Dhwani

I kept running, now I must pause, reflect, breath, return and live.

2011-12-30T21:03:00.001+05:30

The future and my run. It is an inescapable relationship. Holds true for everyone, I suppose. Our current day miseries, love lost, dwindling sense of achievement, super imposed ego, craving for attention, fucked up idea of individuality, hiding from our true emotions and thoughts, teaching ourselves to be strong when in true sense we are broken to the last bone, ligament and tendon.

It is not moral corruption; no, no. That’s not what I am talking about. It is worse, at least in my head. It is paranoia about the impending future that everyone seems to be running away from. As if the logical tomorrow or the time ahead will eat out what was once beautiful and certain.

Suddenly, everyone is going berserk. People are consuming more; they want more, from other’s share, other’s share of happiness, lust for leaving one’s mark in the shifting sands of our days.

Somewhere in this mad run, GOD as a concept still lingers on. So does the concept of LOVE.

For a while, I have been a cynic and in my cynicism I found my own rationality. I found my own safe haven. I found my own madness, my own brand of chaos that was eating up the rest of the world. It was the same stuff, just in a slick and cynical package. It ate me up too. It made me do irrelevant things. It made me write this jibberish.

At the turn of this year, I have had it with the sense of consumption. I do not yearn to run, I yearn to stand still and savour the bounty and the opportunity that I am alive. That I, like every mutable or immutable substance in this cosmos, am made up of that same fibre. That I, like everything around, am a testimony to the superseding power of thought. That my life is more than an expressed mathematical probability. That I am connected with all my righteousness and erring, and am also a reflection of the collective righteousness and erring of all.

The last few days of this year have taken me back to memories of my childhood.

Where in my mind, the world was a wondrous thing. The sky had the most beautiful designs, and the starts glittered brightly and the diamond shaped “mishri” was a piece of those starts that I could eat. People where always a bundle of stories and mysteries about them. And the only reason people met or bumped into each other was to share those stories, there was no other purpose. Everyone was a story teller and everyone was a character in those stories. Animals where the most beautiful of thoughts that came to exist around us as life forms. Birds were always flying to distant lands, yet they came and sat at my balcony wall every day, waiting for my mother to feed them steamed rice. Sun needed rest so it went to sleep each night and rose early morning each day without fail. My dad told me then… follow the sun in your life, and you will always be ready to witness the dawn and say goodbye gracefully at an end. I had thought then that sun was a huge nest of fireflies that lived far away in the darkness so that children do not catch them and keep them in their pockets. That when no one was speaking from the other end of the matchbox-thread phones, god spoke to little children. That I could be anything I wanted to be on a given day. I could be a peasant tilling the soil in the gray stone plant pots in the balcony, or be a vegetable vendor the next by laying down a gunny sack and placing some of mom’s vegetables from the kitchen on them, or I could be lord ram by holding a bow and arrow, I could be anything. Everything around me told me that, every fabric of the universe around me spoke to me and told me that it is child’s play.

………..all that and more of that stuff.

Funnily I have started to hear those noises and voices again. I am so glad that I am again invited to the garden party of wonderment. Last few days, I have ventured into the garden party of innocence. The cup of tea from the little toy cup tastes just like it did when I was three. The stethoscope from my doctor’s kit toy pack made me feel just about alright to play in matter of seconds.

And the voice from the little god phone lying on the ground told me, the year ahead is going to be a playground of innocence.

Return to innocence.

Thoughts upon those soaring peaks!

2011-08-29T20:10:00.002+05:30

During my week long stay at Leh, I had numerous thought bubbles that I wished to capture. However, due to preoccupation with various important things that come up during a trip like that I could only pen down four such meandering bubbles. For much of my thoughts, it does not make much of a sense, but then senselessness often is the only refuge worth aiming for.

1) Mountain talk!
2) Mountains and the story of lost love!
3) Mountain drive!

4) Mountain Kings, and Viking snow caps

Mountain talk!

Years ago, I love you was all that there was to the world. The words were revolutionary. But now, these are just words. Two mountains, standing next to each other. Some like soul mates. I wondered how after years of togetherness they would recall how their togetherness came to being and how they through centuries grew together. “I met you as a stranger, I said something, you said something, and in middle of that conversation I wanted to spend my entire life with you. Next to you, forever.”

While some like sworn brothers. They would have started out as, “I will be taller than you. Oh really! Well I will be snow-capped, you grow all tall, I will be broad and snow flushed. Alright! Whatever, let us get a couple of drinks and block them ravenous winds from passing through.” And then they grew around and alongside each other over unending cycle of time and space.

Mountains and the story of lost love!

During my week long getaway, there were moments that I used steal for myself and my own thoughts. And in some of those moments I would think of stories that I have never heard before. I would think them to flesh and blood in my imagination. One such day, when I was talking a long walk into the Leh market, a story called out to me.

“A very long time ago, when the sun and moon were not named, when the wind didn’t know which way to blow, when the water didn’t know whether to flow up or down, there were these two young lovers—Alaya the princess of fragrance and Him the god of wind. They were the only two folks on this beautiful land. They used to spend their evenings looking at the setting sun and would be back again to honour the rising sun in the morning. Days, weeks, months, years, centuries and millennia passed and they kept at their simple routine and filled the mountains with beautiful fragrance of love.

Then one day, the first man, a traveller reached Leh. He witnessed the wondrous dance of the lovers; he revelled in their romance that filled the air with mesmerizing fragrance. He presented himself before the lovers and sought their audience. He shared stories of his travel from a world that was far away and far different from this beautiful land. He urged Alaya to give away a part of her to him so that he could take her fragrance back to the world from where he came from. He cajoled them to this end and promised that in return he will give something that will always stay with Him. The lovers agreed, and the traveller took a small portion of Alaya into his glass vial. Instantly, Him started to feel a new feeling. It was the feeling of missing Alaya, as in the glass vial there was no air—Him, the god of Wind, did not understand this feeling but it grew on him over time, forever.

The traveller went back to his land and shared the fragrance with his world. The men and women in his land had never experienced something as powerful as Alaya’s fragrance. Soon the little vial with her fragrance was not enough for the traveller’s world and the greedy men and women travelled through the difficult terrain to source more of Alaya. They came and trapped her in large jars, bottles and what not. The more of her they took away, the more Him started to miss her until the day came when there was no more of Alaya left in Leh, except in Him’s heart and in his yearning for her. Until this day, he yearns for her in those solitary mountains. A tale of unending and lost love.

This is the story of Alaya and Him, the story of Him and Alaya—the story of Himalaya!

Mountain drive!

Going through the meandering mountain terrain, my feeling to return back to civilization faded at an exponential rate. I wanted the drive to never end, I mean never. I felt utterly empty, and in a neutral sense. No desire, no expectations, no nothings. Just being at the moment. Soaking all that was around like a sponge. The senses were first enamoured and then were slowly numbed. Life back in the hustle-bustle of the city seemed futile. The linkages and attachments to life’s semantics were unreal. No matter how beautiful, or how rooted I was to people, experiences, or my way of life back home, that drive made me feel like receding into a dot. A dot! That’s what life seemed to me. The ups and downs , the peaks and troughs, the joy and sadness, the wave of success and the treacherous chasm of failure. All these evened out to a dot for me at that moment.

Mountain Kings, and Viking snow caps

I couldn’t stop myself from being awestruck by the big brothers of hard rock—literally. The drive to Pangong Lake was five hours plus and all my eyes saw were these monstrous mountains, these legends, that monumental demonstration of over-bearance. They stood there, as if in guard; no, no, not as if in guard, but perhaps just stood there for that’s what they preferred doing. These mountains of Ladhak, amidst the bareness of the desert, rose high and broad sombrely announcing their stature.

Residue!

2011-05-30T21:04:00.000+05:30

Events, episodes and eras end. What remains is residue. The clutter at the end of the gig. The after thoughts. The unconsumed. The irrelevant. The un-burnt bones among the ashes. The mirages and flashes from memories. The haunting waves of sounds. The unending and infinite darkness. The charred gates of possibilities. The mummified effigies of life. The “no more”. The once floating body of knowledge now gone; only a faint smell of “what once was”.

Hands fervently struggle to grasp and hold within what no longer exists. Lungs battle to breath the air that once was. Feet clamp in the quick sand to make one final stand. The skin curdles and the sight deceives. The eye lids give away. You don’t sleep or wake up. You don’t dream, you don’t live. You exist in some vacant limbo and you are never sure if you really do. The senses fail. The grip dissipates.

The cowbells you once heard as a child keep coming back to you. You can feel the sound but can’t hear it. The fragrance of flowers that once brought cheer, now only bring back residual imprints on your sightless vision. The actions that once tasted like life now seem like a one-dimensional wall art on some far corner of the endless chasm. Then it suddenly hits you. You don’t belong here. You never did.
At long last, you see a thousand “YOUs” on the burning grounds, trying without avail to change what is. And you remain dislodged forever.

Delhi comes alive, shines a glimmer of hope!

2011-04-07T00:49:00.000+05:30

This write-up is not about the famous cricket world cup win. It is about how my city responded to the win. It is about how the response to the win delivers an underlying hope that the city is not lost to callousness.

I along with my friends decided to move towards India Gate after the match, and what we experienced then was a revelation. Delhi came to life, like it had never come to life in my life. Many of you reading this might have very well been part of this carnival at night. So you will be able to relate to this as closely as I am being able to.

Cars and bikes, for the first time perhaps, carried Indians and not any other identity. The music, the energy, the tempo, the excitement, the delirious happiness, the exult of a triumphant nation outscored any other feeling people might harbor otherwise. Absolute strangers hugging, shaking hands, “hi-fiving”, and greeting each other throughout the night was not an India I have ever witnessed. People had no other purpose but to celebrate a long cherished dream come true. It was as if for the first time, as a city, we had a greater meaning to our lives, and not get consumed by petty differences. The best thing I loved about the experience was that not for a moment, women who were as much part of this celebration were made to feel unsafe and intruded. Sociologist have always eluded to women’s treatment in a society as the barometer of the evolution of a civilization. And in that one night, I felt as if we have the inherent potential to be a civilized nation.

There were girls wearing shorts atop cars, swinging to the mass musical riot. And I did not notice, even a single guy making an inappropriate remark or a gesture that has until now come to be known as a trademark of our city.

I for most part of this wondrous parade, was quite, silently absorbing this experience, realizing that all our youth needs is a strong enough reason to believe in its potential and the motivation to dream of the infinite possibilities. I also realized that there was so much of pent up ambition within all of us, that one glorious win got the masses to rise above their insignificant lives, their constrained though processes, their conditioned belief systems and their repressed angst. It was a testimony how such epic energy was held back and it resulted in drip by drip release through crimes, insecurity, negativity, and regressive decline of our social and moral fabric. Only if we could learn from this experience and make a mindset shift in what possibilities actually await us—we will be unstoppable as a nation!
As a nation, we really need true reasons to celebrate. Not self indulgent hooplas that celebrate every compromise we effect in our drab lives. For the first time, I saw promise in our city and its youth. I have been a cynic for quite some time, and might continue to be so. But this surely will make me cynical about my own cynicism.
Our city can and I hope someday, drip by drip, improve its benchmark of how it views, values and validates its own self.

Emotional poverty: the phantom issue

2011-03-26T12:32:00.001+05:30

We constantly hear people, politicians, intellectual-jerk-offs, diplomats, students et all, talking about poverty in our country. While all of them talk about economic poverty, seldom does anyone pay attention to the emotional poverty our country is saddled with.

For a country with a billion strong, emotional deprivation and poverty is far more a serious issue than it is ever recognized. A country full of people with voiding relationships, under-achieved aspirations, unconquered dreams, ailing self-image; and all at the cusp of hyper modernization of the society, economic liberation, and fundamental shift in the sense of rights and wrongs.
While everyone is celebrating the new India, the so called “affluent” India and pushing the nation toward a hyperbole; little does anyone fathom the likely impact of such rapacious appetite. While at an individual level, this madness for more, more for self, might bear fruit, well at least in the short run; taken on a larger canvas of a community, state, or the country it is likely to take us to the next frontier under-prepared, under-equipped, and to an extent brittle. A generation with strong sense of over-achievement thrust on them, delivering to this end with their misplaced sense of emotional stability. Most economic modalities fail when people are not able to cope up with low phases, when at the slightest of storms their backs bend.

Analyzing poverty from both economic as well as emotional standpoint might yield us a better grip on this problem that plagues our nation. I put forth some extremely rudimentary set of equations that might field as childish or even prudish, but nonetheless encapsulates my vague yet stirring thoughts on this topic.

Economic poverty + Emotional poverty = Crime
Economic prosperity + Emotional poverty = Decadence
Economic poverty + Emotional prosperity = Value for sustenance and linked growth orientation
Economic prosperity + Emotional prosperity = Self actualization and spiritual evolution

Strangely, many of us oscillate between the four states at some point or other. Sad to know in this restless generation of ours, keeping to one’s axis, stable, and steadfast is no more a vital consideration. Only if we were more giving and less volatile, our country could realize more from what it already has.

I am, here, offering no solution or actions. I am not qualified to do so. But I do feel, and so I write. I am one of you.

Random thought or a greater meaning?

2011-02-06T20:42:00.000+05:30

Ever since some sense got instilled into my mind, I have always believed that there is a greater purpose to our existence. Something larger than what we are able to see through the fog of everyday mundane, hustle-bustle, stress, anticipation, eagerness, highs and lows. A greater meaning to life—something that has remained unchanged like a ghost code in the machine of civilization. An underlying purpose to things, a pull towards a greater consciousness. That often we live our life without paying attention to the patterns we draw through our activities, thoughts, feelings—that in its own mystical ways tells us all about who we are and where we are headed. Like a forecasting model that feeds on the base data, as well as on the exponential formulae that resides in the cells of life—hidden, encrypted, and password protected.

We meet people in our life for certain reasons, we go through our experiences, we fall, we pick ourselves up, and carry on and learn and unlearn a lot of things. When the jamboree is happening around us, to us, from us—suddenly there emerges a realization of a grand design. A definitive definition! We humans have limited and finite set of emotions and emotional responses. But what we do with these, how we respond to life basis these emotions are infinite. We fall in love, we care, we fight, we agree and disagree, we leap, we fall, we fly, we believe, we surrender, we conquer, we institutionalize, we rebel, we demand, we command, we do all these and much more.

But once in a long while, I get this sharp shooting thought. What if there is no grand design, no higher truth, no deeper consciousness, no rising or evolution of the spirit? What if this belief of a greater force in our life is merely an interplay of the super-ego and human insecurity? What if our life is what it is on the face of it? Just nothing more to it. A fabric of weaved through the strands of action, reaction, inaction, choices and situations. Is life nothing more than a mega-structure of randomness? Events and episodes just random occurrences with nothing more connecting them than cause and effect.

We are born, live, and then eventually die. And after that, there is no more to be. Just millions of tissues wrapped around a calcium bone structure that will one day decay and be consumed. Then why do we fret so much about happiness, enjoyment, achievements, disappointments, rights and wrongs, social order, or for that matter that much fabled feeling that we call “love”? What is there to truly feel? The mere sensory signals of touch, smell, taste and sight. Then why worry so much all our life? If the only purpose of existence is procreation. We humans seem to be extremely good at it, and we produce off-springs at a rate. And surprisingly the only specie to work out a way to limit the growth of our own specie.

Well to this random thought and dilemma, I have a simple remedy for myself. Even if there is no great design awaiting us or a greater truth beheld, let the randomness be more meaningful. Let the randomness be a means and not an end, at least in my own life. Let me live out this random existence with a openness, simplicity and compassion. So that when I am done, and it is time for me to die I can shut down knowing that it was fun.

Rise of Man or Fall of God?

2010-10-03T21:46:00.001+05:30

Did they rise as men? Or did they fall as Gods? The question keeps propping up in mind every once in a while. I must confess I do have my view on this. However, it is not a rooted viewpoint; it has moments of doubts, alternate views, reasons and dilemmas.

All that is I can reasonably affirm is that somewhere fact and myths were splashed on a churning pan to concoct some of the mythological flashes that I wish to use for my argument or better to say my quest for a better answer, an evolved viewpoint.

Revering Rama or Krishna, or despising Ravana or Indrajit is the larger, if not the comprehensive view of the world. I would focus on the reverence—our Gods, the immutable, the expendables, the noble, the untarnished ones, the glorified. The Gods without a trace of imperfection, and even the slightest of imperfections understated against a larger purpose.

I am alright with this.

It must have taken the religious machinery thousands of years and repeated interventions—sometimes peaceful and at others extremely forceful to uphold the myth of our religion and gods. I am impressed by the system’s clinical approach and its far extended success in our life and theology.

The question I am posing here is, were Rama and Krishna God incarnates who lived near flawless and inspirational life?. Or were they men like us, who chose to be better, bigger and inspirational? Did these mythological giants had the same dilemmas that we have as men, moments where our integrity, morality, ethics and better sense clashes with our need to achieve or survive?

Did they also have moments where they had to choose between what is right and what seems lucrative? Were they troubled by the constant strife between leading a comfortable life and following their heart’s call? How many times would have Rama have thought to break free of his fourteen year exile and moving back to Aayodhya and reclaiming what was rightfully his—the throne. How many times would Sita have prodded Rama to stop the seemingly insensible decision to continue with the exile after Bharata came to Rama and offered the kingdom and called him back? Did Lakshmana even once did not regret his decision to accompany Rama into the Jungle leaving his young bride back home? Did Sita even for once not feel that ever since she got married to Rama, her life had been anything but smooth?

These are question that often criss-cross my mind and they demand answers.

My instinct or some voice within tells me that they were men, great men, perhaps the greatest men the time has witnessed. They ascended to a level where describing them as merely men failed, and hence they were approximated as beyond men or to word it better Gods—those with a higher sense, those who have evolved and connected their inner conscience with the larger play of the universe. To levels where everyday dilemmas were child play for them, they saw the illusion of life in its face and it no longer sucked them in—except may be at moments. Where there human genes and instincts kicked in.

I would reference here two well documented events from two our most revered and widely published epics—the Ramayana and the Mahabharata!

Episode of Bali Vadh, Ramayana (Kishkindha Kanda)

Starting with a quick background for the uninitiated ones. Bali was the ape king of Kishkinda, elder brother to Sughriva. Because of a misunderstanding between the brothers, Bali the elder and the more powerful one of the two banished Sughriva from the kingdom and made his wife and family prisoners of the state. This was around the same time while Rama was searching for Sita in the southern jungles of Bharata Khanda after she has been abducted by Ravana. Both Rama and Sughriva met through Hanuman, and instantly saw mutual purpose in joining forces.
Rama wanted to search for his wife, while Sughriva wanted his honor back, reunion with his wife and his position restored. There was symbiosis.

Bali had a boon from Brahma, according to which anyone who came before him lost half his strength to Bali. Which meant that in a straight duel Bali was indestructible. He would always have half of his opponent’s strength plus his own. So logically there was no defeating Bali in an honorable and straight battle. So Rama schemed that Sughriva should challenge Bali to a duel to death and Rama will hide behind the tree lines and shoot an arrow into Bali’s heart and slay him. This was executed as planned.

Now where does this leave us with the pristine image of Rama? He did an unethical act, only to serve his end of securing Sughriva’s support and the monkey army which knew the jungles so well that even a fig could not have been hidden for long if they searched for it. Rama needed to find Sita, a purpose for which he killed Vali, a great warrior, by deceit.

Now we have two options, to consider…

1) Did Rama, the god of Gods, fall to a low when he assassinated Bali? Was it the fall of God?

2) Or did Rama, a human like all of us, rise beyond his human inklings most of his life and lived a life only befitting a god? And that he did a few things once in a while that is very natural for any human to do, for his love, for his attachment and commitment to Sita. Did Rama, a human, rise? Was his life a living testimony to Rise of Man?

Karna Vadh –Mahabharata, 17th day of battle

On the seventeenth day of the great battle of Mahabharata, Karna had vowed to face Arjuna and come back victories or not come back at all. That day Karna was unstoppable, he dissected the armed entourage that was protecting Arjuna at Krishna’s behest. Krishna knew that Karna had waited this entire time for this moment, to repay his debt to Dhuryodhana, to slay Arjuna.

Arjuna and Karna, the greatest warriors came face to face and a long drawn battled ensued. During one of the turns, Karna’s Chariot wheel sank into the earth. At that moment, all the Kaurava armed troupes deserted him. Karna got down himself, during the battle to get his chariot wheel out of the sand. He was unarmed in a seated position. Arjuna seeing this, held back his volley of arrows as it was against the dharma of war to kill a unarmed opponent. Arjuna was in tune with his righteous karma; however, seeing that as the only opportune moment Krisha, the supreme God, my personal idol too, order Arjuna to slay Karna. Despite Arjuna’s argument, Krishna did not relent his influence. Giving into Krishna’s rhetoric, an arrow was shot from the Ghandiva (the celestial bow given to Arjuna) and Karna was beheaded.

Krishna, the upholder of dharma, the orator of Gita, ordered an act of dishonoring rightful karma. It won Pandava a decisive advantage in the war. Beyond Karna, there was no one in the Kaurava army who could have slayed Arjuna.

So again, did Krishna, the god of Gods, the universal consciousness, fall in value in a moment of desperation?

Or did Krishna, a human like you and me, a valiant and an evolved life form, demonstrated his entire life the value of realizing the vastness of spirit?

I would like to sleep with the thought that these two gigantic mythological figures were human just like you and me, who demonstrated through their entire life the possibility that lies ahead of us. Of becoming so pure and connected that you become one with the universe. I would like to live with a conception that they were human who rose. Rather than look at their weak moments and say the fall of God!

The rise of Man!—is perhaps a thought that wins in my deliberation. But I have my moments too?

Life by the temples

2010-10-02T00:59:00.000+05:30

In August, I was traveling down south—Kumbakonam in Tanjore District of Tamil Nadu to be precise. The place was a breathing paradise with the rains turning the usually arid and ochre land into wet and lush green expanse. I have never seen this place like this. So pleasing to the eye it was that I for a moment felt as if I was in a rain forest.
I had gone there to attend a wedding in the family, and post the wedding had a few days to loiter around town. My extended family, reloaded with elders, cousins and their kids, decided to hire taxis and visit the nearby temples. A day excursion of sorts!

Knowing my usual disinterests in visiting places of worship, my mom broached the topic and tried securing my consent to join. I reluctantly gave in. Not a very religious guy you see—at least not in the conventional scheme of things.

Then the discussions started—which all temples to visit. A thorough perimeter grid was created in each of the elder’s mind and plotting of each temple by importance and sacredness was accomplished. As a result, it was decided that it needs to be a two-day excursion.

Day 1 – Heading north of Kumakonam and covering all the temples, and extending their much awaited subservience to each of the deities in the domes.

Day 2 – Heading East of Kumakonam to cover some key temples that were a bit off from the usual route to be clubbed on day one.

So much for signing up for a day excursion. Now I was auto-pulled into for Day 2 as well.

Initial thought of was utter disbelief, and then I rationalized it and said to myself, “come on, I could indulge in my own pastimes during the trip… eating, talking, unraveling myths about the temples, trying to understand the architectural influences in the temple motifs, and most importantly the “PRASADAM”.

Then our trip started. A sixteen-seater Mitshubishi van arrived and I seated myself by the window. It had rained until an hour ago so the roads were clean, the tree lines lush green, and no darting sun to be seen. Pleasant journey lay ahead of us.

It seemed to me that apart from the kids, my brothers and their wives, and me, none of the elders were interested much in the journey. They were focused on the next temple on their itinerary. It seemed like they were playing “join the dots” game, with temples serving as patterned dots. And finally when they finish their mini-pilgrimage a grand image of heaven would emerge from the temple dots they connected. Believe me there was an air of utter seriousness when it came to sequential ordering of the temples we visited. Wow! Mesmerizing!
Soon we parked outside our first pit stop. Let me be honest, although I was reluctant to join this troupe, I was bowled over by what I saw when I got down. Sheer size and intricate detailing coupled with quaintness of a temple that was built around 2000 years ago. I was standing in front of the Shiva temple in Patteeshwaram. It seemed straight out of a mystic lost world movie. As if once we entered the Gopuram (the conical dome at the entrance), we will be teleported to a distant land in strange time and space continuum.

For a moment I kicked myself for forgetting my camera back in Delhi, while in a rush to leave for the airport. Darn! I needed a strong optical zoom and manual adjustments to capture the moment as I could see it. My smartphone camera was just not smart enough.

While soon I lost my entire clan to reverence and rituals in the temple, far more interesting things caught my attention. The architecture was clearly from the Dravidian era; with pantheons of gods, demi-gods, heavenly creatures, and related legion crafted almost in every direction one could spray a sight.

The stone walls of the temple haven’t seen much of restoration but they looked solid. Somewhere from the moss that grew on their walls I knew that they hold within their mortar bonds stories that traversed centuries or even millenniums. Hordes of worshipers with their troubles, woes, sadness, happiness, joys, victories, thankfulness, reverence, belief, faith, wishes, offerings, gratitude would have walked these very aisles. For thousands of years, this temple has stood its ground amidst invasions, natural calamities, communal bitterness, coronation of multiple kings, assassinations, treasure hunts, myths, and god knows what else. But stood its ground and even in its faded façade is far more intriguing than the most modern and state of the art architecture could be.

The Shiva element! Like an all absorbing and evolving truth.

At that moment, I felt privileged that I joined my folks on this mini-pilgrimage. I said to myself, stop cribbing you idiot. You are amidst timeless keeps. Memory for life and a provoked thought that could potentially alter how I look at life, my own life and of those around.

As a writer, I was always believed that I am here to create. Something that would last, perhaps outlast generations, and seep through as thought matter. Something universal and indestructible. That something will be my absolving, my claim at immortality—a part of me that will transcend. And here I was right at the centre of something similar. Right at the centre of a belief system. A belief system so strong that when it was conceptualized it had no room for eradication. The temple is just a manifestation of that thought in form and matter.

I asked myself, what I am in front of such a singular thought factor. Can I, in patches or in percentage, ever match this?

That gave me a silent stroke of realization. About the people who believed in their dream that his temple will go nowhere. That someday perhaps a bloke like me would come and remember them. Perhaps there were more like me who would have walked this temple lanes and felt like I felt. Honoring their glory.
It is not about a temple, or the ones I visited in my trip ahead—I visited many and each seem to have its own glory and stories hidden and waiting to be unraveled. I looked around the population that was settled by the temples and realized that these temples were the single most potent economic vehicles for this villagers, strongly rivaling agriculture. There were flower vendors, tea stalls, kiosks selling small take away religious books and other religious motifs. Entire generation supported by the temples. For them the temple is their only source of livelihood.

It made me see the whole temple trip business of ours in a very different light. I suddenly felt important and ran out to buy flowers for Puja and tea and biscuit for all my relatives. I think I made a tiny fraction of a contribution to the long standing tradition.

We moved on from temple to temple and I kept paying attention to the myriad architectural marvels, the black stone walls, the faded yet colorful murals of gods all around.

Every once in a while I would see a young kid selling flowers or fruits on the temple lanes and I will smile at them and feel how lucky for them to have an anchor like this in their lives. They may not be the most well off financially, but they have something that my contemporaries in cities don’t. They have a belief and unlike many of us in cities they are not a generation lost to misguided thoughts and ambitions.

I agree with all my heart, I had a deeply satisfying excursion, and it triggered me to pen my thoughts down affirms my satisfaction. I could have wrapped up all I had to say in just two or three paragraphs but I rambled on.

I am sure some of you might have had some moments like this in your life where you suddenly feel part of history. This post is dedicated to all such moments.

Wanderer’s final flight home – Abode the golden chariot of fire

2010-04-11T00:54:00.004+05:30

Right now at the final leg of this purgatory, there was a need for one last circle of the world. To solve the remaining few unsolved equations. To balance the remainder and wipe out the quotient.

A) Radhanation, a country for the free
When the knowledge of the universal spirit and its banality dawns upon us, there is very little that is left unanswered. The seam of the universe and its mentors is cracked open for you to see the inner clockwork, the cogs, the pistons, and the overall maintenance schedule. You are exposed to the back stage activities of the most monumental event—an event called life. Trust me, as this comes from someone who has seen this, it does not steal away the awe from the front-end circus of life. Instead after witnessing the back end, one feels super awed of and in one with the ring master.

Through this tour of this weird country, I felt free. Everyone is invited to collaborate and co-create reality. There are no biases or left outs or untouchables in this grand plan. With our simple wish we create our reality. When we wish that our life was more beautiful, we set in action a course of events that take us nearer to that wished state. Like that a billion of us wish, and often counter wish each other each moment and thus the balance of the universe is sustained and we are bequeathed this consensus version of reality. If you recall Venn diagrams, the area of overlap is the reality as we all know it. An area where all else in the universe has agreed to exist in parts. But we as individuals are like each petal of the Venn diagram; our span far exceeds the area of consensus, and thus far exceeds the limitation of the notional reality.

For instance, let us consider there were three devout Krishna followers – Prahalad, Chaitanya, and Meera. Each one of them had a vision of Krishna that was real to them and in their respective visions Krishna came through to them in varying colors. So each one of them had seen Krishna in different color variations and each one of them strongly believes that whatever they saw is the only truth and rest is mere imagination. One day all three of them decide to meet and establish, for the greater good of the world, the true color of Krishna and through that establish reality. Without getting in detail about their discussions and arguments I put forth the case in form of a Venn diagram.

Now if you observe, the area at the centre is the overlapping area and it is shaded in blue. In the vision all three saw, Krishna at least appeared before them once in blue. Except blue there were no overlapping colors between the three devotees. Hence the only version they could agree upon was that Krishna was blue and hence it was established that the flute master was a blue incarnate. When Krishna came in Meera’s vision in Red the valiant color of passion it got labeled as deviant behavior and hence not accepted as reality, the same goes for his green form when he appeared to Chaitanya symbolizing his overarching involvement with nature and so on and so forth.

In the same spirit, I would like to put forth the all inclusiveness of Radha. Not piecemeal but in absoluteness.

Radha to me is a state of the universe. To label her as a flower or the moon-faced fiery eyed girl would be an understatement or even injustice to her in totality. The flower and the girl, Radha the glorious, is one of her surfaces and beneath that mesmerizing surface is the true culture of life. The nucleus of solar flares, the source of all light, she is the keeper of the true identity of the cosmos, deep within that beating heart lies the pulsating verve of creation that when reverberates spreads like an unending magic carpet, like an ever expanding desert dune that rises and falls through the tunnel of time and is a monster shape shifter, where no two moments are alike, where change is the only becoming, where change loses its meaning to metamorphosis, and yet at the flick of the mind’s eye the entire range of Radha remains as a magnanimous constant. Like a well amidst the mirages of the deserts, Radha quenches the eternal thirst of the traveler, of this Wanderer. Radha, like the first rain, alleviates the grouse of the parched land of the desert and fills it with the seas. Radha like the poison of the night scorpion inflicts herself upon those cursed with immortality and absolves the Wanderer. Radha like the enchantress of the forest keeps the ghosts and ghouls in tranquility. Radha swallows and devours time like a headen-demon goddess sucking in past, present and future into one conjoint syllable.

Om!

Radha is a nation for the free. Radhanation, a country for the free. Radhanation is a country where everything flies and there are no boundaries of form, shape or thought. No barriers whatsoever. You are bestowed absolute control over the course of your universe. A country of free beings, where there are no dividers between gods and mortals, not dotted line between the HAVEs and HAVE NOTs, no unfulfilled wish, no unlived dream, no Jesus pinned on the cross, no one weeping by the ashes of loss, no slave or a master or a boss.

Like all, the Wanderer, the phantom of all noble warriors that ever were, are and will be , too has an obligation to the lady ornate—to Radha. To wander into her territory and unshackle the uncontrollable that lies deep within her. To unleash the purity that resides, to pull the pin out of the grand grenade.

To do silly things in love.

Radha is liberation.

B) Merging into the painting
To set this vast wheel in motion, I decide to indulge personally to interfere and alter reality. To soak my hands into the stream of timeless consciousness and like a brut kid bend the realms of tangible reality to suit my heart. I get a pure go ahead from GOD. He speaks - “Go create your heart’s call. Shift the building blocks of reality and like a bully alter how life moves frame by frame.”

One moment it is here and the next it’s gone. Like a stage trick. One moment she doesn’t feel, the very next she does; in fact that’s the only feeling left in her heart. Like the apple was red and now it is bright green with red polka dots. Invading Radha’s dreams, plunging into her thought super highway and riding the chariot of fire and burning the landscape with after burn of love and liberation. Painting the inner walls of her souls with childlike designs of universal love. This act of altering reality and making the universe to adjust around ourselves is a zero sum game. No one loses and no one truly wins. Yet I create the perfect picture of truth and reality.

Enough of the sedate state of leaving it to time and her will. Time to take absolute creative control. Like an overlord, I take it all within my hands.

I call up my dear friend, Shikha—the painter. I ask her to paint this story and its deemed curtain closure on a series of canvas for me. She agrees.

We agree to size up my bedroom walls. The longer crème shaded sides would carry the paintings, while the deep wine red shorter contrast walls will blend into the theme. She agrees to work on a series of smaller canvases to tell this story through a series of interlinked murals. The way it happens is that we sit together and I tell her the larger moving themes of the entire Wanderer series and the Radhanation. I share with her the valuable Deux ex-machina of this operatic narrative. Then she goes back to her lair and takes her own sweet little time to come up with the complete collection. I tell her to use a lot of oranges, a lot flares, a lot of reds, with an offset of golden and yellows. Then there are some paintings that will be indulged in blue, black and silver.

She meticulously and in her own careless manner creates a juxtaposition of colors and strokes of thoughts – she captures the thematic underplay as well as the direct notation of divine love of this story in her paintings. She delivers magnificence. Well there is more. Every time a painter is commissioned to etch out a work of art, the ‘artcome’ often exceeds the theme and carries a hidden and a far greater gravity than what was originally intended. Same is the case with these series of paintings.

The first painting of the series, from left to right, captures all seasons of love, of my love, the multifarious yet singular love I have always felt, full of abundance and excitable childish purity. It has simple color combinations, basic colors, simple motifs that repeat themselves in the frame and form a progressive musical pattern. It personifies my love for the women in my life. The ardent truth of my heart, the young Krishna of this heart, the single spindle shaped focus of my heart’s sightless vision.

The second painting takes off and brings to life, in part, the fundamentalism of falling apart, of loss, of inevitability of churning change, of letting go what is most dearest to oneself and yet love with simplest form of love. It further underscores the dark phantoms that circle my haunted mind and how these black-feather winged ghosts blot out the sun, and then finally it leads on to the Wanderer, who like a super-god-bird comes to my rescue, like a beacon of light in the dark night of a curse. Wanderer, the universal hope!

The third painting through contradiction of color and tones, gold dust and pale bones, explores the initial conflict and despondency while coming to terms with the Wanderer and how this bond, with the Wanderer, the wandering bond turns into a singular lifelong backdrop. The celebration of coming face to face oneself. The painting for the first time opens up the portals of Radha, the mystic Aradhana into the schema of my life. There is a strong hint of eternal light in this painting that forces one to look through the next paintings in a hurry to finally see what the last painting has to offer.

The fourth painting goes berserk; it goes all out, like a mania, like devotion, like love of a god, like cha-cha-cha and fox trot, like colorful bolt of lightning that lights up all our hearts. It is a riot of colors, like a billion and more colors were invented the moment Shikha would have sat down to paint this one. It explodes into my Radha, it captures the super-duper supernova explosion of love when I drank the Radha juice and of the time when I held the Radha flower in very own hand, of the visions that came to me of Radha and the thousand and more gopis in consort when they swirled over and around me in a dance, in a trance to the eternal music of the grand flute. This painting singularly celebrates the lady ornate, the completion of my soul, the connecting link to the eternal light. To sum it up, this painting is a carnival of my voice that sings out loud to my Radha. Urging her to dance and dance and dance. Begging her to unleash her true self unto this world. Supplicating in front of her soul to take me in and absolve me. It celebrates the cosmic equation.

The fifth painting articulates the final frontier before blending of the soul into the vast ocean of god’s consciousness. The shades of blue, black, silver and white convey the last attempt the world makes to chain and leash a true Wanderer. The last veil, the mirroring smoke screen that obscures the vision of the great beyond where at the centre stands the one without form of norm. The last attempt inflicted through the façade of none other than Radha herself. A sort of foul play that momentarily hinders a passing thought. Your goddess denies the existence of light at the end of the tunnel. The flower denies the cycle of ongoing pollination. As if a farce goddess appears before a hermit and cheats him into believing that there is nothing that she can offer him. It finally captures the way the soul leaves all this pretence and manifestation behind to co-create the universe it ought to be. The last step taken.

The sixth and the last painting, the grand consummation of this entire saga is the simple dream I always had. It is the simplest of the paintings in form and shape. Here is the picture of my childhood and overarching dream. Picture this. A country side meadow with green grass and brambles all around. At the centre stands a mid-sized and quaint red bricked single storied house with an enchanted garden with white picket fences. Onto the terrace of the house leads a winding staircase. In the lawn, grow beautiful flowers of gracious colors, and a German Sheppard gazes lazily from the garden onto the road. Two small bicycles parked near the small wooden gate of the house hinting at the two kids, one boy and one girl, who are up to some childish mischief somewhere in the garden. A big window that opens up to the front of the house, behind which is my writing table—a rose wood writing table with an antique table lamp and jar of honey, some cookies and sundry items that amuse a writer. A wind chime at the entrance of the house that speaks volume of the rich taste the lady of the house enjoys. On the right hand top of this painting’s canvas, in the sky beyond the red brick house, is what seems like a golden chariot, a chariot made of flames, with horses of fire, and two entities aboard it surging to the heavens and beyond. That’s it. That’s the last painting. My perfect dream of a worldly life. The only thing I want from this worldly existence. There you go. I put it down simply into words and Shikha paints it for me.

The moment I dreamt this, this was waiting to happen. The moment Shikha painted this, it started to manifest around me. Einstein opined, with adequate data, that energy cannot be created it can only change forms. Which typically means that we cannot dream something that does not exist or a corollary to this being what can be dreamed already exists in some form. Through our will and focused efforts we merely urge that truth to manifest around us.

Now there was only one thing left to do. I knew this the moment I saw the last painting of this series pinned up on my bedroom wall. I took a deep breath, closed by eyes and ran towards the painting and merged into it. I am no more part of this reality that we have to make do with. I fell through the tiny crack in the window of this consensus reality and got absorbed into my far reaching petals of truth. I am now part of the painting—the only existence that I chose.

C) The final flight home, abode the golden chariot of fire
I open my eyes, for the first time after merging into the painting, to my room in the red brick house. I am sitting at my writing table, yes the rose wood one, and penning down this last chapter of the journey. Until now the world of common beliefs was the canvas on which the world of the dreams was being etched out and now the tables have turned. I am sitting inside a painting on the wall of my room and writing all of this.

Suddenly I notice that on my writing table to the right hand top corner, beside the pen stand, is a mug of ginger-honey tea. It startles me. That means I am not alone. I look outside the window and it is dark with the light on the verandah mildly illuminating the garden where beautiful flowers grow. I keep my gaze outside and I spot, at some distance, a few Radha flowers on the bloom. A chill runs down my spine. The within and without of the painting seem to carry the same theme over and over again. Just now, I hear a voice that is all too familiar. It is a deep base voice of a lady. Like sonic boom, it cuts through the stark silence of a painting.

“Balaaaaaaaaaaa, please finish your tea and sleep dear. It is getting really late. You can finish whatever you are writing in the morning.”

I know this voice. This is the voice of Radha, the low octave command of Radha. Shell shocked and trying my best to acknowledge and comprehend the partnership I have been bestowed, I turn around. Towards the back of the writing table, on the opposite wall, is a huge mirror. In the mirror I see Radha walking away into the aisle with her back facing me and her long lustrous hair swaying like an enchanting spell. She then turns back and we come face to face, and I am blinded by the sheer light that her fiery eyes are emitting. By the time my cornea adjusted itself her face has started to disappear, yet I catch the glimpse of the lady ornate. A sight that would forever remain with me!

The very next moment, I see what the mirror on the wall should have otherwise shown me. The mirror was facing the window. It shows me the garden, dimly lit, and therein a blue flower half hidden in the foliage.

I realize now that there is yet another leg to the journey that remains—the final one.

I rush to my writing table and quickly, at manic pace, beyond manic pace, start to write what is to follow. I take a leap into the future and write it before it happens. I need to. For once it happens, there will no more be. So what I write is followed by what I write. Like a repeat, word by word, frame by frame.

I write all of this down, even the words that are going to follow.

I guzzle the ginger-honey tea, and rush to my bed room. I open the door and there she is sitting by the dressing table brushing her long magical tresses before going off to bed. I place my right hand gently on her left shoulder. Initially without turning, she brings her right hand across and keeps it over my hand, which is resting on her shoulder. The touch completes me.

She slowly turns her face towards me and I see in her hot fiery eyes the depths of all womanly love. Her big round eyes and her moon-like round face. I pull her up and closer to me, our breaths intermingle and they ignite. There is fire all around. We are on fire, the fire from her eyes trigger the Vesuvius inside of me. The flames are leaping from our eyes, mouths, ears, hands; our bodies are now hardly visible. It is a raging orchestra of flames. At this very moment, I know that we need to leave our world behind. Turn it to ashes.

From the very core of my being, I summon the gods out. “I” emerges. I am now the Solar storm, while she is the fuel. I am lord Surya himself and I lash out the power of all the suns in this multi-verse and a chariot manifests around us. My hands still gripping hers and our eyes locked. Whatever that means… now that we are only flames.

The grandest chariot of all. The golden chariot of fire. The chariot with one thousand and one horses. The chariot which has a flag emblem of Agni himself. With brute force of certainty I pull Radha abode the chariot and crack a whip of flames. The chariot bursting through the roof of the red brick house surges into the night sky. In one trail blaze we turn the night scorpion who is still lingering in the outer reaches of time to ashes. As we move higher into the realms, the chariot gains speed and the thousand and one horses slowly turn to fire. Now there is only fire, no body, no grip, no feelings, no thoughts, only pure unadulterated energy. The purest god form. Very near to the highest order. In our solar run, Radha and I consume and devour the entire universe. The world, the unending cycle of creation, provides the fuel and we burn it to ashes. In the last split seconds of individuality, I ask her to look back on the blazed path we have left behind. Just when Radha is about to turn back the loci of individuality has ceased. Now there is no Radha nor me, nor Krishna nor she. Nor Surya nor thee. We have transcended. For memory’s sake we see a million Radha and me surging towards us the way we were surging towards the universal spirit.

Existence never meant what it did now.

We have taken the final flight home, abode the golden chariot of fire.

Orison
What will be, will be!
Whatever is left after that… are you and me!

Wanderer and the accusation of faking reality!

2010-03-27T02:22:00.003+05:30

Days rolled on since my return to Delhi. The New Year ’s Eve celebrated in a quieter fashion with my closest friends. No dramatic night out, no living off the brew, no obnoxious headache the next morning. Just two Tequila shots to farewell the year that has been a life changing one for me. I just took one long and deep look back into the days of 2009 and gazed on to it with a heavy heart and moved on leaving a little piece of myself safe in the blanket of the year gone by.

Whatever lies ahead, only seems to me, at best, like a repetition of the all the years gone by. My best friend, on our way back to our homes in the car, tells me that the year ahead is going to be an amazing year for our group; he tells me that the year will be the year of material success and one that will build our base or launching pad for our true pursuits of the heart. We seldom question or doubt each other’s vision or clairvoyance. We have grown together into this set of cognitive blokes. We see things as they ought to happen and they happen. The entry into the New Year was really great. It was about 10:15 a.m. and my mom woke me up from sleep. She wished me New Year again and told me that there was a courier at the door for me. Still half asleep, I walk to the door and collect the mail and head back to my room. On opening the envelope I am delighted to see a draft of fifty thousand rupees from LIC. What an amazing start man. I quickly call up Kshitij and tell him that his vision has already started to unfold. We decide that we will meet up later in the day. I make stray phone calls to my dear ones and wish them greetings for the new born year.

Then days rolled on further, and Radha started to make heightened appearances in my life. Often at the rear glass window of cars, or at my colony walls where some crazy person had painted the word Radhey Radhey in Hindi in black paint, or when my cab stopped each day at a red light adjacent to Radha Apartments in Dwarka. All these and still more are difficult to articulate. These flashes keep happening; they increase in frequency as days go by.

In one of my dreamscape sleeps, I hand over the Radha fragrance incense sticks pack to Radha herself. She makes sum fuss about it, like a juvenile, but eventually accepts it. Don’t know if she lit it up or threw the sticks towards the dark end of the universe. But I felt light, after handing it over to her. My job was done. There are pattern layered, yet randomized visits by Radha in my vast dreams. We talk often for hours, I share my exult of finding the Radha flower, of drinking its nectar, of the amazing journey that I am having. Days roll into nights and nights roll back into days, like a roll of unending papyrus. The cryptic messages of eternal love keep on playing hide and seek. I spend nights and days just thinking and probing deeper into it, into the Radha the glorious. Soaking in all the knowledge like a monster sponge. I start to retire within myself, getting lost into the endless thought barrel, unraveling layer by layer of this jing-bang called love, called Radha, call it whatever you want. The sounds of the outside world have started to lull; the means of the world outside drain and tire me, this pursuit is drawing out all that I got, the voracious hunger for knowledge, the knowledge of Radha and cynical balance of the universe.

In my sporadic, yet extended, dialogue with the keeper of the flower, the Radha herself, I indulge in tragedy of the world, I keep ranting my heart out, like a volcano that is spewing thick bubbling lava out of its vermouth. There is no end to this maze of interaction or where it might lead. The gates of truth have been kept at close cordon by the glorious flower girl. Beyond some point in the journey into Radhanation – I get accused of faking. Of faking all this up, of faking the self, of faking the concept proof of universe, of faking a feeling called love. Creation brushed aside as a fake. Ignored like a counterfeit. Now I felt how God feels when all the great sages leave the world, which was co-created to decipher the splendor of the beyond, in pursuit of moksha. How God feels ignored by the very person who needs to understand him the most. Brushed aside as fake! Damnnnnnnnnnnnnn!

I felt truly disgusted at hearing this. There was true disappointment. After all this upsurge, is this what one needs to be told? Really? Well, before I could lose my fulcrum and give away from love, the Wanderer took command.

He blanked Radha out, for a few moments, just like that. Woosh! She was nowhere, as if she never was. He looked into my eyes, reminded me of the promise of knowledge.

He told me, “Bala, listen. There is very little that I need to tell you. So whatever it is going to be is really going to be supernal stuff. No stratospherically entwined mediocrity. You are done with the Alpha, Beta and Gamma, now is the time for Phi, Chi, Psi and Omega for you. Yes boy, eventually, it is Omega for you. The eventuality is just round the bend. So hold your breath, for you will need it no more.

Remember, the flower only holds the fragrance and the nectar for a series of moments. Beyond that the universe takes it back, Be it the Radha or the Parijathak. It all goes back to the source, and in that source there is no Radha or Parijathak. There is no fragrance, no truth. No light. No dark. No you, no me, no her, no nothings. No awesomeness, no pain, no gain, no love, no trove, no reason, no season… et al.

So pardon the world, the way we are pardoned. The harshness is only a myth and a perception. There is no true hurt. No disappointments. No heart breaks. No valium to sleep, no pain to weep, no dirt to sweep, no sow to reap, no trust to keep, no essence to seep.

I am you, the Wanderer. I am all that is. Yet you seek that lays beyond. Beyond the pale blue dot. Remember the friend of mine you met at the café and what he told you. There is naught beyond what you are. That naught is the absolution. No quest can deliver, no pursuit that can quench, no freebie in this commotion, no far no near, no love no hate, no trap no gate, no magic no fate, no upsurge no abate, no train that freights no real mate. Just you and me, me and you.

So forget all that this world offers, but taketh what it giveth. And let it giveth only that you wish to taketh. For thou art the supreme, the mesmerizing Krishna, the ever evading horizon, your Radha, your true “adha” is within you, no one can steal that what you truly are, part Radha and Krishna, not even Radha the glorious can deny what is set out to be yours. So let not the fickleness of the world inhibit you. That’s not what you are designed to be. I am what you are to be. In absolute communion with Radha, the ever enchanting. So while there is still breath in your lungs, let you be an absolute slave to this carnival of love, to the bamboozling smile and her fiery eyes. Sing a song, sing along, try the beat, there is truly nothing to move on, go on, and remember you have been born.

Let the magic unfold before your eyes, for it is my personal and sacrosanct promise that your Radha is all yours, and after traveling a million seas, she will head forth back to thee, to me, to the man who loves her without a fee, like the roots of a tree, like the roar of the sea, like the knock of the knee, like you are today one day she will be. Remember the poem once you wrote about all this and me… I quote you Bala here.

“A day will come and you will see that I will turn into every answer that I once asked of thee”

It is my solemn promise my dear boy, that Radha is all that is to be. And if one day still remain in this universe, remember the song by Jon Bon Jovi… Always, forever and a day, she will be… she will be.”

Hearing this, I hooked up to the universal signal and caught the last train to the coast and believed that she was waiting there for me.

Wanderer and the touchdown in Delhi

2010-03-21T19:13:00.005+05:30

Standing in the queue to collect my boarding pass, I look at the watch and it is 7:50 p.m. and my flight departs at 8:30 p.m. I was running slightly late. On reaching the boarding pass counter, I am told that unlike the Delhi airport, I need to get my baggage scanned at a different counter separately before I can collect the boarding pass. Darn. That puts a belter on me. I am already struggling for time.

Nonetheless, I run back to the end of the conveyer belt and place my huge backpack on it. Waiting for it to reach the electronic scanner, I was getting restless by the moment. The day being, 25 December—for most people it is Christmas day and for me it is my dad’s birthday. I was hoping that with my flight scheduled to land in Delhi at 10:50 p.m. I should be home in time to at least wish him happy birthday before the day turns over. I was hoping on the flight not to get delayed and Suchit, my dear Michael Schumacher, driving me home at super-sonic speeds like always. My baggage went through the scanner and the security pulled it aside and asked me to take out the battery operated device that has been identified in the scanner. I knew I had no battery operated device in my back pack, the only three powered devices on me were my mobile phone, by watch, and my camera—none of them were in the back pack. So I told them that there is no stuff inside that is battery operated. They repeated a few times politely, but I was getting cranky… I was too eager to get on to the flight and reach home in time to wish my dad and was not at all at my cooperative best with the airport security. So within seconds, a few commandos of the Central Industrial Security Force (CISF) were pointing their assault rifles at me. I looked at them in weird wonderment; and then without a hint of heroism I grabbed the back pack, unzipped it and got most of my stuff out. All through the pull out and unraveling of the “stuff” that was largely dirty laundry and fragrant incense stick packs; I noticed a small packet gift wrapped in red gift paper with little white stars. Then it hit me, one of my cousin sisters had given me some gift and I had asked her before packing my stuff to put in the backpack. I ripped open the packet and it had a table clock ticking its way to glory. Both I and the airport security guards were relieved that it was only table clock and not a C4-based detonator device. They took the battery away and I was left on my own to pack in the stuff back. I did that at manic pace and rushed to the counter to collect my boarding pass. Somehow I managed to catch the bus that taxied me to the flight.

The flight took off; the jet propulsion burst was again well enjoyed by me. I was eager to get back to Delhi, see my best friends, somehow manage to reach home before 12:00 a.m. to wish dad. At the same time, I was already missing Pondicherry. I have found some anchor in that sea-side town. I am anchor-less now, and without an anchor I know not what to do. “What now?” is the single most important and overarching question within me. I am flowing no more, I am just oozing. Without direction, hence into all directions at once; like a scent of a flower. The Wanderer had made me appreciate this state. He had ensured that I see right through this into the larger realm of knowing oneself. The journey within, although has just begun for me, has made me realize the vastness and purity that waits. Over the next two hours, I try to put in perspective the bamboozling experiences and events that have come to be in my trip. The Wanderer coming face to face with me and making himself clear, Radha’s overbearing and overpowering presence, the mystic and invigorating sea, the dhwani of my heart, and very fact that all this has started to happen with me all over again. I am now extremely comfortable with the way things are evolving; there is nothing that I can complain about, nothing for which I feel any rage when I look into the sky, the sense of loss has been purged into a sense of peace, the void though is hugely unavoidable. Nevertheless, when one has love at one’s core, nothing can terribly go wrong. The thought stays on with me, perhaps forever.

The flight captain’s voice booms through the aircraft, “Sir, we will be landing in Delhi airport in the next twenty minutes.” People slowly break out of their short nap, and start their hissing conversations with their co-passengers.

Soon the flight landed in Delhi and I called up Kshitij and Suchit, my best friends who were to come and pick me up. They were already waiting at the arrival area. I walk out of the airport in eager anticipation to meet my buddies after a week away. The temperature outside was freaking cold. The week spent in tropical climate had made me extremely uncomfortable in the cold. Moving out of the comfort of the airport was unsettling. The two musketeers were waiting for the third.

The moment I reached were they were standing, they started the dramatic welcome ritual… shouting “welcome bhai” in made up Uttar Pradesh accent, and with a huge marigold flower garland—all this in front of the entire crowd... such Hamm!

It was freaky fun though. So typical of us!

Despite the indented embarrassment, it feels great to come home to people who love you so crazily.

Instead of Suchit driving me home, these guys had hired a cab and first Suchit was dropped, then I was, and then Kshitij. I reach home and dad and mom were both waiting for me. I give dad a hug and wish him happy birthday. His eyes are moist; he is an extremely emotional man. I see in his eyes an acknowledgement that he has gotten old now. At sixty six, he is still a man of good activity and vigor. Touch wood! Silently, through my eyes, I promise him that I will stand by him.

I retire into my room. I didn’t sleep that night at all. It was just too much to absorb. So much awesomeness!

Wanderer and the dance of zero gravity

2010-03-13T23:10:00.007+05:30

I somehow managed to move away from that spot. It felt as if someone was pulling me away by my hand and I kept staring at Radha. Like a child mesmerized in front of a Candy store and his mother dragging him to move. But here there was no one. Still I felt as I never wanted to move away from that spot. I wanted to stay put all day long and through the never ending night of the universe.

Then there was the snap, I think I heard the sound too. Something snapped in the overall schema of the cosmos. I felt as if the umbilical cord connecting me to the mother ship snapped. I suddenly felt as I was a free flowing thought form, disassociated from all the manifestation, all material forms, all sense of perceptions, all articulation of form and matter, all needs and requirements, all limitations of vision and senses, there were no boundaries or shapes, it felt like zero gravity, like a lazy and sleepy revolving dance in zero gravity. I started feeling vibrations where I once saw forms such as people, trees, water, air or stone. All around and within were just vastness and oneness.

There were moments in my life earlier where I felt this, however, only in frames or moments of magic. This time, in the now, it was all there was to be. I surfaced on the ocean of everlastingness and all there was to be was light – endless and unbridled.

I will be honest at that very moment I felt contented and honestly didn’t knew exactly what the pronoun “I” meant or rather should I say that I knew what in true sense it was meant to be.

I placed by camera back in its pouch, placed the two Radha flowers on the scooter’s carry tray, took one more look at the plant where Radha grew and started riding towards the Chunambar backwaters resort.

The entry to the backwater complex was only about five hundred meters from where I found my Radha. The complex is a government run tourism initiative. I ask around for what the place has to offer a tourist and I am told that from the complex, a ferry takes people through the backwaters to an almost virgin beach – hence is a ferry through what is expected to be beautiful and scenic backwaters and then finally to a quite sand beach. I purchased the to-and-fro ticket for the ferry and wait until enough people arrive for the ferry ride to start. I waited for about twenty minutes by the wooden jetty of sorts. Around me, as I sat down and started to write, was a sweet and happy family of dogs. A new liter, about three weeks old, pampered by their mother. I always connect with dogs, a constant that has remained in my life. My love for canines. I look at those little pups and I am at once reminded of Stooky – the first dog I had as my companion. It was in the winter of 1996, on February 18, that we got home this mischievous mix-breed pup and I named him Stooky. From day one we connected, we both out did each other in levels of mischief and mayhem at home. Mom had enough on her hands managing us both and then as a family we decided to get one more pup, just two weeks after getting Stooky home. It was March 2 and we had gone to the Vet to get Stooky vaccinated and we saw a beautiful little fur ball. A month-old German Spitz and we took her home. We named her Jerry – funny name for a bitch. Well within two weeks we had two members added to our family. From that day onwards my life turned around. Being a single child I was always on my own, always doing my own things, always felt lonely at time and hence have always reached out to people more openly in my attempt to connect. Hence friends have always been more than friends in my life; they have always been an extended family to me. But with these additions I became more reliant. I became more responsible as an individual – that too at an early age. When you nurture something, you get connected with the purest part of yourself. Nurturing these pups and watch them grow – felt like a big brother watching over his siblings. I miss both Stooky and Jerry now. Both have passed away. Now we have another German Spitz – named “Jerry” again. In my head one of my yesteryear’s favorite song plays on—“The Animal Song” by Savage Garden.

Then suddenly a whistle blows, it is the boatman signaling that the ferry is ready to go. All the people who have purchased the ticked boarded the ferry one by one. The boatman pulled the string attached to the motor at the back of the ferry and the engine gargles into action and slowly we start our little journey through the backwaters. I wish I was the boatman—I know how to operate a motorized ferry and have been trained on it back in the days in one of my visits to Rameshwaram.

Soon the beauty of the backwaters steal away my thoughts. It was like how Kerala would have been at this time of the year. Calm and huge backwaters with dense tropical forests on both side, with the water reflecting like a mirror the glare of the sun and the dark green color of the forest on both sides and a black outline of the canopies. The backwaters, while looking through the ferry looked like an inverted world, a mirror image of the world around. Strange images form and then deform by the foamy water around the ferry. Every once in a while I see Radha’s face in those waters. In the depths, as if reflecting the world and emanating her depth to the world. Then suddenly her face will be no more, it will be then the face of the night scorpion. Radha, the unadulterated manifest form and night scorpion the mystic off-shoot that is both within and without Radha. A kind of super form, superimposition, yet only a shell and a transient one at that.

Glorious! Glorious!

I spot a few sea gulls flying a few meters above the water level, a Kingfisher—the majestic bird of the water lands, a pair of beautiful skylarks. Skylarks in this part of the world means that this is the onset of the migratory season, the Skylarks migrate from colder reaches of European water belts to the warmer locales and enroute grace the India Ocean and Bay of Bengal. I see myself as flying at greater heights, watching over the sentinel system, I see myself as the bird of Jove, a golden eagle. Above my eagle flight is a far mightier and stronger bird prowling the skies, it is my Wanderer—a Garuda. Watching over the world and spreading his wings to mediate dark and light. Above the Garuda I see the night scorpion raising her karmic sting, ready and mounted with her delirious poison. Above the night scorpion, I see Radha shining like a Solar storm and when the light from Radha reaches the Golden eagle it shines like the brightest bird in the sky blinding all else. Then I look down again into the waters and these layers of realities, one on top of another, seem inverted, with me the Golden eagle at the top and in that order, the Garuda below him, the night scorpion and then Radha.

Magic of inversion!

Such images, thoughts and realities criss-cross my mind. I am mesmerized by all the beauty around. It feels good. I am happy.

In the ferry alongside me is a family of five—I am sure of them to be Aggarwals or Guptas. Then in front of me a middle-aged Tamil couple looking into the glaze of backwaters trying to find the romance lost to their years of marriage. Further to the nose of the ferry are seated three people. Someone of fatherly age and a very-young, just-married couple. I am intrigued somehow by them, don’t know why. I keep my gaze at them focusing my lancing intuition to draw out the truth behind their eyes. I slowly get a sense of what they are like, but my mind takes time to piece together the strings of feelings and built a coherent reality of their lives. The ride to the beach was fairly long, unlike most ferry rides at tourist destination. It took a good twenty minutes or so. The backwaters, unlike the sea, have a supremely calming effects on most people and it had no different effect on me. It calmed me further, well almost to sleep. It is like losing yourself in the long tresses of your lover.

As the ferry neared the beach, the sound of the waves started merging with the calm of the backwaters and there was a slow introduction to the babe of Bengal. We arrive at the beach spot and disembark from the ferry. Walking towards the beach line, I realize this is an almost untouched beach. Far disconnected from civilization, possibly this could be a place just in the vortex of my strange mind. Was this real? It felt as if the beach was a junk yard of lost souls, souls who have forgotten what they were ought to do, or souls who have outdone their spirit, a kind of exile beach where your soul gets trapped for all eternity in the same state as it arrived here. A null and a void—a coordinate that did not exist in the cordon of time and space. A beach for immortals when they have outlived life itself, for the retrograde consciousness, for the ant that has realized that it is GOD, for the truth that knows that all this does not exist. All this could be a random aberration or a trick played by the mind. But whose mind? Does Pondicherry exist? Do I exist? Is Radha real? Or is it just another of those fervent attempt by the system to keep a rebel mind under check? Is poetry the only medicine? Is poetry the most feared of weapons by the keepers of this landscape? What if it came to our knowledge that all our collective memories were a farce, all our lives and its individual histories just a scripted sitcom, all our loves nothing but a journey to our inner self, all our hates and dislikes just our inability to cope with our own selves? What if I told you gravity does not exist?

I stroll alone on the beach line, the only people around are the eleven people who were ferried here. They all pick their respective spots near the beach. I stroll. I know what this place is meant to do. I can smell and taste its purpose.

I spot a small grey shell crab on the beach and click a photograph—my god is he fast moving or what? Took me three shots to get him in the frame right. Cancer—the crab. Strolling along the coastline, alone, with the foam of the sea flushing my floaters, I get a distant sense of how Khalil Gibran would have felt in his heart when he wrote “The Prophet”. I get a sense that he too is acknowledging my presence in his solitary beach. I get this strong sense that he is smiling at me from there, and half expecting me to smile back. I do.

I am just a grain of sand,
Blow me away to distant lands,
I am just a trick of the hand,
It’s your music played by my band,
I am just a nubby drop,
Plant me in your heart and I shall crop.

After a good hour or so, I look back at the people who were my ferry companions. I see the family of three, the old man and the young married couple and in one shot I get the truth of their life—without any exchange or words, just like that, through God’s own merit in me. This is the story of their lives in a nutshell:
“The old man has accompanied his married son and his wife on this trip. He sorely misses his wife, who has passed away to an ailment. He feels deeply uncomfortable carrying on his life without his wife, his partner through thick and thin. Yet, he concedes to life each day and tries his best to be around for his son and daughter-in-law. But he is deeply uprooted from life. He feels that his presence is an intrusion in his son’s life. The daughter-in-law does her part to talk to the old man on the beach and make him feel as much part of the deal as he is. But something is amiss. The old man is waiting for his end and is praying to God that he takes care of his son’s life when he won’t be around. This place does this to these people. They unashamedly feel what they are feeling.”

I walk within striking distance of the old chap and look into his eyes. I convey, without words or action, that I understand what it is all about. His eyes respond in a humble gesture of thanks to me and reassurance to himself. Eyes speak in languages yet not heard by man. Such potency!

From the background we hear the familiar grunt of the engine; it is the ferry bringing in more tourists. I decide to head back to Auroville and so take the ferry back to the Chunambar complex. From there on I pick up my scooter and ride back on the Pondicherry road. The Radha flower on the scooter’s tray has bloomed further. Deep indigo-blue shade and a sublime fragrance. I stop at the Le Café and order a few Radhas and gulp them down like routine shit. Like a drunkard on a bar stool. Repeat! Repeat! Repeat!

By now the waiters at Le Café have started to recognize me and have started giving me the welcome smile whenever I drop in and ask me “So Saaar, should I get you a Radha Juice?”

Yes baby, yes. Get me Radha. Get me all your Radha. I am holding my ground and making my claim. Get me my Radha, my stake. Bring her on in any form or matter that one might seek & find and I will be her true keeper. In this dance of zero gravity, where up is down, all left is right, I will fall above into Krishna and through whatever gods who keep this source code hidden, I fall into all of them consuming all gods and emerging from them as me, I consume all powers and cardinals, I devour myths and tranquilize inhibitions, I lunge and plunge into the core of Radha. Into the inferno of manifest, into the source of this light, breaking her rib cage of fears and preconceptions, straight into heart. Unwelcomed and uncalled. I barge in, ground my spear, let go of my shield in the battlefield of the universal heart. I plant my ticking bomb inside her myriad forming heart and sit and wait for the thunderous explosion. Into that where there is a dungeon of musical keeps and a lonely melody weeps. ‘I’ the true shape shifter attain the unattainable and thus make this very statement absurd.

The number of Radhas consumed go up to insane levels, and then in about a couple of hours, the waiter announces—“Sorry Saar, we have run out of today’s stock of Radha juice. Saar! You drank 23 glasses of Radha.”

Then it freaking hit me that I am about to burst out into the ocean. I could hardly move, so freaking full of Radha. After another hour or so of sea gazing and I decide to head back to my cottage in Auroville and enjoy a much missed afternoon siesta. I ride back on my scooter almost half asleep. Reach my cottage, and fall into the bed and doze off.

When I woke up the sun was still shining brightly through the window. It felt as if I had a slept for a long time. I looked at my watch, it was 3:30 p.m. The early start to the day was really a magic. Here I was after all the adventure and an afternoon siesta and it was still not even four in the afternoon. I felt vague pangs of hunger and a tremendous urge to write down the notes for day. I washed my face, picked by tote bag, my camera and the scooter keys and off I went. I rode towards Auroville and on reaching there, the first thing I did was I picked up the Radha flowers from the scooter’s carry tray and ran to Neeraja’s kiosk and showed them flowers to her. She gave me a big smile and said, “So you found it.”

Boy was I exulted to hear that. I knew all along that this was the Radha flower, but Neeraja’s validation meant that God was on my side. It might seem like an absurd pursuit, and trust me it is. Like all absurd pursuits, it was powered by love and lunacy and a child-like hope. Well I made it. Yuppieee!

After that I clicked a few photographs in Auroville and of the tourists and ate a vegan salad at the Canteen. Post that I wanted to sit and write, so I headed to Kofi Bar. On entering the Kofi Bar I at once felt at ease, just like home. The sofa and seating was much like home. I parked myself and started to write. In rushed strokes of the hand, the words started to tumble out and I galloped through pages of my diary, filling it with the words that captured the progression of the days here in Pondicherry. Usually, when I am well and truly into my writing I seem like an eccentric nerd, as if concocting a grand plan to swallow the world. There is a rushing urge and a stormy flamboyance. I ordered a honey oat cookie and hibiscus tea and plunged into my writing. Writing about Radha, celebrating the saga, and how it all made sense to me.

The Kofi bar, as I mentioned earlier, is a hang out joint for the perma-vacationers and hippies. So people who come here are mostly regulars, who meet each other everyday. Much like the Central Perk from FRIENDS. The food preparation and sharing model is also innovative and not something I have ever heard of before. These perma-vacationers, from all parts of the world, often come into the Kofi Bar along with ingredient for a dish or two; prepare it for a sizeable number of people, then eat their share also get to eat dishes prepared by other such vacationers from the group. So they prepare something for everybody and then they also partake what others might have prepared—kind of a global kitchen. For tourists like me, all dishes are paid. Nonetheless, I simply love the variety and the hippie overtone of this place. So many languages being spoken over the common sitting area. I was pleasantly surprised to hear a lot of people speaking German. My German is poor, albeit I am able to decipher simple conversation and speak simple sentences. It gives me a far greater acceptability among these foreign nationals. I share the Sofa with a set of German twins, guys of around 25 years of age, vacationing in India for the last four months. We exchange pleasantries and they ask me what I am writing. I tell them some outline of the narrative, about the quest for Radha flower and the adventures I have been having in my life and in specific around my days in Pondi. They seem impressed. It always is great to find someone who appreciates one’s writing—that is the ultimate kick of being a writer.

After about half an hour, I tall and beautiful looking foreign woman walks into the Kofi Bar. I notice her and then I am back to my writing. The next thing I know is that she is sitting on the couch adjacent to the one where I am sitting and she is fiddling with a chess board, setting it up for a game. She then prods me and asks me if I would be interested in a game of Chess. I was not too sure if I wanted to indulge in Chess; however, I then thought—what the heck Bala? Just play, you are on vacation?

She said, “Hello, I am Maali. What is your name and where are you from?” I responded by telling her my name and my country and place of origin. Then I ask her where was she from. She was from Israel.

Then she asked, “So what is the bet?”

Just then a voice interrupted, it was Raj the co-owner of the Kofi Bar, an educated Indian chap of about 27 years, “Sir, beware. She is the ghetto champion in Chess. No one plays with her anymore here, at least not the usual gang, she beats everyone.”

Naturally I was hesitant, but then she was persistent. She threw an open bet, “If you win, you ask for anything of me. If I win, I take whatever you are writing.”

Hearing this, the Kofi bar crowd roared. An open bet from such a stunning lady. While my writings, that too the ones without any back-ups are extremely dear to me and it should have made my further not indulge in the betting jamboree, it did the exact opposite. I felt an urge to take on the challenge in order to taste the feeling of defending what is rightfully yours even in alien territory against the best in the business.

I took on the challenge and we had a game on.

Maali made well crafted moves and I could tell with the precision and the confidence that they were technically coordinated ones, a set up of fall traps. My chess play on the other hand is unlike that of a strategy game. I play chess like a battle. My game play is aggressive, relentless, and full of foolish frontal attacks. My idea of Chess is that there should be carnage across the enemy lines, the enemy should bleed and feel the roaring power of your attacks and should fear placing their players when you have opened the firing line. So what if you lose some of your key players in trying to do so. If you are in battle, be prepared to die, but more than that be prepared to kill. It is an attitude that holds water in all my situations of life. It is not a violent display or an aggressive bent of mind, but more a reflection of how I yearn to see life in black or white. In chess there are no gray areas. White you win, black you lose, or vice-versa.

Well here my precious writings were on line. I had to win the game. I ceased to see losing as an option; it stopped existing, like it never did. She was perhaps the best in the ghetto, but I was invincible. It was unfair, I placed the Wanderer at the thinking level, like a governing body, and I jumped as if literally into the Chess board. I was the king, marshalling my army, mounting attacks, dissecting enemy coups, and ready to bleed but not to lose. Maali made well thought out moves after spending minutes over each move, and after each of her moves I would move my pawns only basis by instinct in flash of a second. So the moment she started to build an attack, hoping in her head that I will run for cover and give her space to accentuate the attack; I would kill her first player in my firing range. This worked wonderfully well for me. Her orchestrated build ups started losing relevance and I was eating into her army at rapid pace, while still losing some of my own. A good half an hour into the game, I had invaded into her inner lines and her King was in jeopardy, and within the next three moves it was check mate—I won!

She was aghast at this. She kept nodding her head in disbelief. Then she was a true lady and congratulated me on the win and we clicked a snap. She asked me what was to be her side of the bargain as part of the open ended bet. I said, free lunch. Somehow those around me gave me looks of disbelief, as if I should have asked to get laid or something. But free food scores over all that jazz you know.

While the free lunch got ordered and it started coming through. Maali made another bet, free dinner or your writing. I was game. This time just for kicks. You lose once to me, I will beat you to pulp anytime. Unlike the first game, I was not on instinctive reactive offence mode. This time, I went for the kill from word go, brought out my Queen within the first four moves, then getting the Bishop into action by the fifth and the mighty Rook by the twelfth move. The horses also joined the party and the whole board was a mess. I had parked my heavy weights at absurd places, making it difficult for Maali to make any sensible move. I choked her game play like a python and was wolfing down her players almost at every alternate move without losing much of my own wards. The victory was not far, it was glorious and full of fire breathing moves. She finally conceded her champ status of the ghetto to me. She had worked for nearly four months to get this title of sorts and in one day I swallowed it. I kind of felt weird for her. But such are the fragilities of pride.

With the winning of the second game, my free dinner was assured. I need not pay for anything I eat from that moment onwards until night. I decided to only move out of Kofi Bar after dinner.

I get back to writing and the evening moves on, more people come and go, Some just eat a snack and make their move, while some stay put for hours like me. Here no one asks you to get going, even if you are not ordering. This is an awesome place. I see posters of hippie culture groups, dream interpreting sessions, yoga and mystical initiation flyers, kundalini information pieces—all these and more pasted on the walls.

I strike amazingly deep conversation with so many foreign nationals, we talk about life, love, philosophy, writing, art, literature, life after death, death while living, sex, hope, religion, mythology, human behavior, nature, success and failure and a hell lot that I can’t coherently remember. I was on a high. I never needed alcohol or any other intoxicant to get high. I go bonkers even while sitting on a chair by myself.

Then as the night slowly stepped in, the Kofi bar started filling in by musicians, artists, painters etc. I saw a group of Europeans with musical instruments walking in—one with a guitar, another with what seemed from the cover like a mandolin, then one with a round African percussion two-piece drum set. Soon the night eased out these people and they started to play initially their favorite songs, then taking in requests and within an hour it was all of us sitting in the joint playing and singing like one composite band. First I requested them to play, American Pie by Don Mclean—we all sang the song… “By by miss American Pie, I drove my chevvy to the levvy but the levvy was dry, then good old boys were drinking whisky and rum, singing this will be the day that I die”.

Then I requested them specially if they could improvise a tune on the song I made up during my Delhi-Chennai flight—“Sonic Boom”.

With a few iterations, we agreed on a reasonable version and I was asked to front the song, and I went on:

"Boom, Sonic Boom, Boom Sonic,
I am on my own, not on gin n’ tonic,
I blaze the sky, with the look in my eye,
I got no wings, and that’s why I fly,
Boom, Sonic Boom, Boom Sonic,
I tell the velvet eye, to wander the sky,……..”

It always feels good to get your lyrics onto a song. That’s the culmination. That’s when you set a song free. Let it roam the streets of forever and into the hearts of whoever cares to listen and hum. I set the Sonic Boom free.

I feel that I belong here. I am not an outsider. We think alike. In fact all us thought less and felt more. I was in sort of a delirium with the music hitting its crescendo. The dinner came in patches, we all shared each other’s food and it was good fun. In fact, one of the best fun days I have had in some time.

Then the lights were dimmed, it was around 9:00 p.m., and a round of sharing our thoughts with the group started. Unlike a therapy session, were such things happen in a forced and lame manner, this was voluntary and natural. Some spoke about their fears, their loses, their love, their dreams, their plans, some just sang an old song, and then my turn came.

I spoke of Radha, about the flower, about the girl, about everything that this name means to me. I spoke for a good ten minutes I suppose, and there was a deafening silence. I had for the first time shared this Radha saga with people besides my closest friends. I felt a huge weight off me. I was not holding anything back. I wish Radha the girl could have been here, right at this moment, and looked at the world and herself the way I was able to see. She would have been bowled over; heart over head, on the insanely glorious wonderment that I see in her. Once I completed my rhetoric of sorts, some of them came forward and hugged me so tight and some came through and lifted me on their shoulders. I had never been treated this way. This was new and amazing. I was treated like a rock star after a monster performance. There was adulation alright. There was love and there was a respect for what had been shared. Wow! Being lifted by people of different nationalities almost felt like I was a global icon.

After sometime, things slowed down and it was nearly 10:00 p.m. and we parted for the night. I headed back to my cottage and slept the night off.
Next morning, life was still beautiful. It was all there—the secret of happiness. I headed out towards the Kofi Bar for breakfast and was treated like a celebrity in a one-horse town. I thank Kate, the Dutches, who guided me to Chunambar backwaters to find Radha. I ask her if I could find a pack of incense sticks of the Radha flower. She tells me to head for the Sambani Café—whose owner also runs a parallel business of exporting incense sticks and fragrances. The Sambani Café was to be found in the by-lanes by the East Coast Road, just a few hundred meters before the Auroville beach. Honestly I was not too hopeful of finding Radha incense sticks, as I had already had spoken to Neeraja about it and she categorically mentioned that it is not used for incense sticks due to its undertone fragrance. Also, I had tried almost every incense stick store in the town and miserably failed in finding what I was looking for. But I was not disappointed, as I had found the flower itself.

So Sambani Café was just a try. I walked into the closed doors and asked for the owner. He was a fat middle-aged man, very dark skin with blisters on his forehead. He seemed like a nice chap and entertained me with my questions. I told him that Kate from the Kofi Bar had asked me to meet him and I was looking for a pack of Radha flower incense sticks. He nodded his head and asked me to wait, and went inside his home—an old world but beautifully done up brick house with a beautifully manicured garden. The wait was short; he came out with a purple pack in his hand. My soul almost jumped with excitement.

I pulled the pack from his hand and to my utter dismay and confusion it read “Lavender”. I was not looking for Lavender; it was Radha that I was seeking. No, no, no. If I had wanted Lavender, I could have purchased it straight on day one from Neeraja’s kiosk.

Then he told me that since Lavender is a hugely popular fragrance and is in much demand both within Pondicherry and in export markets, they try make as many packs as possible. However, since Lavender is not a very widely grown aromatic plant around Pondicherry, they adulterate the costly Lavender essence with bulk of Radha flower pulp. Being a lower toned, fragrance, Radha does not interfere with the much stronger and higher spectrum Lavender fragrance. At the same time the mild fragrance of the Radha flower provides the much needed girth to keep the diluted incense some body and smoky texture. Wow! I have never felt so happy and thrilled at someone carrying out adulteration.
I purchase six packs of Radha fragrance, and I head on to the beach where I spend the next couple of hours just gazing at the sea. Just admiring the goddess. My trip to Pondi has surprised me and filled me in whatever that was needed. I thank the Wanderer, and I see him at me. I head back to my cottage, look at the six packs of incense sticks and decide that one pack goes to the land lady of the cottage, one pack goes to Kate, one pack goes to Neeraja, one pack goes to the musician group that put my Sonic Boom song to tune, one pack goes to the Le Café counter from where it all started, and the one remaining goes to Radha herself.

The last two days in Pondicherry are spent enjoying the moment, eating amazing organic food, drinking amazing Radha gulps and herbal teas, meeting up with the friends I made in Kofi bar, seeing around town, taking photographs, visiting museums, lighthouses, etc.

Then one fine day I take the morning bus to Chennai. I spend two days in Chennai visiting my cousins, elders, extended family. They all are more than happy to see me. I had not connected with them for so many years and always thought that they will not able to relate to me. But then I was so pleasantly surprised by the love and warmth that I received that I vowed to come back to them as frequently as I can. Then there is always the pull of the Pondicherry to draw me to Chennai. After hectic two days of relative mingling, I enter the Chennai airport with my backpack hoping for a pleasant flight home.

What days were these? It is even hard to believe it myself. Will people, at least the ones close to me understand this? In the line for the boarding pass, I keep thinking these things.

Wanderer and the sight of my glorious Radha!

2010-03-07T23:29:00.006+05:30

I woke up bright and fresh to the morning chirping of birds. For the first time in my trip, I had woken up in the middle of a jungle, in a cottage of course. On an earlier day I had woken up on the rocky beach, then in a hotel room. Waking up to a jungle morning is altogether different. The birds create a symphony of serenity in the morning, the trees go whisha-whisha, the cattle grazing around moo or bleat, the sound of the water in the nearby canals sounds more like a water fall, and there is a pleasant breeze that fills the air with morning smell of the soil that has been vetted by the overnight dew. There is an innocent and eager childhood in each morning—a sense of the pure and clean that we felt in our childhood. Trust me, if you happen to wake up to a jungle, stand upright, close your eyes, tilt your neck backwards, spread your arms; you will feel like a four year old.

I looked at my watch; it was 4:40 a.m.

Early to rise,
Makes me wise,
The morning emerges from tired nights,
No hint of sleep in my eyes,
The birds chirp, and the rivulet sighs,
My loving angel, a seed of rye,
I am abode the Chariot of fire,
I hold her hand; pull her by my side,
We look into each other’s fiery eyes,
Off we go, into the skies.

Early morning poetry. I like that. Like I really like all that.

I was ready to greet the day by sharp 5:10 a.m.
I walk down from my cottage floor, open the gate and drive off in my scooter. I knew Kate, the Dutches from Kofi Bar, told me to go look for Radha in afternoon to catch the late bloomers.

I am not looking at tier two or whatever. I need to find her, find the early blooms, in the morning music of the birds. I ride towards Pondicherry town from where onwards the Chunnamar backwaters and beach is about another fifteen kilometers. I ride straight and I ride fast, pushing the engine to its prime, revving up the RPM and maximizing the torque. I feel like I am riding a sheet of wind rather than the tarmac. I reach Pondi in about ten minutes flat. I decide to ride through the beach promenade and take a sip of Radha juice if Le Café was already open. I was really hoping it would be.

What do we know, it was. I parked the scooter besides the old light house and walk to Le Café. Radha juice early in the morning by the sea side would be awesome. Let me put the picture the way I saw it. It is like sitting with the girl of your dream, your soul mate, your completion, the opener of your sprit’s bottle; looking through her and seeing how the world looks through her; then sip by sip drinking her and realizing that it is impossible now to distinguish between who you are and who Radha is. There is no definitive boundary between where Radha juice ends and where you begin. It is now one composite truth, indistinguishable, like it never existed in separate forms, like an alloy.

Taking a few steps around Le Café to reach the seating area, I spot the Wanderer gazing into the sea. He is lost, open and extremely vulnerable. I seat myself at the next table and hail in the solitary waiter and order Radha Juice and a fruit salad.

My order arrives, I relish the Radha juice and it fills me in with certainty. The Wanderer is unmoved, steadfast gazing into the sea. We don’t exchange words; however, I know that we both acknowledge each other’s presence. But this was more of a personal time for both.

The sea goddess is ecstatic, beautiful as ever. I see the sea change color and viscosity and turn into an endless sea of Radha juice. This juice has strange and beautiful effects. I pay the bill and ask for directions to the Chunnambar area and I am asked to take the winding road by the promenade until it turns right and I hit the first traffic signal from where I need to take a left and into the highway that will lead towards Cuddalore.

I ride on at tearing pace. The buses on the highway shudder past me at inglorious speeds. Against the wind speed and the velocity at which I was riding the Kinetic Honda, it was a test of my sense of balance. But I knew I cannot be harmed. I am being protected and propelled by a force that is way too higher and pure to be messed around with. I feel the touch of god in every breath, as if it is God itself is breathing out of me. As if I am only a shell and I am taken and consumed by the celestial unison.

A good fifteen minutes into the ride, I see a huge signboard that reads, “Chunambar Backwaters and Beach” and a huge arrow to the left. The weather is still awesome, the sun has only started to emerge out of the horizon and you can still see shades of grey in the sky reminiscing about the night. I take the guided left turn and enter a dusty path. The dust and the potholes slow me down. The breath of God is all too susceptible to dust allergies. I slowly wade through the bumpy ride and kick up a small dust storm of sorts.

Slowly the concrete of the highway gives way to sparse lining of trees on either side, while the dusty road blends into a motor-able road. I am back on a breathable track. The tree lining on the sides starts getting dense, the foliage lush green and I started seeing small pockets of water bodies on both sides. As I moved further, every once in a while I spotted a few peacocks, some with their feathers in dance. Such a sight! It reminds me of days when Krishna loitered around the magical forests with his cattle and played his flute while the peacocks danced to the magical tune. In that perfect moment, Radha slowly walked in, quietly, behind Krishna’s back, trying to keep her visit of this Krishna krida a secret from the flute master himself. While Krishna, the all knowing, keeping with Radha’s games does not make it evident his knowledge of her presence. Thus the two keep the world at balance.

Down the track a good kilometer, I think I saw something. I think I saw what I was looking for. Have I found what I was looking for? It took my hands a few moments before they pulled on the break and the scooter came to a halt. I locked the scooter and ran back a good fifteen-twenty meters. Towards the right hedge grew what seemed like the Radha flower. Was I dreaming? Was this even happening? There it was a flower as constructed in my mind by “Neeraja-the flower doctor”. It grew from the branch elegantly and quietly. I somehow knew this was Radha. My heart swelled with love. Like first love. I always know how first love feels. Some of these feelings can never be taken away from you, once they happen, they remain with you forever. They become part of who you are. That’s how I felt on seeing this indigo-blue flower. I stood there for moments, may be minutes, and may be an hour. I don’t know. From that moment onwards, I stopped keeping track of time. There was no need. I looked around for some assurance that this moment was achieved, to tell me this was real, to tell me that this was mine. There was no one. Not even the Wanderer. There was absolute silence; I could not even hear the usual jungle air or the rustling of the leaves, or the chirping of birds. I could faintly hear my heart beating in an absurd rhythm. The world fused out, obscured, out of focus, silenced, blanked out, blurred, dizzied out… and all those words once can use to describe when everything fades in to the background. There was this awesome looking flower and I felt love.

Unlike how I always feel, like a bolt of lightning, like a dragon’s fire, like thunder, like exploding supernova and all that jazz; this moment was the exact opposite. It was quite. Wow!

No one around during this glorious moment! Not even the freaking Wanderer. Why? Then I knew what I was to know and pick up. This is how one feels when one comes face to face with one’s destiny.

Alone. Perfected. Done.

Like a devotee, I take out my camera, adjust the aperture and white balance, rationalize the ISO and click. The images get captured in the camera, and forever in my heart. I look around the ground to see if at all a Radha flower had fallen from the branch. I see a few and I pick up two. They fit perfectly in my palm. Just like a baby sits perfectly in a mother’s womb. I was wiped clean. My trip was done in spirit with only days to roll for me to sing, celebrate and spread this glory in the world.

Wanderer and the Radha Rake!

2010-03-01T23:00:00.005+05:30

Feeling like a gush of wind, I flowed towards the jungle on my scooter. The Wanderer sitting pillion and was making operatic sounds to mock me. I kept focusing on the greens around. It was a jungle damn it. Tropical trees lined on both sides, the cool sea morning breeze with scent of the Parijathak flower enveloping me from all sides. As a child, I used to hear the story of the Parijathak flower and always had a sense that in some alternate realm of the universe when all people will be flowers I would have to be Parijathak. Little-white-petal flowers with orange miniature stems. The flower that falls off each morning from the trees. A flower that only lives one full night and then submits to the light in the morning and spreads its celestial fragrance.

I keep a look out for a canal from where I was asked to turn right. I was relying on approximation because I was to expect the canal after about three kilometers and the speedometer on the scooter was defunct and to top it there were numerous canals criss-crossing the jungle road.

It was the quest, the pull towards the Radha flower, the humungous magnetic pull that was driving me. I was trying to second guess how the Radha flower might look like. Believing what the waiter at Le Café told me, I imagined it to be blue and petite… much like a blue version of the Parijathak.

While riding the scooter, I imagined a huge garden of divine flowers where all the flowers in the world grew in abundance, layers of flower beds, a Technicolor dream of sorts, the enigmatic fragrance of all these flowers filling the air, flowers of one color, flowers of two colors, flowers with absurd combination of colors, flowers without colors, transparent flowers, talking flowers, mesmerizing flowers, flowers that told you the secrets of the universe, and then a flower that told you the secret of your beating heart – the Radha.

In my vision, I saw the entire garden as an ever expanding sphere of flower beds. Flowers spinning in spherical formation in a spiral trajectory… moving both within and without at the same time… creating an illusion of a throbbing and growing heart. Much like the orchestrated dance of the thousand divine women when I first sipped the celestial Radha drink. I slowly moved through the vast garden in my attempt to reach its centre and see from my eyes the beautiful Radha. Moving past the glorious garden filled with creations’ most precious and beautiful flowers was like risking temptation. Radha was hidden, while the consort of flowers was drawing my senses towards them, as if in a bid to disillusion me from my quest. Make me lose myself in the invigorating mysticism of the billion flowers. Make me forget Radha. While some flowers intoxicated my olfactory sense, some other just absorbed all my visual preceptors, still many flowers enchanted by mind by their occult and clandestine luring, while some of the specially gifted flowers mesmerized my ears by telling them enchanting stories against a backdrop of crystallized music, still others brushed past me drawing unexplainable feelings out of me. Slowly as I moved towards the centre of the sphere, the first time in my journey I did so, and my sense gave way and I fell out of my senses. The glorious, the senseless, the indefinable feeling of not being able to sense. Senseless idiot, the glorious senseless idiot at the brink of purity and the edge of the true universe. Yeah baby yeah! That’s how it felt.

I was just about to discover and decipher Radha that I got a pat on the back. It was the Wanderer. “Boy, you missed the turn by the canal by a good kilometer. Turn back. Let’s find that nursery.”

Pissed off at the interruption I took a U-turn, back towards the canal. I always believed, when in doubt go straight. I would have gone straight to Radha, hadn’t been for this divine jerk on my back. I took the U-turn and then took the turn by the canal into a nearly non-motorable road. The dusty road and bumpy ride led me and the freak by my back to “Yashodha Nursery”. Yeah right! Now how freaking can this further get? I bet a few more days in here and I can place the entire “Nandh Gram”.

Well the Yashodha Nursery, with its faded steel board on a swollen wooden frame, doesn’t seem nothing more than a huge farm land with barbed wire. I find the gate, park my scooter outside and get inside. I looked around and find no man or women in there. Just saplings of plants and little flowers plants tied up in polythene. Somehow nurseries are not the most beautiful of places to visit. They look shabby, uncultured, raw, unlike the exquisiteness of a tastefully kept garden but much like the way the universe was when God would have sat down with his feet deep and sullied into the human clay. Well I look around for a flower that would be the Radha flower and take it back to my little homestay room and lose myself. But to my disappointment I find nothing. Then from the eastern side of the nursery, I know it is the eastern side as the Sun has slowly made its way up the horizon from that side, I hear a man shouting at me to not keep my foot on the freshly sown soil.

Oh man! Was I delighted to see a caretaker or what? Hoping from all my eager heart that he will introduce me to the flower that was Radha. Like one of those introductions through a common friend. I was all excited, not knowing what I will say when I will see her first. Trying to fix on an opening line, a smooth delivery or a my trademark stark and from the heart fool hardy nonsense.

The caretaker came closer and started to converse in Tamil, a language that I am all too familiar with. He was not amused on my gate crashing entry. The wrinkles on his forehead pushed up by the raised brow told me that he was not in any mood to entertain a free-wheeling wanderlust that too an Indian one. A local, brown hippie. I tried to establish a rapport with him by speaking in the crude-Pondi-Tamil dialiect. Tamil spoken in this part of Tamil Nadu has a distinct roughness about it, far removed from the what is regarded as the polished and pristine Tamil-Brahmin dialect that I have grown up in. What the heck. Adapting has never been a task worth my consideration, I am a shape-shifter, moulding my way through numerous turns of life. So this was easy too. After the initial exchanges with the caretaker, I came down straight to my business. I asked him if he has in his nursery a culture of Radha flowers. He looked at me in a lost state of mind. He asked me again to repeat the flower name. I said, Radha. He nodded his head from side to side, and said – “No Saar!”. The typical stretch of the “ae” syllable when a clipped “a” would have sufficed. He further added that he was not aware of a flower named Radha. I tried to explain him that the flower was probably blue in color and is used to prepare a refreshing beverage. But that hardly helped, he displayed his ignorance and instead told me to pick some other flower that he had in the garden that was blue in color.

Oh my god! What the heck is with these people? It is like I am on a space journey to Pluto and I ask directions mid-way and some universal Pan-shop owner asks me to land in Jupiter instead as he doesn’t know the way to Pluto. Wow! What an alternative? Idiot, I am searching for Radha, not any darn blue flower. I then probe him further on where I could find someone who might know a good deal about flowers in this part of town. He directs me to Auroville and tells me that inside the Matrimandir sanctuary, there is an incense stick kiosk by the canteen and the girl who runs the kiosk is supposed to know a lot about flowers and is known to be a qualified botanist. I was thrilled at hearing this. I really wanted to deal with someone who knew this flower business. I thanked him and rode on towards the Matrimandir.

This is how you move on in your quest, following leads, clues, tip offs, until you find what you sought. I was so thankful to my Kinectic Honda, it made me nimble in a setting where public transport was absent and the distances were sizeable. It was around 8:30 a.m. now and I parked my scooter at the Matrimandir parking and walk in. I could start sensing the frantic frenzy in my footsteps. Like an eager and delirious child, I wanted to find the keeper of the flower. I ask Auroville volunteers, most of them French nationals, about the incense stick kiosk owner. They direct me left from the entrance and tell me it is a small outlet just about fifteen meters from where I was. I quickly breeze through these few meters only to find the kiosk closed. Disappointed, I looked around and found a small tea-shop-cum-tuck shop towards the right of the kiosk. So I decide to indulge in my age old quest of hunger. I see that they have an assortment of home-made cookies and croissants. I order a blue-berry croissant and a hibiscus tea. I love this place as most recipes involve a flower or two. But where is my Radha?

The girls at the tea shop tell me that the kiosk will open in about half an hour. So I restlessly loiter around. Clicking photographs of the beautifully manicured gardens of Auroville. Side play indulgence of this writer, a new hobby – photography. Writing and photography are complementary arts. Both aim at reliving the moment over and over again. Both arts master the universe by eternalizing fleeting frames of time. Both these art forms seem to be an arrogant challenge at the finicky mechanix of the illusion filled universe – a challenge that you may play your freaking overlapping and myriad tricks of Maya but an open consciousness here understands all your games and stands strong and vulnerable. A kind of dominant submission. I will love to delve more on dominant submission later on, but now it is time to move on. I race time ahead by tweaking the universal clock work to about 9:15 a.m. when a dusky girl in pastel colored salwar kameez is opening the shutters to the kiosk. I wait in anticipation for her to be done with the ritualistic prayer when one opens a shop. I have always revered this act. Of worshiping once work. The daily routine of such nature bowls me over. It tells me that there are people who are thankful for each moment that they got to make it right, and that they are ready to submit to a higher calling that their actions may bring the results that it deems fit. The belief that the first sale of the day sets the tone for the day although seems like an overblown superstition but the belief a owners of trade have on this has made me take this on face value. In fact I have been often complemented by some shops that I frequent that I have proven extremely lucky for their business when I have opened their day’s sales. In fact, one food kiosk owner near my previous work place told me that ever since I started to open his day’s sales his business had sky rocketed and on days when I am unable to make it to his shop, the sales have been pale. I remember this date clearly when the food van vendor told me this, it was 28 September 2007, the last day of my stint at my previous employment. When he said that I did not have the courage to tell him that I will not be coming to his shop from the next day onwards. I would be shifting to an office from Noida to Gurgaon. But I still remember the belief in the vendor’s eyes when he told me this and the in-your-face irony of his timing. I just pray that his business only multiplied from that day onwards. Maybe once I am back to Delhi, I will make a visit to his van in Noida and check it out first hand.

The kiosk finally opened for the day and I was the first customer to walk up to the girl at the counter. I knew I had to buy something otherwise her day sale would start on a non-starter note. I asked her the price of the various incense sticks packs that were no sale. After the initial inquiry, I bought a few select fragrance incense packs. I picked up Opium, Lily of the valley, Peppermint, Holy Basil, Ylang Ylang and Parijathak. Out of these, the only fragrance I had reserved for myself was the Parijathak. A fragrance that defines me perfectly. Then it hit me suddenly that may be the Radha fragrance is also on sale. I rummaged through the stack of packs but couldn’t find it. So here is how I started my probe with this girl who was supposed to be a qualified botanist.

I asked her if she could give me the Radha fragrance pack. She said that the flower is not usually used in the preparation of incense stick and instead asked me to look for any other fragrance that I might want to buy. I knew I should not beat around the bush and come straight to the point. No time to waste. I informed her that the caretaker in Yashoda Nursery had suggested that I speak with her as I was looking to find the Radha flower. She was taken aback by this. Why would someone search so vehemently for a flower? I told her that I need to see the flower and that I had tasted a Radha drink in the Pondicherry beach café. She could not make much sense of the frantic tone in my voice. She was puzzled and slightly disinterested. But then again when have I turned back when I am on a high ride. I persisted, this time with a wise man garb, trying to engage her into intelligent conversation of sorts. Told her that I was writer and as part of my story I need to find where the Radha flower grows, how it looks, told her that this was sort of an academic endeavor for me. I also told her that I was aware that she was a qualified botanist. Hearing this she gave me a very cautious look, as if I was stalking her. But soon as the conversation progressed she sensed that my search was really important to me. We got talking for about fifteen minutes, in which she shared the details of the Radha flower. I recall word by word the way she described the flower and in my mind the flower started to take shape, artery by artery, petal by petal, pollen by pollen, with the color slowly taking the right shade as her description became more and more vivid.

Thus the botanist spake in thick Tamilian ascent “Sir, the Radha flower is usually found as a five petal flower, with dual tone, white to purplish blue or indigo blue, with the white shade from the core of the flower bleeding into the blue tone. To size it up, you can hold up to two Radha flowers in your hand. The leaves of the plant resemble a betel leaf in color and shape with tiny sprockety spikes lining the leave ends. While the Radha flower is tender and would easily dwindle even with the slightest of pressure of the hand, its stain is quite fast and would be struggle to wash it off one’s clothes. She told me that some locals also use it as an ingredient in garment dyeing. The creeper that nests the flower grows tall and of moderate bramble density. The fragrance is mild and understated. Very hard to smell among louder smells of the forest. The flower is used as part of southern traditional healing concoction. The essence of the Radha flower in tempered quantities is used to cure skin ailments and rashes, and stomach infections. The flower’s anti-septic properties were also acknowledged in traditional medicinal streams and often infused in ayurvedic therapies to cure poisoning, dementia, and hay fever. As a juice, it is known to calm the nerves and provide calming effect in cases of insomnia.”

She went on to explain how the flower in ancient times was considered a rare and miraculous flower for pregnant women. The root of the Radha flower creeper when tied as a waistband around an expectant mother's waist ensured a normal child birth even in cases wherein a surgical delivery was anticipated. Even in the now hugely popular practice of Feng Shui, a Radha flower growing in the house gives the home an invincible aura that transcended on to the people.

I asked her where I could find the flower. She said that it is not an uncommon flower in this part of the country and that one might just spot it along the jungle path or in the garden of some houses. She said she had seen the flower somewhere once on the highway to Chennai and growing in brambles on the jungle pathway. She added that the flower has a lot of sub species and one of the rare sub species is the three petal snapdragon-shaped Radha, often found around the back waters of ECR (East Cost Road) shore line. So both these varieties have very different physical appearance.

I tell her that once I find the flower I will get it back to her and she needs to confirm if it was the Radha flower or not. She smilingly agreed. She must be thinking “what a loony?”.

I must confess I was bowled over by the level of detail that was offered to me by this botanist girl. Wow! I couldn’t have asked for more and honestly I expecting far less. This botanist girl, or perhaps all botanists, describe flowers as a poet would describe the morning dew. So much passion and so much knowledge about flowers. I felt so lucky to witness someone as passionate taking about her craft. She clinically constructed Radha in my mind’s eye with near surgical precision. She seemed to me like a flower doctor.

After all this information soak up, I introduced myself and told her my name and asked what her name was. She was named Neeraja – “Neeraja the flower doctor”. I take her leave and tell her that I will be back with the flower or its photograph.

I head out with the Wanderer floating around at my back further into the jungle. Searching for my Radha. I stop anywhere I spot flowers growing on the sides, special indicators being blue flowers. But for the next few hours or so I keep stopping my scooter every few hundred meters only to feel disappointed that I am unable to spot what I was looking for. I ask the local people who are doing their daily chores in their mud house gardens, drying laundry, cleaning utensils, that if they know where the Radha flower might grow. Mostly I get rude or indifferent responses and every once in a while I will get no response at all. As if I am speaking to thin air. Not the most encouraging of moments but I carry on. Looking for the indigo blue beauty in the thick green of the jungle.

I have drifted too far and I slowly get the sense that I might not know the way back from this far into the jungle. But I am confident and follow the same old dictum of mine “when I doubt go straight”. I look at my watch and it says that I have gone without food for good four-five hours now. Wow! No food for that long while being awake. It is 4:00 p.m. and the sun’s intensity is not relenting although I am shielded by the heavy foliage and closed out canopy of the trees. I am slowly becoming cranky, it is the hunger and the realization that I have been that far away from food. The water bottle is empty and I had not spotted a single shop in the last six or seven kilometers. I decide to retreat for the time being and wrap myself in the arms of Annapurna – the goddess of food who is the source of the ability to render infinite food to the infinite mouths of the universe. The goddess of food symbolizing the divine enactment of nourishment and motherly care provides the travelers the energy and verve to aptly follow their destiny. They say, my mother used to say, when food is cooked with purity of heart it becomes alchemy and when served with care it becomes as potent as a mother’s caress.

Well I take a U-turn and ride back on the same path and it is likely to be good forty minutes before I hit civilization again and indulge in food. The heat started getting to me, my face dust ridden and sweaty, neck-line itchy and rashes started showing up. I rode back intuitively on the dusty path, and in my mind the images of Radha flower were super imposed over food. Glorious food. I didn’t knew that if at this moment I spotted the Radha flower would I admire it, sense it, smell it, feel it, photograph it or simply pluck it out and eat it. Lucky me I didn’t spot it then. I rode on.

And came out of the bend that led to Auroville... the first land mark of sorts on my way back. My cottage was a good eight kilometers from Auroville towards the East Coast Road. Just two-three kilometers from Auroville I spotted a eating place to the right. It read “Kofi Bar” and from the outside it seemed like a nice joint, done up with Kane and Bamboo furnishing. I parked my scooter and entered inside.

The next moment I realize that I am inside a hippie joint. Whoooopie! I must share at this moment that it is here in this Kofi Bar that I met some amazing people over the next few days and spent sizeable time here writing, deliberating, discussing life with people from all parts of the world.

I sat inside the beautifully and artistically done up joint and look at their menu. It is an all-organic food joint. I spot an interesting item – “Raagi Dosai” and order one along with Hibiscus tea. Soon the food arrives and I am again teleported to the arms of gods and goddesses. My energy meter started slowing climbing up like a fuel level indicator of a car.

Now at ease alongside food I started to reflect deeper into the gracious goddess Annapurna. According to Hindu mythology, Mr Shiva once in his super pensive mood shared with his wife Parvati how the universe is an illusion, a maya, and how food is another of the illusion. Parvati, who is the force behind all material things, including food, became infuriated and disappeared. As a result of her disappearance, time came to a standstill and the universe became a barren place with no food to be found.

However, being the mother of all mothers, she could not hold herself back on seeing all the suffering. She reappeared on earth in Kasi and established her divine kitchen. Shiva, when he came to know of this, presented himself in front of her with skull bowl in alms. Parvati smiled and gave food to Shiva, thus absolving the hunger of life and giving the energy to the manifest world to transcend the maya. From that moment, she is revered and worshipped as Annapurna, the Goddess of Food and Nourishment.

The best part I like about Goddess Annapurna is her depiction. She is depicted adorning glorious garments made of finest silk and golden-silver zari, with numerous jewels of precious stones, with a golden ladel in one hand and bowl full of food in another and Lord Shiva in his near Wanderer garb on his knees extending his skull bowl begging in alms. This completes one core truth of existence for me.

Having thought all this, I reel back to my quest, the quest of Radha flower and I plug in my earphones and start listening to Metallica on my cellphone. The song “frantic” plays out loud in my ear --- “Keep searching, Keep on searching, This search goes on, This search goes on, Keep searching, Keep on searching, This search goes on”.

I eat, then eat some more, and still more. I pen down some of the thoughts that come rushing from the sea of my life. I capture them in my brown diary. Give the abstract some shape and release. I take a walk outside the Kofi bar and realize it has been a while that I have been sitting here eating and writing. It had started to get dark and the birds were on the way back home in this southern sky. I too felt an urge to go back to my cottage and retire for the day. I was tired, and disappointed. Suddenly I felt I had nothing to do but to search for Radha and with the day gone by I was nowhere close to spotting her. I felt like a sad and disappointed child, and it is then that the Wanderer hushed into my ears – “Look Bala. This is what you need to learn. Learn to pursue when the world tells you through all its channels that it is not attainable. Learn to flow into it even when all you see is an inpregnable stone wall. Learn to believe in your vision even when all hope is lost. Learn to love even when you love an empty canvas. Learn to love even when all you can hear back is your own echo. Learn to love and let love create the reality. Love not what you see, but see what you love in the heart of your universe. Love the flower and create its creepers around you, like an old mansion let the Radha flower bramble swallow you, let all realities fade into naught and let only the Radha remain your only consort. Let the fragrance reach you before the flower blooms, taste its juice even before it has been plucked, feel its petals before the seeds of the plant were even sown. Then you will know what love truly means. Boy, you have come this far and know this that you are the knower of all this. But let it not remain as some background static, let it be the amplified fog horn of your ship. Give not a chance to the universe to manifest any other way but the way your heart beats. That is the only dharma. Perfect sync between the creator and the creation, the music and the musician, the writer and the story.”

I came into the Kofi bar to pay my bill. On the counter said a European lady and we got talking. I introduced myself and got to know her name. She was Kate from the Netherlands. She had been living in Auroville for the last seven years and is a perma-vacationer. Perma-vacationers are people who live life on permanent vacation. Living from country to country, moving time to time when they feel like. She seems to know a lot about Auroville and Pondicherry. I tell her a bit about my quest for Radha flower and she tells me to look for the flower around Chunnambar beach and backwater area. The backwater area is about thirty kilometers from Auroville towards Cuddalore. She advises me to go there in the afternoon it I need to spot a Radha flower, as locals who use Radha flower for juice and fragrance might pluck it very early in the morning. So the ones that bloom in the morning would be gone by 7:00 a.m. The ones that are slow to bloom would make it through the day.

I make a resolve to find Radha the following day. I head out of the Kofi bar and pack myself a whole grain pancake and yogurt pie. I ride back on the jungle lane, which is now dark with no lights except the dim headlight of my Kinetic Honda. I reach my hotel room and it is 8:30 p.m. and it seemed like the whole town was already fast asleep. I quietly eat my dinner. Call home and talk to mom and dad. Inform them that I am safe and things are going good. I move to the terrace and I see a faint outline of the moon coming out no moon phase – a waxing crescent... a beautiful sight. I look into the sky and the night scorpion shines her light on me. The scorpion of the night sky flashing her star filled eyes on the tenacious Cancer. The star-lit sky and the buzz and creak of the insects fill the night air and I slowly walk down to my room and sleep. As I am slowly drifting off to sleep, I get faint images of the Wanderer working his magic, manipulating the mechanix of the night, pulling the invisible strings of the universe, and drawing the picture of love that I wish to see in the morning. The Opium incense sticks I lighted before going off to bed, fill the air with sweet smoky fragrance and the light at the tip of the sticks keeps the universe ablaze and I sleep like a tired child.

Wanderer’s colossal revelation of the jerk divine!

2010-02-14T23:35:00.003+05:30

I drove the scooter into the jungle lanes to the Italian bakery that I visited yesterday. Ordered ginger bread and a jar of hot honey ginger tea and got a seat in the open lawns. Surrounded by flowers and the chirping of the morning birds, it seemed as the ideal setting for a detailed interrogation of the Wanderer. I must confess, I was a tad irritated and anxious. The Wanderer was characteristically calm.

He kept looking at me with a mild smile on his face. I could not hold on for much longer. I had to speak, I asked him.

~~~This is how our conversation went~~~

Bala: Who are you?

Wanderer: I already told you my name and have been sharing my story for quite some time now. Is there something specifically that you are seeking to know? Please be specific, and I will give you specific answers.

Bala: Fine. Explain me then what are you? It seems like “Who are you?” as a question does not bode well with whatever you are. Are you a freaking ghost or some phantom? Are you just a screwed up thought in my head? Are you some demon? Some GOD? Are you even real?

Wanderer: I am all that and more, Bala. I am the one who meditates on the spotless supreme with thoughts attuned by constant practice and not wandering after anything else. I am everything that your mind can conceive and heart can perceive. I am the one who lies beyond, the charred gate beyond which you cannot self deceive. I am the sum total of your spirit’s possibilities, the blown up holographic projection of your inner solar nucleus, pinnacle of your god’s resonance in you. I am your direct uplink to the entire universe and silence. I am the one-page snapshot of your soul’s journey; past, present and future. I am your sum over histories. I am each of your probabilities. I am the only certainty. I am more real than you will ever be at a point in time. I am what God intended you to be at the onset. I am you. But you are not me.

Bala: Shit! WTF? Can you just talk in simple terms? I mean can you just cut the overblown cosmic crap and come to the point and tell me who are you?

Wanderer: Oh boy! The king of crap is telling me that he doesn’t understand this overblown cosmic crap.

Bala: Fine. So be it. Tell me now in simple terms.

Wanderer: Well. Consider yourself as a hundred rupee currency note as of now. That means you have some credibility and value in the system – a certain and finite value. Tomorrow your value might appreciate or depreciate. It will be finite and certain though. Basis your enriching experiences and what you garner from those, you might ascend to be a thousand rupee currency note. Or through your misdeeds and lackluster endeavors might fall through to be a ten rupee note. A finite value nonetheless.

Now let me let me explain who I am, keeping this in perspective. I am the concept of money itself. Infinite and all inclusive!

So if you actualized all your potential and thrived on all your possibilities, got screwed on all your misfortunes, fought all your fears, listened to every beat of your heart, absorbed every hint of your mind, lived every moment as it merits, dreamt all the dreams, and kept yourself open through all this, it is me who you will see in the mirror.

I am your finality. Your destination and your journey. You are the eye, while I am the vision. You are the heart, while I am feeling, you are night, while I am darkness, you are the sun and I am light.

I am your amplified truth, broadcasted!

Bala: Oh damn! Oh freaking god’s mercy. So eventually I get screwed up like you? Screwed up that bad? More than what I have got screwed up until now? Wandering? Damn it. Wandering through ages? Unquenched? Traversing through ages without a visible milestone? Like a nomad from here and there. Searching for god knows what and not finding it? Constantly feeling incomplete in every moment? Aimeless?

Shit this is a nightmare. Is this? Please tell me it is. This can’t be. I do not want to end up like you. Oh no, I don’t. For all the fancy words, this is not what I desire. Forever incomplete is not my definition of glory or attainment. Get out of my head you freaking Wanderer. You cannot be me. Not like this. I won’t go down like this.

Wanderer: Relax Bala. Don’t panic. I am not a disease or rather I should say we are not a disease. This truth that I shared should not scare you. No truth should.
I will be honest. It is not the way you have built it in your head. I am not in a state of incoherence or incompleteness or inadequacy. I am the state of perfect equilibrium.

I wander because you wander right now. My journey was complete even before I started out. I am only here to prod you on. The moment when you look within for answers, I come forth. You are able to see me now, feel me now because you are now on the path that you are meant to be. I can never be harmed, so is the case with you. For we now walk step in step. Chains of gold bond us together.

I am your infinite reserve, a pool from which you draw your invincibility now and forever. I am your cheat sheet and god mode. Stop judging me or trying to figure me out with your worldly eyes you fool. Sense me from your core and you will see the bounty of gloriousness within you that is me.

This was a one-way ticket to inner space that you bought. Now there is no turning back. You cannot run away from this. Period.

Bala: Ok. I need to take this in. What you are telling me is that I am the one who is at unrest.

Wanderer: No, I didn’t mean that. All I meant was it is alright. This is just entropy.

Bala: What do you mean by just entropy?

Wanderer: Just what the word entropy means. A measure of uncertainty of an outcome. You are just hung up on the thin slice of doubt that still lingers on and that which still makes you human.

Bala: Fuck you! (the legendary middle finger held upright against the Wanderer’s face).

Wanderer: Dude. All you need to do is your part. Do it right, without slightest of doubt or expectations. That is all. Run as you ran the marathon. Feeling every moment... not for timing, not for glory, just for the fucking love of it.

Bala: Hmmm…

Wanderer: That’s the problem with you creative shit heads. You always are living for the “boom”, the “ah haaa” moment, the redefining big bang jamboree. Get out of it once in a while. Feel the simplicity.

Bala: I feel the simplicity!

Wanderer: Ya right!

Bala: Anyways. What is the deal with the night scorpion of yours? If you are so in balance then why do you still search for her?

Wanderer: I search for her, for I am indulging in your universe. Boy, from where I come from there is no need for love. To put it simply, in the realm beyond every realm, love does not exist. Because it is not needed.

Bala: Not needed? You mean love not needed? What is the deal with needing or not needing love?

Wanderer: It is different. Love is for your universe. The ever-expanding universe is a cold-dark place. Really cold and dark. To emote and energize, you need love. To traverse your thoughts through this cold, dark and warped space and time you need love. I need love here. It is the medium, the channel on which our lives here are embedded to break through.

Bala: So why the night scorpion? What is your connection?

Wanderer: The love of the Wanderer is not physical, mental or even spiritual. It does not exist in the form you know love to be. This love does not have its vertex in gender, specie, form or non-form. It is functional. It is like the desert winds that create intricate patterns on the dunes and through the night of the scorpion the dunes shift shape. It is here for its own purpose, like the wind, water and sky. It is not sweet, caring or benevolent as the love of the human spirit. It is flavorless, shapeless and unbiased. It is the keeper of the universe. Forever indefinable, forever untouched and spotless.

It is the night scorpion for me, for I come into this realm of yours to set you free. For you to be free, the scorpion must inflict her poison. This world is held captive by fear. The moment she inflicts her poison, the world will be free or at least freedom will be ushered in. She will be free.
So here I am, provoking the scorpion to mount her sting, and inflict me with her fatal venom, for the poison to creak into my ethereal being, to send the fading signal to my mind that has been left in the other world.

For what difference does it make, you seek the sea goddess and I seek the night scorpion of the desert. For where today are the deserts, epochs ago there were seas. Where water reigns supreme today, the wind will master tomorrow and that will complete the cycle. The dance of Radha and Krishna. The legendary union of relative and absolute. Before the start of the universe, there was promise that when the Wanderer steps into the world… the world will inject its poison into him and he will gladly vaporize… taking the poison away from this world. I am here to make her “part with her poison”.

You might ask, Bala, that is she real. Well she is as real as I am. Look into the girl’s eyes and you will see the dormant and latent scorpion and the reflexive poisonous sting. That’s how nature had conceived it. Like all poison, this poison too will set something free.

Bala: Wooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooh!!! Are you like GOD?

Wanderer: Oh no, no, no! Please don’t get into that kind of shit with me. I do not understand this god business of yours. Keep that topic off. For the buddies I sit and hang out in other realm, we really don’t see much of Gods. You are our only Gods, our only entertainment buddy. While you look into the sky with your powerful telescopes, we use the same telescopes to observe you. I and my buddies just are looking through what you call the wrong end of the telescope. Beyond the skies above.

Bala: And what about the Radha flower? The images of the dancing queen? Those eyes?

Wanderer: Sure. A botanical garden will be the best place to start. Let us do it the way you would do it. Step by step, every step has its marks… like a mathematics exam.

Bala: I was a total loser at math. The only thing I ever knew in a math exam was the last line… “Hence Proved”. Never knew the steps.

Wanderer: Then it is high time you learn the steps. By the way, are you satisfied with the answers? You and your question man, seriously!

Bala: I guess so.

Wanderer: Then go ask the lady at the counter where we can find a botanical garden or a flower nursery nearby.
-----------------
I ask the lady at the counter, and she tells me to head inwards into the jungle about three kilometers towards Auroville and take the right by the canal.

In a bizarre state of mind, I ride on searching for Radha.

Wanderer and the dream of perfect happiness!

2010-01-23T23:41:00.004+05:30

Sleep well. That’s what the Wanderer told me. “Tomorrow we start our little search. We head out for searching Radha. Sleep well tonight.”

I must confess I didn’t want to sleep last night. Not a minute that night. I wanted to feel every moment that was passing by. Not lose it to sleep. I believed it to be simple. I hadn’t slept much in the last four-odd months. All these months sleep had eluded me, even when I begged it to come. I assumed last night to be no different. Ironically, I couldn’t keep my eyelids from drooping the moment I hit the bed. I tried real hard and I mean really-really hard to be awake. But sleep came like the sandman had sprinkled gold dust over my forehead. Moments before I lost to sleep, I felt as if I was being pulled into some sort of a silvery whirlpool.

I recall looking at the clock in the hotel room; it was 9:00 pm by the non-studio clock before I lost my battle to sleep. Unusually early for me be at the bed. But I must now confess how slept like a log. Like I haven’t slept for months... I was held prisoner in the ambit of sleep and strangely I recall how lovely it was when I was sleeping. A lucid and deep sleep.

I recall that there was a dream… a long and enigmatic dream that I dreamt last night. Full eight and a half hour of sleep. Like a full work day. In that dream I seeped to the bottom of the sea. Into that silvery whirlpool, like Alice tripping down the rabbit hole. All around me was liquid… shiny slivery and bluish liquid. Much different than the water we know of. It seemed more like a sea of pure energy rather than sea water. Like active nucleons of positive and negative charge were making love to each other. I was surrounded by pure energy in motion or what is abbreviated as emotion…. Energy in motion, Emotion!

During that reverie, I remember that I had read about Atlantis – the lost civilization. Instantly my sub conscious mind started to relate the dream with that of the fabled Atlantis itself. I saw magnificent underwater-like life, corals, multi-colored corals, more corals, coral drawn, fishes with wings, birds with fins, beautiful butterflies, butterscotch mountains, black currant ravines, penguins and mermaids in a trance, Robin Hood and Queen of New Orleans in a dance, I realized that I love her and have taken the chance. Further down the fathoms, I saw all the people who are dear to me. My family and friends, my loved ones, my teachers, my students, my dogs, my writings, my poetry, my actions, my reactions, my quests, my achievements, my triumphs, my highs, my books, my dancing gods, my loving nods, my childhood dream, my awesome teens, my sweet tooth, my wisdom tooth, my hilarious guitar, my this life, my that life, my love life, I was running through butter like a hot knife.

It was beautiful, to see all that you love in one place and time. I realize it is very rare to witness this. To be in the august company of all your happiness put together without pilferage.

I floated around for a while, looking at the sheer beauty and perfectness of creation, mesmerized by the flawless orchestration of life by the invisible hand. Theories aside, God or no God, I feel the compounding effect of love accumulated here in this moment, accumulated bank balance of love of all those who are numbered in the file of existence. This is what can be termed as “awesomeness” – what if the English language does not currently recognize this word. The more I look inward and sustain the moment, the more futile the entire cacophony of life appears, yet at the same time it sounds like an enchanting symphony. I realize that the enchantment is not because of what it is but what it is meant to be.

There is unquestionable beauty within each one of us and it is absolute. If I were to describe my idea of God, then this would be it. Humanity is a great example, a great term that we seldom realize.
.
The feelings flowed inwards, and I at once realized how harsh I have been in my life. To my loved ones, to people who matter, to people who don’t, to random people around, to things that agitated me, to my own self, to little miracles that happened in my life, to things that I didn’t believe in.

My harshness hurts me now. It hurts the inner walls of my soul, and my soul cries for all that harshness. The scream of all the hurt that I would have caused in the universe, knowingly and unknowingly, was sounding as a sharp relentless screech in my ear and I could feel my senses bleeding. I was connected with all that exists in the universe and all the hurt that has been floating around from the past, present and future. It broke me down to the basic constituent of life. To the level of thought.

In that thought I understood all the Xs of life and all the Ys, understood my excesses, my ex, and the reasons why. I felt weightless. I was trembling and unable to be coherent. The nadir and zenith of the soul were made visible to me. I saw in God’s vision.

I feel refurbished beyond comprehension and imagination. Slowly the scenic beauty around me started to disappear. The attributes got dissolved into pale light, the shapes were no more, only love. I dreamt of myself sleeping and dreaming all this in that dream.

Then the voice prodded me, “Wake up, Bala. Time to start our journey, time to wake up, rise and shine. Shine like the true Sun. From heart to head, shine.” It was the Wanderer. Speaking from within that dreamscape.

I woke up at once without a trace of sleep in my eyes. As if I hadn’t slept at all.

The clock on the wall indicated that it was half past five in the morning. Full eight and a half hours of sleep and dream. Wow. A miracle of sorts. Such beautiful sleep and a wondrous dream. I was overflowing with happiness, beaming with joy, radiating life, broadcasting the universal signal of love. Like a cosmic broadcasting station, I was broadcasting the splendor of the vision I saw to the world outside.

Took a bath and got ready by 6:15 a.m. to take a walk by the sea side. Just then, the Wanderer interrupted the day’s proceeding, by booming his voice in my head. “Bala, pack up your bag. We are checking out of this hotel. I mean, right now. We are going to stay somewhere in the jungle. That’s our best bet to find the Radha flower. Time is running out, so hurry up.”

I was aghast at the comfort with which the Wanderer was breaching my privacy. However, I felt I had to listen. So it was. I checked out.

No sooner than I had mounted my scooter with my backpack, he said, “Towards Auroville, let’s ride”.

I drove towards Auroville, the morning breeze from sea jostling past my face. We both got talking, the Wanderer and me, like two friends, like two found souls; we talked random stuff, little things, singing songs along the way, like merry men. Although he didn’t find the concept of Radha Juice to be weird and funny like I did, he did join me in the song or rather the bhajan that my mom plays every morning, a bhajan that invariable wakes me up from sleep, a bhajan that is the first dhwani I hear every day, and I mean every darn day. It used to rupture whatever little sleep I was managing to have all these months.

This is how it went, “Krishna, Radha, Radhika, Krishnaaaaaaaaaaaa, Radhaaaaaaaaa, Radhikaaaaaaaaa...”

Slowly we started to bend the meter of the song, making it sound more a rock ballad than a tranquil bhajan.

We let out a huge laugh, almost together. It was fun. Superb!

Taking the left turn from the highway, we get through into the winding road that leads through the jungle to Auroville. A kilometer into the jungle, I spot a three storied house with a board “Homestays Available”. I park the scooter and ring the door bell. An aged lady walks out to the door. I ask her about availability of accommodation at her place. She plainly refuses. She tells me that it is an old board and they don’t let out anymore. I am about to walk off, but then the Wanderer booms in my head, “Persist, and win her over. We are staying here.”

I knew what I had to do. I looked into the old lady’s eyes, brought on my lunatic childish smile and pleaded and pestered her. I can turn into a little harmless kid any moment, it’s a god gift. The child is always ebbing to appear. Brought my full-on sentimental spiel, I am like your son and will not cause any trouble. Please, please … and I continued until she agreed to take me in and show me a room on the first floor.

She opened the door; I liked the minimalistic décor in the room. It was perfect for me. A medium-sized room, with peach colored walls, and a small wooden desk. I asked her how much will she charge for it, she said Five Hundred a night. I smiled back and said, I need it for four nights. I paid her the advance, and settled into the room.

The Wanderer said, “Perfect, I like it now that you are listening to me without your worldly garb. It is so much easier now to accomplish what we collectively need to accomplish. I will help you find the Radha flower, help you unravel this mystery, decode the code, lead you on further in your journey, give you the missing links, take you to where you yearn to be. In return, you write my story as and when I share it with you. You write it as I tell you, without pretence, without fear, without shame, without game, you write it as within. You don’t question me when I ask you to do something.”

Hearing the last sentence, I was infuriated. “Who the hell do you think you are to tell me not to question you when I feel like? I am not your slave, not your bonded labor, you crazy Wanderer. Hell, first of all tell me clearly who the hell you are. Come out with it. Let us do everything else later. First I need to know and understand this crazy thing that is happening with me. Ever since you showed up, my life has been in a topsy-turvy, although I acknowledge that it has been fantastic but I am not too sure. How much to trust you? I don’t even know who you are.”

The Wanderer said, “Fine, if you so insist. We do this over breakfast.” We headed out into the jungle on my scooter to fetch breakfast.

Wanderer and the Dhwani!

2010-01-14T00:12:00.004+05:30

It is around noon. Day two in Pondicherry. My body still cranky from the night spent at the beach. A few abrasions on my back, my neck extremely itchy, head a bit heavy. I head out of my hotel, with my usual gear, by small back bag with my writing pad, the book I was reading ‘Illusions’, my diary, a few pens, mint, and my camera.

Extremely hungry, I walk into the same café by the beach. Without thinking much, I order a glass of Radha and a fruit salad.

The journey starts.

Plug in, plug out. No you cannot plug out. You pull the damn plug, but the music won’t stop. You realize it’s not a fucking joke, it is not fantasy, it is not a scenic dream, and it is not a trick your mind is playing on you. You have little control. I had little control, which is to say I had no control whatsoever.

While waiting for the order to arrive, I walked up towards the rocks along the beach. Instantly, I wanted to fall off into the sea. Just head first into the unknown waters, plunge into the shapeless fathoms of the churning ocean. Ever since I was a child, I had this thing of standing on a cliff and falling off. Lunging forward into the chasm. I always had this magnetic pull towards the endless free fall. It is not suicidal. Hell no. I am not the suicidal kinds. Neither am I regressive and self defacing as otherwise perceived by a fall. There has always been an unexplained fascination of falling into the infinite. Dissolution by absolution!

The waiter called me, “Sir, your order is here”.

I walked back to my table. I wolfed through the freshly cut fruits with gulps of the radha. I recalled all of yesterday and the mesmerizing things that were happening to me. The music of the flute and the swirling images of Radha were still rushing in front of my eyes. Just that it seems to have embedded alongside the roar of the sea.

I decided in my head… I will not sleep on the beach. No way.

I call up my best friend and tell him about Radha juice and the night spent at the beach. We laugh our lungs out. We make all kind of jokes about Radha juice and wreck our minds around possibility of Krishna juice, Kansa juice, Balram juice, and every other fucking juice in the cosmic blender. In that moment, on call with him, I felt like I was eighteen again. Like when I first met him… carefree and extremely disoriented from this world.

This moment, the mist and young child-like sunlight
Is what I got, and I love it so
No aching memories, no troubled spot,
This moment is all I got
I bring this world alive, spin it by the tide
I can smile now, a resting, unhindered smile
I really don’t have to lie, for this moment is all I got
The wind blows and greets my eager cheeks
I say ‘hello’ and let it be
For this moment is all I got
I strum and it sounds out of tune,
I smile, for this what I got… this moment and my hilarious guitar
I write and enjoy the moments I have got.

I feel extremely happy on writing the above piece of poetry. Something simple and bouncing with carefree joy. Like good old days. Like my childhood. Like the conceded youth. Like me. I feel.

I take in the moment. Feel great. Over to life!

I hail in the waiter again for a repeat of the Radha juice and while ordering ask him how is the juice prepared. The waiter tells me that it is prepared by mixing the pulp of a flower named Radha with lemon juice. He does not disclose the concoction ratio. I probe but he doesn’t budge.

However, I was more interested in knowing about the Radha flower. All about it. How does it look like? What color is it? How big is it? How beautiful is it? Where can I find it? All about the flower; about the glorious flower. My interest in flowers until this moment has been restricted to hibiscus, rose and parijatak and that too purely because of the mythical stories I have heard about these flowers as a child. I haven’t researched flowers beyond these three… let alone actively pursue.

To my utter, and I must admit almost childlike frustration, the waiter had no great detail to share except that he told me that the Radha flower is blue in color and grows on trees or shrubs. Yes my genius. Flowers and I mean all flowers, except water flowers, grow on trees or shrubs. They don’t grow on our heads or on space shuttles. Mr Einestine. Damnnnnnnnnnnnn!

I enquire where I can find someone who knows about Radha flower. The waiter was absolutely clueless. Nonetheless, I order one more glass of Radha and decide to chase this absurdly named flower later and indulge in some more sea gazing.

But I couldn’t gaze for much long. The flower was making me extremely restless or to say the quest was making me restless. I am a guy for quests. Pursuit!

I am at my fucking best when I am chasing windmills, chasing truth, chasing the elusive self, chasing what has been perennially hidden, chasing troubles, chasing disappointments, chasing happiness, chasing mirages, chasing realities, chasing cockroaches, chasing butterflies, chasing thrills, chasing things that kill, chasing the oldest ailment and savoring the pill, chasing the entertaining thought, chasing her about whom we all forgot, chasing the rainbow, chasing wounds that do not show, chasing love and everything else.

The wave chaser! Yes that’s me.

I ask around for directions to Auroville. The township conceptualized in the middle of a forest, on the outskirts of Pondicherry. The abode of the “Matrimandir” the sanctum sanctorum of Shri Aurobindo and the revered Mother—built on the central thought of humanity and peace.

I realize I need to get mobile. I cannot hope to travel around without transportation. I search for the nearest two-wheeler rental shop and hire a worn-down Kinetic Honda for five days and fuel it up to the brim.

Yes, baby… now we are talking. Motorized nirvana.

I take the two wheeled pixie for a ride around town and when I am comfortable with the reliability of break’s response time, I switch on the afterburners and hit the highway.

The weather was pleasant and I asked directions to reach Auroville. A left turn from the highway led straight into the lanes that eventually blended into forest and a few bends and eight kilometer further I was parked my scooter in the Auroville parking lot.

I get inside the gate only to learn that the entry to the visiting point of Matrimandir was closed for the day and I need to come the next day. Nevertheless, I entered inside the forest area where there is the Auroville canteen and a few of the Ashram’s shops selling all kinds of organic wares including incense sticks, spiritual books, house decoration items, organic tea, ayurvedic herbs, etc. I get straight to the canteen and order a vegan salad along with lemonade.

Here I should take a moment to share with the larger world my utmost devotion and fascination with food. Yes! You heard me right, Food! Food in fact has been the biggest driver of my life. In fact I am at my best when I am chasing food. Not for thought, but purely for my stomach. No bigger Nirvana than food :)

After tanking up on some energy, I wander into the shops that are selling the organic-spiritual ware and at once love what I am surrounded with. These are the stuff a writer’s dreams are made of. Bright colors all around in the shop, the air filled with almost overpowering natural incense, beautiful wooden decorative items. One couldn’t ask for more. Can one?

I pick up some incense stick packs for my home and dear ones. Memorabilia of sorts. You bring back a certain something of a place with you. You steal some magic from a place you are visiting when you get something home from there. I can feel how Neil Armstrong must have felt when he brought back tiny pieces of the moon. You recreate that place at home.

Well after loitering around for an hour in Auroville, in the middle of the jungle. I felt hungry, as usual, my hunger strikes, like the cymbal stroke of a speed metal song, and incessantly I hunger. I get on my scooter and ride around the jungle lane to find some nice place to eat. I spot an Italian bakery to my left. I park the scooter at its gate and walk in.

On entering I sense that perhaps I am the only Indian in that place. The joint was buzzing with foreign nationals. Various European dialects being spoken. I could her a few Germans germinating, a few French franchising, a few Italians italicizing, a few Polish polishing, a few Czechs, a few Slovaks. I was the only brownie among the apple pie. I walked up to the counter and order a slice of the mushroom pizza and a hot jar of honey hibiscus tea.

I am handed over my order in about five minutes and asked to seat myself on the benches in the garden outside the counter area. I merrily devour the pizza and pour in the tea into my endless pit of a stomach.

When with food I feel safe. Like I am in the arms of God. I feel as if beautiful angels are dancing around and rose petals are being showered over me by the demi-gods including the usual list of Indra, Varuna, Agni, and the mythical white elephant Airavata. I decide I will soak myself in food. In good food. In good organic food. This place is a heaven for someone like me. Replete with bakeries, coffee shops, tea joints, vegan food joints. Heaven!

Who said gluttony is a sin? Bring him on. Dare I make the statement? Food often is better than sex and good food is often better than good sex. The underscore being on the word often.

I take a few snaps of the beautiful garden and then take a few more. All around I am surrounded by colors. With my favorite color, Green, being the larger backdrop. Reds, violets, gold and more. The flowers filled the air with beautiful aroma and life for once seemed slow and simple. The eagerness of the foreign travelers is amazing. They look at your country in new light. They appreciate it. Seldom do we appreciate our own land, appreciate what we got.

With that thought in my head, I head for the Auroville beach.

The Auro beach is a sand beach. I sit by the beach and there is hardly anyone around. A few street urchins playing around and a dog loitering by the shore. Not much by way of company. I feel easy. There is quite. There is the sea and her roar. There is unison with my own thoughts. There is abundance of love within and without.

I look towards the sky and smile like a village idiot… hoping that someone or something up there would smile back. But there was only the breeze brushing against my face. It felt right. I felt right. Right as ray.
The memory of the hurt was on its final way out… taking its last few footsteps out of my door. I was feeling purged by life’s miracle.

The phoenix-like reality of consciousness.

There is not much of us left at the end and whatever is left is this magic. When our dust and bones wait for the solitary rain, they too long like us. Our dust and bones long for the horizon to come forth and embrace them in everlasting cessation and shapelessness. After we recede into the ocean of non-time and non-space, sound of our now beating heart remains forever and forever in this world. Perhaps the only part of us that never shifts shape, our sound, our dhwani, the dhwani of our beating hearts, like the dhwani of the flute is still heard in our dreams like a harbinger of victory, like the dhwani of a new born, like the dhwani of Vedas recited by ancient gurus, like the dhwani of the sea. The composite dhwani of all that ever was, is and will be.

I looked outwards into the future, looked at the next few days and nights in Pondicherry and the adventurous journey that lay ahead. Searching for the Radha flower, searching for my true identity, searching … and then suddenly I heard a sound… Booooooooooom!

It was thunder and lightning in the middle of ocean. I knew it was time for me to get going. For my days ahead in Pondicherry are going to boom in my head for ever and ever.

Before I left, I heard a voice, it was the Wanderer—“Bala, you managed well on your own today. I intent not to disturb your day. Tomorrow we ride together. Tomorrow we start our little search. We head out for searching Radha. Sleep well tonight.”

I looked into the sky and it started to drizzle. I quietly walked away to the parking and rode my scooter back to my hotel in Pondicherry. I loved this day.

Wanderer and the essence of the universe

2009-12-22T22:15:00.008+05:30

Someone patted me on my shoulder… “Sir, we have landed in Chennai.”

I woke up feeling a little weird. The airhostess was smiling at me. I unbuckled the seat best and picked up my hand baggage. The wanderer was not around, hew was gone as expected. I was not doubting what had transpired. The rhythm was still lingering in my head…

Sonic Boom! Boom Sonic!

I get down the airplane, slightly spaced out. Pick up my luggage and head out of the airport… I ask around for the nearest train station and I am told it is just across the road. Me, my backpack, my camera… all three of us reach the train station and board the electric train to Tambaram, a suburb of Chennai, from where I am likely to get a bus to Pondicherry.

I get a comfortable seat in the train; the short change over journey is likely to take twenty-odd minutes.

Sitting down, I look at my co-passengers. Daily commuters, going to office, to colleges, they give me strange looks. I am wearing my black UCB sweatshirt (it was cold in Delhi when I boarded the flight) in Chennai. I am sweating profusely. My handkerchief is on overdrive. Then one of the passengers sitting opposite me takes out a magazine from his bag… and on the back cover in red block print runs an advertisement…

It reads “Boom Time”

…and I couldn’t help but notice the in my face mockery. I do not believe in coincidences… let who believe in coincidences be damned… for they deny the flawless orchestration of the universe. Nothing ever happens without a reason. Things are how they are meant to be.

‘Boom Time’. The advertisement places the ‘Boom’ in my head and I realize that something is churning. Such signs and symbols have happened with me before, on numerous occasions over the years and I have learned not to ignore them and have trained myself to follow their clues.

‘Boom’!!!

I get down at Tamabaram station and walk out of to the mail road. I was told I would get a bus to Pondicherry from here.

I ask people around in Tamil and get vague directions to the bus stop. But the funny part is that I can only speak and understand Tamil… cannot read or write. People ask me to board the bus that reads “Puddycherry”… that’s the only help they offer. And I make no sense of the boards on the bus. They are in Tamil.

I struggle for fifteen minutes then a bust stops nearby. I ask the conductor if the bus goes to Pondicherry. He tells me that he can drop me at a place called Thindukal, which is about an hour away from Pondicherry. And from there I need to board another bus. I think in my head, “What the heck Bala? Just board the fucking bus at least you will be nearer to Pondi by the minute.”

The only seat available is the first seat to the left of the aisle, by the conductor. I place my backpack on the aisle and make myself comfortable. Then suddenly the TV blares into action, announcing loudly that it is a video coach. Some random Tamil song plays out loud. Damn!

The speakers are screeching and the song is really not a song. I put on my earphones and try listening to Mr Bryan Adams but the sound gets drowned in the cacophony of the video coach.

I give up and try and look outside the window. The bus picks up speed and a thrust of wind hits my face and I start to enjoy the way the near-barbaric driver is driving the bus.

Then suddenly the song ends and is replaced by an old Tamil movie, one staring M.G.R. – the old-world legend. I realize that the next hour or so are going to be hell and suddenly my eyes spot the name of the channel playing the movie.

It says, “Boom TV”

Damn!

I take out my Sony H20 and take a few shots of the channel name, just for evidence. Just to check later that it was not my mind playing tricks on me. For the remaining part of the journey I kept thinking where all this would lead.

“Boom” is the word I need to look out for. Find meaning and follow the rabbit to the wonderland.

Boom Sonic! Boom Town! Boom TV!

I get down at the “Thindukal” and take another bus and reach Pondicherry at about 12:30 in the afternoon. I scout for a hotel and find one at Rue Buss Street. French Town. French street names. Hotel Ruthira.

I quickly take a bath and head out on foot to the famed rocky beach of Pondi. Fortunately, it is only about a kilometer, a walk that is beautifully lined by French Villas and post card perfect cafés and houses.

By 2:00 p.m. I have reached the beach. When you are nearing the sea side, you start hearing the enchanting murmur… long before you can see the sea. The murmur is followed by a cool breeze hitting you on your face. I was so thrilled that any minute I will be able to see her, the “Babe of Bengal”. A few steps, a few meters and there is she… huge, vast, monstrous sea. The vastness, the horizon covering sea, the watery mother, the wet lover, the raging beast, the quivering girl, the shapeless whole. The Sea!

My dear Sea! There she is! There Sea is! She the Sea!

“There is something utterly romantic about the sea... it can make you insanely happy and hopelessly sad at the same time.”

For a minute I am motionless, awestruck at what I was seeing, feeling and hearing. Then my camera came out and I went berserk… clicking at will, full on burst mode.

After I was confident that I would have got at least one good shot of the sea, I parked myself on the black rocks. This beach is a rocky beach. You cannot get down and swim… only watch by the rocks, as the sea dashes herself against the rocks. Time and again. Like a perennial loop.

I settled down on the rocks and started gazing the monster that was grunting in front of me, and every once in while the waves would dash and spray water over my face, My spectacles were dotted with misty water droplets.

Soon hours started lapsing and I kept looking at the sea. Trying to understand what lay ahead of me, trying to reason out with myself the events that have shaped my life off late. The marquee events of the year gone by. Love, this, that and everything else.

As time flew, the answers came, and brought with them more questions. The sea answered and questioned at the same time, like the angel of contradictions, and once in a while I could hear two voices in my head. One probing, the other answering, then the second voice saying absurd things to which my voices giving simple explanations. It happened for a while, then a while longer, and for far too long. Hours passed by or so it seemed. And I kept looking at the sea. I was stone faced. But my mind and heart were going through a gamut of emotions. I was laughing out loud one moment, then suddenly bursting into howling cries, then the other moments I will be lost somewhere in the far spreads of the sea. I pretty much went through every emotion that a human can experience. Yes, in that one long gaze into the sea. I sensed how the entire human race felt about everything. I was for once connected to every human, every life form, every tree, every insect, every stone, every sand grain, every mood, every day in every way. For those moments I was all and all were me. The sense of individuality blurred until it completely disappeared. It felt very different. Felt the way… I really don’t know how to word it. It was tasteless… without flavor. The closest I could term that feeling was… I felt “neutral”.

Then slowly I let myself slip out of the phase, out of the inertness, out of the wormhole into the present. Facing the sea… hearing voices of people around, seeing young couple hold hands by the sea, peanut vendors selling warm roasted peanuts in conical paper packs. Coming back to life around was like waking up from some deep sleep. I was both refreshed and clumsy. I realized I was thirsty. I looked around the beach and spotted a café on the beach “Le Café”… just ten meters from where I was sitting.

I moved to the café and parked myself on the sea facing table, well all tables in the café face the sea. I start to write.

A waitress, a young lady, possibly 30-odd years old, brings me the menu card.

I run through the menu card’s drinks section and I am almost about to order Ginger Tea. But what do I know; I see an item on the menu that makes me jump out of my seat, out my place, out of this world. I put on my spectacles to double check if I read it right. Yest it is what I first read.

Lo’ behold, Ladies and Gentlemen! Boys and Girls, Crows and Crabs, Gods and Mortals!

The item’s name is “Radha Juice”. Yes Boss! It is on the menu. That’s what it reads. You can go check it out and drink your heart’s fill.

Radha Juice!

My mind swivels and I get the inner pulse of what all this is turning out to be. The solid ground under my feet starts to melt, like a liquid, like the sea has invaded into the Terra Firma of my life and existence.

Yu hoooo! Radha Juice it is for me.

With a strong circular wave of the hand, I hail in the waitress. Almost embarrassed I tell her to get me a glass of Radha Juice. And off she goes. I couldn’t believe it… they are selling the essence of Radha… whatever they meant it to be. I know what it is. I wait eagerly for the drink to arrive. My camera ready to capture how she looks like in glass. Supernal Radha poured into a glass.

And there she comes. What a beauty!

Radhey! Radhey!

Purple, mauve, eccentric, electric, like black currant. I take one sip and I could feel a familiar flavor. It was half way between black currant god knows what. I instantly fell in love with the flavor. The more I drank, the more my head swirled. It had a taste of eternal longing blended with the taste of eternal union. Polarity went for a toss. Two extreme realities collided and turned Radha Juice into elixir of knowledge and fulfillment.

After one, came the second glass, and I kept ordering until the count went up to six in a matter of an hour.

I had fallen deep into nothingness, if at all there is such a state.

Slowly in my mind, I felt a vague and distant music playing… lingering on somewhere. Slowly the music came nearer; it was the sound of a flute. The magic slowly unfolded in my ears… I could now hear the birds chirp and leafs rustle… slowly as I was eating the chocolate brownie… I heard footsteps of someone walking with payal reverberating at the ankles. With the passing moments, I could hear more footsteps with payals making an orchestrated advance towards the jungle where I was sitting.

No it is the sea shore. No it is the jungle. Oh no, it is both. The two realities overlap.

The footsteps come closer and closer, as if in a circular dance… they are closing in. I can now see faint images of women, dancing to the tune of the flute. The flute ranges up and down and then deep into the souls that lay mesmerized by its atonement.

The bodies have been given up to music, as the music lifts them up and now the women are too many… dancing in spherical formation over and around me. The flute sound grows deeper and louder… throwing the women into a trance… thousand women and their payals keep tempo with the flute. But the flute is still searching… its call loud and long into the abyss of life. And then slowly emerges the Woman Ornate.

The call of the flute! Lady of the thousand moons! The eternal lover! The gracious herself! The pole star of all immaculate quests!

There she comes draped in turquoise, oh no it is red, or is it blue, no it is green. She wears the colors, all these and more. The thousand women circle the lady of the longing… and she forms the centre of the ever growing sphere of dance.

The flute calls and she answers.

Radha!

She sways to the soul aching layers of the music and the music surrounds her like the sea breeze surrounds the nightingale. Moment by moment the picture becomes clear. Now the dharak of the flute comes slowly through Radha’s ecstatic dance. He comes clothed in the shades of light and fills my vision with splendor.

Radha the glorious,
Radha the effercent,
Radha the enchanting,
Radha the divine,
Radha the lover,
Radha the loved,
Radha the music,
Radha the muse,
Radha the magic,
Radha the real,
Radha the ageless,
Radha the French,
Radha the German,
Radha the Indian, the Italian, the Brit, the Greek, the outlandish,
Radha the love!

She danced and danced and the flute master played the eternal music of Immaculate Conception. They communed in language yet now known to man in entirety.

The universe started to take shape in that rhythm. The flute obscured all thoughts and Radha was celebrated. And Radha with her divine dance made the truth evident.

Radha! Oh my Radha!

The gopis all merged into one, into Radha. And then Radha slowly meshed into the music of the flute and the flute master was spreading his music to create all universes and this verse.

The flute master! The omnipresent!

I feel the joy and entirety of the experience.

Radha the music! Radhey!

A voice prodded me. It called my name. Bala! I was aware. In multiple worlds at the same time. In the grandeur of Radha and the flute ! In the expansive roar of the sea! The gentle company of the Wanderer in me! The cerebral voice of my conscious self! In the world of mortals, in the world of demi-gods, in the world of all else. Aware!

It was the Wanderer trying to tell me something. He called my name, Bala!

And I knew now what the Wanderer feels above love. About his true identity, about himself, about me, about Radha, about the night scorpion. I had seen her face through the aircraft window, a face full of sun and moon, like splendor of truth filling in on a ruined church.

At this time I felt both as the “nightcrawler” and “wolverine”, as myself and the wanderer. The duality that vanquished all dualities.

The scorpion of the night sky superimposed over the lady glorious “Radha” and I carry their imprints in my heart. The true essence of love.

The word R A D H A … falls like rain in front of my eyes and reassemble themselves in various forms to deliver meaning to me.

Radha is the very basis (ADHAR) for the ever flowing stream (DHARA) of divine worship (ARADH).

Radha, the incarnate universe… the medium to unravel the immanent divinity of the absolute!

I quietly pay the bill and walk back towards the rocky beach. It is dark now. Around seven… I seat myself and gaze at the monster goddess in front of me. The goddess of unending shape and distance. The maker of life. The watery respite. The stable of the unstable. I am back staring at her. My face we with the watery slaps. She teases me like a lover, then assures me like a mother, she then rages like an angry land lady, then dances like Radha herself.

I keep a quite gaze. I subject myself to her.

Given to thee oh magnanimous! I am but a seed, take me away to the garden of the Parijat, And sow me there, For the blue one is aboard the Garuda and searching for me!

The night slowly drives the hoards of tourists away. And it is me and the sea and few strangers lingering on. It is getting late and I look at my watch but can’t see what time it is. It is very dark, a moonless night at that. I take out my mobile… it is 11’o clock. I stay put.

A solitary policeman comes and shudders his stick near me. Drawing my attention. Asking me to leave. I tell him I won’t cause any trouble, but he is not amused. So I amuse him. Hand him a hundred rupee note and off he goes. I hear the wanderer murmuring something. He is second guessing my questions. I ask him if there is merit in existence, in this entire struggle to cope up to life, in this everyday nonsense, in the infirm construct of a reality, in this maya?

He asks me to look at the sea and learn. I look at the sea, I can only hear her now, all is black like death. All is consumed except the white foam boarder of the invisible sea when it hits the rocks. Like death and cessation when Shiva had danced his “Tandav”, only white ashes in the darkest tomb of Shiva’s annihilating reality.

The destroyer!

Like Shiva’s tumult, the invisible black sea roars and rages, like rogue kids fighting under a blanket in a dark room. The black waters dash against the black rocks and are turned white, and hence visible.

I start to believe in futility of action and reaction. Of any action or reaction. The giant and unending sea surges towards the land and yet every time her will broken down by the cold black rocks. This eternal game, this waste tells me to not believe in action or home. For none exists in the dark womb of the true universe.

I keep the thought in my mind.

Time passes.

I am feeling extremely cold and uncomfortable. I try to move but my body is stiff. I look around and for a few minute thrown out of my wits. I woke up at the beach and it was before sunrise. I had slept on the rocky beach. I forgot to go back to the hotel. It was 5:30 a.m.

I looked at the sea and she was still dashing against the rocks, with joy of a child and therein I learned my true lesson and went back to my hotel.

Wanderer and the saucerful of magical absurdities

2009-12-21T11:19:00.003+05:30

With the boarding pass in my hand, I alight the shuttle bus to the aircraft… edgy, eager and looking forward to my trip to Pondicherry. Since yesterday evening I have been feeling a pounding void inside of me. A deep longing… something gnawing at my core.

The news channels were abuzz with Pondicherry bring in the watery embrace of a cyclone. But I was not moved… the cyclone within was perhaps calling out to the two cyclone without.

I boarded the aircraft and was ecstatic to get the seat I yearned for. Window seat at the wing. I could see the clouds and also see the propellers and the entire right wing. I kept staring out. People filled in. It was time for takeoff. I was too lost… too fascinated looking out of the window of our stationary metal bird.

Outside were many more of these metal bird monsters. To me they appear like Garuda, the vehicle and emissary of lord Vishnu… only that these were metalized.

And then my favorite part of the flight the sudden thrust and off we are on the tarmac… surging towards the sky and in a jiffy lift off.

The entire episode happens to be the only interesting part of a flight journey, except may be the mid-air turbulence. Otherwise flights are boring. I am train journey chap. That too second class. You have not traveled to or through a place unless you have breathed its air, heard its voices, felt the verve.

Anyways the metal beast thunders and shudders and we are air borne. The ear starts to hurt as the bird soars higher.

For the first time I look to my left… at the passenger sitting next to me… and I am shocked beyond my wits.

Its him, the Wanderer! Boom!!!

“Goodness gracious! What the hell are you doing here”, I scream. But my scream is drowned in the jet propulsion.

And he is grinning at me. Wow!

“I can’t believe this. I knew this trip will be flushed with strange things. I knew it.” – I tell him. My voice hardly audible. He continues to grin, the Wanderer!

Slowly by the minute the metal bird, the spice Garuda grains altitude and the engine goes over to cruise mode , the cabin crew’s voices are now audible, the turbo blast is calmed.

The Wanderer speaks – “Let me start with quoting the American poet, ee cummings,
“here is the deepest secret nobody knows
here is the root of the root and the bud of the bud,
and the sky of the sky of a tree called life;
which grows higher than soul can hope or mind can hide
and this is the wonder that's keeping the stars apart
i carry your heart… i carry it in my heart.”

These lines dear Balaji, ought to establish why our lives are crisscrossing. Need I say more? I know not. Well. How have you been? You look sleepy. Sleep then. Don’t worry I will be around with you, through your trip. Intruding once in a while."

Although I was indeed sleepy, I was too astonished to sleep. I had to speak with him, query him, understand and probe…

I said, “well, tell me. What is this entire deal? You speak about love, about wandering, about seeking, about pursuits. And your friend on the other hand comes down hard and tells me to think about bigger things. About the cosmos, about the universe, about finding the true purpose of our existence. Both of you are supremely compelling in your own ways and I am at tenterhooks. To believe or let go, to plunge or withdraw. You both speak of opposite things. What do I do?”

To which the wanderer said – “dream boy… dream. For dreams are our only saviors. It is through our dreams and your writing that we will be able to make sense of this. Worry not about my friend. He has the purest of emotions and sacred is his concern about me, about you, about both of us, about this story. In all my wandering ages, I have found him to be my safest escort. Take my word, it is all for the good, as you people say.

I know what makes you take this trip and I am here to help you on this journey. The way you are helping me with my story and with my journey. Quid pro quo!"

I interrupt him, “But I want to know your story. Closely like I know myself. Tell me. I am all ears. I am so awed by the way you take love to be. Tell me about this night scorpion, this moon-faced fairy up the faraway tree, this sharp eyed lemur, who is she? Well is she even real? Do you love her? How does it feel to love her? Does she know, if she is real that is? But are not too old… you look a few centuries old easily. What’s she like?”

The wanderer puts his hand over mine in a reassuring gesture.

He says – “Relax Bala. You will know. There is nothing I will hide from you. But right now I want you to feel, Bala. Feel the way you want to feel about yourself. Tell me. How does it feel to be you? What is going on in your head? In your heart? Within you?”

I look at him and start talking, “I feel often lost, rudderless, free flowing without a tangible direction, I feel like a kite whose string has been snapped and the passing wind is taking it along to wherever it is going. I offer no resistance. I flow, madly without reason or purpose. I feel an urge… an urge to explode , to create a huge thump, dish-dash, cling-clang, slam-baam, like the propeller of this jet, like an exploding supernova, to burn like fuel, to consumer all and be consumed, like a burning comet, like Dhumketu, like a cosmic storm of fire raging in the dark universe, like a Tsunami, like a blind hurricane, like a drunk tornado, like an all shattering earthquake, like a raging forest fire, like a cyclone, like a ….”

The wanderer interjects and completes the thought – “… like a supersonic jet tearing through the skies and bursting the heavens at the seam. Boy you feel like a Sonic Boom! Don’t you? Boom! Boom! Sonic Boom!”

I smile back at him and say, “Yup, like a Sonic Boom!

Boom, Sonic Boom, Boom Sonic,
I am on my own, not on gin n’ tonic,
I blaze the sky, with the look in my eye,
I got no wings, and that’s why I fly,
Boom, Sonic Boom, Boom Sonic,
I tell the velvet eye, to wander the sky,
To the French town, to eat all the French fries,
Boom, Sonic Boom, Boom Sonic!”

The wanderer is humming a tune and he takes my words… “Boom, Sonic Boom, Boom Sonic,” and asks me to look outside the window.

I look out and I see the absurd vision. It is me outside, on the wings, not one but four MEs.

Spaced out over the right wing in a rhombus formation. Four freaking ‘MEs’ The one at the front, near the edge of the wing, was me with an ESP Explorer guitar with an ebony inlay fret board and with a steel mesh mike in front; the one to the left besides the window was me the bassist, to the back was me on 14x6.5" Bell Brass Snare Drum with All Zildjian Cymbals and the heavy duty works… the Cymbals were flying through the air as if in a fit of air trapeze feeling my hand only once in a while; the one to the far right was me, the lead guitarist with Gibson Firebird, bending and manipulating the air around the aircraft with my soul aching liquid leads. Those were all ‘MEs’, singing to the tune the wanderer was humming, singing to my lyrics, I could hear “‘em”… could hear me.

The one at the lead guitar had already started to peddle up, complex flow of fingers almost gliding through the fret board, so fast that only a haze of the hand is visible, only an approximate hand; the one on the bass was shaking his head like a monster and banging the living day lights out of the strings; the one at the drums was pounding so hard that the with every cymbal stroke the aircraft twisted toward the right and lost its balance momentarily, the one at the front , the front man, manning the vocals and rhythm guitar was screaming the all too familiar song, the one that was just conceptualized…

“Sonic Boom”, he stretched the word “Soneeec Boom, Soneeeeeec Booooooom!”, then with a sudden thump clipped the syllables… “Sonic B’om! Boom Sonic!” and so went the song.

A deafening rock concert on the wings of a plane… I watched them as they played out the rhythm from my mind, dripping words into the raging sea storm of the music. Boom Sonic!

Then suddenly, there was turbulence in the air and I peeped down the wings to see how the world looked. The moment I tilted my head, hoping to get a better view of the world from the window, the metal beast, the Garuda, swayed to the right, plummeting rapidly. I sensed it was to do with my vision... I had caused it to drop, my need to see the world below has pushed the aircraft to drop… now I was in a daze... the drop in altitude had caused the blood to rush up to my brain… I was feeling light headed… I tried to look up and focus on the monster band playing on the wings… what I now saw was very different… instead of four ‘MEs’ it was only one ‘ME’ but like a headen god, like Ravana meshed with Vishnu, I had four heads, eight arms, like one composite stage act, each doing his own thing, playing to the Sonic Boom. One gothic monster playing out my song. The bassist, besides the window was now one of the heads protruding from the analogous neck, was giving me an eyeball. I looked out at him in amazement. He looked at me with rage. I heard them out play my song, multifarious variations of it, numerous times over and over again.

I looked inside the airplane and the Wanderer was staring at me. I asked him if he also saw what I saw.

He said – “I was too busy being me, my dear, I was watching the night scorpion circling the sky, looking at mortals below, eyeing her target, mounting her sting and inflicting me with her venom, the venom that makes me the wanderer, the one who rides the desert winds, the one who understands each one of those mirages, the one who forever seeks the oasis by the palm tree.”

I ask him, “how does she look like, is she really a scorpion, an arachnid?”

He smiles back and asks me to look outside the window.

I look out and see that the rock monster of me has disappeared into thin air and now I could see the plane gliding over the clouds, white clouds, like blurbs of shaving foam. Slowly one of the bigger foam blurb starts to shift shape, I could see a face emerging, a familiar yet distance face, I could see that it is a face of girl, big and bright, the rays of the sun reflecting on her face or is that she is radiating that light I am not sure. But the face is huge and round, like a moon, and at the same time bright and glorious like the sun, the face is fiery orange, and I can see a pair of eyes as if exuding fire… and I feel a sense of déjà vu. I have seen this face. It is near. But I cannot confidently ascertain who this is. I look at the wanderer and he is blissfully lost in thought. I look out again, but the face is gone. Now there is no face. Just more white blurbs of shaving foams.

I turn to the wanderer and say, “I saw her. Was it her? Was it your night scorpion? Well she doesn’t look like a scorpion. The face was beautiful.”

The wanderer responded, “Well she has many faces, she too like us is a shape shifter, she is both the sun and the moon and the intervening darkness.”

He then takes out from his hand baggage an ivory saucer and a vial of purple serum. Pours out the liquid from the vial into the saucer and hands it over to me.

I drink without question. And then my mind slowly blurs. Before I passed out I recall the Wanderer’s words… “I will be with you through this trip, in you, you won’t even notice for most parts, but then you will know that there is someone inside of you, inside your freaking head who is not you. That would be me Bala. We wander together for some time now.”

I passed out.

Wanderer – beyond the pale blue dot

2009-11-26T23:32:00.012+05:30

After reading the letter from the Wanderer, I was all set to meet the Wanderer’s friend at the café. I believed without doubt that I will find him sitting on the same red wood table where I had the two encounters.

I folded the letter into my blazer pocket and headed out. I was back to travelling public transport. Wanted all my time and attention to be on my journey, not on driving, not looking out for traffic of life, not bothered about looking at indicators of turns in life, not sucked into shifting gears, or the need to accelerate or to break. I wanted to be driven to my destination like a prayer.

I kept taking out the letter from my coat pocket and reading portions of it before I put it back. This happed a few times before my ride ended and I was just across the café.

Without wasting time, I rushed into the oriental old-world building that housed the café. I entered this time with such certainty that I could see the Wanderer’s friend smiling at me even before the door opened. There he was, broad-shouldered and quaint, wearing a steel gray cots wool overcoat.

I said hello.
He said, “About time” and smiled.

Without saying much I handed over the letter. He kept staring at me while holding the letter in his left hand. I said, go ahead. Read it. He didn’t care much. But I insisted. Suddenly his face turned a bit tense, a bit irritated, a bit of every emotion that I was uncomfortable with.

He said –“So all this is a damned joke to you. You consider this to be some kind of a thrilling story line. You come here, we tell you some crazy stuff, you glorify it, you pen it down, garner the creative credit, and greed for more. You have any idea how you are making it seem like? Do you have any idea? Any fucking idea?

Boy, do not test my patience. There is nothing that you can test in me. For once get this straight; I am not your juke box of knowledge. I came here because the Wanderer saw something in you, something that I believe to be true. I did not come here for your misguided projectile youth. So stop treating this as your prerogative.
Do I make myself amply clear?”

I was taken aback and it took me a moment before I could gather my thoughts and respond.
I said, in a shocked state of mind, “what did I do? I do not understand what you are saying.”

He retorted – “Well, look around you. What do you think is happening? With you and in your life? Do you actually think that all this while we have been here to gift you a story? Really?

Damn it. Do you think all this brewing is for some forsaken story of love? Do you think this is all about some random guy, who knows nothing but Wandering, falling into love endlessly? Do you think this is about some melancholic story of love, longing and completion? Or do you think this is about some moment in your life when your art of writing has been earmarked and some benefactor has sent down two agents to guide you to your glory. Fuck you!

This is not a linear, chronological, epitaph for you to journal.

This is life as it was commissioned to be. LIFE, the story of its commissioning, the narration of being, the counting of the mid-day cash at the counter, counting of the sheep before moving ahead, this is the journey back, the journey to when it all started, to where it all started, to why it all started, to whom it all started with. This is the story of nature and its beyond. The story of the great beyond.
Look at this picture (taking out a photograph out of his coat pocket). Look at this grand revelation, the spoof of all times, look at this, do you understand what you are looking at? Can you spot anything of significance? Anything at all? Do you even see anything you recognize in there? Anything?

Damn it and you think it is about some wandering bugger. Damn it!
Look closely at this for a moment or as long as you would want to (pushing the photograph towards me on the table).”

I looked at it and could not make head or tale of it. An underexposed photograph with slanting lines going through as if some murky light filtering through a black curtain into a dark room. That’s it. That’s all I saw.

I looked up to him, and made a contorted lip movement amply displaying my ignorance and the disability to make any sense of the photograph.

He asked– “What is your favorite color?”

I responded, “Green, bottle green, in fact clear bottle green to be precise.”

He continued – “Well, do you even see a semblance of green in there? In the photograph! Look closely, young man. Look at the tiny dot on in the middle of the brown inflection bar to the right. Look at that pale blue dot. Do you see it?”

Following instructions, I looked closely. I found what he was referring to.
I said, “Yes”

Moving on, he said – “Well that little spec, that little pale blue dot, that “you don’t even have to blink to miss” dot is our beloved planet. It’s a real photograph. Taken by the Voyager from space panning into our solar system.

Understand the perspective. It is important that you do so. This snapshot puts our planet in perspective of our solar system. Now imagine the enormity of our solar system. Can you? How do you feel? Weird? Small? Insignificant? Like a non entity?

Now consider this. This was just a view from within the solar system. Imagine how our planet will look if we pan out and look at our Galaxy, which contains innumerable such solar systems. Imagine the swirling Milky Way with millions of such solar and interstellar systems and then try and picture earth in that pudding of heavenly bodies and stars. Flummoxed? So soon?

Now try and put it in perspective the fact that in the “known universe”, as we know it, as Science and human race understands and defines it, there are about 500 billion such galaxies. So if one has to spot Milky Way in the burst of galaxies in the known universe it might not even be visible as a dot.

And to loop this up, let us put the so-called “known universe” in perspective to the entire ever expanding cosmos. Well, well! That’s a tricky order. Would you agree? The known universe, the extent of Science’s reach is only a drop in the larger ocean of the unknown universe, perhaps even less.

Having said what I just said, look at the pale blue dot in the larger schema. Does this mean anything? Anything of real consequence?

The life, the complications, the splendor of the perceivable, the aching of the unperceivable, the gimmick of success, the dangling of failure, the edginess of wait, the strut of the gait, the rhythm of the rhyolite, the silent smirk of ignis fatuus, of all that and everything else. Is it of consequence on a nearly non-existent planet of ours, the collective memory of millenniums, the million and one gods, the theology of religions, the billions and billions of life forms, the rock and roll, the blues, the maroons, the long hair, the crew cut, the nose pins, the roadster, the toaster, the ipod, personal gods, the velvet fist with a iron rod, the make belief, the military chiefs, the romantic novel, the white witch, the dark knight, the dull and the bright, the ace of spades, the queen of hearts, the jester card, the Avon bard, the B-52s, the concord cruise, the Titanic, the Carpathia, the Sitar, the electric guitar, the walking mummies, the dying babies, the virgin mother, the unborn god, the fluke, the lucky princess, the unlucky toads, the flying monkey, the barrels of sin, iss din, uss din, ye saare din.

Do you get me young man?

I mean there has to be some grand design. Don’t you think so? I mean this can’t be just for kicks set up. Can it? Look at it, why would someone, say GOD, sprinkle dust of life on this pale blue dot? Importantly, is it not naïve to believe, and not merely assume, that life roots only on this tiny spec of a planet? I mean come on.

Give up your screwed up blockages and think rationally, and I mean truly rationally for once. Putting all this in perspective… Who could have, would have done this? And why? And then what are we supposed to do? Just play out this seemingly insignificant existence of ours in the ant hole? Is that all? Is this all that we have or are meant to do. To foreclose our being in a tiny wormhole in this universe. Loose our sense to anonymity?

Think of this young man and seek your answers. For we will meet again here in a few days time. For now I need to go.”

And he left me there… in this café… with a lukewarm cuppa by my side to chew on this.
End of day!

Letter from the wanderer

2009-11-10T23:44:00.004+05:30

After meeting two forces of nature, the wanderer and his friend, over two different encounters, I was ready for more. I knew my next meeting will be with the wanderer’s friend. I was all geared up, packed in my questions, neatly rested my mind, was all happy.

Just then the door bell rang, my mom went to open the door. After about half a minute, I heard calling my name. I rushed out of my room to the door. It was a courier. I received the envelop and signed the counterfoil.

Walking calmly back to my room, I ripped apart the envelope from its sides and pulled out the letter. It was addressed to me, “dear Bala”. I flipped the pages to see who had undersigned. It read, “Yours, always, Wanderer”.

I felt a cold sweat trickle down my spine, my hands were trembling and were cold. For some reason I was shit scared. It was as if the motifs of this entire episode had started to invade my life, my home.

From meetings in some coffee shop to my home, my bedroom, “The sanctum sanctorum”. It was until now, a just for kicks, bring it on, let us have some metaphysical fun. But now it was in my life. Forcing its way like a gust of wind from below the door.

I started reading the letter…

****************
Dear Bala,
Last day of October!
Since now you are truly into my story, and are penning it for me I would like you to publish this rapture for me.

“Yuppie! My hunch worked. It feels awesome. Losing as a word has ceased to be in the dictionary of my life. This has primed me up. The meeting with her. One glimpse of her and it felt like love. The same it felt before. Marquee feelings going round in my head.
It tasted like ecstasy for a moment. Like choco-chip muffin. The melting cocoa of love. The boiling pot for that instant. The scorpion of the night sky. She, the “now-for-the-moment” angel with big moom like face, eyes bright as sun rays, smile half concealed of our past. Basically, the works.

The prima facie evidence of heart’s calling. The magic of small moments, the innocent overture of young love. That’s the thing, bamb! Love keeps us young. Irrespective of our recent conditioning. It makes us young, defying age and experience even if for a few moments.
It breaks the occult of time and bondages. It frees the spirit and at once we kneel down and drink out of the ocean of love.

For me, it is a promise that I will never fall out of myself. I will stick to my convictions, go by my heart, abide by its calling, and shamelessly give into its command. And in doing so, feel sane. And hope that one day, just like that, love will answer back and I will be taken.
Now, I am relying on such miracles. These miracles are my norm. The joy of loving each wandering step. Finding a soothing balm in every tiring step. I don’t know if I have choice, or even if a choice truly exists. But that doesn’t hinder me. I carry on, without boundaries, into shapelessness. Rules merit no mention, and rules of the world merit no worldly mention.

The wait is enjoyable. I am liking it. Nice and soft and this time so full of wisdom, especially knowing how it’s going to end. I feel the path ahead, like clockwork, every step, it’s as if god gave me the power to love, and that love gave me the power to control it. But I let it go, scot free… like a bird in the open sky, like a flowing river, like an overflowing giblet of wine.

I touch thee or thy ‘will’ not. For this sweet bitter longing and “up to chance” thing is more fruitful than all of certainties. The anticipation, the verve, the moments, the spark, the ocean of love overflowing into me, like a never ending saga. My heart pounding, just by her presence in the periphery. The shake of my hand as I write this, the thoughts overflowing out of me, but my words failing to keep up.

I wait in pure anticipation… for her, for her acknowledgement, for her to walk up to me, break the code of social and safe conduct and say something, anything. I don’t care. Just about anything, anything at all. God help!

It is a feeling I am sure of more than I ever did. It is the anticipation of love’s response through no less than love itself.

Well as for me it tells me that love is worth all this. It tells me that I am still young; it tells me that no matter what… there is a safe white place for love. Where is there no harm, no fears, no inhibitions, no restrains, no stoppages, no nothings. A place where love and hate don’t collide, no boundaries that divide, no masks that hide, magic and love, all of selfless pride.

I don’t think it’s a waste, no its not. It is all worth it… centum worth. But I also know… despite the fanfare, it’s at best is going to be a fledging moment, post which I will be all alone, stranded.

“But how can I be lost, when I have no place to go”, sooths James Hetfield.

I stay focused and stray for that once glimpse. Please don’t steal it away from me. If it has to come as a clichéd writer’s moment… so be it.

I will wait and let the summary of the world be written at this moment. Steal it boy! Steal it like a breathing populace. Steal the charming by the dozens.”

After reading this letter, I was finding it difficult to picture up the wanderer. He was old, full of wisdom, full of fullness. This was juvenile, young, quirky, like a young kid throwing tantrum for candy and trying to romanticize his craving for it. But what the heck, as a writer I am loving every moment of this. So much to write about, so easy to get a hook, so easy to fantasize and mesmerize.

I am going to take this letter to the Wanderer’s friend and show him what his old buddy is up to.

Before I brush this aside as some clear happy shit, I am tempted to read into the date when the Wanderer wrote this and it kind of spooks me.

Seeking the wanderer... God Gene

2009-11-08T15:10:00.006+05:30

(Suggested pre-read Wanderer)

I have been wandering ever since. The encounter with the ageless wanderer had left me muzzled up. All I could do all these while was howl and scream and run the last words the he left me with in my heart.

“My love train stops at no station, no passengers abode, just the driver and the guard… set perennially apart by the manifest, by the jest, by the infirm test, by the world and the rest…”

I kept going back to the same café in search of the legendary wanderer but to no avail. With each failed attempt my angst and frustration grew louder. Today was supposed to be the last visit to the café. The moment I entered, I saw a familiar silhouette; of a man sitting at the exact same table, where I met the wanderer earlier. My heart was overjoyed. I rushed to grab a seat next to the gentlemen. I sat down and greeted him.

He looked up. To my dismay it was not the wanderer I had met before. It was someone else. I felt disappointed and at the same time also embarrassed that I had barged into someone’s personal space. I said sorry.

The man, almost sixty, replied back –
“Boy, you must be Balaji and must be looking for the wanderer. He told me all about you and how you helped him pen his story. He told me you come here every day and wait for him and go home disappointed. He feels sorry for you. But he can’t make it to this place for quite a while now. Instead he asked me to meet you and here I am.”

I felt strange, really strange. I asked him who he was.

He responded, “Well, I am an old friend of his. He wanted me to thank you for taking his story to the world and he knows it is in safe hands. But he also knows that the encounter with him had left you with many questions. You can ask me the questions boy; I will give you the answers that he would have given you. Word by word!”

My first question, Is it really love? Really? For so many women?

He responded, “Poor you! must be traumatized. Well young man, let me put in a way it really is and then you decide whether you want to call it love or not.

Technically speaking, right at the time when god was toying with the idea of Genesis, he realized that he needs to have a one-on-one connection with all his creation all the time. He knew he needed a platform that afforded no outages, no noise. He also felt the need for peer to peer connection between his creation so that he could relay signals. After much mulling over this, he knew what was required. He embedded invisible traces of himself in each of his creation. Ardent grains of god blended into each soul. Each grain having a certain, specific and unique pairing code for relay signaling and a universal architecture for seamless summation at the cosmic cash counter. This was full proof, tiny seeds of gods embedded into each vessel.

Well don’t get overwhelmed young man, this was the only technical part, rest all is emotional as you would like to call it.

The flavor of god within our Wanderer had started to churn. When the churning gathers momentum, it releases a sweet, heavy, pull somewhere between his lungs. An ecstatic central thump in his chest, a dish-dash, which suddenly makes you see the seams of the universe. A feeling of glorious foolishness, a kick, a swirl, a tilt, a sway, a connection stronger than the one when we pray. The onset of god’s direct, overbearing, tangible presence in us. It’s flame, a spark, a mark, that would talk. It talks, he listens. It commands, he obeys. It directs, he delivers. Now his heart is fully radioactive – like an active radio it transmits and receives, without modulation, the link to the absolute signal.

He continues to wander… for he searches and searches for years, decades, centuries, millenniums, within the shores of eternity. He searches for the vessel, which not only emits, but has become the true emblem of that cut piece signal. He searches for his completion, the one that resides in the hallway of time… a consummation of his soul with the stark water paradise. A cosmic union, at a time and place when and where he himself will attain his pinnacle and his love will wander carelessly to a woman who would be ready to relay the signal home. The magnetic match whose value will be precise to the value of Pi to the last decimal. A day and place when he will cease to wander. A day and place when he will unfold the hammock by the tree and laze around in company of his love and slowly disappear into the sky.

Until then, this wandering is his calling. To find the vessel, to find vessels, to understand her, to understand them, to understand his true calling, understand the mechanics of love’s true nature, to understand why his radio hooks up to this frequency, to understand where this channel will lead him, to understand this sub-relay (relay within the larger relay), to understand his own self, his true currant, the blackest currant.

And through this journey, many worlds would swim across him, bringing him hope and despair, love and hate, free will and fate, timelessness and date, empty bottles and crates. Then the spark will be fanned by his true pursuit and it will engulf the forest of his life, blow out of proportion, like a million supernova exploding at the same time, it will be the brightest light on the every darkest night. It will be his absolution. His answers without the questions. Like an electromagnetic wave it will dissolve all else, and love would shine the brightest.

And through this journey, he will touch upon the vessels of his calling, the women in whose being his god finds a match, he will seek, until there is nothing left to seek in that vessel, and through this he will learn the baby steps of god, of tactical deficiency of life and attainment, and en route rub off his magic to these women, and unassumingly guide them towards their own destiny, prod them to their wondrous acme, and one of these very women would without fail quench his eternal thirst and making him flow into god, eventually.

That’s it young man. That’s the all I wanted to tell you when you asked me the question.”

Whoaaaaaaaaa... I had no clue what to do now, what else to ask him next.

But cutting through this seamlessly endless ocean of knowledge, the gentleman asked me a question.

“Tell me young man, what should the wanderer do? If I told you that the women he pursues now holds only promise of knowledge and would not be his grace. Should he hold back the wave of his heart? What should my friend do?”

I looked into the old man’s eyes and replied –

“So if from rank to rank she darts her ardent eyes,
let she find only love, and if love be thy true calling,
let it find its own path!
Keep the flame burning bright, Foreknowledge is alright,
You take only what was yours, in your unending flight.”

I was amazed at what I had heard, at what I had said, at how all this was beginning to shape up. I felt an irresistible urge to dart back home, write this down, word by word… the way it happened.

I asked for the old man’s leave. Said I will be back tomorrow to meet him again. He only smiled back. Put his hand through his coat pocket and pulled out an old world silver business card holder. Carefully, like all old men, he took out one card and handed it over to me. Without looking at it I put it in my kurta pocket.

I still do not have the guts to see what the card reads!

At this juncture, I would like to quote myself - “A day will come when you will see, I will turn into the answers I once asked of thee”

Wanderer

2009-10-31T01:08:00.005+05:30

Off late I have been making wandering visits to coffee shops, pubs, old world shopping arcades like Connaught Place and even to weekend flea markets. Not for fun or recreation, but to find pieces of life I had lost. Moments that now seem too distant to be real, yet so real to be close. I am turning into wanderlust!

In one of my wandering visits to a quaint coffee shop that also served hookah I met this seasoned wanderer. A wanderer who traversed through life like a smoke screen. He was now beginning to blur at his edges, getting sort of translucent, almost like a watermark. Yet he held on to his stories, his experiences, his only definitive definition.

My privilege of getting to know him was a result of a lazy Saturday afternoon that had hordes of people flocking the coffee haven. Unlike the super-commercial Cafés of the times, this one had an old world bookish charm. I had to park myself at the only available seat in the joint, and with due permission of this gentleman who didn’t seem to mind having company on the same table, at such close quarters.

I ordered my hookah to be made ready and a mug of Cuban coffee along with raisin croissant. It took about ten minutes for the order to be served, and during these ten minutes I had started to write something in my diary… totally oblivious of my company.

The gentlemen spoke, “I remember you, I had seen you years ago. So frivolous you were. Full of possibilities of defining the world as you deem fit. And look at you now; you are falling into the same pattern as I have.”

I looked up at this unwelcomed rhetoric. Hoping to snipe back… but looking at him, into his eyes, my tongue froze. I was transfixed. I was his slave until he deemed fit to relieve me. He had some kind of supernal power over me. I gave in.

He said, “I need you to write my little story, my little thought bubble, on this piece of paper.”
I started to write as he spoke – “I have been wandering through this life in search of something that I haven’t found until this date. I have tried life, love, lust, longing, labor, trust, adventure, alcohol, drugs, coffee, wine, women, god, truth, temper, fear, levitation, and the list is endless. I have tried all there is to try. But I still am unquenched. My soul still longs for completion and cessation.

Of all things, I gathered through this tireless and unending journey, it is my memory that I cherish the most, my memory that I hold close to my heart, like a lover who keeps image ethereal images of his first love.

And I want you to write this as I remember it. Word to word. The story of my love, the stories of my love. I am incapable of not being in love. The one state of being foolishly in love defines my core. As my memory serves me right, I do not recall one moment when love was not washing me ashore. Sometimes like gentle tide of the frothy ocean and at other times dashing me to the rocks, until I bled through my eyes and created the Red Sea.

For all these years, I am constantly falling in love. It all started when I was a young lad, probably four or five. I saw this girl, big black eyed, huge face like a full moon, and I knew that for that moment and forever I wanted to be with her. We were in our first grade, we spent three wonderful years together in school before my parents moved to a new place and I had to switch schools. I love her until this day. She might have changed ever since, might be all old and wrinkled, but I still remember her as my morning sun. I wish she could read this. I wish.
Then years went by, switching two schools since then, I fell in love again. This time with the perfect Juliet of all times. If I were a writer like you, I would cast her as Juliet in every story. I was in my sixth grade, I had fallen head over heels with this silky haired girl. I could see no further, I knew that she was the girl I would like to grow old with. Boyhood dilemmas played havoc with my young innocent beating heart. I could not gather courage to walk up to her and paint her red with the teenage mush that I was the prime originator of. The opportune moment passed by and I experienced what we melancholically call a one-sided love. The prima- genitive of all of the poetry in this world. I then realized the bridge over the troubled waters could only be crossed by the true poet and the lover had to concede to poetry at this juncture. I became a poet.

Then life trudged on and I had frequent bouts of love for new women and recurring occultism of unending nature of all my loves. They all came back to me in my head and made it a timeless museum. They came in hordes, they outnumbered me. Yet I always had unwavering and abundant love for all of them. I was feeling like the giver of thoughts, the cornucopia of love for all those who were flushed with my heart. My sanctuary grew in space and in humble numbers, I fell in love incessantly, repeatedly, with the same women, finding her in new faces, in gazes, in new chases. I fell for her every time, through voice and mime, through whisky and lime, through cedars and pine, until I lost what was hers and what was mine.

Many summers went by and the winter’s cold kept at bay, by the unrelenting lantern of love. I was now a young man, all of twenty two solar revolutions old. And love my boy was the perfect bride I was waiting for.

And she happened. Love happened. Yes it did. Again.

I stepped into a room full of people who were hoping to make the cut into the post graduation school. I saw this timeless beauty, somehow knew what her name was, went ahead and called her by her name and she answered. Surya. The sun goddess, the miracle of light. The poet in me was now dancing in the ecstasy of a new found love. The poet was on a song. A rockstar! We started connecting at levels where consciousness ends. We exchanged thoughts through mere gazes, understood all before anything was ever said. It was the dream run, this machine was waiting for. But little time played its tricks. It was to be my mnemonic to move on. She got married, I got wasted. But that was that, for we before parting exchanged our art. I gave her my poetry and she her sketches. Our love had consummated. The meeting of the artists. Those dizzying heights of artistic playfulness when we knew what our hearts and arts meant.

Then for a while I was down, blood drunk in the darkest corner of my poetry. Like a ship wreck, I floated up unto the far reaches of eternity to find my love’s longing back. And in one of those eclectic visits to the other side of the universe, I felt a strong need to go back to where I came from.

When I reached life, I found my dear friend, morphed into my love. She and I, I and She, we fell in love. We loved. For years, we were together, we married each other. She was, presumably my best foil. Then my destiny cornered me. We fell off, but my love endures. Forever it endures. For it endures, I give it the least footage in the story. This is the meatiest part, hence hardly any need to marinate. She taught me, for the first time, how to love when you fall apart.

Through all this surreal and often chaotic experience of loves in my life, I found this sharp-eyed half-real women. Instantly fall head over heels with her. In her kurties I see pagan symbols of my own life, mocking at me, yet I fall in her, until a time that I would indulge in my root’s call and the shape would shift, the moment would drift, the veil would lift. Till that time it is “Aradhana”… the scorpion at the night, the lotus of fire, the balance in my lunar aspect, the conditioner of the moon, the disciple of the divine spark.

My love train stops at no station, no passengers abode, just the driver and the guard… set perennially apart by the manifest, by the jest, by the infirm test, by the world and the rest…”

Just then, a voice interrupted, excuse me… here is your hookah and your order. I looked up to the waiter in daze. He smiled and placed the order neatly on the small redwood table and walked away. I looked back at the gentlemen. But he was gone. Although, the book he was reading was lying on the table. The cover of the book read… “The song celestial”.

I felt an irresistible urge to cry and I cried in the coffee shop for hours after this episode. I cried when I came back home. I cried for days. Whenever I think of this episode, I explode into howling cries. And it made me remember what love is.

Conspiracy

2009-10-25T01:04:00.002+05:30

Humpty Dumpty spat on the wall,
Finding what we miss in every call,
The wall answered before the mighty fall,
When you stand together, you stand tall.
Humpty Dumpty disagreed and had a brawl,
They no longer played together with the ball.

Let us take an off the tangent view at everyday things. Let us just for kicks look at things in a different and not so “normal” way. Everyday happenings, events, “coincidences”.

Do you think there is a universal spoof being orchestrated on us? Some sort of a grand theft being carried out to steal little moments off our lives?

Imagine a day, when everything went along as if you were the director of the movie called life. Imagine it for a moment, how many retakes would you foster in your head to make it just perfect. And just when you are ready to roll, lights, camera, action. The universal spook begins to ghost direct your movie. All your dream sequences, randomly yet methodically, disrupted. Leaving you frustrated and at your wits end.
Does it feel irritating? If so, relax this was just a dream movie sequence. Not your “real” life.

What happens to your “real” life is worse.

You wake up with simple and achievable thoughts about a day. Thoughts so simple that they give you happiness, joy and contentment. But all of a sudden, some pieces are moved, wires switched, cards swapped. Your simple plans go for a toss.

Do you let this pass by as merely as a normal pattern of life? The way things are. Be subservient to the thought that we can’t control these things? That these obstructions happen randomly and have no “read between the lines” message.

Well as I urged, let us take a different view at life. Let us look at a day in the life of Mr Humpty.

“Humpty wanted to spend the whole of Saturday with his friend Dumpty. Humpty was feeling a deepened sense of having to share his feelings with Dumpty. This was very important to Humpty, yes it was. It was a deep craving. The entire day with Dumpty on the wall. It was all planned and agreed.

Come Saturday morning, Dumpty gave Humpty a call that he was to go meet another friend and will not be able to make it to the wall in the first half of the day.
Crack in the sky. Humpty’s craving quashed. Humpty felt that someone was trying and succeeding in parts to make sure Humpty didn’t live his day as planned. That someone was conspiring against his will to share his heart out to Dumpty on that day. He needed a full day with Dumpty for it to work for him. But now half the day was lost.

Humpty and Dumpty met in the evening at the wall. Humpty was irritated, Dumpty was confused.
The moment was almost gone, but Humpty tried to empty his heart . Just when Humpty was about to share his deepest feelings, concerns, it was nearly time to go. The rules of the world, its late, gotta go home. Again the intruder stealing away Humpty’s life.

When there were only a few minutes remaining for them of the evening. Humpty got a call on his cell, it was home calling, again those last few minutes too stirred.
And this joke continues, day after day, years at length. One day it is reason x, the other day reason y. It continues. Like a sick experiment.”

The above “day in the life of Humpty” might appear ordinary, so what’s the point, what’s the message kind of story. But the fact is that this happens to each one of us. Our little moments stolen. We don’t realize it. Like dishonest servant, who steals silverware behind the back for years. And when we get old, the thief becomes a robber. Barges in our lives and takes what’s rightfully ours at gun point.

Damn. I don’t know why I wrote this post. Just had a feeling in my head. Didn’t want the universal thief to steal it away. So penned it down. Irrespective of what sense this makes, I have managed to keep my moment with me. I feel happy, feel relieved that I could finish this.

But I feel sad for Humpty. But more than being sad, I would like to do something for Humpty.

Can anyone suggest what I can do?

Conflict

2009-10-04T23:09:00.005+05:30

The worst conflict you can have is with your own self, your own thoughts. I do not wish to sound abstract or elusive. I am at want for the right expressions and words. I find myself struggling today. The human in me is fighting hard with the storyteller. The fight to feel instead of weave, dramatize and share. Episodes very close to my life and heart have churned my being and stopped mid-way leaving a spiral aura inside of me, some sort of distorted galaxy of thoughts, opinions, rationalizations, expectations and disappointments.

The human in me gives into the storyteller. The storyteller in turn promises a non compromising view on feelings. Here it goes.
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Story 1
Two friends, genuinely close, were exploring their lives through the lens of youth. In their early twenties, they couldn’t have been happier. One of them had an awe inspiring love story taking shape. He loves this girl so strongly and purely that she could not stop loving him back. A perfect unison! Then over time a complexity arises. The other friend develops a romantic inclination with his close friend’s girl. Instead of holding back or confiding, he tries to work his way into the girl’s heart. His friend, the girl’s suitor, senses this but remains calm as he values his friendship too much. He is confident of his love and his relationship with his girl. However, then the other friend spins act. As an evasive tactic, he forges a cover up relationship of a god sibling with this girl. And that kind of continues for a while. But soon the mask rips apart and due a moment’s weakness this guy writes a letter to the girl confessing his feelings and telling her how he loves her more than his friend. This sets in motion a crazy turn of events. The inner convolution of this situation comes in the open. The two friends find themselves at the centre of a confrontation – a confrontation of ideologies, of upbringing, of merit of one’s character, of choices, of dealing with life.

At this juncture, the impinged friend becomes crazy with rage at the thought of being betrayed by his close friend starts getting seriously negative and destructive thoughts towards his friend. Thoughts that do not abide by rules of the society or of civil conduct. He communicates his malicious intention to his now estranging friend.

However, soon becomes overcome by the value of his friendship and dismisses his rage in favor of longevity of true friendship and accommodates this other friend on the condition that he comes out clean with his intention. The friendship lives to this day, after years of transformation, change, bouts of strive and mistrust, but still remains.

There is still, however, the element of awkwardness, which I feel remains. And that is the sad reminder of how things were. Of how we humans are fallible and how at the same time we can be magnanimous.

Now you might ask “What troubles you?”.

The answer is that to until this date I do not find a trace of honest repentance in the eyes of the second friend who was showered with the accommodative spirit of the first friend. This might not be an overbearing issue in the mind of the guy who forgave. But for me it is hard to fathom, it is hard to let go. My value system forbids me to be at peace with this situation, although it does not directly involve me.

You might ask how am I bothered or know how and what transpired. Well I could say, I was around, like a fly on the wall spying on their lives, like an thief stealing their emotions, like a judge passing my infrequent but stern judgments, like a culprit letting it happen, like another friend who could have done more far sooner.
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Story 2
Two friends, genuinely close, were exploring their lives through the lens of youth. In their early twenties, they couldn’t have been happier. One of them took the role of more than a friend, he was philosopher and guide. A brother who watched over. Many summers passed and through these seasons they grew closer to each other allowing each other’s intervention in life.

An hierarchy established, an order formed. One was clearly the active guide, the other largely being the guided. He guided his friend, relentlessly, through numerous dark woods of life. During a decade of friendship, this chap conquered great difficulties in life with the unwavering aid of his friend. But there came a point, after a specifically huge life changing event in this chap’s life that he started to operate independently. Often not caring much to believe in his friend’s ideology and wisdom. Although his friend was happy to see him finally coming onto his own, he was at the same time feeling left out. Kind of how a parent feels when the child grows up and leaves the nest. The interesting part is that even to this date, the friend’s philosophy and approach towards life remains simple and direct. In spite of this fact, the now freedom soaked chap, often does not believe in his friend’s approach the way he used to.

Now the question is, is his friend clinging onto the past and not moving ahead with time and embracing this chap’s new found individuality? Or this new town feeling is a mere illusion? Although this seems like a clichéd and boring thought. This very thought exists and manifests itself in most close relationships. And when it strikes we either are too scared of facing it or just brush it aside in the name of progress. But as the ancients say, wisdom has no age.

How does one handle such small but telling scenarios in life? I am clueless.

Now you might ask “What troubles you?”

The answer is this dilemma. The feeling of empathy with both of these close friends. Are we to move ahead leaving behind such magical relationships? Are we to sacrifice such timeless unions for sake of infirm progress?

You might ask how do I know what transpired. Well I could say, I was the crossword, the alphabet that joined these discrete yet connected souls, a culprit who let it happen, like another friend who could do more sooner than later.
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This ranting might not do too good in solving this scramble called life, but it helps the storyteller to do a day’s job and earn his piece of the bread.

Is this the bane of life? A seeping dysfunction? Are there simple things we can do to achieve a less complicated life? How far can the storyteller help the human? Is there a point after which the human walks alone, a journey within, to find solace… leaving the storyteller “the phoney bhand” to the world?

Gulaal, an afterthought!

2009-09-23T23:41:00.007+05:30

I watched Gulaal and could not stop short of penning my afterthoughts.
-Balaji Iyer
Gulaal is a raging mix of small town fallacies, vicious power struggle, relentless focus towards disillusioning motifs of values, and run towards self preservation. Nepotism driving people to man slaughter, to death. The movie is a hydra headed, multifarious war cry towards youth’s debauched snarl. A testimony that youth is power indeed, and thus, needs nothing less than a rebellion to justify its mere existence. An extremist view at youth’s craving for change. A decadent reality, albeit true in snort and shape.

Stellar performances by Abhimanyu Singh as the self-disinherited royal Rananjay, Kay Kay Menon as the local Rajput warlord “Dukey Bana”, Raj Chaudhary as the unexpected protagonist Dilip Singh make the movie a tight watch.

The most notable performance came from the stage veteran, Piyush Mishra, who essays a deranged “sutradhaar” of the otherwise megalomaniacal plot. A manic performance that dazzles beyond compare. With his burlesque rendition of Bismil’s “Sarfaroshi ki Tamanna” and war whooping “Aarambh hai prachand”, he rattles the screenplay and keeps temper high, very high. The music is one of the key characters in the movie, as the score broils the sequential progression of the characters and gives them provocative company towards their disarrayed destiny.

Unlike most politically strewn movies that delve into the decaying moral fabric of our society and impinge on how corruption and greed remain to be only dualities, Gulaal makes no such attempts. Its plot is devoid of any moral judgment, it is more of a reflection.

The aspect that smacks you to focus is the nauseous symbolism running parallel throughout the plot. When the disgraced lecturer (Jessy Randhawa) walks into her class, the word “Nihilism” on the blackboard greets her. The very scene spins the movie on its axis and we are thrust into a world of relentless anarchy and serial annihilation of power blocks. Violence is not a sin, but merely a solitary grip on self preservation. Or even the “Democracy Bar”, the place where the Ransa “the heir who has left his aristocratic loom” resides makes one wonder about the hidden meanings in each frame in Kashyap’s Gulaal.

Kashyap pulls no stop and pretends no excuse for this in your-face-gut-wrenching power play. Aarti Kashyap’s editing is as rapid and as it ceaselessly follows evolving situations, often as audience we are gasping for breath.

More than anything else, Gulaal reminds us of the volcanic power of our national language “Hindi” and its various dialects. Piyush Mishra’s stark poetry and its soul blazoning rendition can make even a stone stand upright and search for reason, search for redemption. Such is the potency of those crafted words sung in almost a pauper’s daze. It transcends cinematic values and inducts the rawness of a street play and the nudity of stage production.

All in all a must watch for every youth. A lesson to learn… channelize energy, it is endless and insurmountable.

Welcome to Dhwani

2009-09-23T23:36:00.003+05:30

Welcome all who care to stop by and read through these lines.
Through this blog, I wish to share my mindspace with the world at large.
I hope, truly indeed, that some of my thoughts will be loved, enjoyed, challenged, criticised, and to an extend understood and accepted.

Welcome once again, and do tell me how you feel about what you read here.