Mundane Monotony.

Three months is a break long enough from my beloved estranged blog. Time to reconcile, kiss and make up and head towards another break up. So let's see.

Coming out from the cinema, all good movie drugged up. 7 Khoon Maaf. Well, definitions differ and how they do. Sometimes they are bigger than items of pure entertainment. And hidden symbolism that some people find are beyong their little bubble. Or maybe some of the big headed freaks want to get out of things ideas they don't really possess but which possess the person.

Sadly, normal popcorn movies cannot be relied on. And there has to be some degree of dependence on the movies that keep your hands away from the popcorn tub and hovering about different little things in the movie. The quirks and the questions and answers and little adorable admonitions to the mind.

So what finally pushed me to finally type something out here on the blank white I've been keeping away from for these "busy" months.. a couple walking behind me. The guy explaining to the girl who Ruskin Bond is and that the movie is based on one of his short stories. Well, she finds it hard to understand who the guy is. How hard can it be to infer the meaning of "a very famous writer". And the fact that movie is based on a story. I hope she knows what a story is. Unless she's been living under a rock. The rock would've cried tears of anguish.

I narrate this incident to my father and he laughs and tell me some people just don't believe in reading and writing so much. Well? There must be a certain amount of "reading and writing" an average person does. Maybe that has gone way, way down or maybe I have been living under a rock. And I am pretty happy living there until someone somewhere knocks it over.

And on my way, all throughout.. I'm standing there on the Metro, between two girls who are discussing some pseudo important issue regarding some people. And I wonder what would've happened if the situation with the couple be reversed and the guy's asking the girl the questions. Or would that even happen. Guys I've known have always known things like who's who. Not in the page 3 sense, of course. But even that.

I spent around five minutes wondering how many girls around me in the Metro knew who Ruskin Bond is. Or are they too stuck up in their own pretty world to look at the rest of the ugly world. Or will stuff continue happening and what flashes infront of my eyes is a makeup brand stall that graced our canteen lawn with their presence today. Is that all it means to them? Cash in on the all girls college? Gullibe little girls who think caking on makeup will solve all their problems. Turn them into a princess maybe.

There's a lot to say about that. But things rush through all the time. And there's not enough time to write it. Maybe the problem is not enough reading, it's the sheer thought that they don't need to read. I know girls who'd go through their life without touching a sheet of paper that does not give them marks or is not related to a celebrity.

Or well, even if they read.. it's stuffed with subliminal ideas that permeate into their brain with a lot of love and no reality.

Maybe guys have an upper hand at being the better equipped in the grey matter group when they know they gotta deal with it in the real world. Not to say women don't work, but I do not spend my days with totally awesome working age women now. And I don't encounter eighteen year old males enough, face to face than I can dish out deserving insults at them. And those I do I won't say are much lacking in the mind matters.

But without making this a long monologue about anti feminist feminism, let's move on to the movie of the moment. And the moment's a long one. Going by the reviews I found on the net, the makeup is not cakey, the art direction was not overdone and the acting was awesome. I don't know what's deviating them from the story. I think it's a wonderful depiction with fresh, witty dialogues and a different mean streak to it. But I think it's a continuation of the crush I had on Delhi 6 with the pang of love for 7 Khoon Maaf. I mean what's not to like about a mainstream awareness created on sadomasochism. An obsession with poisonous mushrooms, a plagiarising rockstar gone wrong, an insecure soldier of war, a desperate police officer, a cheating Hindi-speaking Russian, and a very, very disturbed woman who's yet gone on to maintain her sanity enough. Reminds me of Dahl's dark fiction.

Not to mention the treat it is for the lovers of language. Dyachenko's seemingly funny shuddh Hindi that's so rare to the native ears. And Shah's amazingly accurate Bengali accent. Khan's Urdu. Also worth loving were the tiny lines here and there which give a difinite shape to the timeline. From the Berlin Wall to the recent Taj firings.

But more than that it's the whole idea of psychological extravaganza that the movies portrays that tends to snatch up my fancy. I only wish I was studying psychology right now to delve more into it. But so naturally, it's better handing in my own interpretations, because Freud and other "scholars" were just only thinking individuals too.

I think movies certainly reach out to a much larger group than books. And it's time someone did something about everything. Been thinking so helplessly that this world stands no chance until the demand for good genes is inclined towards the demand for good brains.

And when girls get enough time to stop looking at themselves in the mirror enough to look at the world and think instead. Specially when those books does them no good. Preaching ideas of a male perfection and the helpless damsel in distress syndrome who can't spoon up even her breakfast without the "comfort" of having someone in their lives. No taking names.

What's scary is that these girls will be tomorrow's women. And the men are gonna be running behind them. I'm going to get nightmares tonight.

This all was probably much of mindless judgments. But when things and mindless, it happens. I was gonna write something about people's opinion on war but more important things come up :P ;)

Also, the stong slashes of religious symbolism that decorate the movie, for those who have seen it. The idea of forgiveness reminds me of a Spiderman 3 quote:

"You want forgiveness? Get Religion."

She pressed the phone to her ear and hmm-ed absent mindedly while she scanned the screen mindlessly. And thought about nothing in particular. It's so easy blurring your thoughts to an almost incoherent buzz in the background. It all dulled to a certain black spot in the back of her mind. And she pushed it all in, it got sucked into it as if like a tiny black hole.

The white screen reflected in the almost black of her eyes and she closed them. And then blinked. Put down the phone. Slid the laptop off her lap. And stood up. Things you do. So human. So meaningless, so harmless. Missing people so much and then not showing it. Showing it and not feeling it. Hiding things, lying, making a show of empty emotions and pulling in raw feelings of perplexing intensity down into the back hole.

And it's almost gagging with the convergence of all that is in the world.

All of it is nothing. And nothing of it is important. Just get if off you, go to sleep.

Long time, old friend.

It's just one of those days. Fortunately, when I feel like writing. There's been a long hiatus, a very long one. Life's been busy, the mind's been sidetracked into something of a less fantasy-friendly direction.

With all the Historians, their words, ideas and the facts and theories, the vital part of creaitvity was probably being ignored but I think Erich Segal's Only Love tapped into the dozing, lazy writer, jerking up tears, making me miss things, being homesick and citysick and nostalgic. For everything. And every one.

Making me think about the rain at my old house, the pattering on the roof and the partial comforting darkness of the late afternoons, enveloping me in the utter love and the essence of what life is made of.

And I guess the worst thing I hate about the room I'm in now is that it doesn't have a window. Probably the ONLY room I ever saw so unfortunate. It's like being blind. Reminds me of eyes being the windows to the soul.

And it's only through the screams and shouts from the corridor that I come to know that it's raining right now, as I type.

Rain was there yesterday when I went out but strangely it wasn't pleasant enough and that's on rare occasions that I feel that. Waddling through knee-deep dirty water is never pleasant, I think. For any one.

There was some refuge in the rain-time ice-cream tradition we've come to perform. But even that was short-lived.

The streets are generally alive with the college kids, their shopping and their somethingortheothers, but occasionally there's something deeper and thought-provoking for the listless brain and the periodically blind mind's eye.

Like a few days ago passing between the row of buildings, walking on through the somewhat narrow lanes of restaurants, various stores with t-shirts on display, small shops selling momos and the old, old wooden doors of the ancient-looking houses resting in between them, up there, in one of the first floor windows.

Moving my eyes up from the muddy wet ground to the lighted small balcony, I see an old man sitting very near the railing, with his head bowed down to the people passing below, an almost sinister expression on his face, but blank nonetheless. Craze and anger.

Sitting on a small stool.. he stared down at people, moving his head along the direction we went, sitting deathly still, tensed, with just his eyes and then subsequently his head following us. I jerk my head back from looking at him, but can't resist looking back once more just to see if I just imagined it.

But, no, there he is, looking back at me in the eye, blank and strange. I rush on ahead to my friends and decide then to think about it later.

And it's right then that I know that this will be written about. Now or later. Stories started materialising out of think air and I asked if he could be locked up, nah. Or probably just another normal old person angry for just a minute at something trivial. Or what WAS it that made him this way. It could be a number of things ranging from the trivial to insane. But I keep this for sometime else.

There are other eerily amazing things going around in this so-called young people's abode. This University area we see. There are people living here.. in this ancient city, the old houses, the pigeons in the building next door, which I will never understand is lived in or not.

It was my second night here that I spent an hour sitting in a balcony looking at the building, my friends occasionally shining torch light into one of the windows. Empty rooms in the subsequent floor. Thank god for that. The floor below had a cooler fixed on a window and we could see people moving about in the darkness. An old building with the yellow paint peeling apart, the blue beneath it visible.

Sometimes I imagine out building as the Gringotts Bank, with the striking similarity in the shape. Bit smaller, I think. Us Goblins, working on laptops, watching TV, cursing the terrible food. Funny. Never thought of being a Goblin until now.

The building with the plaster peeling off is lovingly named the Pigeon Building by yours truly. A row of pigeons sitting on a window ledge. And just sitting there. Till the end of time. Not even moving a quarter of an inch.

And it's not just the animals.

On the way to McD there comes a series of permanent people on the sidewalk. It's not every time that I notice but then he's not that easily noticeable too. This little figure couched down on the sidewalk, sitting against the wall, covered and wrapped in off-white clothes, and a makedo turban on his head. And I don't even know if he's a he or even his age.

The face is never seen, just the hands outstretched from under the tattered cloth wrapped around his puny shoulders, a small frail figure with his head bowed low, sitting in a corner, not saying a word. Not asking for money , just not doing anything except sitting there hidden with both his hands opened together as if he's holding something precious that we can't see.

Then there are the two little kids who sit with a weighing scale, ignoring it much of the time, as people step over it carefully moving along the narrow sidewalk. While the two little people carefully and meticuolously copy notes from the textbook to their notebook. Discussing with each other something very important while they study. Not more than 7 or 8 years old. And their heads at the right place. Probably siblings, one girl and one boy. Sitting quietly, lost in their own world. Studying.

And such a crude contrast to us "DU students". Take a hint.

Another are other small children selling mint and tiny chocolates, trailing around people, running behind them, shieking in their little childish voices. Yesterday, as it happened, waiting around in a line for the ATM, a "bhaiya" apparently bought a chocolate for my friend and asked this little chocolate seller to give it to her.

And great laughter ensued. For the stretch of time waiting for the ATM, being inside the room and getting away from there. And the poor child trailing behind us all the way pushing the chocolate on to her unwilling indirect customer. She stopped only after we took the chocolate from her. And ran back gleefully shouting that the didi took it. So much happiness.

I'm not getting around to clicking enough pictures, not as much as I want to. Or expect myself too. And writing too. But I think this much will be enough to while away the time being happy with myself for getting something out of my system onto the keyboard and seeing it on the screen. Bliss.

Such picturesqueness. Such inspiration lies in the narrow lanes and the branded stores and the old houses of Delhi 7. The streets, the sounds, the sights. Loving it.

More to come. Very soon. The College. And The People :)

Long Break.

After a month long back and forth with the First City (okay, the name's plagiarised, but I like it).. finally here for good.

Travelling across all this expanse of varied landscape has me gasping for breath with an unending unstoppable sudden burst of literary ideas from this golden faucet of creativity. And pity, nothing of it is left, evaporated dry until I'm in close vicinity of my laptop or anything that could help in writing of any kind. Note to self - Keep a pen close. Always.

So all that's left is fancy pansy empty words warbled into this small Blogger box.

Anyway, getting on with this utter melodramaticity..

Flitting through these narrow lanes so many times a day, one gets to wonder if they were always this old. And were they EVER new, did they ever get to look new all at once, if someone living there could actually call it a new place. Or if one or the other building came up randomly dimming out all the others, like it happens so often. So every day.

And looks like this will become a Travel blog soon or something totally potpourri to the best. Malls shmalls to roadside stalls, the bottom line is Dilli Haat is the best place ever. Or anything to do with Indianness for that matter. If and when is an important contibuting factor regarding many facets of the ness I just mentioned. Sadly.

Feeling at home with my room which is I will be sharing with my (yet) non-existent room partners.. re-reading Deathly Hallows, which by the way I have read only once before when it came out, in the two days that followed. On the two days I was supposed to study for a Math test and conveniently, and happily, didn't even care to touch the book. Never regretted it. :P

And of course, also managed to spew out a washy review on my older blog, which in fact was the last post on it :/

Wonder why. Not.

And yes, found out about the base book for the first year History. AND, I realised sometime last year during the "free" periods as we, the minority get to have.. I did go yawning around the library and abruptly shut my mouth snatching up these two very random books from the bottom shelf on different occasions, did read a quarter of it.

And would have gone through all of it too if I had a library card. But laziness gets the better of me. And a very active sense of being distracted. Grabbing up a number of books every day, flitting through them and trying to keep some of the names in my memory, with a certain "mental note" which always gets blown off. No stick-it notes. Whoops.

So no full on bragging. Just a quarter, I guess.

I'll need a photo blog soon. And another diary-like blogthing for the crap I have to dish out.

Somethingortheother.

Only when you're sad do you crave the once comforting sounds and voices of the past and the images which seem to hug you tight and never let go. Like a long lost friend or your very own soul mate. Together forever.

The warmth and the coziness of the late afternoon sun. The slowly receding warmth of the evening, sitting on the backyard stairs. Feeling the hair on the back of your hand rise up very slowly as a cool wind blows through the air which is thick and dense with the warmness and the love of the dying sunshine.

A bird sings here and there and you have no care in the world except to just stay there for as long as you can and as long as you like. Until something equally, if not more loved calls out for you. It was a time of not people, but feelings. Simple, pure feelings. Which had no twisted complications and gruesome mutations. The now tainted will of the girl was then straight and unassuming.

Watching the ants zoom past her big toe and each one of them following the other. The only lone one was her and she didn't want it any other way. Everything else seemed to have someone to be with. The trio of the cats lazing out on the stones, the couple of squirrels scurrying past each other, running around the old mango tree and playing hide n seek.

The rustle of the leaves from somewhere up above. A dead dry branch falling down through the branches and breaking into two coming down to the ground. I trying to find out if I can notice which one is missing and where exactly was it before. But I couldn't of course. A hollowed out mango falling down the next second, attacked and devoured by a red-beaked parrot which holidayed there up above every summer.

Even a peacock, once seen from the balcony, from somewhere or the other where peacocks live. And another peahen, white and grand. Always made me wonder why the males were so showy. I thought that happened only in animals. But then as it just turned out, hilariously, when I found out that was not the case at all.

Going back to simpler times..
It feels strange that I don't remember exactly what I used to think about all the time then. Like I think all the time now. But knowing exactly what was on my mind, then would've been precious to know about now. Facebook was not waving "What are you thinking about?" on me then. It just makes sense how super duper psychology is used in making networking websites turn you narcissistic and self-absorbed, to make it work for you. It's good though. Not all the time, but. This, sometime later, I guess.

There was a time when all thoughts went out to how the world looked to me and not the other way round.

When everything feels like it's going wrong, down the drain, tumbling down.. I try to catch at these fading memories, flying away from me like an important paper, a currency note or maybe a photograph I adore, cherish, can't live without. The wind is taking it away and it's strong. And just as I clutch at it, it drives it farther away.

But somehow I manage to catch that. Somehow. And I capture it and put it down right here where no one can take it away from me. Never. The golden sunshine on the roof, hungry crows gathering around the bread crumbs I put out for them. The sparrows sitting on the bird rest, rolling around in the inch high water pooled from the night before. The dark, cold nights spent out on the balcony thinking about nothing at all.

The least about the future and what will be in it. The questions were all about the world, not my life. Leaning against a tree, feeling the roughness of the bark against my arm, smelling smells from the day and the night. Walking on the iron pipe which led to the water tank. Feeling the coolness below my feet standing near it. And comparing it to the still mildly hot stone of the backyard.

All this and more, making me forget for a moment of what is the present and what of the future.

Things like the frayed end of the jeans, walking barefoot and letting it get more frayed, showing it off if I felt like. The walks on the gravelly path to the patio. Barefoot and dreamy. The feeling of dry grass under the feet. Or the moistness, the wetness and the ticklish feeling of little pebbles. Catching blades of grass between the toes and transporting it back to the non grassy areas. Trying to catch a high up branch or a lone flower hanging high high up, looking pretty and so unachievable. I gave up on it, I didn't want to have it. And so it is, now. It may be very easy to get it. I might get a chair to get the pretty flower on the high branch but I won't.

Just like that. It's just inherent now, not wanting what I can have easy.

An evening lies vivid in my mind, like it was yesterday. Or today evening, a few hours ago. I heard someone play the flute not far away. I loved it.. every little note. But I was not curious about who it was or if he/she would be here again. I did not venture out to see if it was really someone or maybe was I imagining things.

Sitting on the cement stairs leading into the house, with a glass of salty lemonade, picking up dry blades of grass scattered near the bottom stair. And then throwing them away. It hit me like love, like a breath of fresh air.. it was not sweet or sappy. It was just soul. Bringing forth music, for anyone it may reach to. Or even if it doesn't. It was just so full of feeling. And I believed feeling was all that was in the world. And nothing else.

Leaning against the handrails, smelling the iron. The paint. And the dust. Scratching out a dried drop of tar on it. And looking at the clean, smooth space left behind.

The ever changing colours of the sky and the shapes of the clouds. The colours, the smells and the sounds and voices. Everything that can be seen, felt and sensed. Heard and smelt. Everything which could be lived. Not just survived.

So it just rolled on to me, all of a sudden. When I feel too negative, it has to be taken to positive. Led by the hand and told to sit there. Until it gets too late and they're waiting for you to come have the dinner inside. To the busy dining room, with maybe the TV on and the day's happening being shared with much gusto. A dozen smells, all clashing into each other. And I would settle into this, forgetting all about the quietness and music of the other world.

I don't want to do that. This is much more than evening ruminations and dinner time.

I was going to the bad and I pushed myself to the good. Feelings can change feelings and nothing else. I wish, hope I hold on to the surrealism of life as it is and not give in to the normalcy of business, which people say life is.

But it is the world, for me, which I think about. And not my life. Is that such a bad thing. No, it's not a question. Not any more.