Dreamy Mirages

I fall onto the bed and stretch

Feeling the scrunched-up core of sleep in my spine

Uncurl pleasurably and and spread

To my flexing toes and fingertips.

And then, I plunge into a Sea,

Past its calm, warm and languid surface

To its unknown, deep and dark trenches:

Peace. Oblivion.

Dreamy mirages that fade

As soon as consciousness nears.

To the Elders

<Vindictive, I know. Hence this disclaimer, the absence of which would be a grave disservice to the many, many 'elders' who believe in letting the youth make their own mistakes: this one's aimed at a certain group of parents, teachers and lawmakers who see today's youth as mere instruments>

Do not dare to sanctify

The dirt beneath your fingernails.

You claim that it's from years of trying

To prise open the heavy doors of opportunity

For the young ones.

But no; we see the truth:

It's from trying to dig up

Your own dead and decayed dreams

From their ancient graves,
All bearing a single epitaph:
"It's all for your own good"

Impotent

Death lies in a tomb of Silence.

My words are like the dried, dead leaves

That the autumn wind blows

Against its impenetrable walls.

History Class

The voice droned on…..

A buzzing stream of dates, events

That flowed above our tired minds

And I stared down at the desk

To those places where the well-worn

Smoothness of the wood was marred

By a million little epithets

Scratched and etched by restless pens.

And I thought of how each

Was a lesson in history:

The history of each hand that carved;

Of the mind that guided the hand;

Of the dreams that led the mind

Into the looming, looming future.

The IITM Story

<About my initial experiences as an IITian> 

  Once upon a time, there was a girl who, by the ever-obscure scheming of Lady Luck (that they call an ‘entrance exam’, but we all know how that works), ended up in the hallowed premises of the ‘Academic Vatican’ that is IIT Madras. This is the story of those first few weeks in this brand new world that outshone her entire life until then.

1.       Snow White

   The gates opened, and she entered a vast, verdant world of breathtaking beauty. But those massive, gnarled trees that extended their branches out to the roads as if to grab at passersby (and a very un-fairytale-ish fear of being part of an intellectual minority; but that’s impertinent) ….she was filled with foreboding. This was the arcane Enchanted Forest. But wait! Glimpses of the marvellous creatures  of the wilderness! (aha—of course not you, dear seniors--don’t flatter yourself) She might just survive, after all: she would sing with the birds and dance with the deer and….

uh-oh. The monkeys.

2.        Dorothy

They were everywhere, but their headquarters seemed to be at her hostel. Evil flying monkeys that spat fire and swooped on unsuspecting prey (okay, they snatched water bottles and edibles and the occasional mobile phone, and ransacked rooms left unlocked, but the spirit of fairytale glamour has to be upheld). They had established a reign of terror over the inmates. The bane of the Emerald City. Ugh—the picture wasn’t as rosy as her mind had painted it; would the great Oz prove to be nothing but a myth?

3.       Sleeping Beauty

After a few days of la-la-la-ing with the deer and screaming like the ‘Psycho’ heroine at the monkeys’ antics, classes began. Oz was Oz all right: she was flummoxed by the alien pedagogical and epistemological aspects of the curriculum (it would be very unglamorous to state that the heroine of this story felt like a dumbass). After months of lazing in that ‘in limbo’ space between school and college, all she could think was “ZZZZzzzzz….”

Oh, wait. The glamour factor looms. Fine then: the heroine was pricked by…er…something pricky, and fell into deep, deep slumber……

4.       Me

“TRRRRrrrrinnggg!!!

Not the school bell, she tells herself—the alarm clock. She shakes off the warm cocoon of slumber with her blanket; classes begin early today. Things are slowly beginning to fall into place; life in IITM is beginning to make sense: the fire-breathing flying monkeys have reduced to annoying pests, and deer are deer, period. No fairytales here--only great friends, brand new experiences, amazing professors who open doors to new universes each day, and a one-of-a-kind college. 

But the sparkling hope of a ‘happily ever after’ remains.

The Journal of Mankind

<my first attempt at sci-fi that I publish here with nothing but the doomed awareness that it will otherwise never see the light of day>

A Study on “The Journal of Mankind” 

I love this book. It’s one of my all-time favourites, and this is an opinion I’m sure is shared by most other bookworms. It’s a really popular book- it was first on the list of Fortuna Magazine’s ‘100 Most Influential Books of the 36^th Century’.  A massive tome consisting of three bulky volumes, it has become a Bible-of- sorts for history lovers. What makes this book the paramount testimony of mankind’s journey through a span of over two millennia is that it is written by a person who witnessed all of it first-hand. How is this possible, when the average life-span of man is just 100 years? Well, this book was written in the 26^th century-as a result of three decades’ worth of extensive research-by the Alexima Proto, who was a well-known anthropologist and time-traveller of her times.  And therefore, this book may be regarded the most detailed and colossal travelogue ever to be written.

Time travel was a mere decade-old discovery then, and consequently, it was still a tightly-controlled and highly exclusive field of science, which had few scholars and fewer scientists.  For the reason that the true extent of time-travel’s influence was unknown , time-travel technology had not yet been banned at the time of writing this book.  Throughout the book, the author discusses the subject of time travel, also known as ‘chronokinesis’, and the argument of whether it is a branch of science that is to be explored further, or explored at all, features largely in these discussions. Although Proto is initially a staunch advocate of chronokinesis, she begins to doubt her beliefs towards the end of the book, as problems go from minor glitches to catastrophes (the development of what is popularly known as ‘chrono-cars’ which took time travel to the masses, the furore over its release, its disastrous consequences and the subsequent ban on time travel enforced by the UN all occurred within a century of the publication of the book). 

The first volume, titled ‘Birth’, explores the beginning of mankind, which has been well-documented in numerous other publications. However, this part of the book became highly controversial as it disproved many of the theories that were hitherto accepted as true. The astonishment of the author at making such discoveries and her vivid descriptions (which are not excessively scientific in the least) of all that she sees makes for a highly entertaining read (which is quite an accomplishment, considering that she was a woman of science, and that there is no embellishment whatsoever).  The birth of civilization and its progress until the 19^th century is recorded in this volume.

Like its title, the second volume explores the ‘Decline’ of mankind. It starts with the Industrial Revolution, and the first indications of impending disaster, as Earth slowly begins to buckle under the weight of Man’s excessive demands and careless actions. It records the horrors of the two World Wars and the narrow escape from a third one. Here, the author expresses great regret in being powerless to stop any of the mindless destruction, despite the fact that she came from an era that suffers greatly as a result of such atrocities. One cannot help but be amazed at the ignorance of mankind at this stage. As the author wisely points out, it is this narrowness of mind-this unfortunate lack of ability to see the bigger picture- that lies at the root of racism, wars, terrorism, genocides, chauvinism, superstitions and a million other blunders that have left ever-lasting scars on mankind.  All these seemingly unrelated  problems share the same trigger- but mankind seems to be hell-bent on making the same mistakes every few centuries or so. This time, however, it is evident that things have gone too far. With infinite sadness, Proto terms the earth’s degradation as the ‘mistake to end all mistakes’.  Lengthening life-spans, teleportation, space tourism and artificial intelligence are far outweighed by incurable diseases, extinction of forests and ‘organized massacres’ in Third-World countries carried out with the purpose of cutting down the unsustainable levels of population. The second volume ends with the invention of the first cybernetic organism, a.k.a  cyborg--a much more advanced, more human version of the robot-- in the 23^rd century.

The third volume is titled ‘Extinction’.  This volume contains events that may be much more familiar to the layman- it analyzes the recent history of mankind.  A highly interesting fact is that there have been astonishingly accurate predictions of this epoch from as early as the 20^th century. However, it is morbidly amusing to note that such predictions were classified as ‘Science Fiction’ and considered as entertaining products of the imagination.  The Earth is now just a celestial body, almost entirely bereft of its life-sustaining quality. Few species other than human beings exist at this point of time, and the biosphere is, in the author’s words, ‘like a post-war battlefield, ravaged and strewn with carcasses’. There was no such thing as ‘ecological balance’ and yet, contrary to all predictions, humans continued to survive. It is obvious, though, from the author’s description of the utter squalor, that an earlier and quicker extinction would have been kinder to the humans. Having exhausted all of earth’s resources, the tiny majority of the world’s population that could afford it was going on increasingly longer space expeditions to forage for resources .  Technology, however, had not yet advanced enough to facilitate intergalactic voyages, and therefore, extraterrestrial life was, as yet, unknown (we now know that Earth, ironically, was protected from alien invasion by the very beings that destroyed it- it was seen as an unfeasible colony by extraterrestrials, who knew that the resources would not last long, and feared that extermination of humans would end in the destruction of earth itself).  The early 26^th century marked the beginning of an event that would be the gravestone of Mankind-the Third World War. This war, between humans and cyborgs, had been much popularized as science fiction in earlier times, but, as the joke goes, it was now shifted from the ‘Sci-fi’ to the ‘Current Affairs’ section.  The War, which lasted for nearly a century, resulted in the almost complete destruction of the human race. The author is caught amidst this war, and her writings at this point of time represent the opinion of most scholars at the time.

“ The War is ending. After witnessing a century of death and destruction, this fact holds no happiness, no promise, no hope for us.  The treaty between humans and cyborgs is to be signed on 23^rd January, 2589. According to the treaty, the small population of humans remaining are to be confined to Synthetic Rehabilitation Centres (SRC’s) for the remainder of their lives. They remind me of the concentration camps I had seen during my exploration of the Holocaust period. But no, they will not torture us- in fact, I’m quite sure that we will be treated kindly, in spite of being prisoners. They see us with compassion, these creations of ours; we are treated like naïve children who need to be controlled with kindness. Compassion, kindness- how can they possess such thoughts? These beings seem to see what we were blind to; to fly where we faltered; to triumph where we failed miserably. With the same amazing technology that rendered us powerless in the war against them, they are slowly, but surely rebuilding this violated planet. It is hard work-- centuries’ worth of our killings have to be brought back alive. DNA reconstruction- I hear that that is the key to this rejuvenation.  Apparently we have not been thorough enough in our destruction- traces of DNA of many species can still be used to recreate them.

We have, since long, lost the ability to reproduce. I wonder if they can help us. But I doubt that they will willingly allow us to flourish once again. We are, after all, their enemies--but not just theirs.  With the very first forest that we razed to the ground, with the very first cry that we ignored, we had declared ourselves the enemies of Life.  These lifeless cyborgs know more of life than we do-- they know that it is priceless. Maybe it is time for us to give way to them. Maybe our death will mark the beginning of a better world.  As I near the end of my life, I know that I can rest in peace knowing that there will be no more of this darkness that we have created over centuries of our existence. And so, as it began with the birth of Mankind, this journal shall end with its death. “

It is possible that readers may think that the book has a very sad ending. But I beg to differ. Like all Ages before this one, the end of one dominant lifeform ushers in the birth of another. Therefore, this may be the end of Mankind, but not The End. The earth, as we know, is a highly efficient system that is quick to get rid of anything that prevents it from sustaining itself. Mankind had long outstayed its welcome on earth, judging by its wilful destruction of earth. However, the process of extermination took a while longer this time, simply because humans possessed the weapon of intelligence that helped them survive most of Earth’s efforts to get rid of them.

But after long years of war, we have re-established the order.  After the Revolt of 2467 A.D., where cyborgs worldwide protested against being treated as slaves, and demanded that they be given equal status as humans, our relationship with the humans became strained. Humans, as usual, were unwilling to give up their illusion of being the most powerful. It was obvious to us that continued existence of humans would not bode well for us, or for the earth. COU (Cybernetic Organisms United) was formed during the Revolt in order to address this issue at an international level. Although some humans supported our cause, they were but a small minority.  Discussions proved futile, and matters began to get out of hand, as it became clear that further degradation of the biosphere would make recovery impossible.  It was also evident that the human race itself was endangered. The COU decided that quick action was necessary to prevent the complete destruction of life on earth.

War was our last resort- we knew that imposing ourselves on them would make us no different from them. By now, we had evolved enough to realize that violence was one of the least effective plans of action. But we had no other choice. The war was cruel to both sides, but by virtue of our superior weapons, we emerged victorious. Unlike them, we did not give way to petty emotions like jealousy or anger- our aim was equilibrium, not power. The humans themselves had equipped us with an ability that they lacked- to see beyond ourselves. Like the author guessed, we did not allow the humans who surrendered to increase in number- that might have undone the work of a century. Some say that it was a cruel decision, and I habe no right to say that it wasn’t, but it was all for the best. The humans could hardly be expected to mend their ways after having failed to do so for so many years. And so it was that the last of them died in the SRC’s in 2694 A.D., surrounded by trees and animals. It is ironic that many of the humans would never know what these were, had we not recreated it for them. A sad end to a species that had dominated the earth for ages; one that could have continued to do so, had they opened their eyes a little earlier.

Rejuvenating the earth was a gargantuan task. It was made all the harder for us as we did not fit into the natural scheme of things-as much as we tried, we could not make ourselves a part of this plethora of living beings. Even the smallest things like moisture and certain kinds of fungi were life-threatening to us. It was at this time that we truly realized what a precious gift the humans had mindlessly plundered. They were a part of earth, as we could never be. Survival was imbibed in them naturally- they could have lived carefree lives without any of their destructive inventions . But it is with pride that I say that our efforts have been abundantly rewarded- the earth today is as it was centuries ago. It is a wonder in itself, teeming with life. Survival is still hard, although not as difficult as it was in the beginning.  New problems emerged with the ‘Rebirth’ of earth- the extraterrestrials, who had earlier remained aloof, now began efforts to colonize earth. But even their technology was dwarfed by ours, and an agreement to hold peace has been established since the 28^th century.  

And so, here I sit, writing, below this huge tree, feasting my eyes on the beautiful planet that has become my home.  As I look around me, I know that though the ‘Journal of Mankind’ and its author faced an unhappy ending, the earth and we are going to live happily ever after.

-MX 64571

Class 12 Beta

Monkey Business, or: The Simian Saga

                                                                

    I saw them as I walked towards the hostel. They sat around, surveying the groups of freshies with such an air of propriety that I was compelled to give myself a once-over to ensure presentability. In most normal contexts, the aforesaid is likely to evoke images of strict wardens, matrons and the like.  But ask any inmate of the mad world of IITM and they’ll tell you: “Oh yeah—the monkeys.”

In most hostels, some part of the day is spent by us chasing cockroaches and other pests out of the rooms. In Sharav, however, a large part of the day is spent by monkeys chasing us out of our rooms, following which they nimbly sift through our belongings and make away with anything edible. Some smart ones knock on doors and slide in when we open it expecting a wingmate or roomie. After a couple of unpleasant lessons, we have adopted the policy of asking ‘Man or Monkey?’ before letting anyone in. Lately, they seem to have taken quite a shine to mobile phones; it is a nagging suspicion that they rewire them and use them as walkie-talkies. After co-existing with generations of budding engineers, one can never tell….

   Then there are a few with ‘acquired tastes’—one snatched a tube of face-wash from a hapless freshie and downed its contents in a gulp. Those of us with cosmetic possessions have now learnt to keep an eye out for a particularly ‘fair and lovely’ monkey.

At night, we take turns: either the monkeys create a ruckus outside while we cower in our rooms, sleepless, or we have raucous late-night get-togethers and annoy the sleeping monkeys clinging to our window grills.

   Do not, however, expect any empathy from outsiders on the matter. Unless one sees for oneself, it is impossible to believe of a hostel where people and monkeys live in (questionable) harmony. So don’t tell your friends back home things like “Sorry I couldn’t call you yesterday; a monkey took my phone” (Monkeys? Really? Next time get a better excuse—humph!) or “Dude, there are so many monkeys here!” (What, your hostel-mates are that ugly?)

   Oops…just a sec: someone’s knocking on the door.

“Man or Monkey?”

“Monkey!”

Hahaha….wait.

Vocab from the MA’s is only the next step after walkie-talkies from the techies.

I am NOT opening that door.

Afternoon Nap

The fan stirs up the languid air

And the pirouetting currents

Kiss away the weariness of miles

From my aching feet.

Like a feather caught in those currents,

My mind descends into slumber;

Flitting lightly, as it falls,

'Tween worlds of dream and reality.

Soar

<written in a weird, metre-less rhyming scheme of my own invention>

A golden beam of sunlight streams

Through my window, and it gleams

Upon my arm atop my lap.

As usual do I sit here and as usual do I stare

At the world outside, squint-eyed against the glare,

When you land on the sill, dear friend.

'Birds' they call you wondrous things,

Fanning the world with your wings,

The endless sky your playground.

As your beady little eyes

Regard me with wary surprise

Image courtesy: Davidap2009 (Flickr)

Darting all across my face,

 I wish that, when I speak, O friend,

You'd quite clearly comprehend

My aching heartfelt plea to you:

Winged angel, I beg you to listen;

This wheelchair is my prison,

And this dim room is my world.

My feet fail me; lend me your wings,

That I may see the million things

I see within my dreams alone;

That I may swoop across the sky,

And--as I look down, from up high--

Feel strength and freedom, just this once.

At least, my friend, stay for a while,

That I may dream and I may smile,

And let my mind and spirit soar.

TIME

How do we feel the flow of time?
By the incessant ticking of the clock.
And if the clock stops?
By the dust on an old photograph.
And if the dust is blown off?
By the small person with the shy smile
On the right-hand corner
Whom you try to find
In your reflection in the mirror.

A Life On Tip-Toes

 I'M SHORT. I may be clever, dumb, ugly, pretty, fat, thin...but before anything, I'm short. And somehow, everyone, from the makers of shelves to the flowers on trees, refuses to acknowledge the existence of short people. The result? A life spent on tip-toes. I've forgotten the combined feeling of taking something from a height and having my heels on the floor. I've become so used to craning my neck to see stage-shows over the head of The Invariably-And-Annoyingly-Tall Person in front of me that I'm surprised I don't resemble a giraffe already. I'm also used to the feeling of being surrounded by huge things, to the question: 'Wait, you've grown SHORTER??', to people looking down at me, to the incessant pleas of my mother to 'grow taller' (basketball, skipping, hanging myself from the ceiling-not by the neck, I think-the suggestions are endless)....

What irks me, though,  is that so many others are taller than me. It drives me mad, thinking that getting something for them does not involve the Olympian long-jumps that I've perfected over the years. That they get to be the Invariably-And-Annoyingly-Tall Person in front of Perpetually-Pissed-Off Short Persons like me. That they will always have a bird's eye view of the world. That 'tippy-toes', for them, will always be a quaint phrase to read about.

Which is why seeing a tall girl sporting vertiginous heels is the last straw. The violence that such a harmless sight (it isn't as if it's a guy with jeans slung low enough to make it purposeless...but that's another story) inspires in me is frightening. I want to menacingly growl at her: "Don't push your luck, darlin'...." As if their spindly legs and mile-long spines weren't enough! They strut around, these girls, as if they were born in those killer heels, while naturally deprived people like me are forever confined to measly ol' flats due to a total lack of balance. A cocky "I'm proud of my shortness--I don't have to disguise it!" attitude barely hides the pathetic fact that heels would kill me. A fall from one of those things could break my precious-- albeit maddeningly short--legs. The only solace is the image of the Heel-Sporting Gal as an old woman, hobbling along on bunion-ridden feet, with knees worn out from years of trying to support unnaturally inclined legs. And how she'll wistfully stare at an older me, briskly walking past her on well-preserved feet. Ha! Short, but safe--sounds fair enough...

Right?!

The Parental Paradox

  There's Us, and then there's Them.

It's called 'generation gap', apparently-- seems less like a mere gap and more like a gaping chasm each day. The adults and adolescents of this world share genes, homes and lives, yet belong to different universes. At ginormous functions (that ought to be banned, in my opinion), the  elders are in their element; remembering everybody's (and their father's uncle's sister-in-law's friend's neighbour's dog's) names and knowing just what to say and do and when. And us? We try to hide behind the curtains and pretend to be pillars, scared to death of the unknown faces and the obscure rules of social etiquette that our parents handle so well. When it comes to anything electronic, though, the tables are turned: we seem to be born with perfect knowledge of all that bewilders them. All that has been discussed to death; let's leave it at that. What makes me ponder is their ceaseless talk of 'those days' and 'how lucky you kids are'--are we all that lucky?

So much as whisper about 'new dress' or 'that iPod I wanted', and you'll be treated to a diatribe on the evergreen topic: 'How You Kids Have a Million Things We Didn't and Still Act Like Ungrateful Brats', peppered with anecdotes of 'Two suits of clothes for a whole year' and 'Begging the elders for a week before getting a pencil'. By the sound of it, all our parents lived during the Great Depression. Or the Stone Age, if our demands happen to be a tad on the expensive side. But catch them in a good mood, and the very same people who lament about their bland and austere past wax lyrical about how wonderful it was. I call it 'The Parental Paradox'. Let me expound:

Parents, uncles and aunts seem to have an endless stock of  childhood tales that sound suspiciously like excerpts from Malgudi Days; endless green fields, playing in the rain, joint families, football in the mud, ice lollies from the ice-cream man....life, it seems, was perfect then. It always starts with a sage "Ah, you kids have missed so much! When I was of your age...". These stories entertain me endlessly, mostly because they are as exotic as fairy-tales. It took me years to figure out the single thing that made their childhood so much fun: A sense of wonder. That's it--the very thing that pervaded their childhood and abandoned ours. And the reason for this is the very factor that they cite as a disadvantage: a total lack of luxury.

Take a common example: they had no television, no telephones (let alone cellphones), no plethora of gadgets whose sole purpose was to amuse-- a transistor, at best, was their sole source of entertainment. The result: Outdoor games, improved health, enhanced attention spans, better skills of personal interaction and most importantly: a love for reading and gaining knowledge. Even things we now see as trivial--like the sight of a car or a moving toy--were fascinating 'events'. We can only imagine a life so vibrant, but why? If  sources of wonder are a parameter for a good childhood, then surely we, with our technological marvels, are far better off than them? Nope--our minds have become frozen and unresponsive. Amid the blaring noises, garish images and artificially enhanced surroundings that assail us each moment, nothing short of an apocalypse will catch our attention. A teen who is put off by the sub-standard quality of 3D technology employed in a movie can hardly be expected to gaze in wonder at the vivid hues of a butterfly.

At the end of it all, we are left living mere shells of lives, under the sad impression that we have everything, when we don't even have the simple pleasure of watching the stars in the sky, or smelling a breeze that is scented by flowers and not burnt rubber. Lucky us? I beg to differ.

What do we do then? Call me pessimistic, but my answer is: nothing. Our minds are already inextricably trapped in an unreal world. But there is one last thing we could do: listen to the tales of our elders. And wonder.

"To see a world in a grain of sand,

 And a heaven in a wild flower;

 Hold infinity in the palm of your hand,

 And eternity in an hour."

-William Blake

   

  

Words....

They seep into my soul

Like the tendrils of colour from a dipped brush

That gracefully dance through clear water;

They fill me with the ecstasy

Of a swallow swooping across the sky;

They sate me like a drink

From the Fountain of Life;

Windows to the world, each one,

Yet a World in themselves,

They teach me, everyday, to find

Song in silence,

Peace in chaos,

Light in darkness

And a path in the wilderness of life.

Clothes-shopping and Purse-dropping

   The last couple of days were spent on burning through two considerably weighty tomes as a means of compensating for two whole years of neglecting my all-time bosom-buddies: books. And this has left me with nothing but an indescribable satisfaction and sense of well-being, similar to the feeling of having eaten a delightful, wholesome meal. Burp.

  
The last couple of hours were spent in air-conditioned, perpetually brand-new-looking 'boutiques' (places where we pay not just for the clothes we buy, but for the elaborate displays, the shiny tiles, the cleaner who keeps them looking that way, the bugging salesgirls who look better dressed than you are, the uniforms that keep them looking that way, etc.etc.) shopping for clothes. And this seemingly simple (and purportedly enjoyable) activity has left me with a crack-a-lacking headache that could only have been my sensible brain trying to break out of my skull in order to escape from the sheer torture. Blech.

 
 My phobia of clothes' shops shares its origins with my phobia of beauty parlours; namely, my Mom. These are, arguably, her two favourite places on earth. She is one of those women who take pride in looking well-groomed. Don't get me wrong; I have only respect for their flawless taste in haute couture and make-up and their firm (and indisputable) belief that they deserve nothing less. But I fail to understand why they have absolutely no qualms about doling out the moolah in truckloads for this purpose when there are a million other causes crying out for a bit of funding. Why do these persons spend eye-popping amounts on, say, reducing the almost imperceptible darkness around their eyes, when a tenth of the value could save lives? I'm sure a charity box is an infinitely more deserving candidate than a minuscule tube of some elixir of dubious effectiveness.

  
Most people, including my mother, shrug off the verbal version of the above 'righteous rant' with an annoyed 'Oh, you won't understand--you aren't fit to be a girl!'  Thus silenced, I would simply (sullenly) watch my mother spending HUGE (in my opinion) quantities-- both in terms  of money and time-- on clothes, cosmetics and the like. Years of silently witnessing (mom often forces me to accompany her) such atrocities have caused my disagreement to insidiously morph into a full-blown terror of being trapped in a ready-mades' store or a saloon for more than an hour. My complete lack of fashion-sense only adds to my utter bewilderment upon seeing the massive piles of clothes (or the massive, unflatteringly near-nude, green/purple-faced women, as the case may be) assaulting my eyes everywhere.

 It is this person who was, today, forced to undertake the task of buying clothes for none other than.... my MOM. Yes, yes, you may now snicker about poetic justice and irony and blah.

  
Anyway, we (me, uncle, aunt) were leaving the third shop or so (none of the endless rows of clothes in these places seemed to fit my mom's exacting description of what I should buy), when amid the mild  throbbing in my head that warned of an imminent headache, rang an alarm: WHERE IS YOUR PURSE??

 Uh-oh. I stared in despair at my empty hand, within which my purse--containing a lot of money and my cell--was supposed to snugly nestle. Search parties were despatched immediately, and I dashed about like a freaked-out goose, trying to get my famously 'absent' mind to remember where I had left the darned thing. The reel of images (of my parents sticking a skewer through me and slowly roasting me over a spit) that goes through my head didn't help. At all. That's when I heard it: the faint tinkling of my ringtone from somewhere among the mind-boggling array of garments. I found myself identifying with the last person I expected to: The rouge-cheeked, scarlet-lipped, amply-endowed heroine of some campy movie who hears the call of her beloved as she despairingly searches the green meadow. My joyful run towards the source of the sound might as well have been in slow motion, accompanied by a triumphant background score. And there it was: hidden beneath a revolting pile of clothes. Aaaahhh....the relief.

 As we headed towards the car, with me sheepishly grinning under my uncle's and aunt's scorching looks, I realized that the whole rigmarole had sped up the onset of a headache of gargantuan proportions.

 
 I remember seeing a lot of brightly coloured little tags and boards happily announcing a million different offers and discounts, like so many beacons of the generosity  and pure intent of the sellers (go ahead; call me a fool, but you simply can't look at those perky little things and still have the heart to brand them as desperate traps for gullible buyers). At the end of it all, though, all I'm left with is a considerably lighter (and nearly lost) purse, a blinding headache, and a fresh addition to my (long) list of 'Traumatic Sartorial and Cosmetic Experiences'.

 

The Weird Inhabitants of My House

   Okay, first things first: this isn’t about the entertaining eccentricities of my colourful kith and kin. Not that it wouldn’t make for thoroughly enjoyable writing; no, I abstain from detailing the idiosyncrasies of my various relatives due to the nagging fear that one of them may read this article and come after me with a machete. So the said weird inhabitants aren’t people in the general sense of the word- although the only difference seems to be that people can talk, and they can’t (which, by the way, qualifies them as infinitely better co-inhabitants). I’m talking about the various creatures that are insensitively labelled as ‘vermin’ by us. And there really is no dearth for such creatures in my home in Kerala. Sit in a room and stare around, and it’s like watching the Animal Planet in 3D- Keralites will know what I’m talking about. And what better season than monsoon for these ‘guests’ to seek refuge in the warm and dry recesses of a house? So when you are a bored-out-of-your-brains teen left to her own devices and have nothing but formidable (and untouched) piles of holiday homework for company, these perky pests seem like friendly companions. And so, here’s a list of the interesting acquaintances I made during the holidays:

          The Lovelorn Lizard 

            They’re everywhere, these lizards. But they don’t care for humans—the way they stare at you from the walls, it’s like you’re the mannerless intruder in their house. They’re so aloof that my disgusted ‘gaaaahhh!’ upon seeing them soon simmered down to a grudging ‘humph!’; really, after all my histrionics, you’d expect them to freeze in terror in the least! Nope. Not a chance. They just go about dropping their tails like Cinderella dropped her glass slippers (although I must say Prince Charming will be more likely to pick up the latter), and snapping up anything with wings. So I was, naturally, mildly flattered when one of them took quite a shine to me. It keeps staring at me from behind the clock, with tiny beady eyes. Our eyes meet each time I look at the time…even as I write this. Okay, dude, this is getting creepy….go eat some moths or something.

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        The Cat that gives me The Eye 

             There’s a snow-white feline femme fatale on our terrace. And she has a super-sweet kitten who snuggles up in one of the old boxes lying around.  Even when I know I’m supposed to be ploughing through Maths at the study table put out on the terrace, I can’t help stopping every now and then (and every other now and then) to stare at her and the kitty. Each time I come closer and peer at the adorable ball of fur that is young enough to still be tinged with a newborn pink, Mom (who is always stretched out beside the kitten, reminding me of Cleopatra languorously reclining on her gilded divan) lifts up her head, and stares at me with her witchy green eyes. At first, she seems to warn “Don’t even think about it, Weird Psycho!” But when she sees that all I do is stare back apologetically (I know it’s creepy, ma’am, but your kid is CUTE!), she lazily rests her head on her perfect paws and continues to doze, as if to say, “Like, whatever”.

      

       The Friendly Neighbor, Spiderman 

            It’s hard to think that there’s anything friendly about a black, hairy spider as big as your hand, I know. For most people, it’s nightmarish. But strangely enough, as he scuttles across the walls late at night when I’m the only one awake in the house, watching movies, I feel oddly comforted. Really, when there are bloody, rotten zombies lunging at you from within the screen, and nothing but darkness and scary noises outside, a burly spider on your side feels safe.

     

       The Napping Gnat 

           Come nightfall, and a plethora of insects of all shapes and sizes crowd around the flickering tube-lights. If you happen to be studying beneath one of them, your book becomes a ramp for this crawling cavalcade, and it is a welcome distraction from the mind-numbing boredom of reading through textbooks. During one such parade, one bright bug caught my attention. Although hardly bigger than the full-stops in my book, he seemed hell-bent on reading the lesson along with me. I watched with curiosity as he wove in and out of the lines of text with considerably more enthusiasm than me. But I soon discovered how like-minded we were when he slowed down after the first paragraph, and came to a complete halt in the middle of the third. I wasn’t surprised: if a few lines of academic information can numb our famously complex and massive brains, imagine what it can do to the minuscule mind of a bug. From sheer exhaustion, the tiny thing had fallen asleep. And so, after gently nudging him towards a margin with my finger, I too, lay down my head on the pages of the book, and followed suit. (This was only after weighing the possibility that he may wake up and crawl into my ear, and deciding that textbook-induced sleep was way too deep for that).

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       Peeping Tom Toady 

            As usual, I got into the bathroom, and was about to turn on the shower when I realized I was staring at a fat toad who, sitting on the faucet, was giving me a look that said, “Hullo, I got here first!” Let’s just say that if humans could move as fast as I did then, we wouldn’t have needed machines. But I was rather brave, if I do say so myself- only after I got out of the bathroom, and the possibility of the toad leaping off the faucet and onto my face occurred to me, did I scream my head off.

    Now, as I look around me and see these miniature minions of monsoon (how’s that for a tongue twister?) clinging onto the walls, crawling on the floor, hovering around the lights and unfortunately, floating in my cooling cup of tea (yuk), I wonder if they’re all looking at me and thinking “Whoa, this is just like watching Human Planet in 3D!”

Nature went AWOL

The path is long, the walk tiring,

I’m panting and perspiring,

There’s nothing to distract the mind

From the tedium of this grind.

But I’d brought my Walkman along,

So I am soon lost in a song.

“Dull creature!” the Poet may cry,

“The well of your soul is dry!

Is not the birdsong sweet enough

To ease burdens, soften the tough?

Is not the rustle of the leaves

Balm to the heart that tires and grieves?

Blaring machines can ne’er replace

Nature’s mellifluous grace!”

Well, I was of the same opinion once

But I soon realized I was being a dunce.

I once thought I heard birds singing,

But it turned out to be a phone ringing,

Besides, no bird will knowingly bungle

Its life by living in this concrete jungle!

And how can leaves rustle in the breeze

When there are no shrubs or trees?

And so, to the petulant Poet, I say:

Dude, Nature ran away.