My World

"We all are Famous"

2011-05-02T05:47:00.000-07:00

I have often wondered what the friendly gatherings of great people were like. In a group of friends where each member is a celebrated artist/poet/musician, what would they have possibly discussed?

Last day I saw a picture taken by John Deakin of Francis Bacon and his London School friends, though all of them are not quite celebrated as Bacon, but nevertheless are distinguished personalities – Timothy Behrens, Lucian Freud, Bacon himself, Frank Auerbach, and Michael Andrews – at the Wheeler’s enjoying a meal. (Mention should also be made of Leon Kossoff, Kitaj, who though weren’t in that picture, were friends of the same group). And I thought if I was allowed even a corner of the room to just sit quietly and listen to them everyday, I’d have done the same everyday for a lifetime.

In trying to trace the nature of friendship of such artists as mentioned above, I had to trace back to the London School Period, though most of them did not belong to London specifically: Frank Auerbach and Lucian Freud were originally from Berlin, Bacon from Ireland, Kossoff was the son of an immigrant, and the most English of all Michael Andrews described himself as having no roots at all. It is interesting because though these artists of the London School were a group who were active in the 1950s exchanging ideas as friends do, but they had a little in common from an aesthetic point of view. However, the artists of the London School did infact occupy the forefront of a certain artistic scene in England at that time. They were primarily concerned with individual expression while other artists were developing an approach based on the critical awareness of everyday life.

Among such friends then, each person must have been an inspiration for the other, as an artist or a subject, without anyone compromising on their idiosyncratic individualism. Undoubtedly so, we find Lucian Freud as a subject of Bacon’s paintings, Auerbach and Bacon of Freud’s, and so on. However, the modes of expression were chosen differently by different artists. While Andrew and Freud were tempted towards descriptive painting, through landscape and portraiture respectively, Kossoff and Auerbach were attached to the expressive dimension of the pictorial material. Though the artists experimented mostly with human figures, however, Bacon’s treatment of them was unique. The importance Bacon attributed to the human image (or the ‘image’ in general), radically distinguished him from the other members of the group.

Bacon rejected the descriptive representation, the imitative aspect of the image as illustration. It, for him, was the instantaneous evidence that immediately transmits itself to the brain without verbal intervention. Bacon believed in exploring the instinct, freed from the logic of resemblance. And that was from where his paintings began. While Kossoff and Auerbach were essentially expressionists, Bacon’s illustration was that of a mental image, drawn from the memory of things seen and from the aspects of the existing images (Bacon drew a lot from photographs), resulting from a state of awareness in which even the subconscious played a part, a form of waking dream, as he himself described it. Hence unlike the other painters of the group, Bacon’s images appear distorted, fragmented, exaggerated, and complex, that of perceptive evidence over imitative.

With such differences amongst a group of artists brought together by similar interest in figurative painting, there is no doubt that their discussions and arguments were in every moment vivacious and highly enjoyable. Discussions might also have sprawled on to other famous personalities from whom they drew their inspiration - from painters like Van Gogh, Picasso, Degas, Cezanne, to poets like Eliot, Yeats, Dylan Thomas; from models like Isabel Rawsthorne (who was also a model for Alberto Giacometti!) to lovers like Estella (to Auerbach). The topic of films also cannot be disregarded as a matter of lighthearted amusement. Afterall, Bacon himself regarded it as the ‘most marvelous medium’ and would have liked to be a film-maker if he was ‘very young’ at that time, Michael Andrews played a small part in a cinema, and Frank Auerbach met his lover while playing his part in a play! J

[An observation from: Francis Bacon by Thames and Hudson; Tate.org.uk, Wikis, ibiblio.org, etc.

Image from: http://www.alexalienart.com/bacongallery.htm

Lunch at Wheeler's Restaurant (1962). Left to right: Timothy Behrens, Lucian Freud, Francis Bacon, Frank Auerbach, and Michael Andrews. Photographed by John Deakin.]

Drip-drop, Drop, Drop

2010-12-05T09:37:00.000-08:00

I love snow.
This time of the year,it knocks on my door
And I run out to get drenched in it,
I wait for it.

I sit by my window,
The roads are crowded,
There's too much noise outside.
I strain my ears for I might miss the knock.
I stare at the sky,
The sky stares back blankly.
I think perhaps it's not yet time to snow,
I wait for it.

Suddenly there's snowfall, the same bright white flakes...
It didn't knock. But I knew it'd come.
I stretch my hand out of my window...
I try to feel the same old warmth of the flakes,
I close my eyes and try to smile...
I feel my palm burn and find ashes in it.
I look up. The sky's raining ashes.
There's too much noise inside.
I hate noise.
I look around.
My room's so crowded.
It's ashes everywhere.
I feel choked.

I go outside.
The road is empty.
It's so silent out here.
I look up at the sky and wait for signs of snow.
It's too dark to see.
But still I wait for it.
I love snow.

The Sun's Everywhere...

2010-02-18T04:40:00.000-08:00

Sitting in the sunlight that I've always hated to hate and loved to love, I suddenly start to hate and hate to love. Dreams half-fried and baked in the sun emit a smoky stench. Rugged clouds peek and flee, scared lest I should use them for shelter. The huge banana leaves watch me and wink at each other in jest. Some whisper to the other too. Perhaps in pity. Perhaps they know how I hated to hate and loved to love. I'm sure they do. This sun blinds me now. It reflects and refracts on the empty courtyard. I can't look at it. I try to shade my eyes with both palms and squint at the vast sky, the bushy leaves, all that were mine once, but can't see anything. The oozing brightness dazzles and burns them all. The sun's everywhere. The sun's too bright now. I can't look at the sun either. I turn to go back to my warmly lit room. But it's all dark in there. I can't see anything. I turn blind.

Spoilt

2010-01-15T05:56:00.000-08:00

I tried painting the sky a bright red...but it got all messed up and turned yellow.

Stargazing...

2009-08-09T23:33:00.000-07:00

Lying on the grass, I look at the sky and think how would it be if stars were like kites? Flying hither and thither...floating up and down, setting the whole universe in an illusion of swirl...how would it be?

I would then have a collection of stars....Raising the brightest to the sky every night, I would conjure the nymphs, and set it free....Then I shall gaze with intent how it shoots up in the sky and is carried to the land of my dreams. Next day, as early dawn would kiss my eyes, I shall pull my star back to me and untie eagerly the dream that it would carry back....And every morning a new dream will be mine....Every morning I shall live a new reality!

Ecstacy...

2009-03-17T23:44:00.000-07:00

Knowing the unknown, experiencing the inexperienced, freeing the restrictions, i sing....
Tying the strings of the guitar, learning the notes of the piano, i sing....
Breezing through the air, flowing through the waves, i sing...

I
Smell the wind, trickle the water...

And find
It's all in there.

Strings...

2008-06-22T03:54:00.000-07:00

It was a Saturday. Lush green valleys, bright yellow flowers, an exotic scene, an ethereal breeze—she didn't feel like receding from the balcony that morning. Suddenly the door of Paradise seemed to have opened before her.

That was a holiday too, when on her birthday he had brought those bright yellow flowers, so sweet smelling.

That fragrance of recollection just seemed to blend with that particular smell of freshness that crown the morning zephyrs. Such odious sensuousness charmed her into a trance, as it always had done, and she set out for a walk among the orange-leafy roads. Each whisper of breeze dispersed several palm-shaped leaves upon the road, as she walked along it. Each leaf wavered and wavered, and twirled and twisted on its way to kissing the ground. The road infront had slight bends and curves but seemed secured and protected by the soft embrace of the orange-leaved trees. A completely picture-perfect scene.

The same picture as on the card he had given her—the same road, the same trees. It had made her dream—of them walking together in a soft embrace, with the call of the distant bird and the soft breaking sounds of the dry leaves beneath their feet. So then it was a dream come...

The sonorous effect of the distant calls of the birds almost made touch her dreams.

He used to call often—sometimes the shrill telephone ringing or the sweet singing tune of the calling bell. It was always he. They met sometimes-at the parks, in the cafes and shopping malls, in her garden and also infront of the multiplex buildings. But he never used to enter the darkness of a hall to watch a film together.

The sky was bright and clear that Saturday.

The same sky color was in the background when they had planned to play the game of hide and seek in the woods. In her desperate attempt to seek him, she felt she had lost him in the wilderness. Suddenly, after a long search, she had found his form, standing with his back to her. She heaved a sigh and called him. He turned back. A distorted monster's face gazed back at her. She was fearfully disgusted. He put on the mask and smiled. "You know me, don't you? I am the same one", he said. But her heart wrenched within. She did not know him. She knew him with the bright yellow flowers, she knew his fingers holding the card, she knew his voice over the phone, she knew his form standing at the door. But she did not know him. She ran away from him-terrified, blind, blank-as fast as she could, till she had dashed against a tree.

She suddenly dashed against a tree. The sudden jerk loosened a dry brown leaf from its lowest branch, which fell on her. It touched her by the side of her head, rested on her shoulders, and toppled to her hand. She grasped it with both the hands. Suddenly she felt herself standing alone in the woods. He had never returned. She broke the dry leaf into pieces, with a soft breaking sound accompanying the crumpling. She ticked the broken pieces lightly with her fingers allowing the breeze to carry them off at its will. She was freed at last. She retraced her steps back the narrow path, careful enough not to lose her mind again, till she reached her bungalow, her focus, which she could see from far-off, standing there to provide her a shelter against the vast nudity of the sky.

(This post was written by me in 2005. While leafing through the pages of an old diary, suddenly found it out, and thought of posting it here.)

My heart's a fool...

2008-04-02T09:40:00.000-07:00

O! My heart's a fool!
Or why should I walk through a hollow dream?
A deep hole whose edges are burning with every passing day?

Days are speeding by,
Characters, places, thoughts,
Splashing a million of dreams, moments, despairs...
A heeding ear, a watching eye, a passive curiosity, a passionate soul
Tries to fit the cacophonic comedy of life into a rhythmic wonder,
Searches meaning of a meaningless existence,
Tries to apprehend the puzzles of life,
And tries to build dreams with careful shaking hands—
Like building stairs of cards;
But the dumb lip that emits noise incessantly
Laughs out loud, laughs like hell...
And says...
O! This heart's a fool!

When hopes leave....

2008-02-26T22:14:00.000-08:00

A day passes...when dreams shatter under the crashing hopes....illusions part and make you face the grim reality...but hopes rebuild itself upon its ashes and emit foams of dreams from its surface...lifting your life up in its bubbles...and again you hope with different illusions...again you feel to live and laugh.

Its Mumbai now! - Part 2

2008-01-15T00:27:00.000-08:00

Hey, am back really soon with another post. This time about Mumbai as well....But a little different than the earlier one.

The Mumbaikers will be really happy to know that I have really started to like Mumbai and love staying here! (Thanks to them all who kept theirfaith in saying me that I am really gonna like it sooner or later...You are proved right!) The buzz of life here is truly amazing.... Gives you the pulsating feeling that you are living and you gotta live it fully. With lotsof places to hang around and lots of chores to do, especially if you are alone, the city leaves you no time to feel bored.

Coming from another city with an absolutely different strain, it does take some time to adjust to this impersonal strain of life... But once done, it does not feel bad (Perhaps I've imbibed the strain too, to not to feel bad about it).

But one solemn evening can make you wonder, that in this race where all the people are madly running after money and success, how many are truly happy or is it an illusion of present happiness with a dream of being happy in the future?

It's Mumbai now!!!

2007-12-30T23:15:00.000-08:00

At last I could step into this space again...after quite a long time. It's all about Mumbai now. It's all about knowing Mumbai now. A city whose grandeur was oft heard of. It's now turn to be a witness of the same. Landed here on 28th November, and since then there was no stopping. A quite hectic personal life followed and an equally hectic professional life...and with these unfurled a new phase in my life...new experinces...new tensions...new thrills....The first time getting used to a hostel kind of life...first time waking up on my own...washing clothes myself...going to the market and buying veggies...cooking...all by myself! (during the last two, am however aaccompanied by some comrades of the same soup am in). And Mumbai people are quite helpful if you are alone....except for the auto-rickshaw walas. They'll take all means to hike their meter.

For the first time being away from Kolkata for so long, am obviously missing it terribly. The underlying strain of warmth that the city has, the food, my dear friends, my sweet home and most of all my family. (No, am not home sick...I'm just missing those few good souls there).Though the last 3 are irreplacable, to make up for at least one of them, I have explored a lot and finally found out a sweet-meat shop in my locality here selling rasgullas and rasmalai :)

These few days im Mumbai have left quite a many impressions on my behavior too (and it's an ongoing process for the next 3 months am sure). It has made me a part of 'the mechanical Mumbai' where people have stronger heads than hearts (among the few there are) and am being processed to completely merge with this club. The rest of my behavioral and attitudinal changes are being taken care of by my professional life. It has been ensured that I don't find time even to blog and my grey creative matter is absolutely sucked dry. It has made me more efficient in handling my own finances and many chores that I had never given a second look all my life. Now my parents will obviously be happier and much relaxed (that I can somehow take care of myself).

Not worrying about reaching deadlines in office (since the curve for that has reached the saturation point and hence gone flat), I have now quite a lot of space to worry about my culinary skills, whose deadlines have been fixed 3 months from now. My conceptual skills in this repect would really have already made me an expert cook, if that was the criteria of being an expert instead of putting your hands into it. "It's always in the head" that can reach you heights...that's what I learnt from my professional life...donno why my mother is never pleased with this brilliant spark of mine. Nyways, this time she's gonna be really happy.

As they say, life is very fast in Mumbai, so it is. There's so much to do alone, there's really no time left for myself except for my sleep. For the rest of the day (other than work), food is the constant buzz in the head (getting it and having it). Mumbai food is really bad...especially to a Kolkatan...as it all tastes the same (hot and sour) and looks similar too (reddish-orangish).

And yes, Juhu beach wasted one of my precious Saturdays. It's just overhyped as is the hot paw-bhajis there. Nothing close to mandarmoni beach (my earlier blog was about). But am really impressed by the organised traffic (wonder why there are jams still!) It'll be much easier to drive here than in Kol. The life that starts pretty late and goes on late is also impressive.

Nyways, just squeezed out a few minutes from work to write this stuff...Lots yet left to be explored in Mumbai. But am sure won't bore you again with such boring documentary blog. Not me to be blamed though (you know by now who is to be...)!! So, better luck next time :)

Wish you all a Very Happy New Year!!!

An experience of a lifetime

2007-11-05T05:28:00.000-08:00

The sands must be still carrying our footsteps, the clouds still heavy with our thoughts. The waves must have gone crazy searching for us, the rains still hoping to hear our laughs...

Why not? That's how we were at the virgin beach, Mandarmoni ... walking, laughing, sometimes lost in thoughts and at other times gone absolutely crazy....

The 4 hrs drive from Kolkata, through great highways, and the narrow broken road of Mandarmoni, could not dampen our spirits. Nor could our absolutely packed in condition in the Tavera, which was carrying 10 of us. However, wondered later, why 4 of us always packed ourselves in the middle row, even before picking up the rest of our friends, when there were many empty seats around ... and it never occurred to anybody! Not even to Aritra, who had to bear much grudges of Shoma and me for fidgeting in his small space allowed to him! The only excuse can be the level of our craziness.

Though we all had been waiting since 6 o'clock in the morning, at different places of the city (again donno why, the car would have taken some time to travel from one place to the other), and though the car was 1 hour late at the first point, yet none of us seemed tired or sleepy. No, we did not play songs in the car during the first few hours. My home-burned CD wasn't in the format that would play there. We rather opted for a chat with breaks provided by Angshuman's some very good and very bad singing.

All contributed to the fun of the journey. We were also occasionally cautioned by him of bathing in the sea at Mandarmoni for in the rainy season (when we went) it was of full of jellyfish that emits a poison 'stricnine' (though later he admitted he was wrong with name of the poison, but certainly not with the poison fact).

At Mandarmoni, our fun knew no bounds. Neither did our craziness. Apart from bathing, what delighted us were striking poses while our friend ‘stricnine’ struggled among the waves to capture shots (for he wasn’t bathing after all). And our falling from the pose at the strike of the waves, when we heard our great pose wasn’t yet captured… But thanks, to him, for all the great moments that he has captured to preserve it in our memorabilia…

Afternoon was the time to let the sea take its toll on our senses. Just to enjoy the sight of the sea and the feel of the breeze… the sound of the sea as if synchronized with the silence of humanity there…

It is so silent that the night would scare you of ghosts if a slight effort had been made to build up an ambience…Likewise, Shoma and me were made the victims. We all gathered in our room at night to share our experiences of ghost stories…And a few of them did it. We, who were never scared of ghosts before, were scared like hell! Each and everything scared us, be it Abhishek’s peeping through the window, or Upal da’s sudden springing up in the climax of his story; though Aritra’s coming with a mouthful of paste foam or Prabal’s thronging out his hand through the window went flop. And after a lot of planning about how to spend the entire night, we kept the entire group awake till 3 am.

Our morning started at 6 am (though Anupam was too angry to be woken up so early after being kept awake till 3 last night). Bright sun greeted us at the beach and then there were no regrets. We heard that there is a river at the far end of the beach. We had started towards it last evening…but a photographic freak of my photographer friends (after all there were 8 cameras with the 10 of us), made our mission late, and then with the rains pouring in it wasn’t completed. So we were determined to reach there the next morning. After a long drive over the beach and it was a superb one, we stopped where the last tyre marks could be seen. A long leisurely walk through the beach, aspersed with red-crabs and shells, could never have been more beautiful. We walked so long that when we looked back to check our car, nothing could be seen but the horizon.

Some water from the ocean came meandering in to the beach. And stepping on the cool water bare-feet was a blissful feeling that perhaps no city spa could give. After walking for a few more miles, we reached the heaven we had set out for. The beach had ended, there was a beautiful narrow river flowing into the sea, the green trees a bit far away on the other side, making the horizon seem much nearer. The soft kiss of the sunlight only on the trees far away made them appear greener. We sat under the shade of the clouds, by the edge of the river and perceived with an unquenchable thirst the aesthetic beauty of the scene.

After touching the lonely horizon, after walking through the salty beach, after dreaming and singing our heart’s desire, after dancing to its rhythm, it was finally time to retrace our steps.

And so we left that world, with all its sublimity untouched, but carrying with us a cavalcade of memories, that a slight touch of it gifted us.

When Home becomes the World

2007-09-08T12:52:00.000-07:00

People live and die. And in this life's journey they embrace many things as if their own - like a house. You are born in a house, that becomes your home, sheltered and secured in its warm hug, it takes on your personality and through its own frames yours - both mingling in the other, souls blended, lives shared. Until suddenly, you have to leave it, there, alone, for your life has moved on and must move on. And when you return to it again, after a few years, it still stands magnificently, but deserted, desolate and grave, and you wonder whether either of you have changed .... You feel the same pleasure as returning to your home, but it stands unwelcoming, a deep pain frothing within it, as if it will burst now and encapsulate you within its grave, hissing like a hurt, revengeful lover. You wonder who should be blamed - it for splashing you in tides of happiness, when it knew that you must leave one day, or you for being disloyal to all the happiness bestowed....

You stand infront of your (once) Home, that still bears a part of you, as if it never wanted to part with it and you never cared to take it back... The chairs of the veranda sofa set left exactly in the same position you had left them after you tied the strings of your shoes, the shoe rack cover uncovered in the same angle that you had hurriedly moved it to for taking your shoes out. That single string still hanging from the cloth-drying cord, that once you were so displeased about ... And behind all these you see shadily the huge magnitude of your Home, smiling at you, a smile at once of pleasure and of pain, of oneness and separation; but always one of trust, as if it was still loyal, still to hide all your treasured moments, and relieving you once more to feel you are safe, your past secure ... and no one shall know afterward the life that lived, the moments that passed, the liaison that was ....

The mesmerizing slumber...

2007-08-09T03:03:00.000-07:00

In the warm coziness of slumber, lies millions of dreams nourished.
A world away from this world, encapsulated within a virgin charm...
No ties, no bounds to make you linger in the same space and time...

It's a beautiful world to dwell in...no bloodied crimes to spoil,
Beyond the starry skies and the bright moon
It unleashes its golden hue and kisses your dark, tired eyes,
And you feel as if you own the world...
Far away from the world that is never your own...

Such is the mysticism...
Such the mesmerizing slumber...
Where millions of dreams lie nourished!

The laugh of the age, the laugh of life...

2007-05-09T03:17:00.000-07:00

In the dark crevice of the pits falls the soul
Turning and twirling, twirling and turning...
Into the hot pithy grime...

Even the Savior has lost his hopes...

The stars above twinkle mockingly!
The earth shrinks in avoidance!
No place to hide.
No place to heal.
No other way.

But to fall lower and lower...
Along with millions of people...
Amidst roars of laughter!
Loud hell-shaking laughs!
Unbearable drums of laughter!

Only a single shriek can be heard...
That of a child
Untainted by the worldly muck
Screaming on its way down...
"I don't know, I don't want,
I still feel...
I still have hope...
I still have hope..."

Wish you be with me through all phases of my life!

2007-03-17T00:49:00.000-07:00

In this life of running fast and faster, "I" was somewhat getting lost in the wilderness. In the rush of the office hours, I was lost. In the irony and coincidence of my daily life, I was lost. Among the masks and masquerades, I was lost.
My "self" went raving for one corner to express itself. The corner where the bud, so long repressed, can find the freedom to bloom.

It was the first of April, 2006. The sun dawned on a new day and I made a new discovery! I cried out of joy! At last I had found the most appropriate thing to gift my 'self'. I decorated it beautifully and quietly went on working. Afterall I had planned a surprise! Later in the day, when the mind brimmed with thoughts, and I went on following norms and the 'self' drooped clumsily, I quietly took it out and Bang! There was the surprise gift - My Blog space! My 'self' was overwhelmed! Searched for great names for such a beautiful gift, and then was born "My World", "Glowing Thoughts" and "Aura of Ecstacy".

It's a year now that you, my Blog, have been my best friend. Many a thoughts have been poured, much happiness shared, many wishes wishes flown, many dreams distributed, much love collected, wise thoughts too. And so I have been making my heart light, increasing my happiness, decreasing my woes and dreaming together, here, on your space.

And today, on your birthday, dear Blog, I wish you a very long life and may you be by my side, just as this, for years to come.

Happy Birthday dear!

2007-02-21T02:13:00.000-08:00

Disclaimer:

This disclaimer is being provided by P's 'Work Pressure' (WP). Every effort has been made to ensure that P doesn't find time to blog. WP, however, does not hold itself liable for any consequences, written or mental, arising out of such an act. Her WP is not confined to writing, but also to detailed formatting of text and creating Powerpoint Presentations. You should in no instance try to emulate, modify (it cannot be however, for we always seek the best), transmit or display this WP, for it will be a punishable offence under the law of Doctors. P's WP is also not responsible for any damages or losses of ideas, energy and time that might happen to her. Any resemblance, directly or indirectly, to her mental or physical sickness, anger and curse of her friends for not blogging, will be understood to be purely co-incidental.

I hadn't realized!

2007-01-15T02:01:00.000-08:00

I no longer dream, I apprehend...

I no longer succumb to illusion, I observe...

I no longer expect, I demand....

I no longer remain dumb, I speak...

And yes, I think .......

necessarily ... unnecessarily,
about religion and love,
sufferers and millionaires,
life and death,
facts and aspirations,
happiness and money,
and many many things ...

And with each unnecessary thought I grow...

With each necessary thought I learn...

As I have learnt to observe, demand, speak, think....

And as I have grown to favor self-satisfaction over competition,
Being myself rather than trying to fake ...

And when time has lead me to this crucial point of life,
I realized that I have grown up.

2006-12-12T02:31:00.000-08:00

What a Discovery!!!

It's high time I write my tag, lest I should be untagged, as I have been warned by Shakhi.

I'm not really to be blamed for this, but my nature. "An absolutely normal person like me can't be possessing any wierdness!" - so I used to think. And I went on thinking and thinking.....for 2 months....digging my mind and analysing my nature to find out 6 weird things about me!(now i think am excused for being late;))

Thanks to Shakhi for giving me this exciting opportunity to explore myself . And you know what? I could really find 6 weird things about myself! Imagine Weird...Me!!!! God, am I going crazy?!

These are the severe symptoms:

I never let a dream break at midnight:
Yeah! You've read it right. I never let any interruption in my sleep, like getting up to drink water or to kill a mosquito, break the beautiful dream I have been having. After the completion of my mission, when I get back to sleep, I make it a point that I complete the beautiful story of my dream. All I have to do is remember the last portion of my dream after I close my eyes, and am bound to see the rest of it. I sometimes even decide what dream am going to dream that night before going to sleep n believe me, it works!!

I never throw any small thing away:
I tend to keep everything of old like a pen(that no longer works), a copy(that I no longer need) with me coz I feel that every small thing should be kept for each has it's memories to carry. Especially I can never throw away small chits of paper where something of past importance was scribbled coz I have a strange feeling that I might again need it someday, when or how I don't know. Thanks to my mother, or else my home would have been a godown of old antique pieces and papers by now!

Am dumb after a storm when toooo angry or sad:
When am angry, you'll find me throwing things from left to right or from above to below or the vice versas (but am aware enough not to throw brittle things coz I know I won't get a replacement if I break it that way, so I play safe with pillows n all). When I can't find anything, I just stamp my foot on the floor or beat my hands on the table to make an irritating noise (or simply anything that makes noise irritaingly). And all the while and after too I remain dumb, absolutely silent, neither the tsunami or the earthquake can break a word out of me.
The latter remains the same when am too sad. The only difference between the two conditions is a mental one. When angry, my mind remains sometimes blank (ofcourse after purging out the anger in the above mentioned way) but when sad, my mind just forms bubbles of stories and packed with thoughts of I donno what!

See imaginary pictures on walls or in clouds:
If any paint is scrapped off unevenly on any wall that I get to see for some time, or have time enough to stare at the clouds, I start to imagine figures or sometimes even a complete scenary out of the remaining paint or from the shapes of clouds.

Think with head up:
Need to think fast and correct, you'll see my head popped up. Realized it the other day when my friend caught me staring at the roof of an auto when she asked me to think of the fare she owes me.

The watchful eye:
Whenever I feel distracted while studying or working (only at home), I draw pictures of eyes, either on the white space above the page of a book, or the last page of a copy or even on my legs if am sitting with legs folded. And I seem to indulge in competition with myself, trying to better myself with every effort. So this lands up around 7-8 eyes on whichever place is destined to be doomed.

So that's the weird side of me. 6 weird things.Gosh!

I tag whoever is left to take it up (though I think I am the last one to do it, but still, that's the rule).

Ah! Feeling relaxed, the tension of searching my weirdness being over at last!

2006-10-27T05:02:00.000-07:00

If You Love...

Take me to the zenith of the mountain...
Where I'd feel closer to the heavens,
The winds blowing my hair wild,
The clouds kissing my temple...

Lead me to the water below...
Where the rainbow bathes and the moon,
I'd bathe my soul in the elixir of bliss,
And behold my face where the ripples shone...

Hold my hand, yet let me free...
And never will I part,
Some foamy clouds for you will I bring...
And pour the rippling moon in your heart!

2006-10-25T21:34:00.000-07:00

All That Glitters Is Not Gold...

Faces have shrunk into oblivion...
Hearts have grown cold...
Friendship seems a precarious path
And being true - the impediment,-Behold!

How strange it seems at times...
Faces that were so clear, hearts so close,
Now on their way to accomplishment,
Forgot the friends old!

How true were the hearts then?
How warm their thoughts?
All seem a masque now...
All false, all cold!

My City

2006-10-06T04:08:00.000-07:00

Kolkata calling...!

Perceive the white swan-like clouds floating in the clear blue sky and you can hear the first beats of the 'dhak' already.( a kind of drums beat during the bengali festivals).
It's time for festivity, for the arrival of Mother Durga to her paternal home, for the city (kolkata, where I live) to dress up in her gorgeous and dazzling attire, for a riot of colors, for hearts to brim with fun and happiness...

Thus did my Pujas begin too. On Sashthi (the first day), me and my office friends, hurriedly packed off our work at around 5:00 pm( infact we were too excited the whole day to concentrate on our work:), it's a secret I let out, so hush up!). It was then a joint effort to put on a bit make-up according to each one's own style (since we all are somewhat reluctant to become a spiritual student of the K-serial school). And all ready and steady, it was time to let brakes loose. We set off hopping the pandals of South Kolkata. The huge crowds, the rain, all were defeated by our overwhelming high spirits. The streets were flooded with lights and people. The city was as if ensnared within an exuberant aura of festivity.

The rest 3 days went fine with me. I found the holidays an exact oppurtunity to cherish the most valuables- my bed, a story book, and the precious of all - a royal slumber. Come evenings, and you could find me in our Para's Pandal with my friend.

Be it pandal hopping for all the four days or sleeping the day off, the Durga Puja in Kolkata evokes a fervor of happiness that we all wait for the entire year. The sound of dhak, the smell of dhuno (an incense made by burning coconut fibre) all create a mesmerizing charm that's sure to engulf anyone in the city.

Be there in the city this time and see if you can be spared off the charm!
So, non- Calcuttans, think you must give it a try?...

2006-09-15T00:47:00.000-07:00

How we have changed!

Last day, an old wretched-looking beggar got up the bus with a big torn bundle. Unable to find a place to sit, he kept on standing, then sat on the floor of the bus busy digging his hands in the bundle. One or two people were kind towards him. I too felt bad. But suddenly, a man just called out to everyone to check out if he's fixing a bomb. Then started the bomb-scare. After he got down a thorough search was done in the bus. But nothing was found.

Such have the situations become. Specially in the metro city Kolkata, with the biggest festival, Durga Puja, very near, everybody travels with his life in his hands. After the Mumbai blasts, the London blasts, travelling during office time, when the crowd is the largest, is really scary. Now you can't leave your work and everything for that. I too have to travel quite a lot everyday by bus and metro rail, and just leave it to God. Afterall who can deter fate? But still the bomb-scare that day, in the bus I am sitting, really made me shudder for a while.

Later I thought how the emotions, pity and care towards the old and poor are being sucked out of us by the dreadful tension about one's life! Who knows when, where, what'll happen and our existence would cease, the love, care, anger, dream, desires, fighting for all earthly pleasures, all swiped in a moment!

2006-09-07T02:11:00.000-07:00

What's happening?!!

Suddenly many thoughts are cluttering up my mind. Thoughts about ...
Oh! Just too many to help me concentrate. Not quite concrete ones but a misty hue that's shading my heart foggy.
I really don't know why I'm feeling so or what am I feeling. Just a presence ... or an absence ... a satisfaction ... a dream ...

How nice would it be if sometimes time could move itself in a flux, and a few drops of golden dews from the past create a radiant ripple in our present!

Life

2006-08-20T21:30:00.000-07:00

Yea...It's life...

The long journey...life

The myriad ways, the twists and turns...

A known stranger sometimes...

Sometimes an unknown friend...

A perpetual enigma...

Within the cosmic soul of the universe...

2006-08-20T21:20:00.000-07:00

A thought...

I love to dream...
Dream to attain
Dream to fulfill
Dream to quench
Sometimes I feel 'I can'
Sometimes 'I will'....

I love to dream...
Dream to love
Dream to live
But always I feel 'What if...'
'What if...'
'What if...'

2006-07-27T02:47:00.000-07:00

The hero-meets-heroine-but-not-in-a-party.

Wonder why Ekta Kapoor has never travelled in bus. It would have given great variety to her dragging, monotonous ideas and prevent her from at least the copy-paste procedure from one serial to the other which she religiously follows.

A variety of characters is the best part of it. And if you can spot one or two handsome hunks ( it's a pity they are so few of them) [or beautiful girls (for guys, hey you're lucky for most girls are naturally beautiful)], your journey can't be better. The quick glances you exchange, where both feel the other person hasn't caught you glancing, is really fun! The 'embryonic romance' continues amidst a lot of traditional obstacles (they have unconsciously posed as obstalces to 'crushers' from days old). The 'moti' man or woman who pushes his/her way in between thus blocking the sight, the tired ill-smelling man who dozes even while standing like a horse, his head swinging from side to side and often 'eclipsing' the other's face and many such varieties of 'jhamela'-s. But nothing can (as never could) dampen the romantic spirits. A sweet feel, a thrill, a shyly glad tension(when suddenly eyes meet) all continues in the den, making time fly away.
The probs are however much less and the fun more if the person sits beside you. The strange inevitable occurence is when an elderly grave woman stands by you who sniffs the matter ( or God knows what she sniffs!) with a crooked eyebrow and stares at you as an Agatha Christie on a suspected murderer. If however you ignore her (and you will), you are all smiles. An alert consciousness (so that you are never caught stealing a glance), a faint smile, a rush of thoughts, a throb of heart and the the journey seems of a second! Your stop arrives. Your day's mood is decided.You board down the bus happily and spring off to your work. That's the end of the story. Though it doesn't leave memories exactly, still a nice and sweet one, right?

2006-07-17T23:02:00.000-07:00

Who doesn't love cakes?

Some friend(?) of mine recently took a short interview of mine. She was in search of some spice that was worthy of scatter. Here's how it went:

Your love - cakes
Something you can always snatch from others- cakes
You dream of- cakes
Your passion- cakes
Your guilty passion- cakes anytime
Something must on your birthday- cakes
You can quarrel with someone for- cakes(otherwise I don't easily quarrel)
At last, exasperated, she said, "Are you never satisfied with cakes?" And I was too shameless in replying No.

That was the end. I am sorry to have disappointed her as nothing can be more 'spicy' to me than....CAKES. Anytime, any type, anywhere. My favorite filmy dialogue hence is:'Cake khane ke liye hum kahin bhi ja sakte hain'. And I am not ashamed. Afterall, who doesn't love cakes?

2006-07-17T03:08:00.000-07:00

A Sweet part of life

Haven't written a single post since many days. Too busy combating my nemesis-exams! Yesterday saw my friend's grandma visit her. I do really feel to know sometimes how it feels to have a grandma and grandpa. As I have lost both of them(I should rather say all four of them)before my birth, I now really miss them. Their love, run to them whenever I am in despair; the refuge, go under their shelter whenever get a scolding from parents; to put me to sleep with their stories; being ever small and never grown-up, I miss all. However friendly parents be, I guess they can never take the place grandmas and grandpas have in one's life. They are an 'anmol' slice of everyone's life which I have never been fortunate enough to taste.

2006-06-07T05:23:00.000-07:00

Oh God!!

What do you think the worst part of our lives is?To me it's the exams. Now that M.A.final exams are knocking at my door, I've already started feeling the blues.
But you get to experience many things that you wouldn't have had otherwise: the ghosts of the silent night, transformation of boring letters into interesting stars, very frequent recharging of phone cards.
And you miss all: T.V. programmes you would die to see, meeting with your college friends, enjoying the adda with your parents and sibling, long chat with your brother or sister, going shopping...oh! a lot! You miss life as such and I hate it.How nice it would be only to study, read nice novels and stories (we, English Literature students need a lot to)without the burden of thinking about the probable questions each story might prop up!
But anyway exams are exams - a frightening nemesis- as it is always for me, doesn't matter even if I study the entire year, that single day's fated morning is the worst always.This year specially I'm very apprehensive as for the past few months I've been juggling work with studies. Donno what's gonna happen.

Dear Blogger Friends, you'll not see any more posts of mine till 13th of July (that's the day when my exam ends).Please don't forget to check my blogs after that.Wish you all farewell till then. Please take good care of yourselves.Bye bye.See you after a month.
REMEMBER:Don't forget.

2006-05-18T05:20:00.000-07:00

A CUT FOR FUN

One of my friend's blog on loadshedding, made me remember my own experiences when we used to stay at the Officer's Quarters in a place near Kolkata .Our power-supply was from the industrial line. So we hadn't to experience the frequent power-cuts that the outsiders experienced. But when there was a fault in our power line then we had power-cuts. Previously we had turbines, which brought the power back in a wink. But it was from when it became faulty that we had real fun, especially if it was after evening. As soon as power went , first a holla would be heard from all the quarters. We just had to grab our torch, light the candles ,wear the sandles and zoop! all were out of their houses.We had only to wait for our mothers to move out. That wouldn't take much time because one of the aunties who would move out first would scream the names of the others and call them to come out.Then we were dogs without collars. Addas have such a magnetic charm. A great cacophony of haha hehe in the dark would welcome any visitor who would have entered the campus during a power-cut, which made it more difficult for him to find the house he was searching for.It was a huge campus with similar-looking huge bungalow type quarters (as the Britishers had left them).So it was very obvious for any visitor to be afraid of the unknown,the ghosts, there then.But we knew every brick and pebble of it. We wanderd anywhere, on the big field we had or on the narrow road in between the field or on the road separating two rows of quarters, or play on the pavement infront of our houses. We just had to move out. It was simply great.Suddenly when the lights in the mill compond would be on(we knew ours would follow two seconds later), we would be like ooh!! and sadness creep in amongst the fun, we knew we had to get back to our studies and the same boring routine.All enjoyment suspended till the next day when we would go to school. Regarding those innumerable enjoyable incidents on the way to and back from school, I'd be writing some day else.

2006-05-18T00:02:00.000-07:00

Say Cheeeeeeseeeeee..........!!

I love to laugh. So I keep on seeking opportunities to do so. A drab and grave atmosphere is very tough for me to bear. But I do really hate coarseness and farcical comments. Before joining my job, I was pretty apprehensive of overpowering gravity. But it's really fun to be in the office. Here's a pleasant admixture of work and fun. The homely ambience along with the funny,witty comments that one or the other pops up with every now and then, is really worthy to make one's tired brains relaxed. A party- mood,which lasts for around 15-20 minutes, sets in once there's a heavy shower outside or a meeting is cancelled. Besides what I've really gained here is a bunch of great friends. The friendship too has evolved greatly as we all share the same mental set-up, all sorts of craziness mingled up. This makes us perhaps the craziest bunch in the office.(or should I say one of the craziest!!) We are also too innocuous to let other's sceptic eyes fall upon us. A nice combination, don't you think? We all are very happy the way we are. Though certain situations sometimes demand mature worldliness and thrust one or the other of us in a pool of despondency, the others surely boost the person up with their exuding high spirits(we very cleverly do not lose all of our's toghether).It's really fortunate to find such friends and people around you who can make you laugh. Laughter is really a bliss, a world without peripheries, so that you can enter it easily.
Just LAUGH your heart out and experience the unfathomable delight it is to live!!

2006-05-03T22:31:00.000-07:00

The captivated freedom ...

There are times when I feel the struggle of 'self' within me......
a tremendous sense of imprisonment......
imprisoned by necessity...
by society...

I flutter my wings...
but find them clipped...
I can look at the distant world but can never reach them...

A free bird was I before...
when I could dance to my whims...
stroll at my desire...
dream at my leisure...
love in my dreams...
laugh at the thoughts...

nourish the beautiful...
cherish the pleasure...
see the clouds glide...
hear the leaves whisper...
feel the waves revel...
perceive the colors riot...
smell the nature refreshed......

Now I'm a victim of necessity...
always succumbing to to the sadistic moulds of the society...
stroll at social hours...
dream when it's necessary to relax...
hear the transoport ply...
smell the suffocating fog.

It's only in 'my world' that I know no bounds.I dream, love, think.
But at times it rebels for losing it's power.
And then it's a silence.
A grave silence.
It drowns my thoughts in it's depth.
Casts a gloom over my soul.
Suffocates me in it's wrap.

But I hate this struggle...
I want to remain unaware of all struggles....
I just want to fly...
to fly beyond the horizon...
to fly upto the heavens...
to fly till eternity...
just spread my wings ...
and fly.

My first addiction

2006-04-24T11:41:00.000-07:00

I was first addicted when I was two and a half years old.That was the norm of our campus.I barely remember my first days but like every other child I was very scared of water.But it was fun, me and all my friends of the campus, waited like hawks for Tuesday and Sunday of every week, for those were the only days we were allowed to go beserk.But it was not all fun then. We had to stand in neck deep water, our trainer, though a thin man , used to take three of us on one hand, and three more on the other, glide us a long distance and leave us suddenly, in midst of the deep waters ,we, struggling , sinking and gobbling in water.That was how we had been trained in swimming.The pool was within the officer's club premises, a really beautiful place surrounded with flowers and trees. And the open sky above. It was really fun to dive in there (of couse after I had learnt it well).
However the training was a fun too. After a bit of hardship, we were allowed to play a lot of water games. We played, were mischievous at times, hit each other with water, and got scoldings from our trainer. The best part was when we were able to annoy our trainer to such an extent that he would hit us- a slap, not with his palm but with water- but it hits really hard , believe me. There's no one among us who hadn't experienced a water slap.
It was not everyday that we were allowed to dive. But it was such fun that we used to be eager for it.We used to plead our trainer everydayto let us dive, plead and plead and plead...but he weas a bit too stern. When at last we got a chance, we had to follow a rule.We had to start swimming from the shallow end of the pool till the other deep end and who would reach first would get a chance to dive first and likewise in turns.
The best I liked of swimming was floating. Just gliding over the water, staring at the open sky.It felt as if there was all the bliss of the world.

Those are the bygone days. But I crave for those days to return: the tuesdays and sundays.The narcotic effect of swimming still troubles me whenever I pass by a pool or a lake. I love to be addicted by it over and over again,to be wild in it's effect and lost in it's charm.

Dance

2006-04-07T15:57:00.000-07:00

Dancing Ladies ...

It's the dance of life and the dance of death, of Eros and Thanatos, a reflection of happiness and of pain, the dual mysticism that bounds our life within it's peripheries, as we pass through it silently, with our hands up and heads bowed, always surrendering to the omnipotent.....

Yet we live on and love to live for ever.

For ever dancing to the rhythm of fate.

2006-04-07T12:23:00.000-07:00

Springing Thoughts

Every time the spring comes laden with bright sad memories.That was the time whenI was not in a city pent. The fresh smell of nature waiting to hug, the sweet symphony of the chirping birds, the lovely flowers all embellished in bright hues dancing to their tunes, made me wake up in an ethereal world after a sweet night's dream.Time seemed a benevolent lazy lass providing me lots of it to enjoy myself and strolling at it's own pace.Then 'my own world' was just a next-door neighbour. Now it's only a hop-skip-jump. No time even to glance at the open sky. Its now only in my reveries that I do get back to that world - one of happiness, free of stress, of worries, of the troubling thoughts of future. And once I reach the now far-living strange world, it's spring all over again.There the flowers are still in bloom, the birds are still chirping, the nature is still fresh. There's ETERNAL SPRING - that's MY WORLD.

RECOLLECTIONS....

2006-04-04T16:03:00.000-07:00

Being Crushed

If anybody tells me s/he hadn't a crush anytime in his life, I'd be the last person to believe it.It usually happens when one is in school. Anyway, everybody gets crushed in school, one way or the other:teachers , studies , tests;that's however something different.It's being crushed under the wheels of Cupid's chariot that I am speaking of here.Mine was funny. It took two years to generate and one more year for me to understand that I had a crush. Obviously it was too late by then. It was the feeling of his absence that made me think why I enjoyed his presence so greatly and cherish the past moments.The recollection of those past days are really sweet.I don't want my 'crushed' relationship to materialize because I want to cherish them in my memories for ever, a sweet relaxation after a hard day's work. Isn't it?..........