THE PERSONAL PANDEMIC

I lost my mother to the pandemic. Not in flesh, not in blood… but in spirit. Three years ago, my mother was diagnosed with dementia, which later turned out to be Alzheimer’s. It’s a diagnosis that withers a family, dismantles its hopes of happiness to smithereens. I knew what awaited my mother — a psychological limbo. When the doctors said that medicines would delay her cognitive decline, my sole objective in life was to make her present — the only shred of certainty she was clinging on to — as happy and bearable as possible.  

 

Keeping that in mind, in February 2020, I hosted an elaborate bash for my parents’ 45^th marriage anniversary. “Do you think we will not live to see the 50^th?” my mother joked. I wasn’t so sure. I still remember that day when she couldn’t recognise many who’d come to join the celebrations, but she was happy and jubilant. And that’s all that mattered because happiness was the only prescription to making Alzheimer’s bearable to us as a family. In my mind, I’d decided to fly down to Delhi every two months to spend time with my mother before her mind completely descended into void.  

 

Two months later, my mother was condemned to house arrest. She wasn’t alone, Covid-19 did it to the elderly the world over. As India imposed strictest possible lockdown to contain the spread of the virus, my mother would have to find her world at home. This, at a moment when the doctors had advised us to let her socialise more. Alzheimer’s wasn’t the only demon mum was fighting; it was also years of untreated depression. She needed to be out and about to discover and distract herself. If there was any hope of that, the lockdown proved to be the final nail in the coffin. My family began to witness a sharp decline in her attention spans that had already shortened over the years. She found herself lost in her own home. Staying in an indefinite period of confinement, she even forgot her partner of 45 years — my father. She suffered hallucinations, mourned the death of a husband who was very much alive. My brother became her only connect with the present.  

 

Staying in Dubai and caught up in the rigours of a job, I was oblivious to the final descent that had already begun. My father’s standing instructions to the family at large were not to tell me about the exact nature of the deterioration. This, he thought, was his way of protecting me, even if it meant casually saying that she had been stable.  

 

The dark truth revealed itself to me on the day of Diwali. As I called to wish my family, my brother seemed reluctant to talk to me. He would insist I speak to my father or mum. It wasn’t until I pressed him for the reasons that he told me about the rapidly worsening nature of my mother’s Alzheimer’s. Within a week, I took a flight and went to meet my mother. She wasn’t around when I finally reached my residence. I waited anxiously about what I was about to see. As the doorbell rang, I opened the door and was relieved to see my uncle and mother. “Thank god,” I told myself, “She looks alright.” She entered the room and sat next to me. I thought we would be sharing a mother-daughter moment. She touched my hand and asked, “What’s your name, beta?”  

 

Today, my memories of mum are neatly compartmentalised into the time before and after this moment. In the time before, she had been a woman who had expectations from her retired life. She had been wanting to visit England, a prospect I kept planning for every year fruitlessly. Having a sweet tooth, she learnt baking. She wanted to run after grandchildren who were yet to be born. Somewhere in the middle of this daydreaming, a nightmare was unfolding. 

 

As someone who was not living this nightmare day in and day out, I felt obliged to put out a strong front. It didn’t mean that I would resort to assuring my family that mum would be alright. Rather, it meant working towards creating a system that would make my mother’s life easier. Making notes for her to remember things. Putting small chits with her name and address in her purse lest she head out and forget where she lives. The world loves the idea of a strong woman till adversity hits and challenges our resilience. My strength came from looking at the silver linings. My mother was still alive during a pandemic that had already claimed several lives. If there was one prayer that I kept repeating to my god on loop, it was for Covid to stay away from my family.  

 

What we fear most also has a way of turning into reality.  Covid did enter my household in April this year. This was a time when Delhi was exasperated with shortage of oxygenated beds and proper medical care. Alzheimer’s and Covid turned out to be a heady concoction. Not knowing she is infected, my mother would reach out to the nurse who’d been appointed for her. Fearing that she would be infected, the nurse left soon after. If the oxygen levels were dipping at an alarming rate and she had to be hospitalised, who would take her? The rest of the family was already weak and bedridden. There were many good samaritans who would volunteer, but could a woman who experiences hallucinations remain in company of strangers in PPE? There was no light at the end of this tunnel. 

 

Mum eventually recovered. It took a lot of help from friends and foes — whether it was about having food delivered at our home or getting medicines and concentrators. But it came at a cost. She went deeper into her hallucinations. 

 

I have lived through much of this period as a spectator living in another country. What hit hard was the knowledge of my mother’s mortality. In the time of crisis, we seek faith because scientific facts don’t always appeal to the heart. Moreover, the human mind does not accept that life comes to an end. We create ideas such as afterlife in order to convince ourselves that something of our loved ones will be retained. 

I had gone through all stages of grief when Covid hit my family and transported me back to denial. It was another stark reminder of my mother’s limited time on the planet. I needed closure that would not come so easily? What does closure even mean in the time of the pandemic? This is an alienating virus. It demands that we live in our own silos and interact with people virtually. This is a consolation we give ourselves every time we experience loss — whether in flesh and blood or in mind. We are collectively in a limbo. For people like me, however, the limbo has an additional baggage — that of survivor’s guilt. I often wonder what am I really guilty of. The knowledge that I have escaped the nightmare that my brother and father live through every day of their lives. The knowledge that I might just be experiencing moments of happiness at a time when mum might be hallucinating. I survive while my family simply exists. This is what my conscience tells me every day. 

 

Survivor's guilt is the mind’s way of acquainting you with your privilege, while also undoing your self at the same time. I often think about how I have survived with the survivor’s guilt. By looking the other way. This has meant burying my head into work. Sometimes, inventing work for myself so there’s no room to think. If this means fewer phone calls home, so be it. Survivor’s guilt hits the hardest when you have empty moments in life. I fear such moments because inadvertently the image of my mother comes to mind. The knowledge that I might just be abandoning her in her time of need. Sure, I can blame the Covid-related travel risks for my infrequent visits to Delhi now. But in my heart, I know that this is not the case. Is survivor’s guilt also the mind’s way of being hard on yourself? Even if so, it is penance. Waking up every morning to numb yourself to a sense of loss, that has been my way of coping with mum’s rapid cognitive decline. 

 

In the context of Covid-19, we tend to associate survivor’s guilt with those who have experienced loss in more tangible terms — death. But there are many of us who continue to be in this constant state of loss. Think about it, when was the last time we experienced devastation at this scale? While the world has changed, the terms on which it operates have not. Money still buys us good life, which sometimes means as little as affording best treatment should things go wrong. For those who are employed, work from home has often, if not always, meant longer working hours. Given how the pandemic has impacted various sectors, we are also living with a constant sense of dispensability. If in pre-pandemic times, we could simply pack our bags and go anywhere in the world to ‘recharge ourselves’, it’s not so simple doing so at a time when many countries have imposed travel restrictions. 

When it started, we romanticised lockdowns as the much-needed ‘pause’ we needed from the hustle bustle of our lives. But in this new normal, where individuals are so easily replaceable at work and at home, we have been denied a basic coping strategy — distraction. What can possibly distract you when Covid dominates living room and water cooler conversations? Somebody or the other has been experiencing loss, reminding me of the impending doom that's lurking in my own backyard. Every day has been about picking up the pieces and starting afresh. As the virus mutates and rears its ugly head, we are experiencing burnouts, anxiety, a sense of languishing. There is almost a sense of urgency in naming the feelings we have not felt before because it gives us a faux sense of being in control. The truth is, we aren’t.  

 

I have often tried to dissect the origins of this grief and guilt I have been experiencing.  To understand how the virus has not only changed lives, but also transformed people, The New York Times sent its reporters to Bergamo province in northern Italy, which was worst-hit by the pandemic. It is here that hospitals became makeshift morgues, scenes of absolute helplessness offered initial signs to the Western world about the absolute horrors the virus could wreak. Interestingly, in a detailed report, NYT found that people who had lost their loved ones to Covid-19 had diametrically opposite reactions to the crisis. Some wanted to be left alone, the virus had pushed them to it. Some sought company fearing the loneliness the virus had subjected them to. There was anger against the government for letting the situation go out of hand. There was anger against gods too. Every emotion was underlined not simply by loss, but a survivor’s guilt and that had changed the very fabric of people’s lives. It had even turned them to substance, alcohol and cigarettes.

 

While it is a mental condition, survivor’s guilt manifests itself through depression and anxiety, both of which have been rising post-pandemic. A study conducted by Columbia’s School of Public Health observed that the number of mental health cases that had been reported had increased by 21 and 24 per cent respectively. In Asia, it has been a staggering 18 per cent. According to the World Health Organisation, one in 13 globally suffers from clinical anxiety, while close to 264 million people of all ages suffer from depression. Enduring loss for those who already suffer from these mental health conditions has been particularly difficult.  

 

They say the wound is the place from which light enters you. That light entered into my life in the form of writing and therapy. Going through my own stages of grief, I began to write about my mother’s condition only to see it resonate widely. I vividly remember the first time I wrote about my mother’s battle with Alzheimer’s. There was a fear that writing about her would invite stigma. Moreover, it was also opening of personal wounds to a public that I would never see or meet. But writing also articulated the journey the mind was going through. 

This sweet spot between acceptance and reconstruction was discovered by me, thanks to a therapist who chose to show me the larger picture. With her, I embarked on a journey to understand my own mind and realised that while grief is personal, it is also universal. I also confronted that thought that I’d buried in the subconscious — I was never having it as easy as I thought. It also took immense courage to get up day after day, and carrying on. You see, sometimes, survival itself takes courage. Once I reached this point of realisation, it was easy to rationalise a few things. What I have learnt in this journey is that the greatest gift we can give ourselves is healing — beginning a constructive dialogue with our own minds, talking back to the voice that deems us guilty of survival. Our salvation lies in this conversation with ourselves.  

Heartless! Godless!! And now Godotless!!!

I have almost always abused this space by addressing my anxieties, the many 'rights' and the 'wrongs' that have been done. Make no mistake, I am a damsel in stress, not distress. This explains why I have inflicted numerous poorly articulated posts on this space without caring if at all these words will ever be read by any mortal. Enraged by the selfish nature of the writing, the space too has given me a befitting reply---a silence in which I introspect my  life and its many 'miseries'. For the last four years (ever since I started the blog), it seems that I have been waiting for Godot without knowing who or what Godot is. Is it success? Money? Love? Debauchery? Godot is definitely not success or money...these can be acquired way too easily. He is definitely not love, because he claims to come my way often. He is perhaps a debauched traveller. As perverse as you are in your emotions, but a lot more silent. Your patience is a journey too, at the end of which lies a heartbreak. In the guise of lover, he is a stranger. He is a lover as long as you are a stranger. A patron as long as you are the Petrarchan mistress. In few days, several hours, many minutes and numerous seconds, he will travel through life to find his sense of self. He will cremate you in his heart and bury you in his mind. Like a trapped soul, you will continue to wander and wonder if he will ever put his hand around your waist again and murmur on your lips, "Dearest". Your heart pounding every second and chanting "Come as you are... not as a friend but as who you were".

Next morning, when a furious sun absorbs the water on your face, Godot shall be making new memories with new strangers. His lens would see them all, it would be the mute witness of his tryst with life. You will shed a tear every day in solitude till you become perverse and say "Goodbye blue sky!"

And that is the day another part of you will quietly die.

Heartless! Godless!! And now Godotless!!!

The Late Dorian Gray

Beautiful?
Forever.
Handsome?
Rarely.
Young?
Always.
Vain?
Destined to be.
Loved?
Rarely.
Killed?
Himself.
Soul?
Sold.
Name?
Dorian Gray.

Amiss

We are no V. Woolf whose mind is a locked closet nor are we J. Austen whose truths are often 'universally acknowledged'. Unlike these women, words have stopped befriending us. Obscurity is our opium. We find our unhappiness in our bliss and find our failures in our successes. We find our refuge in our passivity and fall back on pills that keep us numb. Having conditioned ourselves in a way that makes sure we remain 'unaffected' no matter what happens, we make sure that no emotion---love or hatred---can move us. As for me, I am an obscurist. Quite often, in a moment of self-introspection, I have wondered if I am half alive or half dead...if I am living or merely existing. The answers have never come easily to me, neither to those with whom I have wanted to share the aforementioned anxieties.  I survive in the zone between happyness and existential angst. Uncertainty is my only companion.

Words Apart

The worst kind of crisis for a mind looking for redemption is loss of words. When she had words, she did not have a story to tell. Now she has a yarn to spin, but words are not her companion anymore.

Jeffrey Archer: On the Write Track (May 2008 interview, A Prisoner of Birth)

His life is stuff bestsellers are made of. There are scams, trials and of course, his favorite theme, prison. All this and more makes Lord Jeffrey Archer a man worthy of a tête-à-tête. Currently the author is travelling across the country for the first time for Landmark's Jeffrey Archer tour. He is actively promoting his latest book, A Prisoner of Birth, a rags to riches tale of a man wrongly convicted for a crime.




In a rather candid chat with HT City, Lord Archer not only talks about his latest book, but also clears the air about the rumours related to his writing, and, of course, why he wouldn't really want Hilary Clinton to be another Florentyna Kane (The Prodigal Daughter).



The rendezvous starts on a rather unexpected note. Before we pose a question, it is Archer who throws one for us. The question is --- "Have you read the book?" It's only after a loud "YES" that the chat progresses. "India is a great place. People actually read books here." This coming from a man who has sold more than 130 million copies worldwide. "One hundred thirty only? I don't know how many more I have sold in India because of the piracy," he says.



Many reviews have stated that the book is explicitly based on The Count of Monte Cristo, and Archer, on his part admits to being influenced. "Well, I's say it is a modern version of The Count of Monte Cristo. That book is 1,700 pages. It was written at a time when there was no radio, no television, and very little theatre. People read big books then. Things have changed now." Well said Lord Archer. But when quizzed about his own stint in the jail and if it had influenced the plot, the author couldn't help but get into a diplomatic mode. While trying to settle in his chair, he says, "We all use the knowledge that we have. You write about your experiences. For instance when I go back to England after spending 7-8 days in India, I would have an Indian story. Here I have come across situations and people I would want to write about." So, is this the formula for a bestseller? Apparently not. "Then you would have been writing a book," says the author unassumingly. "You write when you have a story to tell. It's a god gifted. And of course you write about what you know. Jane Austen wrote about a small village and how a couple of sisters get married. And these went on to become the five of the greatest novels ever written. Write what you know about. Otherwise there will be four pages of sex and four pages of violence, and then four pages of a story. "



He spoke about the first woman president of America in Florentyna Kane, the lead protagonist of The Prodigal Daughter. An obvious question is if he's routing for Hilary Clinton for the US presidential elections. He laughs his heart out and then responds, " Twenty years later, the Americans have woken up. I would actually like Barack Obama to win. I have followed the elections very closely. I think he is very exciting. I believe he's beaten Mrs. Clinton already and he can beat Senator Mc Cain." But what about the buzz that Florentyna Kane's character was closely modeled on Golda Meir, Margaret Thatcher and Indira Gandhi? " By the time I wrote the book, there had been 5 women PMs in the world. What Mrs. Gandhi, Mrs. Thatcher and Mrs. Meir had in common was their toughness. As for Mrs Thatcher, I worked for 11 years with her. So it would be difficult to write a book and not be influenced by her. By then there had been 5 women PMs in the world. In fact Mrs. Thatcher once said that to beat a man you have to be twice as good, and she was, in fact, twice as good." One of the most cherished moment: When he invited Beatles to Brasenose College to perform for a charity event. " I kept in touch with Paul Mc Cartney after that!"

While the readers just can't get enough of him, his detractors, however, have had a mixed opinion about his writings. One of the more popular rumours revolves around his wife Mary, and many have gone to the extent of claiming that she often writes for him. When quizzed about the same, Archer loses his composure and points out, "Yeah, my wife was in prison and writing the books for me. My wife could not write a book to save her life. It's been the most ridiculous statement ever made. I will tell you a little secret, when I went to prison, stupid people stopped saying that someone else wrote the books. I wrote three books from there and they went on to become number one. She's a scientist. I can't write her books either."



Moving on to a more cheerful topic (read: his blog), the author professes his love for blogging and feels it's an easier way of connecting to a number of readers. "I get 542,000 hit on my site last month and about 25 per cent of my emails are from Indians." Since he's also a cricket buff we asked if he'll be catching up on the ongoing IPL series. He was planning to watch one on Saturday evening, but confessed that Twenty-20 wasn't his cup of tea. "I prefer to follow test matches." So was there anything else that he was looking forward from his Indian tour. "England beating India, five matches in a row. But then, that's not possible."



For someone so prolific yet controversial, one couldn't help but ask if being controversial comes naturally to Archer. "Well, I have not been controversial for the past three years. I have written six books, and have been doing a lot of charity work." Any regrets in life? "No way, you've just got one life, live it as best as you can. Work hard and live your life." Now that's what we call living live king-size!



Archer's favourite authors of Indian origin


Salman Rushdie
VS Naipaul
Arundhati Roy

The Bed of Agony

Witness to the love

Long lived or long forgotten,

It stands blind and mute,

Not tall, yet firm.

Soft is the surface,

The scent is sweet.

Don’t forget the hardness

That lies low and beneath.

The warmth of the bed

Is like love itself.
It is tender and fragile,

Almost like a lover’s sigh.

The bed often growls

In a joyful pain.

Over it’s subtle top

The lovers reign.

Its sheets are often wet

With desire and glutton.

As the moonlight falls,

The bed shines with passion

No rose adorns it,

Yet it feels the bliss.

The stains fade in a day,

The memory lasts a lifetime.

Basterds, Nonetheless!

There are two ways in which you can tell someone that s/he is dumb. Either you say “You are plain dumb” or “You have been deprived of common sense”. The latter is only a subtle yet a stylistic manner of telling the friend in question that he is a fool.






In his latest Nazi slugfest, Inglourious Basterds, Tarantino has used the latter version to mock the entire exercise infamously known as Nazism. Told in four chapters, the film deals primarily with three aspects of the Nazi occupation in France---the oppressive Nazis, the defiant Basterds and the victims of Nazism. Each aspect has been embodied through characters, who in their own way, are as blood-thirsty as the leader of the Nazi pack, Adolf Hitler. Colonel Hans Landa of the SS is cruel yet dynamic, an oppressor who has a way with words. In the opening scene of the film, he kills a Jew family taking refuge in a French dairy farmer’s house. The daughter, Shosanna Dreyfus, manages to escape. Four years later, Shosanna herself assumes a new identity as Emmanuelle, heading a small but a well-known theatre in Paris. The petite and beautiful Shosanna becomes an object of fancy for Fredrick Zoller, a young war hero who is all set to star in a film that glorifies his role in killing hundreds of Jews. In the meantime, the Basterds, under the leadership of Aldo Raine continue to cause mayhem, killing SS soldiers and scalping their heads with the Swastik (as against the inverted Swastik, a symbol of Nazism). In his endeavours, Raine is helped by a famed German actress Bridget von Hammersmark.





As Zoller and his filmmaker/ Nazi propanganda minister Joseph Goebbels agree to hold the premiere at Shosanna’s theatre, the Basterds and Shosanna herself come up with their respective plans to blow the auditorium where the ‘Fuhrer’ is also expected to come. The second half of the film puts the four chapters into a perspective with a sole mission---to kill the Nazi leaders who are to attend the premiere.





The plot aside, what holds the film together is the sheer flamboyance exhibited by different characters. Alda’s portraiture, be it in terms of the appearance or the gestures, are not different from Hitler himself. His brand of anti-Nazism is as lethal as Nazism itself, except that he happens to be a reactionary. Add to this the thirst for revenge in Shosanna. So who exactly are these inglourious basterds? The Nazis, the Basterds, who, though operate in small numbers, have waged an equally bloody war against the Nazis, or the revenge-seeking Jews like Shosanna? The answer lies in the title itself and the fact that no character is spared a redemption, not even Hitler himself who instead of committing suicide (which he is believed to have done in reality), is shown dying in the locked auditorium screening Zoller’s film. This very aspect of the film is an evidence of the mockery that Tarantino very consciously plays on each of his protagonists. There are more, but I don’t intend to spoil the film for you by revealing the end.





Any discussion on a Tarantino film is incomplete without an insight into the violence that is an integral part of his films. The violence in Inglourious Basterds works at several levels. Beginning with the title itself. Obviously one couldn’t have named it ‘French Connection 3’. At another level, the nature of the social and the political context the protagonists live in are equally violent. Take this remark from Landa as an example. “What a tremendously hostile world that a rat must endure. Yet not only does he survive, he thrives. Because our little foe has an instinct for survival and preservation second to none. And that is what a Jew shares with a rat.” It is another matter that towards the end the survival instincts in Landa take precedence over the ‘Hail Hitler’ syndrome. Finally, the physical violence. Portrayed in its rawest form, the violence is aesthetic. For Tarantino, brutality is brutality. There’s no escape from it. And the finest aspect of his work is that he doesn’t even seem to keep his viewers under such an illusion.





The lead actors Brad Pitt (Aldo Raine) and Diane Kruger (Bridget von Hammersmark) put up a decent act, but an ‘act’ nonetheless. The Greek God of Hollywood (read Brad Pitt) has a meaty role in the film, but it is only in few scenes that Aldo Raine takes precedence over the star. Ditto for Kruger. In contrast Christopher Waltz (who plays Hans Landa) and Melanie Laurent (who plays Shosanna) come close to living their respective roles. The other actors do not disappoint either.







Don't wait, just bask in the glory of the Inglourious Basterds.

A Life Less Ordinary

The June sun was furious. Its ruthlessness was evident on the light and dark skin tones of boys and girls waiting for the University-special. At the bus stop outside Patel Nagar market, Sushant Banerjee preferred to roll his eyeballs around some neatly waxed legs, his eyes admiring their sheen, his heart craving to feel their softness. Personally, Sushant disapproved of clothes that revealed one’s body parts, but the voyeur in him couldn't resist to take a look. He himself was happy in his regular refuge of a full-sleeved shirt and trousers, a gift from last year’s Durga Puja. This was but a part of the act he put up as a Mathematics lecturer at the prestigious Lord Stevens College. 

Fair enough for his secret indulgences, his life, he believed, was everything except extraordinary. And even as he turned 30 today, little had changed in his world, despite his mind embarking on an Odyssean journey to the past. A cherub-like face had always betrayed his potential to assert his manhood, so he thought. But being thirty was a landmark. In his mind, Sushant kept convincing himself, "Today is just another day." He had spent many birthdays trying to solve tough problems --- both in mathematics and his life. He owed loyalty to the subject as it saved him from realising several truths. And he found peace in this imposed ignorance. Be it the screams coming from the adjoining room, his mother’s tears that fell on the pages of his books when she taught him or the urgency to pay the school fee, no factor was factor enough to intervene in his love affair with Mathematics. On his fifteenth birthday, the mother insisted on a small celebration at school. Sushant, however, was reluctant. He loathed the idea of selling old newspapers to buy toffees for classmates who did not even care to speak to him. But his resistance wasn’t strong enough.

Later that evening, as Sushant rejoiced the last Kismi in his toffee packet, he felt jubilant. He looked at his unshaven chest in the mirror and felt the freshness of adolescence. The joys of boyhood, he grinned. The narcissistic indulgence would have continued for a while had the mother not called. "Baba modey daariye aache. Niye aashte paarbe, shona? Aamaar shorir khaaraap laagje." (Father is standing across the street. Would you get him here, dear? I am feeling sick). Sushant evidently had no choice. He hated helping an intoxicated father find way to their house. On several sleepless nights, he had seen his mother waiting till midnight for his father. Sushant wanted to contribute to that little gesture of care, but couldn’t. He didn’t seek any reason for the detachment, just felt it. Fifteen years later, things were different. The ageing father had surrendered to what he believed was cruel fate, and Sushant took over as the breadwinner of the family.

Lost in the memories of a joyless childhood, Sushant noticed the U-special making its way to the bus stop. As he stepped in to see bright young faces and all-sized figures draped in branded apparels, the excitement of turning 30 took a backseat and the anxiety of a lecture with Maths Hons second year took over. Sushant perspired once again. For a reason unknown to him, he had forgotten to prepare the third chapter of Mechanics. The over-enthusiastic second year students were known to be the inquisitive lot---the kind that often left the teachers breathless in their quest for knowledge.

To deal with the unpleasant challenge that these students posed, a lecturer needed a sound strategy. A STRATEGY rather than a teaching skill. As the U-Special reached Maurice Nagar bus stop, he climbed down. Making his way to 39 A, he nodded many times as a young group of girls and boys wished him. "Being wished good morning is much better than being wished Happy Birthday," he thought, his mind refusing to accept that he liked being wished on his birthday. As the mathematician entered the classroom, his probing eyes scrutinised each and every student. "I'm planning to take a surprise test today on Mechanics Chapter 2. I hope all of you are ready," he announced, with a grin so wide that it exposed the last tooth of his lower jaw. "What the f*** !" Sushant's hatred was matched by an irreverent student. Though the Mechanics teacher pretended to ignore the comment, he knew it was Charles Eapen, the rebel who was also the class representative. As the CR, Charles had asked the class to contribute Rs 100 each to buy a Reebok t-shirt for their ‘favourite’ teacher. But surprise tests have a way of bringing out the worst in students, and Charles was no different. With the ‘burden’ of  conducting a surprise test, Sushant Banerjee can very well do without a Reebok tee, he thought. 

Fifty-five minutes passed when the bell rang and Sushant snatched the papers from his students' desks. Will these papers be checked? This was a question in each student’s mind. Sushant’s sloth had the answer. As he entered the staff room with a pile of papers, the entire department greeted him. And such was the excitement that he feared an impending demand for a party. "What if they ask me to order a cake? 500 taka joley jaabe! (Rs 500 will go down the drain)," he mumbled. Sushant’s miserly ways, however, were no secret to his colleagues. A gentle handshake and chapter was closed for a year.

The clock struck 2.55 pm as Sushant’s last lecture got over. He wouldn't have to feed to anyone's culinary fancy. As he boarded the U-special once again, the 30-year-old 'man' felt the tiredness his work brought to him. His sister, a journalist at Bharat Times, worked almost 14 hours every day. Sometimes he couldn't thank his stars enough that he chose lecturership. He may not have become a permanent faculty yet, but the eighth year, according to the family astrologer, was lucky one. A smile lightened an otherwise pale face at the thought as the bus stopped.

Hoping to take a quick bath, Sushant rang the doorbell, only to be informed by the mother that there was no water in the tap. In the absence of a shower, a sleep would do some amount of good, he thought. A dreamless sleep was not unusual to Sushant. He had spent many nights seeing nothing but darkness. "Please get aata and cheeni baba," mother woke him up from what was a deep slumber. The frown on his face was true to the anger he felt at being woken up at 7 in the evening. But the mother’s knowledge of his slothful ways only helped her remain calm on such occasions.

Seven to nine pm was a time that Sushant dedicated to Mathematics. As he saw the clock striking seven, hunger took precedence over Mechanics. Mother was quick enough to lay the table with a glint in her eyes that gave her an assurance of being complimented for her culinary skills. As Sushant made himself comfortable in an old wooden chair, his disapproval of the elaborate dinner was evident."Pomfret? Do you know how much it costs? Rs 400 a kilo," screamed Sushant, aghast to see a seemingly sumptuous but expensive meal laid out at the table. On occasions like these, Sushant couldn't help but brand his mother a spendthrift.  “Kintu onek din pore baanalaam,” (But I cooked it after long) was her explanation for cooking her son's favourite dish on his thirtieth birthday. When he threatened not to eat, the helpless mother offered an assurance that the money was spent from her own savings. Sitting next to Sushant was the speechless father, who often blamed himself for Sushant's irreverence towards his wife and himself. He had conditioned himself into believing that the son loved them despite the irreverence that his agitation and miserly ways exhibited. Silence, on such occasions, was the father's defence against an arrogant yet lovable son. Finally, Sushant decided to sleep hungry on the special day to prove that he was by no means to be taken lightly.


The lazy alarm was the first sound Sushant heard every morning. As he woke up, he found an unusually silent mother preparing lunch and tea for him. Fresh from last night’s hurt, the mother laid down the breakfast. Sushant’s apologetic gaze towards his mother defeated its purpose as she chose to look at everything except her beloved child’s eyes, the child for whom she had decided to stay in the marriage. They sat quietly, finishing the last crumbs of bread on their plates. “Durga! Durga!” the mother mumbled as she picked Sushant’s bag and offered it to him. Leaving for the bus stop, Sushant felt compelled to look at the verandah of his two-bedroom flat. This was an indulgence that had transformed into a habit with time. Like always, the mother stood there, her vision blurred by the tears that gathered in her eyes. The tears complained and mourned a rejection that she felt first from her husband and now her son. Several minutes of guilt passed. At the bus stop, new pairs of glistening legs had replaced the guilt the mathematician felt till about few minutes back. As the U-special stood in front of the dusty lanes, Sushant was, as usual, the last one to climb up. "Today is just another day," he assured himself.

Ends

A Lot Like Love

Love or the idea of love brought them together. He, a young boy, who dreamt of everything except her; She, a young girl, who dreamt of nothing except him. He spoke of many nights he spent thinking about how he would rise and shine, the nights that were only his, the nights she wasn't allowed to be part of. She was no less. Living the change He had brought into her life, she wove her own fantasy. A young girl She was still, yet felt like a woman. That he had become a part of her was a myth He endorsed and she readily surrendered.

They met often. Often enough to keep the pretence of 'love' alive in each other. And when they did, her eyes would beam with an unmatched joy. His had guilt. She wanted him to look at Her, feel Her breath against His chest, feel the fear she had nurtured ever since the tight of their hands loosened. He couldn't. She knew that she had come close to losing Him. "Why?" was a question that haunted her. Hoping to have a part of him back, She decided to sell her soul. His had already been sold...

... She spent nights, crying. Her eyes, filled with tears, mourned the loss of self that she felt. He loved this lowness in her. Curled in her mother's arms, she lied about Him, lied about the happiness that the mother had seen in her eyes long back. He learned to live with the lies and the denial.

Pain was an obscenity they began to enjoy. He, in the satisfaction, that She was deprived of his love. She, in her aspiration to become what she had been to him once. Out of love, they preyed on each other. Hurt was not an emotion they felt any longer. The monstrosity in their minds had benumbed them. They were lifeless but performed the act of togetherness to perfection . In this lifelessness, they lived or pretended to live unhappily ever after.

The Faustian Conflict

GOOD ANGEL.
Faustus, repent; yet God will pity thee.

EVIL ANGEL.
Thou art a spirit; God can not pity thee.

FAUSTUS.
My heart's so hardened, I cannot repent.
Scarce can I name salvation, faith, or heaven,(20)
But fearful echoes thunder in mine ears
“Faustus, thou art damned!” Then swords, and
knives,
Poison, gun, halters, and envenomed steel
Are laid before me to despatch myself,(25)
And long ere this I should have slain myself,
Had not sweet pleasure conquered deep despair.

The Faustian Fall

FAUSTUS.
Ah, Faustus,(65)
Now hast thou but one bare hour to live,
And then thou must be damned perpetually!
Stand still, you ever-moving spheres of Heaven,
That time may cease, and midnight never come;
Fair Nature's eye, rise, rise again and make(70)
Perpetual day; or let this hour be but
A year, a month, a week, a natural day,
That Faustus may repent and save his soul!
O lente, lente, currite noctis equi!
The stars move still, time runs, the clock will strike,(75)
The Devil will come, and Faustus must be damned.
O, I'll leap up to my God! Who pulls me down?
See, see where Christ's blood streams in the firmament!
One drop would save my soul—half a drop: ah, my
Christ!(80)
Ah, rend not my heart for naming of my Christ!
Yet will I call on him: O spare me, Lucifer!
Where is it now? 'tis gone; and see where God
Stretcheth out his arm, and bends his ireful brows!
Mountains and hills come, come and fall on me,(85)
And hide me from the heavy wrath of God!
No, no!
Then will I headlong run into the earth;
Earth gape! O no, it will not harbour me!
You stars that reigned at my nativity,(90)
Whose influence hath allotted death and hell,
Now draw up Faustus like a foggy mist
Into the entrails of yon labouring clouds,
That when they vomit forth into the air,
My limbs may issue from their smoky mouths,(95)
So that my soul may but ascend to Heaven.

[The clock strikes the half hour.]

Ah, half the hour is past! 'twill all be past anon!
O God!
If thou wilt not have mercy on my soul,
Yet for Christ's sake whose blood hath ransomed me,(100)
Impose some end to my incessant pain;
Let Faustus live in hell a thousand years—
A hundred thousand, and—at last—be saved!
O, no end is limited to damned souls!
Why wert thou not a creature wanting soul?(105)
Or why is this immortal that thou hast?
Ah, Pythagoras' metempsychosis, were that true,
This soul should fly from me, and I be changed
Unto some brutish beast! all beasts are happy,
For, when they die,(110)
Their souls are soon dissolved in elements;
But mine must live, still to be plagued in hell.
Curst be the parents that engendered me!
No, Faustus: curse thyself: curse Lucifer
That hath deprived thee of the joys of heaven.(115)

[The clock strikes twelve.]

O, it strikes, it strikes! Now, body, turn to air,
Or Lucifer will bear thee quick to hell!

[Thunder and lightning.]

O soul, be changed into little water-drops,
And fall into the ocean ne'er be found.

[Enter Devils.]

My God, my God, look not so fierce on me!(120)
Adders and serpents, let me breathe a while!
Ugly hell, gape not! come not, Lucifer!
I'll burn my books!—Ah Mephistophilis!

[Exeunt Devils with FAUSTUS.]

My Inseparable Companion

You live in my eyes. You share my dreams. You share my joys. You see me fall. You see me rise. You are the reason the kohl drains away from my eyes. I own you, yet you claim me. You are His gift, you are nearer than ever. My inseparable companion, you are but a drop of tear.

Hope Floats

Hatred makes sense because there's love, sadness makes sense because there's happiness, failure makes sense because there's success. I find happiness in my despair and despair in my happiness. The fountain of eternity just showered happiness on me. Not in a human form, neither in tangible one. It's gift is a joy akin to the one that comes from the fragrance of a woman's body once it has been conquered. It's inside me, much like an unborn child. It will grow and lead a life that never ends. It is the immortal within the mortal. You call it hope, I call it desire.

Ode to Cynicism

Samuel Beckett's Waiting for Godot, Pink Floyd's Wish You Were Here, The Notebook (film), calligraphy exhibitions. A growing fascination for these means not all's quite well in your life. Did I say my life? No, I meant yours, and you could be anybody. Even me.

Midnight in the Garden of Good and Evil

As I walked in the garden of good and evil, little did I know how I was being consumed. Now that I know, I am nothing but a skeleton.

Pursuing happiness

Of all the qualities that people my generation have, the one I respect the most is the sheer irreverence we tend to have for certain things. And a part of this irreverence is the casual detachment most of us have towards a couple of things in life. Something that was a prized possession once (even if in our thoughts), transforms into a memory--- good or bad, you don't know. You gave birth to a dream and began to live it as well. You nurtured it with utmost care and believed in it when others mocked your obsession. You realised that they were right, but pretended to move on hoping for the impossible to happen. You grow with the dream, the dream grows on you. You bloat with the hope of an impending happiness. And then...


.... it is all over. You can't figure out why or how? It's just over. What comes along is another hope, another place where you can find happiness. It is like a shallow pond that has nothing to offer you except for a momentary high. This is when you realise you are dreaming...dreaming once again of greener pastures, those subtle drops of rain and the flower beds. Your flight of fancy has taken off pretty well. Will it come to an end soon. Maybe, maybe not. It's the rise before the fall, its the salvation preceding the doom

The Other Knight

It took me a week to realise why exactly I liked The Dark Knight. There were great special effects, Batman had a new vehicle to drive and finally Heath Ledger. I must confess I like such psychologically s*****d up characters but this one certainly takes the cake. You see, for me, first impression is not the last impression ... it's more of a teaser. SO WHAT DID I DO?

After a rather gruelling day at work, I decided to watch the film again… alone. And so on a rather lazy Thursday evening I went to see the latest installment of the caped crusader’s latest adventure. After a second watch, the movie seemed to be a parable of the eternal good versus evil conflict. It seemed like an extended lecture on Milton's Paradise Lost, for this wasn't just yet another that heavily banks on the popularity of the heroism of the superhero in question (sometimes even imposing it), but it was something more.

I found most of my answers in the Joker. Being a sceptic myself, I found the anarchist in the Joker more appealing. He is very similar to Milton’s Satan (in the early sections of Paradise Lost). Like Satan, he too questions the authority of an established order, in this case as a self-proclaimed vigilante. Like Satan, he too convinces people to sin, and in fact succeeds in transforming Harvey Dent to a potential murderer (remember the way the serpent convinced Eve to eat the apple). Like Satan, the Joker too, admits being an 'agent of chaos'. It’s a choice he has made seemingly because of a father who was “a drinker and a fiend. And one night he goes off crazier than usual. Mommy gets the kitchen knife to defend herself. He doesn't like that. Not. One. Bit. So, me watching, he takes the knife to her, laughing while he does it. Turns to me and he says "Why so serious?" Comes at me with the knife,"Why so serious?" He sticks the blade in my mouth. 'Lets put a smile on that face!' And..... Why so serious?” He also remembers his wife in one of the most poignant scenes in the film. “I had a wife, beautiful; like you. Who tells me, I worry too much. Who tells me, I ought to smile more. Who gambles, and gets in deep with sharks. One day they carve her face. We have no money for surgeries. She can't take it! I just want to see her smile again. I just want her to know that I don't care about the scars. So I stick a razor in my mouth and do this... to myself. And you know what? She can't stand the sight of me! She leaves. Now I see the funny side. Now I'm always smiling!”

A viewer never really gets to know if all this really happened or if this is just a figment of a 'psychopath's imagination'. But what seemed more real to me was the fact that the character, pretty much like his other half (read Batman) makes an attempt at heroism through a battle that's more psychological than physical . His heroism is anarchy, chaos, anything which could shake the very foundation of an otherwise acceptable existence. Come to think of it, there's a lot that binds the destinies of these men. Both have had seemingly troubled childhood. Both choose to hide behind a mask and most importantly both, in their own ways, claim to be vigilante. While one attempts to don the hat of a saviour, the other is the self-proclaimed new "classic gangster that the city needs".

What I liked about the film was the way Batman's pedestalisation is deflated in the film. This time Batman wants someone to take forward his legacy (through DA Harvey Dent who ultimately goes against what he once stood for), wants to be with his lady love (who chooses someone else over her long time love interest), makes a choice as to who to save (he saves Harvey Dent while Rachel dies in a trap set by Joker) and finally accepts to wear the mantle of a Dark Knight (even though he has not killed Moroni). In a nutshell, towards the end of the film, even though he remains a guardian figure, but by then the society he's been protecting has already turned its back towards him. The Joker wins the battle.


So what exactly makes the Joker more convincing to me?

a) He wants to puncture the deification of Batman by asking him take his mask off. Once the mask is off, would the hero be still worshipped? Probably yes, but even then at least he would come across as a more human a figure.

b) He doesn’t want to kill the superhero because ‘you complete me”. In a rather poignant scene in the film, the Joker says ‘You just couldn't let me go could you? This is what happens when an unstoppable force meets an immovable object. You truly are incorruptible aren't you? You won't kill me out of some misplaced sense of self-righteousness, and I won't kill you, because you're just too much fun. I think you and I are destined to do this forever.” They truly complete each other. Probably that's why neither of them wants to kill each other.

c) Millionaire Wayne aka Batman is just too heavily dependent on technology to rescue him (probably because he can afford it) while the Joker falls back on his dry wit and presence of mind. That proves more powerful as the narrative progresses.

If the negative characters are so deeply etched like this one, a day will come when movie buffs like us would go and watch superhero flicks for such super'villains'.

Surviving Brida

Reading about a quest for fulfilment has rarely been this predictable an experience for a Paulo Coelho reader. But there's always a room for exceptions. The author's latest book, Brida, delves on quintessential Coelho themes --- search for wisdom (read Soul mate), magic, failures and self introspection. The story is set in the eighties where a young Irish woman embarks on a journey, both physical and psychological, to find her Soul mate. In her endeavor, she seeks the help of a witch, Wicca and a 'wise man', Magus. To attain that everlasting wisdom she does not mind spending a night in the woods, even though it scares her to death. She "dances to the sound of the world" and wears each and every cloth in her wardrobe because "everything that contains energy should be in constant movement". Twenty one year-old Brida's journey might be a novel experience for her but not for a Coelho reader who has treaded on similar paths before as well (remember The Alchemist and The Witch of Portobello). However, there are moments of self introspection. For instance when Brida is advised to wear all the clothes in her wardrobe, she wonders "Perhaps Wicca had overstepped the bounds of her power. Perhaps she was trying to interfere in things she shouldn't." At this stage, the reader can't help but celebrate the protagonist's pragmatism, so what if it lasts only for some milliseconds.

Pitted against her is a witch, Wicca, who like Magus, sees 'the gift' in her and helps her 'find the Soulmate'. For the uninitiated, Wicca is also a term used to refer to a modern version of an old witchcraft religion. While Brida is still jostling between the ifs and the shoulds, Wicca, on the other hand is a complete believer. Magus comes across as more believable of all the characters. One gets acquainted to the genuinity in his very first meeting with Brida, when he realises 'he had met his Soul mate', but simultaneously wonders 'She's pretty. But I am twice her age." At yet another poignant stage in the narrative he realises his masculine needs are more important than the ones he has being a Teacher of the Tradition. And then there is a moment of realisation, "The Magus watched Brida lie down on the ground. He tried to concentrate only on her aura, but he was a man, and a man always looks at a woman's body."

You certainly can't miss those one -liners that form the core of all Coelho narratives. "We might know the how, where and when of being here, but the why will always be a question that remains unanswered." or "Gardeners always recognise each other, because they know that in the history of each plant lies the growth of the whole world."


The novel is pacy and just in case you feel too compelled, you can read it on a lazy weekend afternoon.

A drink and a heartbreak later...

A drink and a heartbreak later, you begin to wonder if life was just incidental to living. Even if it was, it has to be lived. There are things to look forward to and people to run away from. Every high has to be cheered for and every fall has to be lamented. Happiness is not just over-rated, it's also overpriced. We all have our Godots to wait for. They turn their faces when they see us, only to return when they aren't needed any more. The tragic farce is that you live your life but that life never lives in you.