Before It All Began

I have a ground floor office with a one-way glass wall that faces the street. Once in a while, a woman comes really close and adjusts her hair or fixes her make up. Or a kid would try to peer into the other side. They have no idea that there is a person sitting right there. It is entertaining, especially when I am in a meeting. I am entertained easily.

I finally slept yesterday. At least a little bit. This is what happens everytime. My sleep patterns get normal and then it is time to leave. The whole story all over again. A school friend of mine who is a movie director in Bollywood is shooting in France and he wants me to visit. I have never been to a Bollywood shoot. But then again, I have never had malaria, either. So I think I will pass.

Have you been following the political developments in Hungary? It is a crzy place. I will be in Budapest next month and I am strangely excited and a little nervous. We shall see how it develops. So if you suddenly see me stop blogging in October, read a Hungarian newspaper to find out what might have happened to moi:-)

This reminds me the time right after PRI was defeated and Vicente Fox was elected after a free election. I am no fan of Fox and his politics. But it was nevertheless a historic period. I was in a small town in Mexico that day. At 10:00 PM, on my way back to the hotel, the car was surrounded by people out on the street celebrating. On a whim, I got off and joined the guys on the street cheering and clapping. Ole Ole! Who knows, wherever there is unrest, the blogger goes there:-) Often for the wrong reasons.

Anyone for a good protest rally?

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Before It All Began

(Previously published. Written in 1998, I think.)

Comeon pink Frederick, I said moving back and forth
Chanting endlessly.
Moving about behind buses,
Under the clouds, toppling rickshaws,
And almost beside myself with joy.

Comeon pink Frederick I said calling out, what a hoot!
Let's go and touch a flying kite,
Let's see rainbows and remember last night's dreams.

Comeon pink Frederick lets open our shirts,
Show incipient chest hair to each other;
Level with each other;
Learn about each other;
Touch our pre-pubescent upperlips;
Reach over and pat them down
And pretend to study.

Comeon pink Frederick lets draw vermilion lines on hands
With razor edges; make tears with blood, menstruate from our cuts,
Be women together,
Know each other's chants, slogans,
Play politics, let's sit on a strike,
Give up food, be the watchman's nightmare.

Comeon pink Frederick be fat.
Be sleepy. Lie under a blanket all day and all night;
Listen to the rain, masturbate and be scared,
And think of suicide and make nooses in our heads.

Comeon pink Frederick lets be a spot on the firing line,
Open our skeletal chests, our pot bellies to police.
Watch the bullets spray, fall under a running mendicant's feet.
Be dead.

Sans sommeil, sans rêves

Mind plays tricks on you when you don't sleep and can't sleep.

As special friends would quickly recognize, I too am indeed "Un grande malade qui s'ignore sciemment." Sleepless and tired, I am about to somnambulate to the UN to have lunch with a diplomat friend who is the Chargé d'affaires for an Eastern European country. I don't want to go as I have been falling asleep sitting down at all sorts of places. As they say in Eastern Kentucky, "that'll learn ya, Bubba."

And in the spirit of this plagiaristic cross reference (and you thought I will never be upto it), there is always a method to this madness. Memory envelops me in the night. Silences. Conversations. Un dialogue qui surprend par son la simplicité ajoute à l’atmosphère tantôt impudique tantôt angoissante d’un univers que seul l’oubli semble vouloir apaiser. Pray to drink the elixir of eternal lapses of memory. Hmm, Well, I am no better than Gunther Grass, I shall declare (not so subtle reference to his memoir).

Here is to sweet, peaceful sleep that eludes me every night.

Desi Vs. Desi

Lets call the first girl Sunitha. She is nineteen and was born in a suburb of an East-coast city where she grew up. She wears her unbranded Nylon churidars without being conscious and eats with her hands in public. She is a vegetarian but does not consider tofu or mushrooms vegetarian because they are not “Indian”. She went to her high school prom dateless in a sari. She has never had a boyfriend and has no confidence in talking to boys. She divides her entire world into things “Indian” and everything else. Of course, being Indian means being Tamil (the best language in India, according to her) and being Hindu. She is a pre-med student who puts oil in her hair and her mother has told her that conditioning is a bad thing for the hair. Her jeans and tops are shapeless and functional. She adores Tamil actors and watches Bollywood movies once in a while, but Hollywood films offend her. The only music she listens to is Tamil film music. In fact anything that is not “Indian” is not kosher, a value system instilled by her parents forbid her to experience the life around her, and she obeys without questioning. India is an abstract concept for her that means a set of values when it comes to dress, gender relations, song and dance, food and religion. She probably doesn’t know anything else. But if you ask her, she will say that her country is India, a country she has no real connection to.

Her parents work in a setting that entirely services the Indian Diaspora. Their house is decorated as if they still live in an Indian village (not in the furnishings per se, but a certain aesthetic sense or lack thereof guide their decisions, such as the series of black and white framed pictures of dead and living relatives on the wall.) She was molested at thirteen or still is being molested (no one can get the straight story out of her on the details) by a “respectable” member of the Indian community as a result of which she has contracted herpes. But she cannot tell her parents or go to the Police.

The other character is Naomi. Naomi lives in Bandra, and she too is nineteen. She goes to college in the city and comes from a rich broken home. She wouldn’t be caught dead in a churidar or a sari. She is the product of a union when her father left his wife and three children to marry his secretary. Her stepbrother killed himself and her stepsister is battling a drug addiction problem. She is sexually active but not in love. She drinks, smokes and is frequently in night clubs where someone her age should not be. She is Muslim or Christian but does not practice her religion all that much. She adores Kianu Reeves and even though she watches a lot of Bollywood movies, will never admit that in public. She knows she is Indian, but it not something she spends any time thinking about. Her facebook lists her musical interests as Oldies, Hip-hop, Jazz, Latino Salsa and TV shows as Oprah Winfrey, The Apprentice, and Sex in the city. And she likes Japanese, Indian, Thai, Chinese, American and Goan food.

Naomi is not political and has no political views. She doesn’t seem to think a lot about India as a concept but lives India as it evolves and changes. She probably will move to the US someday only because that is where everyone moves to but she will miss the Bombay social life. But she has a strong opinion about where the one-way streets should be in Bandra and about the Police shutting down outdoor parties after 11:00. She thinks that Kingfisher airlines is “way too cool” and strongly believes that “everyone from Bombay parties in Goa for the New Year’s.”

I wonder which one of these girls is a true desi. Does it matter? My personal opinion is that Naomi is a true Indian as she lives and breathes the air of India and intrinsically have it in her. She may not be a typical Indian, but there are no typical Indians. And I feel sorry for Sunitha for all she is losing out in her country, which is the USA.

I have met Algerians and Moroccans in France who are a lot like Sunitha. I wonder if this is universal, this quest to belong to something old when you feel marginalized by the new.

I know this is a controversial view. But that is how I feel.

Ab sab kuch oopar waley ke haath mein hain!

(translation on the title for the friendly lurkers from Amerique and Afrique: Literally means, now everything is in the hands of the Lord. Typical Hindi film dialogue)


People here take the day of the sabbath bloody seriously. If you are planning to seek asylum here, you better know that you can't even mow your lawn on Sundays before the cops would show up at your door armed with Swiss Army knives and other weaponry.

So this is what I did on the day of the Lord (milaad, mujhe kadi si kadi saza diya jaaye.)

1. Went for a walk in the rain in the dark, talked to myself under my breath when it was quite dark and nobody was around. Peeped into the groundfloor restaurant windows of Hotel President Wilson. The whole place was empty.

2. Was too lazy to cook or go out for dinner. So ate the following things from the fridge in random order: Half a jar of pickled olives, 2 artichoke hearts in olive oil, 2 thin slices of jamon, one plum, some cheese, a slice of bread, 2 cookies and some chips. Washed it down with coke. Called it dinner.

3. Read a book. Not Pratchett. Lying on the couch. With TV on mute.

4. Semi-counseled someone out of a semi-divorce. Very long distance. Most of it was listening. Did not say: You haven't lived until you have had your first divorce. Proud of the successful suppression of cynicism.

5. Had a burger with a friend at Pickwick's. Her treat actually. She showed up red/sunburnt, unwashed and unslept and I forthwith adviced a shower and sleep and sent her home.

6. Did laundry, ironed my shirts, cleaned the house, took the trash out all the while contemplating pointiliism in my head. Don't you love Seurat? I used to go to Chicago Art Institute just to stare at Le Grande Jatte.

5. Debated the comments of former Cardinal Ratzenberger on Islam with people on the phone. Won't debate online. Suffice to say, I am a First Amendment fan.

4. Decided against calling mom.

3. Switfly ignored all the SMS messages from people.

2. Without meaning to, insulted someone on Ramadan and apologized right after.

1. Slept in. Did absolutely nuttin'.

Making of the Global Village

Executive Summary
This is a semi-double post sorta, kinda. Part I is the Juvenile what-ddddid-I-do-last-night update nobody cares about and part Deux is a more "sheeriyash" thang that (also) nobody cares about. But that is what I do, I seek not to entertain. Go figure!

Part 1: Je Suis Malade
The other-side are coming on Monday. So I had to work all day Saturday to get things ready. In case anyone thinks that all I do is party and look after this blog (hmm.. why would you think that?), I do have a real job that I pay attention to once in a while:-)

The South African landed here from Dublin for the weekend. So the young and old, mostly led by the young from an American company that shall go unnamed, got dragged into Platinum Club. I needed that like I needed a hole in the head. After all the lining up and obligatory stares from the bouncers, the lively group descended in, got bored and split up, and a few of us ended up in another place called Unik in Carouge. Five thousand steps up, all black paint on the floor sort of thing, and with the hostess that looked like she had an eventful career entertaining men for money. Anyway, I ended up playing the spoiler babysitter preventing the yungunes from picking up a glow-boy or two (so referred for the white on white look that so GLOHS in the dark). I am sure they were none too pleased. Got home at four and slept, 400 SWF poorer and with a pounding headache.

South African went back to Dublin this morning. He is in worse shape.

The remorse has set in. I am not proud of it. Won't do it for another month at least. Those who are about to lecture me on responsibility (you know who you are), please take a ticket and get in line. Those preferring to write, I have left a waste basket outside for your convinience.

Part 2: Now for something completely different
It was a Midwestern college town. A faint resignation remained as the status quo between the townies and the gownies. You got off the exit and drive through cornfields and without much pomp of ceremony, the town gradually appeared in front of you. The main street was a collection of every chain fast-food joint that you can think of interspersed with a video store here and a bank there. There was an obligatory Chinese restaurant and a funeral home, side by side; I don’t like Chinese food that much but I don't think the funeral home’s business did not depend on the food at the restaurant.

It got bitterly cold in winter. The rumor was that if you took a piss outside, the stream will freeze as soon as it touched the ground. (Not true but good for repeating among generations of students.) Except for Cyrus, who belonged to the Polar Bears club and wore shorts and tees even in the dead of winter, everyone else actually looked like a polar bear with layers and layers of clothing. I still fondly remember my black winter coat that served me so faithfully through those years with pockets so large that they comfortably could handle the gloves and mittens, a scarf, one or two small-sized goats and a copy of the dictionary. Getting into a locked building was an acrobatic skill we had to practice with only a precious minute before your extremities would freeze and hurt after you remove the gloves. So the fluid motion of retrieving the key, removing the gloves, inserting the key into the cold metal keyhole and turning it before your hands broke off had to be perfectly practiced. Especially at two in the morning, after a long, solitary walk from the lab.

I had many roommates over the years, the tai-chi expert from rural China, the Turkish man with a voracious libido whose nocturnal proclivities next room made sleeping at night quite difficult, a very quiet American, a jealous-pervert from Hyderabad who resented the more successful perverts and the tortured Marwari with a Japanese girlfriend who went home to get engaged to a girl of his parents’ liking abandoning all contacts with his family and the fiancée upon his return are some I remember. The pervert also used to entertain two young pretty Jehovah’s witnesses week after week in “Bible study” in the hopes that someday he will at least get to hold their hands. That was a mutually lost cause for them, with neither side benefiting. (As an aside, this same gentleman once went to a girl and said thus: You sleep with your boyfriend. I think I am just as good if not better. so you should sleep with me also. Of course, he managed this conversation after tricking the girl to go on a long drive, so she had no choice to endure the really uncomfortable drive back with him to town.)

All this banality was important to our lives because there was no other way to connect to the worlds we have left behind. No cheap ways in any case, and considering we were poor students on a shoestring budget, our calls home were weekly and lasted not much beyond the obligatory 20 minutes. But connecting is not just knowing that nobody is sick or a cousin had a baby. Connecting is really staying in touch, being part of people’s lives, knowing what made them happy or sad. We did not have that opportunity, so the vacuum was occupied by the tortured banality of small-town existence.

This was Seventeen years ago, that is to say not so long ago. Before the “World Wide Web” changed all that. I say WWW and not Internet because Internet did exist. Internet was the jumbled black hole that carried email, facilitated ftp, enabled “talk”, “finger”, “ping”, “Archie”, “veronica” and was accessible only to a few. I remember being able to see most people who were connected to the Internet from India by fingering the few sites that supported Internet connectivity. There was in fact only one or two places in Calcutta that were directly on the Internet and I cannot for the life of me remember them. I missed India terribly and there was no way to get any news from India unless it came though those awful weekly Indian papers published from New York. When a fairly new company called Sprint introduced $1.40 a minute as a cheap deal to call India we were thrilled considering that the regular rate was over Three dollars. Needless to say, I spent those years completely cut off from India when India suddenly went from the sleepy socialist country to join the open economy.

The most interesting thing is that if you went to this sleepy town today, it is still recognizable. I am sure the local video store is now part of Blockbuster, there IS a Wal-Mart that has killed off more mom&pop stores, and may be somewhere a new chain restaurant has opened. A few new buildings perhaps, the boundaries of the city have extended farther into the cornfields. On the other hand, Internet (now used in the current sense) has transformed the connectivity and communication. I know what my cousins did this morning by just signing on to messenger or by calling them on their cell phones. Everyone is connected all the time. My family, with footprint in India, Singapore, USA, Switzerland, Turkey, Malawi, UAE, Canada and Thailand, is more or less closely-knit because nobody is too difficult to reach. And much of that reach is free of cost. I sometimes wonder how I got by through those years without any of this.

After the Physics revolution and Biology revolution came the information revolution. I am so glad I lived through that period of intense growth and change. I wonder what the future generations would write and think about that time when finally the whole world spontaneously came together and connected its knowledge through seemingly pointless connections and complex protocols.

Now if they could come up with a way of inserting a key into the keyhole in the dead of the winter without breaking off the fingers, we will have something.

Transcients

She is a former bar tender from the Midwest, who when young, left everything and moved to Europe for an adventure. She has very little money, but still tries to have as much fun as possible. I can see that she probably doesn't go to a lot of nice restaurants by the way she orders carpaccio without knowing that the beef is uncooked. Tomorrow she will go with a friend to Paris for a visit.

The friend is a painfully shy man from Okhlahoma who works for an oil company and is posted in this town. He doesn't speak French and is lost in Europe.

The Canadan is gay. He has a boyish face and is friendly. Apparently he is the back-up sperm donor to all the single women. He is very perturbed that, unlike Canada and the US, there are no alliances that support him. He is looking for a boyfriend but is frustrated by all the people in the closet. This city has gay men, but no gay community. It has the Chinese but no chinatown.

She is half Palestinian and half Venezuelan from New Jersey who with a Yale education is taking a break as an au pair. She lives with a couple who are too rich to care but not rich enough not to work.

She doesn't know why she is here and would like to leave. But she doesn't know what to do or where to go. She hates her boss and her job but loves her ex-boyfriend.

He is an Egyptian diplomat who loves life. He attended all the parties until an accident confined him to wheel chair. I wonder what hurts and pains he was concealing by dancing his time away.

We are all transients here. Nobody has a purpose, nobodt seems to know where they belong. I think the only thing that bind us all together is our comfort in this city away from all those places we would otherwise call home.

I like collecting their stories. I like telling them mine. We sometimes spend a few minutes drinking a beer or just chatting. Who knows, someday all these people would go into a novel that I plan to write (but probably never will.)

Pooria Dhanashree

If you know where I work, I will say a lot of us are feeling betrayed. Since the news has been out at 6 AM, people have been calling. I say it is not such a big deal. I try to brush it off. I go for a relaxed lunch with colleagues, but we are worried. And we should be. At 2 AM yesterday, I was happily walking down Mont Blanc with Jesus after having a beer with Andrea after the rest of the gang went home. And at 6 AM my boss calls. His voice is shaken as well. Have you heard the news?, he asks. My eyes are still welded shut from lack of sleep.

I had to make many serious practical decisions today. About work and life. But this is not the place for them.

But in the end, these things don't worry me. Not yet, anyway. Life has a way of finding the right balance.

Earlier tonight, I was tired. I left the party at 11 PM and walked back through the narrow lanes of Paquis. Dark shadows had fallen across the sidewalks. Broadway cafe still remained open with no patrons inside. I saw the waitress sitting at the bar eating her meal. The streets had already gone to sleep except for someone hurriedly walking away into the darkness on their way to or from loneliness. It is a warm day and I am dressed warmly. Style over substance.

Now in my bed, I sit silently and listen to Parveen Sultana singing Raag Puriya Dhanashree as I write this. Payaliya Jhankar is the Drut bandish in tintal. I don't want to look back at the way I behaved in the last two months. I am just shocked. I don't know what it was. Life always moves forward.

I love her voice as it rises and falls through the myriad folds of the raaga, filling my ears. It takes me back to a JanFest in Bombay long before it became Mumbai, where I first saw her perform. I sat by the corridors of the library with a friend and listened to her sing. Both our eyes were closed and I could forget everyone around us and then be one with the music. The stage was under the chapel and the moon lit the silhouette of the building behind the stage. It was beautiful. At 3 AM, Bhimsen Joshi started to sing. It might have been late, but I didn't feel tired. I felt the tiredness only at 6 AM when I fell asleep on the train and missed my station.

Those were also crazy times. The day before that, the Prime Minister was suppossed to address the crowds at Chowpatty. We went walking there at 2 AM, twenty young boys and girls and decided to climb the podium. Predictably, the police showed up and chased us down from there. We ended up at the (most aweful) 24-hour coffee shop at the Ambassador. At three, we descended on Oberoi looking utterly unpresentable and tried to convince RB's sister who worked there as a manager to let us in to the disco without a cover charge. Predictably, the plan didn't work and we ended up leaving from there in ONE car and I still don't know know that many people got inside that car.

I remember it tonight because, like during JanFest, I am operating without much sleep and being out every night. Unlike then, this is very foolish. This whole time is foolish. I ought to do something more "age appropriate". So this weekend I am going to italy, to Turin and do some serious things such as buy some pasta:-) And listen to Verdi as I drive.

Right now I wish I would fall asleep listening to this.

Everything else will just work itself out.

Borex

Last night I went to visit this wonderful couple who are friends with a friend in the US. The three of us, with their children, went to dinner to a small village called Borex. It was such a perfect place, tucked in the corner of a perfect village which you will never find unless you are looking for it. Near the village is an unmanned checkpoint to cross over to another country. All around the place, there were apple orchards. The local wine was perfect, and cheese quite remarkable. These are the days when you think it is worth this move.

I got home at 11:00.

Folie à deux

I am back in the apartment in Europe. The room is quiet and I am reading a badly written book on foresics. It is the sort of the day that is perfect for long walks.

It is also a day of loss. But not just a day of loss, but also a day to gain perspective.

Right behind my house in California were these ravines and past them you could see mountains. On clear days, far away where nothing was visible, you could see snow capped mountains. Some nights, when all was still and the air stood still, I would go for a walk with the dog through the winding paths. I remember the day after 9-11, when all traffic was still grounded, the sky was so clear and there were no blinking lights. Across the Lynn Canyon, you could see the lights from the houses. I was so upset then. One of the passengers in the planes that hit WTC carried someone who was coming to visit me in California.

If you live a few years, you lose count of all that you lose. And you mourn all your loses. But very rarely do you focus on everything you gain. A few days after 9-11, I spent a night at J. Krishnamurthy's old house in Ojai valley. It was a small house in the middle of an orange and avacado grove. At night, there were crickets and fire flies. There was a small piano in the room and books. I remember sitting in the living room, trying to read a book and hoping to gain some perspective. The next afternoon, walking down the same hiking trails that Jiddu used to take with Charlie Chaplin and Bernard Shaw, I got lost in the bliss and pure beauty of that setting. I felt that in Ojai time had stood still. A feeling of utter stillness. That is something I gained.

So for me, 9-11 is not just about death and terrorism, it is also about teaching about silence and beauty. You never know how things affect people. Recently I learned that the window of my friend who died in the plane now works with Afghani widows in Kabul.

There are lessons in everything.

For all that is lost...

Things you remember for no reason! There is an escalator that goes down from the airport train to terminal 1-B at the Frankfurt airport, if you pay attention, that sounds like a swarm of bees. Every week as I go down that escalator, I remember Kevin Smith’s “Dogma”; every scene when the kids who play Satan’s pawns appear in front of Linda Fiorentino, you hear the same exact noise in the background. Every week I get fooled and think there are bees around. Escalator, bees, noice, Dogma, smile.

I am so lost today. It is rainy and gloomy here in my town. It is the sort of rain that makes you want to weep (refer back to my earlier post on “Blogs You Want to Avoid”). I am listening to Adnan Sami on my iPod. A half-hearted half-ended conversation rings in my head. I wish I could run until I am tired.

In my ancestral home (or more fashionably, “summer home”), during rainy days like this, I could walk to a simple mound in the middle of an open field and sit under a forlorn flowering tree that stood there for no reason. There was a large hole under it that I could almost crawl in. From that vantage point, with the protection of that giant tree over me, the world appeared alright. Then one summer, it fell without any warning, roots and all. For a long time since then, a large hole remained where it stood. A few exposed and orphaned roots were all that remained in its place.

Sometimes in the evening, the local boys would gather in the open field to play cricket with makeshift bats and rubber balls. I watched from the top as they hit the balls in all directions. Their cries and shouts were the background music to those crimson sunsets.

Years later, I would often listen to those shouts and cries whenever rain visited me unceremoniously in a Chekhovian fantasy.

I am a slave of my obsessions. Of course obsessions do not make any logical sense, but they are nevertheless crippling.

It was in that place that I learned to climb trees. They must have been small trees in retrospect. Because I remember climbing them with ease, and often because at the end of the effort was the reward of ripe guavas or mangoes. Sometimes, all the cousins would climb mango trees with a packet of salt so we could savor green unripe mangoes with salt, sitting hidden by the foliage in those branches.

A few years ago, I was on my way to Pondicherry to look for something that was not to be. The taxi driver was very amused when somewhere in the middle of nowhere, I made him stop the car and I climbed a guava tree. I remember that journey like a dream for all the right reasons. The sunsets in Pondicherry were spectacular; the dreamy sight of people walking idling by the water as the sun slowly descended was least of it all. Sunsets in Pondicherry were spectacular for the same reason as they were spectacular in Laguna beach. It was the soul.

It is all about associations. Connections. Everything in the present working as a conduit to the past. Everything in the past working as a clue for the future. Unspoken things and feelings, unfinished sentences and dramas. But I know that you know that I know that you know.

I don’t know which memories to trust and which ones to forget. Unfortunately, life never gives you clean options.

It is easy to wake up the one who is truly sleeping, but it is impossible to wake up one that pretends to be sleeping.

I am feeling so lost.

One Night

I wrote this in 1997. It was first presented at a Writer's Club meeting in Indianapolis and was subsequently published elsewhere in 1999.
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One night nothing other than ordinary
nothing to remember no one to remember it by
one night falling from the sky on black thunder
cloud with sabre's edge lighting
flash carried with it a memory
a memory nothing other than ordinary
like a bit of spinach caught between teeth
sting of after-shave aging face staring from
a faded reflection on the mirror
a cold shower lingering aftershock of jalepenos
what is it about that night and that memory special
going around endlessly like wind caught in a reed forest
like bamboo enslaved to humming like mosquitoes to my skin
it comes back around pulling me by my toes
or hair or any other convenient part left unguarded
was it her eyes or her lips
seldom speaking saying volumes
or was it just the newness of something forgotten
wicked as it was going in circles
yeah like spinach caught between the teeth
it lingers with one distinction
it was ordinary

Guide to Respectful Communication

Since we all come from all walks of life and so many different countries, I thought I will post this gem I found somewhere on respectful communication. Enjoy:-)

Treat others as you expect to be treated yourself.

Always return messages on time. If you don’t have an answer, let them know when you will have an answer.

Don’t be forced into a position you do not want. However, let people know where you stand. Do not make excuses or tell white lies; it destroys your credibility. Once your credibility is gone, it is very difficult to reestablish it.

Understand that different people come from different perspectives. It is very important to set clear expectations. Clear expectations always lead to clear communication.

Always treat people with respect even if you disagree with them. You catch more flies with honey than with vinegar.

Anger should not be hidden, as it is important that people understand that something they did or something that happened made you angry. Yet you can explain that without lashing out and escalating the conflict further.

A conversation will only work if there is dialogue. A true dialogue builds a common understanding and brings people together even if they disagree. This requires trust and comfort. Trust and comfort are predicated on clear expectations and openness.

Dialogic listening is similar to active listening, although it emphasizes conversation as a shared activity and stresses an open-ended, playful attitude toward the conversation. In addition, the parties focus on what is happening between them (rather than each party focusing on what is going on within the mind of the other), and it focuses on the present more than on the past or the future.

Avoid making crude stereotyping. All human beings are different and to gather them together into crude stereotypes hurt feelings and create unexpected reactions.

Follow the simple rule: RESPECT

R = take RESPONSIBILITY for what you say and feel without blaming others.

E = EMPATHETIC listening

S = be SENSITIVE to differences in communication style

P = PONDER what you hear and feel before you speak

E = EXAMINE your own assumptions and perceptions

C = keep CONFIDENTIALITY

T = TOLERATE ambiguity, because we are NOT here to debate who is right or wrong

Upto Old Tricks

In my office in the US. Well rested. After what seemed like a million miles of travel in the last few days, this feels so dead. Which is good, I guess. Because I need to regenerate my mind before I head off to Europe, I am glad for this downtime. I am actually more productive at work this week than I had been the last 2 weeks, without all the emotional anguish.

Call me a glutton for punishment, I do miss the anguish, even if I don't show it.

Even if you can't tell.

Can you?

Neruda's Head

I wrote this poem in 1999. It appeared in Monsoon Magazine and was subsequently published in "Sulekha Select", an anothology of poetry and fiction in 2001.
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This afternoon, here in this desert heat,
At this languid moment, when punctuation dies on my paper,
Half-awake from a siesta (this heat, glasses of lemonade),
I see Neruda's head looking at me in askance from
Across the room with his flint-sheer eyes.
Resting uneasily on the window sill,
Now breaking into a smile,
Wobbling about in an imaginary axis,
Showing off the blood-red hollow circle of
Dead human flesh
Where the torso once joined the head in motions
And reactions and endless ailments.
"I have been lucky" he growls
Not paying any attention to my discomfort.
"I at least I kept my head", he chuckles.
A cemetery smell fills the room, I choke.
"Think of those who died starving.
Who were stretched across a cot,
Cut off with a blade for speaking their mind."
My ears reverberate in an uneasy echo.
Pushing away childhood nightmares,
I check my Agnostic's clock.
The satin pillow case tickled, the sleep's season lost
I stretched myself to the oblivion of reality.
The window stayed opened to the empty world,
Still bearing the moist marks of dead human flesh.

Reflections : Seducing an Afternoon Illusion

This story was written in 1999 and published elsewhere. I am reposting it here to keep all my work together.

"Imitation is the best form of flattery, Asha," said Uma, dangling her legs from the side of the chair. Then she took a deep puff of her cigarette as if to imbibe the collective appreciation from the comments on her latest published article with great satisfaction. "They are all imitating me," she said lifting her head for a second, tapping her fingers on the desk lazily, fishing for compliments from Asha. Asha nodded vigorously focussing her eyes on Uma, and spoke in a perfectly rehearsed tone, "How beautiful you look Uma, when you are so fabulously disengaged." Uma smiled a self-acknowledging smile and gazed at the computer screen lazily once again.

That is not what I was looking for! Not a word of appreciation on my work from Asha, not one! She has perfected this technique of praising my looks whenever she wants to avoid commenting on something else.

It was a cozy afternoon and Uma and Asha had just finished discussing some new writer. Ram Nanda. What an ace, Uma thought, even though she was too proud to admit that aloud.

Such clarity of vision, such brilliance! I wonder if he has the purple skin of a laborer? Perhaps a thin moustache. I am sure he is quite attractive. If I liked men, he would be on the top of my list. Sometimes I hate myself for my mediocrity. I am glad to have Asha for a chamcha. She thinks I am the best writer in the world.

"What are you thinking about?"

"Nothing," Uma said dismissively.

I am getting irritated with this girl though. If she didn’t make such great malai chai and pakoras, I would have broken up with her months ago. She may be stupid, but her cooking is to die for! Besides, she is the most willing lover I have ever had. That must say something. Lord knows what she does at work, this computer programmer fool. She and her insufferable office mates. I could bed a lewd panshopwallah before I would give a second glance to any of them. But then, I don’t think I would.

She chuckled at the thought of her parents still waiting for her to get married.

"You are lost in thought again," yelled Asha; "I am waiting for you to say something."

"Say what? About what?"

"You don’t listen to me anymore. You don’t care one bit. I was asking you how you like this song."

"It’s OK."

Yeah, its OK for a dog. I won’t say anything more. I am going to pretend to smile.

She felt a slight pang of remorse. Perhaps I judge her too harshly.

After all, I use this silly girl to pay for my life. Who am I kidding? If she wasn’t so enamoured ofme, I might still be living in that crummy apartment with Lauren and her crackhead friends. I should do something before this girl drags me into another meaningless topic.

"I am going to write a new article," quickly announced Uma, getting up with a lot of energy.

I am going to write about these idiotic fools from India who can’t appreciate art or literature. I am sure I can get it published. Kevin is always ready to print stuff about these programmer types and their follies, ever since he got outwitted by one of them.

"Asha, chai milegi? One cup. Only for inspiration?"

"Huhmm," Asha whined, "I am lazy. Wait for an hour. Come here and cuddle with me."

"Asha, sweetie, I have a wonderful idea for a story. If I don’t write it now, it will be gone forever. Samjha karo."

Asha got up and walked to the window.

Did I raise my voice? I know she is mad. I can tell even though she is facing away from me. She always bends her neck sideways when she is mad. She is pretty though, even though not as pretty as I am. I could just walk up there and kiss her on the nape of her neck. I can almost see her legs framed under her white summer dress. Oh heck, I have some writing to do.

2

"Imitation is the best form of flattery, Asha," says Uma, smoking her fifteenth Virginia slims. "They are all imitating me.". I remember her days in the drug pad that she called home. Dimly lit, covered in smoke, and filled with the stale stench of unsatisfying sex. But now she thinks she is God’s gift to humanity.

"How beautiful you look Uma, when you are so fabulously disengaged," I say in a rehearsed tone without meaning a word of it, and instantly regret it. Why do I do this? Uma fleers and looks away to the monitor. But I still love this girl and hate myself for doing so. And I hate long pauses.

"What are you thinking about?"

"Nothing," Uma mutters with her characteristic nod. Even in that tone of condescension, I can’t help but notice the sweet pitch of her voice. She is the pretty one amongst us. If she wasn’t, I would have walked out of here six months ago. I have to work 10 hours a day to make the money to feed both of us and her extravagant life. She thinks that this writing pays for her side of the bargain. I wish. I can feel the anger running through me. I think of all the code that I have to debug on Monday, and about Mahesh, my cubicle mate. He is cute in a rustic way even, though his constant whistling irritates me. I am sure he wants to ask Uma. Where is your cute roomie these days? he asks. Roommate! But it is better that way. Just as the woman on the CD coos in the background, "hum tum sanam, lekin duniya kehtee hai na na na." I close my eyes and listen to the words. Ordinarily I am not a big fan of these stupid songs; Jhinjhak music Uma calls them.

"So what do you think of this song, Uma. I borrowed it from Shalini at work."

Uma pays no attention. She types away on the keyboard with two fingers, like she is writing an epic.

"You are lost in thought again," I couldn’t help my voice rising; "I am waiting for you to say something."

"Say what? About what?"

"You don’t listen to me anymore. You don’t care one bit. I was asking you how you like this song." And you think I am stupid. Without any creativity. But you eat my food and live in my apartment and withhold sex from me whenever the mood doesn’t strike you. May be you deserve someone like Mahesh.

"It’s OK." And she thinks I cannot detect the placating condescension in her voice.

"I am going to write a new article," Uma announces, getting up with a lot of energy. A conversation stopper, I could tell. Next, she will ask me to make tea.

I don’t want to say anything. I hope Kevin publishes this one. He would publish anything from her. I am sure it is yet another wounded article on how technology is complicated and programmers are stupid.

"Asha, chai milegi? One cup. Only for inspiration?"

"I am lazy. Wait for an hour. Come here and cuddle with me." And pay for your chai with some quality time bitch. Wait for an hour. Wait for an eternity.

"Asha, sweetie, I have a wonderful idea for a story. If I don’t write it now, it will be gone forever. Samjha karo." Uma raises her voice. Really? Now I would rather look out of the window at the empty parking lot than make you tea.

I walk out to the window and gaze out at the clouds. The sky looks so cloudy and worried. Under that the paved parking lot is curled up end to end in humidity. Cars look like they were left out like playthings in this heat.

3

Ram Nanda finally withdrew his gaze from the painting on the wall and looked away. He must have looked at it for a long time; the painting stood against a white backdrop, framed in a simple wood rectangle, the canvas showed two women, one slender beautiful girl facing a computer, smiling and typing and another facing a window away from the viewer. His eyes felt tired and he really wished for a cigarette. You are psychotic, he said to himself, making up a whole story from a stupid painting. But I am sure these girls could only be named Uma and Asha if they ever existed. Uma with her slender features and dignified fingers and Asha wearing a sheer white summer dress. There was a perversion in him that made him feel sexually aroused, just a little bit.

Time to leave, he thought. Can’t look at one more painting this afternoon. He felt tired. This was a routine for him. Waking up late; walking unkempt and under-groomed, from the hot hole on Sand Piper Lane that he calls home to Garrand Plaza,; watching the buses and the Mounties, drinking coffee at the Future cafe if he had enough change in his pocket; laughing at people audibly and impolitely and then wandering aimlessly through the art district until he found a painting he liked. Then weaving fantastic tales in his mind until the place closed for the day or he felt tired.

Perhaps I need a haircut, a shower and some sleep. And my mouth is dry; these SSRIs* make my mouth so dry. He came out of the hall and stopped at the entrance for a second, and paused stylishly, touching his thin moustache. He thought of the better days before depression struck him, before Paxil, before Renu left, before mommy died. Now he can’t even cry when he thinks of those days!

He walked out of the gallery to the parking lot and let the hot sun bake his purple skin for a minute. Then he carefully fished out his keys from his pocket and walked to his car, lying under the shadow of the tall apartment complex across the street. His Toyota stretched in front of him submissively like a dog.

4


Hmm, strangely enough, there is an Indian guy coming out of the building across the street; Asha is almost sure their eyes met when he looked up. She watches him disappear inside his car, and slowly drive out of the parking lot. Who goes to an art gallery at this time of day! Perhaps, I could drink some tea myself. The sun is baking the asphalt and I can see the colorless wave of smoke rising down below. Time to close the window.

With a deep sigh of resignation, Asha moves closer to Uma and strokes her back as she sits writing.

New York, New York

Just got back from New York. Tired. Have a cold. Was informed that a common friend fell off a balcony last night.. and he shall never walk again. Very very depressing.




Next to me on the train, a man sat in his undershirt watching a documentary on Bukowski on his Mac laptop. How fitting, I thought, to cap my obsessions. Outside, Connecticut went by very fast and for the first time in my life, I thought the inlets neat Lyme were pretty.

Blogs To Avoid When You Surf

There are four types of blogs I cannot stand. Since mine is made up of all the four in equal measure, a little self-criticism is in order. If you recognize yourself as one of these four, get help because there is still time. I am. I am trying to hate the sin but love the sinner.

And there ain't nothin' wrong with some self love:-)

The Whiner:

He hates his life. It is so sad and nothing ever goes right. She writes poems and cries at the sunset and probably keep peacock feathers in her BOUDOIR (and she calls it that). He uses words like lyrical to describe things. She is completely focused internally. She has lost so much in her life and love. On rainy days, she likes to sit by the window and weep. When he is happy, he feels so guilty, he cries. He is a cross between Marvin the Paranoid Android from HHGG and the sensitive guy from Bedazzled.

The cure: A titrating dose of SSRIs for depression and please, please get laid.

The Bore:

Nothing ever happens in the utter boring existence of this character. But he has to let you know all the minute details of the pointless waste of space that his life is. She has acquired a new love or a child. And while we may think that the acquisition is a cross between an ape and velvet Elvis, she thinks the sun rises and sets for her new love. So we are invited to step into the endless stream of pure drivel about how he looked oh-so-cute in his purple velvet shirt or how his friends debate if he is going to win his first Nobel prize in Physics or Medicine. Never mind that he earns a living as an accountant for a supermarket. She is supremely happy in her life, in all the details of its pointlessness. He is chirpy. And of course, don't forget the pictures. She always has pictures of Mr. Velvet Elvis with his three friends on a trip to Australia.

It would be interesting if the whine and the bore collaborated on a blog together.

The Cure: Get a life. Buy a life. Whatever you do, keep it to yourself. Things are much more enjoyable that way.

The Pundit:

He knows everything about something. He is the self-appointed expert in nylon kite flying or toy soldier painting. And he assumes that the world in general shares his enthusiasm for his purpose for living. He endlessly waxes on the fine details of using the right red paint for the hat of the period Napoleonic miniature soldier. Occationally, he is quasi-academic and speaks of epistemological privilege. Nobody has a clue of what he is talking about. He was born with a pocket protector.

The Cure: There is no cure; none has been invented so far but I am sure some pundit somewhere is writing a blog about it.

The Master deBator:

He is the greatest intellectual masterbator ever. He has opinions on everything and would like to take you head-on on everything from the fine art of chinese tea-making to the war on Iraq. He gets his jollies through perfecting his craft of arguing. She is angry with you about something else but wants to prove your point wrong on something tangential because she can't say she is mad at you for something else. The action at the Master deBator blog is mostly in the comments section.

The Cure: Real masturbation, two or three times a day. Use the web for what the rest of the world uses it for, obtaining and using quality porn.

Of course, I am skipping the word acrobat, the one who likes to twist and turn the language on its head; the one that likes the sound of his own voice.

If you read this closely, you realize that the cure for blogging in general is more sex, masturbation and drugs. Unless you are a bore. Then the cure is to get a life with sex and masturbation while on drugs.

Did someone just say rave party? :-)

Right Before I Leave

It is 1:00 AM and I can't sleep. I need to fly tomorrow and haven't packed. Or really done anything other than reluctantly chomp down some unappetizing take-out sushi. This apartment is even more depressing because it is large and so quiet that I can hear the laptop fan whizzing.

Last time I was in Manhattan, three months ago, it was raining and I had taken a New Jersey transit train to Penn Station. I walked and walked and when tired, waited for a cab outside Grand Central. I was alone. It is not that I am always alone, I just end up writing only about those times I guess. I love the energy of New Yrok during rush hour. No city in the world looks like New York from higher hotel floors. I still feels like a kid looking out into the New York skyline from hotel rooms. I can do that all night. I love the restaurants and bars. New Yorkers know how to be urbane without being rude, unlike the French.

On Saturday, I need to go visit a friend who just lost his father. He lives in Connecticut.

On Sunday, I rest.

On Monday, I shall go to Amherst. There is a little Vietnamese noodle place in downtown Amherst. It is painted in very bright colors and I love the noodles.

I miss the normalcy of America. I am ashamed to admit this in public, but I am beginning to miss all-you-can-drink refills (may be because I am thirsty), and honest, genuine folk in small towns. So, I look forward to Amherst more than new York. Little things, remember, little things.

And I know the territory, I understand the language. I like what I drive, I don't care if I am dressed right. People return my calls and they call back when they say they would.

So here is to simple living. Here is to friends. Here is to people who care and want to reach out to meet. Here is to good food and good wine. here is to laughs and jokes. here is to comedy central. Here is to a good plain ol' burger. With fries. And a large glass of coke. Here is to wandering in central park. And in Boston Common.

So adios.

What Subaltern Think When They Do Not Speak

(With apologies to Gayatri Spivac):-)

she says i think so much 



     like an oldman who has lived through life 

     thoughts envelop my brain like a condom 

and  stop  me   from      just        feeling, 
being        primitive 

i went to the store to buy feelings
they were having a sale and were all out
except for panic, so i bought a dozen
but now at home i wonder if the shopgirl
fleeced me, is p   a   n    i   c    a feeling?

(but you know i can still feel) kidnap you
in the morning, roll you up in a be
dsheet
drive you to the lake and show you sunrise
and laugh and just be good
if you let me

and let it all spill out

do you think the subalterns think of
     funny things like did derrida pork
     his favorite graduate student from Cool-AM-bia
stripped her of her skeleton
     and deconstruct it in his head?
     or if germaine greer and simone de beauvoir
     shaved their privates and kept their armpit
     hair for show? there i go thinking again
     may be edward said had funny bedroom habits
     or gramsci jerked off too much in his cell

             (i will stay away from the living legends
             know too much about them, like
             who is porking which graduate student
             so we will just read their great thoughts
             and bore you to death)

if i were a porn star, people will
     pay to watch me fuck
or if i was a cook or a movie star
     i can let it all out and be good
but i get paid to think
     silly thoughts in big words

(once flying a plane over oxnard
tim taught me how to cut my engine and glide)

so that is what i do - what i do is think - about silly things - i think silly thoughts - and about big things - i think silly thoughts - and use big words - so i can earn a paycheck
and my mommy can tell her sisters
that her son is “doing so well”
even though what he “does so well”
is such a mistery

(on thursday in new york
at the intersection of 43rd and lexington
i will stop and watch
the stores to see if i can get happiness on sale
may be go to coney island
and be a kid, but the rides are rusting
and people are losing limbs)

there i go thinking again
     you are an old man, she said
     always thinking
     but what to do babe
who will clean up the spill

when the brain condom comes off?
    
what is an old man to do

other than write poems

Random Observations

1. Morocco is so much like India. Chaotic traffic, exhaust fumes and very friendly proud people.
2. The size of the travel dossier in the hands of a traveller is inversely proportional to the number of trips they take in a year.
3. Apparently I have a Berber face.
4. If twenty is the only number you know in french, then that is the taxi fare from and to all places
5. Amitabh Batchan and Shah Rukh Khan are more popular in Morocco than a lot of Hollywood greats.
6. Crossing streets in the evening requires the skills of an acrobat, juggler and a sizeable medical insurance (much like India).
7. I have a new-found respect for the veil as an all-purpose garment that covers all sorts of sartorial sins
8. Camels like unripe dates. Hold on tight if you pass by a date palm of you might just break your head.
9. Dental care is not a priority for Moroccans, just like it isn't for Indians.
10. Moroccans have a quirky sense of humor which is part of the everyday banter.
11. This is twenty first century. So, if you are a Spaniard or a French person reading this, hang up the colonial mindset already. Just because you have a favorable exchange rate doesn't mean that you can lord it over other people.
12. Atlas mountain is only visible on post cards and not in real life. In real life smog replaces the mountain.
13. Moroccan girls are pretty. Very pretty. And 70% of the population is under 30. And pretty is for sale quite often.
14. Royal Air Maroc doesn't make any announcements in English or apologize for delays. And if you need gate information, you are on your own.
15. Airports are dimly lit like Indian airports. The Marrakech airport looks a lot like Cochin airport.
16. One of the only places in the world I have been to which is NOT crawling with Indian tourists. I think it is too similar to India for the Europe-bound honeymoon types to waste their money on Morocco. I didn't see any Indians when I was there.
17. My only association with Indians in Morocco was a brief experience in rescuing the wife of a former Indian ambassador to Morocco after she locked herself in the bathroom at a party in Delhi.
18. All locals seem to know each other in town. My taxi driver kept chatting with everyone as he drove around.
19. A fool and his money are soon parted. There is a sucker born every minute. Etc, Etc.
20. As an Indian-American, I was treated as an Indian when making chit chat and American when it came down to money:-) I didn't even bother with the Swiss residency thing. As such I was treading in dangerous waters with French.
21. They have enough sense to seperate Americans from the US government. Now, if only the US governement had half as sense.....
22. Freshly squeezed orange juice: 3 Dirhams. Ice made from non-sterile water: 0 Dirhams. Being in the bathroom all night sick: Priceless.
23. Poverty ain't something money can buy. The government needs to invest more in education. And build more back-end manufacturing facilities. Look at Mexico.
24. The man selling assorted herbal potions had a framed picture of the world cup champions.

Hand of Fatima : Morocco Madness

I just came back from Morocco. I had gone there looking for something, a cure perhaps, some understanding, a little bit of nostalgia for a place I know nothing about. At the end of the trip, I got what I wanted but I am not sure I am any better for it.

Writing authoritatively about Morocco after a weekend in Marrakech is like writing about India after a week in South Bombay. You may get the sounds and smells right, but not the soul. So what I am writing about is my own journey and my own experience. In Hollywood speak, this is “One man’s journey to find the soul of a city.”

There were ups and downs in this journey as there would be in any, and there were happy moments and sad occasions. A ten kilometers ride from Guéliz to Djema Al Fina transported me magically from 21st century back to the 12th century. There were leafy avenues and sidewalk cafes where I sat observing people as they went about their modern lives and there were places were one could look into the expressive soulful visages of old men as they idled by the streets for no particular reason as they might have eight hundred years ago.

And of course, like any Asiatic place (even in Africa), I was taken for a fool and seperated from my money by a quickthinking scam artist. I can’t blame anyone but me, because I ought to know that “paying for services or goods not rendered in an Asiatic country” is the third great blunder (adding to Vazzini’s “Never start a land war in Asia” and “Never go against a Sicilian when death is on the line”). So I thought, “you are welcome and glad to help the economy.”

But the magic still remains.



I may not be part of Morocco’s plan. I may not have been accorded the protection of the hand of the Fatima. But then I have no plans, just impulses. I have no faith, just instincts. I floated through the souks and wondered in and out of cafes and palaces, mosques and tombs. But that is not where I found Marrakech’s soul. I found it on the streets. Crazy, chaotic, and hectic, the streets came alive in the evenings with all the purpose of anarchy. The whole place reminded me of Delhi, much more than I ever imagined. There were places that reminded me of Old Delhi, Chandni Chowk and Juma Masjid, and of course there was Guéliz and Hivernage that have echos of Vasant Vihar or Defense Colony. Marrakech lacks the scale and grandeur of Delhi but it also is cleaner. What I found really refreshing was that Morocco seems to wear its Islam lightly.

As Spalding Gray once looked for his perfect moment while writing the Impossible Vacation, I too was looking for my perfect moment. I wanted to understand why Moroccans were the people they were. I ran into a former Pakistani Diplomat from Europe in a café and we spoke of being enchanted in Marakech. I don’t know if I was being entirely truthful. I was enchanted with parts of its soul.

But unfortunately I am not part of the plan. Morocco flows like a river, you step in it but for a moment.



Then I had my perfect moment away from all the hussle and buzzle. In a perfectly lit courtyard restaurant called Cibal. I dined alone in the courtyard; I had a perfect mojito, Moroccan wine (need another eight years before it gets its groove, if you ask me, Sahara Reserve, Too fruit-forward and a little flat) and feasted on perfect Moroccan food. Norah Jones was singing and her voice just makes me melt (her soul may be Texan, but the talent is all Indian. Whatever you think of Ravi Shankar, all his children inherited his talent. May Shubho Shanker's soul rest in peace.)

I waited 'til I saw the sun
I don't know why I didn't come
I left you by the house of fun
I don't know why I didn't come

There were three belly dancers who strutted their stuff among the guests. Later I saw one of them leave with a white man who was apology for a middle-aged human being.

When I saw the break of day
I wished that I could fly away
Instead of kneeling in the sand
Catching tear drops in my hand

Spalding gray’s perfect moment resurrected in me. I knew nothing more would top that evening just for its sheer soulfulness. But then, I knew all things must come to an end.

There were moments of tranquility before, in the lush gardens owned by Yves Saint Laurent, inside the Saadi tombs. And a rambling palace of a vazir that reminded me of my child hood memories of Kerala palaces. Weddings, funerals, songs. Double meanings, conflicted feelings, a nightmare about someone walking through the mountains high on marijuana for a whole week.

My heart is drenched in wine
You'll be on my mind
Forever

Afterwards, I walked a long distance in the night alone. The air was hot and pungent. In the shadows lurked working girls and other dubious characters. I felt perfectly safe and was guided by the neon lights of the hotels far away and perhaps the hand of Fatima (which is a major cult in Morocco). It was time to let go.

Out across the endless sea
I would die in ecstasy
But I'll be a bag of bones
Driving down the road alone

May be when I landed, I thought I will find the magic of the city in the camel rides and the tourist spots. Or at those outside eateries and fortune tellers.

But that was not to be. I wish I could know you better, but that takes a lifetime. The pragmatic Morocco perhaps blocked the impulses of the soulful Morocco. So I had to seek my perfect moment away from the din and chaos and it came as a revelation. A secret message from the Atlas mountains.

Norah Jones played in my head as I continued my sleepless walk. Cigarette smoke enveloped me.

Something has to make you run
I don't know why I didn't come
I feel as empty as a drum
I don't know why I didn't come

Sometimes you just have to do what you feel. No matter what the price. Even if that means sitting in a plane and traversing continents to feel the dust and heat of a soulful place. Not see the place but be the place.

At the airport, sitting alone sleepy and tired, waiting for my flight, I looked out into the desert horizon and smiled to myself. I was carrying a cure for a malady, some understanding, a little bit of nostalgia for a place I know nothing about. Thank you Morocco. I will remember you. Fondly. Even if I don’t return. I knew I walked the paths of others. I knew I felt the secrets they kept.

And then the Monday morning phone calls started.

Morocco

Off to Morocco in a few hours.

United Sates - India - Morocco comparative Overview
(I know, the soul of any country is bigger than all these dry comparisons. No two countries are the same. This is just to give you an idea of the relative size of the country and its economy).

Land Area : 9,161,923 sq km / 2,973,190 sq. km / 446,300 sq km
Population: 298,444,215 / 1,095,351,995 / 33,241,259
Growth Rate: 3.5% /7.6%/ 1.55% (India is growing about 4 times as fast as Morocco and about twice as fast as the US)
Literacy : 99% / 59.5% /51.7%
Government Type: Democratic Republic / Democratic Republic/Consitutional Monarchy
GDP (PPP): $12.36 trillion /$3.611 trillion /$138.3 billion (Indian economy is 26 times as large as Morocco's and about 1/3rd that of the US)
Per Capita: $41,800 /$3,300 /$4200 (this is really the problem - Population
Population Growth Rate: 0.91% /1.38%/ 1.8% (Morocco is growing faster)
% of Population below poverty line: 12% / 25%/19%
Income by percentage share: lowest 10%: 3.5%/ 2.6%
Public Debt: 64.7% / 53.8% / 72% of GDP
Total Exports: $927.5 billion /$76.23 billion /$9.472 billion
Number of cell phones: 194,479,364 /69,193,321 / 9,336,900
Internet Users: 203,824,428 / 50.6 million / 3.5 million
Paved Runway Airports: 5,119 / 243 /26
Military Expenditure: $518.1 billion /$19.04 billion /$2.31 billion
Military Expenditure as % of GDP: 4.06/ 2.5 / 5

Looking up to Dr. Perelman

Sure he looks the quintessential nerd that he probably is. Dr. Gregori Perelman is two years older than I am and still lives his mother in a tiny apartment in St. Petersburg. His only existing photographs in the public domain shows him to be a cross between Steven Wright and Ted Kaczynski, which is to say, not the most appealing specimen. So much so, that the Russian newspapers that have taken to dressing him up in fashionable clothing with the help of Photoshop when they write affectionately about him.

Having said that, Dr. Perelman is an oddity in these times in the most unusual way. Having proven the Thurston's geometrization conjecture, he was awarded the prestigious medal which he promptly refused and didn’t bother to turn up any functions falicitating him. And it looks like he is also getting ready to turn down a million dollar prize money for another award.

Why is this man fascinating to so many of us? In Russia, where the unfortunate and ill-prepared dissolution of USSR left a whole country without self respect overnight and with no visible infrastructure to compete in the capitalistic world, he is hailed as a symbol of old-style Russian genius. A proud son of Russia who cannot be bought with Western-style crass academic oscar celebrations. This may well be so. But I don’t know how Dr. Perelman fits in with the new Russia with its fascination with mafia dons and cheap hookers.

What is even more troubling to me than the Russian gingoism about him is the American wounded pride. I don’t watch Fox News and the like, but I can only imagine what its “venerable” commentators would say about him if they actually have heard of him. Rejecting a million dollars is more of a sacrilege in the US than murdering a child and feeding it to a pig and then having beastial sex with it (of course I am exaggerating, because in the good old USA, having sex with the pig is much worse than murdering or rejecting a million dollars, ask Anna Nicole Smith’s dead-husband.)

After all that I have read, he seems to be the genuine article. He is probably not the gingoist or the anti-capitalist anti-West nay-sayer he is made out to be. That inspires me greatly. He is someone, after a very long time, that the world can genuinely look upto to stand the test of time by not devaluing his work with crass materialism. Unlike the academics I know back in the US, where junkets and conferences drive their trade and petty office politics drive their work ethic, here is a guy who works for its own sake, for the pure love of scientific discovery. Just like the old masters. For those of us who look at Sub-Commandante Marcos for inspiring a whole population of the genuinely voiceless, Dr. Perelman is a symbol of the same in the academic world, someone who quietly rejecting the business of science for the pleasure of science. This is the sort of scientist that inspired me when I was growing up. Since then, I have met my fair share of high-achieving scientists from MIT, Harvard and Princeton and all they seem to be interested in is how to churn out papers and get grants.

So here is to you Dr. Perelman. May you lead by example and at least let the rest of us believe that there is a way to retain self respect without always having to sell out to the almighty dollar.

But at the end of the day, can he still get a date?

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And the great Egyptian writer Naguib Mahfouz died yesterday. I feel sad.
Gabriel Garcia Marquez is very ill. Sad.
John Grisham and Steven King, on the other hand, are very much alive and healthy. Even more sad.
There IS no God.
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God is dead. God remains dead. And we have killed him. How shall we, murderers of all murderers, console ourselves? That which was the holiest and mightiest of all that the world has yet possessed has bled to death under our knives. Who will wipe this blood off us? With what water could we purify ourselves? What festivals of atonement, what sacred games shall we need to invent? Is not the greatness of this deed too great for us? Must we not ourselves become gods simply to be worthy of it?
— Nietzsche

And Nietzsche is dead - God
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MRS. HENDY: Oh! I never knew Schopenhauer was a philosopher!
MR. HENDY: Oh, yeah! He's the one that begins with an 'S'.
MRS. HENDY: Oh.
MR. HENDY: Umm, like, uh, 'Nietzsche'.
MRS. HENDY: Does 'Nietzsche' begin with an 'S'?
MR. HENDY: Uh, there's an 's' in 'Nietzsche'.
MRS. HENDY: Oh, wow. Yes, there is. Do all philosophers have an 's' in them?
MR. HENDY: Uh, yeah! I think most of 'em do.
MRS. HENDY: Oh. Does that mean Selina Jones is a philosopher?
MR. HENDY: Yeah! Right! She could be! She sings about the meaning of life.
(Sorry couldn't help it, I cannot help but think of Eric Idle and Michael Palin going on and on about it in the "Life of Brian" when I think of Nietzsche.