For over a month, my narrow little lane had been hijacked by the neighbourhood children as a battle ground for cricket, badminton, cycling, running, hiding, screaming and laughing. This made activities like driving, walking and standing extremely hazardous. You never know when a little munchkin will crash into you or worse when a cricket ball will do the same. The local watchmen, car owners, vegetable vendors, pedestrians and dogs, pray collectively everytime they hear the screaming that heralds a sixer. Gods are invoked, chanting is resorted to and there has been considerable adult bonding over the fear of broken merchandise.
The children however, choose to be oblivious to the fear that they have caused. The mini-munchkins have a disorganized running and screaming routine while the older children have organised their running and screaming into the framework of games. By evening, they bring out packs of cards, shuffle them up and take over the staircases and entrances of buildings. Mellowed down after a day in the sun, they stare at their cards intently and try desperately to win at Uno and ekka-pa-char.
About two weeks ago, the aforementioned newly religious parents formed a union and loudly vocalised their fears for their cars and lives, to the munchkins. The solution to stop these potentially dangerous games was a total ban on playing on the road. The adults who believed that this would result in some peace were rudely shocked. The children just redefined the rules and space required. For example, the cricketers play happily within our society by declaring anything more than a foot from the bowler/batsman a boundary and anything two feet away a “SIXXXXERRR”. So the noise, animated individuals with their hazardous flying objects continue to dash around unabated.
Unabated, that is, until last week when schools restarted and cursed my lane to a lonely existence with stationary vehicles and adults.
Sunday, June 21, 2009
Thursday, May 07, 2009
Syncing, to swim.
Ghalum gu ta ka ta di… Yesterday I felt like I was in a funk. I was lethargic yet restless, asocial and generally very bored. I didn’t want to go out, I didn’t want to meet people, I toyed with the idea of going for a walk to the hill and sitting quietly by myself near the quarry but I eventually vetoed that idea as well. Gin-a-tom… ta- tai- tayum tat- ta-… But this strange feeling had to be dealt with, I wouldn’t sleep for another 6 hours and I didn’t want to spend that time floating around like a grumbling ghost. I saw Eyeless in Gaza lying on my desk. I had wanted to reread it but right now I really didn’t want to delve into the life of Anthony Beavis so that idea was chucked. Kita taki taam... dhet tam… kita taki tai…tat tai… I wasn’t even feeling hungry so my mind could not be pacified with food! And then it struck me that there was only one thing I wanted to do – dance.
Kita tam dhet tam tai tat tai… After tying my duppatta and closing my door I warmed up. I started with a few shlokas and surprisingly all that grouchiness disappeared! On a lark, I decided to do the first item we were taught – the allarepu. It is a short little dance, which just makes you keep moving. It’s been years since I did my first allarepu and I couldn’t remember it completely. Tam dhet tam tai tat tai… I danced in fits and starts, I’d get a whole part and then suddenly the next part would be alien to me. I played the beats continuously in my head. I invented steps where I couldn’t remember them, ad libbed and generally messed around. The body knew that the steps were wrong and strange but through this process, the brain would suddenly remember the correct step! It would seem so simple and obvious when you remembered it! Those eureka moments are incredible, it’s like suddenly remembering an old face or someone you knew in your childhood and loved. You feel so happy and warm.
Tam dhet tam tai tat tai… Yesterday was like using a map in my head with certain landmarks visible but the connecting right and left turns missing and as I kept dancing I’d suddenly remember a right turn here and a left turn there until slowly the whole map became visible and I knew how to get from start to finish perfectly. And suddenly the world seems at peace. Kita taki taam.
Kita tam dhet tam tai tat tai… After tying my duppatta and closing my door I warmed up. I started with a few shlokas and surprisingly all that grouchiness disappeared! On a lark, I decided to do the first item we were taught – the allarepu. It is a short little dance, which just makes you keep moving. It’s been years since I did my first allarepu and I couldn’t remember it completely. Tam dhet tam tai tat tai… I danced in fits and starts, I’d get a whole part and then suddenly the next part would be alien to me. I played the beats continuously in my head. I invented steps where I couldn’t remember them, ad libbed and generally messed around. The body knew that the steps were wrong and strange but through this process, the brain would suddenly remember the correct step! It would seem so simple and obvious when you remembered it! Those eureka moments are incredible, it’s like suddenly remembering an old face or someone you knew in your childhood and loved. You feel so happy and warm.
Tam dhet tam tai tat tai… Yesterday was like using a map in my head with certain landmarks visible but the connecting right and left turns missing and as I kept dancing I’d suddenly remember a right turn here and a left turn there until slowly the whole map became visible and I knew how to get from start to finish perfectly. And suddenly the world seems at peace. Kita taki taam.
Wednesday, March 25, 2009
Armchair activism and other redundant pieces of furniture
I read that Earth Hour is going to change the whole Global Warming scenario. All I have to do is switch off my lights for one hour for one day in the year. This act will inspire the World Leaders at Copenhagen to choose policies that will fight the gaseous terrorists of global warming. Then I can sit smugly in the dark, commending myself on my sensitivity to international ecological issues.
Bah, humbug.
How is this really going to make a difference? The representatives at Copenhagen have already been chosen to work on issues to reduce global warming, why do we need to further inspire them? But that’s a subsidiary issue. What I really want to know is whether the decisions made there will actually work as they are supposed to. People who want to work around the agreement will find loopholes and grey areas to misuse the words written and signed on. Or worse, they will create legal spaces that could work against the very goal of the agreement. The Kyoto Protocol, for example, was supposed to work towards reducing carbon emissions. Or as they put it, “stabilization of greenhouse gas concentrations in the atmosphere at a level that would prevent dangerous anthropogenic interference with the climate system”. Thus, every country now has a certain amount that it can pollute. A new found right to pollute. If a country is not polluting to the full extent that it is authorised, carbon trading allows the country to sell its rights to an over-polluting country. Whatever else the treaty may have done, it has also justified polluting and created legal spaces within which it now becomes economically viable to pollute.
Is that what they set out to do? What is the value of such treaties that are distorted or not enforced effectively? They degenerate into hollow words printed on nice stationary.
To know why these things happen we don’t have to look beyond ourselves. We don’t take an active role in creating, criticising and enforcing rules. Somewhere an understanding that creating rules is the work of the government and following, criticising and making sure that these rules are enforced efficiently is offloaded on civil society organisations. All we citizens need to do is switch our lights off for Earth Hour. But why do we need to make this difference between civil society organisations and civil society as a whole? We, as concerned citizens, have to take part in the processes that create and enforce rules. Apart from all of this, why do we need external bodies to decide how much work we can and should do? Can we not be self-propelled individuals?
There is some value to laws and policies, there is even value to motivational gimmicks like Earth Hour but these are of additional value. They are incomplete in themselves. We can’t divorce ourselves from issues and expect things to work out. We have to go beyond these comfortable spaces of activism and actually take part in the issues we believe in.
Bah, humbug.
How is this really going to make a difference? The representatives at Copenhagen have already been chosen to work on issues to reduce global warming, why do we need to further inspire them? But that’s a subsidiary issue. What I really want to know is whether the decisions made there will actually work as they are supposed to. People who want to work around the agreement will find loopholes and grey areas to misuse the words written and signed on. Or worse, they will create legal spaces that could work against the very goal of the agreement. The Kyoto Protocol, for example, was supposed to work towards reducing carbon emissions. Or as they put it, “stabilization of greenhouse gas concentrations in the atmosphere at a level that would prevent dangerous anthropogenic interference with the climate system”. Thus, every country now has a certain amount that it can pollute. A new found right to pollute. If a country is not polluting to the full extent that it is authorised, carbon trading allows the country to sell its rights to an over-polluting country. Whatever else the treaty may have done, it has also justified polluting and created legal spaces within which it now becomes economically viable to pollute.
Is that what they set out to do? What is the value of such treaties that are distorted or not enforced effectively? They degenerate into hollow words printed on nice stationary.
To know why these things happen we don’t have to look beyond ourselves. We don’t take an active role in creating, criticising and enforcing rules. Somewhere an understanding that creating rules is the work of the government and following, criticising and making sure that these rules are enforced efficiently is offloaded on civil society organisations. All we citizens need to do is switch our lights off for Earth Hour. But why do we need to make this difference between civil society organisations and civil society as a whole? We, as concerned citizens, have to take part in the processes that create and enforce rules. Apart from all of this, why do we need external bodies to decide how much work we can and should do? Can we not be self-propelled individuals?
There is some value to laws and policies, there is even value to motivational gimmicks like Earth Hour but these are of additional value. They are incomplete in themselves. We can’t divorce ourselves from issues and expect things to work out. We have to go beyond these comfortable spaces of activism and actually take part in the issues we believe in.
Sunday, January 18, 2009
Stationery: the movement
Stationery!! Oh glorious stationery! I am officially addicted to it. I get lost in stationery shops. The colours, textures, sizes and shapes boggle my mind. I am prone to ogling at paper, only to be pushed by the annoyed person who I've blocked for the last 15 minutes. How can you not fall in love with these shops? Most of the addiction revolves around paper - hand made paper, printed paper, thin and thick paper, sparkly and subdued paper; I love all paper. My tongue drops out as I pass by the section of books, the paper clips, the pens and pencils and don't even get me started on Post-its! My heart, my soul and all my materialistic tendencies dance together while I move through the stationery shop. But, I realise that stationery is redundant and that this obsession is not healthy. I have to kick the habit, get onto a de-addiction programme of sorts. I'm sure there are patches for this, and maybe just maybe they come in different shapes and sizes and colours and textures......
Friday, January 16, 2009
Of chains and other electronic fetters...
I was asked to continue and propagate a chain blog by Harshad. The rules are:
1. I shall write 6 random things, and 'tag' six people to continue this
2. They shall proceed to write six random things, and 'tag' six random people
3. They shall intimate me when done.
I shall be a little rebellious by writing but not propagating ;)
1. I love finding post offices, the 'speed post' signs to be more precise, in random cities.
2. I hate the sound of cotton when scratched by nails (human).
3. I'm a sexist, women are vastly superior to men.
4. I'm claustrophobic.
5. I am plotting to conquer the world and become a benevolent despotic empress.
6. I think lauki (doodhi/bottle gourd) and boiled carrots should be banned. They corrupt the impressionable minds of all those who consume them and are thus the sources of all the evil in the world today.
That's all folks!
1. I shall write 6 random things, and 'tag' six people to continue this
2. They shall proceed to write six random things, and 'tag' six random people
3. They shall intimate me when done.
I shall be a little rebellious by writing but not propagating ;)
1. I love finding post offices, the 'speed post' signs to be more precise, in random cities.
2. I hate the sound of cotton when scratched by nails (human).
3. I'm a sexist, women are vastly superior to men.
4. I'm claustrophobic.
5. I am plotting to conquer the world and become a benevolent despotic empress.
6. I think lauki (doodhi/bottle gourd) and boiled carrots should be banned. They corrupt the impressionable minds of all those who consume them and are thus the sources of all the evil in the world today.
That's all folks!
Tuesday, January 13, 2009
Happy New Year!
Welcome to a new year! It’s the 13th of January and as my numerologist (a wise woman called Chiquita) says I should begin all auspicious things on the 13th of the month, I write my first blog of the year today. Those unfortunate souls who read this post shall be subjected to a sentimental one because I awoke on the 1st of January smiling like an idiot. Why the silly grin? I don’t know, but I have a sneaky suspicion that it was a smile of hope. I got up from my bed (stupid smile still in place) and realised that it really was a beautiful day. I could see the amazing Pune winter sun, people bundled up and walking like cartoon characters, kids cracking up as they fogged up windows and wrote what I imagine to be censored stuff. I also realised that this happens everyday and I hadn’t seen it for a long time. I should have seen all these events on the days before but I was too consumed by work. I awoke every morning dreading the day ahead, rushing through everything, hoping to finish work and eventually crashing again. Only to do the same thing everyday after that. I don’t want to feel like a robot at 22 or at any age for that matter. I want to wake up like I did on the 1st of January - happy, hopeful and high! However, I needn’t have waited till the first of January to realise this. New beginnings can happen anytime. The 9th of May or the 17th of September (sorry, I mean the 13th of May or the 13th of September) are beautiful days to begin a new year. The point is not the date but the essence of starting a new year.
So people, my first blog of the year is corny, clichéd and very carpe diemesque, but so am I! Happy New Year!
So people, my first blog of the year is corny, clichéd and very carpe diemesque, but so am I! Happy New Year!
Friday, October 17, 2008
To boldly go where no ear has gone before...
The other day, while I was harmlessly (and till then, happily) having lunch, a friend of mine told me that I had a leaf in my hair. As I was going to remove the said piece of foliage, he realised that there was no leaf. No indeed, what he had seen was my ear sticking out from under my hair! And thus I was reminded of the fact that my ears are not even remotely proportionate to my face. Bah! Not great stuff to be reminded of! On the bright side however, if NBC decides to make an Indian version Star Trek (the Indian Generation?), I’ll have a guaranteed role… Beam me up Shetty!
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