Friday Night

Outside my window, it is a Friday night. It’s a deep blue night, with little lit squares in the skyline. From up here, the road is an electric snake, a carnival of cars moving along the stretch in unison. I can see little people walking on the pavement, some hand in hand, some distanced, some in a great rush to get somewhere. It is a Friday night, and Friday nights are never dull.

For the strangest of reasons, I find myself suddenly feeling very small. Not just in person, but in dimensions of space as well. Kind of like I’m collapsing into myself. The familiar feeling of nonsensical sadness sweeps over me and I walk over to the balcony aimlessly. I know I’m searching for something, but I can’t tell what it is. I take a deep breath, take the city into my lungs. It smells of exhaust fumes and fine cement, dust and fatigue.


Two years ago, this is how I built my familiarity with Mumbai. In her smell. She smells like a fake bride, I remember thinking, though I still don’t know what that really means. I got off the plane, collected my baggage and walked out into the city, excited, nervous, upset.

A friend had arranged a home for me in Mumbai. I was told it was impossible for a single woman to land a good place, unless it was in one of the flashier suburbs. Nonetheless, he found me a nice place that fit my budget. It overlooked a hill and was in a pleasant neighbourhood. There was an ATM five minutes away, and a share-rickshaw stand just outside the building. You could only share a rickshaw with others if you were riding to the Central Station. It cost only Rs.4 per passenger. That’s a mere Rs.120 a month. From there, I’d take the train to Chhatrapati Shivaji Terminus, an hour away. That would cost Rs.520 a month. So together, that’s Rs.640 to get to office. Plus Rs.900 a month to get back to the station and take the train home.


I have no idea why I’m thinking of this right now.


I look down my balcony again. The vegetable vendor I buy my groceries from is still there, outside the gates. The cigarette guy I frequent is also around, looking down at the street. I wonder if he and I are seeing the same thing. Of course we are, I think. Nothing has changed from the last time I looked around consciously. Cars are still flowing like a lit waterfall down the road, the skyline is still ablaze with yellow white lights. People are still rushing to get someplace in a hurry.

I jump.

Build me a Vlilage and Call me a Geek.

It took me ages to come out with it. I am finally ready to confess.

I am a geek.

But before you judge me, I have to make my stand clear. Out here, in the world of flesh, blood, bank balance, terrace homes and 8’o clock news, I’m an everybody. I’m someone who believed I had an identity owing to my unique DNA and hair do. I have dreams, and I believe I will one day achieve them, and the world will watch as I levitate up the ladder of personal success. Just like every other unique idiot around me.

But in the virtual world, I am secretly a warrior. A brave warrior of three founding villages and an average population of 650 in each settlement. I wisely chose to hone defense over crop/lumber/clay production and then blindly raided and plundered every other villager in sight to feed my army. I am a Hittite. A Genghis Khan of cyber space strategy gaming portals. The Angulimaal of the virtual wars. My name brings shudders to people’s servers and they beg for my non-existent mercy over mails and portal chats.

Warrior Rae.
Founder of the villages Warrior Monks, Saints of Gaiah and Armorica.

Warrior Rae.

“Name yourself!”
“Warrior Rae!”

“Name your Alliance!”
“N16 and the Guardians back Warrior Rae! Withdraw your troops immediately!”

“Submit!”

“Never! The Saints of Gaiah and her 3500 Phalanxes will never submit! Remember, Warrior Monks and Armorica have a large army, too!”

“No, you idiot! The final ad! Submit it!”


*Blink* *Blink*


“Oh. The ad?”

“Yes?”

“Can I send you crop instead?”


I have just deleted my travian.com account. Clicking on ‘delete account’ took me back in time to the time I had to say goodbye to my best friend at the airport thirteen years ago. I knew I would never see her again, but I told myself reality was never as important as hope.

This hurt more.

So I sat down to mail everyone I attacked, traded with and befriended - my fellow warriors, soldiers and generals of multiple villages, like myself. It hurt to say goodbye, but it is the code of a true warrior. It is honourable and courageous to quit when you know you have given the battle all you have, to step down and gracefully exit when your time has finally come to……


“…. In deep gratitude, I remain…?”

My collegue was reading over my shoulder. I grinned before he could call everyone around to check my screen. Yeah. That’s your laugh for the day. Suckers.

“Warrior Rae of Saints of Gaiah…?”

He looked me in the eye, like he found this scarier than funny.

“Are you serious? Like Gaiah.. the Earth….? Like in God of War II? The Titan God chick who helps Kratos get back at Zeus?”

I smiled. What a geek.

Things I Don't Get - II

So I still don’t get too many things. A friend under the influence of much too much cheap wine and The Simpsons’ reruns once told me, “You can either be happy or you can be intelligent.” Apparently, I’m happier now. Either that, or I’m sleepwalking my way to work everyday.

This city isn’t making any sense to me. Not the culture, not the intolerance, not the fact that everyone knows the directions to everywhere. And worse still, some more things I don’t get.

I don’t get the meaning of “Ya?”

So… what part of speech really is this? Who the hell ever thought this was a cool way to figure out if people were really listening?

“So, I was trying to crap, ya?”

Why it this a question? How the fuck do I know?!

I’ve had full blown conversations with this woman who says it like it’s a comma. And a full stop. And a capital. And the three dot thingy, the “…”. Not to forget the long 'yaaaaaaa…' when she’s trying to figure out what to say next. Honest to God, every time she asks/tells/demands a response, I have no clue what to say. So I finally gave in till we sounded like two ducks in a pond you threw popcorn at.

“Dad wasn’t gonna hear me out, ya?”
“Ya.”
“So I told him to just let me live my life, ya?”
“Ya.”
“So.. yaaaaaaaaah!”
“Ya.”
“Ya?”
“Ya.”
“What are you yaaahing about?”
“I dunno, do ya?”
“Yeah.”
"Ya?"

She doesn’t get me either, these days.

I don’t get music in lifts.

Really, I appreciate your concern. But I am NOT GOING TO KILL MYSELF OUT OF BOREDOM in those 15 seconds in the lift. What is with that?! And why, WHY Kenny G? Why polyphonic phone ring tones? And why, of all, the tune of BHAJANS????

I can imagine hoteliers supervising their restaurants being designed. They turn to their architects and interior designers and in that one moment of utmost malice and vengeance for all the soon to be broken glasses, the returned too salty-too old-this is not what I ordered dishes, the unflushed floaters on antibacterial crap-pots (another thing I don’t get, but will not bother talking about) smiling villainously and going, “Make the lift out of glass. Thin glass. Make it move sloooooow. And get my Anup Jalota tape from the car.”

Liftmen offsprings will evolve with smaller ear lobes. And have inflexible lips cos they don’t smile anyway.

I don’t get idioms in conversations.

I remember this ad that showed up in Bangalore a couple of years ago. It was like the copywriter found his inspiration in a Preeti Sagar’s Jargon Soup for a Chicken’s Soul.
It went thus.

“Imagine!

The apple of your eye…Your home…. Being eaten like a MOTH.. Called GEYSER!”
No! NEVER!”

And this was an ad for a solar heater. More shocking, this was an AD.

So maybe he didn’t put those idioms to good use. But why do people use idioms to talk to one another? I get it if you’re writing it, that’s a disease I too, have. But why when you’re TALKING??? Language evolved to communicate simple things.
Burp means “Thank you, that was delicious.”
A fart means “I’m comfortable around you.”

Simple sentences are ‘I want.’
I want food.
I want more food.
Gimme pizza.
Fuck off.

See? Simple. I understand these. Then my boss comes around and says this.

“Its like sex on toast, guys! Just do the biggie bag and turn over, ad the chicken’s done. No need to arm wrestle deadlines, just put an enema in the soup and we'll touch base later.”


Whatever, ya?

Things I don't get

I'm in a George Costanza meets Stewie Griffin kind of mood. Not 'meet' per say... more like a tip of the hat as you pass by kind of meet. Or like a half smile like your botox is doing nothing for you as you see each other on the road but don't bother to talk kind of meet.

Yeah.. So you get the idea.

I'm in the mood to rave and rant and complain and crib and roll in the mud and whine, so really, this weekend, let's not meet. I am kind of pissed off/frustrated/ don’t really care but makes for good time pass on the long journey to work on board smelly train/ about some things that I’ve recently begun to pay attention to, and the list is growing as enormously long and intolerable as is this sentence. Just to prove I am not neurotic, (shut up Mother, what do you know) I’ve compiled a brief list of things I don't get. So seriously, for the sake of whatever's left of my sanity, tell me if it’s just me.

I don't get Vodafone Customer Care
So this woman calls me up the other day from Vodafone. Her name is Ujwala. I hope you're reading this, UJWALA.
"Your outgoing has been barred because you've exceeded your credit limit, ma'am." Ujwala says.
"But my bill's due only next week! I've never paid late, why have you barred my calls?" I argue.
"Ma'am, please call customer care and clarify it with them." Ujawala smartly replies.
"Aren't you customer care?"

Ujwala blinks so hard it causes a hurricane in Australia.
"Ma'am, please call 111."

"I can't. You've barred my outgoing." I say politely.
Ujwala hangs up on me.
Ujwala Ujwala Ujwala Ujwala. Bitch.

I don't get actors crying at the movies.
Even better, actors crying at their own movies. Why, exactly?

I don't get buzzers at the Moment of Truth
This is a game where the toughest answers is a "Yes" or a "No". And there's no 'I dont remember" or "Because she told me to." You say the truth, you sell your privacy, self esteem and life for a million dollars. Sounds like a deal.
"Do you purge to lose weight?"
The audience awwws and gasps and chokes on a pretzel as the competitior looks confused into the camera.
The obviously like duhuhuh! bulimic competitor refuses to answer cos her anorexic sister hits a buzzer yelling, "Don't answer that!"

Now really! Does she? NOOOOOOOOOOOOOO!!!!!!!! I guess we'll never know.

I don't get scam.
It feeds me. But I still don't get it.


More coming right up. Honestly, IU]'m gonna keep ranting cos there's no one more perplexed and irritated like I am, right now. But I gotta go cos I've to get into a meeting that I don't get. But thats for the next post.

The BIg Black Lie

So a neon sign rendition of Priyanka Chopra sauntered around a neon sign rendered city, crooning seductively about her new found beauty. Apparently, she found it in Unilever’s Pandora Box, hiding in a bathing soap called Lux Provocateur.

One boring Sunday noon, intoxicated with very, very flat beer and leftover macaroni from last night, my eyes lit, neon-signly. Whoever thought they’d play a soap ad on Cartoon Network, that too in the middle of ‘Courage, the Cowardly Dog’? I stood no chance against large media agencies.

To be fair to my cause, I wasn’t under the impression that I was made of rice lights, nor that I would magically turn into Priyanka Chopra if I bathed in Lux Provocateur. What fuelled my imagination was that the soap was black in colour.

Kaala Saabun, I thought. That’s dynamite’s nickname. Under the influence of Vijay Mallya’s only contribution to the world and the traumatic standstill of Sunday, my left brain gave way.

As fate had it, by evening, an empty fridge told me that the impending visit to the grocery store was now unprocastinatable, if there’s a word like that. So I went, heading straight for the booze.
POP and retail strategies are crafty, cunning and ruthless. They got me again. For, bang opposite my favorite wine section, stood a new brightly coloured standee.
The Lux Provocateur grinned at my hypnotized being, inviting, scheming. Unwittingly, I picked a dark chocolate coated pack and scanned the gold motifs on it.



Though I didn’t need a bath, I turned on the geezer. Ripped the package open, and the naked bar of black soap lay on my palm.

It didn’t look as exciting as I imagined.

Ssomething inside me began to break. I think it was the rumbling of my logic waking up.
Quickly, I began to look for a defense. What color could the lather be?!


White. Bubbles… small, tiny ones.
Like in detergent soap.
Like in hand wash.
Like in every friggin’ cleaning agent based discovery since soapnuts!

I am distressed, shattered and curse EVERYONE involved in the conception, inception, production marketing and stocking of the black wonderless bar of broken neon-signed dreams, false promises and white bland bubbles and… I HATE YOU!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! I hate you Provocateur, you stupid spelled bar of Indian Ink! And Lux! You too! You betrayed me! You and your.. you.. black, black soaps and your celebrity caricature endorsed stupid… stupid slogans and baslines and.. and… what the hell does, ‘Ab Khoobsurati se darr kaisa?” even mean?!

Fuck you, Unilever! And all you motherfucking Js, Ws, and Ts of the world!!!! FUCK YOU ALL!!!


I’m back, Harmony! Love you dear, dear Harmony. Non-endorsed by deceiving celebrity, dirty font, cheaply designed pack of Harmony. Fruity, normal colored Harmony. And your lather has bigger bubbles too, and they’re a little red and orangey and.. and blue!


Eh… That’s a good thing, right?

Waiting Room

Some years ago, I made a friend, with some effort, who told me how he hated the waiting room at the dentist’s worse than the experience of having his vulnerability shift from below his stomach to above his neck.

I’ve been to a dentist once or twice. I’m not sure when, but I remember it was the age just before a milk tooth hanging by a vein stops being cool. So I can’t remember if it grossed me out, but I know I pretended I wasn’t scared.

Coming back to my old friend. He was twenty two when he saw the dentist then, and since he didn’t have the advantage of age, the decision to set his jaw straight was his own. I still think that’s what scared him the most. That he couldn’t go home and tell his mother to compensate for the trauma with a hug and hot chocolate served in his brother’s mug. If being an adult sucks, pretending to be one is a black hole.

Apparently, the dentist excavated his mouth to find cavities you could look down into and see his spleen. His whitest tooth was ochre and the yellowiest was black. Like farmers in Haiti, his teeth fought with their neighbours for land and displaced the weaker ones, pushing them into the darkest recesses of his mouth, left to rot, thin and flaky.

For reasons I couldn’t even begin to comprehend, this relieved him. With a deep sigh that nauseated the flies on our table, he explained.

“You should’ve seen the room, Golly. It wasn’t even a room… It was a long corridor... kind of like a morgue. You can’t see the person next to you because you’re scared his teeth are worse, and if they’re not, you know you’re in deep s*it.

When the person next to you is called in… its like you shared a bunk in Hitler’s Extermination Camp. Your heart burns to see him go in. He gulps silently, looking at you, like to say, “I was a b*tch, brother. But I know you’ll miss me.”

The worst part is all that waiting time kind of gets your imagination running… dentists always look like nice people. Nice people who shine and polish sharp steel things that go in your mouth.”

He sipped some water and lit a smoke. His cigarette burning on both ends, he closed his eyes tight shut, like to see inside him.


That image is kind of frozen in my head, him lying back, eyes tight shut and exhausted, and it kind of thawed here and now. I’m in my own corridor of sorts, waiting. Now, I get what he meant when he said the dentist was scary, but waiting for him was just lethal. You can’t not wait, there’s no option. You can’t walk out because you know its bad enough for you to have finally come. You can’t barge in next either, because you’re still too scared.

Only, I don’t quite know what I’m waiting for. I guess its okay as long as nothing inside is rotting. Nothing’s displacing anything else.


My friend’s mouth now elsewhere, the city is less polluted. He never went back to the dentist, though he had scheduled an appointment for the next week. He felt guilty for a while and then stopped pretending to be a grown up.

“You’re allowed mistakes when you let your instincts make them.” He explained.
And he turned out alright.

I guess my nice people with polished steel thingummies will call me in soon or later. I just hope whenever they do, I have fewer battles inside me to show them. Until then, I’ll just have to close my eyes tight shut, look inside me, and wait.

Rotten Coffee Beans

There's a beach close to my dad's village in South Canara. Strangely, its unnamed and not too many people know of it. You could keep driving down the coast and can see the wild Arabian Sea smashing against the rocks on one side. The road begins to narrow down and you realise the other side belongs to the River Suvarna, calm and childlike, streaming against your road. You keep driving down as the path narrows down and stops to meet the point where the river and the sea meet. Its a spectacular sight, really. Like from another planet.

When I got there, I knew I had to sit at the shore and just blankly stare at the water around me, but I was far too confused. To my left was the sea, the sea and the sea. It was vast and angry and powerful. It had tamed its shore to flow down softly into it and disappear under its blue. Somehow today, it was scary, like God is sometimes. Too big to love. Too powerful to be tender.

To my right, though, was the river. The femininity of Suvarna hit me immediately. An aimless drifter, she was ambition-less, childlike and careless and she loved every moment of the freedom her purposelessness gave her. She joined the sea with almost no struggle and made way for the massive white foam to hit her blue green tranquility defenselessly. It didn't matter anymore, as long as no one told her to stop flowing. She was scared, but she was just as curious.

Not thinking too much more, I sat down by the bank of my new found girlfriend and listened to the noises around. The moon was rising above the Suvarna and the refection of the setting sun on the Arabian Sea caught my eye. I needed to write, instantly, and it didn't matter if I wrote gibberish. It didn't matter if I tore it up later and hid my hopeless romanticism and less than none expressive skills. I'm still kind of spaced out though I'm back home now, and I hope to remain so for some time.

Make me a wave if you must make me an ocean.
Make me the wave nearest to the shore.
Make me white and make me break
So you can take me again and make me once more.

Make me a river if you must make me a sea.
Make me sleepwalk in the arms of the paths I choose.
Make me weaker than I know really I am
And let me cry for every dream I lose.

Make me a drop and let me forget.

Make me one with a thousand insignificances.

Let me lie here till I can't move anymore

Till all the ocean in me erupts into a thousand dances.