No Strings Attached

Few people except the residents and businessmen may be aware of a place on the landscape of West Bengal called Haldia. It is a serene (or shall I say was!!) beautiful city on the banks of river- Haldi and has provided enough fodder- being a port city- towards the growth of the biggest industries in and around it. Then came the sharks to tap the educational potential (that the place was supposed to offer; being away from the City Pent) and behold; an engineering institute came up by the name Haldia Institute of Technology.

Like a chain reaction- it propelled small but sufficient and family-like shops to mushroom around it; each specializing in tea, omelette, maggi (bhaja maggi v1.0), parothas, etc., the staple diet of engineers.

I had left my job in September 2009 and was preparing for GATE ( graduate level examination for admission into PG programmes) while staying at my professor Dr. P.R.Purkait's residence in the college campus. I was a student of the institute from 2003 to 2007.

There was one such shop that bobbled very recently and to my greatest surprise it was selling "litti"- a kind of spherical or circular flour cakes filled with fried gram flour along with a host of spices, ginger, garlic, etc. and cooked either deep fried or over heated charcoal. This litti has its ardent base in the states of Bihar and UP. It is usually served with "chutney" (made up of fresh coriander leaves grinded with a pounder against a stone slab) or "chokha" (made from roasted brinjal/ potato/ tomato- all mashed together with a tinge of mustard oil, green chillies and salt to taste.

Now my college- in the vicinity of Bengal and away from the pompous and grand Kolkata (by a margin of 120 kms.)- did have a substantial population from those northern neighbors- and accordingly business acumen prevailed over simplicity. It was a kind of daily affair to have litti-chokha-chutney in the evening and tea to complement and savour the spicy taste. Moreover the taste of the above delicacies tend to reach pinnacle if its monsoon and rain gods have their supplies uninterrupted on a plain lucky day.

Most of the shop owners employed children from the nearby villages or children from their extended families so as not to create dependencies. In that litti shop worked an effervescent and garrulous kid named Bhola-ageing around 7 years. Bhola is the name of Lord Shiva and it also means simple. And he was the center of attraction and we used to pull his leg on the least of pretexts. But he took these in the best of the spirits and amused us beyond anger, surprise; and a healthy dose of entertainment was lined up in the evenings. 

A recent study carried out by eminent scholars concluded that any two unknown persons in this world would be somehow connected by the seventh node i.e. one person would be related to another by a chain of other seven persons. On this note and out of curiosity and general inquisitiveness, I thought of knowing more about that little kid, so I placed a nugget, Who else is there in your family? And his stark reply swept me by surprise; more so as I never expected it to be so choking and full of a sense of lost childhood and brimming pathos (which that kid might not be fully aware of!!). 

And his reply to who else is there in his family was Aamar keu nai!! (Nobody is there in my family).

Written on 24th May 2011.

An Empty Bottle

The brain of a child grows at a rapid pace to process myriad information- keeping in mind the newer explorations encountered in day-to-day life. The pursuant nature of a child tries best to decode plethora of first -time knowledge, save the data and retrieve it later as an information. While all these management procedures keep churning tons of data, a silent mind is engaged so as to act such that appreciation follows from the near and dear ones- and this involves adventures of selfless values- for a little smile on the face of the parents, for a heartfelt hug from a brother, for a pound of love from a sister. These feelings cannot be harbored superficially- they have their origin in the tranquil unadulterated corners of the auspicious brain- called the heart. I don't see them as two entities- rather it's their jamming effort that leads to the event called thinking.

It was one such event that led triggered this story to see the light of the day. While four of us 'friends' were happily ambling over the road for an evening snacks, we discovered a girl- little enough not to carry heavy weight- carrying discarded items (or may throw-away items); a comb with protruding teeth like that of an old man, a slice of a mirror with sharp protruding edges like that of life- a little misjudgment and a deep cut worth lifetime of memory, some torn books like dreams of a poor- with pages but unordered and disconnected, a pen without a cap but with little fountain of ink left- enough to propel the dreams for a constructive travel ahead, a few caps of soft drinks bottles- like the courage to prevent the aerated soda to flip, a glass with meandering edges like the mountains and volleys- none can keep you at the bottom for a lifetime.

With much effort she was trying her best to keep the paraphernalia from falling from her gracious clutch. She may be around 4-5 years old, wearing a purplish frock that seemed to have outlived its expiry, multicolored sandals belonging to two different sets adorned her motherly little feet, a pair of eyes like that of an archaeologist set to unearth some heritage monument, ruffled hairs from where the setting sun was bidding a charismatic good-bye.

She was just unaware of anybody's presence around her and was walking with the slowest of strides lest her findings may once again have to be arranged and that might break this composure and the rhythm of this pleasant walk down the road. She was some hundred feet away from us when all of a sudden- she put down her valuables by the side of the road and picked up an empty bottle- looked  very closely from all sides and somehow her face gestured that it brought more of an accomplishment than the rest of her findings.

In the meantime we were about to pass by her and I could not resist myself from asking her, "What would you do with this?". And I just could hold back my tears to what she replied. "This is what my baba (father) drinks daily.". It was a empty bottle of rum.

A child who has hardly seen anything beyond her village and nearby was so satisfied on discovering an empty bottle that her father brings daily. It was a feeling that never knew how to distinct- a shudhha (pure) and satwik (virtuous) ātmā's (soul's) outbursts- this feeling moves and surges ahead with the fuel called care and love.

Written on 23rd May 2011.

The Guava Crow

Just behind my window is a very old guava tree- much more than my age of three cube. My first memory association with it- and even then it was bearing all-year round guavas. The canopy that it is above my home is an affable attraction for a variety of local birds, a family of squirrel and a murder of crows. And of-late a dumb crow.

The crows are not fond of guavas as far as my knowledge informs. The congregation is a shelter to these living creatures- a home from the sultry and scorching wave of summers.

The crow is physically challenged in our parlance. It is unable to speak like the other crows. Yet it has never let that doom to take precedence and unceremoniously glorify its life. Nor do the other crows have established rules to bog it down for its inability to express itself in their words. Interestingly, the other crows (identified only when they crow-crow) share an identifiable bonhomie and a sense of care and fraternal maturity towards the dumb crow. In fact, it is I who is distinguishing between them; they may not be aware of terminologies as such physically challenged, dumb, etc.They may be accepting it the other way round - 'that crow speaks seldom and in a different tone altogether. And that may be reason enough for their gatherings on the guava tree around the dumb crow at different times of the day.

While the other crows unanimously crow saying either kaanv-kaanv or kaa-kaa or a variety of other k-type expressions, the dumb crow specializes in uttering the smallest k's like k-k-k-k... At times I have seen them sharing their meals with this crow. But crows are reputed scavengers and this a statement hard to fathom!! Is it because they are non-human? Or is it because they are humane to some degree? Or is it because their books don't preach differentiation but integration? The crows are predators of minuscule nature and take great pride in social development.

On the other hand, we as the species of biggest evolutionary cycle are holing up our values, ethics and humanity for scalene means. In an oasis of complex developments on all grounds, men still owe a lot to the animals. With changing environment and biology, paucity and surplus- animals have adapted a lot and have kept the social fabric intact as well. Alas! we evolved the most but inculcated dreary and hollow ideals to quench the materialistic thirst - forgetting the purpose of sustainable life in the round marathon.

The crows still assimilate and share stories of courage and patience- after all they've the tacit listener in the guava crow for them.

Written on 24th May 2011.

Decoded...Not Yet

In today’s technologically progressive world, human feelings have been relegated to the brink of humiliation. Now the so-called social life breathes only in the virtual world of Facebooks, Twitters, Orkuts (my sincerest obituaries) and so on. Real people are nowadays found only in the cobwebs of virtual constituencies from where all the phases of fast-paced life are made public without the incursion of RTI on their lives. Quite shocking and disturbing, especially when we hear on a regular basis that defamation suits are filed more often than appreciating messages.

But the more intriguing question that lurks is- why are we cutting the real connections and unnecessarily procuring ourselves to others unasked for, while shunting the real fabric of attachment and letting it die a silent death- mocking it with a tinge of embarrassment.

Only the other day did I find that I turned a year older and some 70 odd Facebookers walled me on this monumental achievement; and believe me I was least impressed. I had no real connections with at least 60% of them, haven’t spoken with the rest 30% for almost 5 years, and the filtered ones numbering around 6-7 do share a bond of coupling- shall I pronounce strong enough and tested for tenacity over the span of time- but even a notable number of them preferred to limit themselves to walling me- an ode to Facebook on curbing the sensibilities of mind and heart- without it being imposed on them.

Agree that out of those 6-7, few might not be having the privilege of owning my exclusive ‘mobile number ‘- at least the remaining 2-3 must be free from that- and when I say least let us agree on ‘1’- who shall have all the reason to touch me by sound waves- even there Facebook lured away. What bait does it offer in turn? It must be their secret recipe behind this unassuming feat- changing the course of attachment with its magical chords.

Written on 23rd May 2011.