Studio of Thoughts

MANIC SCREAMING - Some Rumi and Hafiz

2009-05-26T17:47:00.004+09:30

I'm still learning the great poems of these two Sufi masters - I started posting some individual poems, but realise that's a futile task - these exquisite pieces need anthologies, not selections. I've posted below some that have truly touched me.

A big kudos to David Ladinsky for the translations - he apparently studied under Meher Baba of India, and based his translations on those done previously in 1891 by Wilberforce Clark.

So simple, so profound, so touching.

You Were Brave in that Holy War

You have done well
In the contest of madness.

You were brave in that holy war.

You have all the honorable wounds
Of one who has tried to find love
Where the Beautiful Bird
Does not drink.

May I speak to you
Like we are close
And locked away together?

Once I found a stray kitten
And I used to soak my fingers
In warm milk;

It came to think I was five mothers
On one hand.

Wayfarer,
Why not rest your tired body?
Lean back and close your eyes.

Come morning
I will kneel by your side and feed you.
I will so gently
Spread open your mouth
And let you taste something of my
Sacred mind and life.

Surely
There is something wrong
With your ideas of
God

O, surely there is something wrong
With your ideas of
God

If you think
Our Beloved would not be so
Tender.

---"The Gift: Poems by Hafiz the great Sufi Master" translated by
Daniel Ladinsky

Every child has known God

Every child has known God,
Not the God of names,
Not the God of don’ts,
Not the God who ever does Anything weird,
But the God who knows only 4 words.
And keeps repeating them, saying:
“Come Dance with Me , come dance.”

Hafiz

With That Moon Language

Admit something:
Everyone you see, you say to them, "Love me."
Of course you do not do this out loud, otherwise someone would call the cops.
Still, though, think about this, this great pull in us to connect.
Why not become the one who lives with a full moon in each eye
that is always saying,
with that sweet moon language,
what every other eye in this world is dying to hear?

Hafiz

Stop Being So Religious

What
Do sad people have in
Common?

It seems
They have all built a shrine
To the past

And often go there
And do a strange wail and
Worship.

What is the beginning of
Happiness?
It is to stop being
So religious
Like That.

("The Gift" - versions of Hafiz by Daniel Ladinsky)

Someone Should Start Laughing

I have a thousand brilliant lies
For the question:

How are you?

I have a thousand brilliant lies
For the question:

What is God?

If you think that the Truth can be known
From words,

If you think that the Sun and the Ocean

Can pass through that tiny opening
Called the mouth,

O someone should start laughing!

Someone should start wildly Laughing -
Now!

Hafiz

A Golden Compass

Forget every idea of right and wrong
Any classroom ever taught you

Because
An empty heart, a tormented mind,
Unkindness, jealousy and fear

Are always the testimony
You have been completely fooled!

Turn your back on those
Who would imprison your wondrous spirit
With deceit and lies.

Come, join the honest company
Of the King’s beggars –
Those gamblers, scoundrels and divine clowns
And those astonishing fair courtesans
Who need Divine Love every night.

Come, join the courageous
Who have no choice
But to bet their entire world
That indeed,
Indeed, God is Real.

I will lead you into the Circle
Of the Beloved’s cunning thieves,
Those playful royal rogues –
The ones you can trust for true guidance –
Who can aid you
In this Blessed Calamity of life.
Hafiz,
Look at the Perfect One
At the Circle’s Center:

He Spins and Whirls like a Golden Compass,
Beyond all that is Rational,

To show this dear world

That Everything,
Everything in Existence
Does point to God.
--Hafiz

What Happens?

What happens when your soul
Begins to awaken
Your eyes
And your heart
And the cells of your body
To the great Journey of Love?

First there is wonderful laughter
And probably precious tears

And a hundred sweet promises
And those heroic vows
No one can ever keep.

But still God is delighted and amused
You once tried to be a saint.

What happens when your soul
Begins to awake in this world

To our deep need to love
And serve the Friend?

O the Beloved
Will send you
One of His wonderful, wild companions ~
Like Hafiz.

From: 'I Heard God Laughing - Renderings of Hafiz' - Daniel Ladinsky

Manic Screaming

We should make all spiritual talk simple today
God is trying sell you something but you dont want to buy

That is what your suffering is:
your fantastic haggling
your manic screaming
over
price.
--Hafiz

My Eyes So Soft

Don't surrender your loneliness so quickly
let it cut more deep.
Let it ferment and season you
as few human or even divine ingredients can
Something missing in my heart tonight
has made my eyes so soft
my voice so tender
my need of god
absolutely clear.

--Hafiz

Look

Look as long as you can
at the friend you love
No matter whether that friend is moving away from you
or coming back toward you.

--Rumi

Tender Words

2009-05-26T17:42:00.001+09:30

Tender words we spoke
to one another
are sealed
in the secret vaults of heaven.
One day like rain,
they will fall to earth
and grow green
all over the world.

Rumi

Translation by David Ladinsky

The Lute Will Beg

2009-05-26T17:40:00.001+09:30

You need to become a pen

In the Sun´s hand.

We need for the earth to sing

Through our pores and eyes.

The body will again become restless

Until your soul paints all its beauty

Upon the sky.

Don´t tell me, dear ones,

That what Hafiz says is not true,

For when the heart tastes its glorious destiny

And you awake to our constant need

for your love

God´s lute will beg

For your hands.

Hafiz

Translations by David Ladinsky

This being human is a guesthouse

2009-05-26T17:37:00.001+09:30

This being human is a guest house.
Every morning a new arrival.
A joy, a depression, a meanness,
some momentary awareness comes as an unexpected visitor.
Welcome and entertain them all!

Even if they're a crowd of sorrows,
who violently sweep your house
empty of it's furniture,
still, treat each guest honorably.

He may be clearing you out
for some new delight.
The dark thought the shame, the malice,
meet them at the door laughing,
and invite them in.

Be grateful for whoever comes,
because each has been sent as a guide from beyond.

--Rumi

Translations by David Ladinsky

Dance, when you're broken open

2009-05-07T09:03:00.001+09:30

Sufi Dervish Dance

Dance, when you're broken open.

Dance, if you've torn the bandage off.

Dance in the middle of the fighting.

Dance in your blood.

Dance, when you're perfectly free.

- Rumi (1207 - 1273 )

"It's me, you, love - lets go"

2009-02-24T17:50:00.005+09:30

And so it ends. The Oscars are done for the year. Slumdog Millionaire buzzes on everybody's lips, the controversies forgotten (for now at least), Danny Boyle is now a beloved of Britain, while India - well, India is probably unitedly on its feet, all 1 billion of them - wait, what am I saying - on its feet? Scratch that. They're all dancing on top of buses in the streets, that's more like it.

Yes, everyone's happy with the film's success - but I still feel the Indians are aware it has been piggy-backed on British Boyle's shoulders. Notwithstanding the fact that Anil Kapoor was not above pushing through anyone else's shoulders throughout the award season to get to the mike - any mike, be it on podiums or red carpets. And then repeating the same sentence again and again. ("This is for the children, it is all about the children, so its special because its - you know - for the children." Or "Danny Boyle changed our lives, its what he does, he changes lives, so this is what happened, he changed our lives." )

As SRK put it in an interview, the next, legitimate step is yet to come - that of an Indian produced, Indian acted, Indian film winning the top honour. When it comes to film quality, I'm thinking we're actually almost there, barring the hire of a good script editor who can spot those ridiculous plot side steps that crop up in the biggest of the films. Indeed, I can currently count recently flawless dramatic Indian scripts in one hand - Rang De Basanti, Omkara, and a most recent addition, Luck By Chance (box office be damned). What I'm not sure of, though, is 1. The possibility of a film made in Hindi (or any other regional Indian language, though even less likely) to qualify in the mainstream categories, and 2. The capacity of Indian organisation to galvanise high-stake lobbying power post-nomination. The scenario begs for attachment with the big studios, and if that happens, how Indian does a film really become then?

In light of this, therefore, the real win, that will reverberate right through the annals of Indian film history, of course, is the double whammy of A R Rahman.

Now words cannot express one's admiration of the man and his music. I was fourteen years old, in a tiny nobody town in Malaysia called Alor Setar, where my partner in crime, who used to attend math tuition with me, told me about this song she'd heard on the radio, that sounded incredible. She said it was a Tamil song, for a Tamil film, but that it didn't sound like a Tamil song at all. I had no idea what she was talking about. "Listen to the radio," she said. "They're playing it constantly".

I will never forget the first time I heard it. It was about seven in the morning, and I was in the family car being dropped off to school. I was in the back seat, looking out the window. Mum was driving. The radio DJ droned some nonsense in Tamil (the only Tamil station in the country then) and I never paid attention since he was an old crone who had no sense of intonation. Then the opening strains of 'Chinna Chinna Aasai' from Roja started. I continued staring out the window, but I was now frozen. I didn't blink, I barely moved, for I was trying to hear it above the noise of the car engine and traffic, and didn't wish to add to the noise level. My jaw slowly fell open throughout the song, and I've yet to close it back.

At the next tuition session I cornered my friend, and sang those opening strains back to her for confirmation. It had to be. It sounded so new. Like nothing we'd ever heard before. It could only be that song. "Where is that from?" I nearly squealed.

In a few weeks, I found out it was from the soundtrack of the film Roja, and that the composer was called A R Rahman. My friend bought the cassette, I had a walkman, and during homework time at the tuition we'd sneak ear plugs on and listen, algebra be damned. We did that repeatedly till the film came out a few months later, but that's another story. I still remember looking at the tiny black and white photograph of this boy, well, boyish man, on the cassette cover. No soundtrack cassettes featured the composer's photograph on the cover, this was an exception. Mind you, it was the size of your pinky fingernail next to the film title, but it was something to focus on when slack-jawed in open admiration.

The year was 1992.

Today, I am still a blithering idiot when it comes to expressing the pride I felt when I watched Rahman Sir, with characteristic shyness, say "Ellaam Iraivanukke" (Everything is for God). Therefore I beg to use the words of Simon Beaufoy, the screenwriter of Slumdog Millionaire, to illustrate the unabashed, open love affair between me and this man's music:

"I learned to stop being English about things like love. If you make a film in England about love, it's hugely complicated.... It's all about saying what the weather is like, and you're secretly telling someone you love them.... Let's be honest, it's not like that in India. India is incredibly uncynical about love. It's not a complicated thing. It's me, you, love — let's go."
— Screenwriter Simon Beaufoy on what he learned while filming Slumdog Millionaire.

Jai Ho!

Shyamalan on Indian film

2008-06-12T08:42:00.002+09:30

Something on rediff, which I thought was unexpectedly thought-provoking - Shyamalan's take on the 3-odd Hindi films he saw, and his take on the value of stories that sweep you away. And his odd view on accents, which I find quite alienating.
-----------

On using Indian actors in his films

Of course I would, if the casting was correct -- but not as an agenda. I would never cast anybody as an agenda. If I could find the right balance, it would be cool. I've talked about it a bunch of times, whether it is feasible to bring in some of the stars from India, cast them in some roles. I have a difficult time casting any actor with an accent, if I am not using that accent. I've done it before, where I've asked a British actor to do an American accent, and I find it very constraining as a director. The actor in such situations tends to lose some of his arsenal, his skills; he is so busy getting the accent right he reduces the bandwidth he has for performing by 10 per cent or 20 per cent. Or he exaggerates the accent a hair too much in trying to hold on to it, and I have a tough time with all of that, so that is one of the reasons I would hesitate -- it is difficult for me, whether it is a Spanish actress or a British or even Indian actor.

On prominent role for children in his movies

I think that is [Steven] Spielberg's fault. I was 10 and 11 when he made all those amazing movies, ET and Close Encounters of the Third Kind and Raiders [of the Lost Ark]. And they are all about that 10 to 12 age group. So a lot of my movies are about that, about how you've lost that belief in magic you had at that age, or you are desperately trying to convince adults of that magic. Like even in Unbreakable, where the boy is trying to tell his father he is a superhero, way before the father believes it himself.

On Indian cinema and its place in the world

I've gotten more and more interested in Indian cinema. My wife [Bhavna] is obsessed by it, and she keeps me abreast of all the new things. I think it is a very powerful art form. I find it very powerful, that heightened vocabulary -- the push-in [close up] on a character, then another push-in and another push-in and the music is going into overdrive, and the character is telling the wife get out of my house, and she is screaming, and running out of the house, and this heightened thing, it's powerful. At first you giggle when you start to watch it but then, you get acclimated to that vocabulary and you start feeling the same sort of heightened emotions.

I was telling Tom Rothman, the chairman of Fox, that Indian cinema reminds me about old-school storytelling. We keep getting more and more subtle about our film making, and you feel it has been reduced to a very delicate process. It's like in Shakespeare -- they were making big bold moves in the plot and big, bold acting. And the people, a lot of them were not really educated, and were leading miserable lives, and they came in and paid their pennies and they were taken away by the storytelling. Those stories have lasted 500 years, and Indian cinema has a lot of those things in it -- and so I was telling the chairman that we might be getting too smart for ourselves, we should remember what it felt like to be swept away. So yeah, I've actually been thinking about it a whole bunch even with regard to my own work.

It's kind of like if I was a chef, the first thing I make, everyone likes it. But as I learn more and more, and begin tasting flavours you cannot even sense, I start getting subtle in what flavours I will use and pretty soon, if I made a dish and gave it to the man on the street he would go blech, this stuff is so bland, and I would go what are you talking about, it is very rarefied, it has seven spices, blah blah.

But the point is, if it is so subtle you cannot taste it, then the point is lost. You don't want to get to that place where your voice is too rarefied. It is something I have been thinking about, constantly going back and touching universal cinema, asking myself why is it that Indian cinema is so popular, why has it lasted so long, what are they doing right? It reminds me of the old musicals; it reminds me of the movies Hollywood used to do.

Indian actor with the most potential in Hollywood

I would be a terrible person to answer that, I just don't know enough. I've seen about three movies all the way through. What's that guy's name, we were talking about him at lunch, Shah Rukh Khan [Images] -- yeah, I think all three movies had him in them. There was this thing, he is touching her in the rain, what was the name of that movie, Kabhi something... [UTV CEO Ronnie Screwvala helpfully supplies Kabhi Khushi Kabhie Gham]... right, that one; that was kind of cool, I got pretty emotional during that one. And I remember there was an old one, it was supposed to be very salacious at the time, wait, Shivam something? [Satyam [Get Quote] Shivam Sundaram, supplies the ever helpful Screwvala]� right, that one right there, that was smokin'! I don't remember the name of the third one -- wait, Devdas, there you go.

Mahathir's catchphrase

2008-06-09T22:19:00.002+09:30

"Perjuangan yang belum sudah"

Perhaps the sentiment will be more relevant when re-contextualised for a newer, fairer, more egalitarian Malaysia.

Obama Speech: 'A More Perfect Union'

2008-06-08T13:45:00.001+09:30

It's been awhile since any of us heard something truly articulate in American politics, so.

Thiruda thiruda

2008-05-16T22:15:00.001+09:30

An obscure AR Rahman/Mani Ratnam gem. Vintage Rahman, his early days when every song was a masterpiece. This one had my jaw open for days. Early 90s? A film that came out between Roja and Bombay and got buried in the bustle of the two.

Ah Rehmanji, they don't make 'em like you anymore - not even you.

The Un-named

2008-05-12T12:05:00.001+09:30

Sometimes, I really do wonder at people.

But then again, I suppose it’s the price you pay for not naming names, for protecting the identity of those you know.

Let it be said – the post Game Over is not about anyone who thinks it’s about them.

I hate to expound on what is already said, it is like un-saying it. However I am quite taken aback at the amount of people who have just assumed that the post is about them. I suppose unless explicitly told, the ego will convince itself and everyone else that the Sun and Universe revolves around It.

No end in sight

2008-05-08T08:13:00.003+09:30

First it was in flames, now it is drowning.

Repeatedly Burma suffers, and all I can do is stare at my screen and weep.

When YRF lacks Tashan

2008-04-26T08:58:00.000+09:30

When flailing YashRaj has to rope in the competition, and the competition ends up being the highlight of its seasonal blockbuster, you know it may be time to start typing condolence letters. (Adi, marry Rani quickly, and take a break. It might rejuvenate your perspective on cinema).

As of now, the critics are drawing comparisons between Tashan and Jhoom Barabar Jhoom : all style, no substance. I beg to differ. I’m one of the few that thoroughly enjoyed JBJ – music, Rikki Thukral, confessions by the café et al. It’d be an insult to put Tashan on the same platform.

Don’t get me wrong – the movie started off wonderfully, and left me gasping by the time intermission came around. The opening shots, of a car careening with two different musical genres inter-cutting from its radio, before plunging into the depths of a river, from where Saif breaks the fourth wall and starts telling the audience what an ass he’s been, is totally brilliant. (The film’s character binaries of language are also instantly established in the two songs, Highway to Hell and Kabhi Kabhie – a masterstroke).

So we’re immediately pulled into Saif’s story of working at a call-centre, bearing a fake English name Jimmy, and falling for a fresh Pooja (Kareena Kapoor), while teaching English to her boss Bhaiyyaji, who turns out to be a regular I’ll-kill-anyone criminal. (Anil Kapoor in a thoroughly unforgettable role). Jimmy falls for Pooja, helps her swindle Bhaiyyaji of 25 crores, which she promptly runs away with. This gets Jimmy to surrender to Bhaiyyaji, who hires a regional, Kanpur-ian goonda Bachchan Pande (Akshay Kumar) to find Pooja and recover the money, with stuck-with-the-rats Jimmy.

What then follows is a two-level road movie, which starts off crisp and engaging due to the originality of the characters, and some absolutely zinger one-liners. The spoof element is always there, especially in the fake rape scene with Kareena and Saif, where his “Why do you need God to save you? Ha ha ha!” totally brought the house down.

But this tightly-wound in your face parody road movie unfortunately starts to unravel quite soon after the interval. The faint echoes of the 70s masala film that was mocked initially, turns serious, complete with its clichés of childhood sweetheart flashbacks, ‘bachpan se bichchad gaye’ theme, the villain roasting his victim with electricity, and loose, barely believable action that doesn’t justify its overblown budget.

While a treat to watch, what was missing from these crucial bits are the tongue-in-cheek elements that the Indian audience is quickly catching up on. When Main Hoon Na first released, with its mid-movie action piece that cocked a snook at Sholay with the Dhanno rickshaw and “ab tera kya hoga Kaalia?”, the critics were just beginning to wonder at the prospect of respectable Bollywood parody. By the time Om Shanti Om came out, everyone, from the audiences to the critics, got it, and were rolling in the aisles.

So when you’re catering for this audience now, your genre parameters should be quite clear. And once they are, you stick to them from beginning to end.

Akshay Kumar, is of course, a complete thespian by now, and he lifts every scene that he’s in. His Ravan entry is phenomenal in comic scale, and kudos to the writers for his character. It’s Pande’s (and Bhaiyyaji’s to a certain extent ) mythological references in the movie that remind us of the constant parallels that 70s action movies were trying to emulate. Good guy versus bad guy, guru and shishya, damsel in distress. His take on the dehati is the perfect foil to Saif’s ‘cool dude’ Indian trying to be American, and gives some of the most thought-provoking nuggets about the value and pre-conceptions attached to English in India, and the prejudices that might invoke.

Kareena honestly deserves better. Post-Jab We Met, she won me over completely, however she proves here she’s more immersed in basking in her new-found ‘it girl’ glory – her face is a treat, while neck down, well. Poking ribs are a sign of malnutrition, as any WHO member can tell you. That Kareena wants to look like Victoria Beckham, in a country where large swaths of people have those same poking ribs, for those exact WHO reasons, is a sad sign for her, for Aditya Chopra, for Bollywood, and the I’ll-lap-up-anything-that’s-marketed-on-TV middle class Indian masses.

In all, Tashan is another hiccup-filled YRF fare that only brightens whenever non-YRF staples are around, ie Akshay and Anil. That’s a sign of things to come, if you ask me. But this is the era of burning Romes anyway, be it the pre-election fervour in the US, the Olympic hoo-haa over Tibet, the protests of monks in Burma, the class action suit against Queen Elizabeth by the Indians in Malaysia. All monopolising monoliths will have to crumble at some point. Which is why I said – Adi, really, get married.

Tashan ki tashan

2008-04-26T00:17:00.004+09:30

So the unthinkable has happened - due to non-agreement between YashRaj Films and a united front of multiplexes (yes, I know, it's weird) - India's multiplex's didn't release Tashan today, the proverbial Friday. And how bizarre - us NRI-log have now watched a major Indian release way before our desi counterparts.

Time was when I saw Taal in 1999 in a musty, one room cinema the size of a toilet in Lutwyche, populated by local Indians dressed up as if attending a wedding, since it was one of the few occasions for them to see and be seen. And Taal came months after its Indian release, hired out by a distributor hanging on to some form of new desperation.

Today Tashan was showing at The Regent (even as it gets ignored at AdLabs and Inox in Mumbai), was a full house for both the 5:30 and 8:30 shows, and were full of new Indian faces I didn't recognise, wearing casual jeans and shirts. (The fact that none of them turned off their mobile phones, littered the cinema, and constantly cut queues, is another story. ) And all of them were new imports - for both educational and professional purposes. I hesitate to call them NRIs - you only earn that after you've collapsed into tears upon listening to AR Rahman in your home stereo, and gravitating towards tabla music playing around Queen Street Mall. Yet - they almost wanted to seem slotted that way - almost as if being NRI were somehow superior to being desi. Who the hell knows.

Anyway - preface over, here's the actual review, since I know those in India who haven't seen the movie, and want to know if its paisa vasool - or even if there's a hint of the ol' Khiladi-Anari chemistry from AK and SK. My personal theory - if there was, it was chalked out by the script.

But you decide:

**NOTE: This review is written ad hoc as first thoughts, and may be revamped in the future. Original version appears in Bollywhat (check out 'tabula rasa').

Tashan - The Good, The Bad, and The Ugly.

GOOD

- Anil Kapoor's English. I want that man to read Shakespeare to me before I go to bed every night.

- Some zinger one-liners. ("toh kya, AISE hai?" And the translated Deewar monologue. And "bilkul George Bush ki tarah").

- Akshay Kumar's Bachchan Pande characterisation. Esply his entry as a Ravan who stops the play.

- Some of the movie's road trip aspects.

- A good tight first half.

- The Sanskrit chant in the climax (it sounds familiar, I want to know what it is).

- Surprisingly, the Dil Dance Maare picturisation.

- The very interesting film discourse about language, Eng vs Hindi, illustrations of demographics of those that use them and those that don't, and what one type thinks of the other.

BAD

- Unconvincing action - way too OTT.

- Unconvincing in terms of character motivation too. We have no way of believing that Kareena can shoot well, or that AK can run up buildings and accost a whole gang of goondas, and dodge bullets till kingdom come.

- An unravelling climax, where there is no crescendo - the action plateaus at a high pitch, which makes it unwatchable. It's suddenly 70s villain climax, without the tongue in cheek.

- A ridiculous backstory to Bachchan Pande, and the ridiculous unlikelihood of Bebo as Gudiya. And the coincidental realisation. Again, way too serious 70s cinema. Came into the story waaayyyy too late.

- An unresolved/unnecessary plot point of Saif as police informer, whose purpose dies with the officer. His motivations aren't enforced in the script after that.

UGLY:

- Kareena in Chaliya. Surprisingly she wasn't as skinny in the other parts - Chaliya seems to have been a nugget of time of super-skinniness. Ribs. I could see her ribs. There's nothing sexy about poking ribs.
(Interestingly, the house full audience which hooted every time Anil opened his mouth, and whistled at Akki's entrance, remained strangely silent throughout that song).

- A halting, skipping script post-interval, which only gets highlighted when the characters are being themselves.

- An overblown budget on action that does not get justified.

So? Worth the DVD? Hmm. Yeah. But if someone could rip just the 1st half for me, I'll be happy.

Game Over (?)

2008-04-23T11:24:00.002+09:30

What is it they say about journeys, and their various stopovers? That implication that as you progress towards your destination, it's not about the distance left to get there, but the distance that you've already covered. But most importantly, it's the distance you get from yourself. So you can, after a while, literally stand slightly away, offside, look back, and go "gee, that was someone else who started out, wasn't it?"

I think I am now that person, and because of my stopovers, some brief, some protracted, I think I've become a little more seasoned. I know when a barricade is staring me in the face. I also know the whole thing about it pulling back when you push against it, and then pushing forward when you don't expect it to.

I'm getting it now. From unexpected quarters. This is a very seductive stopover too. There're facilities, warmth, stimulating conversation, thought-provoking ideas.I want to be here, hopefully for a long time. The thing is, I’m a little too busy at the moment, with work, study, managing my mum, etc – to spare the time and energy to play this push and pull game. I’ve been there, done that.

But more than that – my last stopover (which is still stopping over, there doesn’t seem to be a clear departure in that sense at the moment) – came to me so easily. Dropped down from the sky, intact in kneeling position, with Persian poetry and proposals to book me in our next lives. I didn’t have to lift a finger. Perhaps that’s spoilt me.

But perhaps, too, as journeys go, you grow up a little. You respond better to fellow travellers who’ve been there, done that, who know what its all about. Who know that playing pull-push games are restricted to adolescent episodes and today's tweens desperately trying to come across all 'found'.

*sigh*.

I have come far. I have still further to go. I'm intrigued by this junction, but I'm also quite weary of it. So unless the barricade stops pretending and opens its arms and envelops the beautiful gift this can be, I really don't have the energy to play its game.

Insider Out

2008-04-15T21:51:00.002+09:30

Given the surfeit of writing that occurs in my life these days, I rarely drop by this place anymore, despite curious emails from friends and acquaintances wondering what's happened.

My blog is my space to ponder, and fortunately or unfortunately, of late I have had little time for that.

But then, there are also such things as kernels of notions that invisibly plant themselves within you, then gradually grow over time, till it spills forth at unexpected moments, words that you have heard others say but never thought you yourself would.

At such times, pondering is not an indulgence, it is vital.

I have lived in Australia since 1999, and now know the culture and people enough (I hope) to be able to function adequately in their midst - even when I'm the only one of my kind amongst them. I'm quite used to that notion now, of being the only one of my kind, in any room, in any situation. In fact, it's a second skin I now wear so comfortably that I know that all those I attract are of the same ken as well - that they belong nowhere but within themselves, that they're square pegs in round holes and didn't ask to be that way.

Perhaps it is because of this outsider status of mine, that I see things in my clients that others don't. That although being Indian (raised that way to the point of almost denying my Malaysian nationality) in an all-Australian department, I cannot seem to stand other Indians coming into the Library.

It is an awful feeling. It's akin to treason in my book, that I quite intentionally handle my Indian clients quite differently from my Australian ones - and in a negative way. But I cannot help it. I feel put in a position where I cannot deviate from my professional commitment to treat them just the way I do my other clients, which therefore means many rude things in the Indian book.

These things include:

1. No leniency in accepting e-card prerequisites.
2. Saying no to unreasonable IT demands (even though they come by due to lack of knowledge, not arrogance or laziness).
3. A brusque and no-nonsense manner, pre-empting any chattiness, because:
4. When Indians meet fellow Indians the instinct is to geographically locate you somewhere, if not an Indian region, then its diaspora - followed by a tracing of your geneaology back to the tiny little Indian village your forebears would've waded out from.
5. An expectation of rule bending 'to help out your own kind' once the above nexus is established.

It annoys me no end.

And it annoys me that it annoys me.

I can't seem to find my fixed position on this, and instead I ambit around a locus - I defend the Indians full-scale in the staff tea-room, suddenly representing the whole sub-continent, but after a few hours at the front desk I'm the first to spew the frustrations that they as a group have repeatedly inflicted on every member of the department. It's like my loyalties need to be cleaved down the middle in order for me to reach any level of coherency.

In all honesty - I'm a little surprised at the straight-up boorishness of this particular group that frequent my workplace (by group of course, I mean a 250-strong collossus that has invaded the city centre). I've always, in my various dealings with Indians and India, been charmed off my socks with their knowledge and refinement and intellect.

For the first time, it seems, the India of the village is encroaching upon the town-masquerading-as-city Brisbane. Collisions of culture seem harder than before, their powerful clanging against each other producing vibrations nobody has been prepared for. Hell, even I'm not, and it looks as if I'd been in training for it for years. I'm the perfect halfway house.

Is this natural resistance to being claimed by the Indian mob, a traitorous streak I need to address, or is it merely an indicator of all the various milestones I've crossed since I came here - crossed them to point of having reached the other side?

Oh that I would be Kali with a million arms

2008-02-10T10:52:00.000+09:30

So that I could spare a pair anytime I wanted, to do all the various chores

So that I could simultaneously wash dishes and write a chapter

So that I can pay my bills and get my place in order

So that I can cook according to current health guidelines and not break my back

So that the trash can be taken out without having to remember it

So my garage is locked down without heaving everything away

So I can fan myself in this Godforsaken, draining heat

So I can slap some slappable people who aren’t being very genuine

So I can, true to Her name, stop Time and treat it like a construct

So I can attain these unattainable standards I’ve ridiculously piled upon myself

Review in M/C

2008-01-30T12:33:00.000+09:30

A recent review of mine that got published. Acknowledgements to Tim Milfull at the University of Queensland.

Sands shifting under Burma's brutal regime

2007-10-05T15:35:00.000+09:30

Excerpt from article on ABC:

by Mary O'Kane

Each night Australians sit in their lounge rooms and witness dreadful violence on the streets of Burma.

Each morning, when they pick up their daily newspaper they are confronted with pictures of dead monks, shocking beatings and great bravery from the thousands of people who have taken to the streets, protesting against a brutal government that thinks nothing of spilling the blood of its own citizens.

The Australian Government has also watched these news bulletins, read these newspapers, and seen these pictures. There is no avoiding it.

So what is the Australian Government and its international counterparts going to do to help the people who so bravely have taken to the streets in Burma, after decades of being repressed at home and dumped in the 'too hard' basket by countries that should, and could, do more?

For more, click on title above.

Has anyone seen this man, dead or alive?

2007-10-04T11:18:00.001+09:30

If so, please email me and let me know.

A Monk's injury

2007-10-04T11:13:00.000+09:30

The people crowd around to tend to a monk's injuries.

Monks are revered greatly in Burma, and are almost outside the law. To cause harm to a monk is considered a great sin.

And I've never seen any clergy of any country as politically active as the monks I met and spoke with in Yangon (Rangoon)

No more internet in Burma now

2007-10-04T09:12:00.001+09:30

I can't email/call anyone I know there. Some of them are monks, and I dreadfully fear they may be imprisoned, or worse, dead.

O Burma, my Burma

2007-09-28T11:27:00.000+09:30

It burns and I burn with it.

New Home

2007-09-16T11:40:00.000+09:30

So its official - I've moved into my very own apartment. It sort of came at me out of nowhere, knocked my socks off when I saw it, and left me breathless at the very prospect of it.

Hence, I decided to take the plunge into the unknown ( having never actually purchased real estate before, ha ha ) and went for it, hammer and tongs.

Result, a really cool retro apartment, large kitchen with gorgeous Italian tiles, and dark brick walls, all reminiscent of vintage 70s, and the good kind too. Area - Paddington, that historical haven of everything new and bohemian, as well as possessing some of the most iconic establishments of Brisbane, though there seems to be an upheaval of sorts for this recently. Freestyle, for example, is gone - where am I gonna go for a big end sugar rush now, I don't know. But by the same token, there's talk of more delis, more gourmet shops, more organic food stores about to make an inroad - one can only hope.

Personally its the opshops that have me going - once I return from India, the long term summer project is to set up home properly, from a trip to Logan's Ikea for endless bookshelves, to thrift shopping with neighbours to find that exclusive object d'art at that swoon-worthy fraction of a price. I've already found one, in fact - the very last of it too - a gorgeous antique-style South East Asian hand of the Buddha, holding a lotus-shaped container for a tea-candle. At Target, amongst considerable generic junk, I might add. For a price that would fetch me perhaps only a tea-candle itself in Loot.

For now, though, my possessions live in boxes, stacked in their respective future rooms. My internet access is reduced to my laptop, a modem, my fast dying Telstra phone, and a gargantuan jumble of wires in between. My neighbour Frances (technically mother of neighbour/friend Andrea, but hey we have plenty in common too ) is the secretary of the body corporate, and resident thrift and tidy queen - her place is so spotless I'm afraid to even sweat in there. We both indulge in interior-porn through the Ikea catalogue in our junk mail, and we both indulge in pre-loved product shopping. Come November and blithering hot summer, there're gonna be plenty of sprees, sparsed in between with homemade chilled smoothies made in my housewarming gift from work - a unique retro blender.

Ahh, domestic bliss! I can barely wade through my house in a single straight line right now, but I can dream.

Library Thing

2007-06-05T16:12:00.000+09:30

Alright, okay, so I'm officially a nerd. Hey, try working 8 hours a day, 5 days a week ( sometimes 6 ) at the State Library, and see what quirky crap you come up with.

So I attended their Emerging New Media seminar recently, and witnessed a presenter fawning ( yes, that really is the appropriate word for it, fawning ) over LibraryThing, your own online personal cataloguer. You can add the books you've read throughout your life ( its an insider thing to boast about how many books you added in how little time - mine is 150 in 40 minutes ) and then check how many others have read the same, who have personal libraries similar to yours, tag each entry as per your wish (sensible borers go 'fiction', 'history', 'self help'; others prefer 'honeymoon', 'ultimate depression', 'sweet nothings'. Whatever rocks your b...uh, bookcase ). Then you can add yourself to particular groups and start chatting on message boards.

It's ultimate geekdom glorification. I had to get on it instantly.

Below is a java operated generator of random books in my current catalogue. It will grow as and when I have time to add on at work ( and also attempt to avoid getting paid out for it - some people weren't surprised at my enthusiasm, which is kind of alarming ).

So for all you fellow nerdy bloggers out there, get on board and do a bit of a showoff - until you get heckled, anyway.

My name is Cog

2007-03-08T08:22:00.000+09:30

I interrupt my supposedly riveting account of Yangon to give a small update on my currently spinning-like-a-top life.

I’ve been accepted to work full-time at the State Library. It is news that’s made all my previous work colleagues incredibly envious, spouting congratulations in awed whispers and slightly widened eyes. Which of course gets me a little cowed and grateful from my first day of training.

So for those of you hungering to know what’s it like to work at the State Library, that repository of great knowledge in Queensland, the source of much resource for students and professionals alike, researchers and recalcitrants together, here’s a small byte to chew on.

My new workplace is not so much an archaic, hallowed institution these days, as it is a living breathing mechanical machinery, departments and branches securely in place and cranking throughout the day, well-oiled and slimy-smiled.

Coming from two libraries, one of which is family-owned, and the other concentrating on alternative therapies, I’ve always been comfortable in small libraries and personable relationships with patrons. Hence running up and down four floors a day and hotdesking when I can, and being trained in turning patrons away to other floors, saying ‘we don’t do this’, is new. It works for the place, but it’s still new. It’s the result of being a joint in the limb of my floor, connecting up with the duties and workings of the other departments.

Basically, patrons obtain a free e-services card, which allows them internet usage of up to two hours per day, Levels 2 upwards. (Level 1, or the Infozone, has free internet usage, though there are limitations of 20 minutes and an hour. Plus there’s wireless available on that floor, which patrons love ). The e-services card also lets you add credit onto it, in case you need to print or photocopy documents.

And photocopying is popular, given the fact that we’re a Reference Library, and the only thing we lend out is Music ( which not many people know, but get into raptures upon discovery ).

And if what you’re looking for isn’t on the open shelves of the floor you’re on, you can request that it be sent out to you, either via the online catalogue’s ‘send a request’ facility ( which again requires your e-services card ), or by a manual request. There are set times of the day by which you’d need to put the request in, in order to receive the item from the repository. For example, requests from Level 2 and 3 are to be put in every two hours on the half hour, ie by 12.30pm for a 1pm delivery, missing which the next cut off is at 2.30pm for a 3pm delivery.

For those who love digging up Queensland past through our Heritage collections, or looking up family history, there’s Level 4, where the request timings are more frequent, ie every hour on the half hour. It only means we’re constantly running in and out of the repositories to desk almost continuously, rummaging to find not just books ( how wonderfully uncomplicated that would be ) but also original materials, newspaper clippings, and photographs. I still tend to catch my breath when I come across some incredibly beautiful, historical or valuable items, like a box of photographs of the Fortitude Valley from the 1930s to now, and I consider that my one comfort when I have to sort every single photograph back into order before re-shelving them.

But this is basically what I do – I run into repositories picking up patron requests, I process cards at front desk as well as assist patrons in printing and photocopying, I discharge and shelve books out on open access and back into repositories, put out the daily newspapers, re-shelve microfilm in the micrographics area, and hopefully in the near future get to do back of house, which is a whole other blog entry by itself.

So, yes, I’m one of the many nuts and bolts of the place, executing the concepts of librarians and orders of patrons, ensuring the cycle of circulation stays smooth and uncantankerous. I’m like a spare part in a car, invisible but holding much together. Might be time I changed my name.

Yangon Days, II

2007-01-18T14:52:00.000+09:30

10th dec 2006, Sunday, 7pm.

It’s Indian central today. An aftermath of my mum’s instant networking from the day before. Its wonderful, of course, and the Tamils here are incredibly helpful, yet to me it’s a little too self-validating to come to foreign country and immediately immerse yourself in everything that is like home. Thankfully, though, I think Mother realises that I don’t think along the same lines as her. We may be going our separate ways tomorrow.

We went to the Perumal temple where she was last night. It’s ancient ( from the 20s,and true enough has the Reddyar, a well-known Indian philantrophist during the Raj, as the main patron ), though a kumbhabhishegam is happening coming January. No renovations though, just a repainting of the ancient gopuram, since the place is heritage listed.

The painted but otherwise untouched Perumal temple Gopuram, Yangon 2006.

I made a friend in a mute Burmese artist, who apparently has drawn all the murals in the inner parts of the temple. Quite remarkable, in that he’s got the Indian style just right. Even more remarkable is his sign language, which is very understandable, and we had long conversations using just nods and smiles and varied gestures. He wants us to employ him in Malaysia, and indicated repeatedly that he will fly there to see us. The poor man very badly wants to leave.

Our driver ( provided by Bharath restaurant owner Krishnan ) had to go help out his boss, and told us he’d be back at 1pm. We had lunch at the temple, consisting of a banana leaf spread, though the contents were highly doubtful. I had memories of a similar almost inedible meal in Kadayam, my paternal grandmother’s place near Tanjavur, India. But the great feeling of hospitality that we were surrounded by, in the form of total strangers wanting to look after us, more than made up for it.

While we had lunch ( at a table, while the rest sat on the floor ), Mr Mute Artist actually fanned us constantly so that we wouldn’t have to keep swatting flies. It was colonial times all over again. And ironic that I had such lengthy conversations with a mute as compared to the Burmese-speaking locals, all due to the language barrier. Thankfully gestures ( and dance ) is universal. I tipped Mute Artist about 1000kyat. The man didn’t want to receive it, but I insisted. He then indicated that he liked me a lot.

Anyway – we went to the High School just behind the temple, where we believe my grandmother would’ve gone to school. It used to be called the Reddyar High School. There we met an English-speaking gentleman, who led us to the current headmistress. Apparently this is now a state school ( as per nationalisation of everything in the 60s ), and a premier one at that ( no idea how truthful that is ). It all looked incredibly run down though. I took some pictures of the classrooms and the school hall and library. However I did feel something was off. No great moment of truth hitting me, not even a sense of awe at being at the school where my grandmother had studied.

I put it down to the sheer haphazard notion we had about us this day – as is usual with our temperament, there was no planning, and everything was in a jumbled up fashion, therefore the entire experience was passive and unstimulating. I’m quite sad and regretful of it.

Of course, what made it worse was, we were late in getting back, which meant our driver had arrived, found us missing, been given incorrect instructions that we’d be at the Post Office, and had gone looking for us there. The travails of a mobile-less world!

We therefore had to sit there and waste time waiting for him – however Mother left with a Kalaichelvan to a nearby grocery store to get essential supplies for us like coffee and bread and milk and fruits ( and chocolate ), while the Managing Trustee of the temple kept me company. He recounted how the Perumal gets His own donations through diamond merchants who donate in lakhs ( the Indian word for a hundred thousand ). He was also incredibly disinterested in Aung San Suu Kyi. It was the very first time I’ve approached the subject, albeit to a person to whom it means nothing. Quaintly enough, he’d know more about Trichy ( spoken of in awed tones ) than the current state of Myanmar politics. I guess this is one of the truest meanings of diaspora – that a temple trustee in Yangon could be the twin brother of any Iyer in Old Klang Road, KL – all roads lead to Tamil Nadu.

In the meantime, Mute Artist, who was by now my fan, came in with a Sprite equivalent drink in a bottle with a straw, headed straight toward me in a crowd full of temple trustees and administrators and other VIPs, and presented it to me. I was tickled and embarrassed, and poor Mute Artist was again the subject of much teasing, which he endured with a silent non-committal smile.

When Mother returned I had a short conversation with Kalaichelvan, whose casual remarks that the government doesn’t care at all about its locals hit a nerve. It’s one thing reading about it in academic journals, another to have a Burmese-Indian spout it in a throwaway fashion, like it’s a part of the landscape. Everyone keeps saying the streets are safe, that there is absolutely no robbery, but the real reason for this, is that if caught, your life ends. You get thrown into jail, and forgotten, or so he says.

Mother and I have planned to buy 2 things – some lungyis, ( pronounced ‘lohn-jee’ and more of the thanaka, or sandal-like paste on every woman’s face.

Life here is slow – and we’re talking central Yangon. The trustee felt these days time flies by, so I shudder to think how life must’ve been in my grandmother’s times. It’s understandable that her entire childhood existence would be around just one neighbourhood. That her universe was only a few blocks in size. Especially being the daughter of a migrant Indian post-master. Naturally her world revolved around the ‘donnai’ of the Perumal temple in Maargazhi, around the wooden desks of her classroom ( which she stopped going to once she was of marriageable age ) and her upper floor home at the post office building. From the letters she kept, her sister Meena’s death from tuberculosis ( or consumption as it was called then ) was common, as was mortality. Meena was apparently the brightest in the family, and her loss was felt by all in the family. Apparently patti’s non-knowledge of her parents’ passing, so soon after her wedding, was a big tragedy in her life. She hadn’t been able to return to her parents’ even once after her wedding, as is usually the case when the wife gets pregnant ( usually with the first child but can be for subsequent children too. It was probably to safeguard against death at childbirth and infant mortality ).

For a woman in her time, it would’ve been a colossal loss, when you’ve married someone you have no idea about, and traveled to a foreign country with him, and then learning that you will never see your parents again. Perhaps that’s why she’s never expressed any desire to return and see Rangoon, and her old places. Perhaps her survival depended on suppressing those memories. Now I understand and appreciate how difficult it might’ve been for her to talk about her Rangoon times with me, when I kept pushing it.

** Handwriting here – English – very cursive, and has lots of curves and rounds and an artistry to it. Very similar to my grandmother’s writing. I believe Reddyar’s was a Tamil school when she was there. (The plaques are now covered by common cardboard notice-boards ). I wonder if the current handwriting style is an influence of the Burmese script. If so, how come it’s similar to Patti’s – unless there’s a general writing style that is so, due to the generally cursive nature of both Tamil and Burmese.

Yangon Days

2007-01-11T14:22:00.000+09:30

I recreate my travel journals here, recording all the silly stream-of-consciousness writing I was doing while on the field. I'm dating it chronologically, and may include pictures as and when I feel they're relevant. Hope you like it.

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Yangon, 9 DECEMBER 2006, 5.15pm ( the day we landed )

It isn't 2006.

Seems more like 1964. In a place that's between Old Delhi of today and Kuala Lumpur circa 50 years ago.

Yangon streets may not be as dusty as any Indian city's, nor as arid, but there is definitely a sense of stymy and decay about the place.

Shop signs are like matchboxes, and I've yet to see a flood of neon - the occasional one signifies an upper crust joint. Cars are aplenty but ancient, drilling out its engines and gasping out deadly fumes. Five-footways are alive with makeshift markets, laying down everything from roasted meat to fruit to pirated movies to toy mobiles right on the grimy gray footpath, saved from a kick from a passer-by only through thin blankets and blinding smiles.

A great difference that reminds me that we're in a foreign country - the lungyis of the men ( the cutest thing ever ) and mushrooming pagodas ( or payas ) at any given point in the landscape.

The Burmese script is another fascinating thing. To me, it seems a mix of Telegu/Malayalam, with a sprinkling of Sanskrit. Interestingly, there's nothing remotely Thai about it, which I'm certain is due to the fact that the Thai script is man-made, by one of its kings in the last century.

After the initial shock at the antiquated environment, though, you can't help but start looking at the people - contrary to what I expected, the Bamar ( the largest ethnic group in Yangon ) remain gentle, unassuming, mild-mannered, always ready with a smile and an easy laugh. They very much remind me of the kampung Malays - the kind that has almost disappeared between the cracks of KL's mind-numbing skyscrapers.

They seem easily content - a two-sided coin, perhaps, since that may only be a hop,skip and jump towards complacency - again, a trait the Indians and Chinese in Malaysia associate with the Malays. As Mr Tan, our only local contact ( and still a stranger ) here mentions, the economy is in the hands of the Chinese and the Indian Muslims - neither of whom, I can surmise, would be much interested in the political situation of the country, as long as it doesn't threaten their livelihood. Its the sad apathy that every ethnic minority disapora wears like clothes - essential for survival.

There is another, more important difference between the Burmese and the Malays, though - the Burmese love to read. Really. It was quite a surprise for me, despite the various warnings in my Lonely Planet guide ( henceforth known as my 'good book' ). Literacy levels are high, and bookstalls abound, selling mostly Burmese books.

And another thing - the electricity goes off quite a few times a day, as it just has right now at Bharat Restaurant, 5.45 pm. Good places keep generators to get the energy back up.

Mother's made contact with the workers of Bharath Restaurant where we've had lunch. The food was atrocious, but I picked up that the waiters were speaking Tamil, and Mother's hooked up with them and found out all about the temples etc.

There seems to be a pocket of Indian-ness to Yangon that everyone seems to know about - even Mr Tan, who had no idea where Bharath Restaurant is, found it in no time due to local help - who knew the name while Mr Tan didn't, and kept saying "Namaskaaram", which tickled Mother no end.

There is still the occasional beggar, and purchase of a street product brought an old Indian beggar woman to me. Looking into those hope-forsaken eyes, it would've been inhuman of me to desist. I don't even know how much I gave her. But I did turn away from a cry from another quarter subsequently.

Arrrgh! Temporarily Adjourned

2007-01-05T16:31:00.000+09:30

Just as I delve back to my Yangon days, endeavouring to encase them in prose, the real world collides and rocks my boat.

I have a major interview coming up next week. All activities must cease till then. I will resume hereafter, when I don't need to feel jittery down to my toes.

Wish me luck!!!

Kipling's Mandalay

2007-01-05T14:34:00.000+09:30

Something to tide you by while I get my 400+ photographs organised, darlings.

Kipling's Road to Mandalay - a poem I read ages ago but understood only now, particularly with regards to a certain context. Do forgive his surprisingly racist and missionary-head in one of the verses, though.

MANDALAY by Rudyard Kipling

By the old Moulmein Pagoda, lookin' lazy at the sea,
There's a Burma girl a-settin', and I know she thinks o' me;
For the wind is in the palm-trees, and the temple-bells they say;
"Come you back, you British Soldier; come you back to Mandalay!"
Come you back to Mandalay, Where the old Flotilla lay;
Can't you 'ear their paddles clunkin' from Rangoon to Mandalay?
On the road to Mandalay, Where the flyin'-fishes play,
An' the dawn comes up like thunder outer China 'crost the Bay!

'Er petticoat was yaller an' 'er little cap was green,
An' 'er name was Supi-Yaw-Lat jes' the same as Theebaw's Queen,
An' I seed her first a-smokin' of a whackin' white cheroot,
An' wastin' Christian kisses on an 'eathen idol's foot:
Bloomin' idol made o' mud-- Wot they called the Great Gawd Budd-- Plucky lot she cared for idols when I kissed 'er where she stud!
On the road to Mandalay ...

When the mist was on the rice-fields an' the sun was droppin' slow,
She'd git 'er little banjo an' she'd sing "Kulla-la-lo!"
With 'er arm upon my shoulder an' 'er cheek again my cheek
We useter watch the steamers an' the hathis pilin' teak.
Elephants a-piling teak In the sludgy, squdgy creek,
Where the silence 'ung that 'eavy you was 'arf afraid to speak!
On the road to Mandalay ...

But that's all shove be'ind me -- long ago and fur away,
An' there ain't no 'buses runnin' from the Bank to Mandalay;
An' I'm learnin' 'ere in London what the ten-year soldier tells:
"If you've 'eard the East a-callin', you won't never 'eed naught else."
No! you won't 'eed nothin' else But them spicy garlic smells,
An' the sunshine an' the palm-trees an' the tinkly temple-bells;
On the road to Mandalay ...

I am sick 'o wastin' leather on these gritty pavin'-stones,
An' the blasted English drizzle wakes the fever in my bones;
Tho' I walks with fifty 'ousemaids outer Chelsea to the Strand,
An' they talks a lot o' lovin', but wot do they understand?
Beefy face an' grubby 'and-- Law! wot do they understand?
I've a neater, sweeter maiden in a cleaner, greener land!
On the road to Mandalay . . .

Ship me somewheres east of Suez, where the best is like the worst,
Where there ain't no Ten Commandments an' a man can raise a thirst;
For the temple-bells are callin', and it's there that I would be--
By the old Moulmein Pagoda, looking lazy at the sea;
On the road to Mandalay, Where the old Flotilla lay,
With our sick beneath the awnings when we went to Mandalay!
O the road to Mandalay, Where the flyin'-fishes play,
An' the dawn comes up like thunder outer China 'crost the Bay!

Same Song Blues

2006-12-31T13:38:00.000+09:30

Arrived back in Brisbane last night, and been unpacking all day. It never ends. And there's already so much to do, so many chores to be finished, and I can't even get started because of the date. The country's paralysed, and I have to empty bags taking out Burmese-teak Buddhas and lacquerware tissue-boxes, and pause with pain at memories.

I even tried listening to some of my fave Bollywood songs to help heighten the mood, but to no avail. Its official. I feel the alienation in my bones. In the fibre of my being I know that I'm looking around like a departed sprite, hollow and otherworldly.

I want to go back to Yangon, where people suffer but care, where movies in cinemas are five-years old but watching kids play on the street is far more entertaining, where people are very hush about forced labour but will donate what little they have for a gold leaf to be laid on Shwedagon in their name.

Where food is bought fresh off the streets and tastes like it should, where monks place themselves in danger just in order to confirm new military directives, where housekeeping boys insist on paying for you, where email is an elitist concept, where your teacup is never allowed to be empty because quenching another's thirst is supposed to bring you spiritual merit.

Ah, I have to write about Yangon, so much, and soon. Yet I have to take care of things so mundane I want to scream. Help.

Here I come o saturated world

2006-12-29T19:00:00.000+09:30

So its done, I guess. My trip's over, and I'm in the throes of my regular chaotic packing, which takes all day and is endless, and just when you think the bags can be zipped up, new stuff pops out of thin air begging to be taken along.

Unlike my other times, though, this time the depression is palpable - perhaps because I'm already aware of its forthcoming presence and am trying to be prepared for it. Friends have been forewarned, and bouts of silence have been observed.

I leave for an uber-civilisation after spending the largest chunk of my break in a country where people can't vote and sometimes work for nothing, not even food.

And then I need to observe New Year's Eve in a First World country where binge drinking is the norm and people complain about holiday weight and tasteless, regiftable Christmas presents.

Strangely enough, I was happier in the supposedly more miserable country.

Love you, Australia. Make way, I'm coming over.

Madnesses and Methods

2006-12-06T12:38:00.000+09:30

So I'm finally here in Malaysia, en route to Myanmar. In about a week or more, I've successfully exploded at my mother, burst with pride at my godsister's dance graduation, spent copious amounts of time with my dad before he left overseas (yes, leaving behind a just-come-home daughter ), eaten alive by mozzies in a very forgotten Christian cemetery, obtained dubious blessings from a Shiva-like Thai ascetic, and utterly confused my geography in the ever-mystifying maze that is KL.

Planning anything when my mum is around is an act of futility, given my family's inherent love for chaos. Distractions abound and taken to almost with obscene veracity. My mother doesn't speak in sentences, but in paragraphs - and if she wants to ask me something, she never actually just asks it- she has to outline the history of that question from its inception, offer me 25 options and why those options exist, and just when I've successfully tuned her out and wondering which Malaysian dish I should sample next, finally goes "So what you do you think?" and expects an instant answer.

Ah, home.

KL is a whirlwind this time. I'm spinning around in a city filled with banners of Bollywood stars, who are descending on the city for a concert/award thingy ( another one of those un-rememberable ones, so not surprised ) and of course I'm left out of the whole thing. Its my regular catchphrase now that all of Bollywood is exactly where I am not - but they chase after me and reach just as I've left.

Tag! I want to lose!

I can barely touch my friends the way I'm used to doing when I'm around. Its like I've got ADD, nodding absently at instances when I usually get emphatic and empathetic. Perhaps because this time around KL is my halfway house between family time and research time in Myanmar?

I have no answers right now. Perhaps they will resurface when I leave.

I need to make a move - Anniza's showered and is waiting to drop me off to Megamall before attending a meeting. That's what I seem to be doing most in KL - shop!

Short sad update

2006-11-20T17:09:00.000+09:30

My mobile blogging remains an unfulfilled techno-dream. My providers don't function well in Myanmar, but worse - a local sim there costs 1k USD. I kid you not. One thousand American dollars. Talk about trying to milk it from the tourist.

At this rate, I'll be happy if my pen and paper doesn't get snatched away in broad daylight.

Looks like my blogging luck will now depend on the availability of internet cafes - now how expensive THEY'RE going to be, is anybody's guess. I might have to start depending on charity for free speech soon.

Another pre-travel ponder

2006-11-14T16:34:00.000+09:30

I always get a little nervous before getting to Malaysia. No matter how much i try to prepare myself, I just am not. The more I think of the notion of "returning", the more I feel isolated from the reality of it.

The first thing to accost me is usually the language - alien yet understandable, brassy yet a comfortable lingua franca.

And then there are the usual mistakes and misunderstandings that constantly underline my existence there - the misconception by everyone, no matter what race or background, that I'm Malay, not Indian - and therefore by default, that I'm Muslim, not Hindu.

Hence, my nose-piercing gets stares, as does my uncovered head, growing sinfully lustrous hair. I'm too fair to be Indian ( as per the horrifically steretyped notion in Malaysia that all Indians are the colour of charcoal ) but too well-spoken to be Melayu-mari. Many taxi drivers jump to the proud conclusion that I must be 'kacukan', or to be less elegant, 'campur' - of mixed parentage. Despite my polite ( and these days plain bored ) efforts to say otherwise. One even went so far as to try and convince me that my parents must be of mixed breed ( operative word being convince ).

And then there's the rabid materialism of Kuala Lumpur - a vision of exciting urbane-ness that always fascinates me. A metropolis of cutting edge technology and infrastructure that can rival any global city, in terms of on-the-face sophistication, streamlined skyline, and never-close-shop malls.

Thing is, I like to leave it at that. Once I stay long enough to scratch the surface, the packed-tight seeds and wounds come crawling out - the race for more money, the judging of character based on the latest designer jeans you have on, the left-behind forefather generation spouting wisened wisdom on ears deafened by the din of construction.

And then I grieve, I mourn, I question, I exasperate, I relinquish, I resign, I return.

A year later, the cycle begins again.

Travelling Travails - the prologue

2006-11-08T14:10:00.000+09:30

After a couple of months of people wondering if I'm going to be perenially just 'bereft' and nothing else, I return to my blog in a flurry of pre-travel activity, organising little frustrating details that insist on going wrong and ruining that big rosy picture in your head. The kind that leaps up from Vogue Travel and such-like, replete with jet-setting Ralph Lauren travel kits and L'Occitane aromatherapy air-mists.

The reality is more about yelling at your travel agent for failing to understand the minutiae of visa-acquisition and listening to an automated voice on the phone at Malaysia Airlines educating you on the advantages of Enrich points ad-infinitum.

And doing 12-hour work shifts in between.

It's a little hard to envision the final destination when in this quagmire - a brief return to the nation I was born in, followed by a much-anticipated, much-planned, a little scary trip up to Myanmar ( a name nobody here recognises unless you whisper 'Burma' conspiratorially ) to experience, evaluate, and dare I say it - perhaps understand - what it was like for my maternal grandmother, when she lived as a little schoolgirl in Rangoon of old.

I hardly trust myself in these trips back home, since all the great self-made promises of remaining calm and breezy and most of all, adult, during my trip almost instantly vapourises at the sight of friends, family, heck, even buildings and smells and language. I'm a mess when I arrive, and a mess when I leave.

So when it comes to this trip up to Yangdon ( Rangoon! ) - and with my mother no less, wanting to explore her own mother - I field awed gasps from Brisbane-white Aussies with serene cool, and silently quake in my Jacqui-e heels.

I'm endeavouring to set up Mobile Blogging as we speak - though that's not confirmed - and will be texting my experiences as and when they happen. Instant images are out of the question ( very sadly ) since they're yet to be supported by non-American mobile providers, but then I've relied more on my words to paint my stories anyway. Something that might change next year if my duty-free shopping this time goes according to plan.

So buckle up my honeys, it's gonna be one crazy ride for me. Pray I get back in one piece, but really, don't expect much sanity in the forthcoming weeks.

Bereft

2006-08-05T09:32:00.000+09:30

My friend Richard has left for England. For some people that would probably evoke the response “finally!”

And with reason. For the past month, I’ve had, hidden but unbeknownst to me, this odd button that just presses against my gut, every time I think of the fact that he was leaving. That there is a Brisbane without him in it, that I’m in a Richard-less city.

I’ve been his pillar of strength through thick and thin, but in all honesty, on things that truly matter, it’s been the other way around. I’ve appreciated his kindness, been stimulated by his intelligence, and most of all felt a bit like a wondrous creature in his presence. I sensed there was always something about me that fascinated him, and I think I’ve been trying to discover what it was along with him.

But that also means I’ve never really cried in his presence – be it with him or to him or for him. The closest I came to was on the phone, when I was in the death throes of my past relationship. Therefore he doesn’t have the slightest clue about an aspect of me that’s common knowledge to many of my other friends and family, namely what phenomenal waterworks I possess. ( Hence in a way they’d be relieved to know the ‘event’ has finally occurred ).

From the time he messaged me saying he’d written his resignation letter, a little more than a month ago, I’ve been given to random bouts of tears, at sudden times in sudden places. Some friends have been witness to it, but it’s mostly been when I’m driving and have my thoughts to myself – which is not a very safe thing. But the most alarming was when a kind lady I know from work listened to my diatribe and casually put her finger on the core of it – “you two have a soul connection, don’t you.” I obviously never cry at work, so we both pretended that stray tear peeking out of my right eyelid was invisible.

And as the irony should go, of course, when Richard did come over one night before leaving, for a last goodbye, I willed myself not to lose control, and I didn’t. He had this months-long idea of us watching the very last episode ever of Six Feet Under, which he’d taped and not watched on purpose – SFU was our thing. Of course, after prolonged attempts by a very ‘manly’ Richard to hook up his VCR to my TV, it turned out the episode hadn’t been taped at all, and we only kept coming across annoying footage of ‘Phone Booth’ on the video. It was a classic last night.

And of course, still very much in keeping with us, he cried, and I didn’t, as he left. I could almost see the disappointment in his damp eyes as they searched mine, wondering if they would ever moisten.

If only he could see me now.

My life cannot be busier at the moment. My work keeps me on my toes, my demeanour attracts all kinds of people who come up to me and just start confiding, my postgrad plans keeps my intellect stimulated, my social life has gone through the roof so much I’m having to cancel on people, and my next two months are already quite booked up with parties and functions and dos and events.

Yet, the ground beneath has fallen away. Everything is shaky, and all that was constant is now adrift. At times I’m so unbalanced I almost get dizzy.

Because he’s missing.

He’s missing, and I’m bereft.

The Power of a Fall

2006-06-01T11:49:00.000+09:30

It’s amazing how breaking apart in one way can put you back together in another.

Two days ago I was in the midst of a very busy, chore-filled work day, with deadlines to meet, projects to plan, and no heartspace to feel much, though Lord knows I needed to. I just shoved it to a point inside too far to reach, putting around it immediate events that needed attention – caring for a friend in a quandary so bad he was being physically affected, suddenly getting closer to a long-term acquaintance when he’s in trouble, nodding blankly to being told I had an IQ level of the top 5% of the population ( like that makes a big difference ).

And then, I fell.

And not just any fall, but a spectacular one. In the middle of a street.

Hurrying back to work after lunch, a birthday gift in the office bag weighing a tonne, one hand warming on a Gloria Jean hot chocolate, the other clutching my suit jacket. Waiting patiently at the signal, for the lights to change.

When they did, I took one step, and next thing I knew, SPLAT! I’m on gravel, scalding beverage half-spilled on jacket, head spinning.

A couple of pedestrians helped out, and I sat on a nearby bench, trying hard not to cry out at the shooting pain in my knee.

A phone call to a friend for a whinge-fest later, I decided to brave it and walk back to work. Limping along, I slowly realised I was still holding my hot chocolate in my hand, spilt but potable. Hoping the cocoa will soothe, I took a sip.

And gagged. It was coffee.

I hadn’t had coffee since I was 10, rushing for a great-grandaunt’s Sadabhishegam (80th wedding anniversary ) at 5am knowing I wouldn’t have anything to eat till 2pm, sculling the horrid brew, and duly spewing it in the temple gutter a couple of hours later. Scarred for life.

I cursed the Gloria Jean waitress and looked around for any cold, Aboriginal street characters who could use a hot drink. Seeing none, I dumped it.

At work, the two colleagues I was relieving took one look at me and started to gush. And that was when I realised it too – cuts on my knee, gashes on my arm – and spilling blood. There was talk of first-aid, and rests, and sympathy from well-known students – none of which I needed at that point.

Then the colleague I was closest to looked up from her work to see what the fuss was all about, and I proudly held up my bleeding arm and declared “I fell!”

She shook her head and bit. “Woman, honestly, what am I going to do with you? Constantly getting into scrapes – you’re hopeless!”

And I started to laugh. It was exactly what I needed.

The pain registered better ( or worse ) when the antisepticised wounds started to burn, and as my colleague shoved a bunch of bandages at me and rushed back to work, leaving me to apply them myself, the pain seemed to start something.

An ignition, a jump start, a giving way.

Something from within actually seeped away with the flow of blood, exorcising unknown elements with the breaking of skin.

Along with the release, a pull-together came as well. Inelegant and graceless, as I winced my way through covering my injuries, but it was there nonetheless.

I threw away the unneeded scraps, and paused. I knew I had to start work, but I also needed confirmation.

Closing my eyes, I dug away to that hidden point within, climbing over the self-erected fences. I fell again, for now there was just emptiness there. Space.

Amazed, I came to, smiled, and got back to work.

2006-05-17T18:07:00.000+09:30

Its the poem that reduces me to tears, whenever the world gets frustrating, when all my best attempts backfire and it seems pointless for a woman to have a brain. When life somehow becomes easier when you act dumb, and you then wish you were dumb so you would be ignorant of how horrifically easy it is, which evidences that society almost expects a woman to be dumb because it feels threatened otherwise.

Its my poem of wishful thinking in moments of despair.

Nallathor veenai seithein - athai nalangeda puzhuthiyil erivathundo
Solladi sivasakthi - ennai sudarmigum arivudan padaiththuvittaai

Vallamai tharaiyo - intha maanilam payanura vaazhvatharkae
Solladi sivasakthi - nila chumaiyena vaazhnthida puriguvaiyo

Visaiyuru panthinai pol - ullam vaendiyapadi seyyum udal kaettaenn
Asaiyaru manam kaettaen - niththam navamena chudar tharum uyir kaettaen

Thasaiyinaith theechchudinum - Sivasakthiyai paadum nal agam kaettaen
Asaivuru mathi kaettaen - ivai arullvathil unakkethum thadaiyullatho

Dear "bau bacang" Bharathi - eternal gratitude for these words of lament.

"Revelation": from the Book of Sree

2006-05-11T11:12:00.000+09:30

I like the person I am when you two are not around.

Silent Melodies

2006-05-03T10:35:00.000+09:30

This is one of the rare times for me when I’m almost proud of the fact that I can be closed. I willingly disallow the possibility of wanting to touch someone, and more importantly, the possibility that someone could touch me.

After a gruelling time of constantly being emotional nurse/essential-decision maker/spineless near-daughter-in-law, the absolute last thing I wanted to do was to get into a position of looking after someone else, very simply because I was all dried up.

And I’m going quite good on this whole ‘closed’ business. Strangely enough it allows me to be more open in other ways. I can tell some people exactly what I think of them. I’m incredibly brash with dates, and I’m not bothered that they’re too insipid or too elusive. I even decide to experiment on certain things, as long as I ensure that I myself know exactly what I’m doing.

My environment, too, supports my closed stand – any movie you see, TV show you watch, music you hear, people you converse with – all suggest how this is a great thing – to seal yourself from within, amalgamate your soft tendrils and shove away all that was good about your past.

And then you commit the silliest, most trivial of mistakes – you watch a movie from your childhood.

Mouna Ragam ("Silent Melodies"), an early Mani Ratnam movie starring Revathi and Mohan, is one of those films that you shouldn’t see when you’re young, impressionable and learning concepts from everything you absorb. Because when you re-watch it as an adult, you don’t watch it with your head, but your heart.

The film plays with the concept of commitment, and love that is furthest from its physical aspects. Divya (Revathi) resists an arranged marriage with Chandrakumar (Mohan) but agrees when her father gets a heart attack. She moves to alien Delhi and desists all of CK’s post-marriage getting-to-know-you attempts, retorting with hurtful sentiments like “your touch is like that of a spider’s” ( ie its revolting) and requests a divorce within days. She explains a painful romantic past as the reason for not accepting CK. Forced by the law to remain together till the end of the year, they live under the same roof in separate bedrooms, and over time Divya starts to feel attached to CK, and comes to look upon him as her husband.

CK, though still fond of Divya, shows no sign of it after the application for divorce. He’s as distant as she’s trying to be intimate, and I have to say I felt bad for her as at every juncture, her attempts to get close to him is rebuffed by him spouting the very same lines she said at the beginning of their marriage. Yes the girl was nasty to an innocent man in the beginning, but she pays and pays and pays for it throughout the movie.

But it’s when Divya, in the beginning, tries to explain why she can’t accept CK as her husband, and it falls out of her being, almost by accident, that I felt the pang.

CK asks her why she can’t give the marriage a chance, and she replies she can’t accept him as a husband in her heart. CK again asks why, to which she answers suddenly “Yaenna en idhayam en kitta illai” ( Because my heart is not with me ).

That line’s haunted me for days. Be it when I’m doing something mundane like the cleaning and the laundry, or handling a million useless requests at work, or dealing with an elusive contact who’s fine with the rest of the world but totally ignores me, or even interacting with a casual guy that doesn’t really make sense to interact with. At some point in all this, if there’s even a slight pause, I feel those words cracking my inner scab, breaking open the surface, and I bleed and bleed.

Yes, there are some movies you shouldn't watch, because you watch them not with your head, but your heart.

!@#$%^&*

2006-04-23T00:26:00.000+09:30

And then there are times when you feel like this and honestly believe you're the Last Nice Girl On The Planet.

Singledom

2006-04-20T15:07:00.000+09:30

So I’ve officially been single for a while now, and I must say it took some getting used to initially. Now I believe I’ve gratefully sunk into this lovely label, and I must admit, I kinda missed being single when I was a girlfriend (its such a layered, laden role, being a girlfriend). And oddly enough being single this time around has a quite a new twist to it :-

20 things about being single.

1. Friends, but more surprisingly acquaintances keep commenting on how relaxed and cheerful you look these days.

2. You go to your hairdresser’s and go “Just chop the damn thing off”.

3. Buddies can’t wait to come over and crash after a night out.

4. Oprah turns you off.

5. You’re asked to work your ass off since your colleagues know you’re only going to be spending more on yourself and are unbearably jealous.

6. You catch the eye of someone, someplace, and when they look on, you don’t look away.

7. You can afford to be the bigger person when your ex gets an attack of pettiness and returns all your gifts.

8. You listen to your friends’ relationship troubles, and you can’t genuinely sympathise cuz its still nothing compared to your experience. And suddenly you know you've grown up.

9. You don’t worry about cleaning out the place for a while, then wake up one weekend, have a heart attack looking around and have a full on clean-fest.

10. You watch SATC and go “I SO know!”

11. You have enough headspace to concentrate on your legal file.

12. You can pack up guilt in a bundle and throw it wholesale out the window.

13. You look up suddenly at work and see a veritable queue of guys waiting for your attention and go “oooh, playground!”

14. The phone not ringing doesn’t bother you in the least.

15. You’re happily ensconced on a quiet day in bed with a great book, and all your mind does is wander and wonder. Trip? Book? Real Estate?

16. Random strangers (pizza delivery guy, fellow theatre-goer ) start flirting out of the blue. It must be the sign on my forehead saying "hit on me, I'm available".

17. You love dining out with the sole purpose of people-watching.

18. You kick yourself when your regular patron at work drops broad hints that you register, but you just don’t flirt back, and he gives up and leaves.

19. Your work projects get completed much faster than anticipated.

20. You suffer fools less.

Ah yes, it's good being single.

Surreal Distractions

2006-03-26T15:09:00.000+09:30

You know you’re in for a night of total surrealism when you attend a Bollywood dance party with three elderly Malaysian-Chinese women.

First off, there was going to be only one oldie – N, a member of my dance group. The plan was to meet up at Jo Jo’s for a couple of drinks, meet up with some other classmates (more my type) and head to the nightspot.

When I got to Jo Jo’s and met N, though, I realised she’d brought people along – S, another classmate ( whom I never speak to ) and her friend, who really looked like her mother. We’ll call her M ( since I love capital letters ).

Now, the age range of N, S and M seems roughly between – oh, I don’t know – 45-236. Nothing wrong with that, and they seemed a sweet gaggle of girlfriends in their own world. And all very matronly Malaysians, might I add, who seemed quite tight-lipped and defensive at Jo Jo’s, clutching their handbags and perusing the drinks menu for non-alcoholic mocktails. In the meantime my two dancing buddies called and cancelled on me, and our dance instructor said she’d meet us at the club itself. My party non-karma was working itself up – I can smell a bad damp squib night out from a mile away by now.

After several hems and haws over possible fruit juice combinations, they ( read S, who seemed the most dominant makcik type ) decided to leave and head to the club.

Now, Cesar’s, I’ve been warned, is quite the current sleaze-spot in the city, with hired tabletop dancers etc. I made a fair call that the Bollywood dance party would have a non-establishment host getting the venue for the night, and initially it seemed I was right. However there were scantily clad models at the entrance gate, all bindis and bangles and blonde white smiles, which threw the Makcik Group a bit. S derisively went “Oh, is this going to be in a nightclub?” with three bouncers standing three feet away. I tried my hardest to pretend to both not having seen them and not having heard her. So after some more hem and hawing over whether to enter or not ( and there is always such a herd mentality about all this ), we paid extravagantly to enter – an empty nightclub.

I so needed a stiff drink. So I got one.

The Makcik Group Herd Mentality continued. I picked a nice comfy spot at the back, with sofas. No, we all had to move to uncomfortable bar stools right up front near a makeshift stage because “the poster said there’d be performances”. And we sat, and waited for our instructor. And waited. And waited. And drank. And waited. And called. And waited. And messaged. And waited. And drank ( you get the idea ).

In the meantime, the music sporadically alternated from Hindi remixes to hiphop, with sparse results on the dance floor. A threesome of two lovely Aussie ladies and a lanky geeky guy stayed on for a quite a long time, the geek’s awful moves providing mild entertainment. A middle-aged couple dressed as if to attend a flashy Broadway play came in, picked a table and never left it the whole night, incongruously looking on. The man tried to catch my eye, which magnificently failed since I was way into my Double Black by then. A Korean couple walked onto the floor, the guy in T-shirt and white tennis shoes, and just never left the floor the rest of the night. As the music thumped louder, they bobbed slower, till they were intensely entwined while live dhols rented the air around them. Ah, true weird love.

An hour and a half after we’d trooped in, the Indian crowd started to fill up, along with not a few Eminem wannabes. Yet my cronies (pun unintended) would not hear of hitting a near empty dance floor. “Let it all fill up” was their motto. Trouble was every other Indian at the damn place seemed to be thinking the same thing. That however did not stop S from obviously pointing out Indians as they walked in, like you would point at pandas in a zoo. And especially pointing out smartly dressed ones, speculating they may be the promised performers. And also pointing at the DJ booth every time they changed over from the Aussie DJ to the Indian one, that is literally every two songs. I dutifully swivelled my head in every pointed direction, hopelessly unclear as to the reaction expected. Was I supposed to be hopeful that ‘things will start soon’, was I supposed to nod sagely and be suitably impressed at her observation skills, or was I supposed to take charge and march forward to crossly ask for the value of the entrance fee, as they seemed to constantly mutter but never seem to act on?

In the meantime, some of the willowy female bartenders had taken up their ‘coyote ugly’ spot on the bartop, swaying and gyrating to the music. There was the one token Indian chick, while the rest were suitably bindied and peroxided for Indian male viewing pleasure (and not a few of the females).

Soon the whole mix-up hit me, and suddenly I was walking in water taking in this unearthly amalgamation – tabletop dancers gyrating to ‘Jaa re jaa o harjai’, Koreans attempting a cross of hiphop and their video game choreography, watched by at least a hundred bemused black-clad Indians secretly salivating too much at the dancers and too shy to join the Koreans.

Then an elongated session of hiphop started, wherein I made a pact with N that we hit the floor the next time a Bollywood song started. But when it did ( and such a good one too, Aaja Nachle of Monsoon Wedding ) N chickened out saying there was nobody on the floor, and I promptly disowned her.

Luckily the floor filled up soon, and a ditty later S, the matriarch of the group of all people, simply said “Come lets dance” and away we went. I was surprised it’d been her with the guts, but wasn’t about to complain.

And man, did S come alive on the floor! What she lacked in technique, she more than made up in enthusiasm. She repeated the steps in our class, and had a strange smile that was a mix of joy and intense concentration. In a while N joined us, and the trio was made. After a while I started to feel quite maternal towards both of them, two middle-aged Malay/Chinese ladies innocently dancing away stone sober in a melee of black drunken sleaze. S pretty much transformed, she was unstoppable, and couldn’t care less for the looks we were being given. At one point I was quite overcome with ‘awww’ness for her ( that might be the vodka though ) that I went in to do the ‘getting rid of evil eye’ gesture to her – only to be promptly swatted away like a minor distraction before she focused back to the step with a determination that’d put Hercules to shame.

So now that I was convinced at least these women would be okay for the night, I moved on to concentrate on myself, but that, is another story.

Could’ve danced more though.

Surya

2006-03-15T22:56:00.000+09:30

I try to avoid the sun
When it flashes in my eyes
When it crashes my dreams
And exposes my vice

I like to avoid the sun
Because it confronts me
With my lighter fluffier twin
The one I can never be

I stay out of the sun
Smearing a film to protect
Covering all known pores
Flaws one may detect

I ignore the sun
Before it reflects me to me
Before it points as a gun
Scabs I will never see

Mumbai-gia

2006-02-16T14:55:00.000+09:30

I was responding to Sunny, a fellow Bolly-whater, to his question on what Mumbai is like, really. I'm no Suketu Mehta ( though you're a great read, mate ), but I attempt to crystallise my two Mumbai experiences in a small passage below.

Note: - it's angled to Sunny's query after seeing footage of some serious party girls in Mumbai, which seemed straight out of any American nightclub.

I might get to a part 2 of this series covering other aspects, who knows.

Here goes.

I went to Mumbai twice, once in 1999 ( was there and in Goa for the millennium new year party ), and another in 2000.

I’d been to India many times before, and travelled mostly in the South, and a couple of times in the North, including Delhi. Mumbai seemed to conform with the rest of the urban situation in India – utter poverty, incredibly large shantytowns right in the midst of office building clusters, beggars, pedlars, pollution, traffic, corruption, the works.

But I also felt Mumbai had a different ‘feel’. It was a faster pace than Chennai, but also, dare I say it, came across as a trifle more organised. ( Not that someone fresh off US would see that, though ). And, to my untrained eye, amidst the chaos and dirt, you spotted ‘western wannabes’ more frequently. It was such a jarring thing for me.

Initially, I’d be a little tickled by the complete difference in ambience, from say the inside of Pyramids ( a large, famed shopping mall that’s been in every BW movie set in Mumbai, from PBDHH, 1 2 ka 4 to Bluffmaster ) which is pristine and chock a block with designer stores, to just five feet outside of it which had roadside muck drying on the footpath. But then again that’s a clichéd contrast that you come across in almost every Asian city nowadays ( though Indian cities showcase that a bit more starkly ).

So, spotting ‘dudes’ and ‘babes’ in CK jeans, Gucci sunglasses and possibly a Manish Malhotra top wandering around Pyramid and then stopping off at its adjacent McDonald’s to grab a Big Mac ( made from mutton ) was kinda expected.

But it’s a different thing, though, when you’re walking from the YMCA women’s hostel, to Churchgate station, saying no to children selling you plastic toys and bindis, people around you clad fast in sarees, salwar kameezes or obviously street-tailored shirts and pants, and suddenly you see a babelicious belly button passing you by, you don’t really know what to think.

After a while, though, it kinda struck me as being a little hypocritical. I mean, I suppose I was fortunate in a way to mingle with a group of friends who were considered the ‘corporate elite’- they were a large group of mostly merchant/investment bankers, with a girl who was about to go to the UK to Masters in Fashion Designing. My farewell party was held at no less than the Taj, around the same time that Abhishek Bachchan ( at that time riding his Refugee high ) celebrated his birthday party there, though at a different floor. When we were tipsy enough we wanted to crash that, but it was too late, he’d already left.

But anyway – as I said – when I was with this group, it was as if no other universe existed, the ‘other’ India was an inconvenience that was just tolerated when it intercepted with theirs. The only time that world was acknowledged was when it proved useful – in terms of manual labour. Servants, cooks, etc. My host had a male servant who pretty much stayed at the flat 24/7, cooking and cleaning. He also made the best khana I’ve ever had, and was very conscientious of me as a guest. I was travelling quite by myself a lot that time, getting home about 3pm everyday, and by the time I change and come to the living room, he’s got a glass of cold milk all ready ( I never understood the great necessity of cold milk at 3pm, but my host insisted it was good for my health ), and always asked me for an order of food ( which always embarrassed me ). This servant ( called Sunil ) was obviously very attached to my host, who IMO treated him with humorous/affectionate contempt. Sunil felt that his ‘sahib’ was very understanding and accommodating, and treated him well – compared to some other ‘sahibs’, who were constantly abusing their servants, verbally and occasionally even physically.

The other quintessentially Mumbai thing were the trains. They literally are the life-blood of Mumbai, transporting entire masses of people on a daily basis. My ex taught me to take them, from Churchgate station – we literally had to wait and watch a couple of trains pass by before he felt I was ready to try it. You had to literally first push your way INTO the crowd, then just wait for the crowd to push YOU into the train. Apparently that’s the easiest, most painless way to do it. Oh, and of course, I had no help – since I needed to board the Ladies Only coach. My ex entered a common coach, and I literally had to hop on to the Ladies one as it started to move ( scary! ) Later, I braved an attempt to board a First Class but common coach ( there are First Class women’s coaches too ) but regretted instantly as I felt ALL eyes on me – and I realised I was the ONLY woman there in jeans and blouse, the rest were all in sarees etc. How I wished for an elite outsider there right then!

Marine Drive, just by Nariman Point ( which is the main corporate area of Mumbai ) is always a fascination. It’s most recently been showcased in Bluffmaster ( where Boman pleads with Abhishek about his 30 good memories in 30 years ) and also Munnabhai MBBS. During office hours, the place is hell incarnate, but in the evenings, couples are everywhere ( which is another odd thing about Mumbai – public displays of affection are more commonplace. Not in the sense of kissing, but just walking together, PERHAPS holding hands ). So immediately there’ll be a big heap of pedlars hawking hot channa and thandai, and also balloons and soft toys ( I find some of the ‘romance’ there quite childlike, which is fascinating ). And lots of buggy rides. The Gateway of India is a great place to sit and relax, taking in the view of either the sun setting over the Arabian sea, or the gigantic Taj hotel. And the lights on Marine Drive, visible from any high-rise building, curves like a half moon framing the sea, and known as "The Queen's Necklance" to honour Q Victoria, to this day. That was a sight to behold from one of the apartments we went to, and I was always far more interested in that view than in the Hindi karaoke going on that night.

Clubbing – now I’m sure these places have really grown and mushroomed everywhere from the last time I was there, but it was pretty scarily Western when I was there as well. I can’t remember the name of the club now, I think it may have been called ‘The Tunnel’ or something, since we had to go through a man-built tunnel to reach its entrance. It had a house band, that sang ONLY English rock, and filled with nubile nothings that looked straight out of Vogue. I’d spent that day talking to a lot of college kids and staff at Mumbai College which was on the outskirts of Mumbai, where most of them looked half-starved and daggy-cool, so this was a bit of a shock come night.

I don’t know about accents, but I do know all the ‘in’ words were always used. And it was funny hearing things like ‘cool’ and ‘yo’ and ‘check this out’ in a heavy Indian accent at times.

One thing though – despite all this superficial ‘modernity’, the values held are still quite Indian, and none more so than when it comes to marriage. True there was ‘dating’ as I said, although that too seemed more the prerogative of the high and mighty, and seemed to be in quite a childlike form. But arranged marriages were still quite the order of the day. What remains most clearly in my memory was when we were all in this supposedly ‘hip’ Mexican ice-cream parlour which looked like something straight out of TGIF, when one of us took a call on their mobile – and after a while had to get up and go outside for a long conversation. I asked another what that was about and was chilled at the answer – a mutual guy friend of theirs was getting married, arranged, and the girl he’d picked was calling this friend just to find out more about him, ie whether he’s a ‘nice’ guy ( HOW do you discover that from a call to his friend, I don’t know. I mean, what’s he gonna say, “No, he’s not a nice guy, he’s a serial killer”? ), whether he smokes/drinks, what are his favourite foods/movies etc. I inadvertently said “Oh God that’s sad” cuz I couldn’t imagine that scenario in the place we were. And though I was immediately sorry for it, I was very surprised by the guy’s response – “Yes, it is, very sad.” I expected some sort of defence, and didn’t expect not to get any.

Other than that, there are just general memories of Mumbai that I treasure – the wonderful taxis, which are refreshing after travelling in autos in the rest of the country, and the half-English half-Hindi dance I always do with the drivers to tell them where I need to go. Being taken to the Strand bookstore, which is not like any other bookstore I’ve ever been to – books literally coming out of its ears, from wooden pigeon-holes built from ceiling to floor, on just about any damn subject you can think of, crammed into a dark, dingy, paint-peeling, underdeveloped excuse of space. I totally loved it.

Browsing by Crosswords, a newer, more upmarket bookstore that looked like a Borders prototype, attending the launch of Manil Suri’s Death of Vishnu, making small talk with the author who came off as a super-intelligent snobbish Machiavellan. Walking by Chowpatty beach at night, marvelling at how different the sand felt. Braving the ubiquitous pani puri at a Gujarati restaurant, and being the brunt of jokes at my reaction. Falling unconditionally in love with pav bhaji. Eating ‘Chinese food’ that was a sorry excuse for the real thing, inundated in masala and chilli. Shopping at Benzer, where you pick the item at one place, pay for it at another, then collect it ( after ‘parcelling’ ) from yet another.

Mumbai, how I miss you right now.

January in Australia...

2006-01-26T23:21:00.000+09:30

...is when it's too hot to go for a walk.

When it's too hot to clean the house.

When it's too hot to cook, or take out the garbage, or do any of those mundane chore things.

When it's too hot to lift your remote-control arm and change the channel.

When it's too hot to think, for your brains are either fried from the sun or drowning in head sweat.

When it's too hot to feel.

When, therefore, it's too hot to grieve.

GOOD NIGHT, AND GOOD LUCK or REACTION TO THE FEAR OF THE UNKNOWN

2006-01-23T20:21:00.000+09:30

I’d only heard about McCarthyism from my father, and from school history books. I learnt about his specific brand of justice, of control. I witnessed it today, almost first-hand, in this George Clooney-directed movie.

Chronicling the true events in the 50s when television presenter Ed Murrow of CBS decides to call on the pink elephant by taking cudgels at McCarthy’s all-too-sweeping anti-communism campaign, Clooney makes no bones in illustrating that too ignored lesson – that history repeats itself. Parallels are chillingly obvious when Murrow’s restrained incense at the unfair treatment of Milo Radulovich is quietly communicated to his producer Fred Friendly ( played by Clooney himself ). It’s a feeling we’ve all felt too often these days just watching the news.

Clooney drives the point more by stripping the movie of regular Hollywood add-ons; there is no contemporary background score. All you hear is period jazz denoting the various moods of the movie, sprinkled intermittently between recordings of Murrow’s See It Now episodes. Otherwise, silence and starkness rules the screen, letting the film’s issues highlight its drama. A slow zoom out of Murrow, pounding on his typewriter in his office, empty but for a dozing Fred, is unforgettable.

But the main gasp-inducer is none other than McCarthy himself, played by himself straight from the grave. All shots of the Fear Senator is original footage, mouthing concepts not too different from today’s politicians - talking about a similar doomsday, but only an alternate route to it. Communism then, terrorism today.

I come away from the screening a trifle frazzled. It doesn’t augur well for me to know that history repeats itself because we don’t learn its lessons. Clooney’s theme of reacting to the fear of the unknown resonates within the Western world today, as it did in Malaysia, my country of birth, in the Nineties.

In 1998 I was a student poring over Law textbooks, when the Anwar issue broke out. People outside Malaysia called it a political scandal. Anwar supporters called it a Revolution. The rest of us called it The Fall of Order.

The Internal Security Act (ISA) in Malaysia in the Nineties was as real as the brick on my wall and as feared as McCarthy himself, who came up with it in the Fifties. People were arrested under the Act and imprisoned without trial, indefinitely. We knew it happened, but we didn’t know who. Or why. And it was in our interest not to talk about it. And as it usually happens in such circumstances, rumours flew about, each more lurid than the other, both about Anwar and Mahathir, till it was hard to discern who was the patriot and who the traitor.

Matters came to a point when a bunch of hooligans, disguised as party supporters, forced themselves into the inter-city commuter train I was on one lazy afternoon. I was returning from the library, the sole occupant of my coach. I witnessed them get on the third coach from me, sticks and belts and knives in hand. They proceeded through each coach, yelling only “Yes or no?” I failed to hear the answers of the passengers in the din of the train - which was the right answer that merited a grunt, and which the wrong one that resulted in punishment? As they progressed, they beat up less and less people, presumably because the passengers learnt what the right answer was by hearing their non-beaten up neighbour’s response. I had no such ally, and not the faintest idea whose supporters these hooligans were. They reached the coach just before me, and asked the first person sitting next to the coach door. It was a middle-aged lady in a Muslim head cover. “Ya ke tak?” one of them asked. Yes or No?

I stared straight ahead at my reflection on the window opposite, straining to hear her response. I couldn’t, but I knew it was the wrong one, since I next heard a blood-curdling scream.

I felt the shadows of their shapes loom larger as they approached; at the same time, the train slowed. The door at the far end of the coach opened just as the train stopped at a station. The supporters ( of whom, goddammit ) ambled in as the exit doors hissed open. I flew out like a shot, spiralling down the stairs, not once looking back, and didn’t slow down till I was out of the station, across the street, and safely ensconced in a mall.

Reaction to the fear of the unknown. Today the ISA is being bandied about in my country of adoption, Australia. It’s being examined, inspected, put forth as an ideal vehicle for deterring terrorist activity. Probably a leaf or thousand has been taken out of the ISAs of Malaysia, of America. Shut things down before they start. Put out the fire before its ignited. Hole up those who ask too many things. Control what’s going on. Control the madness. Control the fear.

Because isn’t that the best way to protect a people who denounce Indonesians as barbaric because they sentenced media-friendly-faced Chapelle Corby? Australians who to my face, have called Singapore barbaric for hanging Van Nguyen – a sentence that’s been there since the 80s, and passed on a proven guilty criminal? A bunch of beach culture youth, ignorant enough to react to inciteful text messages with terminology not heard since the 70s? And that woefully misled anonymous texter himself? Reaction to the fear of the unknown.

When I wanted to migrate to Australia, my mother was very upset. I’m an only child, and to her Australia was just too far away. She tried to be supportive and positive, but I could see right through her. When it came to the crux, my father stepped in and was vehement that I should go for it. I was surprised by the 100% backing, and we had a little conversation about it.

“When I was growing up,” my father said, “Malaysia was the place to be. To us Indians, it was the land of opportunity, milk and honey. You could come here and be anything. And my father did exactly that. There was a stable government, the focus was on increasing prosperity, development. And we all saw it. And celebrated, and went to each other’s homes for our respective festivals.” He paused. “It’s no longer that. It’s no longer that place that promises things. Not the country anymore, where a Muslim will dine freely with a Chinese or an Indian, drink from the same jug of water.” Here he looked straight at me. “This is not the place of the future for people like us.”

Looking around at the fear I see in the eyes of my fellow Australians today, I wonder about the place for ‘people like us’ in the future here. I wonder if I will tell my child the same thing.

Reactions to the fear of the unknown. It’s not in control. It’s not in pushing away what we cannot comprehend. It’s not in ISA. It’s not in McCarthyism.

I pray everyday for a better solution.

Good night, and good luck.

recently published work

2006-01-05T11:02:00.000+09:30

For those interested, feel free to check out my latest published work:

A poem called Coupledom (I assume the formatting is unfinished )

http://www.dotlit.qut.edu.au/journal/poetry/index.php?jor_id=41

and a short story called Cake and Green M&Ms

http://www.dotlit.qut.edu.au/journal/prose/index.php?id=321&jor_id=41

both published in Dotlit magazine.

Armanied Homophobe

2005-12-29T12:30:00.000+09:30

Its 11.50am and MH135 from Brisbane to Kuala Lumpur is the flight I’m on. I settle in for a good calm night, all meticulously planned beforehand, right down to the perfect in-flight read.

Then this gentleman resembling Raj Kapoor in his later Bobby-days sits next to me. He says a friendly hello, I reciprocate, I go back to my book. He makes small talk. He learns my name, and wonders if I’m Indian. He’s Pakistani – Kashmiri, to be exact. He asks if I know of the historical conflict of Kashmir. I reply in the affirmative ( naively trying to come across as knowledgble to this distinguished, Armani suit-clad benign-smiled elderly man ) and elaborate that I did a paper on the Kashmir issue with regards to self-determination for my Public International Law subject. It puts him over the moon.

He asks what I think caused the first rift, I start a couple of sentences, he cuts me off.

And there is no looking back for us.

The man is an incessant talker. He does not care if I agree with his views, not even if I was listening. He seemed to be one of those who literally likes the sound of his own voice.

He speaks of Kashmir from the time of Alexander’s invasion to the reciprocation to the Indian Army’s invasion of Junagadh. The plane has taken off by then.

I start to fidget, darting glances here and there. A window seat is something I’m never going to take again, I decide. I thought it would be a nice private haven – I realise it can also be a cavernous, claustrophobic trap with no exit.

When he comes to recent conflicts in Kashmir, I decide to vociferously agree and thereby finish the argument. Little do I know I'm no match for his deep seated need to have rigorous tongue exercise, whether I'm interested or not.

And so the night passes. He speaks of religions, compares Hinduism and Islam, and though claiming he sees all religions as equal, he proceeds to ‘logically prove’ that Islam is somehow superior – albeit never using that particular word.

He asks why Islam and Chrisitianity are such prevalent religions followed globally, while Hinduism is restricted to India. I venture ( for this was my area ) that it was due to an edict in Manusmriti, that those who crossed the oceans lost their caste, which to a Hindu in ancient times meant a total loss of identity, and thereby, livelihood.

The man, obviously caught a little off-guard, agilely side-steps, saying “Oh, these are all political manouvres. Religion is good, but man misinterprets it, the people in power use various ways to keep the people under them in control, and don’t want them to travel and gain further knowledge.”

Though a part of me wants to laugh out loud at this blatantly sweeping statement, I decide to play the docile second citizen Indian woman, purely out of curiosity. I even ( mistakenly ) give him the benefit of the doubt, thinking he might be an open-minded free thinker, trying to justify a lot of the religious nonsense we see in all religions today ( and IMO, Hinduism is not excluded in that ).

It soon becomes clear I'm still way too naïve, though, since he proceeds to very righteously ( and IMO very stupidly ) defend the reason the Prophet Muhammad utilised violence in his lifetime, as did his subsequent Caliphs. So during our late night in-flight meal, I'm treated to a monotonous soliloquy on extremely detailed narrations of events, complete with verses and dialogues, all justifying the use of violence to conquer and bring people under the rule of ‘The True God’.

I listen to the entire story of Moses as our trays are cleared and announcements of in flight entertainment, turbulence etc are made. From the time his mother set him as a newborn babe on the river, to the time the Red Sea parted. By now I have no idea what the point is, even. And obviously I can’t ask, for I can’t get a word in edgewise. The man obviously isn’t interested in the opinion of his listener, and after some time, I notice, not even in the body language acknowledging the listening. I open my mouth many times only to close it again, for there never is the right time, the right pause in between where I could interject and just basically go “Okay, old man, you can’t dismiss one faith and expect your listener to be completely in agreement with you on another”. This is obviously a one-man show.

And then, believe it or sleep, it gets worse. My eyelids get heavy and my head is ready to drop, and a part of me hopes this is the broadest hint one can register. Then Mr Raj Kapoor-gone-mad says something that jolts me awake:

Him :Did you know gays originated in Pakistan?

Me : (suddenly wide-eyed) Excuse me?

Him : (nodding solemnly ) Yes, yes, gays originated in Pakistan. That's why God punished Pakistan.

Me : Pu-Punished...?

Him : Yes, yes, that is why God made earthquake there, as punishment for making earth dirty. It is written in Quran.

Me : Really.

Him : Oh, yes yes. And did you know, Sydney is 30% gays?

Me : Uhm, no, I didn't.

Him : Yes, when I found out, I was so scared, I thought, oh, God is punishing Sydney soon. That is why I move to Brisbane.

Me : (spluttering) You - you moved to Brisbane because-

Him : Oh, yes, yes, you wait, you see, God is punishing Sydney soon. That is why I escape now.

I remember my college days, I remember my close Muslim friends whom I am going to visit once I land in Malaysia - friends who know me inside out, with whom I've had mature religious debates, whom I'd fast with during Ramadhan for the heck of it, buy food for when they couldn't fast, who respected my faith so much they accompanied me once to the temple and patiently waited outside, watching over me. I wonder what they'd think of this respected Pakistani CEO, swiftly destroying the image of Islam that they'd belabored for years to create.

I vehemently disagree, I point out homosexuality isn't an epidemic that needs wiping out. He argues, I argue, the details don't matter. I ask him for proof of whether people have committed any crimes like murder/rape/robbery due to the fact they were gay. He hmms and haaws, shakes his head this way and that, and says he doesn't know all that, and when I look like I'm subsiding, changes the subject :-

Him : Did you know all the problems in the world started from Jews? Did you think why is it Hitler was so against them?

Honestly!!!

When the stars don't look upon you

2005-12-02T11:31:00.000+09:30

There are certain times in life when you feel saying that things aren't going your way is a perfect understatement. Times when you know life has it's ebbs and flows, but sometimes the ebb is unending, and just keeps pulling you down, no matter what.

My mother says this particular phase I'm going through right now, has many positives inside the negatives, just tiny little pieces, that when pieced together, comes as protection at the most essential point, despite the seemingly everlasting streak of bad luck that seems to be coming my way.

I've yet to make sense of it, I've yet to figure out the answers as to why these things happen.

I'm lucky to be alive today, and so is my mum. We were both involved in a major car crash about two weeks ago, where a 17-year-old came the wrong way up my lane, heading straight for me on a motorway. I swerved to avoid a head-on collission, my car skidded, lost control, went off the road, over the grass, into the parking lot of a McDs, hit a parked vehicle. The impact swung my car around, and we continued moving and hit another parked vehicle, before coming to a stop.

The car's a write-off. It can't be anything but. The whole front is gone. Two more inches, and we'd have gone too.

I can't say much more on this, for legal reasons.

We're alive, and we're thankful. In those immediate post-accident trauma filled minutes, you don't remember much, even as you're recounting things to the police in a voice clear as summer, eyes straight ahead on the ceiling lights of the rural hospital. You say it like you write an exam - you know it's importance, but you're not really digesting the facts. You vomit them out and hope that's the end of it, that it'll all go away.

And then watching your nearest loved one suffer so much next to you in the hospital, and you tied to your stretcher with belts, you wonder what you'd done wrong.

On the road.

In your life.

How you make another suffer because of you.

"But it's not your fault!" they say. So many of them.

"You're just having survivor's remorse". I had no idea what the label meant, but what a lovely thing to actually have that label. How nicely I'd be able to spout that in conversations, and look like a martyr.

But in the emergency room, when you don't know if your mother's ever going to walk again, you doubt if you ever saw that car, whether you'd dreamt it up.

When your mother sees you on your feet for the first time since the accident and breaks down in relief, you can't be bothered with whose fault it was, you just assume it was yours.

And then people come, and you wake up to the world.

First it was Ram and his mum, driving all the way in the night from Brisbane, to be with us. Proving egos can be set aside at times of life and death. You hope for a renewal of bonds, and even initiate spending the weekend at his place sometime later.

The family calls from Malaysia - you're strong and clear when you speak to your father, addressing the doctor in him. You collapse when you talk to your uncle, a messy heap recounting the first ten minutes post-accident when you thought your mother'd become paraplegic.

You speak to your friends who'd received your messages - some reassuring you about work, some wanting all the details, some just downright scared of losing you. And you're grateful they're all there, in some form or another.

And yet, you know it's a time when the ultimate powers that be in the biggest corporation of them all, are not very pleased with your latest memo, and have sent you one in return. All coded up in a language only they know. You have only the one keyword, supplied into your brain from the moment the sight outside your car windscreen seemed like Monet had made a movie. The keyword that pops up at every subsequent disappointment, trying to fit itself into it's current context, yet uncomfortably dissatisfied. The keyword "WHY".

I'm still trying to decode it. I've acted on previous rough drafts of what I feel are the answers, and come away with great disappointment. Perhaps I won't get the proper search results till months from now, once the legal case is settled, and misery is a memory. But till then, I continue my decoding unconsciously, in my dreams, in my blogs, in my most private moments when I look out the window at the world and try to find my spot in it.

Indian Independence (?)

2005-08-15T07:49:00.000+09:30

It was with a mix of dread and curiosity that I took my partner and his mother to the hitherto unknown location of Macgregor. Having nothing but a computer printed notice outside our local Indian spices shop as a guide, I drove and parked by a primary school last Saturday evening, hoping this would be a good, entertaining distraction for all three of us from the mind-numbing misery we've been going through lately.

Oh, it was entertaining, alright.

First off, it was odd enough that there was a celebration of India's Independence Day ( 15th August ) happening right in the heart of Brisbane suburbia. And that too, in freezing mid-winter, which to my pop-culture addled brain is more synonymous with Enid Blytonised meals of scones and hot chocolate, than the spicy channa bathura and samosas on sale in the canteen next to the school hall ( yes, VERY primary school ).

But more than that, it was strange to see so many Indians ( mainly North Indians ) streaming into the non-descript hall decked in their most expensive finery, bizarrely upgrading the social occasion by a few notches. Mami ( my partner's mum ) and I giggled at our smart casual, wise for weather but totally out of place attire, while Ram found some of the nubile pretty young things looking like Bollywood item numbers just downright scary. And I can almost see why. With straightened locks, expensive, colourful silk and brocade, drowned in costume jewellery and even more make-up if that were possible, these butterflies were fully aware of the real purpose of this gathering - to see and be seen. And hopefully to beguile the local hearthrob enough to merit a clandestine, shy "Can I get you some tea?".

Needless to say, despite being invisible in terms of fashion, we were nonetheless a little too noticed as well, being unknown strangers ( and Indian, at that. There were an Aussie couple seated to the back who blinked and stared at everything, poised to dart out if anything got too threatening. They were of course treated to delighted smiles and occasional courteous enquiries. None came our way. ) To Mami's comments that we were being checked out, and with suspicion, I reassured that she had only to mention that she was from India (*gasp*! The Motherland! ) to have half the so-called socialites fawning over her.

The show started. A set of boring speeches, a singing session with a live band ( complete with semi-celebrity turbaned singer proudly touted as a Melbourne import ), followed by a slew of dance performances and sketches - one of the real reasons for this gathering. Like every good diaspora Indian, I settled in during the introductory speech for the standard "We are Indians and we should be proud of it" tongue-wag, repeated oftentimes during that week, I'm sure, in all the various Independence Day celebrations in every little hall in the suburbs of London, Boston, Johannesburg, and more.

But this time, something rankled. Perhpas it was the presence of the Aussie couple. Perhaps I've been here too long, and more importantly, too deep. There seemed something amiss in this unabashed lauding of Indians doing well in the Western sphere, in the Western fields of science, business and technology, alongside Westerners. Like we've proven something for the rest of the world. Without knowing why, I closed my eyes and waited for the cliched reference to Hotmail's Sabeer Bhatia, and cringed when it came.

To me, the picture isn't right when all the luminaries reverently listed in one of the officials' speeches are all men, and acknowledged by head nods from an audience that were more than half women - but as daughters, wives, mothers, grandmothers. I failed to see a single woman who possessed the confidence and bearing of an independent individual. The bearing borne by the men ( yes, even the hearthrobs ) like a birthright.

To me, the picture isn't right when the Master of Ceremonies smoothly welcomes the audience to a night of celebrating the rich, ancient culture of India - which to this minority community evidently means NRI messiah Karan Johar's sappy film songs and a Shubha Mudgal hip-gyrating frenzy passed off as a Rajasthani folk dance.

But most of all, to me the picture is definitely askew when there are hundreds of Indians residing in Brisbane to make a living, but calling another country their home - and meaning it enough to feel patriotic about the overthrowing of the British in India more than 50 years ago. And proudly declaring on a podium that despite staying in Western civilisation, we Indians have maintained our Eastern values ( which apparently the West is in dearth of, while we happily cherish the trading of virginal brides for hefty dowry in 21st century Australia - calling it an 'arranged marriage' and making it the most lavish occasion in our lives ).

It makes me wonder; at the profiles of accused terrorists gracing our television screens in prime time, at the atrocius crimes they're supposed to have committed in New York and now London, John Howard's apocalyptical announcements that we ( the Aussies ) are next, at the British government's panicky call for the end of multiculturism and the need for immigrant integration.

True, this gathering isn't close to the reported jihad discussions held in suburbian madrasahs in the West, nor is there open denunciation of the West as morally bankrupt. Yet the similarities are chilling - a close knit group that steadfastly holds on to values outdated even in it's place of origin, a stubborn refusal to acknowledge inner loyalty to the temporal home, a sense of false pride and achievement at not being flexible with social mores in keeping with the times, confusing it with culture and personal identity.

I was trying to squeeze my way out of the ladies' room, unintentionally overhearing gossip about so and so's son who actually tried to (*gasp*, oh horror ) hold so and so's daughter's hand when she went by herself to the canteen - (such audacity! *swoon*) - when I suddenly revisited Malaysia, the land of my birth. Brainwashed as much as every minority community about my 'Indianness', I was nevertheless always taught to call myself Malaysian. At the most, Malaysian-Indian - but even that is only a recent development, adopted in this hyphen-loving-politically correct-multiculturist-post-modern-Western-world. The Malaysian government's stance, right from it's own independence, was that of the integration of all the various races already living there. I'm yet to decide whether it was a successful idea, but I do know that I'm as knowledgable about Christmas and Chinese New Year and Hari Raya ( Ramadhan and Eid ) as my Malaysian pals know about Diwali. I do know that my best friends there were Muslim, and that I dragged my Chinese friends to Bollywood movies in vain attempts at conversion, and had a brief but intense crush on Leong Lai Meng like every self-respecting Cantonese chick. In college, I ensured my Muslim roommates woke up in time for their morning prayer, while they clamoured for translations of various Indian sweets. I know I sound guilty of the same thing I'm critiquing the Indian community here of - harking back with nostalgia to a land long left - but I humbly maintain there's a difference. All the cross-cultural shenanigans of my Malaysian youth happened without self-consciousness, without a sense of the purposeful nobility I witness on both sides of the Aussie-immigrant interaction. We weren't loftily striving for a Utopia of cross-cultural understanding, virtuously building bridges as a symbol of the possibility of global peace. We were just being kids making friends.

After the performances ended, an interval was announced - of sorts. A regular feature of these gatherings, this was the time all the chairs were set aside, to make way for the other real reason of the night - late night partying by and for the young 'uns, Indian DJ and all, while the parents discreetly exit, pretending that the dancing session is all about...just that. That their innocent little girls ( and more importantly, innocent little boys )
will come home a trifle late but wholly unscathed.

Not wanting to subject ultra-conservative Mami to this, we made the move to leave, just as the Master of Ceremonies announced the interval. As I did so, I spotted an Indian wife seated by her husband a little far back. She was the embodiment of the chaotic, garish contradiction the Indians glorify - wearing a saree of the smoothest silk, of an ivory-cream shade finely embroidered with turquoise tulips - along with a pair of white K-Martish sneakers, while an unadorned woollen cardigan covered most of her torso. Blatantly flaunting the rules of no food or drinks in the hall, she was munching on home-brought biscuits, and sipping hot chai from a home-brought flask.

I smiled to myself as we left, thinking that some things never change. But I also stopped myself - for I think, in the current climate we find ourselves in, it's about time some things did.

Mira Nair's 'The Namesake'

2005-05-28T15:40:00.000+09:30

This is a book, written by Pulitzer-Prize winning Jhumpa Lahiri, that I must say is the most perfect one I've read in a few years. I highly recommend it to ANYONE who likes cross-cultural themes, or precise, concise writing, or are trying to balance two cultures, or just basically like a good story.

The Namesake refers to Gogol, an Indian-American born to migrant Bengali parents in the US. The novel spans his life from the time he's born to when he comes full circle with his own identity - something he seems to be searching for in most of the novel, with an elegant and exquisite pain that many other authors tackling the same issue fail to capture.

While the story unfolds with a sure calmness as a result of Lahiri's confident voice and writing, her characters are complex and endearing and will stay with you. While Gogol is the protagonist, it is Ashima, his mother, that many readers feel both passionate and compassionate about. As a first generation migrant to a Western country at a time where all Indians were equated with vegetarianism and weird-looking Hare Krishnas, Ashima's silent isolation from everything familiar is captured quietly but effectively. ( Personally, it resonates Mrs Sen, one of Lahiri's short stories from her The Interpreter of Maladies. )

The movie 'The Namesake' is being filmed as we speak, directed by Mira Nair ( who overnight became one of my favourite directors after I saw Monsoon Wedding, a movie that left me breathless ). Tabu, a well of talent from Indian cinema, plays Ashima, while Kal Penn of Harold and Kumar and Dude Where's the Party fame plays Gogol. Of the latter choice, I cannot complain, I can almost visualise Kal's 'lost and confused' look which is the essence of Gogol ( I had my reservations about Abhishek Bachchan, a mainstream Bollywood actor just coming into his own, who was the first choice ). But despite my ardent admiration for Tabu, I somehow feel Rani Mukerji, the current Bollywood top actress who was also first choice for Ashima, would've looked the part more - my take on Ashima is a blend of confusion, strength and fragility, and being a Bollywood fanatic, I can safely say I can picture Rani doing perfect justice to the role.

That said, I have faith that Mira Nair 'gets' The Namesake very well ( http://in.rediff.com/movies/2005/may/23namesake.htm , http://in.movies.yahoo.com/050522/43/5ymue.html , http://nowrunning.com/news/news.asp?id=3411 ) and I'll wait with an open mind ( and bated breath! ) for the release of this movie.

By the way - Kal Penn is also writing a blog on the making of this movie. He's alternately funny ( in a Zach Braff in Garden State sort of way ) and passionate - and young. Take a peek - http://thenamesake.typepad.com/blog/

Comments welcome!

Hail Brisbane!

2005-05-28T03:00:00.000+09:30

It's May, and it's been too long. Life has taken on the appearance of an ice-cream with swirls of opaque unrecognisable stuff, obscuring the view of the actual ice-cream and its suggestion of sweetness.

For those not in the know - Brisbane, where I live, is famous for its tropical sunshine and odd houses called Queenslanders. Yet, in testament to global weather phenomena, we were privy to one of the most freakish weather episodes in the past 10 years.

It started about 5.30pm on Thursday, May 19, while I was still at work dealing with information that my beloved library might be closing down ( I'll elaborate in a later post ). My boyfriend in a recently uncharacteristic show of spontaneity and emotion had surprised me by dropping by the library. It was such an out of context image that for a second I didn't recognise him when he first walked in.

I introduced him to Ryan, one of my colleagues, and Ryan spoke of a thunderstorm warning near Indooroopilly ( we live in neighbouring St Lucia ) and Ram said he saw green clouds on his way over, which is always a sign of hail. This was our first sign of the freakish night to come.

As I was closing up, Ram, who'd had a call from his mother (Mami )at home, rushed back into the library and urgently said we had to hurry, since the hail had hit the entire Toowong/St Lucia area. Moreover, it had broken our roof, and both hail and rainwater was gushing into our living room from the air-conditioning vent.

Just as we were about to leave, the storm broke upon us, forcing us to rush back into the building. Calls to our realestate agent to report the damage did little since their office itself was flooded as well! Calls to the SES ( State Emergency Services ) also gave us little hope since priority was to people reporting houses with roofs ripped off, etc.

So we called Mami back and told her to switch off all electrical appliances, and to wear slippers so as not to get electrocuted.

Then we waited.

When the rain finally calmed down, we drove back...and the closer we got to Toowong, the more my jaw dropped. At first I saw just patches of ice on the road, which I was fine with. But as we neared St Lucia, all I could keep saying was "Ram! Look at this! Ram! Look at that!" for there were just blankets and blankets of ice on the sidewalks, covered by the green latticework of fallen leaves and branches. The further we went in, the thicker it got. Suddenly Brisbane looked like an European country in the middle of winter, with its first snowfall. I kid you not.

Ram had to slow the car down since the sleet was unbelievable. We had a tough time parking it in the garage...our driveway was almost iced-under. It took us awhile to get to our apartment, what with me running almost headlong into the ice in my enthusiasm to check it out, and meeting several neighbours in the building who had come out to greet us ( faces we had NEVER seen before, but had been living next to...that's urban culture for you ) who'd had similar problems ( one guy nodded knowingly when I mentioned my boyfriend's mum was alone at home...he went "yeah, I know, I said hi to her earlier", leaving me absolutely stumped ).

When we finally got home, I was a little relieved that the damage wasn't as bad as Ram and I had feared. The carpet was absolutely soaking, but otherwise everything else seemed okay. That settled, we took Mami out to show the ice ( after marvelling at the ice on our very own balcony...even the sofa! )...and we even took the camera, to take pictures in the ice, albeit amidst much slipping and skidding. We weren't alone...a neighbour couple also came outside with us, gushing at how similar to snow it looked like. In fact, scores of people in the entire area were outside, taking pictures and playing with the ice. Cars passed by with their fog lights on, since the mist from the ice was heavy enough to obscure normal vision, and mist came out of our mouths as we spoke. The ice was about a foot deep, seriously. I was expecting a scattering of ice pieces. No, this was true, thick, deep, WHITE, COLD, snow material.

We wanted to take the car and go for a drive...vain thoughts. The car refused to barely move with all the huge amounts of ice underneath...and despite efforts by Ram and myself to push the ice aside with our feet ( I had to pour boiling hot water on my toes afterwards! ), it was still too thick for the car to move in, and so we had to repark it in the garage....which took another whole episode of ice-moving-with-inappropriate-shoe-laden-feet.

All this has very much brought home to me, the reality of haphazard weather patterns due to overall global weather change. Whether this is due to unwise use of our natural resources, or more astronomy and space-related phenomena, I've realised this erratic weather behaviour is no longer stuff of Hollywood movies. It's real, and its affecting my backyard. Its time something gets done.

Most Silly and Unsuitable Reason to Rent DVD of the Month

2005-04-07T09:55:00.000+09:30

There are slow days, and then there are SLLLLLOOOOWWWW days.

Work. Home. Cook. Sleep. Work. Home. Cook. Sleep.Work. Home. Cook. Sleep.

No wonder people get brain-dead and watch Oprah.

Small comfort - Am now officially member of Indofilms, online rental site of Bollywood DVDs. And have already maxed my queue, along with Ram.

Most Silly and Unsuitable Reason to Rent DVD of the Month: Wanting to rent Kaho Na Pyar Hai because one didn't get to watch the dance in the end. And this coming from someone who proudly proclaims he hates Bollywood because of all the running around trees stuff. Have I got ammo against you now, Ram!

Like, Proud

2005-04-01T14:03:00.000+09:30

Attending my dear friend Richard's play, being performed at the Judith Wright's Centre for Contemporary Arts, at The Valley. Called 'Like, Dead'. I can still remember poring over the first draft he'd emailed me when I was still stuck in Malaysia.

And also how last week's Easter was our one year anniversary of his trip to Malaysia.

Can't wait to watch it at the same performance space where Kala Ramnath, my guy's sis, performed.

Am also starting to write a short story after a very LOOOOOONG break, and its mostly due to Richard's encouragement, but that's another story.

In other news, I broke yesterday and had a meatball. But just one. Reason? Surprisingly, my tongue couldn't get used to the taste of meat after so many meatless meals. Not a bad thing, really. And I've noticed I haven't made that a reason to jump right back into carnivore world. Am still being vegetarian. And plan to make my very own Pav Bhaji this weekend, and perhaps even Semia Upma ( a gorgeous South Indian delicacy ). Can't wait!

Oh, and another thing - found an online DVD rental site in Australia for Indian movies, both Hindi and Tamil. Now it's all about either procuring a credit card, or get into some serious negotiations with the boyfriend.

No meat feat

2005-03-24T15:37:00.000+09:30

I've always considered becoming vegetarian every now and then. My entire family is vegetarian except myself, and meat is not even allowed to enter my parental home in Malaysia. And though I eat chicken, and tend to eat more meat outside the house than within the house, I'm no hardcore meat consumer.

And yet, I've been thinking about this whole thing. Then my boyfriend's mum from India came and stayed with us, and made the most DELICIOUS vegetarian indian food...and I didn't feel the lack of protein since there was always some form of lentils around.

She left one day before the start of Sri Ram Navami, and I'd been contemplating being vegetarian for that, so I thought...hey...why not stick with it throughout Ram Navami and see how i go...see how long I can stick to it.

And so far, true, I do get occasional cravings for meat, but nothing die-hard that a good vege curry can't cure!

identical question

2005-03-17T15:05:00.000+09:30

the eternal question...who am I? Not in the cosmic sense...but in a more human one.

Born in Malaysia, of South Indian Brahmin Iyer parents. Raised as if in a Western country...thought to think, not cook, and to read, not clean. A constant source of worry for my orthodox grandmother, who was convinced I will not be a proper daughter-in-law, and will suffer after marriage, for not knowing how to cook/sew.

Exposed to a very Malay, very Muslim world. Observing the Muslim weekend at school...Friday and Sat, not Sat and Sun. Inviting stares during Ramadhan when I eat/drink outside, since being Brahmin, my skin colour fits that of the Muslim Malays, than the more commonly seen darker skinned Tamil South Indians ( seen in Malaysia as representing the only Indians Malays know of ).

Knowing, reading, speaking, writing in English as if born to it. Having it as the only thing that brought the limelight on me during school days...especially among the Malay majority, for whom English seemed an unending, incomprehensible challenge.

Constantly reading books and seeking worlds that seem the most remote from home...Enid Blyton to Carolyn Keene to fantasy novels to Shakespeare to Grisham.

Finding myself in a little expected English Literature class in A-levels. It felt like I'd suddenly found gills while blinking about in water for the past years of my life. I breathed and indulged.

Chucked into Australia as a result of a very long educational crisis. Realising almost immediately Law wasn't for me.

Progressing within myself when I did a Creative Writing degree immediately afterwards. Being around like-minded people, feeling at home, and yet isolated at the same time. For though I was with my intellectual kin, I wasn't with my cultural ones...I was usually the only Indian...and definitely the only Malaysian Indian around.

It gets me, even now.

And I find myself seeking long forgotten paths to my cultural hometown - movies in Tamil, on Tamil poetry, educating myself on Tamil history, and how my Indian culture influenced that of the now alien Malay culture in Malaysia, my birthland.

How now, even with a Permanent Residency here, I am less Australian than ever before. How I flit about corners of my mind reserved for my Indian side, my Malaysian side, my Western side. How I browse through books in stores looking for that obscure author who might've just caught the essence the mental web I inhabit.

Do I pose this question to the eternal Tamil poet Bharati, my ancient kin, or to Tunku Abdul Rahman, the Father of Malaysia, who so readily embraced the 'others' in Malaya as his own, or to my Audrey Hepburn-like friend Katie Miers, who is convinced my presence in Australia enhances the city I live in, and by that the nation I've chosen to adopt?

Food and The Movies

2005-01-31T14:45:00.000+09:30

The Queensland Summer is starting to show in it's full strength, and my apartment is a total meltdown area. It is SO hot here, I honestly have to find things to do that would take me elsewhere during the day.

Today Ram and I found a really cool South Indian restaurant, at Mount Gravatt, a suburd quite far away from us. Called Southern Spice, they had a buffet lunch, and man, I haven't eaten such authentic south indian fare outside India/Malaysia. Idli, upma, vadai, sambhar, chutney, raita, kheer, dosa....you name it. It's totally divine. Ram declared he would start with idlis and work his way down :) I'm just glad we discovered this place - Qld is not very Indian-oriented. And the service was fast, with a friendly staff ( friendly enough to lend Ram a lighter when he wanted his occasional cigarette...I have made him quit almost entirely, but such with such great food...I totally understand ).

Last week, I was contemplating watching so good awards-worthy movies. Didn't happen. Since Kisna was out, and this theatre in the city had just started to show bollywood movies, I decided to watch it...especially since I was going fida over the songs. Two words. BAD DECISION. I cannot believe Subhash Ghai would peddle this non-quality crap as a great movie that would cross borders. It is worse than some B-grade films. The only exception is Sushmita Sen, and Antonia Bernath. I was disappointed to the point of anger. And what's unforgivable is the picturisation of most songs, with the exception of Chillman, and My Wish Comes True.

Kinda made up for it yesterday night, by watching 'Ray'. Great movie, and Jamie Foxx is seriously excellent in his accurate portrayal. Kinda long, though, and of course, with the super-hype it's being given at the moment with the Oscar nominations, a little overrated. But on its own, a good movie nonetheless, that thankfully doesn't pull punches like most other bio movies that glorify real characters. Rather it showed a three-dimensional Ray, and unabashedly explored the aspects in his life that made many close to him label him a total arsehole, bastard, etc...

Even more...after Kisna, on Friday, after a long and gruelling day, I decided to take some time to myself ( which entailed DAYS of appeasing the boyfriend....don't men ever get the fact that women are actually BETTER partners if they take some time to themselves? ), got home, had some great pasta, and watched 'Raincoat' by myself. ADORED the movie, even better when I realised it was based on O Henry's The Gift of The Magi. Beautiful narrative, setting, characterisation, acting. Just simple and great cinema.

Starting my WeightWatcher's Diet next week...from tmw, in fact. Done it before,but the situation now is so different, and the POINTS value are counted differently. Plus there's my lovely relationship that seems to be based on the sharing of good tasty ( if not very healthy ) food. It's gonna be a challenge, and I need all the help I can get.
Amen.

Jobs and awards

2005-01-25T14:43:00.000+09:30

Wow, its been a while since my last entry. I suppose the major change that's happened so far is that I'm more familiar with my new librarian job at the language school. The building is beautifully old, since it was a hospital during WWII and there are still rooms that used to be wards. The grace of the building has been maintained througout, even in the interiors. I like it that way - rather than having the old facade outside but having a thorough aluminium-steel-minimalist-millennium look inside. I should know. I possess the weirdest copy of the key to the main library door. They don;t make keys like these anymore. It's longer than average, and with an odd-looking nub. It's a wonder my superior found a locksmith who still had the mould to make a copy.

Apparently we even have our very own campus ghost, called the Lady in Grey. She used to be a lady whose fiance was enlisted in the War, and who promised to wait for him at his request. He died and never returned, but her ghost haunts the main building, and she often goes to the window that faces the river, awaiting his return. Scott, one of my trainers, told me that a few years ago they kept old photographs of the main building in the library wing, and you could see a face looking out the window in the direction of the river. All very appropriate to the ambience of the place, if you ask me.

Anyway - I've got some moolah in my account at last, and just in time, too, for it's awards season, and that means watching great movies one after the other. I've already caught Finding neverland, which squeezed out some tears from me, and I'm not a movie crier. Last weekend we watched Alexander - a total stinker. I already knew it wd stink, but went for my guy's sake...he's a huge admirer. But GAWD! Talk abt a miscast lead! I cannot see how Oliver Stone thought Colin Farrell wd be a good Alexander...I'd put my money on Jude Law any day...classic Grecian features, as was Alexander. *SIGH*

Contemplating watching Alfie, Ray, Sideways, Closer,Kinsey et al pretty soon.

Uhm, I'm home

2005-01-05T14:40:00.000+09:30

My guy finally dropped me home today. Packing itself took ages. I realised as he drove me here that I'd been away for more than a month at his place. Sure, I came in occasionally to my place, but it was only to pick up more stuff. I housesat for him while he was away at Europe, and three days after he returned my mum visited from Malaysia. He insisted that she stay with him ( they have a mutual admiration club going, which i don't want to be a part of ), and I couldn't leave my mum there so I stayed on too. She left Christmas Eve, and on Christmas early morning my guy had the most terrible illness and I had to call 000 ( our version of 911 ) to get him to hospital straightaway...after which I'd been staying with him, making sure he eats well etc. He recovered, but then we bought got caught up in the Tsunami spectacle daily, and it was the holidays blah blah blah...and things just went on from there.

So now I'm finally home, and oh my god it is SO hot in here ( summer here in the Southern Hemisphere ), I guess that's part of the reason why I keep finding excuses to stay at his central-airconditioned apartment...Not to mention the MESS...each time I visited to pick things up, I've just barraged, rummaged, scavenged and left...the place was already untidy when I first left, and I'd promised myself to clear it up on one of those rainy days ( not for the sake of the expression, but in the vain hope that it'd be cooler then )...but now, it's like the Asian Tsunami had found it's way particularly into my apartment and decided to leave behind a souvenir for Brisbanites.

It all looks hopeless. Especially in this draining heat. I keep telling myself that I gotta start small. Tackle it small area by small area. But I'm meeting my friend Richard for lunch tomorrow, and that'll take ages since we haven't met up since before Christmas and I know we'll have heaps to catch up on, and I need to get to the gym in the afternoon, and then prepare my wardrobe for Thursday, when I start my brand spanking new job as a Librarian for a Language School Library. Yikes! Looks like I'll find time to clean only on the weekend. Although my boyfriend's already making noise about that, and has said if I don't get to his place, he's gonna come to mine. Yeah right...and as if he'll help with the cleaning. ( to be fair, he does, but he makes so many comments like a bloody grandmother that I'd rather clean alone ).

Oh gee...long blog.

Les Incredibles

2005-01-04T14:38:00.000+09:30

Hey. I don't care how many people read my blogs ( or in this case, don't ), I'm writing for it's own sake. Or something noble like that.

Saw The Incredibles today. Couldn't have seen two totally different movies in past two days...Swades, then Incredibles. Both really good. Not as hilarious as Finding Nemo, but a good play on superhero stereotypes.

Was supposed to leave for home today, but my guy's kicked up a fuss, and we struck a deal, and if he keeps his end of the bargain, I stay one more night. He won. Not telling what the deal was.

Now, updating a post that I posted on another board, about Swades:

I'm glad to see so many people affected by Swades's themes...although I feel Ashutosh Gowariker meant for more things to stick, like social consciousness and accountability.But yes, I was affected by Swades on my first watch. Yesterday I took my boyfriend to see it. He's Indian too and he left India about 11 years ago to make a life here, which he has, successfully, but I feel it's at the expense of him feeling 'connected' to others. He always talks about India and it's out-of-date traditions in a very harsh and derogatory manner. Though he's right on some things, I feel the hostility is his way of masking the fact that he's willingly left his homeland, and this bitterness eases the pain.

After we got back from watching yesterday, my usually calm boyfriend was pacing up and down the entire house, quite pointlessly. He's the one who usually goes to bed first, and yet yesterday it was me who was ready to go to bed...and he was like "how come you're going to bed so early?" and I'm like "honey, it's midnight"...and he just couldn't rest...still wandering around the house aimlessly, channel surfing, going to the loo, etc etc...till he kinda collapsed on the bed next to me. I said "the movie's affected you hasn't it".

He just nodded, looking away from me. There was a long silence, during which I caressed his back. I couldn't think of anything appropriate to say. Finally I said the most lame yet most reassuring thing I could think of : "everything will be fine". He nodded. I knew I hadn't helped.

Later, he just said "the movie's message seems to be that you can say the truth simply, without being nasty about it". That's all he'll let me know.

(my boyfriend IS Mohan Bhargav in many ways - intelligent, compassionate, generous. That scene where Mohan gives the poor farmer money rather than insisting on rent...that's my guy through and through. Buying water from the boy at the railway station, gettting really affected by it...all him.)

I can't believe this film flopped in India. It may not be the perfect film narratively speaking, but it certainly is a very important film, and really needed to be made. Hats off to Ashutosh for having the courage to say what a lot of Indians, local and NRI alike, only think in their heads.

Addition

2005-01-03T14:37:00.000+09:30

an addition...boyfriend just got out of shower. Wearing the shirt I bought for him...a cool fashionable one. It's one he NEVER wears. And I'm always berating him for being sloppy when we go out. And now he's wearing jeans and the vintage 70s shirt I got him. And with that stubble, he can give SRK a run for his money.

Did I mention he looks a lot like Vivek Oberoi? Oh yummmmmmmm...........

Upma and 3-chilli chutney

2005-01-03T14:34:00.000+09:30

Yup, that was my breakfast today, cooked by my boyfriend...or lunch, rather. We had it at 1pm, cuz...well, first there were no veggies, so when my guy caught the cooking bug more than half the ingredients weren't there...so he goes to the local Woolworth's to get some, and of course I had to shove my shopping list on him, and of course he had to buy half the bloody supermarket since I'm not there to scold him each time he reaches out at the junk food aisle...and when he comes back, since he's in 'house chores mode', I need to clean out the refrigerator before putting away the groceries...and I really do mean CLEANING OUT...taking out the glass trays, spraying and wiping them in the sink, the works.

And THEN he starts blending the chutney in the food processor...tomatoes, check. Onions, check. Salt, check. Green chillies...THREE WHOLE PIECES??? And then he complains when I barely touch the chutney with my upma!

We were supposed to watch Swades in the city, 4.20pm show. The sec he insisted on the kitchen clean-up I knew it wasn't gonna happen, and mildly suggested that we make it to the night show instead. But the testosterone driven alpha male in him wouldn't listen..."nah, who said, we'll make it, I'll cook the upma in a flash, now that all the ingredients are here...blah blah blah". Oh, really.

2pm...he starts cooking.

2.35...we start eating.

2.55...I ask him what the time is, and when we should leave ( we take the train into the city...he hates driving there cuz parking is shit, though I think it's cuz he's secretly afraid of driving in a place he doesn't really know, and is filled with one-way roads ).

3pm...we plan that we should leave by 3.30.

3.01pm...I mention that movie is at 4.20pm. It occurs to him that since we're taking the train and all.....*tick tick tick*...it dawns on him.

3.02pm....he suggests we go for the evening show. I smile and agree.Honestly, how do men get to be so cute?

New Year's

2005-01-02T14:33:00.000+09:30

I know blogs are public and I want this to be, but now I'm faced with this new thing - my life, or rather my words, the ones I choose to type, are going to be out there, and once I press the 'post' button I can't take them back. ( well technically I can, but this just sounds more romantic ).Okay, boring details of today - public holiday here in brisbane. Was the first to get out of bed, before boyfriend - now that's a first. Am re-reading the latest Harry Potter book ( NO idea why ), so read a few pages out on the balcony, while checking in on boyfriend during intermittent periods. (still snoring, still in that same posi...oops, no, now he's on his back...riveting ).

He wakes up around 11 o'clock, thank god, and somehow gets it into his head to start something that should've been accomplished last night, after the dinner at Mt Cootha, and the champagne on the balcony at midnight, with candles and a New Year wish. Aaah, not complaining. Just ran a lot of wild images in my head.Made enchiladas for lunch. Given I never learnt to cook while at home in Malaysia, given that I started only in 2001 to feed my de facto brothers Kesh and Vijay while studying in Uni and living together, I have to say the enchiladas really rocked. Who knew I could get so comfortable with an oven?

Foxtel is showing back to back Will and Grace episodes today, for New Years. Watched some. just realised right now how sad my life is during the holidays. No wonder I need to write in this blog.Oh, how can I forget the great oil massage I got from my guy....and the subsequent hot bubble bath, again with candle and Harry Potter.I'm guessing things'll improve once work starts...and also once I finally collect all my stuff and head back to my little one-bedroom apartment...I love my guy's place, but I'm starting to miss getting to sing and dance to cheesy Bollywood songs while doing the dishes at my place.

Archival blogs

2004-12-31T14:29:00.000+09:30

Thursday, December 30, 2004
My first blog. No shame in admitting that was inspired by Zach Braff's public blog online, which I checked out after watching Garden State. Excellent movie.I'm a writer, but right now I'm having way too many problems just typing here. Reason 1: Haven't written anything and not used keyboard for anything other than checking emails. Reason 2. Boyfriend's comp was devoid of net temporarily. Telstra's fixed it now, thank god.Am I interesting? We'll find out. Right now gotta go, since my boyfriend's gently heckling me from the couch behind. Guess you gotta literally drop everything and be right next to him, to watch his boring sports, docos, and news. Yes, the tsunami is horrifyingly tragic, but that's precisely why I can't keep watching it for extended periods of time. Or checking the various versions that the various news channels are covering. I just can't get that depressed and still hope to survive tomorrow!