Posts

Twiddling My Thumb Series - To The Neurons!

Image
Twiddling my thumb - and literally so! Have been wracking my brain for a few words for weeks now but nothing! Had promised a ‘quick read’ to a friend for this new collab series but now my brain is completely on mute. And then something strikes.. Pic Courtesy : Google Recently I heard from someone somewhere that irrespective of this drumming of all the individualistic uniqueness in ourselves, us humans are all wired in a very similar fashion, at least a major part of us are. Herd of sheep in a cattle field and blah blah! And once in a while, we all try to be this unruly goat, trying to be free and wild. Sometimes we succeed and sometimes we potter around only to be tied back to the herd, chopped up and served in a fancy dish to savour!  Anyway! So, that got me thinking. So really, the Q is do you want to be a free range chicken or a poultry fed one..err..sheep I mean..err..humans. And the bigger Q is - does it matter what you want? Unless you can really change your pre-built wiring! But
Post a Comment
Read more

TwiddlingMyThumb Series#2 Okay to be a little late?

Image
Image from Google Twiddling my thumb - in the front seat of the car. The shuttle speeds through the various twists and turns of the Maa Flyover in Kolkata like a daredevil in a F1 video game. Come on! That’s a bit of an exaggeration, init. Yes, possibly. Yet my muscles tense up, my nerves pump in pain. I suddenly find myself driving down the slopes of the Sinthan Top in Pahalgam. My muscles coil in a painful knot as I feel the driver just pressing down the accelerator, trying to overtake the car in front. My breathing gets heavier. In my mind, I say - Slow down. But I don’t want to break the driver’s attention. There is a turn ahead of the road. Just like that, just in a jiffy, the car seemed to have lost its control. I shrieked - Stop ! Mum and Dad were almost asleep in the back seat of the car. My scream had woken them up. I heard a terrible scream from Dad. The car slammed into a big boulder at the turn of the road. The car tilted in a crooked way as it crashed into it. I jumped ou
Post a Comment
Read more

TwiddlingMyThumb Series#1 The Elusive Stars

Image
Twiddling my thumb - outside my tent... It is pitch dark all around. I can just about make out a ghostly outline of the tent next to mine. And after that? It’s all an oblivion. The crisp night breeze makes the tip of my nose very conscious of its existence. A warm fat finger rubs the cold nose tip. A bright pair of eyes winks at me. There is a surreal warmth in this cold night.  I look up at the sky and I gasp. Ooh the sky! A star studded wonder; Thousands of jewels - some neatly lined up giving the perfect constellations and some cluttered up in a random chaos of the galaxy. Every time I try to focus on one particular cluster of stars, it seems to elude me. But when I look just outside of the star jumble, it's more prominently visible than when I look directly at it! So uncanny; so elusive; and yet so magical; so beautiful. It's insane. Is there a method to this madness? In one such star studded galaxy night by the tent. Kedarkantha. Pic Courtesy : Shiladitya
Post a Comment
Read more

On the night of Amphan!

Image
It’s about 7’o clock in the evening now but it feels like past midnight already! The entire city is in darkness due to the power cut. Amphan cyclone has taken over the city. My mum is huffing around, obsessing about the water flooding the bathroom floor or the scarcity of drinking water or about the news of a lamppost burning in the neighbourhood and other similar unpleasantries. Image from Google. My mind drifts. I close my eyes and, in a jiffy, I’m lying inside my little green tent - sometimes on the top of Mount Caburn or by the Jack&Jill windmills, sometimes in the valley of Blois or by the river Loire or sometimes on the slope of the Himalayas, eyeing the snowy Kedarkantha peak. On the slope of the mighty mountains – I am lying numb inside a puffy sleeping bag. I can’t feel my fingers or toes, just a cold pain moving all over my body. I can’t put a finger on it. I’m supposedly asleep. But I can feel the things around me, like I’m in a drugged hall
Post a Comment
Read more

In the time of Corona.

Image
Now, the title of my post may remind you of the book, ‘Love in the time of Cholera’ by Gabriel García Márquez and rightly so. I have, indeed, named my post after that book title. To be honest, it was the title that first came to my mind. I wish I could add ‘Love’ in it too but no, no love. Just daily, dry, locked-down routine. Pic taken from Google It was only a few weeks back when I rushed back home from work, somehow gobbled down a bit of food, not even sure what, but was something to fill the hole i.e. my tummy, while putting on my sportswear and dashed out in 10minutes to meet my friend for our walk to the badminton court. Our game was due in 15minutes. I arrived at our meeting place and at the top of my voice, filled with exasperation, vented out, ‘oh, I have got so much to do and so little time! I am, like, always running around. I have no time to read, to paint, to cook, to call people up, not even to sit!’ and blah blah blah… I imagine that the little monster,
Post a Comment
Read more

The rare common sense!

Image
To start with a bit of a context, I have recently moved to Bangalore and still getting used to living here. It is an everyday learning experience and to be honest, I’m a little shocked at the hilarity of the place at times. I will tell you why! Pic taken from Google So, there are footpaths in this city. The footpaths run alongside the main road and as you would expect, they are meant for being used on foot. But these are generous people here. So, cycles, bikes and even auto rickshaws show their charm on the ‘foot’-paths. And then suddenly someone decides, lets build the electric posts just in the middle of the footpaths and make them short and wide, so that a pedestrian can walk right into them, or duck under them or just step into the road to avoid hitting their head against these posts. Now the road that you step onto to avoid the many hurdles on the footpath could possibly be a service lane. And if it’s a service lane, cars and bikes can be driven in
Post a Comment
Read more

Longing.

Image
I feel trapped in this city of dust and concrete It’s the city of joy and yet I find nothing My heart goes out for a piece of green And the chirping of birds, ears so keen. I want to take a long peaceful walk alone Without smelling gas and petrol, air borne Without getting insane by honking car Without stumbling on rocks and tar I want to start my day by picking berries from trees Sit in a café sipping coffee with your loved one and look at the sea I want to go for an after-work stroll in the beach Drive on the weekends to hike up the hills that I can reach. Sounds like a dream? Yes it is. The funny part is such dreams do exist. I was a dreamer alright, but without hope, until I lived the dream. Outrageous demands and frivolity, to some, it may seem. I'm not here for money, not for luxury items No time for people with big nose or ego There is abundance of joy and love in the little things Gotta get out of the concrete jungle. Forgo. 
Post a Comment
Read more