Thursday 25 July 2013

Mr. Kent


It was a hot day in early summer and I sat in the balcony with Mr. Kent looking out into the streets where a group of shirtless boys were playing about in the dirt. A woman sat on the ground in front of her house playing sitar for reasons I could not perceive. Her face was veiled with her saree to protect herself from the heat as she played. As often as I wandered and strayed away from my conversations, this one was also drifting away from me.

"That's a lie!", Mr. Kent shook me out of my reverie back into our debate.
Getting my head back in, I retorted,"It is no lie! Some people drink for the love of the taste of alcohol."

"I'm still not convinced. Haven't you seen how Tristan squeals whenever he sips his vodka?"

"Why would I be interested in his squealing? His expression is of no concern as to why every drunkard drinks.", I tried to pretend not to picture Tristan downing pints of vodka while waves of discomfort swept across his face.

Mr. Kent smiled a disbelieving smile evoking a desire in me to shake out this strange notion, that everybody drinks for the want of getting drunk, out of his mind. The conversation was turning out to be rather futile for none of us would step down from our thrones of obstinacy and conceited ideals pertaining to why people would drink.

A child started crying out loudly in the distance and the woman had stopped playing the sitar. A gust of cool breeze blew across and Mr. Kent stood up picking his empty glass. The air was getting quite humid and the sun hung directly above the streets causing dust to rise up with every small movement.

"Well, I'm going to get some rest now.", Mr. Kent declared as though he had done some tiring job and deserved his nap. As a gesture of compliance, I stood up and picked my glass,"Yes! By all means, please do."
I followed him into the hallway where he kept his glass beside the flower vase on the table. He continued his way up the stairs to his room while I succumbed to yet another daydream evoked by the wilting roses on the vase. I stood beside the table wondering why Mary had not yet changed the flowers as she usually did. I began to imagine the possibilities and the circumstances under which she might have forgotten to change the flowers. Before I delved further into the depths o my imagination, the sitar playing woman on the street began to shout in her language which I understood not. Shaking the daydream off, I placed my glass on the table aligning it in a straight line with the vase and Kent's glass.

I went out into the balcony wondering what might have happened that led the woman to a continuous series of shouts. As I looked down, I saw another lady with a pot on her head angrily shouting back against the sitar woman. One of the shirtless boys ran towards the lady with the pot and hid himself behind her. Soon, a small crowd had gathered around them and each of them were voicing their opinions making the shouts grow louder. I became annoyed at how they were behaving towards each other but knowing not a word of what hey shouted, I retreated back into the hallway and walked towards my room.

It was quite hot in my room because it had large windows and the walls were very thin. I dropped myself onto the bed and closed my eyes trying to ignore the commotion o the street. No sooner had I drifted off, Tristan walked in.
"Come fast, Andrew fell off the chariot!", he gushed.
"Where is he?", I asked lazily raising myself up from the bed.
"The locals are carrying him home. He is unconscious."
"Oh no! I hope he has not been injured to a greater degree.", I exclaimed frowning.
"Come now! We must get him before they reach the gate. I do not fancy these locals swarming in our house. Ah! There they are!"

Noises filled the corridor as we walked into the hall. Andrew was inviting his friends in and asking them if they would like anything to drink. Tristan was very careful in maintaining a proper distance as he greeted the locals without a hint of smile on his face.

"I thought you were unconscious."
"Ah! That was just for a passing second. The buffalo turned out to be too violent and jerked me off it's back before charging my other friends here."
"A buffalo?", I was dumbfounded, "Tristan said it was a chariot."
"One of them told me it was a chariot.", justified Tristan.
"It was a chariot that brought me home my brothers.", smiled Andrew.

Before I could ask more questions, Martha rushed in with uncle Lance slowly walking behind her.
"What happened?", Martha clamoured.
"It was just a small accident.", Andrew replied trying to act nonchalant.

It was a long moment of torture as I sat there listening to Martha and her never ending questions. The bored locals being utterly ignored by Martha took offense and decided to take leave. Andrew thanked them profusely, followed them till the doorstep and refused to stop thanking until they were out of the gate and drove off in their chariot.

When Andrew walked back in, Martha hissed,"You must stop going around with those people. There are good people here, why do you keep befriending those unworthy people?"


"Martha! How can you say that?", I stood up and went into the kitchen pretending to get a glass of water to drink. I was getting tired of her constant disapproval of everything we did with our lives. I could hear Andrew trying to explain things with the never fading smile on his face while Martha tried to prove that the locals were of bad breeding and could spoil him. Tristan and Lance talked about their horses which was another thing in life I did not interest myself with. Feeling utterly bored at the monotony in their conversations, I walked past them to the stairs and to Mr. Kent's room. His afternoon nap was not yet accomplished so I walked out of the room and was just about to close the door when he asked,"What time is it now?"
I turned back and walked in again to find a swollen faced and red eyed Mr. Kent. I couldn't control myself from laughing and I told him the time while still laughing.
"What is so funny?", he asked.
"You should look in the mirror to see what is funny.", I continued laughing.
"Oh! That.", he said without the slightest bit of curiosity.

He walked towards the washbasin and washed his face, then turned to me,"Have Martha and Lance returned?"
"Yes. They are attending to a heavily injured Andrew. In fact, I came up here to tell you that.", I lied.
"What? What happened?", Mr. Kent stood straight, his face ashen and began to walk out of his room.

I followed him downstairs and when he saw a healthy Andrew, he turned to me and said with a smile on his face,"You little vermin! Why do you keep fooling people with your petty lies? It will get you into trouble someday."

I laughed ignoring the look of surprise on Martha's face. Tristan just kept looking while Lance asked,"What happened?"
"No. It's nothing.", I shook it off.
"Do tell us.", Martha asked again.
"It was just a joke.", Mr. Kent smiled.
Martha was irritated and she stood up saying,"Nobody wants to tell me anything." Then she stormed out of the house. Lance gave a shrug and followed her out of the house.

Everyone was taken aback at what happened but I couldn't care less. I just sat there as Mr. Kent began to ask Andrew questions which then turned into a conversation about the locals where Tristan joined in explaining the reasons why he didn't like them. I began to feel oddly tired so I retired to my room and lay on the bed till I fell asleep.

"Hey! Wake up!", A voice shook me out of sleep. I opened my eyes to find a well groomed Mr. Kent looking as though he were going to attend some ball. Before I could ask, he explained,"I'm leaving now."
That made me even more confused. I asked,"Where?"
"The Professor sent a letter. The chariot is waiting outside and I have to be there by tomorrow morning."
"That's a great news. I hope you're happy there", still feeling lethargic, I decided to bid farewell in my room and not walk him out. He wished me good luck, I wished him a safe journey and he was off.

I went back to sleep and when I woke up, it was already dark. Andrew and Tristan were talking about the buffalo adventure that Andrew had earlier in the day. I joined in the conversation but could not sustain myself in it for a longer time because of the short attention span I suffered from. After some time, we had dinner without Martha and Lance who were still missing.

Later in the night, sleep was hard to come so I sat in the library reading a book. Tristan and Andrew were talking about things in the hall when Martha and Lance returned to the house. Martha seemed to be in bright spirits while Lance wore his usual cool self. Much later, after everybody had gone to sleep, Martha's giggles could still be heard upstairs which made me think that they must have been at some party.

The weeks went by in a monotonous fashion with Martha's emotional rides adding unnecessary drama into our lives. Andrew continued to have adventures with the local people, Tristan participated in horse races more frequently, Martha and Lance would be out at some ball or be locked up in their room while I was getting dangerously close to infinite oblivion. I wanted to think what I wanted to do which everybody else seemed to do. I thought about Andrew, Tristan, Martha and Lance and the things they loved to do. To find out the things that kept them from going insane so I could also find mine. Then when I thought about Mr. Kent, I remembered how he once told me that he had no enthusiasm in life and with his explanations, I thought it to be quite true. Having been driven to extreme boredom and lacklustre, I chanced to sub consciously analyse what made Mr. Kent such a disconcerting person.

As my thoughts continued to go wild, I discovered new lights to perceive him. Headstrong as he was, he never chose to invade others lives with his obstinacy. He had a clear sense of judgement and never failed to be honest with himself and everyone around him no matter how painful it seemed. He knew what he had to do and was never lazy to do it. But most of all, he had a genuine zeal for keeping friends. I began to miss how we had argued together and how we thought the other was wrong and stupid. I missed how we were not in the same page but we still continued to go on without an ickle measure of contempt. For in all our times of arguments and agreements, we had always been honest to each other and to ourselves. We had always been who we were without pretence. And I missed him in times of his absence even without realizing it.

I thought back to the day we argued upon why people drank alcohol and found much truth in his ideas. While not all drink to get drunk, many drink to get drunk for various reasons. I could have been drinking to get drunk to forget my inner conflicts but I had decided and declared to Mr. Kent that I drink not to get drunk but because I like the taste. So to that shall I ever stand.

Monday 22 July 2013

A Can of Oil and a Bucket of Moonshine


When the time came for us to surrender our heavenly abode, we were asked to perform a final act of rejuvenating the walls with shine. One from the trio had one of his bones broken which made help impossible, so the remaining two of us decided to end the demand in cheaper means by painting the walls ourselves. With a violent surge of enthusiasm, the unbroken roommate engulfed me in his determination to paint and get over with it. We got prepared to kick off the mission and descended the swirling flight of stairs gracefully. Having our foot finally set on earth, we set out on a long and engaging journey through craggy hills of dug up soil, dangerous creatures of speeding vehicles, perilous seas of potholes and a flooding river of people. However, our poor observation skills had us walk miles to get the paint while later on I saw that paint was being sold just a few blocks away hidden in some crack of an alley.

After facing the furies of the world beneath our tower, we found the shop selling paints and brushes. The shopkeeper told us that the colour we want was not available in enamel paints but we could mix the colours ourselves. A bucket of emulsion paint caught my eye and by whatever sight was given me, I failed to see the "Matt Finish" label on the bucket. We asked the shopkeeper how the emulsion would look after it was painted on the wall. He replied with an overwhelming confidence, attested by the sideways swinging of his head, that the wall would shine in such glory which would challenge the sun's own. To this day, it pains me to think about the trust he sucked right out of us wit his petty lies. We bought brushes and paints and went back to our tower above the clouds.

With help from an additional kind soul, we went about painting the house admiring our work of art until the paint started to dry. The energy drained out of our body immediately when we saw not a shining wall but an absorbing energy which sucked in all the moonshine from our heads. The wall looked smooth and beautiful sans the gloss so we decided that it was better than how it previously used to be. So we went ahead giving double coats with whatever energy was left in us. The second revelation of joy was also short lived as the landlord decided to pay a visit and found out that his house was not shining anymore. He got freaked out and told us he needed only 'aail' (oil) paint on his walls. We tried to explain to him that this EMULSION paint was as expensive as the enamel paint and that the rooms looked more appealing with the matt finish but to no avail. He was like a kid asking for his brother's toys although better was being offered to him. He accused us of covering his precious shining wall with cheap distemper. I angrily picked up the bucket and hovered it before his eyes showing him the printed price but who would look? His eyes were already blinded by the fact that we had robbed him of the shine. There was no way we could justify our mistake and he was not the graceful one to consider. But after all, it was the shine that we took from him, why would he consider it at all?

Having been utterly discouraged, my roommate was ready to give up but an idea popped up in my head and refused to go. Being headstrong, I turned the tables and forced him to join in on carrying out my evil scheme. We went back to the same shop and gave the shopkeeper a piece of our mind on how he lied to us. Apparently, he didn't care how much he lied and to what degree because he fooled us for the second time by making us believe that the water based colouring agent would dissolve in the enamel paint. And there was a'universal colourant' tag on the bottle which helped him prove his point. With the colouring agent, a can of enamel and a litre of thinner, we returned to our abode to superficially spread a layer of enamel over the emulsion painted wall.

The colourant refused to mix with the enamel paint further raising our frustration levels to new heights. I shook and shook the immiscible liquids until I obtained some sort of my own emulsion. The trial patch gave satisfying results, so we went ahead on a full scale smearing of the wall with our DIY 'aail' paint. It took us two rooms to realize that our smearing had turned the pretty walls into some ghastly plaster. That was the point when our spirits melted away into the depths of the deepest abyss ever imaginable by any living being. We dropped our tools and paints and left the house as it was having been completely defeated in each and every painting way possible.

Days later, the landlord finally came and to his horror saw the ruins we left in his house. I couldn't care less and acted as if nothing had gone wrong. I conjured up all the Kannada in my power and explained, "Paint chanak illa!", which I hope meant that the painting is not beautiful. He agreed with the patented sideways swinging of the head and before he could ramble further in Kannada I gave my glorious monosyllabillic Kannada agreement which I think he understood. All I had to say was, "Painter call madi, paint madi, advance money cut madi." He performed the pendulum swing once again and I was free from all the painting woes. A shining weight had been lifted off my matt chest and I was free to run wherever I wanted.

This particular adventure cost us a fortune but it also helped us gain deeper insight into the mentality of shinephillic people and paint sellers. Never try to go against the wishes of shine loving landlords and never ever trust in a person who sells paint.

Monday 15 July 2013

Forever Waiting


Forever Waiting



I stood with my back against the wall staring at the blue door. Like the summer of my life, the colours were wearing away and shreds fell as I stared. It was the ignorance of time that kept me paralysed and the stare of the unknown was making me go insane. Their look of disapproval and the constant gestures which I was not able to decipher made me want to run away somewhere free and open. The corridor was claustrophobic, the air was stale and the ceiling was giving in while taps leaked murky waters into blocked sinks spilling water all over the floor. Periodically, the pipe gurgled and forced torrents of dirt through the tap splashing water and sprinkled my legs. Instinct lifted me and I jumped but to no avail for I was too slow and the fall back only aggravated the splashes.

It was fear that made me want to run and fear that held me still. The fear of shame and rejection made me want to walk out, give up everything that I lived for and start afresh somewhere nobody knew me and yet the fear of losing myself, losing a chance where I could have been someone, I could have achieved something from what I believed in and the chance to prove myself right when all have denied, made me stand my ground. I recalled Casabianca, the seemingly foolish for those who didn't believe in innocence and faithfulness and the heroic epitome of innocence where one would fearlessly obey and keep his words no matter how close the flames licked or how high the flames soared. Could it be that his death was no pain for him? If that was true, I would willingly stay here till the walls crumble and I fall alongside. The fear of pain sinked in more profoundly making me stiff.

A sudden chill set in and I began to wish I had never left the warmth of home but then again the warmth was what made me run. It was the happy faces and the sweet lies. I knew they never meant bad. They were never hard on us, we were made to believe in things we were not because they were too kind to hurt us with the truth. Staying there kept us from ever growing up to the world outside and back then when I tasted the outside world, I thought I was missing out on life. There were so many things to do and live for. Back then, I had decided a life for myself where it was summer throughout the year, wine and dine with the sophisticated, fall from the sky and pray for salvation, run along the shores collecting unwanted shells, sing at the top of my lungs from a pinnacle above the clouds and get drunk on champagne dancing with my lover. And yet here I was far away from all my dreams with a speck of hope which I held close and held on like it was my life. This winter, a far cry from what I ever expected from life, was a curse which I thought was only a disease for anyone but me.

A door clicked open beside me leaving it ajar. I looked but nobody came out. I waited for the door to close and went back to staring at the blue door. When I thought I had memorised all the details of the door, I looked towards the open door and noticed there was a soft glow. Ignoring the stares of the others, I walked towards the door and took a deep breath. I opened it a little further and peeked in to find a tiny room with a small window. I was shocked on not finding a soul inside but was happy with the strange revelation. The soft light came in from the small window which I opened to find it snowing outside.


A tiny flake of snow drifted in and settled on my nose. It was so cold and yet a magical warmth seemed to spread in my heart. I reached out to the falling snow lifting my arms to the outside through the window. I discovered a part of me which I thought had died long ago. I realised child in me had been suppressed for too long and now was the time to wake him up. With a surge of joy I rushed out of the door into the corridor, looking for an exit. I looked at the others expecting to see looks of disapproval only to find them mending their own businesses without a slight hint of interest towards me. I smiled to myself when the realization dawned on me that their approval or disapproval was never going to have any profound effect on what I did or choose to do.

I ran out into the snow feeling like the child that had once left home in search of the eternal sunshine.

The Bird of Death


Night was sweeping over fast and my young self ran up the steps wanting to be under the protection and warmth of home before the demons got to me. The sound of clashing steel and drums filled the air as shouts grew louder. People carried torches made of cotton soaked in kerosene fixed atop bamboo sticks as they marched across the streets trying to chase away the new angel of death which had made our colony its new home. I was as petrified as a six year old should be when rumours are fed to him by the saner citizens of the society in an age where the internet was unheard of, and the only source of information restricted to words of the mouth and those printed on paper. I admired my younger brother for bravely participating in the chase along with the older people of the colony. I never had the courage to run along with the crowd and noise.

I had also heard the voice of this elusive demon when I was with my best friend's family camping out in their backyard. The first streak of grey had just appeared on the horizon when I was awakened by the blood curdling cry of this infernal bird which had allegedly claimed many lives with its cry. I began to panic when the realization dawned on me that I was the demon's next victim. I couldn't sleep and was too scared to tell anyone that the bird had claimed my soul. This fear haunted me till the day my parents took us out fishing and I had the fortune to hear it's cry once again in the woods.

My happy days were overshadowed by the dread of night and the creatures she spawned. Shooting stars and full moons were no longer a delight for night had cast a spell so wicked over the lands that only the bravest ventured out of the protection of their houses. It was said that the bird would mark you from beyond the veil of night and would follow you home where it would perch on the roof and cry a death song which would claim your soul to inferno.

I had always wished for a magical world, ever since I was a child, filled with fantastical creatures of fairies and elves but the giver of wishes had answered me contrary to what I asked for. My nights, which used to end with magical stories from my mother, began to conclude on a dark and dreary chill. Night began to take over my daydreams. She cast a dark fog over in the land that sunlight refused to pierce through. The minds of people in my colony became clouded with fear and soon foolishness settled in taking refuge behind the clouds.

More sightings of the bird were reported with more frightening details than ever. A man chasing a cat away from his house with a dao in his hands began to shout when he saw the cat perform a series of metamorphosis from a cat to a dog to a pig and ultimately the demon bird which flew off into the unknown. With the knowledge of its capability to morph into pets and domestic animals nothing was to be trusted from then on.

Despite the darkness prevailing, time continued to move on and so did the demon bird. It was hard to determine whether the bird had found a better home with more youthful souls or the incessant clashing of metal and beating of drums every night had been the cause for its departure from our colony.

With the bird gone, life was returning to normal but my ultimate victory over the fear of the bird was achieved the day my parents took us on a fishing trip into the woods, as previously mentioned. While we were crossing a river the unmistakeable cry of the demon bird ran through the trees. I froze for a moment enough for my mother to ask me why I had stopped suddenly. I asked her what that sound is and she replied with a smile that it was a rare bird found in the deep woods. She also went on to explain that in her village the encounter with this bird was considered a good omen. That day our superstitious hunger was sated further for we caught plenty of fish and we all thanked the bird.

More facts began to surface when a certain biologist addressed the people saying that the angel of death was in all its reality a migratory bird with a cry most different from other birds seen in the locality. The demon bird myth began to die down when people finally began to question superstition with reasoning. As I matured in thoughts through intense reasoning, I convinced myself with the possibility that such myths might have been born of coincidence. Something as simple as a migratory bird with an unfamiliar chirp perched on the roof of someone's house who happened to pass away later in the day might have occurred. And some observant fellow must have recorded the whole incident in his mind and with the aid of superstition and lack of information spread it out as the poor bird being the harbinger of death.

Years later, I saw a photo of a python on the local newspaper with the caption "The further the story goes, the bigger it gets" and I thought back to the days when the bird haunted all of us feeling that it was exactly what happened during those days. That was the time when superstition fed on our believes and naiveness. The time when magic was real and everything could be explained as being the forbidden unknown.