Tuesday, April 22, 2008

Pause pls.....

Why so haste. Take a pause. Enjoy your surroundings; the passers-by; the plush green around; the birds; the rivers; the buildings; the mountains... Hear what I say...Dont have time to smile at me... Where you heading... God has put you in midst of all the fun; all the beauty and in a crowd of fellow beings. But you dont have time for any of these; you think of yourselves; your gain; your profits and you rush to make the most of it. You work overtime to get a fat salary; you slog for your employers better results; companies stress out for extra-ordinary growth rate; your country boasts of 9+ GDP growth. What for !. To regret at your last hours; of not getting enough time with your loved ones; of not spending enough time at your favorite village; of not kissing your love passionately enough; of not living at all.... Money is needed, wealth is required but it is not as necessary as your life itself... Live Life; Live slowly; Live long;

Friday, April 18, 2008

Diary'a'

Prologue
All the incidents, characters, monuments and time frame used in this short story are real. This is an extract from 'Jabal Kumar- An introspection'.

Diary'a'

It was some 20 years back, Rajiv gandhi was ruling the country aided with the consummate advice of sam petroda, who was later known to public as the man behind the telecommunication revolution in India. This preamble doesn't in any minutest way relate to our story or to our hero.
This happened in holy cross high school, which was then under Sr. Olivia. I was a small child, studying in the 1st standard. I know for sure, my parents had a terrible experience sending me to school. Early morning at 8.30 Gopi chettans van would come and I still remember how threatening that horn was. From the time when I woke up I used to pray for only one thing, a puncture to gopi chettans van. I wouldn't have complained if the god had listened to me at least once. Every day that piercing sound of his horn would startle me from my prayers.

ദാറ്റ് day also the same thing happened. My mother with utmost difficulty pushed me into the van, where one guy with a broad moustache was sitting at the door; he was Gopi chettans aid Vijayan Chettan. The van was filled with an air of joy. I found hardly two children who were weeping. One was Jose Zacharia and the other, a girl who was studying in the B class. All others were visibly happy. The door closed, the van gained speed and that fairly common song broke the silence. I don't know how many of you still remember those songs. Anyway read through എnd those lines will rekindle your memories.

"ചകോ മറിയ തല്ലുന്നീ നാട്ടാരെല്ലാം ഓടി വരുന്നേ തല്ലിക്കോ തല്ലിക്കോ ചക്കൊച്ച മരിയമ്മേ തല്ലിക്കോ ചച്കൊച്ച."

I kept aside my sadness and allowed myself to immerse in that electrifying environment. The van went past cheruvandoor and peroor and finally reached HCHS. I entered the school compound with the usual expectation "A heart attack to Sr. oliva and a holiday to the school". Disgusting, that day also it didn't happen. I walked past those dense canopies of mango trees, ran down the steps and entered the verandah. My hope then had shifted to Elsamma teacher being absent. Oh heck! Lot of noise from the class, teacher not there, but still there was time for the class to start. My face brightened and the probability of elsamma teacher being absent grew large. I entered the class, walked beside the front row. Surely, that wasn't my place. I liked the back rows and till now that strong affinity to the last rows hasn't changed. There will be a lot of fun in last rows unlike the front rows where the ones like Irin, Midhun, Nisha, Melgev, Renjini, Sunitha, Maria etc would sit. I took the aisle in the middle, shook hands with Dinu raj in the middle row, said hi to Manju and straightened the way to my destination, the penultimate row. There was always some strategic advantage in taking the penultimate row; the teacher in her usual stroll through the backside wouldn't be able to pluck your ears. 'Intelligent', one might think, but that was only the usual me.


I took my seat, the center position on the right hand side, second from the last bench, beside the window. I dismantled the sophisticated bag from my back and water bottle from my neck. I looked outside; it was going to rain in that morning itself. Kerala was a beautiful place at that time, with plenty of rain and the monsoons 'on time', never late. I thought of the water blockage in the six-foot wide front portion of the school directly after the verandah. I was fond of playing in the water, not only me but almost every boy child in that class liked to splash the muddy water around. I was planning a nice time during the interval.

An utterance 'EDA' from him woke me from my thoughts. He was absent, the day before. I was happy to find him that day because he was a regular backbencher and a good mate of mine. He was a naughty boy, probably the most troublesome in the class. Always chatter while the class goes on, he loves to sit on the desk rather than on the bench. He looked like a small rogue in navy blue and white uniform. Brownish in colour, round face, wide forehead, thick black hair, small sharp nose and broad wide lips were his countenance. He sat beside me to my left and he took out a box from his bag and showed some sticker labels he had got the previous day. One a mayavi label, a kottooosan label, a luttappi one and many more. He was kind enough to present me with one kottooosan label, which I preserved for quite a lot of time in his remembrance.

He took some previous days notes from me and started copying it. I asked him why he was absent the previous day. He replied in a sharp piercing tone "diarrhea". Till that date I had only heard about 'diary'. I wondered what the hell this relation between his absence and diary was. I knew the progress card in those days was in the form of a diary and we all used to refer it as diary. Had it a month earlier I could have suspected some doctoring on his diary by him which his parents might have caught. Then I thought that he had theft the diary from the class teacher. No, how can that happen, if happened how could that prevent him from being present. Thoughts widened but I couldn't get a clear picture of what was the reason for his absence. I asked again. That time he evaded from answering and I couldn't clarify it for the whole day.

Later in the evening I asked my mother, in what all ways could diary prevent one from attending the class? Ha ha ha ha…….. She clarified it and from that day onwards I started calling him ഡയറി'എ' മോന്‍ മണി.

By …………
Jabal Kumar……………

Yours truly, His Apparition

Helloonnnnnnnn, I am deputed to write of his small expectations, I am his apparition, his ghost, his spirit, his conscience, what ever, but I am him itself. I heard him being asked of his expectations. I shall give you the true, unadulterated, unabridged, thoughts/ dreams of his. Let me just start by boasting about him, he is very bold, he stands by his words, what ever the consequences are, very straight forward…and above all he has a good heart.. Boasting ends here…..I know him from the time he was born. I was with him all through these years. I know what he wants..

Of his wife he would definitely weigh her virginity, commitment, love and sincerity the most. I know that there is no chance by which he could gauge her in these, before he makes a commitment, because he knows her not.. But it's his belief that she is all these. It's the holy secrets of the nature, the holiness of the god, which makes him believe that she is these all..

Ohh.. Where is he now…My vision gets paralyzed.. My thoughts get blurred.. Oh he is dreaming.. he is in his sleep now.. Oh I see him by the side of his wife, kissing her forehead, he tries to explain his coming late, its very hard to convince her, she so intelligent, she questions him, probes him, gazes at him, she catches him red handed, of his little mischief's, his little bad habits. She so commanding, so convincing that she makes him throw his entire defense and makes him such an obedient and disciplined lovely, naughty, rogue.

Oh he still in his slumber, he still in his dream. I see him beside his wife; he so intently, so tenderly, so lovely watches her suckling their little baby. She loves her baby more than him,, It makes him more happy. She teaches her baby the Christian thoughts, the values, the truth, and makes such beautiful adobe for the little one to grow.. She cooks their food in love. Oh what beautiful a sight is it… Caring, devoted, friendly…She is the best mother I have ever seen…..


He draws his inspiration from her. She makes him work hard for his dreams, his ambitions.. Often he stumbles, he gets hurt, he wreathed in pain, he in deep sorrows.. He cries aloud.. There she not stunned by his agony; Offers her bosom for him to weep... She by her magical love fetches him from the abysses of life… Whole world ditches him, but her still in his side…. Oh such a lovely wife. .

No wonder he considers her the most priceless possession of his.

All these he dreams…he expects…he wishes…..He knows very well that expectations are hard to meet, and even a singleton among his expectations come true will make him happy. The happiest…I swear… I assure…I endorse…

Yours truly,

His Apparition…

Jabal introduced

Let us not forget the fact that this person is one amongst us. He is a paunchy, cranky, young man with lot of nonsense and little of common sense. He is dramatic at some occations and arrogant at some other. The strong affinity to short plays have left its own mark on his mannerisms. He can talk to you in length about anything which falls under the category "preposterous".
Pale brownish in colour, rampant black hair, sharp black eyes, neatly cut moustache and broad lips are his countenance. If a geometrical shape can be assigned to his face, it would probably be an oval. Because of his energetic dramatic conversations he is able to make many friends. Needless to say, some friendships have put him in difficult situations. His nature usually doesn't allow him to maneouver these situations, instead he drags others also into those predicaments. "BEWARE"

This incident which forms the part of this story happenend during last week. Our protagonist was undergoing an Ayurvedic treatment, which is usually done early in the morning at the traditional doctors place, which would be crowded even before a speck of the sun is seen. Our hero during these days would start from house early morning at 5 O' clock. The first two days of this treatment or rather his wait outside the doctors premises wasn't fruitful at all. All the other persons would either be sleeping or reading, nobody cared to atleast give him a glance. He couldn't find a single prey in those two days.

So on the third day he carried a book with him, which he did for the sole purpose of attracting a prey. The trick worked and an innocent looking person fell flat on his trap. But our poor hero didn't know his prey's credentials of luring many beautiful looking men and women into the community, which is notorious for its ways of attracting members.

The first day of their meeting went on without any developments that are worth writing. Our hero might have got many phone calls which the members of this community practised as aroutine to stay close with thier potential members. This is anyway not much probed because of its minutest implication to the cause of this acquaintance.

On that weekend this friend made a sudden, surprise visit to our hero's place. He with little effort unwound his lexicon of knowledge upon our hero, who was spell bound by the engineering knowledge of this "infosysian". The just concluded sentences will surely raise a couple or two eyebrows, which is justifiable because our hero ia as novel to the engineering concepts as a duckling to the mountain stream. The visitor concluded his words by hinting to an "intellectuals meet", which our hero mistook as the kind of one in the "Da Vinci Code" and in the "the angels and demons".

Our hero was informed about the venue and the timing of the next intellectuals meet, which is believed to have happened at some bizzare location, which is usually not disclosed to non members. The story couldn't have changed if the venue was somewhere else, so let us not go astray, but concenterate more on what has actually happened at the meet. The venue was crowded with limosines of the indian make, MUV's, SUV's, UV's and what not. The glitteratti of bangalore city was off on their toes. Our hero felt previlaged to be in that crowd, even though he had to pay a registration fees of 1000 bucks. He was introduced to some persons who are believed to be part of the top echelons of the city.

He might have dreamt about boasting to his roommates about his new experiences and his new stature in the society, which were aliens to them. He might have thanked his new friend for introducing him to this new community. With an air of proudness he entered the hall, which was almost full. He found a seat and rested his buttress upon it, when he heard an IITian lecturing about various ways of making money. His interest in that speech grew moment by moment till he heard that utterance"Amway". He was speechless, his face reddened with anger, not because of the thought about the lost 1000 bucks, but because of the fact that he was fooled the second time. It has not been an year since he had bought a "Conibio" underwear, which the network marketer claimed would reduce the paunch if used regularly with out washing. He worn it continouously in an ambitious attempt to become slim, till his room mates complained about the stink. He took it to a wash only to find that it was torn all over with the moderate pressure of the rinse. That day he decided not to fall prey to any other network marketer. But now all in vain. he is fooled the second time. But this distinction won't last long because Mr. Jabal is still alive to be fooled the third time.