An Alchemist's Blog

The Zoo-zoo phenomenon

With this year's IPL came a much more amusing and fulfilling event - the advent of the zoo-zoo. At least for me it was the highlight of each match. Which zoo-zoo ad would be playing? We'd all crowd around and wait to see; then laugh and clap at each one. My son calls me in each time the ad comes on, for he knows how tickled i'll be. Not when a wicket falls or a six is struck, just every time the ad runs.

The zoo-zoo is my man of the IPL match, no doubt. And the reason is, the zoo-zoo brings out the child in me. I think there is a zoo-zoo trapped inside each of us, maybe even several zoo-zoos all at once. The movements, the chatter, the behaviour of the zoo-zoo releases a child-like empathy in each of us that is both endearing and delightful.

The other day, while doing yoga, i had my first 'out of body' experience. By this i do not mean it was some esoteric, near death blah-blah that we read and hear about. Mine was quite different. While in a posture, i had a feeling that the zoo-zoo inside had escaped and stood beside me, contorting and watching me from outside. My zoo-zoo looked at my inverted face, reddened in a grueling forward bend, then laughed, poked and bumped me. It giggled. It shouted. It followed my every move and never left my side. It helped me in and out of postures. It was compassionate, but firm. It pushed me to go deeper, slower. It applauded me, scratched it's head when i was lost. It was there for me. And when i did shava-asana or the deep-sleep posture, it retreated within me. It went back to nothingness, apparently where it had come from. I felt as if my zoo-zoo was my very soul - the core of my being. Settled there inside me, i felt it's calmness, it's happiness and it's simplicity and i was touched by myself. For the first time i was truly in touch.

All is forgiven, Mumbai. India saved you.

Swept away with the euphoria of having a strong brand new government, I'm even finding it within me to forgive Mumbai her callousness at the polls. The country, at least, was more sensible and vocal and united. A strong government is the best we could all dare to dream of. For this to become such a solid reality has been like waking up in a dream.

It was amusing to watch the channels on TV last Saturday, as the results came in, speak of their predictions coming true. Rajdeep Sardesai was uncontrollable as he patted his channel on it's back for their clairvoyance. Funny, I missed that. All i'd read and heard in the weeks up to the elections, polling, and before the results were declared, was how it was going to be a fractured government, consisting of a motley flea-infested coalition, fielding a weak PM, and even a prediction from a small-time fortune-teller was given coloumn-inches when he foresaw a man from the 'eastern part of India come to power as the PM of the country, with his government collapsing in 2 years time.' What may i ask came of all those news articles and sound-bytes that the media doomsdayers were happily churning out for a hapless and depressed public to read and digest. What utter crap. I wish they'd now own up to their own follies, instead of jumping on the bandwagon of the election success, which truly belongs only to, and is of and for the Indian public.

But then nothing succeeds like success. Look at Rahul baba. Where dinner party circuits in Mumbai were earlier carrying tales about the scion which went like this: 'He spends 2 days in Badohi in a jhopri and  goes to Paris to recover for 2 weeks,' today they are calling him the most charming, the most eligible bachelor and the ablest strategist of them all. Just like that. No questions asked. The stories have all turned in their heads as soon as that dimpled face smiled on TV last Saturday night and spoke to newsmen rather humbly about his party's success. And five years later, all is forgiven for the Mother. She now embodies Indianness of the highest order and all thoughts of foreigness have taken wing.

Pakistan is almost let off the hook over 26th Nov. Who remembers what is happening on that front. With changes in ministries and portfolios, our memories, too, will be shuffled and it may just get lost in the corridors of babudom and such. Like the 2006 Mumbai train blasts that get mentioned now and then, but always in passing. And considering Obama is yet to call our new PM, one week later, to congratulate him on his unequivocal success, what can we say about that great western power we put so much store by.

What makes India tick, most definitely is it's short memory. All that is past, soon passes. We live life in the present, rarely even planning for the future. Since this is what enlightened masters tell us to do, we should all be happy blissful beings. We probably are. Someone tell the news channels.

Unquotable quote

What i hate more than not having a book to read, is having a book that i hate but feel i must read.

To all Mothers

In response to what she read about my mother, a friend sent me this poem she wrote about hers. I'm re-producing, with her kind permission, Sarbani's poem:

'The Wintry mountains

 

 

So stand the Swiss mountains behind me

Stripped of the leaves, left with tall bare trees

The mountains stand tall, proud with the snow

White crests defying the sunny glow

 

Shorn of the green life but death defying

The weary evergreens, the horizon defining

Skeletons: witness to the weather changing

The deep sap within, all withstanding.

 

Who says the wintry mountains are not beautiful?

Who says spring is not far behind?

 

So stood my mother with her crest of silver grey

All flesh and muscle shorn off her withered frame

Her slight figure brave, straight and strong

Defying the overtures of her age.

 

Reminiscent of the proud ancestry in her veins

Refusing to bow before the forceful years

Stripped of all the brawn; energy, vitality still standing tall

No dent in her pride, none at all

 

Her brow raised in a perfect line

Creasing her forehead marking the time

Wrinkles adding grace to her personality

So stands my mother solid behind me.

 

Who says the wintry years are not beautiful?

Who says spring is not far behind?'

 

 

I specially find the  line, 'All flesh and muscle shorn off her whithered frame,' very poignant and chilling at the same time. I don't know why, but this line made me feel as if something had physically been stripped from my body.

I salute all the wonderful women in the silvery generation this mother's day: mothers, mothers-in-law, aunts, grannies, wise ladies of every shape and size. You are the greatest ever!

No Park, No Walk.

When it comes to exercise, i try and do my duty towards my body. But try suggesting a gym and the reaction is usually a negative shake of the head and an emphatic Uh-Uh. To think i could have been going to the gym all these years, with one of those delectable trainers and flaunting a hot bod to boot (sigh). However, we are where we are, and it is only a stroll in the outdoors that issues a sufficiently powerful call to the laziness in me. The writer within endorses the idea, too, for where else would i...

...regularly see the three generation ensembles of the kind one sees in family photos. Where grandmother, freshly minted mother and teeny weeny baby, all dressed up with no where to go except the park, come for a much awaited outing?

...know that little girls are out of their Barbies and into their Hannah Montanas?

...know what kids wear on their t-shirts? 'Been there, Wrecked that' continues as my favourite.

...see the peepul's leaves turn from albino white to deep green via rosy red.

...know that the latest in maid's fashionwear is, oddly, animal prints.

...hear the latest names kids are carrying around? Aryan..Shlok..Ansh..Arth...

...observe that when two siblings race to a mother and ask expectantly who came first, she always says 'both'.

...watch children swing with their eyes closed.

...admit that a father at a park's edge is always greeted more enthusiastically than a mother

...know that everyone talks to themselves; the children to imaginary friends, the old people to imaginary enemies and those inbetween to both. (albeit on their hands-frees.)

...discover that yesteryear beauties still have a glow lurking in their puffy faces and they search your face to know if you have seen it.

...know that old ladies only walk from one bench to the next.

...understand that one day i may be like them.

...see and hear the click-flash-whirr of the parent papparazzi, capturing their children expend those Kodak moments.

...realise that when both grandparents come to the park it is as much to celebrate their love by walking hand in hand, as to watch their grandchildren.

...note that sand, swing, slide, water bottle, snack box and their mother close-by is practically the whole world to a child.

...know it is Sunday when there is a surplus of daddies

...observe men chat in tight circles, their middle age comfortably settled around their bellies.

...see red-rimmed eyes spill in-law-tales into attentive ears.

...know it is time to go home unless i see the glow of cell-phones reflected against cheeks in the descending dusk.

...realise that people, even if they are strangers, not shiny-new gym equipment, mean the whole world to a jaded writer who rarely leaves her desk otherwise.

Shame on you, Mumbai

I am really upset with you, Bombay. It's official - the low voter turnout, further lowered by some recalculation. You probably will report the lowest in the country, by the looks of it. How could you? As your biggest fan, I must hang my head in shame.

After all the biggest film stars exhorting you to vote, after the sms cascades, the e-mails from citizen groups, the rallies and marches this is what you turned in. A dismal report card of your collective conscience, to say the least. A four-day weekend was enough to bribe you away from your duty, your right? How are you any better than the babus you complain about? The heat shrivelled your resolve? The queues discouraged you? Well, guess what? The weather was no different than when you go out to work everyday. So do you stop going to work? It has to be taken with the same seriousness. And if you had bothered to check you would have noticed there was no queue either.

A whole host of issues have been thrown up as the reasons for the dismal turnout - names missing and all that usual nonsense. But, i promise you, not more than 10 or even 15% of the electorate who wanted to vote may fall into this category of those who went upto the booth and were turned away - and i'm being very generous in assigning that high benefit-of-the-doubt percentage. In an educated city like Bombay turnout should be high - high - as much as 80%. Why not? I don't care about statistics and previous elections and all that hog-wash. I want to know why? Why does a person living in a city not care to vote. Why do the illiterate villagers go out and do it and you can't. I just think you are spoilt and pampered and probably deserve what you're getting.

Everything else i put up with - roads in a perpetual state of disrepair, corruption, a single bridge being constructed at a leisurely pace spread over 10 years, pollution, dirt, filth, stench, heat, humidity, slum-like living conditions in most parts of the city other than the square footage one calls home. All that i become thick-skinned about, thinking it is beyond our control, how can you blame the city for all of this. But now I blame you, Bombay, for you are the people of this city and you did not care enough to want to do something. You have lost respect in my eyes, Bombay. I may even start calling you Mumbai now. Just to spite you with that awful name.

I look at my marked finger with despair. Was i stupid or naive to have voted or was it those who did not who are being stupid? Am i an idealist while they are the so-called realists, the cynics? Those who believe that nothing will change, no matter what? But i quickly realise, not moving your butt to do something is always worse than doing it and failing. I think of Mahatma Gandhi's words, 'Be the change you want to see around you.' And i am sure those of us with that ugly black mark on our middle fingers were not wrong. I also feel naive, but for a different reason. Just because i hounded my household to go vote, gave them time off, timed my activities so each of them had no excuse not to cast their vote, threatened them that they need not come to work tomorrow if they did not bear a certain incriminatory evidence on their fingers, i thought i'd see stunning statistics in the paper the next day. But obviously one household does not a city make. But every household does. And there were several who did not care. I feel naive that i thought each of us to be caring and concerned.

Mumbai, be clear, it is the politicians who have shown you the middle finger in this instance. Possibly even the terrorists and the corrupt officials and the wrong-doers who have won and who, indeed, can tell you to shove it up, for you did not do what was your duty.

First do your duty, then rue the outcome, if you must. Now, by not doing your duty, you have no right to expect anything to come of your inaction. Shame on you. Shame-shame Mumbai.