Miles to go..

This post has been published by me on the occasion of the Teachers’ Day as a part of the Blog-a-Ton 2; the second edition of the online marathon of Bloggers; where we decide and we write. To be part of the next edition, visit and start following Blog-a-Ton.

I saw him coming. I leaned on my SUV so that he could notice me. It was time to pick up Varun from the school, and I felt glad that I volunteered for the task. Gopalan Sir, dhothi clad, looked older and leaner. Still, the walk was brisk, with sharp occasional glances to the road side.

Oops, he noticed neither me nor the car!! This was one moment I have waited for, in my whole life. To see that look of appreciation in his face, where I have seen only contempt and anger…

I hurried my steps to overtake those passing feet. “Do you  remember me, sir?” Ofcourse, he wouldn’t. Who remembers the worst kid in a class!! That too, from 40 years back. Gopalan Sir  looked up. “Sir, I am Ramakrishnan, your student in school 40 years back. Right now, I am working abroad as the manager of a private firm. Just waiting here to pick  my son from school”. Putting my one hand on the SUV, I carefully stressed the words. I wanted to see the regret in his eyes, regret for punishing me harder, regret for thinking I am a waste, regret for all those he couldn’t see in me.

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Definitions

Wonderland – The place where Lewis Carole’s Alice fell into, and experienced lots of wonders.

Neverland – The place where kids never grow up and remain kids till the world ends. The leader of Neverland is Peter Pan.

Already these two worlds are like opposite poles on earth. So, what happens when a person from Neverland goes to Wonder land?

Since neverland is kid’s world, there are torches lit everywhere in the night so that kids  never loose  their way. These torch lighting is very important responsibility, and the people doing it were considered to be the inevitable VIP neverlanders. Let us call them Lighters.

One such Lighter went to wonderland for a visit.

“Wow!! This is a beautiful place.”

“Wow!! These people are really sweet, this is like  heaven. I could live here forever. After all, who wants to live in the stupid neverland? It has only forests, animals and pirates.”

“Wish neverlanders learnt everything from these people”

“Oops, do you mean to say, that hole had two buildings in it? Impossible!! Who would ever want to destroy Wonderland? It is such a heaven on earth. ”

“I wish I had these wonders in neverland too. But it will never happen :-( Those neverlanders never grow up (I guess, I am growing up after reaching wonderland).”

“Sigh!! Sad that I have to return. Let me collect all the candies and chocolates from here. The food in neverland doesn’t taste good. Once again, I wish I could stay back”

“They poked my bag!! They  poked my bag saying I am a pirate since I am from neverland!! They poked me!! This is the Hell on earth and these people are demons. This is no wonderland!! People of neverland, save me!!”

At Neverland

“They really scared one of us?”

“This is really a shame. Nobody has the right to insult a neverlander”

“We should poke them too. Who are they to judge we are pirates? Get the pokers ready. From today on, we will be poking every wonderlander coming here, till we are satisfied”

“Yes, let us go to Peter Pan and request him to inaugurate it”

Peter Pan

“Whats the matter?”

“Somebody from wonderland poked a neverlander”

“Poked?”

“Err- poked his bag”

“Why?”

“They thought he is a pirate“

“Why?”

“Because, his name is Jack. (Similar to Jack Sparrow)”

“Jack Sparrow is not a neverlander. He is pirate of the Caribbian”

“Yea, these wonderlanders could have checked that easily!!”

“So, what do you think we should be doing?”

“Peter Pan, we should poke them back!!”

“Should we really?”

“Don’t you see? They just— They just insulted one of our Lighters!!”

“Okay, Go and poke them back. But one warning: the moment you start doing it, you will grow up and will never be a kid again”

“But—- What— Why–”

“See, you are a neverlander, because you are fair in your judgments. That is how  you maintain  your childhood. The moment you loose the fair judgment, and start acting like a wonderlander, you grow up. You know, growing up is demonizing yourself. Moreover, we have our own threats to deal with, like the Pirates. Let us find ways to deal with them first, which we haven’t.”

“Yes, Peter Pan, you are right”

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“Nasra, are you sleeping?”

“No, I was blogging. Just completed typing. I will send the link to you right now.”

Oops!! The blog composer still has only the title – “Questioning a Bollywood V.I.P. Named Khan”. Weird!!

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PS : No intention of glorifying one nation or degrading another, simplifying one topic or complicating it. The words came out of the scary thought of being eyed with suspicion, being discriminated, or being alienated at another part of the world. Comics help reduce the fear.

18 years ago

I stepped into the red, cold floor. There it was, the black, slithering and shiny creature. The next thing I remember was a loud cry from my insides.

It is no Harry Potter scene I conceived.  Red oxide was very common during those days for flooring.

The place is my home, a real serene village. I was the proud member of a nuclear-joint family set up, where the nuclear families and  houses  of my father and his siblings shared the same compound. The best thing was, nobody thought of a compound wall then.

The place was rich with greenery, with trees and shrubs along with many dark and not-so-dark  creatures sharing the space with grasses and weeds in harmony. Nobody had complaints till  summer arrived. During summer, the soil will be shoveled to improve the water retaining capacity (preventing capillary rise, said my science teacher in school), thus removing weeds and grasses, to be regrown again in the next Monsoon. Along with many advantages, those are the days when the reptiles and many other creatures lose their comfort in the grass.  They sought ways to keep their body cool, and one resort was our bathroom. Back in those days, we had  bathroom outside the house.

Our hero was one such brilliant snake, seeking some cold in that red oxide floor, till the “villainess” enters the scene. All she had to do was a loud scream, and people came running from all the nearby house (my father, cousins etc etc). Needless to say,  the rest place was changed to the deathbed in minutes.

Today

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Indiblogger have ranked my blog – 56th out of a scale of 1-100. It felt good, to get a boost during the inactive days – atleast I am up there half-way. Here is the badge:

It sets the goal too, to reach 100 before I die. Still, there are excuses, the best being the title of my blog – “Miles to Go…”. Yes, I still have miles to go :-)

“So, what is happening with your blog? No new posts?”

“No”

“Nothing? Not even translations?”

“No”

“That is bad”

The questions were from  my old colleague and friend, who used to criticize all my attempts to write, alleging my translations kill both Malayalam and English :-D (I agree partially with this. My translations never go poetic. They only convey what they are meant to convey). Anyway, enquiries from the worst critic did the trick. Here I am, trying to resume blogging.

Here is a warm-up post, just for convincing myself that I need to come back here. This translation was born when my friend Pallavi expressed her wish to understand the meaning of the song from the movie Punaradhivasam.

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I know it has been long since I put down anything here. Writer’s block, for me was a head brimming with topics, and not enough time to jot them down. There were so many things to write about, including the visit to the US capital. I might write about it later. Anyway, something had to happen to knock me out of the block – My birthday. It used to come and go without any issues, till I crossed the border of a quarter century :-) Now each time when it comes, it sends this warning signal, “You are growing old dear”. The warning implies that you have wasted your 27 years without any significant achievements. Do you have more time? Who knows!!

To be frank, it was not my birthday which made me think about it. It was this lady,  much-discussed-about, these days. Susan Boyle, who cleared the audition round of a British reality show, “Britain’s got talent”.  Ofcourse, reality shows are not too real these days, and tend to be reel shows,  and we can forget about the judges reaction and the crowd. Still, the reactions are obvious, when she declares that her ambition is to become a singer like Elaine Page, who is probably  only 13 years older to her. The questions  are also obvious, “Where have you been? What were you doing till now?”.

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“For God’s sake, can we watch another program?” I tried to count the number of times we watched that dance before. Yea, my 10 fingers got over even before I finished  one month’s count. Its Allu Raja in his yellow pants, dancing for some Telugu movie. I was watching it because my room mate did. She is a hard core fan of all  cinematic dancers, especially Allu Raja’s.

I don’t mind if I sound like a boring personality, when I say that I have a distaste for most of the cinematic dances – especially the so called erotic dances cooked exclusively in bollywood and Kollywood, and slowly propagating to other state “woods”. I detest the monotonous steps which fits any beats and whose differences only the choreographers know. I have only a few favorites among cinematic dances, like Kuch Kuch Hota Hain, Devdas etc. I like happening songs to watch more than item numbers.

Still, at times I stumble upon some dance programs, mostly reality shows, while browsing TV channels. The horror dawns in when the participants are kids, and they come up with all the hip thrusting, chest heaving movements (Sorry, my vocabulary doesn’t have any milder words for that and I hate talking like this :-().

Recently, I chanced to notice a reality show  quite accidentally. The program  named “Super Talent”  looked like a different flavor  and the judges are celebrities I respect a lot. We were enjoying the range of talents from magicians-cum-dancers to pianists to mimicry artists. Then stepped in this small kid, Shalabha, in glittering costumes and started the power-packed dance “Aisa jadoo daala re”, originally done by Lara Dutta.

She, really is a talent to let out such energy and power at this age. But…. See it for yourself.

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“Please pray for your brothers in Palastine… They are suffering there, and please do whatever you can. Don’t you have a mobile phone with you? Call any authorities and ask whether Israel is acting right and plead them to do something to stop them!!”

The man was virtually on top of his voice. His speech switched fast between English and Arabic.

I was too taken aback.

Friday.

We were at the second speech (Qutba) before the namaz.  The man got into the dais after the first speech and started off in English. The rest was an emotional outbreak. I was surprised. Till today, I have never seen Imams loosing their grip over emotions during Friday speeches. The preachings are always  in controlled tones, perfectly modulated and never loosing the gist. If you look at any sermon in any religion, it is done the same way.

That is why I was surprised. On our way back, my husband told me that the person was a Palestine.

Now, that sounds more like it. I could translate the emotion to anguish. The anguish you feel when your brothers are being hunted in flocks. The anguish you feel when your brothers loose their home and live in terror. The voice which automatically raises when you think of your home. The same anguish we felt when Mumbai burnt and bled on 26/11. continue reading…

We have thrown our existing calendar to trash because it does not have the present month in it. We are following the Gregorian Calendar, hence January 1st is a fresh start.

New year used to mean, thinking hard about purchasing a few greeting cards for friends and selecting the best. That was during the teenage and before opening up to the Internet and e-cards.
After that, new year used to mean a few superficial wishes, and “same to you” templates.
For 5 years, new year used to mean the midnight party in the office, a bone fire and a few laughs with friends.

2008 bid bye making a big loss for me. It was my grand mother whom I always used to find as a pillar of strength. I know there might be others with similar or other losses. Let us forget losses and talk about good things. Life must go on…

There are lots of magazines advising on what all things can be taken as new year resolutions. I will have to refer them before finalizing mine. Why spend energy thinking when others are there to think for you… :-)
My 2008 ended with a pilgrimage. What was supposed to be a pleasure trip ended up with a lot of revelations and new experiences. I might share those experiences soon here…
I think, that is all for now…
Hope you all bought your new calendars and all set to start running to next milestone, 365 days after. Wishing you all the best  at that, to emerge with as much wins as possible…

I remember reading an Arabian comic story of Aboo Kasim and his shoes. Aboo Kasim was a miser, who didn’t want to spend money for a second pair of shoes. So, he constantly mended his shoes on his own by striking nails and stitching wherever required. As time passed,  the leather-bound shoes turned to a skeleton with nails sticking outside from all sides. People could easily recognize Aboo Kasim’s shoes, whether it is in Mosque, or in courts and they made fun of him too. When the ridicules turned unbearable, Aboo Kasim decided to give up his shoes and buy a new one.

He bought a new pair of shoes and gave up the old one in front of the mosque and came back relieved. But remember, any kid in Baghdad recognized Aboo Kasim’s shoes. They saw his shoes lying abandoned, and brought it back to him.

Fed up, he threw his old shoes out of his house and sat relieved. No, not yet.. his bonding with the old shoes was not to be ended so fast. A stray dog bit it, and the nails on the shoes struck in its mouth. With the unbearable pain, the dog jumped onto the roof of Aboo Kasim’s neighbour’s house and dropped the shoes. The shoes fell on the head of an old woman, and she had to be hospitalized. People didn’t have to search much for the culprit. Any kid in Baghdad would identify Aboo Kasim’s shoes. The judge summoned him to the court, and decided on a penalty, ie, bear the hospital expense of the injured.

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