The Morgue

The stacked sliding steel cabinets, the dull fluorescent lighting, the gloved hands, and the covered body – you can almost smell the stench, as you watch the morgue scene of a movie.

Reality is quite different, I can tell you.

It was almost three years ago. My cousin lived across the street from my parents. Always dropping in. Always sharing her dishes. Always consulting on sarees and serials. I didn’t know her all that well – rather, I didn’t care to know her all that well. When you are growing up in a make-believe world where all that matters are the adventures of a bunch of kids and a dog in a far-away land, impressions are carelessly moulded in the fresh clay. Half-baked notions and vague ideas fill up the gaps rapidly, and you fly up on a hot air balloon, looking down condescendingly at the world below.

There are always relatives whom you wish to avoid. In my case, it was everyone remotely related to me, excluding my immediate family. And so it came to pass that my cousin, whom I barely knew, filled the void of my parents’ empty nest better than any of us could, from our distances. Guilt and relief played hide-and-seek with every mention of her.

My cousin had a zest for life in her own unique way. She bought bangles by the dozens, sarees by the bundle, filled up her showcase (that ubiquitous glass-fronted dump) with bric-a-brac, crammed every nook and corner of her house with artificial flowers, avidly discussed every serial threadbare, participated in TV shows and ladies’ clubs, religiously observed every festival and ritual with an unusual amount of orthodoxy – her life busy and buzzing with the trivia of existence.

The morning after Ekadasi (the way my mother remembers it), she was reciting her stotras, when the flower seller knocked on her door. Muttering her curses at the late arrival, my cousin collected the flowers and then proceeded to decorate the innumerable divinities that populated her pooja room. Bending over a lamp that was in the throes of dying out. A flicker and a leap. A circle of orange and yellow blazing tongues. A saree burnt to a crisp. Hands that looked like boiled tomatoes. Agony and hell.

My mother dashed across, summoned by a frantic maid. A doctor was brought. Family members informed. Husband who was out of the country telephoned. An anguished mother comforted. Ambulance and hospitals; ointments and medicines; police and reports; ICU and grafting.

After nearly a month of heroic battle, my cousin succumbed. Finally. Relief at last, from a pain as intense to experience as to behold.

She lay in the morgue. A tiny room, not more than five by five. Whitewash streaked, faded, and peeling, disintegrating into the cement floor in shades of dirty grey. Dirt and some sort of animal droppings in the corner. A rusty metal bed, a stained sheet. She lies serene. Only her face is visible. The rest is bandaged or covered – any exposure would be unbelievably brutal.

She could get up right now, I think, as my mother calls out her name, softly crying. She could get up right now, and walk away. Away from this horrendous place. Away from this dump. Get up, I silently urge. Go lie down some place else. With dignity.

The Nanny

She stands just within the doorway, resplendently dressed as ever, wearing a stoic mask for a face.

“So?” I ask.

“The settlement madam…we spoke over the phone…”, her voice is steady, but low.

“OK, that’s fine, but what happened?”

There’s a struggle going on inside her, as she seeks the right words to explain her week of absence. I look at her and I am reminded of the day we first met her, just about five months ago.

********
The doorbell rings sharp at 1.30pm. That’s a good sign – she’s punctual.

I open the door, and take a sharp breath. Her attire reminds me of a village mela – strings of scented jasmine on her hair like the flower-sellers; colorful jangling bangles on both arms, like the bangle-sellers; bright patterned orange sari with matching blouse, like the cloth-sellers; and surprisingly dainty sandals, like the shoe-sellers. She is small and compact and stylish, and her bright, brown eyes are active within their kajal borders.

The decision to hire a nanny was almost natural. I could see that li’l D. was growing bored within the confines of our apartment. I could see that urge to run around and play in the sand and mud and flowers and grass building up within her, and expressed by her hyperactive tendencies. She was quite bored having me around her all the time. It was time for a change. We agreed a nanny would make things better for everyone concerned. D. could have her fun-in-the-sun time, and I could definitely do with some relief.

We were apprehensive, of course, when it came to the selection. Finally, a recommendation from a friend helped us.

She says her name is Neera*. She’s come with her brother-in-law. We try to agree on the timings – I need her in the evenings really, but she comes from a long way off, and it’s simply not feasible. We try to agree on the rate – I find her a bit on the expensive side. We don’t really make much headway – I tell her I’ll call back.

After much discussion, we decide it’s advantage Neera. So, I give her a call and tell her she can join immediately. She’s to work half a day only.

She is a diligent worker. Doesn’t need much supervision. D. just adores her. I begin to relax. Everyone is happy. It’s hard to believe she’s just 24, and yet married, with a 7-year old son. I wonder how she must have felt as a teenaged mother. Her son, she tells me, is scared of only her. He refuses to listen to anyone else.

Her grandma passes away – she doesn’t come for three days. Her son falls sick – she takes a week off. She falls sick – she takes four days off – she comes back and tells me that someone poisoned her food – she describes the symptoms, and it looks like an attack of appendicitis to me. She says she got herself detoxified through a tantric. It really makes me wonder if I know her at all. Her sister-in-law consumes poison for unspecified reasons – she takes three days off.

Still, when she arrives, D. goes into raptures of excitement. Neera begins to show a marked affection towards D, sometimes even appearing jealous when D insists I be around. I reciprocate likewise – whenever D shows a preference to her nanny, I get all worked up and anxious – perhaps I’m not being a good mother after all!

We convert her schedule to a full day schedule, on a revised salary with a big jump. It’s not a very taxing schedule – D’s at her play school or sleeping most of the time, and I bathe and feed her. Meanwhile, I am waiting on milady, hand and foot, with breakfast and lunch served on a platter. I quell my misgivings about this seemingly one-sided arrangement, consoling myself that she’s looking after D. quite well.

As the days pass by, Neera seems to grow more silent and sullen. Though she is the same with li’l D, I sense rather than see the change in her. And then, the phone calls come. On holidays. Has she come to work today? Will she be coming? When will she come? I don’t really pay much attention to the calls; perhaps I should have. I don’t mention them to her either.

I give her a day off – I’m spending the day at my friend’s place. The next day she doesn’t show up – no call either. That’s a little unusual – she’s always very prompt at calling in when she’s going to absent herself. I mutter something to myself about unreliable domestic help, but it doesn’t really affect me. If there’s one thing I’ve learnt, it’s to be totally unfazed even if the domestic helpers don’t show up – I know I can manage quite well even without them, and that fact gives me confidence when dealing with them.

The call comes late in the night, two days later.

“Madam, there’s a tremendous fight going on in the house”. She is tight-lipped about it. “I will come to work on Thursday”.

Thursday comes and goes with no sign of her. A call again. Same minimal information. And then there’s a sudden uneasy quiet. I don’t hear from her at all for over a week.

Then the other calls begin to come. Where is she? Has she come to work today? I get irritated. Who is this, I ask. Her husband, is the reply.

My mind goes on overdrive. What’s going on here? I come up with a million storylines, all worse than C-grade movies.

Then one fine morning, I get her call again. She says she’s staying with her brother-in-law. She says it’s very far off, so she would like to quit work. And when can she come and collect her dues? Come tomorrow, I say.

The next morning, I get a call from her husband. He says they had a terrible fight. He says he didn’t want her to work late, but she insisted, saying she liked her job. He says she disappeared since, and he doesn’t know where to find her. I hesitate, strangely reluctant to give out any information about her. I tell him she hasn’t turned up for work for the past ten days. Lying by omission.

So here we are, she and I. Facing each other for what could possibly be the last time. I notice the freshly tinted vermillion thread around her neck, the sindoor at the parting of her hair, fresh flowers adorning her braid, a dozen new bangles clinking on each arm, and what definitely looks like a new green and beige silk saree. Good heavens, I think, rather taken aback! She certainly looks like a newly wed bride. Is it possible she’s eloped? It’s unthinkable, and interesting emotions churn through me.

She struggles to answer my question. Finally, she twists her bangles around unhappily, and says, without meeting my eyes…My husband was suspecting me, madam. He said I don’t do a regular job, I am working at a “guest house”, he did not want me to continue, so we had a terrible fight, and I left his home…

I wait, but she has finished what she wanted to say, and is waiting for me to hand over her money. I sigh, not knowing what to think, and give it to her. I don’t tell her about the phone calls either.

She takes it and walks away, without a backward glance, without saying thanks. What hurts most is that she does not mention D even once – she does not ask after the one who loved her so unconditionally. Perhaps she was hurting more.

As I write this, I wonder where she is and what she is doing now. What sort of life did she lead? Had things gotten so ugly that she had to leave her home? Or perhaps she has really run away with someone else, and started a new life somewhere else.

I get a call this evening also from her husband – she has still not gone home. There is a quiet desperation in his voice. I wonder what he thinks. Does he regret his words, and thoughts, and deeds? Or is he waiting to show her who’s boss? I wonder what he tells his little son, who wants his mommy. Will that son grow up with a core of resentment embedded in his heart? Will he be one of the juvenile delinquents who wind up in jail for years awaiting trial? Or will he be strong and conquer all odds?

A story - the ending of which I will never know.

* Name changed to protect identity [Gosh! I'm thrilled that I could use that line!]

Glass Half Empty

Front page news about Anupam Kher being replaced as Censor Board chief.

Agreed, the Censor Board is mostly a redundant and archaiac concept in today's India, with everything that can be considered censor material, being beamed directly into our living rooms.

However, what irked me was the reason given. Apparently, Anupam Kher is a right-wing sympathizer and BJP supporter. And that's enough reason to give him the boot!!

It's slowly but surely that the UPA is now reversing practically every decision that the NDA implemented. When NDA was in power, the media were shouting themselves hoarse for any and every small misdemeanour. Now, they seem to be happy to wear blinkers and pretend that everything is hunky-dory.

I don't know about other cities in India, but I've seen Bangalore reduced to shambles after the general election. Roads are in an utter mess, flyovers are being delayed, the CET chaos simply refuses to be solved intelligently, the film industry is in limbo with activists taking the law into their own hands, and the latest is that the applicants to the Arkavathy layout sites now have to shell out extra as interest for no fault of theirs - it's due to the delay in settling the issues.

There was a headline in the supplement today - Where have all the sidewalks gone? - I wanted to laugh! Perhaps the writer should have first asked - Where have all the roads gone?!

The rest of Karnataka does not make a pretty sight either.

Meanwhile, people continue to live their lives as best they can - no amount of agitation or grievance-airing seems to make any difference. If the government had any iota of shame whatsoever, then things might just have been a little different!

At the national level, when the NDA was in power, there was some glimmer of hope, and one felt somewhat optimistic. In the opposition, however, the BJP is bumbling along hopelessly, without any sort of coherence, while the UPA, with its motley group, appears to be trying in vain to project a can-do image, while trying to camouflage the Leftist angle.

I am feeling very pessimistic about development in this country. I wish the resolution to this disagreeable state of affairs was as easy as creating a new blogspot and building a community around it!

The Quiet American

In the midst of a suddenly and extremely frenetic life, I managed to enroll myself into a new DVD library that opened recently - Cinema Paradiso. Seemed to be a nice place and at first glance, appeared to have a pretty good collection, including World Cinema.

One of the movies we picked up was The Quiet American. I'm never one for war movies, and especially those with the backdrop of the Vietnam war. The only movie I remember having sat thru was Good Morning, Vietnam.

However, my attention was captured by the opening scenes of this movie itself. It starts with the death of an American, Pyle, and a British reporter Fowler, is called in to identify him.

Fowler, played to perfection by Michael Caine, is trying to prolong his stay at Vietnam, comfortable with his life and his Vietnamese girlfriend Phuong, who is a former taxi dancer. He comes into contact with Pyle, an American eye doctor, played by Brendan Fraser. Pyle falls in love with Phuong at first sight, and an interesting triangle ensues, with the politics of the Vietnam war interwoven skilfully into the tale.

Fowler's detachment disintegrates as the movie progresses, and he is drawn into making decisions that affect him personally. One unforgettable scene is when he tries to confront Pyle at his office, after losing Phuong to him. Pyle is not there, but Fowler makes a scene nevertheless, then locks himself in the men's room, and breaks down. A lovely line from his Vietnamese assistant goes something like: "Sooner or later, Mr. Fowler, one has to take sides if one has to remain human".

Pyle's clean and honest character slowly muddies as the story unravels his true identity. Brendan Fraser, whom I've seen before in such imbecile starrers as The Mummy and George of the Jungle, quite surprises, by turning in a real neat performance, with a mature and underplayed portrayal.

Do Thi Hai Yen's dignity, tranquility and expressive eyes, as Phuong, make complete, what I feel, is a casting coup.

It was a quiet and mature kind of movie - no over-dramatising or over-the-top heroics. The human interest angle was retained with a sense of detachment; emotions were very subtle; the war scenes were sparsely used, and shot in a subdued manner; the horrific explosion and its aftermath in Saigon were once again portrayed with a human touch.

It's based on the novel by Graham Greene which I haven't read, so I can't really say what's missing. The other interesting angle was that I watched the movie with little or no sound - only subtitles (as you can guess, I was watching it at real odd hours! :D). So, though I can't really comment on the background score (the subtitles had such gems as "omninous music sounding"!), the lack of sound did very little to detract the substance of the movie, which I felt, was very creditable.

All in all, it was a movie worth watching.

Actors and their Persona

I was watching promos of Swades, where SRK is supposed to be a NASA scientist returning to India, and Veer-Zaraa, which is a partition-background flick.

It struck me that the persona of the actor overshadows the character he/she is playing so hugely, that it's simply difficult to ignore. It's perhaps a little premature to judge Swades, but the impression it left was that of SRK playing a NASA scientist, rather than a NASA scientist played by SRK.

Whether it's Bollywood or Hollywood, the ability to subordinate the actor's persona to the character being depicted, is probably the toughest to achieve. The actor needs to be almost transparent, or as blank as a canvas, to take on the texture of the character. The bigger the image of an actor as a superstar, the more this becomes impossible. It's very difficult to see Amitabh or Robert De Niro, not as themselves portraying some other characters.

We rarely get to see such portrayals in Bollywood. Even supporting actors carry their personal stamp on whichever character they portray. I think probably Anupam Kher is one of the few who can actually morph himself into a totally different character, keeping very little of his real self in view.



The last time I was completely surprised, was by Richard Roxburgh in Moulin Rouge. Perhaps it was because I had never seen the actor before, but when I saw him in an interview, I was completely blown away. He was so very different from the Duke he portrayed! I could hardly believe this was the same person indeed. Right from looks to mannerisms to diction - the metamorphosis was so complete!

...And then there's Paradise!

Last night, at 11pm, I had a kulfi.
A kesar-pista, milky delight.
Every lick was a treat.
It tasted so deliciously yummy.
I slurped it all up - each cold rivulet pulsating on my tongue in an explosion of taste, and sliding down my throat!
Heaven on earth - that's what it was!

Freebie Hell!

To the bright spark who invented "Buy x, Get y free!"

Be afraid, be very afraid! I shall hunt you down to the ends of the earth, and skin you alive very slowly and deliberately.

So you think you're very smart, eh? You think you're God's gift from heaven to companies.

Companies whose vision statements read like so:
"Make the entire universe consumers"

And their mission statements read like so:
"Spread out to the remotest corners of the universe, starting with Planet Earth, and convince/cajole/persuade/force/torture people into a state of abject consumerism".

So, you're thinking - hey! I got a win-win-win here! Companies are happy because their sales are up, since they've suckered more consumers into getting hooked on to their products; Consumers are happy because they feel they've got a good bargain; and I'm happy because I got a great promotion and a fat bonus, on which I can retire to an island in the Caribbean!

Wishful thinking, dearie!

I hold you personally accountable for the tons of junk that have accumulated in my home, and which is now overflowing into other apartment balconies. The association has sternly reprimanded me, and threatened me with, God forbid, house-arrest!

I also hold you personally accountable for the dirty dishes lying in the sink, the piles of unwashed laundry, and the cobwebs lying in the attic! If I was not so busy trying to figure out a place for everything, so that everything is in its place, I might have at least had the time to clean up!

At last freebie count, I have 17 glasses, 5 tubes of toothpaste, 4 plastic boxes, 2 towel hangers, 3 baby mugs, 2 baby books, 3 toothbrushes, 2 steel bowls, 5 packs of papad, 3 packets of Tang-like stuff, 15 small satchets of tomato sauce, 4 cakes of soap... I feel like the modern Noah, with my laden ark!

So, I'm coming after you - I've had it with this freebie stuff! Just because you manufacture thoughtlessly, doesn't mean you can dump it on us without so much as a by-your-leave!

Run, dearie, run!

Gentle Persuasion

Read my new poem here.