On this day....

..well, yesterday actually, seeing that it's well past midnight..... errr, where was I???

Wait, let's have a go again at that, shall we??

It's thirteen years to the day since we came back to India for good...what a journey it was before, and what a journey it has been since.

Why thirteen? Why not ten? Or five?

I didn't have a blog then.

Zahra, you smartass.

Why not wait for the fifteen year mark?

Who knows what life holds? Really..... I can't remember ever using this line for myself, but here it is... There's no guarantee I'll be around then.

Thirteen...for starters that's precisely half a lifetime ago.

Yes, congratulations...so you've calculated my age. I'm thankful, really.... most folks think I'm a few years older.

I would like to believe that I am essentially the same person that stood on the threshold of teen-age at that time...... but the answer to that is yes and no. I hold certain views, opinions, and attitudes today that I wouldn't have thought possible for myself even two or three years ago. The thought is exhilarating and a little scary too. As far as I know, I haven't reached that stage in life where consistency is the norm than not, so maybe, just maybe, that comment was premature.

Back then, I had a very different idea of what my life would turn out to be. And today I'm nowhere near that image. Can't say I'm disappointed at how things have turned out..... but I can't help a faint shiver of disappointment either. Perhaps I'm still in love with the starry-eyed optimist I was then.

My relations with my parents have changed. Inevitable I guess. Things said in a fit of temper have a greater potential to wound now, than when the accuser was thirteen. On the flip side, dealing with each other on a one-to-one basis has its plus points. But there's no change to the sense of dismay I feel when I realize that our viewpoints on some important issues differ widely. I still haven't found a way to convey that my being accepting of more than one possibility does not mean that my fundamentals have eroded.

Therefore, I keep a part of myself locked away, neatly boxed and stowed deep inside. Telling myself that expressing my individuality's not always worth somebody else's pain. Then secretly resenting myself and them for it. And then feeling guilty as hell for even thinking that way. Then back to the slow-burn routine.

Ah, well, some battles never have an outcome do they?

Say what you will about burning bridges with abandon.... I say that can happen only when I really and truly know what I want. And that doesn't look set to happen for another thirteen years at least. :)

But there's one thing I really wish hadn't changed....something I nearly don't have the gumption to own up. I had a lot more faith in my ability to keep fighting and cock a snook at people, even when they put me down. The non-conformity is still there, but I've been having these moments when I'm almost apologetic about it..... Unthinkable. This calls for drastic action and quick.

So here we are. I don't think we have done too badly after all. Even if having the extended khandaan around has sharpened my migratory instincts of late. ;)

No comments on that one :)

Shabbat Shalom, two-day weekends and more filter kaapi to y'all.

The silver cord...

..will be severed and the golden bowl broken, the pitcher by the well shattered and the wheel by the fountain crushed.*

That each one of us will keep our appointment with the Maker is a given, and my grandfather honoured his tryst a couple of weeks ago.

Appachen was my last surviving grandparent. Since his passing I've had this growing certainty that a chapter has been firmly closed despite my efforts to resist it. A sense that one of the last links to my childhood has been severed...... A permanent change in the way I view my maternal home and surroundings. In all honesty, it's not just the loss of a person that I'm grieving, but the loss of a way of life, of stability as I knew it.

It's at times like these that you realise how much a person can dominate a home without even raising his voice or moving around much. At 83, 'sprightly' was hardly the word that I'd have used to describe Appachen, but his mind was clear, his thinking sharp, and his opinions as firm as they'd always been. I can't recall ever having entered Amma's home in Kerala without a grandparent around, so current circumstances will take some getting used to.

It's hard to walk past his room without the customary peek to see if he's awake or sleeping. I found myself pulling an extra chair into the living room the other day, despite a vacant seat...... the empty one is Appachen's armchair, y'see. I can still hear his voice when the family sings hymns for the evening prayer..... I know where he would've paused, in every line of every song that we've sung together. Hesitating a moment before starting the Lord's prayer, waiting for him to lead, as he always did. Keeping an ear cocked for the tap-pause-tap rhythm of the cane he used in his last year.

I had only known this extraordinary man as my Appachen first. The 'Matthews' of his acquaintances and peers introduced himself later. A breakaway from his agricultural roots, he had plunged into the world of business and shipping in the Middle East at a time when 'Persia' was still an exotic mystery to most Malayalees, leave alone Indians. :) Perhaps I should also mention that he was only 23 at the time.

The career took off brilliantly, and he was still seeking new frontiers at a time when most men begin to think of retirement and their twilight years. I still don't think I can fully comprehend the impact this one man has had on the livelihoods and careers of many hundreds of people; his legacy is immense. Appachen was one of the very few men I knew who openly credited a supportive and capable wife for his successes. When Ammachy died close to a decade ago, the flame dimmed and sputtered considerably. I could see that her passing had wounded him deeply, but it did register somewhere in my 16-year-old mind that a woman who could claim that kind of devotion was a rare and lucky one indeed.

You might be tempted to categorize this post as the tribute of a favourite grandchild, but I do not think that would be correct. Appachen had enough old-school chauvinism in him to make it subtly but definitely known that his grandsons gave him a little more joy than his granddaughters. :) We girls can't really complain that we lacked anything, even though I would have liked for him to be a little more demonstrative. His pride in our achievements was unbounded though..... education and a career were must-haves for boys and girls alike.

Looking back, I think the major source of my pride-tinged resentment was the fact that I never got the 'grandchild' treatment as much as his other grandkids did. Even when I was as young as ten or twelve, we did have some very mature conversations on life, peers, and family. Perhaps I should be glad that he saw it fit to treat me as an equal sometimes. But another little voice in my head insists that equals are all around, but only he could've been a grandfather to me.

Make no mistake, there was no lack of love or respect on either side. We did have our share of fun and games, as well as dorky stories that my Ammachy considered highly unsuitable for young ladies of genteel breeding :) The chorichu-malle game was my prerogative with Appachen, and many a family car ride was swept along in gales of laughter and hooting. For those of you who're wondering what I'm talking about, take any two words (a name for instance) and interchange the first syllables. The resulting phrase can range from ho-hum to hysteria-inducing stuff. Eg: Muthoot Bankers would become Bathoot Moonkers.... get it?

I told you it was crazy :D

Appachen's laughter at such times is crystal clear in my memory..... a very gravelly and deep, slightly raspy "Ha ha haaaa" followed by a silent chuckle.....and a smile that lingered long after. Strangely enough, that was the sound that came to mind when I heard the damp gravel roll across the lid of his coffin, after we'd laid him in the grave. The way he'd laughed when we teased him and Ammachy for getting married on a 14th February, all those years ago before Valentine's Day was even heard of in India.

I had mentioned a sense of stability earlier, a feeling of being moored firmly, which I now lack. When he was alive, I viewed the protection of Appachen's love for his family as being similar to what I felt for my home:

No matter which corner of the world I'm in, it is there.

I know it is strong. I believe nothing can shake it.

Once inside, I am safe.

Needless to say, I now keep trying to pull the frayed ends of that loop closer together in any way I can. There are brief moments of respite. The smile that is forced to my lips when I see the photo of me and my brothers furtively eyeing Appachen's birthday cake, while he solemnly smiles for the camera. Running my hand along the armrests of his favourite chair, where the polish has worn off from years of use. The inexplicable comfort of seeing his battered Bible and spectacles on the bedside table. The cluttered desk which makes me feel that he's just around the corner.

Which he is. Someday I'll lift that curtain and join him there.

Until then Appacha, you'll be sorely missed.

R.I.P.




*The reference is to Ecclesiastes 12:6 in the Bible, which is widely used to illustrate death in the context of Christianity. Simply put, death is viewed as a cutting of the cord that binds us to earth, allowing us to go back to our home with the Father.

Then and now...

*Started writing this one fine June afternoon....and sat down to finish it yesterday :). Oh well, procrastination's one of my nicer qualities....



It’d been a regular Sunday so far.

Church in the morning……after staying up reading till 2 a.m.

A quick trip to the local book stalls for the week’s supply.

A leisurely brunch and cuppa coffee at her regular hangout.

And back home by two in the p.m.

Oh well and all that, she thought. This is the way it’s been for a while now. Hard to explain yearning for company, for a trip, for a casual conversation, yet being reluctant to call a buddy or just head out. She puttered around the room, telling herself for the thousandth time that this was the weekend to get the room tidied up. Oh yeah, it is. So’s next weekend. A fleeting moment of amazement when she realized that it was almost July.

What would the rest of the day be like? Sleep? No. Though she eventually will, she knows that. Call a friend? Mebbe later. A quick jaunt to the mall downtown? Perhaps, but the weekend crowd of loud families and clingy couples was the last thing she needed.

Better read a book till I decide.So she stretched out on the bed, keeping the windows wide open to catch the cool breeze.

Ahhhhh..bliss.

Karen Carpenter’s soulful alto rose from the laptop perched on the desk.

Perfect. The only singer she’d ever aspired to sound like. Soon, she was deep into the plot and subplots of the battered spy thriller.

She awoke suddenly, startled by a coolness on her arm. Confused for moment, she saw that the room was much darker now, the curtains flapped wildly, and Karen continued to sing. Make believe, the song name registered somewhere at the back of her mind.

But then is then, and now is now…..

And right now, it was raining…… the sweet, moist scent of the earth was heady alright. As was the cool spray that had woken her up. She could never explain how rain always, unfailingly, triggered off a series of images in her mind.

Of her much younger self stretching her arms out of the window to ‘catch’ the rain. Of running around outside with her cousins in a ferocious Kerala rainstorm, of an era when she could go topless (or bottomless, for that matter) without anybody batting an eyelid. Of praying hard for heavy rain on school nights, so that she could stay in the next day. And then feeling guilty at having her prayers answered, as she watched a street urchin trying to stay dry under the straggly limbs of the nearest tree.

Of more pensive evenings, when a teenager watched the simple beauty of an afternoon shower, and wondered why people and life itself had to be so complicated. Of the bright cleanness of the trees after the rain, of a green so intense it hurt your eye. Of silently crying in the dark a few years later, as she heard the rain pound relentlessly. They’d buried her beloved grandmother that evening, and the thought of the rain pelting that lonely grave, and battering the flowers was almost too much to bear.

Of deliberately prolonging the five minute walk back home from college, if it so much as drizzled. Of watching from her hostel window in another part of the country, as the rains misted the landscape into impressionist masterpieces. Of breathing in the damp, cool air one Easter evening, and wondering if it was just her or if life really was a bitch.

As always, the montage released a sharp, short pang of homesickness. And sadness. A longing to be truly footloose and carefree once again. Secretly, she enjoyed the rain even in the huge metro, despite the whole city turning into a squelchy bog. Despite the ordeal of her commute and the massacred footwear. No sense in spoiling the magic of the moment by thinking of day to day issues……Mundane practicality would rear its ugly head whenever, wherever.

Meanwhile, Karen Carpenter was almost through with her song.

…And now is all that matters, anyhow

I totally agree, she thought, watching as the rain caressed the earth and sang its love songs once again. As it had always done for eons past.

Songs of my days

All of us have certain triggers that unleash a set of memories or emotions. It could be anything. A sight, a smell, a song, a voice, the sound of laughter…absolutely anything. While I have ‘triggers’ filed away neatly under each of these and more, it’s undoubtedly the song category that’s filled to bursting.

Come to think of it, I could retrace my entire life through a series of songs.

My earliest memories would be of listening to tape after tape of Yesudas and Chitra’s Malayalam duets. And some SPB hits in Tamil. Not to forget Ilaiyaraja.

And that brings back memories of days before the scourge called 'education' hit me (:-P)…of our first home in Gelfie-land, and the tape recorder that proudly stood on the sideboard. Unfortunately my aged-three-years version of Kannai Kalaimaane is still quoted verbatim by my folks (Sob!) Am not trying to say that the aged-twenty-something version’s better, but atleast the words are not scandal-inducing. Btw, that song’s the Tamil precursor of Surmai Akhiyon Mein.

Net result: I’m a lifelong fan of Yesudas and still think nobody can sing like he does. Like, for heaven’s sake listen to that voice, and then consider that he’s pushing 70 now!!!

Time moves ahead. Now there are early morning rides to school. And buddy, I mean early, coz my classes started at 7!!! I was a whiner-cum-howler who’d faithfully cling to her Amma’s hand every morning, so school, predictably, wasn’t the best way to start the day. The only consolation was the music during the ride in Dad’s (and my) beloved 1990 Daewoo.

Enter Messrs Kishore Kumar and Mohd Rafi.

Aiyyayya karoon main kya sukoo-sukoo??

Gaata rahe mera dil…Ek ajnabee haseena se yun mulakaat ho gayi….

Kehna hai…humein tumse pyaar kitna…..

Is mod se jaate hai…

Aur agley mod leke, we’d finally reach school. And those songs would be playing in my head all day. Kishore Kumar’s amazing no doubt, and I am a big fan. But somehow, I’ve always had a softer corner for Rafi’s songs.

Not too long after came the glorious day when I took my ‘savings’ (all the chillar collected over several years) and bought….

……(What else??) A (then) sleek, (then) classy looking, (still) great sounding National Panasonic tape recorder. Wow. I can still recall the excitement…and sense of achievement. Doubt if anything I’ve got for myself since has matched up to that first buy.

The recorder found its way to my study corner, as did Amma’s contribution to my music fetish. Two complete albums of Jim Reeves. And thus did a lifelong love-affair bloom. Maaannnn, whattayyyy voice……I still turn into a puddle of incoherent, starry-eyed idiocy when I hear his songs.

If there is some other way to prove that I love you… (Oh, Jimmmmm…really???)

….. I swear I don’t know how (It’s okay…. Believe me!!!)

That such amazing talent died so young is a big, biiiiiiig loss. Oh btw, THIS is the man responsible for my voice fixation….. In case you didn’t know already, a good voice can do wonders for a guy’s wow-score in my rule-book (90% weightage sometimes!!)

Oh come on, don’t snigger. Gals, imagine your honest reaction when you meet your dream man who’s a John Abraham/ Junior B look-alike….. and then realise that he sounds like Sachin Tendulkar…or Laloo Yadav. No offense to either of them, but I trust you’ve got the point.

Back to the music. Then Abba came along as did the Beatles, BeeGees, Jackson 5, NKOTB, Eternal, Police and the rest. And (ahem!) yeah, I went through the Boyzone-MLTR-Richard Marx phase too…. But NOT Spice Girls-BSB-Aqua (whew!). And when a phenomenon called A.R. Rehman came along, I silently breathed a prayer of thanks. Oh the Mallu, Tamil and Hindi gaanas were there too, but I was more active on the Angrezi front then.

And the melange grew more and more interesting as school progressed to college. Pop, rock, retro and movie music combined into unique definitions for each year. Or situation.

Any song from Minnalae brings back the cheering and yelling during fiercely fought inter-dep contests during undergrad. Kaakha Kaakha is permanently linked to a howlarious class trip to Goa.

A much-loved violin instrumental of Kabhi Kabhi conjures up visions of the Qutub Minar in twilight as seen from my hostel room. The same view through misty veil-like sheets of rain whenever O Saathi Re (of Omkara) plays.

Of packing bags to go home post-exams, at 2 a.m. amid shouts and screams of laughter, when Dil Jo Bhi Kahey blasts away in the background. Off-key caterwauling to the accompaniment of empty Bisleri bottles whenever Kajra Mohabbatwala plays.

Of how Kajra Re defined us being ragged in the first year of B-School, Beedi Jalai Le when we did the ragging in the second, and Sajnaji Vaari Vaari in our farewell party.

It’s not about the songs having any significance per se in the context. I guess it’s about a significant memory that acted out while the song was played.

Another category I haven’t mentioned so far, but has been there all along is sacred music and gospel. Thanks to this genre I never knew something called stage fright. At least not while singing in a group. Singing in a church choir is something I’ve been doing for most of my life, and the satisfaction it brings is something else altogether. Catching up on musicals by the MMA and MCC choirs in Chennai, and Paranjothi in Mumbai is something I do religiously, and methinks it’s worth the pain taken.

I guess I can’t possibly list down every single song that brings back a recollection. Hopefully, I haven’t lived half my life yet, so I’m wishing that the soundtrack of my life gets more interesting with every passing day.

And while that’s happening, turn up the volume folks…and let the music play!!!

Memory bytes

Indulged myself in a cupboard-rummaging session when I went home for the Easter weekend. On one of those lovely Chennai afternoons with a light drizzle and a cool breeze at 2:30 p.m. (yes!). With the rest of the family in siesta mode, I had all the time in the world.
So there I was with my ‘treasures’ of the past decade strewn all over the place. An assortment of random doodles done in different classes at different ages, notes passed around in class to share catty comments, birthday cards, friendship bands (Jeez!), team ribbons (Maaannn!!!) and much more.
The most interesting find was a coupla manila covers with nearly a hundred assorted photographs. Vaguely remembered pulling them outta albums as and when they caught my fancy. Given that I was seeing the lot after nearly 4-5 years, it took me on a full fledged hike down memory lane.

Like the one where big bro and I are frozen in mid air above a trampoline. Where he’s all of six years and I’m aged four. With HUGE grins pasted on our faces.

My Ammachy surrounded by her grandkids. (Ammachy is ‘Grandmother’ in mallu X’ian lingo. Bless her soul)

Parents’ wedding pic. (Ohmigosh, Dad had a French beard?? And what kinda trousers was he wearing????)

Moi with friends on our first sari-wearing session in high school. All dolled up and giggly but the ‘little girl’-ishness is intact. Suddenly, sixteen doesn’t seem as grown up as it was made out to be.

With Dad just before leaving for school one day. (I was wearing two ponytails???AND ribbons????? :-O Noooooo…..) This one undoubtedly has ‘Daddy’s Girl’ stamped all over it.

Our first snap as a family. Taken when they brought Mom and me home from hospital.

But the one that found me staring at it for the longest time was one of me and my Mom. Where Mom’s carrying her year-old baby. In typical mom-and-kid pose, with a lovely smile on her face. It’s not the cuteness/sweetness aspect that struck me. What hit hard was:

1. I finally realised that the rest of the family was right. I do look like her. Uncannily so. Explains how her long lost college pals and phoren- cousins would take one look at me and say “But I’d know her anywhere…”
2. The freshness and optimism on her face. It’s not just youth. Given what I know, I think it came from a very simple belief that life ahead for her, her man and her child would be worth looking forward to, no matter what it held.

Dunno what the foundation is for such uncomplicated faith. Mebbe her faith in God. In herself. In the people around, though she’s been let down often enough. An extremely resilient spirit perhaps?
Have found myself wondering since what I would feel like in that same situation. If my turn ever came. At 24, I already feel like a jaded 50 year old cynic. Blame it on the times and circumstances I’ve grown up in. On a world that denies your right to innocence and simple faith. Where everything HAS to be complicated to the last degree or it doesn’t become worth talking about. Or even thinking about.
Have had plenty of disagreements with Amma. Still do. Some are bound to remain unresolved. Or even get worse. But despite it all, she still retains her belief that I am and will remain an individual worth all the love, trust and respect I can get. That knowledge has got me through situations time and again. Given me the guts to hang in there and fight it out. Kept me searching for who I truly am. To walk out on people who figured I was insignificant enough to kick around.
Wow. It's amazing what a little faith can do. Mebbe it wouldn’t hurt to try it out on the people in my life either.

I know this much. The next time someone says “You’re just like your mother”, I’d be hoping that it’s not only the looks that they’re talking about.

Though I don't say it often.....here’s to you Ma.

Thank you.

Now listening: Let it all go - Mark Knopfler