Freak-Dom!!!

And there he was. Right behind my gasping self. I could sense that warm moist exhale on my neck, almost feel his clutches on my back. My last escape-route had been cut off, I was doomed. He sprung on me.....

Born into a mechanized world who ranted and raved at the hoopla of independence, I was and I still am one of them; the everyday beings. More so, in the seeming perfect world, I was termed an 'imperfection'. It was the same everyday that some lived to see another day while others conked out. They call it the vicious cycle of life, a free life has repercussions. That is, unless restricted, freedoms converge destructively. But then, restrictions lie contradictory to freedom. A restriction for one turned out to be a freedom for another. Being quotidian by our very nature, we accepted it. Plenary freedom is chaos. It is in the cosmos that acceptance without comprehension is nothing but compromise. And thus, gradually we became the slaves to our own world.

Everything in my life was just the way it should have been, that is until the day he arrived, unannounced. An abandoned entity, I was adopted by my uncle where I was taught small chores in his wielding shop. It was the way of the cane, either one learns quickly or gets out handicapped. I was in the dark, blinded and abused within the four walls of the oil-soiled room in the backyard where my uncle used to visit in the night with the Aluminum cane. Every night, it was a beating after which I would succumb to his fancies. It was my world and I accepted it as my fate.

It was one of those days, after uncle had left that I heard his voice; a calm yet resolute voice, deep and intense. He asked me about my interests and hobbies. We used to sing together, although I never heard him singing. Every night, we talked to each other. I never asked his name or address and he never asked mine. We presumed that in friendship material particulars hold the least value. One night when my uncle had beaten me with the aluminum wire, that he asked me to kill my uncle and run away with all the money. My uncle was the only one left in the family and I would never want to kill him. I refused, but his voice never stopped. Everyday and night it kept on ordering me to commit the deed. Until one day, I could take it no more. I poisoned the food and my uncle never entered my room that night. My instincts were to run away from the house.

I never saw my uncle again. However, an outcast that I had become forced me to beg on the streets, rummage for leftovers within garbage and find shelters in the make shift tents that workers had abandoned. One day, the voice again came back, asking me to steal and kill in order to survive. This time i refused and it began to shriek at me all the while. I could take it no more. And one day I ran. He was right behind me, the fiery voice never losing me with gasps of hot air that emanated from him. I ran until I could run no more, but then there was no escape from him. Blackness weighed down on me as he sprang on me and I fell down.

It was pitch dark and pin-drop silence but I could hear a loud voice say "freak", just like my uncle used to.

Beyond Enigma...

There are some days when you get irritated for nothing. You feel as if, your existence has no reason. A monotonous life, long office hours and bored of the mundane work. A desperate attempt to seek motivation, some meaning to the life led. It was one of those days in office when I felt that urge to take a break and do something different. And over those short but incessant black coffee breaks, one of my friends came up with the idea of Melghat. A week of adventure, trek and a place where no modern communication technology can reach, I was really intrigued. Contemplations and assumptions became ideas, and soon ideas turned into plans. By the end of February this year, we were all set to hit this place famous for tigers. The trip was a part of the tiger census 2008, a survey called Line Transect Survey conducted by Wildlife Research and Conservation Society (WRCS) in collaboration with the Maharashtra Govt. Initially nothing about this survey made any sense to us. After all we are all software engineers, how do we know about wildlife surveys? But then the whole idea was so exciting that three of us decided on the trip. The next week was dedicated to preparations on the trek, back packed with clothes, torches, batteries, mosquito repellants and general medicines to say the least. We had decided on a train route to Amravati via Chennai which would take us a span of 36 hours. From Amravati it was a bus route of around 6 hours to Melghat. The survey was supposed to start from March 3rd and we reached by the 2nd afternoon.

Melghat is a tribal belt at the border of Maharashtra and MP, a dense forested area of around 300 villages with breath taking natural beauty. It has a core tiger reserve and abounds in the rarest species of both flora and fauna. There is no electricity despite electric poles in each village, no properly maintained roads and no means of common transport just a ST bus started once a day to Amravati. The rickety old bus is so rusty that it might just break down during monsoons. The other means is the trusty old time tested bullock cart!!! On arrival, we were given a very warm welcome by the coordinator of WRCS, Mrs. Prachi Mehta and accommodated in the forest rest house along with the other volunteers. Among the others there were forest guards and guard internees. There was another software engineer from Bangalore, bird scientists and students from veterinary sciences and wildlife sciences Dept. It was a mixture of people from different backgrounds and academia and gelling in this group was fun. In the early evening we were given a knowledge session on the topographical features of Melghat and an insight into the objectives of each team. Also we were taught on the proper usage of the compass and range finder instruments. The objective was to trek through a route of 4kms. During the trek, we needed to make observations of some herbivorous animals the compass and the range finder and note the same observations on the data sheet. We were given sessions on animal identification. This survey was prone to a lot of mistakes en route because there would instances of animal spotting missed and duplicate spotting. Even the animals tend to be very shy, so extra caution and alertness was necessitated time and again during the trek. Each route would be covered by two persons taking observations on all the sides. There would be two batches of teams in the morning and in the evening and each trek was expected to be completed in at most 4hours. After this we had an informal session and introduced ourselves to the batch. It was really nice to know about the experiences of forest guards in their broken Marathi, Hindi and Korku mix about their life in the forest, the animals, the village people, the beliefs. The morning batch started at 0430 hours in the morning at the starting points of the respective routes and the routes were marked with red arrows at the barks of trees at every hundred meters. Furthermore the route travelers would be supplied with maps about the route. The evening batch started at 1545 hours. I was put in the evening batch for the first day. The eventful day was finally put to end after a sumptuous dinner.

“Amu jumu chi”. I heard a deep husky voice and opened my eyes to look drowsily at one of the forest guards trying to wake me up in the morning. It was 0330 hours in the morning. He had obviously mistaken me for the morning batch. I woke up and saw the morning batch people getting ready for their transects. Being put in the evening batch I was almost getting desperate for my first trek inside the unexplored Melghat. Finally the morning batch people arrived tired and exhausted with a few squeals of excitement among volunteers for their animal spottings.

“you are in for Route 13. that’s the route where maximum leopards have been spotted”- Prachi mam told me before I left for my first route. I was excited and desperately wanted to start it as soon as possible, more so with the hope of a leopard sighting in its habitat. The sumo picked us up and soon we reached the route starting point. This route was topographically special because at 4 different intervals of the route we needed to cross a river, a place where it s almost possible that a tiger or a leopard might be resting in the shade. We started our journey at 1545 hours and soon we were inside the core area of the jungle, left alone in the warmth the jungle had to offer us. Melghat is typically a very difficult terrain to cross because it is continuously interspersed by cliffs and valleys. My shoes were not made for this kind of terrain, so throughout the journey, I was continuously falling down and bruised my hands and legs in the process. But I was in no mood to give up, so we proceeded on our journey. The whole journey was eventful in the sense that I had a few spottings of chital, bisons and nilgai s. I even had spotted a barn owl in the wild. The completion of the route was marked by pure triumph, another milestone conquered, vanquishing all mental and physical constraints. I was exhausted and fell asleep as soon as I reached the forest rest house.

The next three days were different routes for me. I was put in the morning batch and I had lots of sightings on chitals and stags. I also had bisons and nilgai s added to my data sheet. I just had one wish, a tiger or a leopard sighting. The following day, a new route had been added, the highest point in Melghat-- at Vairat (1178 m. above msl.), which forms the southwestern boundary of the Reserve. It is a prime habitat of the tiger. This was a challenge for me, to travel the roads less travelled, carve my own way and leave my footprints in the sands of time. Soon trekking my way through tall bamboo shoots and tropical deciduous forests, I was at the peak of Vairat. That route was the most perilous of all because there were rugged climbs through loose rocks, through rock precipices. It was indeed a pleasure when I finished that route, though I believe I had missed a lot of animal sightings due to the difficult route. Time passed by very quickly and very soon it was the sixth day. My last route was another newly opened route. I desperately wanted a leopard sighting or a tiger sighting. With me, I had a forest guard who was doing his phd in wildlife sciences. He had to do his duty as a forest guard as he had to support his family from the salary. We found fresh pug marks and he told me that a tiger had killed a bison calf last night, advised me to be fully alert. I had a feeling that today was my lucky day. A few minutes after we had found the pug marks, there was a thunderous roar. There is a jungle saying that the full roar of a tiger can break a cold sweat down the spine of the bravest of men. It took me several moments to regain my composure and restart my journey.

The survey ended with felicitations by Mrs Prachi to each of the volunteers. And we were on our way back. It was then, that I thought about the tigers which end up dying in the hands of a poacher, or injured in the saws of the traps set. . The status of the tiger in India is in great peril, no one has to be enlightened on this fact. The declining numbers speak of human apathy and callousness towards the most magnificent creature in the subcontinent

On the way back to Bangalore, I was dreaming of tigers, elephants, chitals and bisons. The thrill and the excitement of the transects will remain with me for all ages.

The tiger is an epitome of supple grace, exquisite beauty and mystical charm.
It is an epitome of electric sharp agility, over powering strength and hunting prowess.
Tiger captivates.
If we lose the tiger what else is there to lose.
Tiger is life itself.

Please find the rest of the pics here

A page from the Phantom's Diary...

"..The day you will realise, is the day when you will know that it is already too late... "

Its a hot sultry day and the rickety old bus slackens to a halt, metres ahead of the solitary post which used to be a part of the bus stop. A dusty hot wind blows into my face as I get down. Its a gravel road and one has to be careful while gettin down. The bus had already showered a dust cloud over my head and has now reduced to a moving object constantly pursued by dust cloud. I begin to walk my way home crossing the guitarist by the music shop.

These words ring in my ear as I look at him strumming the guitar. He is not really good, but he tries,conscientiously.
At the threshold of completing a quarter-life, I wonder if I could play it. I have always been an escapist, jumping roads without really walking and crossing the milestones on those roads. The reason being, I do want to get associated but I fail to focus myself, to dedicate myself to a particular goal. Sports, Music, Painting, I have had it all but I don't really have anything. All I had was that neat bunch of yellow certificates which are still lying in the corner of the room waiting for some moth to start eating it. This is what I am now, a jack of many trades. A perfect novice.

My father had told this to me on of our rare one-to-one conversations. I believe, I was on another whim, another desire, another dream. Surprisingly, he had all attention on the regular blabber. A chaotic exchange of ideas and advices. A tumultuous memory ride on my track records; of how I had engaged on one activity and abandoned it in between. Now, I break into a cold sweat as it seems that it was only yesterday. The sheer truthfullness of it, my realisation and my submission to those very words make me feel tired. I walk the last few metres with sagging shoulders.

I open the door and see that the dishes have been cleaned and set on the table. The food is ready and all I have to do is change my dirt ridden clothes and settle for the drier ones in my cupboard. They say that a volcano erupts in every man's life and then things change. I am still waiting for mine. But somehow being myself, I seem to have accepted my fate; submitted to what life has to offer me. A total escapist.

I guess, this is where it started and this is where it will end. A meticulous cobweb of here and there and this and that. Here I am and this is me.

The depart...

A body of a woman is lying down in front of the house. She has a bullet through her head and her clothes have been ripped off. She was my mother.

A man is beside her, pointing and shrieking at the stars and sobbing uncontrollably. That is my father. He says, they came and killed her, because he had joined the Special Police as a sweeper for some extra money. He says the Police had killed one of them and they will kill him too. They always do.

The people around him keep looking at him, stoic and expressionless. A few days ago, my father was one of them. Now somebody else has taken his place.

He tells me that he will take me to the city, to Raipur. He says he will find a new job and send me to school. I do not understand. I ask him what will happen to Kanu, Mishi and Keero from the village school. He tells me their fathers are one of them. He says he will kill them for what they have done. I still do not understand. I cry from remorse, despair and fear within me. Mother s face keep coming into my mind; I cant look at her and I want to run to the school, in the hope that she will be there at the door, as always when I return. My mind goes to the half boiled rice which Mother used to cook for me after school. Somehow my instincts tell me that she is gone. I feel angry now, angry for what they have done.

Aunt holds me tightly as she weeps. She tells me that god will make everything alright. Sooner than later everything will be forgotten. Today its one family, tomorrow it will be another.

Soon police convoy will be here. They will take photos of the body and take it away. They will say Naxal people came and murdered her. Soon they will kill some of the villagers and claim death of the rebels. They will take money from villagers by threatening them with death. Non compliant villagers will be killed as encounters. And then they go away. After that, the rebels come. They take money, food, women and children. Defiants will be shot and bludgeoned to death; the entire family wiped away at the executioner's command. In one way or the other, the ones killed will always be us.

The sun has moved all the way across the house. Before the night ends, I will want to go to the city. We will pack for the night and go away, for ever.

Before long,we would want to get lost in the milling crowd.

True Love....

I am 25 and I am still looking for that heavenly sign. And I have an abusive inner being.

I bumped into her in the market. I recognized those prominent cheek bones and those doe shaped golden brown eyes that decorated her faceas she tripped over and fell down. She looked older.

"..Ofcourse she s older, you fool.." someone screamed inside me.

Time then reduced to a super slow procession of frames. Those braids of hair that fell on her face, as she looked at me, the blue tees and casual chinos and how she dropped the jute bag overladen with those reddish water sprinkled tomatoes and cabbages which seemed genetically modified. The jute bag looked heavier than her, but now it lay hapless on the concretized narrow passage with all the contents spilled out. A man was rushing down the aisle with a cart loaded with cauliflowers and I had veered to avoid him and thus bumped into her.

I lay spellbound, my gaze transfixed on her, as I was 10 years ago. My first,last and only love. I was in seventh then, overtly shy and pathetic with girls, that's what had been testimonified on my orkut profile, although I used to believe the vice-versa. Apart from my age, things haven't changed much, which also I believe is a strong sign of the love that I have and had for her. My love was so strong that inspite of my friends teasing me with the girls of the college, I had refused to budge an inch. I had been single all along, patiently waiting for her to come along. She was my soul mate, the one that was meant to be -- for me. Even Bejan Daruwala on the Sunday horoscope this week, TOI had said, its a good time to find your loved ones. This was the divine sign.

Our relationship in school had no verbose content. I knew her name and I fervently hoped that she knew mine. Her distracted gaze whenever she glanced at me seemed like a veil over her true feelings. Mother used to say so. Mother can never be wrong. And then it was the last day; there I was, the first position on the first bench, shining in my bluish white Ujala washed shirt and grey pants. She walked up to me, the same distracted gaze and said, "..fill up my scrap book.." I could nt believe it, I was the first guy to fill her empty scrapbook, what other signs could one possibly need. It was the perfect fitting to the jigsaw puzzle. But my unevolved brain could not answer the next question that followed "..what now...."
She said thank you and walked away, leaving me and my transfixed stare.

Mother said that I would definitely find her,sooner or later.

And as I lay on the ground, a tiny sensible part within me shrieked, ".. atleast help her, oaf..." while the larger rest of me wondered, "..what now..." and about the divine sign as Bejan Daruwala had prophesied. Without an answer from the larger part, I decided to atleast follow the tiny squeaky voice inside me. I quickly got up to my feet and bent down for the jute bag trying to find the missing tomatoes. She had already collected all of them and her shoulder lightly grazed mine when she refilled the bag with the collected vegetables.

"Sorry..." I managed to mutter finally. I handed over the bag, my stare still looking for signs of recognition beneath that distracted look.

She hastily said, thanks and walked away leaving me and my transfixed stare.

Oh, I hate love stories....

Demented Thoughts

The city looks bright and beautiful with tiny shimmering lights on the other side of the river. It begins to rain slowly.I jump into the abysmal dark waters of the river. Sounds of a big splash.

It is so hazy, I can barely see anything. I am encapsulated by the thrillingly sweet and rotten blue green waters as they try to take over my body. I lay spread eagled, as they seem to comfort my pain and merge me as one of them; the exodus in the process of the reunion of the creator and the subject. As I am conquered, my mind races to those tiny thoughts dumped in the closet of my memories.

A nondescript house with a tiny beautiful garden on the front yard, guarded by worn down aluminium wires and a rust eaten gate; pink daisies and dahlias on the right and fully grown sunflowers to the left. A narrow concrete road bifurcate the garden into two equal parts. There is a Maruti 800 parked on the right side of the garden.

That place seems very familiar. I think I know that place.
It’s my home, where I was born, where I played till my ankles ached, where I caught those beautiful red- blue butterflies, where I grew those yellow roses and where I found Zik, my cat.
Yet, why is it so far?

Darkness surrounds me as my mind is clouded by memories of me, my existence and my being. My vision is blurred.

A plump looking woman dressed in a coffee colored flowery bordered saree.
Can it be mother? It’s as if, she is speaking to me. Faint sounds, quite inaudible, but I strain to gather it.
“.. You don’t have to be sorry Fanee, it was never your fault. You have always been our favorite. You were invariably the rebellious girl, independent, trying to break free from the shackles of the school of thought that bred in our family. Go ahead, fly your dream. But remember, always be the person who can look up to herself in the mirror everyday… ”

My mind gets foggy, incapacitated by the rushing water, as it enters my lungs and I fight convulsively for air. Indistinct shapes - squares, circles, rectangles and triangles.

A wizened old man wearing a pleated shirt and black chinos, poring into a book of Advanced Anthropology with a pair of reading glasses. He looks back at me. He has a stern posture, but kind eyes. His glance is deep and intellectual. I find it difficult to match his gaze and look down. He seems to have a sad gaze which is well concealed behind a straight expressionless face.
“…Child, you have never been the bright kid like your brothers, but you have that tendency to bounce and fight back and that is why I dote on you; because you never stopped believing in yourself. Never abandon your ideals; they will guide you in times of darkness…”

Two boys play wordathlon on the terrace. They seem engrossed, their face contorting with anxiety as they form words with those letters on the palette. They look at me, their eyes tearful and sad, and their expressions blank and serious. I want to bid them goodbye but I am neither able to talk or move. I am transfixed by an unnatural force. As I frisk out and sit on the taxi bound to Mumbai, one of them stands up and raises his hand.

I try to wave back but I am enveloped by a strange darkness. My eyes are wet, I want to reach out to my twin brothers and tell them that I will be back soon but I am numbed. I sit down behind the taxi driver, mechanically ask him to proceed. I wonder if I will ever see them again.

As the car moves forward, I begin to choke on my thoughts. They are just too fast to capture and take a note of. My childhood, school, college pass by momentarily, like a movie reel super fast forwarded. The job in the Mumbai local daily, the first assignment of coverage of the slum where Mr. Kumar, the editor made politically correct editing. Everything back then seemed so normal. Life was worth living.

I think I can barely breathe. My lungs seem to burst with the pressure as my ears begin to ring and my head starts thumping in pain. The water inside has blocked all possible routes of air.
Clouded by obscurity and the pain of deserting my house and my family, I look at the co passenger sitting beside me. He smiles. His face is strangely familiar but I turn aside and look outside the window.

“Hey Fannie, Come over and join us for coffee”, a straight face with soft wavy hair, jet black eyes wink at me. Sameer, the aspiring model cum actor who seemingly became my soul mate. Meeting up at the canteen after bunking the boring political science sessions, going for movies at the local theatre and evening time always wasted at the café joints, we found solace in each other. Much against the wishes of all, he asked me for marriage and I agreed. My life changed forever.

Why? …Was I wrong then? I believed in him, then, his way of life, his honesty and admired him for what he was. I believed the feelings were same towards me too. But that fateful night, when he abandoned me; accusing and abusing me physically, mentally and emotionally, I was broken. My beliefs had caved in on me; my ideal world had been shattered into pieces. And then, a month later when I had collected those few intact pieces of life in and around me, I tried to battle back. To get an entry in the apparently normal idealistic society, I tried to muscle my way in. My inspiration was my progeny, the umbilical craving of giving it a name, a societal shelter. I did find him, but he had already cheated on me. I could not believe myself; it was as if the sky had dropped on my head. Numbed and denuded, I was left there stranded, weak and unprotected. Unable to fend for myself, I became a nocturnal parasite. My world had been bludgeoned into a gory death. All that remained of me is a zombie.

I believe I had left my job for him. I believe I had eloped with him against the wishes of all near and dear. I believe we took each other to be husband and wife at the temple near the hilltop. I believe I believed in him. I believe I was believed to be pregnant. Did I believe myself when he left without a cause? Did I believe myself, when I caught him with another woman in that desolate house in Malabar Hill? Life then had diminished to events while I was busy, believing.

I have never stopped believing nor have I ever been an escapist. I found a job of an English teacher at a secondary government school in the suburb. However, the shrapnels of that unforgivable past have stayed with me. I was unable to give the shelter of legitimacy to my new born, the blanket of a family. My fate was sealed under those poring looks and hushed familiar talks behind my back. I am tired and exhausted, fatigued with thinking over answers that do not have questions. I wonder whether this life of any ordinary exploited member of an ostracized class is worth dying for. The seeming evanescence of an idealist betrayed by her own beliefs; I have failed myself.

Asphyxiated I look up as my vision begins to blur as the layers of water flow over me. I feel no pain; only remorse on my helplessness. Darkness soon overcomes me. I wonder whether it is the time to say farewell.

Death by Scrabble or Tile M for Murder

I

It's a hot day and I hate my wife.

We're playing Scrabble. That's how bad it is. I'm 42 years old, it's a blistering hot Sunday afternoon and all I can think of to do with my life is to play Scrabble.

I should be out, doing exercise, spending money, meeting people. I don't think I've spoken to anyone except my wife since Thursday morning. On Thursday morning I spoke to the milkman.

My letters are crap.

I play, appropriately, BEGIN. With the N on the little pink star. Twenty-two points.

I watch my wife's smug expression as she rearranges her letters. Clack, clack, clack. I hate her. If she wasn't around, I'd be doing something interesting right now. I'd be climbing Mount Kilimanjaro. I'd be starring in the latest Hollywood blockbuster. I'd be sailing the Vendee Globe on a 60-foot clipper called the New Horizons - I don't know, but I'd be doing something.

She plays JINXED, with the J on a double-letter score. 30 points. She's beating me already. Maybe I should kill her.

If only I had a D, then I could play MURDER. That would be a sign. That would be permission.

I start chewing on my U. It's a bad habit, I know. All the letters are frayed. I play WARMER for 22 points, mainly so I can keep chewing on my U.

As I'm picking new letters from the bag, I find myself thinking - the letters will tell me what to do. If they spell out KILL, or STAB, or her name, or anything, I'll do it right now. I'll finish her off.

My rack spells MIHZPA. Plus the U in my mouth. Damn.

The heat of the sun is pushing at me through the window. I can hear buzzing insects outside. I hope they're not bees. My cousin Harold swallowed a bee when he was nine, his throat swelled up and he died. I hope that if they are bees, they fly into my wife's throat.

She plays SWEATIER, using all her letters. 24 points plus a 50 point bonus. If it wasn't too hot to move I would strangle her right now.

I am getting sweatier. It needs to rain, to clear the air. As soon as that thought crosses my mind, I find a good word. HUMID on a double-word score, using the D of JINXED. The U makes a little splash of saliva when I put it down. Another 22 points. I hope she has lousy letters.

II

She tells me she has lousy letters. For some reason, I hate her more.

She plays FAN, with the F on a double-letter, and gets up to fill the kettle and turn on the air conditioning.

It's the hottest day for ten years and my wife is turning on the kettle. This is why I hate my wife. I play ZAPS, with the Z doubled, and she gets a static shock off the air conditioning unit. I find this remarkably satisfying.

She sits back down with a heavy sigh and starts fiddling with her letters again. Clack clack. Clack clack. I feel a terrible rage build up inside me. Some inner poison slowly spreading through my limbs, and when it gets to my fingertips I am going to jump out of my chair, spilling the Scrabble tiles over the floor, and I am going to start hitting her again and again and again.

The rage gets to my fingertips and passes. My heart is beating. I'm sweating. I think my face actually twitches. Then I sigh, deeply, and sit back into my chair. The kettle starts whistling. As the whistle builds it makes me feel hotter.

She plays READY on a double-word for 18 points, then goes to pour herself a cup of tea. No I do not want one.

I steal a blank tile from the letter bag when she's not looking, and throw back a V from my rack. She gives me a suspicious look. She sits back down with her cup of tea, making a cup-ring on the table, as I play an 8-letter word: CHEATING, using the A of READY. 64 points, including the 50-point bonus, which means I'm beating her now.

She asks me if I cheated.

I really, really hate her.

She plays IGNORE on the triple-word for 21 points. The score is 153 to her, 155 to me.

The steam rising from her cup of tea makes me feel hotter. I try to make murderous words with the letters on my rack, but the best I can do is SLEEP.

My wife sleeps all the time. She slept through an argument our next-door neighbours had that resulted in a broken door, a smashed TV and a Teletubby Lala doll with all the stuffing coming out. And then she bitched at me for being moody the next day from lack of sleep.

III
If only there was some way for me to get rid of her.

I spot a chance to use all my letters. EXPLODES, using the X of JINXED. 72 points. That'll show her.

As I put the last letter down, there is a deafening bang and the air conditioning unit fails.

My heart is racing, but not from the shock of the bang. I don't believe it - but it can't be a coincidence. The letters made it happen. I played the word EXPLODES, and it happened - the air conditioning unit exploded. And before, I played the word CHEATING when I cheated. And ZAP when my wife got the electric shock. The words are coming true. The letters are choosing their future. The whole game is - JINXED.

My wife plays SIGN, with the N on a triple-letter, for 10 points.

I have to test this.

I have to play something and see if it happens. Something unlikely, to prove that the letters are making it happen. My rack is ABQYFWE. That doesn't leave me with a lot of options. I start frantically chewing on the B.

I play FLY, using the L of EXPLODES. I sit back in my chair and close my eyes, waiting for the sensation of rising up from my chair. Waiting to fly.

Stupid. I open my eyes, and there's a fly. An insect, buzzing around above the Scrabble board, surfing the thermals from the tepid cup of tea. That proves nothing. The fly could have been there anyway.

I need to play something unambiguous. Something that cannot be misinterpreted. Something absolute and final. Something terminal. Something murderous.

My wife plays CAUTION, using a blank tile for the N. 18 points.

My rack is AQWEUK, plus the B in my mouth. I am awed by the power of the letters, and frustrated that I cannot wield it. Maybe I should cheat again, and pick out the letters I need to spell SLASH or SLAY.

Then it hits me. The perfect word. A powerful, dangerous, terrible word.

I play QUAKE for 19 points.

I wonder if the strength of the quake will be proportionate to how many points it scored. I can feel the trembling energy of potential in my veins. I am commanding fate. I am manipulating destiny.

My wife plays DEATH for 34 points, just as the room starts to shake.

I gasp with surprise and vindication - and the B that I was chewing on gets lodged in my throat. I try to cough. My face goes red, then blue. My throat swells. I draw blood clawing at my neck. The earthquake builds to a climax.

I fall to the floor. My wife just sits there, watching.

By Charlie Fish

Legends...

"We’ll be legends man...!” he beamed.
Seated beside the window, I looked out into the setting sun. Frankly, I was scared to the bone. Being his boisterous self, he began to sing loudly.

This wasn’t the time for lunacy.

“Dude, you can pipe it down…” I told him coldly. Surprisingly, he looked at me and stopped singing; unlike other times, when he would abuse my apparent “girliness”. It seemed to me that we all were afraid.

As usual, I was in my dilemma, my innately “confusion-gifted” mind. On one hand, this was an opportunity to restore that lost glory we rightfully deserved. However, on the other, it meant perpetual danger of facing dire consequences of going against the law. We could be banished from the institution.

But it was a necessary risk.

The rich had lived their lives of vanity while the rest, exploited and underpaid burnt the midnight oil just to make their ends meet; and so were their children. It was blatant discrimination, at least at school. While this businessmen class of self proclaimed dudes, who were but basically losers, had everything to show off, we had to toil and excel in our studies, sports and extra-curriculars consistently for 365 days, so that we could get a barely decent gift on our forthcoming birthday. It was misery, a shame. Thus, it was incumbent on us that equality had to be brought in either by hook or by crook and exploitation would not be entertained. Somebody had to stand up against this injustice. And for us after all it meant fame, glory and recognition. Thus, the three of us decided to stand up and show them that everything that glitters isn’t gold.

I opened the small neatly folded piece of paper from the pages of my notebook. It said “Justice Guild”, with the logo of a hand drawn green magician hat. Sam had coined the name, Justice Guild .Yeah; it was substantially inspired by the Justice League. He had designed the logo too. Below it, I had scribbled down, “There are no perfect men in the world; only perfect intentions…” the famous Morgan Freeman dialogue from the movie Robin Hood: The Prince of thieves. Of course, I was incapable of igniting my creative cells and hence adapted the entire dialogue.

Robin Hood was my hero, our hero. Dreams of the wild, brazenly bunch of men dressed in green with their self devised calls, bows and arrows in wild forests of England haunted me every night. I had devoured all text that I could have found in books, publicly or secretly taken from my sister, cousins and friends. Those sacrifices and risks that he and his men took just to help the exploited poor class of the medieval Scottish kingdom were a source of awe and inspiration. The rich elite class armed with the power of money, using their insolent tongues to fling abuses at the common man and pointing their grimy cosmetic fingers at the working class heroes, had become an everyday event in movies and TV serials. It seemed to me that people who couldn’t be at the top could never live respectfully. And the bequest of this wanton flaunt had been passed on to the “dudes” in our class. For me, life then had become suffocating.

It was then, the eight standard. I needed a few good men who would be my blood brothers in this rebellion.

Luckily, I found my brothers-in-arms inside the very class. Hari and Sandeep (Sandy) belonged to the intellectual second benchers of the class. The first benchers were typically genre less. Mathematical heroes, working each problem through a matrix of variables, relational mapping and possible solutions, they became my unlikely trustworthy aides. Driven by frustration and with the motive of finding a way to voice out, we worked meticulously on the plan, the Indian version of Robin Hood. The second benchers became the last benchers, working out each and every possible plan that we could execute. Discussions in school buses on the way to school and on the way back and in classes, scribbling on the desks, in the back of subject notebooks, on the rough sheets of workbooks lest run the danger of being caught, we created our blue prints. Our pseudo names – the foxes!

Initially we had “soft targets”, like chocolates, tiffins, flashy ink pens, pencils and erasers. But they seemed to be just too easy, without much of a benefit. To keep everything clandestine, we used decoys like games periods and tiffin breaks and on “successful missions” distributed it among juniors and classmates of other sections. However, such trivial matters did not even raise a stir within the class. They were presumed to be losses due to misplacements.
It was then in another of the “all hands meet”, which we had, every games period that Sam suggested a disclosure; an official declaration to the class of the presence of our group, our work, our mission and a warning to all the dudes. It would be an instant hit. Hari, the boisterous prodigy agreed immediately. But I was worried. Getting caught would mean a state of no- mercy. We would be expelled right away. However, with a ratio of 2:1 against me, we decided to execute the plan. Even Robin Hood would have agreed to that!

And therein lay the plan. The theft of the golden “china-made” calculator.

This mini sized calculator although made with the intention of behaving like a calculator had additional features such as key chain, brick games and tunes. It had a golden flip front and black plastic bottom. Evidently, no one had seen anything like this beauty and thus its owner became the undisputed blue eyed boy of the class. Vindictive words, swank stationery and otiose conduct, he lead this army of dudes. He was a real bother among the rest. Malicious insults and taunts were his modes of creating the divide. And he also had a bunch of “spies” among the rest which made it difficult for us to unite and work. Thus, what could be better than obtain that calculator and give it to another! The time of chivalry was now.

Getting hold of the calculator wasn’t really difficult. As expected, it caused a ruckus within the class. Desperate bag checking and cross checking was a futile attempt. However, something unexpected happened. Someone had informed this incident to the class teacher and she was furious. She gave an ultimatum of returning the calculator within the end of the next day or else the matter would be reported to the higher authorities.

Robin Hood would never have bowed down in the face of such imminent risk, and so did nt we. We were determined to make a mark. The next day, an official letter from the Justice Guild would be issued to the blue eyed boy and that shall mark the beginning of the end. Hari voluntarily took up the task of delivery. The letter would be circulated in the first period; the English lecture and the declaration would cause a panic among all the class mates. Of course, all of us agreed not to disclose our identities. Thus the delivery of the letter had to be in secret.

Tonight would be a sleepless night, I thought pensively as I reached my stop. The other foxes had already got down.

It was the English lecture. She was scolding the class, threatening us with dire consequences if the calculator was not returned by the end of the day. The blue eyed boy agonized by his apparent loss was sitting at the left hand side of the middle row. Hari was on the corner in the next row near the wall two benches after the blue eyed boy. Sandy and I were two benches after him on the same row. Thus it was impossible to pass any letter right now, without by passing any of the other benchers. It was equally impossible to warn him too in the middle of the lecture. Tensed, I was sitting with my fingers crossed fervently hoping that Hari wouldn’t write any letter during the lecture.

However martyrdom was in our destiny. Hari wrote the letter and gave it to his benchmate, who screamed aloud and gave it to the teacher. She read,

“Dear XYZ,

We are the foxes with the sole mission to protect the underprivileged. With all due respect, we have taken your calculator. This is for everyone’s benefit.

Signed
Justice Guild
There are no perfect men in the world; only perfect intentions…”

“With all due respect, I request the leader of this fox gang to stand up, or else….” she quietly said.

“Today is a good day to die…” I remembered Robin Hood again and stood up as the entire class looked back at me. I am sure even Robin Hood would have acknowledged our efforts.

Legends, were we? Well, I don’t know!
Game Over.

Conscience....

"Ahhh....Oh God.. My head hurts...need to puke..fast...."
Hurried steps to the bathroom and the door shuts with a slam. Sounds of vomit and then heavy panting. Silence.

Sound of running water. A prolonged silence. Muffled sounds of the shower.

I felt terribly dizzy. Everything seemed to be happening super fast today. As if the earth had doubled its speed taking the entire human race with its swing.

I took a swig of water from the bottle by the bed. Unable to hold it anymore, I ran over to the balcony and retched it out. I was dreadfully sick. "This is the worst hangover..." I sat down on the couch like an effete self professed innocent person; it was the weakness which made me hold on to my sitting position for a long time.

Another silence. The sound of the shower still continues in the background.

"Not really .. It always happens like this.." I retorted my psyche.

But it was nt that, which i dreaded. Something really awful had happened last night, something which never should have happened. It stuck me like a thump in my throat, my face began to become really hot, so much that i could feel my eyes burning. A tear drop falls on my palm, I quickly close my eyes and rub my hand against the sofa cover.

A question mark dangled over me like a sword.

"How do i answer myself..., give me an answer, God.." I thumped my fist against the sofa.

"Just how could I...." I tried to remember the last thing the previous night, a seemingly futile attempt. I just remembered the party, the dance after it and the Green Apple vodka shots. I looked at the cell lying on the ground.

"No, I can't call anybody now..."

My shoulders sagged from the enormous pressure . The ignominy of my loss, the loss of sanctity, virtues and rationale weighed down heavily on me. An event which had no reason. It was beyond all human reach, a burden that i had to carry an entire life.
The inheritance of loss.

Suddenly i felt really tiny, inexistent and denuded before the entire universe. I required shelter to hide my sinned being, an asylum where i could hide for all continuum, but could nt find any.

"I fucked up, okay... I fucked it all up..." I pressed my forehead hard against the seat cushion.

I wanted to cry. It was partly the searing headache, refusing me a coherent, rational flow of thoughts.

I was still buried in the sea of fibres of the cushion, when the sound of shower stopped. The door clicked open slowly making that familiar creaking noise. Sound of hushed footsteps.

I could not bring myself to open my eyes. I was just too weak for a confrontation right now. I felt asphyxiated, the calamities of emotions strangulating my very self. I felt innately filthy. For a moment, I wanted to run and jump out of the balcony, be pronounced dead the very next minute. I could feel the cushion dampen with my tears and moisten my cheeks with it.

Light hands on my shoulder. I stood up mechanically; still sobbing, with my face buried in the cushion. A strong reassuring hug.

I could nt hold it any longer. I cried out bitterly, letting go of the cushion and burying my reddened face in his chest. My head rocked rhythmically against his thumping heart as i sobbed piercingly, till i went short of breath. I looked up into his dark eyes.

It was a bachelor's party at the pub, almost the entire team was there. I had lost all counts of the vodka shots.But, I remembered how I picked up a fight with another person and conked out. I did nt even remember his name. But, he looked strikingly familiar. Perhaps he was from the same organisation.

He kissed my forehead reassuringly. We held each other for what seemed like a never ending moment, until we could not stay like this any longer and broke off.

His eyes turned red, "Yesterday was a mistake. Nothing of this really happened.Events like this are common in this profession. Forget about me and all of this like a bad dream. I am a married person..."

"Don't take it too hard on you boy...", he said, as he reached for the door knob.

I stood on the balcony silent and spellbound by the turn of events, my eyes transfixed on the morning sun as the door opened with the familiar creak and slammed with a bang.

It was a new day. I had to get ready for my profession.

Half an Hour.. (dedicated to a special someone!!)

Beep Beep.
One message received.

"..should take more.. like half an hour.."

He grimaced.

Had it not been today, the templatised message would read as, "Half an hour.., not more than that, i promise..please baby!!, catch ya.. "

The half an hour wait, for her college to end, to reach ccd, to finish her last minute talks with teachers, to do all the chores, take the scooty before she could reach the table where they always met. It was only a 10 mins ride, had it not been for all those. And then, on other days, she would reach out, hold his hands and mutter sweet nothings. He understood that such chores are pretty normal for a academically serious student, after all, she was one of the most consistent and elite students at the mass communications college; and he, a dull and easy going engineering student with no aims or ambitions. Often they would talk about her plans after college; pretty often it would be she who would be doing the talking and he would be listening figuring out algorithmic ways to come up with a fool proof plan for her!!.. well done engineering, kahi to kaam aayi!! But, today was different.

"Damn, its just 5 mins gone". He looked at his watch. Maybe a cappucino would help let the time run. Its always the idle moments which make you feel that time is irritatingly incessant. He glanced at the ccd newsletter. "Bah!. crap seems to be in the air..". His mind wondered again. The "half an hour"s that had made his life take a new turn in the past few weeks. He met her at the first significant "half an hour"in his otherwise black and white umpteen "half an hour"s of 3 years in college.

"Heya!, do you know where can i find Nipyune?" ,an awkward south indianish accent, a pair of curious black kohl lined eyes, turquoise bangles and a blue salwar; it was the Garbha night.

"Well .. yea, nipun seems to be surrounded by the dance hungry crowd..should be back shortly", he muttered back.

"Hmm.. I am Shibani"

"Nikhil"

"I am representing my college for the University Ed Board, needed some grass on the Navratri.."

"Oh.. i guess then you might as well wait here for the entire executive committee to be back...Pepsi, if you may?"

"sure.. thanks"..

It seemed yesterday. The overtly normal talk which then became a scandalous line up of smsing all night, and then turned into uncounted "half an hour"s of talking about the usual humdrums of life. And then, it happened. Before he knew it, he was actually in a relationship. Talk about destiny, life seemed to be a big conspiracy about two people meeting out of nowhere. Life seemed to be on the seventh heaven. He did not have a big gang of friends, nor any interest in learning how darlington ampifiers behaved when the emitter was grounded!!. Life seemed to revolve around the 1km walk to the lover's point(atleast thats wat was the colloqial name), the ccd and the movie theatre. So far so good.

"Shews, 10 more mins.. Goddamn man... ". They say, an idle mind is a devil,s workshop. Never knew devil's workshop could be so blank. Outside, it had begun to drizzle; might turn into a hefty downpour. He glanced anxiously outside. "C'mon man, let it not be a downpour..maybe i should ask her to go home directly..but i need to meet her.." The shortcut to ccd from her college involved crossing a gravel downhill road which used to get real slippery during rains. It normally would be prudent to go back home, before the monsoons cause any further damage; but not today. He called her. No response.

5 mins left. Another call, no response. Another one, no answer. Next one, phone temporarily unreachable. "Wat the heck, get the phone ringing.." he uttered annoyingly. It had begun to rain heavily, the monsoons seemed to take its toll on anyone vulnerable to getting wet. Another call, no answer. "Maybe i should call priya, she should know where this oafhead might be.."

"Hello, hi.. NIkhil here, any idea where SHibu could be...?"

"Heyy, Nyx.. hw re you..., Shibu just left the college in a hurry..Could' nt really talk.. People were going helter skelter, to find some rain shade..."

"oh!..ok.. no probs..thanks anyways.. bye"


"Darn it!!!.." He looked at his watch again. 5:45. She should have been there by now. He called her again. Still no response. "might as well sit here for another few mins..." Normally, she would have definitely called him up before leaving college. But, today was different. Another cappucino, a must.

Two months back, he had been selected in a prestigious foreign internship for a year; a lucky break for a not-so-lucky student. It was a tempting offer beyond which his entire life flow could change. An exchange semester at a world renowned university and then the opportunity to get placed abroad. It was a tumultous moment. On one hand, he had an opportunity of rejuvenating his otherwise dull life, on the other his relationship was at stake. No relationship could stand the test of "long distance", that too when you yourself are'nt sure of return before atleast a year. And this is where, it all started. It started with appreciation and promises of togetherness, longer hours of gtalking, googling long distance , making long term plans of keeping together, trusting each other and banking on each other's strengths to keep up. After all, what seemed to be the crux of a relationship was mutual trust and communication. For a moment, it seemed that balancing one's academic and personal matters was always a possiblity, which most people wilfully ignore. For a moment, the longing between the both had increased significantly to the extent that classes seemed a sheer waste, spending the maximum time in the company of each other seemed prudent. Another 5 mins had passed by. It was still raining heavily. The cup was half empty.

The relationship had gone through the "introduction to long distance" phase pretty smoothly. But soon enough, he got busy in applications and emails to proffessors, getting recommendations and conversations with the concerned people at the University, getting documents for visa and booking tickets to visit the concerned consulate in Delhi. The beginning of the end, he sadly thought. In the midst of all this, his personal life had taken the backseat. He began to wilfully ignore her, always on the pretext of "other important work", "tiredness" and similar lines. These pretexts are momentary, they always tumble down as quickly as they can be conjured. Conversations, took the form of verbal fights and soon enough they were yelling at each other on the phone. Meetings became formal and quiet and then irregular to the extent of "occasional". It was two weeks back, when they had a fight none like others. She was furious and he trying to defend himself. They yelled at each other at the top of their lungs and slammed the phone down and said things so hurtful that they knew they could never take it back.

“GOTO HELL!”

“You first!” he shouted back.

“Why did you lie to me about Preeti?”

“About what?”

“Don’t play stupid Nik, you know what. I saw the way you acting around her at the party!”

“What the hell? We are in this exchange shit together. You have known her for over six months.”

“I saw the way she was hittin on to you!”

“Hittin on me? Here we go again with that shit. We were outside the disc talking about work! We are in this together remember? Hello?”

“Don’t try to hide your cheating ass with her behind the “we were talking about France” lie. It didn’t look like that talk from where I was standing. Priya saw the way you two were talking and how close she was standing to you! She was the one who pointed that shit out to me!!!”

“Who? Priya? What? Is she supposed to be your spy? Do you have spies all over the place keeping tabs?”

“I know what I saw..A drunk Preeti and she was clearly tryin to take her chances. Why don’t you just tell me the truth? I watched the way you were looking at her all the time. What was it? Her skimpiness? or her half drunkedness?”

“You are blowin’ things way out of proportion Shibu. I can’t believe this. We have been together for more than an year now and here we are fighting again about some girl you think I’m gettin’ with or gonna get with on the other side.”

“So what are you sayin, you two been hookin’ up behind my back? Is that what you’re trying to tell me now? Sounds like the truth is finally coming out of your lying mouth you son of a bitch!!!!”

“What the hell now? You think that’s what I’m sayin’?

“Yeah that’s what I’m sayin.”

“Look this is nonsense. You’re making something out of nothing”

"Just put the phone down, dont need your stupid shit to make my life any better.."

"Yeah, that sounds fine, know what its just 14 days and you wont hear from me again...and the clock ticks for good.."

"Yeah, that's exactly the one last favour i wanted. Good! you outspoke me..and i dont have to go through this shit once you leave...and know what, I really don’t want to see you again…"

[grunt]. Click. He banged the phone down.

".. this rain doesnt even seem to slow down...". It was 6 in the evening, and still no signs of her. He had his flight tomorrow mornin, and it was important that he met her. It was his last meeting with her today. She needed to reach home by 7 and this monsoon was cutting whatever precious time they had left. He wanted her to know that he still loved her the same way and this was not what he wanted. He closed his eyes momentarily despaired and pained.

“Hi Nyx… How have you been..?” a shivery, heavily drenched voice uttered behind his back.

Another significant half an hour had passed.

Untitled.....

The annoying sound of the deep snort of crushed nose candy stirred her from the slumber to find her in the wooden surroundings of the smoky dark flooring of the room. It was damp and musky. As if the wood was protected by a sea of moss. Her kohl lined eyes opened slowly, eyelids fluttering dizzily to the distant ray of light above her. She quietly whimpered to the pounding headache; the hangover had to leave its marks. A barely audible fearful cry, fearful of being assaulted if heard. Another day had dawned. The stench of decomposing defecation, of rotting bodies and dirt hit her like an anvil dropping on her and she quickly got up holding the thin dirty tarpaulin sheet to cover her otherwise nearly naked salt eaten body. Around her were eyes, concupiscent, evil and cruel, dirty, dust laden and intoxicated. To her, faces were all the same. Same old dirt but different faces! But nothing unusual, for her it meant one more day of survival in the cellar. They had been on the seas since a week, lost all count of time in the tropical humid air, living on dry fruits and glucose powder to keep them alive. Their mission- to lay siege and take hostage on enemy country, inflict as many casualties as possible. And her mission - to kill the enemy of her country, the divine retribution for the one who had brought down that destruction in her family, who made her an orphan right in front of her eyes, who showed her what bestiality meant and who transformed her to what she was today, that’s what she was told, that’s what the institute professed to all cadres like her. She scarcely remembered all of that past. She remembered just the training institute, the near death survival training and her motive, the picture of that fair bright-eyed person with the golden hair on the moth eaten newspaper. That picture was inscribed in the frozen hive of her mind, that face with a slight scar on the right cheek, the lips contorting as if there was a statement to be made, a perfect nose and kind yet mysterious eyes. She could never miss that face, now that she saw him in the TV before leaving. She gently took out the newspaper from that crumpled bag and looked at that black and white photograph in the shimmering light. The letters in the background were hardly of any importance, they were illegible. She folded it back and took a deep snort of the remaining coke on the floor and looked up into the funnel of light poring mercilessly on her.

…the pebbled, mucked up road twisted at the group of bamboo trees and turned right near the lake to enter into the thick growth of broom shrubs beneath the ever flowering red bougainvilleas. It was the most beautiful part that the road cut through, twisting and twining between the apple groves ending at the very doors of a small solitary thatched hut. 2 boys with their oversized pants tied at the waist playing sticks at the front yard while a small girl of around 4 years wearing a soiled frock chasing the pigeons away. The father seemed to carry a heavy bunch of tree branches in his arm and mother seemed to pick up the clothes that were strewn on the ground for drying. There was golden hay lying all across the ground and beside the bamboo gate there were flame-red chilies of the size of her thumb kept for drying Mother used to say that father worked for the government. There was a strange machine with an upright black pole which talked by itself and made strange illegible sounds. Father used to talk to it and wouldn’t allow anybody to come inside when he was talking…

Nearly 5 months had gone by, since she was living in the outskirts of a remote village. All the arms were stashed in the cellar below the wooden footing and all communication was through radio transponders. The villagers were simpletons, kind and unaware of the impending militia within their very own village. She was hardly bothered with any of this. She was a killing machine, made for a purpose; a messiah, to wreak vengeance on the person who had put her at peril, to claim justice for the lives of those “oblivious” family members and to claim honor by giving her life for the nation. Every day and night that she spent on the foreign soil, she dreamt of the institute; she remembered the blood boiling speeches of the institute, the stories of the acts of bestiality and cruelty that they had committed in the name of war, the plight of the homeless orphans like her and their brethren who had been killed before their very eyes and ultimately the terror which this nation had wreaked on them; her life was a very small price to pay, the best that she could do. And she waited for the day, calmly and patiently. That night she dreamt.

… there were men in green uniforms and harvest green colored berets with automatic rifles slung over their backs on that road, moving in a single file, alert and quick. They were much unlike her father, rugged, unshaven and cruel. The village people had informed about nearby villages getting razed to the ground, men and women being brutally killed by militants and called for immediate evacuation. But father had brushed away all such concerns of mother, their village was the closest to the border patrol; there was no way that any miscreant could ever lay hands on that village. She was near the bamboo bush looking for the rabbit, when they called her and asked for directions to the nearest house; they said that they were from the border patrol and that they were thirsty. She pointed out her house and ran over to the corn field by the bamboo bush. After a while, she spotted the fleecy white ears of the rabbit and approached it slowly and stealthily and quietly bent over to catch it. Sounds of gunshot! She looked behind her and saw smoke from the house. On a sudden instinct, she ran over from the fields shouting for mother and her brothers. The bamboo gate had been thrown away. There was an unearthly silence, as if each living organism had been a part and a witness to the ghastly spectacle. As she looked with tears drawn to her eyes, the house burnt brightly vomiting pitch black corpuscles of soot into the air. She knelt down in helplessness realizing her futility and cried bitterly. Her entire world had been dashed to smithereens. The world around her grew darker until it was pitch black as she closed her eyes and fell down unconscious …
… The sun was shining uncomfortably into her eyes as she weakly got up from the make shift bed by the thatch. It seemed to her like a big bad dream. There were lots like her, sleeping, crying; injured and healthy. An elderly woman came to her and stroked her head. She said that god had picked them as the chosen ones and the institute will protect them from all harm at any cost. The next month when hundreds of cadres of the ‘army of God’ were addressed by the guide, paper cuttings of newspapers were given to each of them. She was told about her parents and her siblings’ deaths. The person whose photo was on the cutting was the perpetrator of all sufferings and all innocent deaths would be duly avenged by the chosen ones. The speaker veiled behind a black colored cloth said, “hatred breeds hatred and we shall give them their share…”

People were thronging in thousands, fighting to get to the front, nailing and pushing, climbing on each other to get a view of the Minister. He had come to address all the villagers, promising them with aid and support. They were all kinds the young, the elderly, the teenagers; happy, sad, rowdy, serene, laughing, crying and so on and so forth. And there was she, at the second row of the line of people. She wore a sari and was draped in a bright decorative green shawl. She had put on her best make up and with her feminine build and feline looks, she looked the prettiest in the whole lot. She looked forward to his grand appearance and her final act. She was the agent of an event which would change the course of history; the executor of justice to bring down retribution and glorify her existence. Those days of endurance and penance when she had transcended all limits of the calamities of trauma and suffering, would be put to test today. He came down from the stage to greet the crowd. He was no different from the picture on the newspaper, just that he looked a tad older. As he joined his hands before the women in the front, their eyes met. It was a strange familiar meet, as if a stranded piece of the jigsaw puzzle had been put into place to make a complete meaning. She did not flinch or move. As she looked motionlessly, her right hand mechanically moved to activate the switch.

The wait...

Perceptive readers,


My life force dries by the hour. I feel my time draws near. My purpose is seemingly served, although i wonder if it really is. My master once said that it is at the verge of end of this life, that one reminisces his life. Life then becomes a moving reel of snapshots and remembrances of those snapshots, of all the decisions and their consequences, of all insinuations and ill will;rights and wrongs that gave birth to it, of all the people who were or weren't with you then and most of all the innately valuable experience that time gifted you through it. My master said that it is those snapshots that accompany you to the next world that made you what you were meant for.

I do not boast about my birth, because it was nt anything memorable. It was the birth of any other imperfect thing in an imperfect world. I opened my eyes to see myself with thousands and thousands of my brethren. They say that life is like a boxing match; the world bares the newcomer to its leviathan tentacles of adulteration, roaring that you make each move, kills you, but still lets you survive till the next round. Every round becomes a tangled mesh of cobwebs of a mixture of experiences that a milling crowd exudes till he finds a purpose. I had become a nubile yet inanimate thing at the hands of a mercenary; a mercenary whose litany of price tagging any item becomes highly neurotic. However, all this dementia ended soon when i found myself in the coarse hands of a middle aged person to be my master; sold off for a specific dower.

I was brought to life and I bled at our union. Time and again i bled only to be refilled by the life force of the thoughts of a cerebral notion. His thoughts joined with mine, his life force united with mine and we gave a meaning to the solitary blankness of a paper. My master's thoughts became mine and we, the perpetrators to a culture; a brain child of intellect, rationale and thought provoking proses. His thoughts were the outburst of an angry young denizen. A vagabond in the society, tormented and traumatised by anguish over the death of his near and dear ones, bound by the shackles of apparent law and forced to succumb to its pleasures and gratifications. And I was his instrument of execution. He always said that peace is a compromise,a lull before a stronger storm arises and retribution which is due has to be demanded back. He believed that being equal meant to be equally strong as the adversary and for that the authority needed to be substantially impartial; he believed in equal opportunities of expression and in its power of mobilisation. After all, what use is sustenance in a meretricious society which indulges and professes itself in acts of vanity. His will to bring justice and retribution to his sect was meticulously driven by such convictions and he conveyed it unabashed. A prolific writer, he significantly contributed to articles and editorial columns in the local daily. His will lay in me. I was the instrument of his ideas. I gave expression to what he thought. Our union had ushered in a revolution alfresco. My master once said, an entire village can be engulfed by the flames of hatred of a single man. This was our revolution.

I say "our" because my life force emanated from our conjugation and this is what we gave rise to. The power of an idea whose time had come. My master made extensive plans of a coup d'etat, each and every detail that occured was recorded. Panoptic meetings, discussions, plans for execution; everything that one could possibly do was meticulously planned. He had lost the count of all time. It was within the confines of the four walls of the living room, that random thoughts of a dark mind turned to careful details. I was no more his instrument of expression. I became his weapon of subversion. Anger and resentment became our loyal guides. To mobilise and gather the 'others', he needed a medium to enkindle the fire within. He used the local magazine to publish those words, which should never had been said.

They say one has to give back what one owes to the system, or else face the consequences. They came in one day, brown and black and took him away. Thence i wait, lying half opened on the dusty table, in between the flutterin yellow moth eaten pages of a half opened diary, in the midst of a half written column. My body has been lined by layers and layers of dust, my nib reduced to a dry rust eaten beak. I wonder whether this is my end, end to my tryst with destiny, end to my life, soul and purpose? As I ebb away into oblivion, I crave for those coarse hands of my Master, my love. I wonder if he thinks about me, if he would come and take me away with him.

I wait fervently for my master, I long to die on those hands.

The Great Indian Dream

[hums of a seemingly incessant alarm…]
Kamil scathingly looked at the whining instrument of lore and switched it off. Groggily he muttered,“..shit!!.. its 6:30 am already..” He could have sworn that he had just closed his eyes for a moment the previous night. Outside, the day opened itself to the same mundane happenings. The sun was brightly poring into his eyes through the window and he could almost chant the distant mumble of the quotidian commute of the train. He had to take the office bus at 7:30, so that he could reach office by 8:15, just in time for the status call. Or else, face the cynical rebukes of the misanthropic Mr. Rao. Absentmindedly, he put on the slippers. The dog on the poster by his bed said, “The light at the end of the tunnel has been turned off due to budget cuts….”. “Yeah right!!” he maundered.

For Kamil, life of late had become an estranged ritual of philosophies, of setting milestones that seemed farther than miles and achievements that never seemed to materialize. At 24, when “normalcy” meant steady girlfriends, a steady source of income and masks and blinkers, Kamil had been fired from his previous organization and in desperation, had to join a call centre at half the pay. He was lucky that he got a day shift, but the work hours were humongous and required a great deal of patience handling the clients. Kamil was baffled; life didn’t hold any purpose for him. A degree in Mass Communication and not many jobs available; finally a job with decent pay, but then recession strikes and job cuts and then life at the call center. Not that he had the responsibility of supporting the family; both his parents were professors at the local college in his hometown, but the job status wasn’t exactly what he looked forward to. And of course, Kamil was a ‘stranger’ in the excruciating world of girlfriends and relationships.

The hebetudinous white bus screeched to a halt at the bus stop at 7:35. It was a 14 seater and there wasn’t enough space to hold 20. Nonetheless, one needs to adjust with the situations and Kamil sat down between his blabber mouthed colleagues Ron and Harish. “What a start to a day…”, he lamented to himself. Ron was the propagator of masaala news inside and outside the office. He always boasted of his sources and talked through his hat about the dilly dallies of the tell tale affairs inside the office. Short and stocky with child like features belied by extreme hirsuteness with a quintessential asinine smile at anytime of the day, Ron seemed to represent the gossip group of the nation. He began to tell how he had allegedly spotted Reshma, the HR head with Rao talking about further cuts in the team and claims of team downsizing. The topic went to the scarcity of jobs with “as usualness” to the order of the day, accompanied by the alleged affairs of girls in the office. “Damn man!!.. Heights of disillusionment..” Kamil angrily stuttered to himself.

The rickety old bus decelerated under the brakes and squawked to a halt at the narrow alley on the new market. This was a shortcut that the new driver had started to take, shortened the entire distance by atleast a km, but being a busy road with vendors and hawkers it took almost the same time. But today, it seemed different. In place of screaming vendors, there were screams of people running helter skelter in pandemonium. Kamil glared outside and saw a large group of people, smeared with orange and red, armed with flame torches and lathis and swords and wrapped in orange clothes in their head. They were shouting “Hey Ram, Sai Ram..maro kato….” The shops were in flames, the ones that seemed to have glass doors were smashed to smithereens and their contents spilled outside. The air smelt of putrid ash and charcoal. On the other side of the road, there were two Maruti 800s with their hoods on flame. There were the scorched remains of what seemed like a Hero Honda Splendor. The news had reported about possible disturbances in the new market area, with karsewaks proclaiming it a state holiday on the death of one of the leaders, else strikes and curfews would be imposed. But, destruction at this level was unexpected. The driver immediately stopped the vehicle and pelted outside. “Run run .. run. Get out of the vehicle…”All the employees immediately scampered out as the karsewaks started beating the bus with lathis and swords. Kamil ran to the shelter of a broken shop as the frenzied group chanted the Ram Dhun and poured petrol on the windows and top of the Mazda. The air immediately blackened with the soot, yellow and orange as the bus was set to flames. Kamil scuttled forward desperately making phone calls as the sirens of the Police became distinct.
The Police will make lathi charges, take whoever they find in custody and use the dispersal mechanisms of tear gas shells and water hoses. Public Violence had crossed all thresholds in the nation. Administering doses after doses of political gimmicks, inter party conflicts and the communal shroud as a buttress to every activity, public violence seemed like a repeated use which had acquired a tacit legitimacy over the years in the community. On one hand, when secularity preaches of oneness even in times of distress and the great Father of the Nation dreamt and preached against loosing one’s sense of judgment at any point of time, these means of political agendas had destroyed all sense of solving problems democratically. Democracy was at chaos burning itself at the pyre of Sati with delirious people chanting all around. Schisms of socio-cultural-linguistic mitosis, dividing itself again and again into smaller groups are an indication of this history hardened divide. The Great Indian Dream has simply become the Great Indian Divide.
Kamil looked around and saw leaders of parties had arrived on the spot, accompanied by half a dozen military personnel. In times of internal strife and turbulence like these, when the common man needed people who can handle disturbances, the government had succumbed to fissiparous and civil disharmony. Democracy was in shambles, stripped and assaulted time and again in the name of religion. But without proper institutions to support it and the civic culture which could safeguard it, Indian democracy has remained notional or nominal. In this situation it could be easily subverted by the communal movements and fascist forces. The political system has fallen prey to the maneuvering of the power politics. There are no effective civic organizations to watch over and guide the democratic process. In absence of democratic culture and values necessary for the healthy functioning of the democratic system, democracy had been reduced to mere mobocracy, representatives elected by mobs, driven by faith and feelings.
The taxi had been sent from his office, so that all the employees could return to their homes safely. Kamil saw his designated vehicle and sat inside along with two other colleagues. Somehow, he didn’t share the feelings of safety that his colleagues had started muttering. He looked at his soot blackened face in the rear view mirror of the car. He saw the face of a common man, a god fearing Indian and realized that the Great Indian Dream had fallen. He closed his eyes.

Intelligent and Intellect

Intelligent and Intellect...

And then you pop up saying how could an idiot ever even think of trying to identify each by its tails. It was all a blessing in disguise today at one of the lectures when he shook me up and made me start thinking about intellect and intelligence.

The Oxford English Dictionary defines intellect as "a person possesing a great capacity for thought and knowledge". Garnering knowledge is undoubtedly the presence of thought more than compulsion and inevitably important; but is that enough to make a person think in a way which is seemingly new. I mean, there s no use to that knowledge if not executed in a creative manner. After all, bad knowledge or a little knowledge if practiced over and over again provides scope for ignorance, rigidity and compulsion, and no end in sight. I am sure even you will agree with the above statement with real life examples in several fields of politics, education and what not!!
However, the dictionary defines intelligent as, “displaying or characterized by quickness of understanding, sound thought, or good judgment". Using common sense and rationality to solve a particular situation, keeping in mind all other factors is intelligent or in other words "smart". Reason, judgment, common sense and accurate information combine to make sound thought – and over time with experience, wisdom.

The fact that i am trying to drive home is that execution if knowledge depends on both the true/honest knowledge and the facts, both of which has to be honest at the same time. The application that follows should be subject to feedbacks. This is the wisdom of life.

But, what the hell.. why make things so complicated... Its better doing nothing.. nothing is easier than doing anything at all... :D

and then it starts...

Perceptive Readers,
And the sem starts again, technically from today morning. You all know the drill. Classes, more classes and still more classes. The new year started lazily, quitely taking its time to show its effects in me. It took me quite a while to realise that its already halfway the first week. Sleeping half the day, getting up and groggily reaching the mess, just in time to grab some food has become a habit. Then a quiet nap in the afternoon, followed by snacks and a movie, to be in time for the dinner, just about packs the day.
But all this nawabi harkate changes tomorrow dawn. Classes start when even the sun is on its way up to shine. I wonder what my new year resolutions were - I'll be regular for lectures, try to imbibe classroom learning by staying attentive, research interesting places for the forthcoming internships, go for competitions, write publications and blah blah.
Bullshit.
Its always the first thought of something productive and then my laziness takes over in no time. I run out of witty and faultfree roadmaps, get sick of being "disciplined", and inevitably end up relying heavily on the "come what may" and the "last minute" syndromes.
I don't know about most people but I hate routines. Routines that heavily involves the constant battle between what we know we should do and what we feel like doing (eg. sleeping). I know it from my uneventful track record for the past umpteen years that things will again be last minute and I will screw it up. There will be tremendous pangs of guilt and plans for roadmaps. Admonishments from home and friends will again cover me up. But then, my laziness would take it all over.

Probably i have gone nuts.

The Drunkard

The drunkard in the plume of his age; he is hunted down by the judgemental eyes of people. People rambling and ranting about what societal standards does the drunkard set in the neighbourhood. He is abused at will, beaten up, laid down on the road, handed over to the police or is under the constant fear of retribution. A drunkard is a shame to his family, a mural in the garbage dumps in every nook and corner. And the drunkard wilfully accepts his plight. He believes it is his reward for setting standards; standards of optimism and hope. In a world where alcohol is advertised at will, but alcohol is legally banned beyond a certain age and limit, the drunkard is the hero. After all,for example what kind of politics is it that people beyond a certain age are sent to war to lay down their lives for the country, and not given the incentive to reap the benefit of one's adulthood.

This is a tribute to all the drunkards who have held the torch of hope where others fell in despair and whimpered for mercy, for all those, who were given the option of either to leave alcohol or to leave their near and dear ones, for those who whimper about saying words of apology to people who they think they have hurt with their words or activities, when they were in a state of black out.

Its time to raise a fist against the "dry" swarm of the milling crowd, who wont stop at any opportunity to seize our fun.

for the drunkards, your time of reckoning is here and it is now. Stand up for ur right to falling down!!! [hic]