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 After 3 months of exile, I had decided to go home hoping to get some rest and have home cooked food cooked by someone other than me, for a change. Well, let me tell you that my primary objective was not met. My trip lasted 10 days of which 4 days were booked by my folks for a family ‘outing’. I thought home-coming was already an outing for me, but God had other plans. Second, I had called in my bro to visit home during the same week hoping his presence would take away some of the attention off me, and also give me some rest. I was wrong there too. Of the remaining few days when I was in my home town, and when I was not scooting around the city sampling food all over, I was sweating over the wok cooking his favourite dishes. This in addition to Mom’s special requests, too. Moving on, the family trip was booked at some supposedly starry resort in a beach town. When we reached there, we found that starry or not, all buildings on the that sea-side were badly corroded due to the salty winds. But thankfully, we could see the beach, and we were staying at the far lonely end of the beach which was peaceful to think of.
Bro somehow is always excited about any trip, though I was not really keen on tripping with my folks. There are several reasons, all of which could be summed up as one primary reason, we are different kind of people. Radically different. On a holiday, I usually have a vague broad plan in mind, but hate to microplan to the minute; something my folks pride themselves for. Somehow the lack of spontaneity and the hours of decision-making kills it for me.
Also, my dad has a habit of packing in too many things in the itinerary, consequently they would call us on the phone extension at 6am every morning and then walk upto our room and ring our doorbell exactly half an hour later to ensure we were up. Which obviously we weren’t. Because we knew they would walk up to our room and ring the door bell to re-wake us. The breakfast was also an interesting time every day. We would gather in the breakfast hall and bro would go around the buffet doing a recci and come back to inform everyone what to touch and what not to. The breakfast was also interesting for one more reason, the live flautist. No he did not play well, whatever he played we couldn’t decipher, he was way off tune and it wasn’t one bit pleasing to our ears. But he tried his best. We sometimes suspected he was also the part-time cook, because some of the food was equally bad.
Anyhow, we did have some nice times too. For example, when we had to tip-toe over a man-made jetty made of sand bags over a tiny lagoon to get to the beach, and we saw tiny red crabs and skeletons of some giant turtles. Their shells were missing so we suspect they did not die natural deaths. Greedy inhuman humans. Also nice, was the drive in the rains to Konark, where we visited the famous Sun temple. We couldn’t help noticing some of the erotic sculptures, and a great deal of variety for that matter, man on woman, woman on woman, dog on woman, snake on snake, threesomes and more. Too much variety for my taste. I wonder what holier than thou explanation will our religious fanatics give to that. Mom was glad we did not hire a guide because apparently on her earlier visits, she had heard them giving embarrassingly intricate descriptions of the sculptures. Porn temple, as some would probably call it. But I am not complaining, afterall I was not there for religious reasons. I was keen to see the venue where every famous Odissi dancer has performed. It was nice to see the attempts to preserve the ruins.
One of the good things of visiting a beach town is the seafood. We has a good time sampling the fried seafood on the road-side stalls lining the beach. Also mentionable is a place called Wild Grass where the food was damn good and the ambience was better than the food. We were seated atop machans as we ate. Dad felt a bit sick though, and the rest of us were busy blaming each other for feeding him all the street side non-sense earlier.
The best thing on the trip though, was the boat ride to Chilika lake. It is probably Asia’s largest lake, and what’s more, it even meets the sea. 5 hours of boat ride might seem a bit too much, there were times when we could only see water around, I even dozed off for a while. But we got some great shots with our cameras, vast stretches of water, driftwood, dolphins, some lucky guy chilling under a shady tree on the banks, etc. There was even a sudden storm in which we got stranded; the boatman parked the boat on a nearby island and covered the boat with plastic sheets to keep us from getting drenched. The storm lasted for about half an hour and then suddenly it stopped and all was bright as earlier again. Can’t imagine how sailors put up with such whims of nature.
In the hind sight, it was a nice break. I just wish there was less activity though. Or maybe not. Sometimes it is so difficult to make up your mind as to what you like. I’m probably scheduled to go camping next week. Now let’s see if I can like it.
Staying alone might be fun, but its not easy. It has been two months since I shifted to another city, and after
three years of unwanted parental protection I was most determined to stay absolutely alone this time. No roomies, no flatmates, just me and my much savoured solitude. So far, it was so good. Until I started shopping for home. And ordering furniture. And doing the laundry. And cooking. Managing a house on my own has been pretty challenging. For starters it takes a week to deliver a bed that is usually delivered in 2 days, because there is noone at your place to receive the package except on weekends. Ditto for courier. In fact, I cannot even ask for a courier to my office because I sit in a Ministry building where human entry is so procedural that no courier guy would ever bother delivering. (It is different for monkeys and dogs because they loiter around freely without a govt. pass) Not that I am being couriered very intelligent stuff from home. They recently sent me a package containing some semiprecious stones (that I am expected to wear for good luck) and a dry twig (that I am supposed to carry in my purse). I would have, of course, asked for something more useful such as packets of shiitake mushrooms, five spice and some such. Yes food of course, what else am I ever passionate about?
 That reminds me, I have been eating around quite a bit despite complaining continually about the bad weather, which, in actuality, is bad. Thankfully the food is good. I am also thankful to the small gutter group we have formed at work; partly named because of the level of sophistication in our discussions, and partly because of the kind of additional work that flows down to us when others stop delivering. Somebody’s tattered report, someone’s rejected document, papers with bad english, papers which make no sense and files which have no defined takers. I have been turned from an environment expert to the official copyeditor, the transport planner has become the administrative head and the urban planner has been reduced to a multipurpose man friday to no one particular person. To add to the injury, we all report to a fat ugly female bureaucrat who scares unsuspecting young boys by flashing her thunder thighs under the table and dismisses young women with equivalent vengeance.
Unfortunately, these are not things to be told when someone asks ‘How’s life?’ so I have been managing with a non-descript nod these days.
So now that I’m gone
Strewn from your life
Far flung from your boundless vicinity
Into the dark dungeons of some other
Hoping it would make you glad
Someday
Here I am back to ask you my lady
Are you happy?
To have let go of me?
After all those years of distress
That I have caused you
Apologies due, in cue
For the waterworks
But why is it that I see
No glee
The smile, unrestored
The frown still lingering over that brow
Was it not enough
to leave you in peace?
Or is it that I fear?
That you miss me, my lady?
Yours truly,
Solitude
My base had been in the same place for so long it had started to get a bit sore. And I admit, itchy. So I decided to shift it. Some people in their good senses had already done the privilege of initiating the process by making me an offer that I saw no point in rejecting. All I had to do was say yes. And relieve myself of my current assignments.
I quickly typed a letter saying “…blah blah..wish I could stay longer …BS..BS..and so I quit.” It was followed by 14 rounds of email exchanges which more or less sounded like this in gist:
“But why, cant you stay?”
“no”
“Are you pissed?”
“No”
“Do you want something more?”
“No”
“Stay till we find a replacement”
“Here’s a CV - *shoot*”
“When do you want release?”
“In three weeks”
“That’s too short”
“Like I care”
But it wasn’t over. I had to make a crisis management trip to the NE, with.my.boss. Couple of my colleagues warned me on phone about this being a ploy to make me change my mind (which I believe they did not want, but then hey, neither did I). As I boarded the flight early to safely avoid the serial late boarder, I got a call from him asking my seat number. And then he grinned at me upon boarding and said he had convinced his neighbour to exchange seats with me. There were several lame excuses running through my mind at that time, I picked up the one that said ‘But I want to see the himalayas through this window”. I could have said “Imma doze off in 5″ but somehow I thought that would be ruder. Now, I don’t know. Doesn’t ‘want to see himalayas’ seem more honest? Whatever.
This just bought me an hour of peace, which was destroyed from the moment we landed and collected our luggage. The 4 hours of car drive to our destination were the most painstaking 4 hours I have ever spent with someone. It started with why I am quitting and went on to stories about his personal life. How his wife doesn’t trust him with women and how he would have been happier had he been married to the woman he loved. “Neither of us know why we broke up”. And I thought “That’s what you think”. I’m not elaborating on the one-sided team bitching I was subjected to, because a compulsive bitch has no loyalties to anyone, so in the end none of it made any sense. My single point program was to get an early release so that I could take some time off at home before moving my lazy base.
My moment of glory arrived 2 days back when I bid the final adieu. I join back the grind in two weeks, which now feels like too short a time for worklessness.
My undying addiction for food and travel shows does not necessarily imply my appreciation for all of them. Two things that put me off are impractical suggestions and fake reactions. For example, you obviously cannot use huge slabs of butter in your everyday cooking. Neither do you deep fry vegetable fritters in clarified butter. Nor would you ever have the heart to load your pasta with equal amounts of cheese. We know it would taste great but we would never dare to use those beastly quantities of heart-blockers.
Talking of reactions that are mostly over-the-top, I totally understand if Ms Lawson swoons over her cheesecake with extra dollops of creamcheese. What I do not understand is how can she make the same sounds digging into semi-boiled chunks of almost raw fish in a badly cooked thai curry with such elan.
Worst of all, I have started noticing our desi anchors taking on from them. I want to tell them dudes, honestly, my mom can steam a better hilsa than your overspiced shit and no, we don’t take improvisation very well when you are repeating the word ‘authentic’ at least 10 times in your show. Also, please don’t try to pass off a samosa as an exotic indian snack by making orgasmic sounds. The whole world knows a samosa so cut the overacting.
A few weeks back I was in an Orissa restaurant, trying out supposedly authentic Oriya fare. The prawns weren’t even shelled and I thought to myself ‘Mmmmm….delectable succulent prawns with hard shells, with tiny chewy legs, and look! When I pull apart the head, the dirty vein is still intact! Let me pour it on my rice to allow it to soak in all the goodness blah..’
I have this habit of seeing life as chapters. As I see it, every event marks the end of a chapter and/or the beginning of a new one. There may be no truth in this theory but it just helps me detach after I close a chapter and look forward to the next. It does get confusing at times though. For example sometimes when I meet people whom I do not necessarily hate and I do not see too often, I am not sure if it is the end or a beginning. There are these faces who pop out of nowhere after long periods of silence and you are unsure of their purpose in your life.
There is a period in everyone’s life when one is naive enough to believe in ’signs’ and then frantically look for them everywhere. So then these lollypops come up and you have a great time and think ‘yay I got the sign, I got the sign! so this is it, this is my destiny’, and then after some days the boat starts rocking and/or there is another lolly and you face a diversion on the road you thought would lead you to your destination. Naive that we are, we again believe this is the ‘right’ sign and that we are now on track but more often than not, history repeats itself. Which is what leaves me wondering if life itself plays carrot and stick, why blame our bosses alone? Also reminds me, two months to appraisal. Need to look out. That’s habit #2.
It has been a while since I have written about my gustatory adventures, partly because I feel guilty to be pigging out all alone on most of my trips. Alone, sometimes by default, at other times by choice. It is better to have no company at all than have the non-adventurous kinds looking for fish-rice in all terrains. Coming to fish-rice, I abhor eating out with my boss, a non-bong who loves bong food and expects me to hunt down bengali food joints for him. Except for Mondays, Mondays we hunt down Shiv temples and he eats veg food. Moving on from boss, and coming to food in Shillong.
I happened to visit the Autumn Fest last month, held near the Umiam Lake, complete with wine stalls and tribal food stalls and a barbecue counter, in addition to fashion shows and live rock shows. I had left my fish-rice eating colleague behind and come out alone for the fest, slightly apprehensive if it was a good idea taking the 2 hour ride alone. Apprehensions were quickly put to rest as I reached the lake to find throngs of people, not rowdy metalheads but people with families. As far as the wine tasting goes, I could not muster enough muscle power to push my way to the counters. The Khasis certainly take their drink very seriously. Defeated, I sniffed my way to the barbecue counter and ordered for spare ribs, which was served with toasted bread roll and salsa. I noticed the Mizo stall and dared to try the Mizo black pudding (kind of blood sausage) just for the heck of it. Diced maroonish coins served with chopped onions and green chillies, kinda tasted like bone marrow. And I got some Putharo with Dojiem or something, basically meant rice cakes with chopped and fried spicy pork liver. Eventually I felt guilty of ignoring the cultural side of the fest, so I hung around to click some pictures at the fashion shows, there was one for kids, another one for traditional khasi fashion and then one with clothes made from eco-friendly fabric. I was there for about an hour, guess that was a lot of eating I did in an hour’s time.
Back in Shillong, I got tired of making my own coffee in the guest house (the caretaker apparently fled few months back). So I discovered this place called Bread Cafe at Police Bazar, the city’s shopping hub. The ten minute walk in the sun for my black coffee and eclair soon became a pleasurable routine activity. I often carried a book to my favorite table next to the window, and sometimes ordered a hot dog as brunch.
One morning I reached bread cafe too early, they had not opened yet and I was hungry. I walked into the cosy chinese eatery I had noticed bang opposite the cafe, Wong Garden. At 9:30 in the morning, they served me a main course meal of pork with bamboo shoots and vegetables with rice. Simple yet extremely flavourful.
It will take me a while to explore the rest of the food there, but my work demands more frequent trips there so that might just be possible. I also have two new recruits under me for this project, and they have a palate no less adventurous than mine. More on them in the next post.
Wonder what it feels like
when the cold muzzle touches the brow
to listen to one’s own breath
a heavy count backwards
an end to a long fight
wonder what goes on inside
All that mess
behind eyes shut tight
Perhaps circles of light
With faces inside
Scenes from the past
washed away into oblivion
Everything that remains
Muted by one final blast
Some peace at last
So when night falls
And the beast is out
On the prowl
Lethal red eyes
Silver fangs and all
On his hunt not to prey
But to endure his time
among these surly beings
and things, not one he owns
nor wishes to own
All he seeks is a dream
of stirring from this night
into a bright new dawn
into a world of tranquil
Where sins are sins
mistakes, mistakes
where no questions asked
no answers sought nor given
Where mirrors don’t blur
And glass is not opaque
Where a lie is not the truth
And truth is not a tale
Where you get what you see
And see what you get
Beyond doubt,
I hallucinate for a living
Dream-borne
I soar
Amidst pink clouds
Soft tender fluffy
Shines the early morning sun
On me and me alone
I float on and along with the winds
My day breezes through
Without much a do
And then night falls
and clouds dissapear
Only distant stars in the clear sky
And the cold moon shine
On the hostile planet
Creatures howling by
In the wilderness of the streets
Through creepy crawly alleys
And green slime-strewn walls
I venture out in the darkness
Eyes, fangs, claws,
Shining of my own light,
the best of me only brought out
by the strangest night..
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