The Journey to School - I

Since I joined Bantul Mahakali High School, somewhere in a far-off area in rural West Bengal, I have been inundated with questions. Curious friends want to know how life is at this village school for someone who has studied and worked in the city and knows nothing of what life can be 50kms away from the heart of Calcutta. I have tried to answer these questions to the best of my ability but there is just so much to say that nothing I could write on chat boxes or say on phone conversations could totally encapsulate my experience. A series of blog posts on my life at school was long overdue! With the doors of this co-ed institution shut for three consecutive days and the weather enforcing me to keep my own door firmly bolted, it’s time to keyboard my story.

This was going to be my first journey on a local train! Yes, when I mention this to anyone, they don’t believe me. It surely does not make me feel proud of this dubious distinction but I have never traveled short distances by train. I didn’t need to. I was gearing myself up for the worst when my colleagues laughed at my question, “Where should I punch the monthly ticket?” These two friends are regulars on local trains and had told me to buy a monthly ticket for convenience. I was of the opinion that they could be punched, much like Metro Rail tickets. When my colleague took out his ticket and railway ID card, I had my first look at what I needed to be armed with to take local trains on a daily basis.

I had done a reconnaissance a few days before I was scheduled to join and knew that it would take me a couple of hours to reach the school. I started off this reconnaissance trip with a lot of foreboding. I had no idea how it is going to be. I had a rough sketch of where I needed to go and what I had to take. The rest would unfold when I hit the track. High on a desire to explore and quite low on enthusiasm, I took off. I had to walk for 5 minutes to reach the bus stop. If I had to go to Calcutta, I need not have walked because a bus going that way would have saved the trouble for me. Anyway, not to be weighed down by the loss of this luxury, I took a bus to the train station. The bus was near-empty because office goers were headed the opposite way, towards Calcutta. I was going away from it. The bus stopped on a flyover above the train station. I had to climb down about two levels to reach ground floor.

The way to the school was a series of questions. The first one was, “Where is the ticket counter?” I had no choice but to depend on random strangers to locate a destination where I might spend the rest of my professional career. I was shown a structure which was more like a concrete hut with a tin roof and polished marble floors. The rain in the morning had left patches of water on the floor and years of use have eroded the surface. Walking carefully, I reached the ticket counter. Two counters were on the sides of a room that can pass off as a rectangular hall. Rubbish was heaped on at least two of the corners. An old woman was strategically standing between the counters, expecting passengers to drop their loose balance into her begging bowl. Many were disappointing her.

I bought my ticket and headed for the over-bridge that will take me to another platform. Again, this information was indebted to a stranger. The climb up made me sweat badly and I realized with a tinge of fear that maybe these flights of stairs, the flyover and now this, will be difficult to manage some years down the line, if I continue to skip exercises. I got to the right platform and asked a tea vendor when the train will come. He replied that it was due and anytime it would arrive. True enough, I saw it chugging in lazily. With each passing day, I have learnt to trust the information of train hawkers more than railway time tables or officials. Seats were available on the train. The same reason, like the bus, applied to save me from another physical exhaustion. I was on my way.

An Empty Ode

Sterile thoughts clog my void brain,

I cannot wade through thoughts profane;

The want far exceeds the frugal means

Of sustenance that life did me ordain.

Each day I hope for a pregnant sunrise

Each day the boredom I despise.

The numbness remains my vital shadow

When will life bring me a surprise?

I feel compelled to shield my eyes,

From the naked shrapnels of the past.

What stark, bare force in them lies

That bring them up out of the dust

The need for a physical consolation escalates;

Blocked are the routes of escapades.

This is a poem I wrote way back on a June evening in 2008.

Dear Dad II

It’s been a year since I last wrote to you. It’s not easy making up my mind and begin to write a letter to you, you know! No, it’s not just the emotional upheaval that I’m scared of. It’s also because of the lack of emotional intimacy we shared. I don’t remember talking to you frankly or freely about my problems, neither did you feel easy enough to do the same with me. Somehow we kept our lives separate, lest we betray our vulnerabilities. There’s something that held you back from talking about your needs. You could never say what you wanted. If somebody understood instinctively, it was done for you. You would accept the favor with silent gratefulness. If it was not done, you would have no qualms about it. I inherited this trait from you, though partially. I can keep silent when no one realizes what I want, but somehow I cannot help but be bitter about it. I feel a bad aftertaste in the mouth.

This last year has been oddly quiet. There were no major events except for my laptop breaking down and me having to spend a whole two months to bring things back in control. Yes, I bought a laptop last year in May, with the money I received as Provident Fund from my last office. I tried to sell off my desktop, the one you worked on, but changed my mind. Remember how we used to fight over it? Things used to get so ugly on Sundays! You were so paranoid about checking your email every hour and I would grumble that I cannot have the computer to myself. I would complain to my mother and she would raise a ruckus and bully you into letting me take over. You would calmly get up and watch TV. I would finish my non-existent work in half an hour and join you on the sofa. Invariably I would take the remote and change the channel you were watching. You would immediately adjust your mind and watch what I did. Why did you never assert yourself? The computer and the TV lie silent for days and months. Need I say more?

You want me to talk about mom, don’t you? She’s fine! She’s heavily into singing devotional hymns and has learnt to play my old harmonium! She asked me to teach her initially. But you know how she picks things up! I gave up in two sessions. She went ahead and got herself a tutor. The lady is a very patient and an ideal teacher. Krishna Aunty joins mom for these sessions that happen thrice a week. But mom practices every single day! She’s really taken this up and is happy to keep herself occupied. Her sense of humor remains keen and outrageous to the hilt. Remember how you used to poke her so that she may say those funny, quaint things? You would laugh till tears came flowing. I enjoy her hilarious side a lot. She makes me smile with her excuses for bad cooking. When I’m pensive, she asks me if I am worried. Then without waiting for an answer, she brushes away all such considerations saying that I need not worry as long as she is around. I trust her completely when she says that. She may be comical, but she’s rock-steady. They don’t make them like her anymore. You did well to choose her as my mother.

If you want to know how we are doing on a daily basis, I have nothing much to say because nothing much has changed. There’s no one to bring the fish every day, so we don’t have it regularly. You know mom wouldn’t put anything non-veg in the fridge. As you know, she’s beyond reason when it comes to following null and void customs that are etched on her mind. She gets hysterical when I try to make her see sense. I don’t try hard or she may think that I’m trying to push my opinion on her. I don’t argue with her, unless I feel that she’s open to change her mind. She asks for my advice on little things these days. She feels that she’s getting old and now I must take the decisions. I tell her what I think of the matter and give her options. I don’t know if I’m capable of standing up and being there for her when she needs me. But I’m not giving up. Ever.

I dream about you every other night. Don’t look away, I know you realize what I’m talking about. Just the other day you were holding me in a half-hug when I woke up, like you used to. Don’t deny, you were right there, I could feel your stubble on my cheek. On other nights, you tell me things that I don’t remember when it’s day. I can’t recall a single word now. Naïve are the people who say dreams are nothing but your sub-conscious mind playing visual tricks. You are not my sub-conscious. There are some little things that keep coming back to me: silly jokes you found really funny, India losing cricket matches, our drunk neighbors fighting. As days pass, I feel I’m imitating the way you were. I gulp water like you did, I sometimes speak like you used to, I react like you did. And you know what, I wrote all these tenses of the last line in present tense.

That’s it for now. Don’t be conscious that I referred to your visits in my dreams and stay away from me. I would feel really lucky if I could talk to mom during the day and with you during the night. I never want to choose between you two. I will accept nothing but the both of you.

Be with me always.

Friendship: Then and Now

I am a self-confessed Facebook addict. If I’m not doing anything better, I’m surfing around through Facebook-scape. It’s like my Ethernet access has shrunk down to accommodate only this one particular website, like a house cut down by a cruel bulldozer to just a room. While I pace up and down this rather cluttered room of mine, I bump into many vestigial relationships. I’m talking about my friends who used to mean a lot at certain points of time, but have dissolved somewhere along the way. Many of them unsubscribed from my life when school was over, and there were many that I couldn’t keep track off. I must admit that I made little or no effort to do that, because migrations are necessary for many.

When I look at them today, I find it hard to reconcile their present with the memories of my past. I find it hard to figure out when I spoke to them last, and if I can somehow remember that, I cannot save my life to tell you what we talked about. It’s like we lived in a village that has been ravaged by the keepers of time. And then we settled elsewhere only to meet at a village fair many years later. By then we have transformed into self-sufficient units and can feed ourselves. We no longer need to join hands for a cause; we no longer need to come together again.

Don’t get me wrong here. I’m not saying that I do not like connecting with old friends. But there’s so much that has happened over the years that the person I work with knows more about me than the friend who was in the school Literary Club with me. It seems like a gigantic task to fill them up with updates, force the drab details down unwilling throats. I feel that friendship, like all other relationships, has a shelf life. Once you drag them beyond their span, you feel the burden and the weight crushes the fond memories you have. I’d pick my memories any day over reconciling myself with a stranger who looks like my long lost friend.

Ode to an Office

An incomplete poem I started writing long time back. It's about an office I worked in...

It was not a long time ago,
That I got an opportunity
To add my spirit of usefulness
And contribute toward an exercise in quality.
There exists a Gothic building,
That stands like a figure imposing;
To know more about this den,
Let's start meeting its merry men.
Guarding the door is a sentry gentle,
He neither smokes, nor chews beetle.
But he has got quite a curiosity,
And asks questions with feverish tenacity.
If you want to get through the gate,
Better come early, or you'll surely be late.
After climbing up the stairs few,
You are greeted with a solemn view.
With computers black, people sit in rows,
They work with perpetually quizzed eyebrows.
Work is not the reason for this gloom,
It's just that on the right is the boss' room!
It would not be safe to talk about
Some of these merry men,
Should they come to know of this,
They'll surely knock out my brain!
So let's go only to the harmless men,
They are nice, they are timid, they are sane.

Napping Away

This is another post triggered by the bus rides that take me to work and back. It’s not that I observed it off late, but I never thought of writing about this earlier. Check the snap. I took it on my cell phone when I was comfortably perched at the last seat of the bus. The gentleman (X) was almost resting his head on the shoulder of the man (Y) beside him. Y was sleeping too, but he could keep his head firmly straight, except for a slight droop. Each time X’s head touches his shoulder, Y gives his shoulders a violent shrug. This alerts X and he sits up bolt upright. Before long he gives up his resolve as the cool breeze wafting in from the Hooghly river sooths his alert nerves. His head starts the sideways slump again. This continued repeatedly till X’s journey came to an end and he somehow pushed himself out of the packed bus.

It’s not a wonder for me anymore. Over the years I have seen passengers on the bus take power naps on their way. Many wake up from the bounce on the roads. Many naps are cut short by an elbow of the passenger standing beside him. Some have a lot of peace stenciled on their faces. It seems like this is the only time which they have to themselves. They can sleep peacefully without a wife yelling in the other room or without a teenage child hankering for extra pocket money. They don’t really feel guilty about taking it for granted that even if their heads end up on the adjacent person’s shoulder, there won’t be much harm done! Some don’t even apologize. Some get angry when they find a head on their shoulder. Sometimes quarrels are triggered. I have seen considerate conductors leave the sleeping passengers alone when he goes along collecting fares. The ones standing and swaying to the movement of the bus look at the sleepers jealously. What would they not give to swap places? Some people have all the luck, they seem to grumble. And why not? While they sweat it out in the humid interiors of the bus, with only very short intermittent gusts of wind striking their grimy faces, the better-off mortals are replenishing their energy reserves.

I am guilty of the same offense as well! There were quite a few times when I fell asleep on my way. But I don’t use the person beside me as a pillow; that much I can assure you! However, I allow children to use me as a pillow if they fall asleep! I make jerky movements to ward off adults looking for the same privilege. As for me, actually my mind starts to wander about the moment the bus starts moving. When it gets lost in a maze of incomprehensible garbage, I find my eye-lids getting heavy. Before long they meet secretly. Their hug is torn apart when the bus comes to a sudden halt or when the car beside honks unusually loud. I squint out to check where I have reached. If that’s far off from where I have to get off, I allow myself to indulge a little, with a mental note that I have to keep this short. Sometimes when I wake to see my destination just a couple of minutes away and I feel really sleepy, I have this mad urge to sleep on and come back on another bus! But I fight it off because our time is such a slave to others that even if we want, we cannot get it to do something for our own pleasure.

A Noboborsho Morning Revisited

My earliest memory of the Bengali New Year was waking up at 4am. My parents had a business of their own. According to the custom of businesspersons, they woke up early on this day to pay a visit to the temple. This was the starting of the business year. Hundreds of small and medium scale businesspersons and their spouses would gather on the temple premises very early. They carried a big wickerwork bowl (called jhuri) filled with flowers, a new copy and assorted items needed for the ceremonies. Tucked away comfortably in the jhuri was an idol each of Lakshmi, the goddess of wealth and her elder brother Ganesh, the god of prosperity. The bro-sis duo is the deities the businesspersons worship in this part of the world.

My parents would blend in with the crowd. My mom, in a crisp new saree which sometimes retained the glued brand tag because she was always in a hurry and desperately careless, would spend the time at the queue chatting away happily with the other women around. My dad, irritated at having to wake up so early but never complaining in fear of a spat with mom, shifted uncomfortably on his feet. He couldn’t bring himself to talk to the others around him. He was a complete misfit there. He wouldn’t even get inside the cramped temple. He would wait outside as mom got in with the jhuri. When she came out with sweat trickling down her face, she had this look of triumph: finally she had got it done before many others!

The jhuri now contained lesser flowers. Red vermillion was painted across the forehead of Lakhsmi, the mark of a married woman. A red dot was marked on Ganesh’s forehead too. This was one was a tika, different from the one on Lakshmi. The copy’s first page was smeared with the same red and a red swastika shone through. There were flower petals inside the pages as well. Mom would open the lid of the paper box containing the sweets and thrust one in my mouth. Her palm smelled metallic. Dad would take the sweet very gravely, as if it was made of the most brittle material. He would then lop that in his mouth and chew it even more gravely. Mom would call on a thousand gods in an indecipherable mumble and eat her share. The rest would be distributed among close family members and the workers who helped the business. We would then be on our way home.