Chetan Begets

When he threw the ball back to her, he said, “Change your point shooter.”
Somehow he managed to put it across in correct English.

”What?” – She exclaimed and surveyed him top to bottom.
That was the moment he wished he had worn better clothes.

I salute that thought came from Chetan Bhagat, not because of any aesthetic excellence, but for a sharp shoot of thought in which a reader enjoys the same wave-length of a writer or even vice versa.

Chetan Bhagat is not one of my favourite Indo-Anglian writers. But I like him, and the writer in him who doesn’t claim anything. He knows he wouldn’t be strong enough to wrestle with the many stand outsize. There are umpteen writers in India who can draw and paint in warmer tones than Bhagat.

That makes me talks to him.

While talking to Karthik Kumar, at the Hindu Lit for Life in Chennai, Chetan Bhagat said, “I know that I’m not a good writer. I’m not in line with the many authors who fill your bookshelves. I do not want to be remembered for ever; I want to be forgotten!

That again makes me closer to him than any Titan who carries the false celestial sphere of languages and looks at all others scornfully. (Reminds me “A little disdain is not amiss; a little scorn is alluring” by William Congreve – The Way of the World)

Before the session started live, a video screen opened with a lady throwing several brickbats at the writer.
” I hate Chetan Bhagat. He’s trash. He’s not rich in words. He doesn’t know how to write in English.”

The concert hall of Lady Andal School was packed and thicker than the many sessions it had earlier. Not because of any box-office hits on the Three Idiots, Two States, Kai Poche. Not because of his latest book, The Half Girl-friend. It’s just Chetan Bhagat, who didn’t have anything to hide from us or claim over anything. It was a hearty talk. A talk from an ordinary human being who thinks he’s one among the millions who lives here.

Bill, the Wood-whisperer

Bill Le Blanc is an artist unsung. He is often spotted during casual morning or evening strolls somewhere in the Hamilton Beach Strip of the Confederation Park area. Most of the time, he is found engrossed chiseling wood to carve distinct images out of tree stumps.

I saw him first on a warm Sunday morning; sweat dripping across his eyebrows while he was chipping away the unwanted stuff stuck to the Roller Skater sitting in a Poplar stump that could only be seen with Bill’s inner eyes.

I walked down the road to greet a few more interesting characters in his wooden story. A Beaver – who took almost 50 hours to be conceived – dedicated to his lovely great granddaughter Nicole. Another one is a Turtle that also took the same sweat of his brow. The ‘Sirens of the Sea’ consists of four mermaids, took its shape from a Manitoba Maple Stump after 160 hours.

The Beaver is the first of a kind experiment for Bill and that gave way to the subsequent themes, restoring confidence.

Bill’s humility never prompts him to claim to be an artist and continues his free service to the City of Hamilton. The decades he had spent as a steel-worker did not help in tapping his buried creativity, but he soon realized how he would be spending his retirement years.

                                                                 Bill’s ‘Sirens of the Sea’

Bill never tires of explaining his unique hobby to the intrigued passers-by. In fact, he’s extremely happy to converse with them about his plans adding beauty to the nature. Only a true woodwork artist like him knows what sleeps in the stump to be resurrected later, even after the death of a tree.

Soup’s on

It's not that I expect my son to answer me how the coriander powder looks like, amidst the one hundred and forty eight similar-looking-smelling small containers in the kitchen rack, but one of the three and a half walls would do so. I started believing in God like anyone who clutches at a straw when sinking. The guys at home are on hot-line to India, running a commentary as to what happens in the kitchen, only if I'm there holding some vegetables. Not even a benefit of doubt given to a poor neophyte entering the culinary pitch! The listeners are so happy to hear the screenplay, walking tall through the streets of Goa, arm in arm, beaming at all the extra salt or chilly falls in a Canadian kitchen.

Suja gave me a demonstration on various easy-to-make dishes before setting her foot into the homing instinct.  She had shown me what all are the contents and where all those have been kept. Her vacation was for 6 weeks, and the longer it goes the more would I be besetting with difficulties, the situation foreshadowed me. The funniest thing is that all the powders kept in the containers had been changed in to a single colour, on their own volition, giving me a tough time when I took the rein. I smelled trouble ahead. My nose picked up fenugreek and cumin seed powder with same smell. I became color-blind in front of turmeric and chilly- powder. Why the cilantro and parsley are playing bopeep in double role with hardly any differences in their looks. Is it my reluctance in cooking crept into my nerves in the form of this phenomenon?

The dayspring of my activity, by the tender mercy of God, taught me a big lesson. It’s not that easy like we cook the books in the office. I was wondering how my wife used to use all the hotplates at the same time for making four different curries in addition to the tutorial guidance given to the next door monster and the intermittent phone calls coming in from her students. By the time I turned my tails from the humdrum and came out of the kitchen, I encountered a giggly young creature telephoning to his mom.

‘’Here is the wounded chief of the Third Punic War…. Talk to him.’’  He said.

‘’What’s up? Where are you now?’’

My wife, over the phone:’’ We just had an awesome sea-bath and now waiting for food at Taj Vivanta’s restaurant.’’

Oh God, they’re in Goa, taking long walks and tasting all the exotic food they can grab. Blessed souls! She’s enjoying with our daughter’s family.

The formidable prospect of making a maiden Sambar in my life gave me a sharp shock and it was not visible for her being at the other end of the phone in India. Thanks to the Sambar Masala Powder and its magic spell and smell turns any worn out rubber slippers into Sambar! Stepping up the initial smirk bloomed at her face my sister-in-law said to me that my Sambar deserves a top star. I know, it’s not that deep from her mind but just a thanksgiving for my dropping her to her office and picking up from there. It’s no different from her comment that I drive very well when I know that it’s possible only when there are no vehicles and signals on the road.

What I infer from the experience I’ve just had is a good cook invites others to eat and finds solace in his efforts in doing so. I remember having tasted a few dishes bland and insipid just because they do not have a flair for cooking but are forced to invite for dinners just to repay for the tastes they had at our place. Many of the items were tasted like warm cardboards. But there were some tough species who ordered food from out well in advance and conveniently transferred all to their own utensils to show that those are all home made. A question or two could easily make the cat out of the bag in such cases.

To put it in a nutshell, it was just reifying a concept which had been believed to be impassable for me so long. Usually dilatory in work habits, I wonder how I got accustomed to this art that requires extreme patience and research.

In my childhood days there existed a misconception among the male highhandedness and children that only ladies cook. Or rather to say that it is their duty and theirs only to feed the rest of us in the family. Of course there were exceptions for men only when they prepare big feasts. That also was based on a ‘generally accepted belief ‘ that ladies are unable to handle ‘wholesale feasts’. If a male is found to be with his ‘daiiy cooking affair’ within no time he would have been notorious that he’s a good-for-nothing guy only to be fit for kitchen slots. Maybe because of that low-graded status quo we never offered our helps to moms in their chores. Instead, we used to fight with her if food has not been provided on time or a bit less in taste. Looking back to those days is indeed painful as we never understood the sweat and toil she had gone though in bringing us up, especially in a time of no cooking gas or stove.

Come hell or high water, a day or two in a week henceforth would make my wife free from her toils by me as a dedication to her prodigious skills of cooking I had been enjoying all these years. 

But I do really feel like I'm that unfortunate cat who happened to land on the proverbial hot tin roof, when in the kitchen, and walking a thin line in the dead of a summer!

The Tale of a Dish Best Served Cold

It was a hot but breezy day of summer. To say precisely, on a day exactly 107 years ago. June 25, 1906. A gathering of the elite on the rooftop of Madison Square Garden, in New York City, to watch the musical revue, Mam'zelle Champagne. Men in dapper suits and women in beaded ones topped with feathered hats, all around. An event of socialization with variable rhythm of sundry talks and clinking of glasses. 

A man in his fifties, with a fashionable mustache, appeared there mesmerized by the show-girls. He was very generous in his applause, grinning and winking at the beautiful girls singing. He was none other than Stanford White, a born rich architect and designer. He was the man behind the designs and decorations of many a spectacular Fifth Avenue mansion. Stanford White was devoted and addicted to luxury and sensual pleasures. The wealth he enjoyed had properly supported him in getting intermediaries to get around the girls he had marked. His multi-story apartment on 24th Street, in Manhattan had its interior designed and intended for carrying out his lechery unleashed.   

The song was 'I could love a million girls. Immediately another young man in a black jacket, which he refused to remove even at the request of the hatcheck girl, appeared in front of him, took out the pistol and fired three shots at Stanford White, point blank. He fell dead with his face contorted.

There was an eerie silence at the outset for a moment, a raucous laughter followed by thunderous applause, as many of the audience took it as a part of the show. There were practical jokes like this in such gatherings, in New York, those days. No sooner was the frost off the floor than the turmoil started. An overwhelming feeling of fear and anxiety spread across like a dense cloud.

A stunning, copper curled woman in white eyelet dress, saw the pistol in her husband's hand, shouted, ''Gosh! Harry, what have you done?'' It was Evelyn Nesbit Thaw.

''It's all right, darling! I've saved your life'', said Harry Thaw. 

The killer had been identified as Harry K Thaw, a millionaire. His profligacy, by all means, had been a subject of talk quite often for the public. His family's abundance of wealth could buy the silence of those who stood against him. He remembered that five years prior to that, White, 47, had seduced the 16 year old showgirl, Evelyn Nesbit. White wanted her rollicking naked on the red velvet swing which could not be pushed back into oblivion for many a girl came into his life, in his apartment on 24th Street. She was on her career growth after a long patch of hardship. Although the affair was long over by that time, the apparent stain to her reputation remained and Thaw was quite disturbed on that score. Revenge was a dish for him to be best served cold. He decided to carry it out that day, when he saw White sometime in the same morning at another restaurant.

There were two sensational trials. 'The Trial of the Century' became known to the public and piqued great curiosity. Eventually, Harry Thaw had been declared not guilty by reason of insanity, thanks to the various treatment he had undergone earlier. He was held in a mental asylum until 1924. Later he died of a heart-attack at the age of 76, in 1947. Nesbit died in a hospital in Santa Monica, California, on January 17, 1967, at the age of 82.

The films, The Girl on a Velvet Swing (1955) and Ragtime (1981) are based on the events connected with the life of Evelyn Nesbit, Harry K Thaw and Stanford White.

Rain in June

Rain, like cold tears
Evanesced from a hot face,
Stopped for a while.

മൂന്ന് മൂന്നുവരിക്കവിതകള്‍

                            

വല കോരിയെടുത്തത്

ഒരു മീനിനെ മാത്രമല്ല,

അവള്‍ക്കുള്ളിലെ കടലിനെക്കൂടിയാണ്‌.

വീടുവിട്ടവര്‍ക്കറിയില്ല,

ഒരു വീടുണ്ടായതും,

അതില്‍ കുഞ്ഞുകൂടുകളുണ്ടായിരുന്നതും.

അന്നു കാത്തിരുന്നത് അമ്മയായിരുന്നു.

ഇന്ന് കാത്തിരിക്കുന്നത്

അമ്മ പറഞ്ഞേല്പിച്ചുപോയ വീടും. 

A Dress-down Friday

by Suresh Nellikode


Another Friday to idle away!

Normally Friday mornings are dedicated to the cruciverbalist in me. But this this time it was destined to be framed in a different way.

The rich aroma of fresh Brazilian Santos cup. That was lovely enough to start with a lustrously coloured holiday. Life, at times, look iridescent!

Nanda was telling me about the incorrigible flirt of her husband in the drama school, which abruptly got switched over to the Tudor Architecture, tucked away down the main streets.

I, in fact, loved that grey page she dedicated to her son for a legacy he has to cherish in future. He was resting peacefully on top of his father's tummy.Both slowly slid down to a snooze serene.

Many a wakeful night was leading her to a host of barren days where the other one had to face the rough realities impeding life.

I consoled her, " sorrow is always the twin sister of joy; and it was only to be looked for that we, who just now were over-rejoiced, should next have something to make us sad."

We were planning to lunch out on the patio, along with my Friday guests, a broad tailed cardinal couple.



.

The Advent of Spring

It's been a long, hard winter - I was told. Ice melted away. Green sprouts everywhere.

Gary says, "Winter is like that last drunken-party-guest who just doesn't know when to leave." Gary is a self-proclaimed travel nut, with apt observations and inferences. He reasons well and his wits are bold.

Suja likes spring. The rebirth of nature. The hide and seek of rain. She's in love with the lilac that stands in front of our house - drowsy, leafless, with a faded wintry smile. Every morning she tries wakes her up.

"Laila, my Miss congenial, lazy bum, get up. It's time to put your shoulder to the wheels. Don't think that you are the only plant that carries the agonising pains of winter."

Like a coy bride, Miss Lilac doesn't even look up. She nods to sleep again. But Suja forces her way into a sunlit world. Finally, under allround pressure she slowly wakes up to the rough realities of this not-so-lit world. Green sprouts like goose pimples. Lilac answered to Suja's calls. She even gets up before Suja does, like an early to rise tot waking up her mother. A few days, and it's green everywhere.

Sapsuckers landed on white birches and they rustled their leaves in response.

The slender, hardy asked, " where've you been all these days when everything was falling apart?''

For a while he bowed down. Then said, ''winter was so harsh and turned my marrow frozen red. Couldn't stand and flew.''

''What brought you back over?", asked the tree.

''The sap... and sap alone in you makes me oblivious of the miles I flew'', said the bird.

A tear had slipped down from the birch.
''Still you held me in fond remembrances. You're a guest to my immobility, and I'm honoured.''

Once barren, ice-coated and frozen branches now brimmed with life and started waving their leaves.

The bird started hammering away, excavating cavities in the trunks.

Tuk ......Tuk ......tuktuk.....

''Haven't you still got the right wood for your ship?"

Woodpecker raised his head.
It's none other than the Saw Whet Owl.
He does not like the round eyed who always act like a spy and question all others. He's lazy, never makes a nest and always use the cavities or nests made by others. He's always prying into the personal matters of others with a scornful look. Other birds are even scared to look into his round round eyes. When they call him 'Snoopy', he gets irritated and offended, follows them and shouts back to a peck of troubles.

Woodpecker stopped his work and flew away, telling the birch that he would be back after some time.

The hooter angled his looks down here and there, couldn't see anyone to tease, also flew back.

A little away, a column of smoke winds into the sky.

It was the advent of spring! Hope it's eternal.




Suresh Nellikode

A Momentous Moment

by Suresh Nellikode

Behram Darukhanawallah is more than a customer to me. So soft-spoken, omni-smiling, unfailingly patient, unassuming, a Canadian retiree took all the strain of coming to my office to hand over 2 Canadian Dollar-coins to me to use it in the trolley-slot to get a trolley released at Lester Pearson Airport, Toronto, when I land there. I couldn't but stand still for a moment with flooded eyes! Behramji is a new friend of mine, who stays alone at the Canadian side of Niagara, comes to Abu Dhabi every year to stay a few days with his son.

I'm no one to him. But I stood lost and surrendered to his kind gesture.

And I resolved not to destine these coins to a trolley-slot, but to preserve it as a token of love towards Behramji. Small things one would never want to forget...It's incapable of being obliterated. It has that intensity, as deep as earth!

Eyeful

He outstretched his arms and told me,

" I know her.This is the creation of your imagination. But where's the other one?"

Sadness, spreadeagled like a wall between our gardens.

My sheep are not back from the green pastures.

Child is still asleep.

I'm on the last line of my poem, short of a word.

She stood behind me, veiling her face with a smile,

Being my root, like a flower opted to be disdained.

"Give me an ear, I shall give you a word."

And I replied, "She's infallible and not visible!"

Cooking With Stella

Talmiz Ahmad's comments were quite inappropriate and untimely, utilising his official position, when the majority of the film viewers took it to their heart. As Deepa Mehta says he has all the right to express his opinion against the film. But what led to his attacking on the film so severely? There is nothing in the film that generalises or justifies a bad deed which as he fears would destroy the images we built up so far. There is nothing derogatory to the clan of diplomats who seldom feel the pulse of a common man. He could take the story as a one off case. Has he or his core of diplomats done anything to stem such incidents back at their fort? I strongly feel that he belongs to a group that went againt 'Pather Panjali', ''Fire'', ''Water'', ''Slumdog Millionaire'' etc, claiming that they all had exposures on India's underbelly. Rough realities make a few who believe in window dressing unhappy. Why a majority of the film viewers did like the film? Why do we want to come out fully and elegantly dressed when we have burning issues snigger on us? We are in front to cover our shortcomings and appear swankily, covering all holes with darkness! One has to see more films and climb down to the realities that pull us back from getting on to goosebumps as the biggest democracy.

I represent a group of serious filmviewers who certainly believe in responding to injustice and unjustifiable social practices and deem 'Çooking with it Stella' is a mode of self criticism brought out by Deepa Mehta Dilip Mehta through their own medium.

On Dropping the Other Shoe...

By Suresh Nellikode

When I mentioned about the shoes with GPS tracking system, Nandu's mercury of curiosity rose.

"What... Shoes with GPS..?"

I said, "probably a company must have had a feasibility study sometime ago in order to bring out a challenging offer to people like your mom and dad who belong to the unknown majority, who in public do not admit, but certainly with a zodiac of a directionally challenged."

Nandu's imagination shot up.

Shoes with a built in navigation system that beeps and shouts at you, if you take a wrong step! The one refuses to move if you do not listen to it! What if the battery gets exhausted at a point you try to overrule the gentle beeps? You have no choice but leave it there itself and walk down to a sandal shop for a cheapest one, feeding your homing instinct.

He said.

Perhaps Chandu needs one set.Oh no! Not he. Amma wants one fix it on him to track down his movements. He comes late from university debiting the account of special classes or combined studies whereas there were no such things in existence, at his place. Oh yeah, that's a good idea!

He continued: But I'm sure he, like a typical Kerala bumbledom who deliberately damaged the attendance machines in their offices, will purposely damage it or it should have an unlimited warranty.

I asked, ''How about you, having a set?''He said : No, not needed. I never go out of my rails. Like a horse fitted with a blinker, I used to shuttle home and school. Ask me why.

Why?
There are human antennae everywhere till I reach my school, entrusted by my sweet Mom.They never default, keep sending regular reports on which way I went and came back. Also, whether I stopped at that Slovenian girl's house and sent my rays of thoughts inside, or did I turn left, instead of right straight to school, to the convenience shop and bought a coke and what not....! Where do I get a chance to go wrong amongst these punctilious lots?

After taking a deep sigh he continued.

I'm sure their scions will blow up their interitances. That's my only relief at old age, in looking at them; a sort of avenging my wronged enemies!
That's how I resolved to walk straight to school and back not looking at any trifles, as long as they do not attack me. It's better be a law abiding citizen student in Burlington lest I should be gathering a lot of moses that can't be washed away. It's recession time and I'm sure that these hawkshaws may not get employed temporarily even in shops like Walmart and Price-chopper. My bad patch of stars will continue for another year till I finish off my schooling. Let me finish my studies to show them how to put shoe on the other foot!

I registered my gratitude to Suja unofficially, for taking care of things in my absence.

By the way, how come you sprung up suddenly with an idea of GPS Shoes? Which is the company? What's the brand name?, he asked.

It's a Gulf News columnist.

I know. I guessed. It must be Suresh Menon, the one who makes everything possible! He only has a swell time always with funny ideas!

Oh my guilt-sick conscience! The cat is out...!

I laughed out of the other side of my mouth.

***

Countertenor of the Unheard

'' I love A R Rahman's music. Among the classical maestros it is Pandit Ravi Shankar and Ustad Amjad Ali Khan'', says John Altman, the Emmy Award Winner, who made his debut in India with a Malayalam film. It was Aakasha Gopuram (A Castle in the Air), directed by K P Kumaran, a renowned film maker. Don't you all remember John Altman who gave music to 'Titanic' and 'Shall We Dance?'. Aakasha Gopuram is the first Malayalam film with an international crew, subject and a music with universal appeal.

He loves Sarangi, the Indian musical instrument, tho most. He is a Jazz person, admires Elmer Bernstein and Steve Wonder.

When I met him at Naji's riverside mansion at Thames (we saw it in Aishwarya Rai's 'Bride & Prejudice'!!) he was sharing a story with Nigel, a co-producer of about 25 Indian movies. He is a treasure-chest of mythical Irish tales, unending. It's quite interesting to listen to Nigel and there your time flies on swift-wings. Probably that may be the reason, as it whiles away, the listeners like Mohan Lal and Sreenivasan huddled together all ears.

John Altman told us about the online music sharing.He prefers to hear, "I went out and bought a CD", to "I downloaded an album from the internet".

Bollywood is bridging out to Hollywood. And John may be one of the many who flies over a host of boundaries to reach Indian theatres, be it screen or stage.

Snigdha was happy to cover Nigel and John for 'Outlook' and me a for a couple of other Indian publications.

Aakasha Gopuram was an Indian adaptation of 'Master Builder' by Henrik Ibsen, entirely shot in the UK. As a newly landed immigrant, Albert Samson was undergoing all sorts of hassles. He went pillar to post to earn a living. Like a migratory bird he changed his nests quite often. All of a sudden his cycle of fate changes. All the doors had been opened and he climbed the ladders of success crushing off all stood against his whims and fancies. In his journey of becoming a successful architect he turned stubbornly resolute to the soft corners of human relationships. But on the other hand, his personal life started eroding away. He confessed to Dr Issac that he stopped building towers and skyscrapers as the inhabitants in those do not know how to live peacefully there. The Halvard Soleness in 'Master Builder became Mohan Lal's Albert Samson in Aakasha Gopuram. Sreenivasan, the scene-stealer-comedian of Malayalam screen acts in a serious role of Dr Issac, which is Dr. Herdel for Ibsen.

I tip my hat to K P Kumaran, for taking up such a challenge.