a compliment

one day SAHUL rushed to my house with the news that APPA was no more. oh god! that was really a bad news. we both didn’t speak much that day to each other, which was very unusual. we both were a little upset and worried. quickly we both contacted DINESH and we three decided to visit AMMA.

AMMA and APPA, it means mother and father in TAMIL, we three were introduced to these words since we were five. she was our tuition teacher since then, her children’s called her AMMA and even we did the same. and her husband was our APPA. more than anything else, i think it was because of the good relationship she had with my family, i was sent to her for tuitions. i remember i was the first to join out of the three. i grew up as a part of her family. whatever values and knowledge i have today is her teachings. she is my first “guru”, or my second “mother” might be more appropriate. i have also heard from my mom, about her interest to adopt me as a son, for the reason that she had been blessed with four daughters and no son.

my tuitions came to an end after i passed out of ninth standard. but i still use to visit her once a month. during those days even though in college, i still use to get time to do few paintings. one such painting i made was “A RAJASTHANI ROYAL COUPLE”; i had worked day and night on this particular one. it was made using water colour’s. though i never had a formal training on art and i never knew any medium other than that, it had come out really well. this was one of my best works till date. the moment i completed it, i wrote it's destiny. i framed that painting and gifted it to amma. her daughter’s were extremely thrilled to see such a beautiful painting. to be true, i was the one who was more happier than them. in my next visit i saw that painting hung on the wall of the first room of her house, i was proud.

we meet the next day and with a heavy heart walked the path to amma’s house, the path which we walked for almost ten years, but never so sadly. appa’s funeral had been performed the day before, but still when we neared the house we could see a whole lot of people still around the house. we entered the house, the moment we saw amma, we couldn’t stop our tears. she was sitting down on the floor, besides the door of the second room, weak and collapsed. this room and the other room were full of people, all of them in grief. we made way and came to her, she was unconscious about our presence, we sat besides her, dinesh on one side holding her one hand and me on the other side holding her other hand, and sahul next to me. she didn’t speak a word, i could see her lips dried up, her eyes turned red and her face full of grief. we were silently watching her, my tears were just flowing, feeling her pain. in the middle of all these i heard some one whispering in the other room “you were asking about that painting” she said “that is the boy who made it, the boy sitting on the right of my amma”.

i have received hundreds and thousands of compliments for my paintings, but this one is etched on my heart.

adios chennai!

it is time to pack my bags, and go back to BOMBAY. though it was not my first stay at CHENNAI, and its not going to be the last either, it was the longest so far. i am extremely happy i made most of it this time around, saw MAHABALIPURAM and TIRUPATI. and i have made sure there are few to-do for my next visit, the world heritage temples of THANJAVUR, the french colonies of PONDICHERRY and a drive in the heritage mountain trains at OOTY.

what i always liked in chennai?
> the evening walks at besant nagar beach
> idlis with four helpings, each different coloured, coconut chatni – white, pudina chatni - green, podi - brown, and sambhar – brick red, serverd on a dark green banana leaf.
> jasmine flower gajra’s decked on hair of almost every girl

what i always hated in chennai?
> the weather
> the water

what would i will look for in the next visit?
> rickshaw’s with “working” meters
> english/hindi radio channels

each city has its own charm, chennai too !!

my contributions to music

i confess, though i am not aware of the fundamentals of music, i have a good ear for music. i like music (from any part of this planet) which reaches the heart , to me rest all are like the sound of a train coming and going out of railway platform of BOMBAY.

this love for music makes us (me and ABHI minus SOMU) attend all music festivals held in bombay. we eagerly wait for the whole year to watch the BANGANGA festival and KALAGHODA art festival. we have together heard LIVE many ustads and to be ustads of music. ustad ZAKIR HUSSAIN, ustad AMJAD ALI KHAN, pandit HARIPRASAD CHAURASIA, SHIVMANI, ADNAN SAMI, ASHA BHOSALE, BEGUM PARVEEN SULTANA to name few. and again this love for music makes us (me and SOMU minus ABHI) attend all the rock festivals held in bombay. we have together heard LIVE bands like BRYAN ADAMS, PARIKRAMA, MOKSH, PENTAGRAM, ZERO, (i missed INDUS CREED and DIRE STRAITS) to name few.

one way to quench my thirst was to learn a musical instrument, i thought. i decided to try my hand on music.

contribution 1
my plan materialized when i was in POONA, i bought a TABLA from a shop in ALANDI, near poona. at last! i thought. with not much fuss, ustad zakir hussain became my ideal overnight. before i could go ahead of “GHI NA NA, TI NA NA”, i saw the practical of the idiom “it’s the silent cat that breaks the pot”, which i had long forgotten after the school english lessons. my nephew made a hole in one drum of the set. his curiosity of knowing what was inside that was making it sound won over my curiosity of making that sound!!

contribution 2
myself and SATYA where roaming in CHATUCHAK market in BANGKOK, when I saw a shop selling this beautiful BAMBOO FLUTES. i was very sure i had taken care of my nephew’s curiosity this time, because, this flute already had more holes than the bamboo!! i bought one FLUTE. we were on our way back from bangkok to KUALA LUMPUR, and the air hostess served a non vegetarian dinner for me. i told her it might be a mistake it would be a vegetarian dinner mentioned on my ticket, her answer was flat “NO”. even SHERLOCK HOLMES’S assistant DOCTOR WATSON could solve this case, culprit was the one who booked my ticket. i asked her to arrange for a vegetarian dinner if possible. she politely broke the news that there were no extra vegetarian dinner packs on board. the only option i told her was to skip the dinner, and survive on a fruit juice. she smiled took the plate and vanished. to my surprise she came back after sometime with a vegetarian dinner for me. after enquiring with her, it came to light that she had exchanged her vegetarian dinner with me. i appreciated and admired her service. i gifted that lovely FLUTE to her as a token of thanks.

contribution 3
i came back from SOUTH AFRICA to BOMBAY on a weeks leave. the best part about the south african project was that we were always left with ample time in the evenings after work. i decided to once again pursue my dream of learning a musical instrument. this time i bought a VIOLIN from a shop near TALAO PALI in THANE. i took it with me to south africa. i downloaded and printed violin lessons from the internet. i worked for a couple of months on the violin. our project was soon over, and it was time to pack my bags and return to bombay. after lot of traveling i have come up with a theory “the number of bags when going on a tour is indirectly proportional to the number of bags when coming back”. i was left with a question mark. my baggage was definitely in excess. i knew some things were to be jettisoned. i ended up gifting (sorry it should be ”donating”) my readers digest world atlas book, weighing approx 4-5 kg’s, and my violin case (with the violin inside!!) to EDDIE, our chauffeur for airport drops.

i just can’t stop smiling when i imagine the airhostess has become a famous flautist in THAILAND and the chauffeur has become a famous violinist in SOUTH AFRICA. i am just hoping someday SARASWATI, the goddess of learning and arts bestows her gift on me too!!

good morning chennai!

usually when i am alone on tours out of the country or in the country, it has become quite an habit, i get up in the morning and the first thing is start the radio on my mobile. i tune into some good english/hindi/marathi songs channel, set it on external speakers with max volume possible and start the day. i enjoy listening to music, specially when all alone. it does make my day.

i remember till mid mid 80’s, radio was the only source of entertainment at my home. he use to get up before me and sleep after me, THE RADIO! that friendship is still not broken, you see.

i havn’t been able to do that in CHENNAI. there are no other language radio channels in chennai other than “TAMIL” !!! not even an english channel !!! forget about other regional languages of india.

note: please carry your ipod or discman if you are planning to come to chennai on tour.

compared to the television media, the radio has not evolved even 10% in india, i feel. i liked the concept of WORLD SPACE satellite radio, but i think that is too bulky for today’s technology.

i wish satellite radio in mobiles comes to india soon. till then its “KAALAY WANAKUM!"

fir milenge break ke baad!!

i came to chennai on 5th of june. it’s almost two and half months away from home. i was desperately looking forward for a break. and at last! the good news is that i am going home tomorrow, back to AMCHI MUMBAI !!

i am just excited to go back. i heard its raining cats and dogs in mumbai, hope i reach home from the airport in a taxi and not a BOAT !!

the most i was missing was the MEHFILS at our ADDA on TALAO PALI near MAAL ROAD. i am sure we will have another one this weekend. luckily, abhi, somu, amya, allan and sally, all will be in town. hoping for a good time once again, as we always have.

will be back in chennai on the 16th.

tot siens!

rambageecha, shop no. 37

i was starting to get worried; we were all supposed to gather back at RAMBAGEECHA, SHOP NO. 37 by 7.00 am. this was where the bus had dropped us early in the morning. we were clearly instructed by the tour guide “the bus will start for the next destination at 7.00 am, and those late will have to arrange their own transportation to reach there”. time was running and i was still standing in the queue of devotees waiting for my turn to get a glimpse of lord VENKATESWARA (commonly known as BALAJI) at the TIRUPATI temple. the queue was long and with a width of 6 persons standing side by side. it was already 6.15 am by now. myself, nilay and viren had planned this visit a week ago. unfortunately nilay could not accompany due to his work commitments.

even viren was supposed to meet me at the same spot. we were not together in the queue. the tour guide had separated all the members, including me, who wanted to perform a MUNDAN (shaving the head) before facing the lord. rest of the group, which included viren, proceeded for the DARSHAN, while we went the other way.

i reached rambageecha, shop no. 37 by 6.50 am and saw viren standing there waiting for me. rambageecha is a small enclave, near to the temple entrance. it has 2 rows of small shops, 5 at each side. There is a good amount of space between the 2 rows. one is a tea stall, one is a snacks stall and the rest ones sold flowers, garlands, coconuts, framed pictures of balaji, spiritual stones, spiritual threads etc. this place was quite busy with tourists. some having breakfast, some bargaining with the vendor, some chit chatting, and some just wandering over the place. but the common property in all was that they were waiting for their bus to pick them up for the next destination, like us. it was more of an assembly point, i would say. it was quite cold and very windy up there. luckily i was wearing a sweater, burnt umber coloured and with a zip in the front. i remember i had bought it last year, during my stay in dubai, on my way to south africa. i use it more as a jacket than a sweater. i was feeling the chill in the climate as my sweater was unzipped, as usual.

we had few idlis for breakfast . we then went to the tea stall which was situated 2 shops besides shop no. 37. “randa special tea” viren told the vendor. “RANDA” in tamil means two. the knowledge of few local words made our survival a bit easy. while having tea, viren showed me the balaji picture which he bought from shop no.37 before i had arrived. i too was interested in buying one. so we went to the shop next to the tea stall, i was still sipping the tea from my glass, we browsed through few balaji pictures, i liked one picture. nilay too had asked us to buy a small balaji picture for him. the smaller pictures were a bit costlier here compared to shop no. 37, while the price for the one i choose, a little bigger one, was a good bargain. as we had less time, we agreed that viren should go back to shop no. 37 to buy the balaji picture for nilay, while i stayed there to buy the other one for me.

i asked the vendor to pack the picture while i quickly went and kept the empty tea glass at the tea stall. i took the bag from the vendor, and holding it with both my hands close to my chest, i started walking towards shop no. 37. all of a sudden i felt a jerk, which pulled me back slightly. i turned almost instantly to see what the hell had happened. It took few seconds for me to realize what had happened. my sweater zipper was entangled at one end of a girl’s DUPATTA (scarf), who was moving swiftly in the opposite direction. both my sweater and her dupatta were stretched to the maximum, in mid-air. she was holding the other end of the dupatta, so that it didn’t fall completely from her shoulders. it appeared as if somebody had tied a knot with one end of her dupatta and one end of my sweater. i recognized her, i had seen her in our bus, she was a part of our tour group. she was fair, in her twenties, and probably belonged to an orthodox tamil family. she was wearing a salwar and had glasses on her eyes. in my observation she was quite “SIMPLE”. there was absolutely no reaction from both of us, we were just standing still, lost in our own thoughts. i became conscious when a figure hurriedly came between both of us; she was her younger sister i suppose. she was holding my sweater with one hand and her sisters dupatta with the other and was trying to pull them apart. she was trying hard to free her sisters dupatta from the entangle. still there was no reaction from both of us. I had not regained my senses completely. next i saw an elderly man coming to help his younger daughter, their father i suppose. at the corner of my eyes i also saw an elderly lady coming towards us, undoubtedly her mother. “AIYO!” her father exclaimed. that was loud enough to bring me back on earth. i could see her younger sister still struggling, she was making it worse, the runner of my zipper was getting more entangled in the threads. at last i reacted, i turned, walked a step back, and i spoke softly. “wait, let me help you” i said. she promptly obliged. in a moment i freed the entangled runner of my zip from her sisters dupatta. “thank you” she replied, as she pulled the dupatta back on her shoulders. i still had this blank expression on my face, i was mum. she went her way and i went mine.

by evening the bus was in chennai city, we were going towards the last drop point, where the tour would be culminated. i and viren got down at the airport road, a few kilometers before the last drop point. she was still in the bus.

i realised it was not a “larger than life” bollywood movie. she was lost in the jungle of people.

july 29, 2006. i will remember this day for 2 things I saw, the awe-inspiring idol of lord VENKATESHWARA and the simple “her”.

mahabalipuram

just by chance i visited the UNESCO world heritage centre web site, and it quickly struck, unknowingly till now i have visited 6 out of the 21 cultural sites in india declared as world heritage by UNESCO.

the 6th site i visited was not even a month ago. we* went to watch a movie in a theatre some 25 km out of CHENNAI city. foote karum hamare, the show was already “sold out”. now what? our motto in life is simple “AAYA HU TO KUCH KARKE JAOONGA”; we did not think twice, we bought the evening show tickets. however our satisfaction didn’t last long, we soon realized it was another 3 hours before the evening show starts. so we decided to go further 28 km to “MAHABALIPURAM”!!

we*: myself, nilay and nilay’s horse (his lml vespa scooter).

“MAHABALIPURAM” was a port city of the south indian dynasty of the PALLAVAS. it has various historic monuments built largely between the 7th and the 9th century. awesome, that means those monuments were around 1200 years old. this was the oldest of all the other 5 sites i have seen.

it was amazing to see all the monuments were mostly rock-cut and monolithic!! with one site of these monuments, in an instant i felt myself roaming in the 7th century. some relief’s depicted scenes of day to day activities they performed, like milking the cows. i also observed on many of the relief’s, the way the people dressed themselves. each pillar I saw was beautifully carved and each set of pillars having a unique design. it was sometimes difficult to even distinguish between 2 pillars of the same set. i thought it was sheer SKILL. it would have been done with proper calculations, with planning, with perfection, and with patience. one thing i was pondering about was, the room for error while carving a monolithic structure, and I knew it very well, it was close to a ZERO! i thought deeper; whenever I draw a figure on a canvas i have the liberty of erasing my errors and redrawing the figure. and i was awestruck with the thought that you cannot erase your mistakes on a monolithic structure!! i was beginning to appreciate and understand the meaning of the word “SKILL”, i was imagining a big rock, 15-20 meters high with a diameter of 15-20 meters, i could define that rock in one word too and it was “HUGE”, with 20 sculptors working on the same rock carving 10 elephants on it, and imagine one elephant figure going wrong!! the result, as i thought was either discard that rock, take a new “HUGE” rock and start from scratch or change the design on the same rock, which calls for complete rework and may not be feasible in certain cases. isn’t “SKILL” very important? i thought. the other aspect which touched my mind was, the amount of patience and time required to do such work.

the shore temple was one of the monuments about which i can write endlessly. it has got a perfect background, the BAY OF BENGAL sea. it appears reddish-brown most probably because of the reddish rock they used to carve the temple, or might be due to passage of time. i peeped through a small opening on the locked temple door, eager to see the idols, it was difficult to identify things in the dark initially, but I could make out, it was a relief depicting lord SHIVA and PARVATI. as soon as I turned, a woman sitting in front of the door said “its 1300 years old” and she was damn proud of it, i replied her with a smile.

it is difficult for me to describe in words the beauty and history those monuments carry.

it was already evening and we were on our way back to the theatre to catch the movie. all the way i still had the monuments at the back of my mind, i was thinking, can we build such monuments now? can we spend so much of time? do we have the patience? do we have space to build such things? why are such precious monuments unattended? why don’t we worship these artistic monuments rather than the idols in those monuments? are we trying to educate people of such a great history?

we entered the theatre, the movie had already started, we struggled in the dark but somehow reached our seats. the movie scene pinched me and i was brought back from the 7th century to the 21st century. we were watching a helicopter chase in the movie “MISSION: IMPOSSIBLE 3”.