a mild pain in the chest, he is most likely to tell you, "Have two glasses of water and try going to sleep. I don't think anything is wrong. If the pain still continues, go to Apollo tomorrow morning and get an ECG done. After that we will see."
But try calling a doctor-girlfriend to break the same chest-pain news and her first reaction, if it is within her control, would be, "Wait, I am coming!" Actually, the very fact that you have a doctor-girlfriend is good news: she would not have come anywhere close to you and have chosen to admire you from a distance if you really were a storehouse of diseases (which a hypochondriac thinks himself to be). And when she tells you, "Fuck you! Go and die", she is actually giving you a fitness certificate.
Which is why women doctors (or 'lady doctors') fascinate me. Each time I happen to find myself being examined by one, a barrage of questions assault me: Is it possible that she likes me? Does she wash her hands before she eats? Does she hog whenever she sees good food? Does she lust for men, knowing fully well what lies inside the human body? Does she have sex once she returns home from the hospital? If she does, does she analyse medically, in her mind, the whole act -- from arousal to orgasm? While kissing her lover, isn't she deterred by the fact that she is actually letting her mouth into a beehive of bacteria? Does she cry when a loved one dies, even though she knows, more than anyone else, that death is inevitable? Does she cry at all?
Strangely, these questions don't spring up in my mind when I am being examined by a male doctor. Maybe because I know that men are men, no matter what profession they are in. They are always guided by basic instincts. Women, on the other hand, are always conscientious and sincere. To imagine that they could have a naughty side when they are not examining a patient with a stern look on their face -- that can be titillating.
The other day, at a small gathering, I happened to meet a young doctor. She was specialising in, of all things, oncology. The hypochondriac in me wanted to stay miles away from her, lest she detect some strange growth on my body. Fortunately, by the time she pulled a chair next to me -- she turned out to be a reader of Ganga Mail and wanted to have a chat -- I had had two drinks to feel brave and philosophical.
"Sir," she began, "I have always wanted to tell you one thing. Please smoke and drink less, so that we can keep enjoying your writing."
"One will remain healthy as long as one wants to. It is all in the mind, you see. The mind is the most powerful human organ, which no doctor can touch or feel." It was the alcohol talking.
"Oh sir, it is pointless to argue with you intellectual types," she smiled. She looked shyly at the glass of beer she was holding.
"Tell me one thing," I said, "you have worked on cadavers, right?"
"Of course!"
"So you know how a man looks after death."
"Of course!"
"And you also know what is inside a human body -- the intestines, the organs, and so on."
"Of course!" she laughed, wiping the froth from her upper lip as she took a sip of beer. "Why do you ask all this?"
"I will tell you why. Suppose you are with a man, someone you like. Imagine a situation when you are standing or sitting very close to him. Are you going to be aroused, or are you going to think of all that is inside him -- the bones, the intestines, the organs?"
"Well, sir," she said, "it's like this. My brain will know what all is inside him, but my heart and eyes will see what is outside."
Saturday, October 15, 2011
500th Post And Six Years Of Ganga Mail. Destination: Salvation
On an average, each post in Ganga Mail is about 500 words. Now multiply that by 500, and it will easily translate into three 250-page books. Three books! Alas, I can't keep them in the shelf. They are invisible books. But they've earned me what real books achieve for their writers: a little bit of recognition.
Tomorrow, if fame comes knocking, the credit will still go to Ganga Mail because it was this blog which helped me find and develop a distinct voice as a writer. I still have a long way to go, but at least I know now that I am capable of telling a story. This would not have been possible without the constant encouragement from the people who read and have stood by Ganga Mail -- to all of you, my heartfelt thanks. With you around, life isn't so lonely.
Ganga Mail was born out of loneliness. I was two months short of 35, still single and, for the first time in my life, without a steady girlfriend. Forget steady, I did not have any woman in my life, with the exception of my mother, who was worrying herself to death about the fact that her elder son was still not married.
There were a couple of women in my life, but they were unknown, unseen beauties with brains who were capable of engaging you in a conversation all night without letting your interest sag even for a moment. They were among the people who read my column in the New Sunday Express and had got in touch, and the conversation with them, even though intense, would be anything but personal. They had built such strong walls of anonymity around them that getting anything personal out of them was next to impossible. Moreover, after a long, stimulating chat, while they would go back to their respective beds or lovers or perhaps spouses, I would be left alone sitting on the mattress and staring at the screen. I had no one left to even call up.
Thus was born Ganga Mail -- as an attention-seeking device. I wanted to be read, to be appreciated. Writing for the paper was not sufficient enough -- that was just my job.
If you dig into the archives of the blog and read the first fifty posts or so, you will encounter the soul of a lonely (though not unhappy) man. In my opinion, that lot contains some of my best posts -- honest and free of the fear of being judged. I would write a post over several drinks and by the end of it would click on the 'Publish' button in a mildly drunken state, without worrying about what I had written -- something that I no longer do.
The lonely phase didn't last long. I started Ganga Mail in October 2005, within six months I was married. By then the blog had assumed a life of its own. It had become my diary, my conscience keeper, my mouthpiece, my front desk, my scribbling pad -- all rolled into one. Above all, it had become my best friend, who not only showed faith in my writing skills and helped me sharpen them, but also taught me that every single moment in your life, no matter how mundane or insignificant they may seem, can be transformed into an engaging piece of writing provided you put your mind into it. That way, you never consider anything to be mundane -- be it the 90 seconds you spend at the traffic signal or the 30 minutes you wait in the queue to pay your phone bill -- every moment, every experience is laden with a ripe fruit called the 'story'. You only have to know how to pluck it. Ganga Mail taught me the art.
Tonight, as I write this landmark post, my mind goes back to the old posts that gave Ganga Mail unprecedented visibility and helped it earn new reader bases. Two such posts easily come to my mind: one, my eyewitness account of Mani Ratnam in action, and the story of Shivani, a fictitious woman I had created.
But the two posts that will always remain close to my heart happen to be written during the lonely phase: one, my search for a particular song, Raat banoon main aur chaand bano tum; two, my eventual realisation that the route to immortality is only through mortality, courtesy a Sahir Ludhianvi song from Kabhie Kabhie. If Ganga Mail were to have an anthem, it would be Raat banoon main -- and it is not even sung by Kishore Kumar, the singer this blog is committed to celebrating.
Then there are countless other posts which I am proud of and wish people would read and reread them, but I can't recall their titles right away to run a search and reproduce the links here. But one of them would certainly be my experience of cremating my mother at the Manikarnika Ghat in Banaras, a place where every devout Hindu desires to be cremated. My mother, even though highly devout, never went to Banaras with the intention of being cremated there: she was merely visiting my brother who happened to be posted in the city, and she just died one fine afternoon while having lunch, three days before her 59th birthday and exactly three hours after I had spoken to her over the phone.
Here again, Ganga Mail came to my rescue: the moment I received the news of her death, I became a blogger-reporter who set out to cover his mother's funeral. I was no longer thinking of my mother, but about how to deliver the news and describe the event to my readers. The readers had become my relatives.
Six long years and 500 posts on, Ganga Mail continues to flow. May not be with the same ferocity when it could be heard even from a distance, but perhaps with a gentle gurgling sound that encourages you to step into the cool waters and splash some of it on your face.
During its journey through the six years, Ganga Mail has received numerous compliments. People who gave those compliments, at various points of time, might have forgotten all about it, but the nice things they had had to say about the blog not only remain engraved in my heart but also lie scattered, as evidence, in the comment boxes of various posts.
But one compliment deserves special mention. It came very recently from someone totally unknown to me, someone who hails from Lucknow, who mentioned my blog on his friend's Facebook wall, saying, Inko padhte jaiye, jeete jaiye, zindagi chakhte jaiye.
Inko padhte jaiye, jeete jaiye, zindagi chakhte jaiye -- Keep reading him, keep living life, keep savouring life.
Now, isn't that the mission statement of Ganga Mail?
Tomorrow, if fame comes knocking, the credit will still go to Ganga Mail because it was this blog which helped me find and develop a distinct voice as a writer. I still have a long way to go, but at least I know now that I am capable of telling a story. This would not have been possible without the constant encouragement from the people who read and have stood by Ganga Mail -- to all of you, my heartfelt thanks. With you around, life isn't so lonely.
Ganga Mail was born out of loneliness. I was two months short of 35, still single and, for the first time in my life, without a steady girlfriend. Forget steady, I did not have any woman in my life, with the exception of my mother, who was worrying herself to death about the fact that her elder son was still not married.
There were a couple of women in my life, but they were unknown, unseen beauties with brains who were capable of engaging you in a conversation all night without letting your interest sag even for a moment. They were among the people who read my column in the New Sunday Express and had got in touch, and the conversation with them, even though intense, would be anything but personal. They had built such strong walls of anonymity around them that getting anything personal out of them was next to impossible. Moreover, after a long, stimulating chat, while they would go back to their respective beds or lovers or perhaps spouses, I would be left alone sitting on the mattress and staring at the screen. I had no one left to even call up.
Thus was born Ganga Mail -- as an attention-seeking device. I wanted to be read, to be appreciated. Writing for the paper was not sufficient enough -- that was just my job.
If you dig into the archives of the blog and read the first fifty posts or so, you will encounter the soul of a lonely (though not unhappy) man. In my opinion, that lot contains some of my best posts -- honest and free of the fear of being judged. I would write a post over several drinks and by the end of it would click on the 'Publish' button in a mildly drunken state, without worrying about what I had written -- something that I no longer do.
The lonely phase didn't last long. I started Ganga Mail in October 2005, within six months I was married. By then the blog had assumed a life of its own. It had become my diary, my conscience keeper, my mouthpiece, my front desk, my scribbling pad -- all rolled into one. Above all, it had become my best friend, who not only showed faith in my writing skills and helped me sharpen them, but also taught me that every single moment in your life, no matter how mundane or insignificant they may seem, can be transformed into an engaging piece of writing provided you put your mind into it. That way, you never consider anything to be mundane -- be it the 90 seconds you spend at the traffic signal or the 30 minutes you wait in the queue to pay your phone bill -- every moment, every experience is laden with a ripe fruit called the 'story'. You only have to know how to pluck it. Ganga Mail taught me the art.
Tonight, as I write this landmark post, my mind goes back to the old posts that gave Ganga Mail unprecedented visibility and helped it earn new reader bases. Two such posts easily come to my mind: one, my eyewitness account of Mani Ratnam in action, and the story of Shivani, a fictitious woman I had created.
But the two posts that will always remain close to my heart happen to be written during the lonely phase: one, my search for a particular song, Raat banoon main aur chaand bano tum; two, my eventual realisation that the route to immortality is only through mortality, courtesy a Sahir Ludhianvi song from Kabhie Kabhie. If Ganga Mail were to have an anthem, it would be Raat banoon main -- and it is not even sung by Kishore Kumar, the singer this blog is committed to celebrating.
Then there are countless other posts which I am proud of and wish people would read and reread them, but I can't recall their titles right away to run a search and reproduce the links here. But one of them would certainly be my experience of cremating my mother at the Manikarnika Ghat in Banaras, a place where every devout Hindu desires to be cremated. My mother, even though highly devout, never went to Banaras with the intention of being cremated there: she was merely visiting my brother who happened to be posted in the city, and she just died one fine afternoon while having lunch, three days before her 59th birthday and exactly three hours after I had spoken to her over the phone.
Here again, Ganga Mail came to my rescue: the moment I received the news of her death, I became a blogger-reporter who set out to cover his mother's funeral. I was no longer thinking of my mother, but about how to deliver the news and describe the event to my readers. The readers had become my relatives.
Six long years and 500 posts on, Ganga Mail continues to flow. May not be with the same ferocity when it could be heard even from a distance, but perhaps with a gentle gurgling sound that encourages you to step into the cool waters and splash some of it on your face.
During its journey through the six years, Ganga Mail has received numerous compliments. People who gave those compliments, at various points of time, might have forgotten all about it, but the nice things they had had to say about the blog not only remain engraved in my heart but also lie scattered, as evidence, in the comment boxes of various posts.
But one compliment deserves special mention. It came very recently from someone totally unknown to me, someone who hails from Lucknow, who mentioned my blog on his friend's Facebook wall, saying, Inko padhte jaiye, jeete jaiye, zindagi chakhte jaiye.
Inko padhte jaiye, jeete jaiye, zindagi chakhte jaiye -- Keep reading him, keep living life, keep savouring life.
Now, isn't that the mission statement of Ganga Mail?
Saturday, October 08, 2011
Fireflies
It is always a pleasure to hold a new book in your hands -- even more if the book happens to arrive at your doorstep in a parcel. It is the time taken to tear open the parcel that heightens the pleasure. You know what exactly is inside, but the effort that goes into unravelling a brand new book is what really makes it worthwhile.
Then just imagine the pleasure if the brand new hardbound book you pull out of the parcel happens to be printed forty years ago! I must have been only a few months old when, in 1971, Alfred Knopf printed the American edition of Shiva Naipaul's best-known book, Fireflies.
I, of course, wouldn't know how many copies were printed and how many got sold from that lot, but it is now certain that some copies remained, unsold and untouched, in some storehouse where no light reached for forty long years. So what I held in my hands last Saturday was a first-edition copy of a celebrated book published at the time when I was born (Andre Deutsch published it in Britain in 1970 and Alfred Knopf published it in America the following year).
I kept rereading, in amazement, these words on the opening page: Alfred A. Knopf / New York / 1971. And also what the jacket of the book had to say about the author: Shiva Naipaul was born in 1945 in Port of Spain, Trinidad, and was educated there and at University College, Oxford (where he received an honors degree in classical Chinese). Fireflies marks his debut as a novelist -- he has previously published short stories, three of which have appeared in Penguin Modern Stories 4. Like his brother, the novelist V.S. Naipaul, he now lives in England.
In a recent edition of the book, if at all there is one, the author intro would stand drastically altered. Shiva Naipaul would be described in the past tense (he died in 1985, aged 40) while V.S. Naipaul would not be called a mere novelist but a Nobel laureate. Fireflies, though I am yet to start reading it, seems to be Shiva Naipaul's answer to his elder brother's A House for Mr Biswas. They are equally voluminous and are set in Trinidad.
Between the two Naipauls, I somehow prefer the younger brother. While the elder one is like a dour-faced teacher who looks down upon you (yet you stick to him because you've got so much to learn from him), the younger brother is a good-natured soul who takes you along on his journeys. I have read, cover to cover, two books of Shiva Naipaul -- North of South and Beyond the Dragon's Mouth -- to be able to say that.
Somehow, Fireflies always eluded me. Each time I decided to look it up on Amazon, either the book would be out of stock or my credit card would have crossed the spending limit. Finally I got a first-edition copy, thanks to Soma.
Soma and I were born around the same time. We lived and grew up in the same neighbourhood and went to the same school. We were in the same class. As kids we were great friends, but adolescence erected a wall of awkwardness between us. I don't recall having a single conversation with her during our teenage years. By the time we could step out of teenage, she was already married and had gone off to America. We ceased to exist for each other -- not that it mattered to either of us. Then, one day, some twenty years later, Facebook reunited us. We were two different people now -- both embracing the age of forty and much wiser.
About a month ago, Soma came down to India to visit her parents in Calcutta. Since I was going to be in Calcutta too around that time, we planned to meet up for lunch at Peter Cat on Park Street. A couple of days before she took the flight out of the U.S., she pinged me: "Dude, is there anything you want from here?"
"Nothing at all," I replied, "But just in case you happen to visit a bookshop before you leave, and if in that bookshop you find a book called Fireflies, please pick it up for me. I'll pay you."
Little did I know that she was going to do what I also could've done sitting thousands of miles away in India. She went to Amazon.com and ordered the book. Unfortunately, the book reached her home after she had left for India. Which meant I could not get my copy of Fireflies during the lunch at Peter Cat (I was secretly hoping I would). But so what, I've got it now and I can finally proclaim, proudly and honestly: That's what friends are for!
Really, the copy of Fireflies is a certificate of that friendship -- a friendship that goes back forty years, when Shiva Naipaul had just finished writing the book and when Soma and I were still in our nappies.
P.S. Talking of siblings, my brother Rohit also has a blog now.
Then just imagine the pleasure if the brand new hardbound book you pull out of the parcel happens to be printed forty years ago! I must have been only a few months old when, in 1971, Alfred Knopf printed the American edition of Shiva Naipaul's best-known book, Fireflies.
I, of course, wouldn't know how many copies were printed and how many got sold from that lot, but it is now certain that some copies remained, unsold and untouched, in some storehouse where no light reached for forty long years. So what I held in my hands last Saturday was a first-edition copy of a celebrated book published at the time when I was born (Andre Deutsch published it in Britain in 1970 and Alfred Knopf published it in America the following year).
I kept rereading, in amazement, these words on the opening page: Alfred A. Knopf / New York / 1971. And also what the jacket of the book had to say about the author: Shiva Naipaul was born in 1945 in Port of Spain, Trinidad, and was educated there and at University College, Oxford (where he received an honors degree in classical Chinese). Fireflies marks his debut as a novelist -- he has previously published short stories, three of which have appeared in Penguin Modern Stories 4. Like his brother, the novelist V.S. Naipaul, he now lives in England.
In a recent edition of the book, if at all there is one, the author intro would stand drastically altered. Shiva Naipaul would be described in the past tense (he died in 1985, aged 40) while V.S. Naipaul would not be called a mere novelist but a Nobel laureate. Fireflies, though I am yet to start reading it, seems to be Shiva Naipaul's answer to his elder brother's A House for Mr Biswas. They are equally voluminous and are set in Trinidad.
Between the two Naipauls, I somehow prefer the younger brother. While the elder one is like a dour-faced teacher who looks down upon you (yet you stick to him because you've got so much to learn from him), the younger brother is a good-natured soul who takes you along on his journeys. I have read, cover to cover, two books of Shiva Naipaul -- North of South and Beyond the Dragon's Mouth -- to be able to say that.
Somehow, Fireflies always eluded me. Each time I decided to look it up on Amazon, either the book would be out of stock or my credit card would have crossed the spending limit. Finally I got a first-edition copy, thanks to Soma.
Soma and I were born around the same time. We lived and grew up in the same neighbourhood and went to the same school. We were in the same class. As kids we were great friends, but adolescence erected a wall of awkwardness between us. I don't recall having a single conversation with her during our teenage years. By the time we could step out of teenage, she was already married and had gone off to America. We ceased to exist for each other -- not that it mattered to either of us. Then, one day, some twenty years later, Facebook reunited us. We were two different people now -- both embracing the age of forty and much wiser.
About a month ago, Soma came down to India to visit her parents in Calcutta. Since I was going to be in Calcutta too around that time, we planned to meet up for lunch at Peter Cat on Park Street. A couple of days before she took the flight out of the U.S., she pinged me: "Dude, is there anything you want from here?"
"Nothing at all," I replied, "But just in case you happen to visit a bookshop before you leave, and if in that bookshop you find a book called Fireflies, please pick it up for me. I'll pay you."
Little did I know that she was going to do what I also could've done sitting thousands of miles away in India. She went to Amazon.com and ordered the book. Unfortunately, the book reached her home after she had left for India. Which meant I could not get my copy of Fireflies during the lunch at Peter Cat (I was secretly hoping I would). But so what, I've got it now and I can finally proclaim, proudly and honestly: That's what friends are for!
Really, the copy of Fireflies is a certificate of that friendship -- a friendship that goes back forty years, when Shiva Naipaul had just finished writing the book and when Soma and I were still in our nappies.
P.S. Talking of siblings, my brother Rohit also has a blog now.
Friday, October 07, 2011
Life In A Metro — The Circle Of Life
Rebel all you want — but life has a way of pulling you back to the basics
This Durga Puja, which got over just two days ago, I went pandal-hopping with gusto even though the festival is celebrated in barely five locations in the whole of Chennai. Which meant shaking hands with hitherto-unknown Bengali men who, like me, are also living in the city; admiring the beautiful Bengali women who made you wonder why you don't ever run into them during the rest of the year; savouring the artery-choking Mughlai parathas and cutlets sold at the stalls; admiring the beautiful face of the goddess as the priest waved burning incense at her to the beats of the dhaak – the sound of Bengal.
Each time I stood in front of the goddess, transfixed, as the incense was being waved at her, I could see my mind racing thirty years back in time to a city called Kanpur, where I, as a ten-year-old, stood watching a similar spectacle.
Back then, Durga Puja meant at least three sets of new clothes, each to be worn on saptami, ashtami and navami. The cloth would be purchased and given to the tailor more than a month in advance. During those three days, you would be granted immunity against homework. Also during those three days, you discovered the joys of eating out – the biggest joy, and sense of achievement, being derived from the eating of the bhog, or the community feast, consisting of khichuri and labra.
Khichuri (a soggy preparation of rice and lentils) and labra (a mix of crudely-chopped vegetables) can only count as the humblest of dishes one can think of, but when eaten collectively out of leaf-plates at the puja pandal, the khichuri-labra combo becomes a delicacy in itself. The smell of khichuri is something that gets embedded in the nostrils of a Bengali child right from the formative years.
Then, one day, youth intervenes. You rebel against the practices you've followed as a child; you find it uncool to waste a day at the puja pandal; you find it horrifying that people should queue up for the khichuri and labra as if they were beggars. You want to do your own thing, much to the disappointment of your parents who want you to come along for the puja just like you did in your childhood. Then comes the stage where you are too busy making a career to be thinking of festivals. Who has the time to go back to Kanpur to attend, of all things, Durga Puja? Years pass.
Finally, one day, you miss the smell of khichuri. You suddenly crave it. You want to take the train back to childhood but it is simply too late. So guided by your nostrils, you scour the streets of Chennai and eventually come across a puja pandal, where scenes from your childhood are being played out. You meekly join the queue with a leaf-plate to have some khichuri and labra scooped on to it. Over the meal, you make new friends and perhaps meet your future wife. And then you start coming to the same place, year after year. You've become a part of Chennai's Durga Puja celebrations.
But just when you are beginning to relive your childhood, you realise that your child is no longer a child but a young man – a rebel – who would rather have lunch at Bay Leaf with his friends than sweat it out with fellow Bengalis over a boring meal of khichuri and labra. But when he takes up a job in the U.S., and once he gets as old as you, he too will crave the familiar smell someday. He will scour the alien streets of his city and eventually come across a pandal crowded with Bengalis speaking English with an American – and not Bengali – accent. He will become a part of the New Jersey Durga Puja celebrations.
Someday, many decades down the line, his grandson will tell himself that he has had enough of the American way of the puja, and that in order to enjoy the festival in its truest sense, he must return to Kanpur. So he will be standing there, on the invisible footprints of a ten-year-old, watching the priest wave burning incense at the goddess. Life would have come full circle.
Published in The Hindu MetroPlus, October 8, 2011.
This Durga Puja, which got over just two days ago, I went pandal-hopping with gusto even though the festival is celebrated in barely five locations in the whole of Chennai. Which meant shaking hands with hitherto-unknown Bengali men who, like me, are also living in the city; admiring the beautiful Bengali women who made you wonder why you don't ever run into them during the rest of the year; savouring the artery-choking Mughlai parathas and cutlets sold at the stalls; admiring the beautiful face of the goddess as the priest waved burning incense at her to the beats of the dhaak – the sound of Bengal.
Each time I stood in front of the goddess, transfixed, as the incense was being waved at her, I could see my mind racing thirty years back in time to a city called Kanpur, where I, as a ten-year-old, stood watching a similar spectacle.
Back then, Durga Puja meant at least three sets of new clothes, each to be worn on saptami, ashtami and navami. The cloth would be purchased and given to the tailor more than a month in advance. During those three days, you would be granted immunity against homework. Also during those three days, you discovered the joys of eating out – the biggest joy, and sense of achievement, being derived from the eating of the bhog, or the community feast, consisting of khichuri and labra.
Khichuri (a soggy preparation of rice and lentils) and labra (a mix of crudely-chopped vegetables) can only count as the humblest of dishes one can think of, but when eaten collectively out of leaf-plates at the puja pandal, the khichuri-labra combo becomes a delicacy in itself. The smell of khichuri is something that gets embedded in the nostrils of a Bengali child right from the formative years.
Then, one day, youth intervenes. You rebel against the practices you've followed as a child; you find it uncool to waste a day at the puja pandal; you find it horrifying that people should queue up for the khichuri and labra as if they were beggars. You want to do your own thing, much to the disappointment of your parents who want you to come along for the puja just like you did in your childhood. Then comes the stage where you are too busy making a career to be thinking of festivals. Who has the time to go back to Kanpur to attend, of all things, Durga Puja? Years pass.
Finally, one day, you miss the smell of khichuri. You suddenly crave it. You want to take the train back to childhood but it is simply too late. So guided by your nostrils, you scour the streets of Chennai and eventually come across a puja pandal, where scenes from your childhood are being played out. You meekly join the queue with a leaf-plate to have some khichuri and labra scooped on to it. Over the meal, you make new friends and perhaps meet your future wife. And then you start coming to the same place, year after year. You've become a part of Chennai's Durga Puja celebrations.
But just when you are beginning to relive your childhood, you realise that your child is no longer a child but a young man – a rebel – who would rather have lunch at Bay Leaf with his friends than sweat it out with fellow Bengalis over a boring meal of khichuri and labra. But when he takes up a job in the U.S., and once he gets as old as you, he too will crave the familiar smell someday. He will scour the alien streets of his city and eventually come across a pandal crowded with Bengalis speaking English with an American – and not Bengali – accent. He will become a part of the New Jersey Durga Puja celebrations.
Someday, many decades down the line, his grandson will tell himself that he has had enough of the American way of the puja, and that in order to enjoy the festival in its truest sense, he must return to Kanpur. So he will be standing there, on the invisible footprints of a ten-year-old, watching the priest wave burning incense at the goddess. Life would have come full circle.
Published in The Hindu MetroPlus, October 8, 2011.
Saturday, October 01, 2011
Life In A Metro: Books, A Click Away
That's one evening I am not going to forget easily. It was October 2005. A colleague, who is also a good friend, and I were at Landmark, the bookstore, trying to make the most of the annual sale. As we went about picking books, I eagerly waited for the phone in my pocket to vibrate — our salaries were expected to be credited that evening, and as soon as the money hit the account, I was to receive a text message. Since my friend hadn't signed up for the intimation facility, he walked up to me every now and then to ask, “Did the SMS come?” We were getting panicky. Our evening depended entirely on the message from the bank.
Finally it arrived, just when we had run out of patience and were considering putting the carefully picked books back on the racks. It is difficult to describe in words the relief that overcame us; suffice to say that we pulled out our debit cards with flourish.
Today, even though that particular evening remains in my mind, the whole experience of whiling away time at bookshops has already become a distant memory. I simply can't recall the last time I went to a bookshop with the specific purpose of buying books. Why should I when I have the bookshop coming to my doorstep — that too with books I thought would be available only in a quaint bookstore in some corner of Europe? Can life get any better?
If you are a book-loving internet-savvy Indian and haven't heard of Flipkart yet, you are probably living in a cave. Flipkart, India's answer to Amazon.com, has brought about a revolution so sweeping that it is soon going to change the way the lay Indian shops — and not just for books. Why should you go to a bookshop and pay Rs. 250 for a book (not to mention the hundred bucks you shell out as autorickshaw fare) when Flipkart delivers the same book at your doorstep for just Rs. 188? For the discerning reader, it's not just about the discount but also the access to books that are never available in Indian bookshops.
Take Henry Miller, for instance. He is one writer I don't just admire, but also envy. But what do I find of him in the bookshops? Two long-unsold copies of Tropic of Cancer and may be a solitary copy of Sexus? And maybe a surprise copy of Black Spring? But run a search for Henry Miller on Flipkart, and you will hit a goldmine. For a few thousand rupees, you can own every single word Miller wrote in his lifetime. Ditto for other authors. You no longer have to lament: “Oh, I love his writing! He wrote that great book, what's its name? I tried looking for it, you know, but couldn't find it anywhere.”
The fun has just begun. It will be more fun starting next year when Amazon begins its India operations. According to informed sources, it has already set up an office in Bangalore (Flipkart is also headquartered in Bangalore), though it remains to be seen whether Amazon is going to function under its own brand name or piggyback on a local franchisee.
The surging popularity of e-tail is, needless to say, giving sleepless nights to the large chains of bookstores. Stand-alone bookstores, which are run out of passion for the written word and which have a loyal clientele, may still survive the onslaught as long as the elderly owner, most likely to be well-read himself, genially guides customers into buying the right books. But it's the big chains, who shell out a fortune each month to maintain their stores in plush malls or in prime locations in various cities, which will take the hit. Eventually they will sell less books and more of other items.
For once, I am not complaining about the changing times. More cars mean more pollution and congestion, more connectivity means less privacy, but more books only mean a bigger library at home. Which person in his or her right mind would ever grudge that?
Published in The Hindu MetroPlus, October 1, 2011.
Finally it arrived, just when we had run out of patience and were considering putting the carefully picked books back on the racks. It is difficult to describe in words the relief that overcame us; suffice to say that we pulled out our debit cards with flourish.
Today, even though that particular evening remains in my mind, the whole experience of whiling away time at bookshops has already become a distant memory. I simply can't recall the last time I went to a bookshop with the specific purpose of buying books. Why should I when I have the bookshop coming to my doorstep — that too with books I thought would be available only in a quaint bookstore in some corner of Europe? Can life get any better?
If you are a book-loving internet-savvy Indian and haven't heard of Flipkart yet, you are probably living in a cave. Flipkart, India's answer to Amazon.com, has brought about a revolution so sweeping that it is soon going to change the way the lay Indian shops — and not just for books. Why should you go to a bookshop and pay Rs. 250 for a book (not to mention the hundred bucks you shell out as autorickshaw fare) when Flipkart delivers the same book at your doorstep for just Rs. 188? For the discerning reader, it's not just about the discount but also the access to books that are never available in Indian bookshops.
Take Henry Miller, for instance. He is one writer I don't just admire, but also envy. But what do I find of him in the bookshops? Two long-unsold copies of Tropic of Cancer and may be a solitary copy of Sexus? And maybe a surprise copy of Black Spring? But run a search for Henry Miller on Flipkart, and you will hit a goldmine. For a few thousand rupees, you can own every single word Miller wrote in his lifetime. Ditto for other authors. You no longer have to lament: “Oh, I love his writing! He wrote that great book, what's its name? I tried looking for it, you know, but couldn't find it anywhere.”
The fun has just begun. It will be more fun starting next year when Amazon begins its India operations. According to informed sources, it has already set up an office in Bangalore (Flipkart is also headquartered in Bangalore), though it remains to be seen whether Amazon is going to function under its own brand name or piggyback on a local franchisee.
The surging popularity of e-tail is, needless to say, giving sleepless nights to the large chains of bookstores. Stand-alone bookstores, which are run out of passion for the written word and which have a loyal clientele, may still survive the onslaught as long as the elderly owner, most likely to be well-read himself, genially guides customers into buying the right books. But it's the big chains, who shell out a fortune each month to maintain their stores in plush malls or in prime locations in various cities, which will take the hit. Eventually they will sell less books and more of other items.
For once, I am not complaining about the changing times. More cars mean more pollution and congestion, more connectivity means less privacy, but more books only mean a bigger library at home. Which person in his or her right mind would ever grudge that?
Published in The Hindu MetroPlus, October 1, 2011.
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