Gelf Experiences

Rainy Tuesday night on a crowded train from Kerala to Bangalore. Sweltering hot. Raised voices that makes you want to take a swan-dive off the next bridge.
While I was musing on how best to spend my time, this cloud burst of an inspiration struck me: Study of human subjects. Specifically, my neighbors on the train in the next bay. Made an amazing case study – this motley crew just returned from the ‘Gelf’ J
Dig this: How do you ascertain if that chatty family is immigrant from Kerala who found their calling in the Middle East?
Lemme give you some infallible tips after my wonderful experience with this family in that ten-hour long train journey.

Point One: The first indication is the whiff of perfume. Expensive Davidoff Coolwater, fragrances of rose-water ‘attar’, mixed with a lot of exotic heady ladies cologne. And while you wonder where on earth is such heavenly fragrance wafting from, a cacophony of noises drown out any reaction that you would have wanted to make. A family of about nine (for want of not offending any body’s puritan senses, I am restricting the family size to nine which is actually quite a modest number) huffs and puffs through the narrow passage way of the sleeper-class compartment in the train. Lugging luggage (American Tourister and Samsonite no less!) the size of mini golf-carts piled sky high one on top of another.
That’s your first brush with these characters.

Point Two: Do you spot that one male, who is probably the size of a beached whale resting on the Miami Beach, hair colored a weird shade of orange and graying at the sides and definitely on the receding end of things, at the centre of everything, controlling things? He’s probably sweating bullets and sports a huge clean white kerchief, mopping his brows and now splotched dark with sweat stains. (This is like the hundredth time he is coming back to his motherland, and yet, having been used to the air-conditioning in the middle of Gobi desert, he’s yet to adjust back to the humid air of Kerala!) That’s the patriarch. The buck stops here. The rock around which others rally. Our man is leading the whole family back into their native land – Good old Kerala from Gelf.

Point three: The Patriarch is by default surrounded by at least three to four ladies, lending voice to the chaos in high pitched falsettos. Against conventional beliefs, these ladies usually are given to brazenly uncovering their hair and only have a dupatta casually draped around their shoulders, stand tall in their Jimmy Choos bought at the last Dubai Shopping Extravaganza and smell of a thousand other fragrances which would send your nose into a tizzy just trying to unravel. Mostly on the healthier side, these ladies would be cradling at least one to two toddlers who would be bawling their lungs out for attention.

Point four: The Rich Spoilt Brats. Boy: Young, Natty, clad in expensive Puma/Adidas footballer tees, and shorts, sporting very large gaudy Casio sports-watches on their wrists and always with a video-game in hand that looks like it will cost you at least 2 months salary. The older ones (mind you, when I say old, I mean like nine or ten) always have the Nokia N-series which they casually flip around in their hands.
Girl: Very young, usually looks like the DOLL. Very pretty, completely dolled up in the latest western outfit, hair cut in the latest French fringe style and wearing five-inch heels ( beat that!). Slightly older girls fare no better, with the complete doll outfits, and hair let loose without a dupatta covering it up. Always with that frosty-nosed stare, eyes made up, and nose stuck-up in a richie-rich snob look and dresses that glimmer and shine in the dark.

That makes up most of the nine-member family from Gelf who are out for a summer vacation back at the ancestral home in Kerala. You can’t go wrong with these pointers; All Gelf Returnees! Hail “Mallu-land Dufaaaii”!

Dropping the Bomb!

I finally heard the penny drop. The sound of Click! Ah sweet mother in heaven. Finally killed those countless ghosts which had filled up the depths of my mind. Yesterday night, I was pondering how they must have felt, before they dropped the bombs little man and fat boy over Hiroshima, Nagasaki. I don’t know how they felt, but I seriously felt queasy. Sick to the stomach. But now that the deed’s done, I am feeling better. What the heck! I dropped the bomb and now it is only left how to fend off the blood feud. I don’t quite look forward to this but, what should happen, will happen. Amen.

The Eternal Questions in Life

Some days are foggy. When reason fails to cut through the clutter.
And I question the purpose of existence. For a larger picture, that someone above is languidly painting on my black and white canvas of a life. I keep wondering when He is going to dip his brush into that pot of bright poster colors (kept open and drying fast beside Him) and splash across my canvas. To bring it alive in an explosion of multi colored hues and shades. And to this day, I keep waiting.

As usual, am in the middle of a transition period in life. And as usual, faced with ponderous life-threatening decisions to make, I am indeed confused. As would any youngling in his impressionable twenties trying to tie down the loose ends of his life, would rightfully be. And Lord, lend me strength to make that right decision.

Today was yet another blotch on my existence. When the guilt that I have not been productive and not contributed to the well being of the other six-billion creatures who walk this earth with me, is slowly threatening to swallow my soul.

I pass time by trying to draft that perfect “separation” notice letter to my employer, praying this does not end in another of those blood baths. (too much blood have I been witness to) I am happy, I am gonna be doing something I love. The lure of greenbacks is hard to resist again. Which doesn’t hurt of course.
And what gnaws at the back of my mind? That I would displease someone whom I really don’t give a rat’s backside about? Somebody pin down that black shadow of a doubt and execute it for me please. I cannot bear to think straight with that hooded assassin (of reason? of logic?) lurking in the back of my mind. Help!

From flames to dust,
Lovers to Friends,
Why do all good things come to an end?

Blues or Bliss?

Weekend Blues

I know, it’s like a misnomer! I mean, who the fuck gets blues on a weekend pal?
Sadly, I do.
Lets face it, Life Rocks – reads one of my friends’ wall on facebook. Hmmm...lets see –

Friday night-out at the movies, [in between I got a phone-call that could change my life!], Saturday lunch-out with a close friend with whom I can rant about everything that is wrong in my life, Evening spent on splurging in buying my favorite books, Night spent at home eating YUM butter chicken masala and watching ‘Black Dahlia’ [Which I rank as Josh Hartnett’s best movie ever beating Lucky Number Slevin], Sunday lazed at home watching re-runs on the telly, catching up with friends in Mumbai [this was very nice], spoke to a NYU Grad who wants to shoot a film la-RDB-ishtyle for her thesis on Indian Call-centre [Correct, am auditioning and I’m hoping she’s as nice looking as Suu aka Gulabbo], now lazing in my bean-bag typing away [ in between I got chided for having slept through the afternoon, I disappointed this really nice girl coz I did not take a huge hint for having coffee with her, Loser that I am!], with Phillip Pullman’s Golden Compass lying next to me.

Good weekend in most senses. Lazy self-indulgent, completely on my terms. I guess in that ways, I’m an extreme existentialist and hate it when someone tells me what to do with my life. I like the Blues. I like the mess. I like the hazy uncertainties that swarm around and engulf me most of the times. Because I like my life, on my own terms. And am glad.