27 July 2015

An old college trip

The following piece is an old one about a trip to Shantiniketan while as a college student. I wrote it back in 2011 on September, 21st. I was in the midst of writing my Ph.D. thesis and reading a lot of Tagore’s writings back then. I’ve edited some bits from the first paragraph for this public post.

9/21/2011

It's funny how some memories need to be written about. I’ve been immersed in reading Tagore and his writings and piles of writings and writings about him and his writings but I know not whether I’m reading the right stuff or the right way. How am I going to approach his chapter really. My main self is disgruntled and keeps wanting to go back to Suvro da's chapter and extend it and fine-tune it...I’ll do that after I have some more stuff on Robi-kobi. He identifies himself as a poet and very clearly and staunchly in Atma-parichay. As in his identity. The Buddha is yet to make an appearance. He simply seems to be standing at the side of my vision somewhere and smiling. Yes, yes – I’m mad. You don’t have to tell me. If I can pull this off – then you won’t think or say I’m mad, will you? See? – and I will. I don’t know how exactly as yet – but I will. I’ve been writing yards in my diary too…Honestly though reading his letters and all  – Tagore’s I mean, not The Buddha’s – he sometimes sounds rather barmy – I swear. Eccentric, delightful and strange. Barmy too. The one that I shan’t forget: in one place he tells his niece that he’d rather be a Bedouin than a Bengali (now tell me who does that sound like?). But then elsewhere he muses dreamily if he were to be born again – he’d not want to be born as anything but a Bengali! As for one little piece that he says about little children – I don’t think I’ll include that. Most improper. I’ll forget this later but did you know he wrote ‘boli o amar golaap bala’ at 17 or thereabouts? – You would know of course. I somehow thought he’d been older when he’d written that…17 though. Which immediately brings to mind a comparison – yes, Sir...I can see why my main self wants to get back to the first proper chapter. Anyway, I’m taking a break here. I’m reminded of that old college trip to Shantiniketan. We had gone to Shantinektan for that college-trip, and that trip has been buzzing in my ears. I can’t remember any longer whether it was in the first year or second year. It was probably towards the end of the first year, I guess. No surprises as to why I’ve been thinking of it. It’s been in my head since May and now with Robi flitting about – I’m reminded of it again. But I’ve also been thinking or having images of Manjira flitting through too. I think had Tagore known her – he may have written some poems or songs about her…maybe he did somewhere else. Anyway, let me not spin daydreams here wondering about Rabindranath and Manjira. I’ll write a bit about the trip instead – as much as I can remember of it.

1. There was our old professor and our Stats professor in charge of a gaggle of 18 or so girls. One boy in our class had already dropped out from our batch, I think by then, and the only remaining boy in our class didn't even think of joining the crew.

2. We took the Shantiniketan Express and had reservations and all. I don't remember who actually got the tickets. I know it wasn't me. I had though at some point the evening before our departure bought a bottle of vodka and had carefully mixed vodka and some orangeade into two big bottles. Unfortunately one of them had spilt and made a mess in my bag which I discovered later but one bottle had survived, which I promptly deposited into the fridge of the government lodge where we stayed, very sweetly asking one of the obliging waiters whether I could keep a bottle of Mirinda in their fridge.

3. The train journey was very comfortable and sunny. Some folks had gotten some goodies from home and they very kindly shared their goodies all around.

4. That was the trip when I systematically sought out and made good friends with a girl who had appealed to me in one instant some months ago through her disarming frankness and honesty even though everybody else around had thought she had come across as being plain rude. It was just before the college elections and I’d been going around canvassing for votes and she had said she didn’t see any reason that she should vote for me just because I was a classmate. I made pretty good friends with her during that trip though I must say.

5. An old school-friend I knew was studying in Shantiniketan and I had bored everybody by telling them that I had a friend there, and that I would meet her. At some point, one of the quiet girls in our group of seven asked me whether I had told her that I was coming. No, I hadn't. Did I know where she lived? Somewhere in one of the hostels. Did I remember the address? No. Everybody gave me the look.

6. The first afternoon after visiting the dorm and depositing our luggage and after lunch at the guest house, we walked around through the town just for a walk-around. Our old prof - an absolute favourite amongst his girls - was never allowed to keep to himself. He was always surrounded by some group of girls and he listened with what sometimes felt like a piercing attention – even to something that didn’t seem important – and most often with a half smile and when he talked everybody around listened. Some gaped. Some gushed. I admired him a lot and even talked a fair bit on that trip. He made amusing observations. Now I'm hard-pressed to remember all he said on that trip but there are a couple I remember.

7. So there we were roaming around in the late afternoon, all of us, with no particular aim in mind - a gaggle of girls with one old professor impeccably dressed as always in his regular white dhoti and white panjabi and one young professor also immaculately dressed in her pleated sari - when all of a sudden there were two shots heard. "Manjira!" "Nipa!" and a slamming hug. And so there it was that out of the sun and the blue breeze, I met my school-friend. Both of us were excitedly yakking away, and we hadn't kept in touch as well as we had through our high-school years through regular letters, and so we were trying to get everything in all at once and finally we simply said, ‘we'll meet tomorrow. Yes, we'll meet tomorrow. We have to meet tomorrow.’ At some point I'd managed to disentangle our old prof. from the rest of the girls and had introduced him to Manjira and Manjira to him, and he looking on with much quiet mirth at our grinning faces, waiting for the excitement to abate while realising that we hadn’t exactly planned a meeting. So he asked us to do that with his half-smile on his face since as he put it, 'serendipity will most likely not strike twice in less than 24 hours'. I nodded. But Manjira and I were simply grinning at each other and looked at Sir in between like fools. So Sir made the suggestion. He pointed out that we were going to visit the 'kopai' sometime in the morning so maybe I could come over for a couple of hours during the afternoon after our lunch at the guest-house. That worked fine.

8. The evening was a lovely one as some of us sat and talked with our old prof. out in the open. The guest-house was a nice one, and it had a pretty garden with stone seats and trees and a riot of flowers in full bloom. I believe there was even a playground of sorts with a slide (there was one crazy picture of the seven of us all balanced on that children's slide...). We played dumb-charades, talked about books and Sir spoke and we listened and different stories were shared. There was some conversation about professions and careers and about parents. I wasn't too vocal but one silly and annoying girl said, "Shilpi - tore ma baba dujone daktar - issh tui daktari porli na kano?!" (your parents are both doctors, why didn't you study medicine?!) I had no response to such a dumb question and was mute. Our Sir very quietly said and with a smile in my direction, 'Shilpi can still be a Doctor without studying daktari." I smiled in return. My memory doesn't serve me well about the whole conversation but at some point one bright girl brought up Kahlil Gibran and The Prophet and Sir and she discussed bits and some of us pitched in. Then very late we bade good night to Sir, and departed to our dorm room. The room was hot. The fans didn't seem to do much good. And the mosquitoes were swarming the place. Once most of the girls dozed off or at least weren't casting their prying eyes at us seven, I got the bottle out (which I'd gotten from the fridge) and we took some swigs and some more. There wasn't much and it wasn't even half-way cold and could hardly pass off as a screwdriver but so what. We were doing something forbidden and that was good enough for me. At some point we were boiling in that stuffed room. I don't know how many from the seven felt they simply had to go out and breathe in the open. But some of us did and some, I think, fell asleep like little babies. Out there in the open - the night was still. The stars were high in the sky. A couple of my friends used to smoke back then, and I couldn’t stand the smoke even as a passive smoker because it used to make my throat burn. What happened there I know not. After sitting awhile with them, I borrowed a cigarette from one of them and loped off by myself, found a water tank and sat on top of it, and smoked. I remember the star studded night sky. And I was hooked.

9. By the time I slipped back into our silent dorm room and had a shower and finally went to sleep it was past dawn, and I was sleeping in utter peace and bliss when the friendly breakfast call bellowed in my ears. That day there was a trip to the kopai. And it was beautiful: the strange gorge made by the cutting river. There was a wee bit of some water down in the ravine and of course I headed straight for it and most of the rest followed suit. I splashed around in the bitty but cool water pool that was there and it felt mighty good, and I remember we wandered around and walked around that gorge/ravine and took many a picture. We spent the better part of the morning and a good bit of the afternoon there, I think. But my memory isn’t too clear about the rest. After my lightning fast lunch, I went over to Sir and told him that I was off to meet my friend. He looked at me, nodded and quietly said, "and be back by -----" I nodded like a marine at boot-camp. I had no intentions of disobeying his order. I knew for a fact that he probably would not have allowed too many from his brood of girls to wander off on their own. 

10. I met Manjira. We talked and talked about who-knows-what. She was a good natured and clever girl and self-contained with an amusing and sharp sense of humour and the ability to observe and reflect and comment on life's oddities and strangeness including but not limited to people, did a hilarious job of imitating people and could be quite acidic (too bad if one got on her wrong side or was the butt of her sharp jokes), read a fair bit of English literature and a whole lot of Bengali literature. She was the girl who got me to read one of Sharadindu's books back in our school-days, which had one of my favourite stories - Maru o Sangha. We hadn't been fast buddies in school but had grown fond of one another and felt fairly comfortable in each other's company, and she was more of a neighbourhood friend. She had blossomed very prettily and there was a misty charm about her and a natural evergreen loveliness of the inimitable sort that no amount of cosmetics and hair-dos can imitate and the sort which age does not rob.

It was a good meeting, and a non-riotous one. We walked around in the afternoon sun through some open empty brown fields. There was very little shade I remember in some of the places we wandered around while some of the places had some thin tree clusters. At some point we came face-to-face with a pond. We took some pictures, and wandered around some more. I had a watch back then, and I'd been looking at it at almost 15 minute intervals, and finally it really was time to go. That was when Manjira came up with an excellent idea. We went over to her boyfriend's dorm and she asked him to come along as well. I rode Manjira’s bicycle while she rode with her boyfriend and it took a couple of minutes to zoom back to the guest-house (which had taken interminably long the other way on foot). We walked back to the dorm-room and the door was locked. I rapped smartly and there were yells from the other side, "go away." "It's me. Open up." Somebody finally unbolted the door taking her own sweet time about it and most unwillingly, and what did I see? The girls were all dozing like little sleeping beauties. All of them otherwise the couple who were awake were lazing around and not even my friends wanted to see my face. "look, this is Manjira." But nobody seemed interested in looking at Manjira right then, and the ones who were awake gave her a vacuous smile. "Well aren't we going anywhere for the evening?" Someone probably shot me a black glare and said that it wasn't evening. I shrugged and then said, well then maybe I would just go back with Manjira and come back later then. There were no dissenting voices. In fact they all thought it would be great if I just scrammed right then so that they could shut the door from the heat and my effervescence. Both were too much to take. I said, "let Sir know. I came back exactly at the hour and I'll come back later. I'm off now."

11. We were off and then we lost track of time. Of course I probably should never have left upon my return. I don't know exactly what we did really. Manjira’s quiet and shy boyfriend obviously went back to doing what he had been doing before being disturbed. Manjira and I probably wandered around and talked some more. God-only-knows but time flew and before I knew it, it was getting dark. The cycle plan was out because her boyfriend had other things to do than to be making up and down trips for his girl-friend's friend who didn't know whether she wanted to stay or go, and I buckled down and decided to take a rickshaw. By this time it was just plain dark and just as the rickshaw driver started ambling along the road and I was getting very nervous thinking of what Sir was going to say, Manjira hollered and I saw. The whole college bunch was walking down the side of the road! Oh, the shame of it. I thought at that point that they had come out as a search party for the missing college student. I leapt off the rickshaw after paying the driver for a bolting passenger and ran over to my bunch. Manjira joined me for some minutes all over again. Sir saw me and nodded and I nodded back but he made it clear that he wasn't going to entertain any conversations at that point. I went over to my bunch of seven and they said that Sir was not happy. I asked them whether they had told him that I had come back at the appointed time but everybody was vague. How come nobody told him. I didn't know what to think or say. Finally, I think someone said that they were just pulling my leg and that things were all right. I didn’t know what to think but we wandered around the local market for handicrafts and jewelry and the girls bought this and that, and Manjira insisted on buying me a pair of ear-rings. I don't know how the matter of my coming late was resolved or how Sir and I got around to talking...I know I apologised and our Stats professor (who adored me for no reason that I could ever fathom: it certainly wasn’t for my stats skills – I didn’t have any) got a word in saying that it was true that I had returned at the right time even though I had not stayed. After awhile of roaming around in the market and on the roads, the college-bunch was heading back to the guest-house and Manjira and I bid each other a hasty and quick good-bye - not even a proper one or anything. Something like a 'see you' as though we were meeting every other day.

12. The following day we went to Tagore's abode. All I remember from there is the silence and one room with, as far as I remember, pale green walls and a bed. And I wanted to sit there and just keep sitting there in the corner. I got to know that that was a room that Tagore stayed in but I don’t remember any facts. That's all I remember from there and even that is fuzzy….and it surprises me to think that I really remember nothing else. We visited a river (a stream?) too at some point but that memory is hazy as well apart from the bit where I know I ran down and into it and some of my friends joined me and Sir kept telling us not to go too far out.

13. On our return to the guest house, we got to know that our train had been cancelled because there had been a railway mishap. I was really excited at the prospect of staying for another whole extra day but that was when something that I didn’t expect at all happened. More than a couple of the girls started crying softly. Some were mourning and moaning as if that were the end of the world. I remember at least one of them sat like a drooping wilted flower with her head leaning against her friend’s shoulder and with such a pained expression on her face that one might have assumed that she were suffering from intense emotional or physical pain or both. They wanted to go home to their parents right then. Sir did put forth the plan that we could simply stay for another day and take the same train out the next day and that all of us could notify our parents and families through phone-calls but that idea was dead on arrival. I was the only girl - the only one who said that I would gladly stay. Most of the girls wanted to take a bus half the way and then jump onto a lorry and then take the ferry and walk the rest if need be but they wanted to go back home to their mums and dads and families because they had already been away for a whole weekend. A couple of the girls didn't say anything one way or the other. They were okay either-way, not supporting but neither dissenting staying for another night. Sir really didn't have a choice. As he told me quietly on the side, ‘democracy has to prevail’ but I did fume a fair bit and yelled too at the whining girls which didn't make me too popular. They simply muttered darkly about something or the other.

14. How we got back is something that I don't very clearly remember but at one point we were walking across train lines at a train station (which was probably a junction of some sort) after taking a bus half the way (and I'd been sitting on the engine of the bus: the driver had very kindly let me sit there seeing I was the only one standing). We were sauntering along the train tracks and suddenly there was the abnormally loud hoot of a train. A couple of us looked around and looked back and I saw the lightning fast image of our sedate, always unruffled Sir dropping his bag and leaping across the tracks in one swift motion to drag back one of the girls who was at that point bang in the middle of a train track. Time stood still. I remember looking behind me and there was a lazy train chugging down the other side far, far away from any of us. Some of the other girls had also seen this fantastic image of Sir leaping and I, at any rate, couldn't help but let out an involuntary chuckle but I don't remember any longer who picked up Sir's bag and whether any words were exchanged. 

15. And so we were back in the city at night. A friend's dad had come over to pick her up and very kindly gave me a lift. I know it was very late by then. Quite what the time was I don't remember.


16. That was the trip. One of the few trips that I've made and one where I happened to avoid making a disastrous mess of everything or almost everything. 

21 July 2015

Sing a song

If I could sing - I'm sure I would have every now and then. But then I don't have the voice of a nightingale or anything remotely resembling it. I don't like talking out-loud quite often because my own voice sounds awful to me although strangers these days, every now and then, say that they wish they had a voice like mine - yes, sure.

The following songs, among others, have been playing in my head loudly for the last few days and I've been using them here and there. I like the Jason Mraz song in conjunction with the Nature Conservancy advertisement. I hadn't known earlier that Rudyard Kipling's 'If' had been made into a song and not just once. I'm not so sure about Joni Mitchell's version but it has a certain feel to it, which sort of grew on me. I don't know why she chose to change some of the words though I like the 'smug fool' bit. Roger Whittaker's version has been playing in my sleep sometimes (even though I disagree with a couple of lines and sometimes quietly and have reasons too...) - but maybe it's a call to keep the faith. Louis Macneice's Prayer before Birth and Rupert Brooke's Fafaia among others have been visiting me too and rather insistently (that is, either some specific lines or the sense of the different poems - pity I can't write music). The REM song I'll take the rain keeps re-visiting me, and has been for more than a decade. It has been visiting me more often in recent times. I think the music video touches something within me, with the soulful but matter-of-fact doggy in the crown, the ever-cheerful and enterprising raft, the big bird and the rest...which I hadn't seen before. It makes sense. And somehow a version of 'megh bolechey' seems to fit in with the REM song and the rest. The last song simply pushed its way in obstinately - I had nothing to do with it. Kishore too wants to get in with something but there it's 'O saathi re'. I actually went up to the mountains back in late March, this year, for some paid work which came up by accident and all of a sudden, and the piece 'Offering' and this piece 'O saathi re' kept playing in the midst of the mountains up North. No changes there, no matter whether it's thousands of miles west or east or up north or over to the south if not 'down by the coast': for 'you can never escape' and one doesn't want to actually (hence the Counting Crows song). A cynic or a smartie-pants or somebody with Asmiov's sense of wicked humour might say that's simply because the two songs are right next to one another on my music player. Bye-bye for now. 
















15 July 2015

Deliverance from evil

I wrote in a previous post about mental midgets and about leaving ugliness behind and often without a second glance. This post is elaborating upon that in some measure. Life is not always beautiful or like a sweet dream. Some parts are nothing short of nightmares – no matter where one is born – and it’s necessary indeed to take a good look at what make up one’s nightmares and leave the ugliness behind and not let the bad breath, talons and claws get a grip on one’s insides.

I got to know about mental midgets, about ugliness in its various hues, shapes and sizes and about the ‘what-not-to-be’ vis-à-vis my blood family. I was born in the mental gutters. I cut off relations with my blood family and my relatives when I was 33. I regret only the fact that I didn’t do it years sooner – as soon as I was completely financially free and had paid back (in money and kind) that which I was sure I had owed them.

I had sensed for years and years that there was something wrong about the family into which I was born. Yet I know now that I was rather reticent about speaking about this or even about voicing out my own thoughts too much. I know now that I have for as long as I have had thought in me been a person who has sorted and sifted through various impressions and experiences and memories and filed an almost instantaneous intuitive response which says ‘to be avoided’, ‘neutral’, ‘interesting’ and so on regarding people and it’s been the same in regard to other responses regarding various other intense thoughts, feelings, ideas. I can say at 40 that I have been right more often than wrong about (what and) who matters and doesn't. Once I discarded what I did – I used to think that the same didn’t need more elaboration because ugliness is not something pleasant. It’s easier to dismiss it than to write about it. But I know that it’s necessary for me to write about ugliness. 

I was born in a family which was mentally vacant, and vapid and vulgar otherwise. 

It was about the age when I was 8 or 9 that I remember my parents and brother sitting around and my mother saying with restrained pride that yes, our family was important in the neighbourhood. As my brother had pointed out: we were the only family which had a T.V, a fridge and a car. She added for good measure that of course that wasn’t ‘important’ in itself but still it was true indeed that it was something to consider – there was ‘status’ that we had. I cannot remember the rest of the conversation. I only remember the sick feeling of terrible shame, humiliation and dejection. Back then, I didn’t even know why I felt thus. I had merely felt that living did not mean just having a T.V, fridge and car surely. I had not opened my mouth but had slithered out of that dining room space.

I was a terrible student in Class III. I was scolded, humiliated or received a few whacks on the palm by the class teacher for being thus. I didn’t think any of it was unjustified. One day I was sharing the bench with a girl whom I actually liked back then and whom I considered a friend. For some reason (I don’t know why) she suddenly screamed out  saying that I was cheating. Now it is important to mention that the assignment was a handwriting assignment. The teacher hauled me up. I think that she too had some unstated anger against me. She humiliated me in front of the class and added quite out-of-context and sarcastically about my being ‘from England’. I argued. That one day, I argued. I said I couldn’t cheat on a handwriting assignment, could I? I certainly had not cheated. It was a day of all days that my mother had come over to the school and to the classroom to check on me. I had joined the school in Class II and had not received any rave reviews and my parents had the habit of checking on what I did and would talk with the teachers about my failures. I remember that while I’d been punished by being told to sit on the podium I had wretchedly thought that at least it was a good thing that none of my parents had traipsed over to the school that day. There was a knock on the door. And I remember just having the feeling that it was my mother’s knock. Someone opened the door. I remember the teacher letting out one long tirade of what a disgusting child I was and how I’d been cheating. I had argued again. It was a handwriting assignment. Why would I cheat? HOW would I cheat? I don’t remember anything else. Back in the house there was a long lecture and a terrible scolding about what a wretched creature I was. I said again and again that I hadn’t cheated. The point made from the other side was that I was despicable for having argued with the teacher. For having yelled. She was a teacher after all. I should learn, should I not – when to keep quiet and accept what is said. I argued still but I had been shaking with anger and a sense of injustice inside. Over a tiff with another girl over a pencil however, when the teacher wrote to my parents reporting the incident my parents had written a long and detailed note to the teacher and had pointed out that the pencil was mine even though another girl had claimed the pencil as hers. The other girl’s parents had stated that they didn’t really care whose pencil it was; it was only a pencil – the other girl, whoever it was, was welcome to it. The same teacher had said with righteousness that I could take the pencil.

I’d been some 8 years old when I heard my parents giggling with great mirth and saying that I was stupid. They repeated that over and over and in various ways. I know and still remember what I heard and had thought at that point about what made me stupid/boka. This was at an age when I could read poems a few times and rattle them off. This was at an age when I’d read about the grand encounter between Alexander and Porus and been utterly enchanted by it although I’d read different kinds of books by then. This was at an age when I’d read about Kabir but had been not that fascinated and couldn’t understand what ‘God’ he’d been singing about although the fact that he had been an orphan made me wonder. I think though that most children do have an imagination, a sense of wonder and glee, a curiosity and a manner of seeing reality and through the façades of reality.

During Parents'-Teachers' meetings – my mother would go and sometimes my parents would go and talk with the teachers. They believed that it was necessary to talk with teachers to find out how their children were doing in school. Every time my mother would tell the teacher that I was stupid and slow in different and very colourful ways. It was a litany I would endure. On two occasions however, two teachers rather firmly told my mother that she was mistaken. One teacher told her sharply that I was not stupid and that I was quite above-average intelligence and that I wrote well but was very careless. Another teacher told my mother that the only reason I made mistakes was because my mind traveled faster than I could write. I don’t know why these two teachers defended me in school but they did. Both used to teach English in middle-school and one of them had a very clipped and very good accent and one of them had given me a (completely justified) 4/25 in Economics once. My mother was not pleased when these two teachers did not fall into line with her complaints about me. A woman tutor of Maths when she heard my mother’s tales about me said that she was most ashamed and disgusted about having me as a pupil for she had earlier thought I was different. And the woman private tutor, I know, never quite liked me even remotely after that. Not much of any loss. I was much to my relief able to attend private tuition in Maths conducted by a very good and stern Maths tutor for a year, at least.

My relations with my brother – the only sibling I had was not something to write home about. He bullied me and tried to butter me up sometimes but truth be told I did not like him. It was more like not knowing who this person was and not even wanting to know the person at all. I felt the same way with my parents but at a different level. I think they treated me – all of them – much like a puppy or dog which is simultaneously coochie-cooed and then bullied. I think many siblings fight and argue and then band up against the parents on common grounds – and that happened too. That is not what bothered me. When I’d written a poem about a playground at about 9/10 and I was pleased with the poem for it had a story to it and also a feeling of loneliness and even rhymed – I showed it to my brother. He asked me whether I could recite it. I actually did recite it although I was very worried about whether I could. He then told me off saying I could not have written the poem. With great intelligence the matter was discussed later with all the people of the family: nobody who wrote a poem could actually recite it from memory. My parents dismissed me. I stood on the sides like a dumb child. Needless to say I didn’t show anything I wrote to any of my family after that. Whatever physical fights that I had with my brother- I bore and fended off the punches and slaps and all until I was 12 or so. After that I gave as good as I got. I would hit hard – and that message was sent out clearly. After I was 13 my brother did not lay a finger on me because he knew I would spill blood. My parents only slapped me around and yanked my hair and pinched me hard a few times during my young years and adolescent years – especially my mother. Apart from that it was a good thing that there was no touching in the family. I was known as ‘gaaye pora’ for trying to hug people from the family and relatives and sniggering comments were made regarding the same but I didn’t know what these meant until I was decades older. When I was molested a few times by different men (the same male did not try to molest me a second time; I knew how to physically take care of myself as best as I could) and my mother got to know from a neighbourhood friend – I was sternly told that that is what came of being ‘gaaye pora’. My father knew too. Yet the people who had molested me were never disallowed from coming to the house nor were told off. I had been about 9/10 back then. For years I had actually believed that I had been cuddled and petted when I was a baby and yet given my memory about certain aspects of life – I could never really remember any affectionate hugs. The memories come from old photographs. In photographs, especially when I was less than 3 and a ½. As a child whenever I had in a moment of weakness told anything to anybody in confidence – about a terrible fear or an unaccountable dream or a thought – it would be shared with everybody at the dinner table and I would be laughed at.

At round about 13, I used to write letters to quite a few friends during the holidays and to a distant mama. He used to write as well and I got along with him quite well. He wasn’t the dodgy sort but used go for walks on summer breaks and converse with me but did not talk down to me. In that rather rotten and awkward life among family and relatives that mama and another mama were people who seemed to treat me more or less like a human being. Those relations wouldn't have survived for long anyway but back then I enjoyed their company and a few of the conversations. Talking about surveillance – one of the inland letters that I wrote to one mama was discovered in a book or a notepad when I was in Class VII and then taken out, opened and read and then I was humiliated for ending off the letter with ‘love, hugs and kisses’. My father berated me and my mother told me that such things were vulgar and improper with a mama. Was I vulgar? I didn’t think I was vulgar at all but in private I remember all the feelings I had had, and feeling very disoriented had merely fulminated. In college, my diaries would sometimes be read without permission and I would be hauled up. I didn’t care by then. I merely told everybody concerned that they wouldn’t know what I was talking about or writing about. I had my thoughts and if they thought that there was something wrong with me because of that – that was their problem, not mine.

Relations are not born out of thin and ephemeral air or any meaningless attachments. I know people might indeed argue with me and say: how can you deny blood relations and relatives and family. Well, I do and have. 

I did get gifts now and then through my childhood years and adolescent years and a few clothes every year and I certainly was not abused physically and my birthdays were celebrated with great pomp and when I was a baby and child I certainly was given medicines when I used to fall frequently ill and they would sometimes talk with me as though I were at least halfway human but the truth is from the time I was a little past 3 years of age (I remember this because there was a geographical shift) – they liked me less and less as a person. I do not think however that they were ever obliged to like me. I was a contrary and increasingly more and more of an awkward, ungainly character with a peculiar gruffness about me and grew up to be more and more ugly in just simple physical terms too (which also drew taunts). And I disturbed them as a person with my likes and dislikes and even conversations which they sometimes overheard. Why couldn’t I be more like my charming and lovely cousins who were so ‘mature’ (and those cousins I must say were charming and lovely). Couldn’t I see how intelligent and brainy and clever and loving most of my friends were? I was seen as being stubborn and also as being submissive. My mother once told a roomful of people while giggling and laughing that I was so boka that if I were told to stand on one foot – I would simply do that. My father once told me that I was stupid for while my friend had very intelligent things to say I only had one word to say, ‘Ya, ya. Ya, ya.’ Even through my school years they would keep telling me that of course they did love me. I was sometimes indulged and sometimes simply verbally abused. And there was no other motivation other than to humiliate me as a person because I was unlike them.

The best thing however was that I was ignored as a simpleton and never mollycoddled. This gave me a certain kind of mental space or maybe I was simply born with this peculiar trait from birth. This mental space, among other things, allowed me to choose and almost without thought what and who were worth fighting over and where it was best to try to keep one’s mouth shut. I had more physical freedom than most of my friends did. This is a fact. And I could go out on my cycle or foot or by bus here and there. I used to go swimming in summer and I used to go out in the late afternoons or during holidays. Sometimes my parents also let me visit other friends who lived quite far away and dropped me off too. There would have been hell to pay if I had ever had a boyfriend during that time – either I would have been humiliated beyond reckoning or worse, the boy would have been but this was not a problem for me. Boys were not interested in me and I didn’t have any usual teenage affair. I used to participate in school skits and plays and whatever extra-curricular program I could from class VII onward. I enjoyed and even loved acting on stage for the little skits a group of us would put up through the school year and we often did not even have a script – which was good because the actors could make up the lines as they went along. Even this was looked down upon generally speaking by my parents and I was scolded but they didn’t know every time that I was participating. Our class used to win prizes too every now and then and there was a nice moment for me when our class won the prize for presenting a one-act play on The Gift of the Magi and I had been Jim. There were other times too. Nothing that interested my family and I didn’t even want to share any of this. The only times they seemed to be really interested was if there was some certificate that I won and that happened only once in a blue moon. Then it was proudly displayed for some godforsaken reason.

In terms of knowledge and ideas – there was nothing to be discussed in the family circles. They all read books though – my parents had read Bengali books and even my brother used to read and they listened to music and songs too. But there was no talk of anything. Nor were any ideas discussed seriously. So I grew up knowing that people who read some or had a smattering of ideas of what Tagore had written or Sarat Chandra or Bankim – didn’t become ‘better’ people. The only thing I was scolded for not reading was the newspaper. I didn’t actually read it. Not during my school-years unless there was something particular that caught my interest. But I was allowed to read books. Of all sorts. My brother had once tried to complain to my parents that I was reading ‘trash’ – that was the occasion that my parents had said that I could read what I wanted to. So my brother’s plan to expose me didn’t work. I don’t know what I would have done if I had not been allowed to read or write or have some degree of the physical space and freedom that I did…maybe I’d have become mad a lot sooner. Much later when I was in college and after a lot of water had flowed under the bridge – my parents kept elevating me to great standards. Such-and-such person had said I was ‘brilliant and that I was a ‘genius’ even. So-and-so had said that I was ‘lonely’. They even tried to tell me that they hadn’t really understood me. I had had to shut them up and very quietly then. It wasn’t about what they were saying anymore. I sensed why they were saying what they were although it would take me years to understand and more years to actually articulate the thoughts. It was out of some instinctive and perverse biological reaction. I was their ‘blood’. They were not about to let go of whatever hold they had over me. And their views changed rapidly. Anytime I objected to what they were saying after 22 - I could be dismissed as being 'clinically mad' or as being 'unreasonably angry'. They swung from saying that it was 'all their fault' to saying that I was sick and insane. My father once told me that if anybody had the right to kill me it was they the parents because they had given birth to me. My mother if and when I liked anybody deeply would either try to tell him/her what a disgusting person I was or try to humiliate me about the person whom I liked deeply. I certainly didn’t keep quiet at all times. I told them what I thought of them for saying what they did and was told that I was oshobhyo (coarse/vulgar/uncivilized) and worse

I did all sorts of household chores from a very early age. They themselves had had hard childhoods – I knew this and I felt a huge guilt all along and so I did whatever I could. And by the time I was 18 since the maid came half of the month – my general chores included getting the milk early in the morning, doing groceries, sweeping, mopping the house, cleaning the bathroom, doing laundry, making basic lunch, going to the bank, taking relatives/friends to the whatever clinic or doctor, making and cancelling train reservations and so on. I didn’t think twice about these chores. I used to think back then that most of the people in college did the same. Even if others didn't or some did even more - I didn't think that doing chores were a bad thing at all. Somehow when I did fairly well in my high-school exams. and got into a reputed college – after my parents were done with feeling very proud in terms of their status, my ‘achievement’ was flung back on my face: bhalo result korechhish, Presidency-te admission peyechish boley mone korechhish onek kichu korey felechhish?!’ (you seem to think that just because you've done well in your exams and gotten through Presidency that you've achieved something?!) I didn’t think that I had ‘achieved’ anything anyway. I had simply felt relieved and happy back then when I’d been able to get through a college I had wanted to in Calcutta. My mother after some months had moved to Calcutta with a job in a hospital and my father stayed in Durgapur and visited during the weekends. I was made to feel as though my mother had come over ‘just for me’, that she had made some great 'sacrifice' by coming over to Calcutta and that I didn’t do enough to show my gratitude. I quite honestly didn’t know what else I could do but still just kept to doing what I could for a couple of years at least. Even before I applied to the US much later for higher studies I had been working for over a year and putting all the money into a joint account. I hadn’t really used much of that money and yet when the question for money for the application fees to the universities came about they said they would pay. I got a fellowship to Purdue, which came with a stipend. Some years later I got to know that they were going around telling people that they had spent 'a lot of money' on me but they never told people what I had paid back to them within even the first year and then two of being a graduate student. I didn't either to correct their tales because I'd forgotten till a couple of years ago.

Homilies they had aplenty. That fortune favours the brave. That it was very important to be honest, courageous and always sincere. That it was very important to do one’s work well and that it was bad to be selfish. That one had to be ‘mature’ and ‘believe in God’, and about ‘suffering’ they had many more things that they said. But the thing is I could see them for what they really were - sickos. People can pretend to be wise and kind and generous and charming and more. I’m sure they fooled a lot of people. But by the time I was in college I was sure that I didn’t like them. I had felt the shame while younger and had sometimes guiltily felt that it was my own shortcoming but by college I knew. They had no concerns outside the gaari-baari-biletey thaka (a house, a car, staying in England/staying in the west), a false sense of status, duty, security, being ‘settled in life’. They might have pretended otherwise but they were trivial, common and cheap people. People I would not have hobnobbed with nor would have wanted to know. People who disgusted me and repulsed me. I do not dismiss and have never dismissed the importance of money in life but I am sure now that the fact that I saw my parents arguing and quarreling most violently about money and over money and when they weren’t exactly poor (both were doctors with secure government jobs) and having a violent physical fight over 1 rupee when I was 13 or 14 made me see that it wasn’t the presence of some bits of money and secure jobs that made for people being decent – just decent – in a meaningful way. I can provide other examples of the kind of 'people' they were but this will do.

Lots of times by my parents, brother, relatives and erstwhile friends I was rebuked, ‘do you think you are perfect? People have shortcomings; families have shortcomings. Nobody is all good. Nobody is all bad. Why do you have to make such a big deal? Nobody has a perfect family, childhood or youth. You got your freedom. What about when you were ill? They/we took care of you. You were allowed to roam around and do lots of things that other people were not able to.’ There are plenty of other things that I had been told. Plenty of other experiences I have not broached upon here. Plenty of stuff that I engaged with, that I pursued, that I experimented with and that which happened especially after I was 21 and after I’d done well in examinations and external stuff. But when I, with all the depth of my being started asking questions within – it broke the delusion. That broke the genuine delusion of whatever normalcy I had tried to cling to while developing my mind and being. After that whatever happened and didn’t happen, whatever I did and wasn’t able to do, whatever I broke and lost, whatever transpired in sudden dreams meeting reality, whatever loneliness I barely stumbled through on grey unbroken landscapes, whatever glorious bits of reality that I experienced, whatever I failed at miserably and whatever I flew through miraculously, and whatever uncertainty I have gone through, whatever and whoever I cherish – those are other matters. What I did see and what I knew is that I did not have a meaningful family. I could see too that not many people had meaningful or loving families. The only difference is that I got to see, know and full well realize what and who matter and what and who don’t in very real and also concrete terms. Then my choice was crystal clear. Yes, I was born in the mental gutters. The thing is I didn’t like it or the people nor wanted to be liked by the people who liked the same and were very comfortable about the same. It was like being enveloped in a sick ugliness where I tried to gush sentimentally about my family's ‘goodness’ but it didn’t last. I saw what the family was and very clearly and over and over again. I knew I was right even when others said I was wrong, back in my early youth. Later, I had the language with which to articulate the reasons too. My family disgusted me not only for whatever it wanted to extract from me whether that was just in the form of mean and callous laughs and tittering at my expense but also for the kind of common, cheap, dirty and repulsive people they were. The rest of the blood relatives were no better or worse. And I had had enough. Yes, I knew when I was in my twenties that people with my kinds of 'sickness' that I had at 21 are often simply kept like locked vegetables inside the house or reduced to the same. I can thank my guardian angel/Holy Spirit for not letting that happen back then.

I was taken out of the gutters which pollute the mind, heart...and the inner realms. I know this. I was 23 then. And I know just what a blessing it was and is. I can even list reasons and I actually have sometimes. Maybe in the end the poet was right and ‘sagacity’ will have to go. There is certainly something ineffable too that defies intellectual and rational explanations and goes 'beyond reason'. That is fine. I shall not dispute that. But I also know exactly why there was only one thing that Willie Garvin was scared of and why he feared only one thing. Only a person who has been taken out of the gutters – and not always the physical gutters – by another can ever truly sense or know, leave alone realize, what he felt and why. I do.

My identity has never come from being a biological daughter and a sister or from any biological relations anyway. This I knew and had felt viscerally within when I was 5 or thereabouts and played the ‘who I am’ game in a sleepy town thousands of miles west. It took me decades to understand, in part at least, that fundamental realization. The Shiva stotra states what God is while saying all He is not and for me, much of life has been seeing what is not ‘neti, neti…’ (not this-not this) and what I will not engage in or dabble in even if it means I go through the fundamentally surreal and the uncanny sometimes or walk alone for stretches without knowing what is to be or whether I'll truly make good. I do not know what the future will bring but I know what the past has brought and I know exactly the points which light up the path of the journey and give it meaning...

3 July 2015

A bit of Neverland maybe

I had written the following in longhand a decade ago, at 29, one sudden evening. I could never quite find the right ending for the story though. I've been typing the below in tiny bits for almost two years now. I thought I'd write something different today. But this came out of the file and started hounding me. So I finished typing it. I'm putting it up. At least then maybe it'll stop chasing me around. I don't know whether anyone will like it but I do hope nobody who reads it dislikes it...Here goes -

বারো বছর বয়েসে আমি সেই ডাকাতকে দেখেছিলাম।

আমি  তখন আমাদের সেই ছোট সহরে ঘুরে বেড়াতাম। মাঝে মধ্যে হারিয়ে  যেতাম। সেই ভাবেই অনেক নতুন রাস্তা খুঁজেও পেয়েছিলাম। মনের মতন সমবয়েসী সঙ্গী সাথী ছিল না আমার।  মা বাবা ছিল না। দাদা, দিদি, ভাই, বোন ছিল না। দাদু দিদা ছিলেন তবে। 

ইস্কুলে যেতাম আর বাড়িতে দাদু দিদার কাছে থাকতাম। তাঁরা আমায় বন্ধিহীন গরুর মতন ছেড়ে দিতেন।  যেখানে মন যেতে চাইত  - সেখানে  যেতাম। ওন্য  মেয়েদের মা বাবার মতন আমাকে ঘরে বন্ধ করে রাখতেন না।   তাই আমিও লাগাম  ছাড়া গরুর মতন ছুটির দিনে সারাদিন চরে বেড়াতাম। আর নইলে ইস্কুল থেকে ফিরেই, ব্যাগ রেখে, কোনমতে খেয়ে বেরিয়ে পরতাম। আমার দিকে আঙ্গুল দেখিয়ে পাড়া-প্রতিবেশীরা আমার দাদু দিদাকে নানা রকমের কথা শোনাতো, "কি বেয়াদব মেয়ে তৈরী করেছেন আপনারা! একটু তো দেখবেন! একটু তো খেয়াল রাখবেন। কি সব  করে বেড়ায় ছাগল মেয়েটা। ঝোপে জঙ্গলে পুকুরের  মধ্যে পর্যন্ত - যেখানে খুশি চলে যায় ! কুকুর ছানা, ছাগল ছানা, বাছুরের সঙ্গে ঘুরে বেড়ায়। গতকাল  দেখলাম দুটো মোষের সঙ্গে কথা বলছে! ছি-ছি।...বাপ মা নেই। তাই এই অবস্থা।" আমার খুব  রাগ হত। তবে দাদু দিদা তাদের কথায় কান দিতেন না। আমার শুধু নিয়ম ছিল সন্ধ্যের আগে ঘরে ফিরে আসা। দাদু হেসে আমার মাথায় হাত বুলিয়ে দিয়ে বলতেন, "রাগ করছিস কেন, মা? যে যা বলছে বলতে দে । তাতে তোর কি? তোর যা করার তুই কর না। লোকে তোকে ছাগল বললেই তো তুই ছাগল হয়ে যাস নি এখনো। পরের টা পরে দেখা  যাবে।" দাদু একটু সময় নিয়ে গভীর যেন কিছু চিন্তা করে বলতেন, "আর ছাগল হলেও তো তোর  দিদা  আর আমি তোকে ঘরে বন্ধ করে রাখব না।" আমি সেই কথায় প্রায় হেসে ফেলতাম কিন্তু বলে উঠতাম "আমায় ছাগল বলেছে বলে রাগ হয়নি দাদু। অমন কথা বলল তবে!" "তাতে দাদু বলতেন, "জানি জানি। সে বলুক গে।  আমিও ওই বিরাট-পেট মহারানী -কে বলে দিয়েছি যা বলার।" তাতে আমি  হেসেই ফেলতাম।  

দাদু আমায় মাঝে মাঝে বলতেন, "ওন্য লোকেদের কথায় কোনদিন কিছুতে মা ভয় পাবি না।" দাদুকে জড়িয়ে ধরে আমি একবার বলেছিলাম, "বাঘ দেখলেও ভয় পাব না, দাদু?" দাদু  তাতে হেসে বললেন, "বাঘ দেখলেও নয়।  বাঘ তখন তোর্ সামনে। তখন ভয় পেয়ে হাতি ঘোরা কি করবি ?" দাদুর কথা বুঝি নি তখন । তবে বেশি কথা বলা আমার বদ অভ্যেস ছিল।  তাই চুপ করে না থেকে বলে উঠেছিলাম,"না দাদু, বাঘ দেখেও ভয় পাব না। শুধু দিদার ভান্ডারে ঢুকে আচার  চুরি করতে ভয় হয়।" দিদা সেটা শুনে হেসে আমার কপালে একটা হামি দিয়ে বলেছিলেন, "যে যাই বলুক, এই ছাগল মেয়েটি আমাদের মন্দ নয়।"


পড়াশোনা করতাম মোটামোটি। আর যখন তখন মনের জানালা খুলে সুন্দর সুন্দর নিত্য নতুন জায়াগায় ঘুরে বেড়াতাম। আঁকতুম  খানিকটা। গল্প বই পড়তাম। দাদু আমায় কত গল্প বলতেন।  সেগুলো শুনতাম। ঘুমানোর  সময় জেগে জেগে সেই গল্প থেকে রঙ্গীন স্বপ্নের জ্বাল বুনতাম । কখন ঘুমিয়ে পরতাম তাও জানতাম না। আমাদের সেই শহরের পাশেই এক জঙ্গল ছিল।  সেই জঙ্গল নিয়েও কত স্বপ্ন দেখতাম।  সেই স্বপ্নর গল্প বলতে গেলে আর এই গল্প শেষ হবে না।  


বারো বছরের জন্মদিনে, আমাকে দাদু দিদা একটা রুপো রঙের সাইকেল কিনে দিলেন। তারপর আর কে দেখে আমায়। সেই সাইকেল করে কাছে দূরে কোথায় না যায়নি।  বেরনোর আগে দাদু শুধু বলতেন, "সাবধানে ফিরিস, মা।" আর দিদা বলতেন, "দূর্গা, দূর্গা। " 


সেইরকম একটি দিনে, সেই জঙ্গলে, সেই ডাকাতের সঙ্গে আমার দেখা হলো। বসে ছিল সে।  একা।  তারও কেউ ছিল না সঙ্গে। সঙ্গী সাথী বিহীন সে বসে ছিল একা ।  কি করে চিনলাম তাকে জানি না। গাছের পেছন থেকে দেখলাম তাকে প্রথমে। সে তাকিয়ে ছিল, জঙ্গলের শেষ সীমানা ছাড়িয়ে অনেক দুরে গোধূলি রাঙ্গা আকাশের দিকে। সন্ধ্যে তখন নামে নি ।  কিন্তূ  যেন  সে কোথায় তার সন্ধ্যা তারা দেকছিলো এক মনে, বা খুঁজছিল তাকেই । কে জানে।  ঠোঁটে একটা বাঁকা হাসি নিয়ে। আর আমি  দেখছিলাম তাকেই এক মনে। কি করে বলি - যেন সেই দাকাত্কেই খুঁজছিলাম কত জন্ম জন্মান্তর ধরে। সেই যেন আমার কতো কালের প্রাণের বন্ধু।  কতক্ষণ দাড়িয়ে ছিলাম আমি জানি না।  সে দেখে নি  আমায়। দেখতে পায় নি সে। দেখবেই বা কি  করে। আমি তো একটা বট গাছের ফাঁক থেকে ঘার বেঁকিয়ে তার দিকে তাকিয়ে ছিলাম এক দৃষ্টিতে। সে তো তাকিয়ে ছিল আকাশ কোলে, তার সন্ধ্যা  তারার খোঁজে। সেই মুহুর্তে যেন হারিয়ে গেলাম - সত্যি কিছু না বুঝে হারিয়ে গেলাম। তারপর ধীরে ধীরে মনে হলো আমার সেই ছাগলের মতন কানগুলো কেউ যেন আগুনের জলে ডুবিয়ে দিয়েছে। একটা শব্দ না করে চুপিচুপি বেরিয়ে পরলাম সেই জঙ্গল থেকে। এতো বোকা হয়ে গেলাম যে জঙ্গল থেকে বেরিয়েও সাইকেলটাকে টানতে টানতে ঠেলতে ঠেলতে  নিয়ে চললাম রাস্তাতে।  কখন যেন  আকাশ কালো করে মেঘ ছুটে এলো সারিসারি।  কি যে ঝড় নামল ঠিক দোরগোড়ায় পৌঁছতেই, কি বলি।  আমি হাঁ করে আকাশের তরে তাকিয়ে খানিকটা ভিজলাম। দিদা দেখেই বললেন, "এই যে ফিরেছিস ঠিক ঝড়ের সাথে!" দাদু বললেন, "আমি তো আজ ব্যস্ত হয়ে তোকে খুঁজতে বেরিয়ে পরছিলাম। ভাগ্যিস হারিয়ে যাস নি ঝড়ের মধ্যে।" আমি  বলে উঠলাম, "হারিয়ে গেছি দাদু! সত্যি হারিয়ে গেছি! আর ফিরি কি করে?" দিদা আমার দিকে তাকিয়ে বললেন, "সে কি কথা রে? হারিয়ে গেছিস কোথায় আবার? এই তো আমরা। এই তো তুই..." ফিরে এলাম তখন।  পুরোপুরি না হলেও -  ফিরে এলাম বটে।  এক গাল হেসে  বললাম, "না না দিদা। কি সব .বলে ফেললাম।  হারিয়ে আবার যাব কোথায়..?" দিদা বললেন, "তাই বল।  আমি আবার ভাবলাম...যাক গে সে কথা।  যা তুই গিয়ে হাত  মুখ ধুয়ে, জামা কাপড় পাল্টিয়ে, একটু পড়তে.বস দেখি।  আর জল খাবার কি খাবি - নিয়ে নে নিজে।"


আমি চলে গেলাম নিজের ঘরে।  কিন্তু পড়াশোনা আর হলো না সেদিন। আঁকার খাতাটা বের করে একটা ছবি আঁকলাম ।  সেই আমার ডাকাতের ছবি। 


কত  বছর কেটে গেছে। দাদু দিদা আর এই পৃথিবীতে নেই। কিন্তু আমার মনে রয়েছেন এখনো। কত  ঘুরেছি। কত দেশ বিদেশ দেখেছি, কত পড়েছি, নতুন জিনিস শিখেছি, কত এঁকেছি, কত আঁকা বিক্রিও করেছি, কত বাচ্চাদের আঁকা শিখিয়েছি । তবে সেই ডাকাতের ছবি কাউকে দেখায় নি। আমার কাছে এখনো রয়েছে সে ছবি। কত গল্প করেছি সেই ডাকাতের সঙ্গে...। আপনি হয়ত ভাববেন "সে আবার কি? এ তো পাগলের মতন কথা।" তা হবে হয়ত। আমি অত সব জানি না। হয়ত বা সেই ডাকাত তার সন্ধ্যা তারা খুঁজে পেয়েছে। সেও হতে পারে। সেই ডাকাতের সঙ্গে কোথাও না কোথাও হয়ত বা আবার দেখা হবে। সেও হতে পারে। আর দেখা হলে তো সেও হয়ত বা মাঝে মধ্যে জড়িয়ে ধরে তার মনের কথা বলতে পারে, কিছু গল্প বলতে পারে, ঝগড়াও করতে পারে...সঠিক জানি না অবশ্য। হতেও তো পারে।